BaoBou

Het is nog steeds een zooitje :D

Geintje (heb ik misschien wel es verteld): het Griekse woord "zooi" is "leven". Dus als zij zeggen "that's life", dan zeggen wij "what a mess" ;)
In dit geval zeg ik... ayto einai h zoi. Zo gaat het nou eenmaal met sommige tracks ;)

You're too nice ;)
Love your new track, it's very sweet!

Thank you so much! I't a track that frustrates me and it might even go to hidden for a while until I find time to fix it... but still thanks, the nice words help :)

Ok, my voice is clearly not at that level, but there's a lot of emotion in the song and I'm glad that comes through. Thank you so much again :)

Thank you so much, that's very appreciated :) Your comments made my day!

Thanks a lot CbC, I had already thought about abandoning this one but I think it's going in the right direction now :)

Thanks a lot Phil, that's a great compliment!

Thanks a lot CBC! Mixing/mastering is still the thing that excites me least so it's great to hear it worked out in this case :)

Dank je wel! Ik begon in dit geval met te drummen, terwijl ik zat te drummen voelde ik de accoorden, toen ik de accoorden speelde wist ik de melodie en toen ik de melodie zong kwamen de woorden ook heel natuurlijk... soms komt het allemaal wat makkelijker dan andere keren ;)

Thank you so much!!
Great to hear your mom is ok, especially at that age. My mom is 81, so I feel you (brain is still fast, her legs not so much anymore ;)
Donald Fagen is a great name to be compared to. I'm happy :)

Thank you so much Angie, your words always stimulate me to go on and go further! :)

Paul Simon!! Yes that's absolutely it and that's also an amazing compliment because that's probably one of the most amazing poets of the previous century.

Setup: well, I moved from a cramped apartment with no real space (via some (mis)adventures) to a place where I can have a study - which is also my man cave and has the space to really set up all my instruments in a more or less permanent setting, so I can start drumming, playing guitar or keys, or singing at just about any time (barring company time of course) ;)

It's amazing and liberating and just about perfect!

Haha it made me really happy that the story hit home with you until I realised it's your ex-wife :D

I always try to write lyrics in such a way that many people will recognise something... I guess that worked here :)

Thanks for listening and commenting!!

Thank you!

Thanks man! Yeah some tracks take weeks to gel and others just flow naturally and write themselves.

This one when I started with the drum beat, I could already hear the chords and when I played the chords I already started singing.

If only creating was always this easy... :D

Thank you Paul! (hug)

Thanks man :)

Thank you so much! Here's the full album btw:
https://baobousmusic.hearnow.com/step-by-step

Thanks a lot!

I like having lyrics that are not fully specific where pretty much evryone probably recognises a bit of the feeling, even if you haven't been in the exact situation. I hope that applies here too, my new track is a bit more specific... but I think it's still a feeling people can recognise :)

Thanks a lot Paul! Yeah totally looking forward to hear what Mark can do with it :)

Great, thank you CCC!

That's lovely, thank you very much, especially coming from someone who I know is much better at that kind of stuff than I am :)

No, thank YOU :)

I usually don't concentrate very much on the mixing mastering as you know; I try to come to some balance where the vocals can be heard well and no individual instrument pops out unless they have the lead.

Then what I did was (all this in Ableton Live):
- the drums right now are midi (I used to have a practice room with actual real live drums but unfortunately I moved away so I don't have that right now). I use a drum buss for that; I played around a bit with teh settings to give it a bit of punch, but not too much, plus a bit of reverb on the kick and delay on the hats.
- a high pass filter on the bass and guitar (obviously more low on the bass)
- I also tried to shape the mids a bit to give space for the vocals, but as Manuela indicated, not enough
- then the keys again I think a low pass filter
- I added a "sustain" return for the keys
- for the vocals I went lazy and used Ozone Nectar
- finally for the master I used iZotope 10, both this and Nectar with the automatic functions. I find it's generally not worse than what I would do and I find mastering extremely tedious and frustrating :D
Yeah, I'll send you the stems, no worries! I'm in the middle of a house move, so hopefully somewhere next week, is that ok?

Thanks a lot!! That's great to hear :)
You can find the final mastered one btw on Spotify and iTunes etc, if you want:
https://baobousmusic.hearnow.com/step-by-step

Thank you so much for listening and your generous comment! :)