I may be opening myself up to some serious ridicule here....

yoinks! Company wont let me do it.

 

I think it sounds great! Are you going to sing something to it or will it remain an instrumental piece?

It reminds me of something, but I cannot say for sure what it is. Maybe a touch of some old Dire Straits tunes mixed with some Santana bits.

 

Not bad. Has a middle eastern type feel to it.

As far as the mix, the acoustic guitar is a little too up front. You should bring the lead up a little more to balance the sound.

Is that a synthesizer your using for the strings? That sounds great.

There is no substitute for practicing. Keep at it and soon you will be able to play those sounds you hear in your head.

 

I started out recording through Headphones, lol, before I ever had a mic.

What did you record this on?

 

The viola is very cool. Just a tip on recording it, the best way to do it is to record it from behind. Putting the mic in the front really accentuates the harshness of the bow on the strings, but, if you point it directly at the back of the instrument, you get all the warmth of the wood. I play with a violinist and have recorded her numerous times that way.

I agree with Bob. The mix could be a little more balanced. The viola is probably ok where it is but the acoustic could go back in the mix some and the lead could come up.

Also, you might consider a different sound for the acoustic. Not sure how you are mic'ing it but a better approach might be to put the mic off-axis and just a bit behind the bridge pointing toward the sound hole. Right now, there is too much of the strings in there and too little of the body of the instrument making it a little harsh. This is accentuated by the fact that the lead guitar has that warm, fuzzy neck pickup sound making it sound a little dull and the acoustic a little too brittle.

If you still want the sharpness of the strings, just record the exact same thing twice. Mic as I suggested once and then record it again with the mic closer to the actual sound hole. Then, pan them like 10 o'clock and 2 o'clock and you'll have a nice stereo acoustic sound. You will also be able to turn the volume level down and the sonic spectrum of the instrument will still come through really well.

Good job overall.

 

LMAO, you're not the first to ask that question. All I had was a cheap cassette recorder, so I just plugged my headphones into the mic jack and played. Once I had that recorded I put that tape in my stereo (very cheap one), placed the speakers next to the headphones, pushed play on the stereo and record on the cassette recorder and added a second guitar.

Very crude, but it was the best I could come up with way back then.

 

For recording, I would NOT use a pickup. You can get a decent condenser mic for arround $100 used. Do a little reading - pick up the latest copy of Recording Magazine ALL about recording guitars. For live, you'll need a pickup, but better to mic it recording.

 

IMHO - wow... sounds good. love the viola and the solo guitar work is a little reminescent of something Pink Floyd-ish...

very nice. please post more after you record more.

 

I have a little crappy Oktava M219 that I bought as my first condenser when it cost $200. You can now pick them up new for ~$100. It's really not that versitile, but it does one thing really well - it makes way-too-bright acoustic guitars sound good in a flat sort of way (ie the way you usually hear on early 70's rock recordings, not a super-detailed classical music recording way.)

For having been recorded on a computer mic, the quality of your recording is tremendous. You should be really proud of it. Something to consider for the future regarding the guiar, you might try positioning the mic a bit off center to eliminate a bit of the jangle of string sounds that you seem to be getting. (In otherwords, instead of pointing the mic at the soundhole where you pick up alot of the pick/string vibrations, point it behind the bridge or where the neck and body join.) I think that would help push the guitar back in the mix. Did you record the electric guitar direct into your sound card?

 

Sweet. I now know where to go for a good strings guy! What an amaizing group we have here at cc.net