BTS.music: Sweet Touch

PODcast: Sweet Touch
Benevolent Heretic and TrueAmerican team up on a sultry, rockin blues number. BH uploaded her beautiful solo vocal recently, and it so inspired me, I took it into the studio and well

I love it. BH's lyrics and vocal, with TA playing all instruments, arranging, recording, mix, and production. Her incredible finale in the tune prompted me to rename it to "Sweet Touch" and really hope BH doesn't mind

length: 04:19
file: btsmpod_914.mp3
size: 4054k
feed: btsm
status: live (at time of posting)

This is really great, TrueAmerican and Benevelent Heretic. I really like this tune, it's awesome. Really like what's been done with it.

DH says "Holy Freaking Cow"! and I must agree. Excellent job TA! Some very rockin' blues there. I love it!

And yes, the rename is very appropriate. I don't mind at all.

What can I say? Thank you so much!

Great work TrueAmerican.

Gotta love those rockin blues. And many thanks Benevolent Heretic.

Thanks parrhesia, BH, and Soficrow! I had lotsa fun working on it as it came together. I've played a bit of lounge lizard blues before, but in this one I wanted to play around more and rock it up. The hardest part was the ending.

BH, you dropped the key which was a smart thing to do on your part, so you could start out lower and end higher! And true to form, the new variety in your vocal I think gives a more convincing performance. Great job to you, too BH!

[edit on 16-11-2005 by TrueAmerican]

Wow, this is incredible!!!

So much talent wow!!!

I cant wait for more , more, more!!!

Thanks parr, sofi and dgtempe.

Yeah, TA, I just dropped it from B to A so I could take your great advice on the last verse. That really worked, by the way.

I loved how you showcased the vocals in a couple of key spots. I also loved the ending. The meandering feel of the instruments... It felt like they were following and honoring the vocals. Just very cool!

Anything you want in the way of vocals, just let me know... Maybe I could do a duet with you or your Hail Jah friend...

OMG Benevolent Heretic.................

What a fantastic voice you have!!!

I have just listened to your singing for the first time and I was absolutely blown away!!!!

More!

Please!!!

I just recenty picked these up on Ebay, and had to work on them a bit, but wow, now I am in love with this set of drums, and I love how they sounded on Sweet Touch!

This new blues tune gave me a great opportunity to record them for the first time! Here is the set exactly as it was recorded for Sweet Touch.



It's kind of a pain to be the player and the engineer at once, but at the right of the drums is a computer keyboard, which I have wired all the way to the main control room so I can control the main system on my own for cases like this where I want to cut live drums, but have no one to help. It takes a lot of going back and forth and a lot of test recordings to iron out the sounds and get all the levels right. But I can say that entire drum part went down at once, from start to finish, with no edits, and got it on 3rd take. Three's a charm?

Also, BH, you said DH in your first post, who is that? And yeah, I got you in mind if anything else comes up we could use a great singer on!

Also, thanks dgtempe, glad you liked it!

DH is Internet board shorthand for Dear Husband.

Nice drums. I envy anyone who plays drums. I could never do it! They do sound great!

OOOOW. Ludwigs. Tres kewl.

Bet you're a happy boy TA.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
DH is Internet board shorthand for Dear Husband.

Nice drums. I envy anyone who plays drums. I could never do it! They do sound great!

OH! wow, ok so the person that it was written about now has heard it...awesome! I was thinking that, but wasn't sure BH! Kewl!

And yep Sofi, I love em, they're awesome!

Yeah, he got home at 2 AM this morning.

He had heard the other versions because I sent him the links, but we heard this one together for the first time.

Awww... :blush:

Too much information?

Well, at least you won't have to cry yourself to sleep for a while BH.

Also, this is the crappy 128kps version, but you should hear the mastered original wave file! (44 meg) The additional clarity is wonderful. If you want it BH, let me know how I can get it to ya. And just so ya know, a production like this usually runs about $ 1,000 out of my studio. Consider it donated for the enjoyment of all ATS members!

I just played the song for my family, they love it!

Its not all conspiracies here! Its a lot of talent!!!

THAT was awesome. TA and Sis, you guys got it going on. Hell, I had to go get a beer to get the mood thing going, turned down the lights and lit a cigarette.

THAT was awesome.

Love and light,

Wupy

OMG that was really good. TA you said $1k for that? Wow it sounded better than that. All three of you are very talented!

Thanks once again dg, mrwupy, and Imperium! So glad you are enjoying it! And Imperium, there were only two people involved, BH and myself, but thanks for the compliments.

