Jay Pace - Enemy Crab

[Jay Pace]

allo allo allo

Been working on this for what seems like ages. Little snatches of free time here and there....

Proving to be a bugger to mix, and I'm not even going to bother try mastering it.

Would love some feedback, comments, suggestions etc

Cheers peeps!

www.blackboxtechno.co.uk/enemy crab.mp3

:cheese:

[BRADLEE]

Jay, they have cream and some shampoos you can get for that.

Just kididng man, dl'ing it now for a listen. :cheese:

[rhythmtech]

interesting as always mr pace..

im loving the big synth that swells into the track.. absolutly beautiful.. reminds me of early hardfloor for some reason (into the nature)

i would shorten the decy on the closed hats (or maybe automate the decay to compliment the rise in the track). i think this would give an over all tighter sound. the bass could do with a little more something too.. sounds a touch hollow on the really low end.

beautifully written song. the melody is superb. just leave it a few days and get the mix nice and tight.

top work.

[Tyrisia]

the mix sounds good, everythings nice and clear, it's nice stuff.

I don't like some of the percussion sounds though, the main snare and the cymbal that comes in on the down beat, they don't sound electronic enough for me. Also I can see what you're doin with the drone, but I'd want it to be doin more musically, rather than just a single note filtered. I can see what you're tryin to achieve though and those are just my presonal preferences.

[rhythmtech]

. Also I can see what you're doin with the drone, but I'd want it to be doin more musically, rather than just a single note filtered. .

was thinking about this..

that drone swells in beautifully but it would be immense if it was sidechained when the kick came back in

[BRADLEE]

well, not really at all within my range of style, but you always make really clean sounding stuff Jay. To me, all sounds very well balanced in my ears. You really do nice stuff man. It's just a little out of my realm to give you much criticism.

Keep going with it amigo.

[Tyrisia]

was thinking about this..

that drone swells in beautifully but it would be immense if it was sidechained when the kick came back in

wasn't actually thinkin quite that, but it'd be good to have it pulsing a bit. But imagine if it just swelled for ages then played an almighty two bar melody, then went back to a drone, and then played another melody etc. It's got loadsa potential to add real character to the tune.

[Siege]

Like this Jay...
Thought ud gone for a breaks trk at first....didnt expect the 4-4 kick to make an appearence after the break..nice surprise!
That sustained synth line is an excellent example of how something so simple can be so effective...its what makes the tune.
Thats the first thing people would hear in a club,that they could identify the trk by..."its that tune!!"
I like the sound of the synth too...nothing flashy...quite basic raw sound.
Id add a few more elements...a 1 note tone or pad hit to compliment the synth line used in a random sorta abstract way..sparingly and maybe have the hit discordant too.

Thats me anyway...i think uve gone for the stripped down approach purposley,and id say it works...
Thought the kick needed some nose in the break section at the begining but sorta balanced out more when it went 44?....im on phones so cant really comment accuratley regarding production but i reckon that simple synth line would work a treat in a club.
I can see this getting played of hawtin like ur other if u get it signed when finished.
Good stuff!

Phew..this is the longest post ive ever done.....sweet narcotics.

[Jay Pace]

thanks loads guys, great feedback & comments

Bass def. needs work, as do the crash cymbals. Still working on tidying bits up with the mix and the EQ's. Computer is horribly taxed CPU & RAM wise, making it a bitch to work with, as the track keeps freezing on me or glitching. Need a new pc...

The main synth has some sidechain compression it, but I wanted to avoid it pumping too noticeably when the kick comes back. Might have been a bit conservative though, will have an experiment about with that.

I'm probably not going to alter the main synth drone sound - I want that to surge and swell throughout and form the basis of the track. Think you got that spot on Siege... and end of the day I'm a simple creature and like simple ideas.

Might look at another random pad/harmonic sound though, Tyrisia I know what you mean in terms of the potential, but I want to try make this work with as few elements as possible. I'll see what another sound adds to the mix.

Cheers peeps

:)

[Little_Fella!]

This track has alot of identity as it is...

I think if you made it pump it would lose that identity a bit...

Great this... a very interesting approach which certainly is indicative of the style that has become noticably yours...

You do seem to come up with what I'd call 'thinking man's techno' with jackin' elements, if ya don't mind me sayin'...

(Won't comment on production as your way ahead of my humble capabilities)

[BloodStar]

interesting tune. production and everything sounds nice. i am not too much into some percs you have got there, but thats my tastes. also that drone sounds cry out for some more development, some little melodic snippets here and there would be nice.. other than that, it is nice track..

[AcidTrash]

your style is completely lost on me jay. Takes its time getting somewhere. Quite like it when it gets there.

[stjohn]

nice track... I understand where Acidtrash is coming from.. but i think its a style thing.

but in saying that i think you really have to work hard with the existing sounds to make the most of them, which would kinda make up for loads of edits/sounds.

trying to think what you could do with whats there......

-maybe a bit funk in those cymbols.. swing or moving them to the offbeat or something.
-the synth that comes in.. seems a tad weak.. you could maybe layer it with a complimentary synth... and really make it huge, it could then be really euphoric, which i think might be the soudn ur going for.
-when it lands back around 5.25 maybe the introduction of another sound/groove might carry the progression a bit better.

its nearly there tho man, nice work, and im feeling the overall groove. i think its really about capitalising on whats there.

look forward to any update :;

[Jay Pace]

Cheers for feedback peeps, all very constructive and useful.

