jay pace - plastic teeth

[Jay Pace]

allo peeps

Lost my ability to sidechain which I'm missing (damn you useless buggy tc native works) and the mix needs more balance... needs more work basically but I'd love some input.

Trying to do something a bit different structurally and use different style/sound combos. Ended up with a minimally detroity jungly thing, which I quite like... Feedback welcomed

ta muchly

http://blackboxtechno.co.uk/plastic teeth.mp3

[Siege]

Very diffrent from you Jay...i like it, nice chilled vibe with the synths works well with the old skool breaks....only on pc tin pans but sounds pretty good this end.

[xfive]

Cool laid back tune mate. Kinda breaky housey thing going on.
Definitely give the bass some boost when you're mixing it down again :cheese:

[Little_Fella!]

Nice and thoughtful dreamy track that is punctuated with military percussion, which I really like n reminds of the good old house days, to accentuate your chapters...

Have saved it to listen at home...:cool:

[Loop]

Nice track, def. not formulaic.
Would love 320 kbps copy?
Just needs a strip down for a few bars of just the breaks and the drums please!

[loopdon]

Delightful. Top stuff.

[BloodStar]

nicely chilled track. cool sounds, smoothly progressing.
as for production it is ok, but personally i would like it to be bit more thumping,. even it is nicely relaxed and easy listening, some sounds could be bit stronger imo,. deffinitely needs more bass,as was said, i think kick could go with bit more punch aswel. looking forward to next version.

[dirty_bass]

Yeah this is different, it`s good to spread your wings.

Overall the mix feels a little wimpish and flat. Everything seems to be mixed to almost the same level, and the majority of sounds seem to live within a restricted bandwidth.
When the synth at 3:45 comes it, it`s as if it comes from "outside" the mix. It doesn`t fit in with the spacial shape you have made, and sounds larger than everything else.

I think the best way to address this is to spread the sounds out more widely in the frequency spectrum, and also maybe use some transient shapers and compression to add some livelyness to some of the sounds.

Overall I think the mix could sound more open and airy.

[Jay Pace]

Thanks for all your comments.

Done loads of work on the mix since first posted it up. Will share once it gets a bit nearer completion.

[Jay Pace]

New mix done, sounding better I reckon.

Still work to be done, but much nearer completion.

Updated linky here:

plastic teeth (http://blackboxtechno.co.uk/plastic teeth.mp3)

:)

[Jay Pace]

Uploaded the final update for anyone interested.
Done a quick master for it, sounding pretty good now. Same link as before.

[eyeswithoutaface]

not my fave track of yours i have to be honest mate, i dont think some of the elements fit together that well at all, with the break being my main gripe. Just doesnt seem to sit well or compliment the other elements, which certainly suit the latter half of the track more so, by that i mean when the 4/4 kick eventually kicks in, which i thought was farrrrr too late, i lost alot of interest waiting so long for it to come in when the track doesnt exactly build up in a really frenetic way to justify the wait if you get me?

production is ok, could do with alot more stereo width though i thought mate everything sits around the same area in that aspect. I personally would EQ all the main elements alot more to help them sit in the mix better and spread them out more too, maybe some more verb and chorus to help things along

i'd also look into automation more too to give some elements more dynamics as some of the sounds that just repeat did repeat just a little too much for my tastes

[Jay Pace]

Cheers for listening Scott.
The break is going to be a taste thing. For me it just reminds me of bukem stuff, with a bit of rave thrown in for good measure.

Fair comment on repetition, will do some work on that.

There's a fair bit of stereo width to nearly all the sounds there, and there are a lot of verbs at work so I'm not quite sure what you mean on those two points. The mix & eq I'm struggling to improve on because after a point I can't get past the room I work in, so its just an attempt to triangulate between headphones, dj setup and studio setup. I thought I'd got it ok....
Have you downloaded the latest version mate?

[eyeswithoutaface]

well no offence but just because there's been some stereo width work and their are reverbs being used doesnt partticulary mean they are being used well or correctly, this goes for any track not yours in particular. Even with verbs being obviously used here, i wouldnt say they've been applied in the correct sense as to help the mix how it should. In this case on stereo width, i like to hear certain elements coming in with obvious panning.

Things sound a little dry and boxy to me still in some places, and i personally like really wet mixes in the sense of their being alot of apparent depth to each sound, alot more of a balanced mix overall.

Re EQ and the mix, i wouldnt worry about the room your in too much, there doesnt appear to be any problems with the mix in the sense of phasing or bass reflection, if the room was problematic enough to be worried about you'd notice it alot more and if it was really that bad i would actually stop producing stuff in their until i could sort it out. If i were you id concentrate on trusting your monitors alot more, if it sounds good on them then i wouldnt worry about touching up the mix for djing or whatever, i've always just trusted my monitors first and foremost and i actually dont check my stuff on anything else to be honest, and if ive ever missed a problem with a track ive always trusted someone to tell me about it

the breaks thing is a taste thing yeah, but dont get me wrong, i love old skool breaks and breakbeats, i just didnt particulary think it worked here, i've lost count of the times ive seen Bukem or listened to his records and i have to say it didnt really remind me of him, but then again, not much does

it was the latest version by the way mate yeah

sorry if it's not what you wanted to hear but i only comment on tracks i feel i need to in here as alot of people get easily offended in here when people comment on their stuff, with the lovely irony of it being a production critique forum emminently lost, but i know your a sound lad who takes stuff on board

[Jay Pace]

Cheers for taking time to reply mate, and no worries - no bruised egos here. I queried because I respect your opinion and I wasn't sure where you were coming from...

Good advice man. Listened to landstrumm's album on the way home, and there's a few tracks there with very similar compositional elements which I can use for reference. Soon as I listened to it I kind of got what you were saying about the mix balance and the stereo space.

Its never about hearing what I want to hear, more understanding what I can do to fix things. Whilst its always great to get positive feedback, its much more helpful to get constructive feedback on how to makes things better. I've done a few updates on this track, and the early ones were pretty shoddy, just wanted to make sure you were talkin about the latest one :)

tanks again bud, and to everyone else who commented.

[eyeswithoutaface]

no worries man, it's always good to hear your music, was just trying to articulate what i meant in direct yet non offensive manner as there have been more than a few dummies spat out in this forum over the years because people cant get over their own views on their music

thats why this place has the potential to be really good again, it used to be THE place for putting tracks up for good honest technical feedback, which is what people need to learn to differentiate between (the other side being their own view on their own work of course)

your definately on the right track man, just probably at that stage were maybe you learn to realise that not every track you do is going to be either good or a great piece of production, but merely serves as a platform for more learning and helps to take things to that next level. God knows i still get this all the time, and i wouldnt like to not have that experience, as it just serves to push me on more and makes me realise that ive got alot to learn still, and probably always will, which is how i like it :)