As with any new musical creation for me, ats member feedback makes it all worthwhile! And just some notes for those that weren't aware:

BH uploaded a solo vocal of the tune, where she said it was done at 80 bpm. Lol, I don't know where stuff was off, but it took me a while just to be able to figure out the exact right tempo in Cubase (multitracking software). I ended up achieving sync lock to it at 123.101 beats per minute, across a 12/8 time signature. Yes, that is thousandths of a beat per minute.

From there once I got lock, then it was on to figuring out the chords, which went pretty easy, for it's a standard blues progression. After that, figuring out how to time the ending just right. Then on to cutting tracks. The rhythm guitar went down first, followed by bass. Then I put in the piano rhythm parts and worked on those for a while. Then I thought about putting down the drums, but I held off because I didn't have the solos yet.

You see, to be able to complement an organ or guitar solo on the drums just right, I gotta first know what they are going to play! So essentially, I finished all the tracks first, including the organ and guitar solos, and then tackled the ever elusive and difficult drum part last. Since drums is my main instrument (been playing over 20 years), I always like to have all the other parts available to me when I practice the drum part, so I can accentuate the other parts with a reference to them on the drums.

After the tracks were cut and I was somewhat satisfied, then it was on to mixing. And I tried a lot of things with BH's vocal, but I wasn't happy with any of them. Her voice is pure and pristine, and pretty much anything I tried just seemed to detract from it rather than add to it. So I settled on a bit of de-essing, limiting, EQ, compression, delay, and reverb. I know it sounds like a lot, and it is, but they are all used in extremely small amounts to leave her track mostly unaffected. I liked it just like it was originally, but it did need real small amounts of the things I mentioned.

But overall, I am pretty happy with it, and it is one of the best "rock blues" productions I have ever done out of my studio. Thanks again BH!

On another note, one thing I have come to notice is that collaborative efforts between people seem generally to yield better products than on one's own, because of the additional angles involved and considered. And music is no exception.

I wondered how you would synch up to it, because with a piece like this, it's not like you start singing each verse on exactly the same beat. It's all over the place. I thought of putting in a metronome. And of course, my keyboard might not be timed exactly perfectly.

And it was 6/8 blues. It's funny how you came to the thousandth's of a second thing. LOL But good detective work!

The drums are the best part! Maybe that's because it's your instrument and maybe it's because it's the one instrument I could never play, but I just love them in this piece!

Interesting how you put it all together. Good work!

On another note, one thing I have come to notice is that collaborative efforts between people seem generally to yield better products than on one's own, because of the additional angles involved and considered. And music is no exception.

I couldn't agree more!

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
I wondered how you would synch up to it, because with a piece like this, it's not like you start singing each verse on exactly the same beat. It's all over the place. I thought of putting in a metronome. And of course, my keyboard might not be timed exactly perfectly.

And it was 6/8 blues. It's funny how you came to the thousandth's of a second thing. LOL But good detective work!

Thanks BH, although technically, it is really considered 12/8. For all intents and purposes it is really the same thing as 6/8, but not when it comes to written music and actual phrasing. You see, for there to be 4 beats, each in triplet, to achieve that swinging "blues" feel, 4 beats x 3 8th note triplets per beat = 12 8th notes, and hence, 12/8. 6/8 would apply if you were just count to 2 beats each measure, but the way the music is phrased, it has a 1, 2, 3, 4 feel.

The other problem is that different time signatures can affect how the computer calculates the tempo, and combined with clock mismatches between programs (most likely due to inherent resolution), things with tempos can become a mess real quick! And add to that the fact that you were quite liberal and "freestyle" with the vocal, and not beginning on the 1 very much, I think you can see what I was up against. But fortunately, I've been at this a while. So yeah, next time a separate metronome track would help, or even one stereo track, with the vocal panned all the way left or right, and the metronome on the opposite channel.

The drums are the best part! Maybe that's because it's your instrument and maybe it's because it's the one instrument I could never play, but I just love them in this piece!

Interesting how you put it all together. Good work!

Lol, yeah well thanks, and I never claimed to be all that great at guitar, keys or bass! But for a drummer, I suppose those other parts coulda been worse. And coulda been better too, but I really wanted to tackle it on my own (cause frankly I woulda had to pay better players) and also wanted a blues feel, which is why the organ. Heck, any old blues band almost always has some kind of organ going on! All in all though, not bad, and I look forward to the next one!

[edit on 19-11-2005 by TrueAmerican]