[DnB Dub Fusion] Ghost Town (The Specials) - Gadje Scum remake

G

gymnor

Member
Joined
Feb 21, 2014
Hey all,

First track I mixed and mastered for our band Gadje Scum. We combine beats with live horns, guitar, vocals and effects. The Ep we've done last year is mixed and mastered by a pro sound engineer, but well, can't pay him for every track...

I'm learning (being busy for a year now), so all tips and criticism are greatly appreciated. I'm not convinced by the final result, but I ran out of ideas on how I could improve on the work.

This track is a remake (not remix) from the classic song Ghost Town by the Specials. Horns, voice, guitar and effects are recorded live, as we play them live on stage as well. It's not intended to be pure DnB, so keep in mind we're not looking for a pure DnB sound either.

Thanks for the feedback!

https://soundcloud.com/https%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fgadjescum%2Fghost-town-the-specials-gadje

PS: comments are set on private.
 
Last edited:
Work on your drums at the start. I find it hard so i cant give advice but a snare and a clap can create interesting snares, even if the snare on its own sounds odd it can go nicely with a clap
 
The vocals are real nice quality, as with the sax and stuff. Just work on that beat, try layering lots of different snares, then cutting frequencies and adjusting volumes! Might get something cool
 
Last edited:
Thank you both for the feedback and the tips, much appreciated. I know drums is my weak point for the moment. If I understand you guys right, the problem is especially the snare not cutting through enough? Or is it the complete drums failing?
 
complete failure imo.

sound waay too thin, snare sounds like its copied out of a sample pack directly with no processing whatsoever, and they just seem out of the project, so to say.

try to reference it with the original, original is awesome (and if you dont know it, google sadhus remix).
 
groelle said:
complete failure imo.

sound waay too thin, snare sounds like its copied out of a sample pack directly with no processing whatsoever, and they just seem out of the project, so to say.

try to reference it with the original, original is awesome (and if you dont know it, google sadhus remix).
Click to expand...
"complete failure", "way too thin" "sound like it's copied" and "try reference with the original". If you have any actual tip to improve my sound, I'd love to hear it.

For the record, this is two snares layered, EQ'd to cut out the low freqs to make room for the kick, cut out around 2 kHz to make room for other sounds, boosted the air band with a shelf filter, added a gated reverb on it (to not lose the attack), compressed a little (1/4 ratio, attack around 10ms, automatic release) in an attempt to beef up the thing and played a bit with distortion and saturation without any success.

So yes, it's processed, albeit without much succes.
 
Last edited:
didnt want to come across like an unhelpful prick, but its all in here.

try to layer it up with sounds from old breakbeats, theyre used for a reason.

or easymode, take your drums, export them, double them up and limit. this way you have really loud, overcompressed (maybe not so much cause your drums seem not to be compressed that much) drums you can layer underneath the drums you have now.

kinda ny style but with a different approach.

sometimes only doubling them up and running them through a brickwall alone brings them up quite a bit and adds to the overall loudness of the tune aswell..

its always kinda hard to argue on such things via words, cause whatever im hearing, youre not. and vice versa.

and with complete failure i just answered your question, didnt mean to be rude. skip through the various drum programming threads if you need further help and try those different approaches.

good luck
 
Thx, that's a nice set of tricks I'm going to try out now. Take my words back, you did learn me something. Very appreciated.
 
another thing that came to my mind in the last few minutes, a thing i use to check if my drums are on par.

listen to them on reaaaally, and i mean REALLY low volume, preferably through headphones. often you hear more flaws that way!

and never forget that you get what you put in, and drum programming is arguably the hardest thing to do in electronic music production.. practise practise practise, as bad as it is :/
 
Back
Top Bottom