Been a bit lazy with percussion patterns, fair point. Wanted simple loops and the progression to come from the filtering and effects layered onto them, but I could definitely have more pattern changes and development.

Tried playing around with harmonic elements without much success. Kinda like it as it is... harmonic elements change the feel of the track in a way I don't like. Maybe just haven't found the right way of doing it though.

Rory - does the synth really sound weak to you? Its sounds massive on everything i've played it on, and my mackie's rarely lie... bit worried if it sounds weak, its as brassy as I can really get away with and its been a ****er to mix as it is...

ta' muchly for listening

[stjohn]

sorry 'weak' was the wrong choice of words! it is quite big!!! and a nice warm sound to it too..
maybe .. 'static' might describe it better

im not sure :ohdear:

but do u know what im gettin at.?

[Jay Pace]

cool... had me worried there on the weakness.

Yeah, the drone doesn't really do anything other than swell and surge, and it does that fairly subtly. But I kinda want to keep it that way. Bit more organic and engineered properly I can see it tearing its way through a PA as just a giant wall of sound growing and receding. That was the plan anyway.

I think I probably need to make the supporting elements work harder to allow the main drone to do so little without losing people's attention. Trouble is I'm not going to be able to see how well this works until I play it out, and not got any bookings for a while...grrr.

[Craig_Lea]

Hey Jay, listened to this a couple of times today.

It's really well put together, but for me it doesn't develop enough.

That synth line builds up to getting super fat and then the kick comes in at 3 mins, then it drops away, only to rebuild to the same at around 5 mins.
As others have mentioned, that drone sounds real nice, but it needs to do something else.
When I first heard it, I was expecting it to shift in pitch, get chopped up around the beats and really get messed about with.

Also, with the bouncing panning noises you've got at the start;
I was expecting them to resurface, and somehow get wrapped around that big noise you've got going on.
And it is a big noise, it would be a shame to waste it :)

[p_brane]

its a quirky little number this one.

sounding good jay

i'd agree with you, if ya want to keep the synth as it is work a little more on the percussion to keep it interesting, not that its boring or anything, i'm sure you know what i mean.

[dirty_bass]

Finally got round to listening to this (Sorry mate).
Bit of a departure this one.
Once it gets going I like the overall feel of this, it gives a feeling of serenity in wide open spaces.

anyway, I`ll try to stay out of issues of asthetics, and look at the production.

Again you are going for this very minimal (but not mnml), very electronic (old skool) sound, which is definitely your thing.
For this sound, due to the nature of this kind of stuff generally being made on classic kit, you really need to go for getting your sounds wide, wet, and very warm.

I find the overal feel to this just a little too boxed in, dry, and digital.

The first sound that comes in, the wierd filtered wobbly one with the delay could do with some nice subtle but quality verb to give it more presence.

I`d say you could give some nice sharp nose to the kick by boosting some top end around 3500-4500 just to give it a touch more clarity as it is a little dull.

then that main synth pad. Again this is very digital sounding and a little too thin and abbrasive I think. Personally I would use a different vst. Something very phat and classic sounding (Superwave pro would be great for this), would be better as it gives a really nice analog movement and width to it`s sound.
Anyway, I think you might have cut too much off the bottom of this pad as I think it should be sounding richer. Some verb, stereo spread (maybe chorus) and a very subtle, but wide flange, would add nice movement to this.

The bass it pretty much spot on.

The top end dissapears once that synth really moves in, to a little more separation would be good here. Also I think the hats could be brighter, and again some subtle verb would do wonders.

I think a good way to think is to look at your tune as being played in the same area or space (say a club, or a kitchen) and therefore everything needs to have a slight taste of this space within it`s sound, to give coherence to the mix and to gel it all together.
It`s your decision to decide where in this space the listener sits, and where in the space each sound is, but it`s a good way of thinking that will allow you to colour your overall sound on each tune in a way that adds more unification to the sound (although some of this process does happening at the mastering stage).


I like this though (anal criticisms asside). The exceedingly slow build and very slow overall change within this tune, is very stoned in a field at summer time, but it works, and is something, when finished right, that would really sound nice on a wopper of a soundsystem.
Trippy, chill out electronica, which I always have some ear time for.

[Jay Pace]

Cheers Steve, great feedback

The main synth pad is completely analog. Its a 3 oscillator patch from a mono anolog synth (waldorf pulse) routed through an analogue filter (sherman filterbank).

The recorded audio then goes through a digital chain of EQ, sidechain compression and then some verb, so I've more thank likely cut too much of the sound away with EQ and given it an artificial sound it shouldn't really have. I was a bit brutal with the EQ to try and fit the main pad into the mix, as left alone it drowns out pretty much everything. Verb, spread and chorus sound like a good idea.

I like the "taste of space" analogy. Probably been a bit too brutal with EQ seperation for each sound and it more than likely makes everything sound cold and thin. Nearly all the sound I use are analog, but all the mixing and processing are digital.

Got some really good constructive comments from everyone to work with.
Thanks loads to all.