Hi there! This is going to be our first foray into this mysterious land of indie musicians

This is a cover of Foster The People’s Pumped Up Kicks. There are issues with it (the drums actually weren’t recorded/mixed on their own, they just bleed into other mics. Lame, I know) but ultimately we would love a critique on mixing and the sound in general. Less bass? More Reverb? We’d like to hear it all Got something nice to say to our beautiful singer? I’ll make sure to pass it on.

Feel free to download it. It’s also on SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com/turn_me_on/pumped-up-kicks

Welcome Alex, in the "mysterious land of indie music". 
You wanna hear it all about ya production? OK, here I go :

First I´d like to say that you delivered an own interpretation of this piece. It´s a good acoustic /unplugged version .
You said it already about drums, they need a bit "finishing". The bass is too far behind. , imo.
Your vox would sound more fully if you´d add a layered voxtrack in some parts. Some work on the dynamics  (vox and entire mix) may give the mixdown more power, strength, coherence.
I assume that you guys are still pretty young, right? Your voice sound that young. So there´s some space for development/ improvement of your own style, your own way to make music.
Hope to hear some of your own compositions in future.  I like it more than covers.  

U.L.I.

Perfect! This sort of criticism is exactly what I needed (I’d say ‘we' but I’m the sole person responsible for mixing). I will read more in-depth tomorrow (it’s 2AM here and I just can’t handle thinking about more music) but to answer the gist of your post I’ll say this:

What do you meant he bass is too far behind? in terms of timing or the mix?
How would one go about layering a voxtrack? (this is the first time I’ve mixed anything, sorry)

Yeah we’re young, last year of high school and our singer is quite petite which could lend a younger quality to her voice.

We have another cover but I don’t think it’s quite BandAMP worthy, but it’s more in our style (a bit jazzier, we’re all pretty technical/proficient in our own fields but we play ‘simple’ music together for some reason. Here is a link to the cover if you wanna give it a listen http://soundcloud.com/turn_me_on/sunday-morning-maroon-5-cover
(don’t bother critiquing the mixing… there was none done)

You also mentioned ‘dynamics’ of the mix. I’d be interested to found out more about that if someone (anyone) can post a link to read about it.

And we will most definitely have some original material up, we’re currently writing, bouncing ideas and experimenting with stuff. But it’s hard work. That’s part of the reason we joined: learning 

Thanks U.L.I.

In terms of the mix, I couldn´t hear it very good, too low.

Simply a double track. You´re gonna sing a few tracks . That makes the voice sound full. You can sing the same melody simulaniously two or more times or you´re gonna sing different melodies ("voices") as harmony-voices. Try it out, play around with this techniques, find ya style.


Here´s a link to a tuto which denis wrote. http://forum.bandamp.com/Recording/15146.html

Here on bandamp you can find a lot of lessons, tutos, links, a few vids and much more when you forage in bandamp´s lessons, gear talk and recording-threads.

If you want to produce a rough demo, then this is fine, it's very difficult to get the balance right between instruments if you only have limited tracks/mics, you would need someone to be able to monitor the sound through headphones whilst you are all playing.
What you could do is use this as a backing track for dubing. So simply start off micing the drums as best you can recording just the drums, you will need at least three or four mics, bass drums, overheads and snare, then do the same for bass, guitar and vocals. Best you research on how to mic individual instruments.

Work on the raw sound first, if that is not right, no software/hardware is going to produce a pro production. The best way is to experiment, hence all rooms have their own dynamics, let your ears be judge.

I like your vocals - great sound and feel

WELCOME TO bandAMP

     
When I click on the link it works fine.  What´s wrong when you click it?

PS : Aaah, it works for you now, right?

MYSTEREOUS - It's OK now, 

First of all I really like this cover - I just compared this to the original - your version is a fantastic interpretation! This one takes on an intimate quality - a more potent psychological quality than even the original! (I think I PREFER your version....and I LIKE the original!) Your singer has some real potential - she's got a great alto voice...it's really expressive, clear and true. Your backing work (guitar, bass drums) is very good but the recording of them needs some improvement - it sounds as if your recording everything except the vocals in one room with one mic, one take. It would improve this considerably if you moved the mic up to the guitar, the bass amp and, as Denis has already said, get several mics for your drums... Do you have a multi-track recorder? It would be much easier to work with the mix if you had everything recorded on separate tracks...then you could play with the mix to your heart's content (I wonder what it would sound like with some harmonies on the chorus? You could get your singer to overdub herself with a harmony vocal....I'd bet that would be killer!) Anyway, you're not too far away from greatness, just as you are!

(by the way....is this your lead singer?...if so, she's amazing...hang on to her! If she's not your singer, she's still amazing...)
       

Yes that's her. I'm amazed you found her.

Billiam is our guitarist! So give him a pat on the back for that

I will try to answer everyone who has questions/comments

@U.L.I. thanks, I will look into the recording forums on here. After waking up I just had a eureka moment that the bass was, in fact, too low. I will re-mix that today I think. For our more professional recordings we will record multiple takes of the voice over itself, how did I not think of that. Brilliant, thanks!

@Denis You are absolutely right, this is just a rough demo. And right now our recording set up is very simplistic. But when we find some of our ‘sweet spots’ we will record them professionally (well, to the best of our abilities). As for our recording room… it’s our drummer’s father’s work shop We’re just Canadian teenagers with a passion for music. But we’re working on it: considering how we started with an amp, drums and an iPhone (for recording) and our setup is getting more sophisticated as we go along.

@BattleCat Wow, respect for finding her. Yes, that is our wonderful singer She really pulls us together. Thank you very much for the kind words concerning our interpretation: the real mastermind behind it is also our singer since she’s the one who arranged it (if that’s the correct term to use). You actually almost nailed it: we did record in one room and in one take, hence (as Denis put it) it’s a "rough demo”. The singer was actually recorded in the same take and the whole ‘one room at one time’ feeling is due to the bleed over into her mic. Since the room is tiny there’s little we can do about that currently (except recording separate tracks/takes which we intend to start doing soon). We do have a multitrack recording device but the problem remains that the drummer bleeds into everything. Actually, now that you found her, she does have on cover where she did harmonies with herself but since she recorded on an iPhone the quality isn’t perfect. It’s also completely unmixed and unedited. Here’s a link to that specific song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPJ_vUv3eQM&nofeather=True
Thanks again for the kind words, I’ll pass it on.

Thank you everyone, for the love and criticism, we hope to post some more on here soon! We know original material is preferred on here and we will work on it. Thank’s again  

Yeah, Catty´s a master of research and investigation.   .  Incredible , what informations he´s gonna dig out . 

I don't think I explained myself clearly in terms of dubing. Use this track as track one (for example) as a guide track for recording new drums, bass, guitar vocals etc....., then you can experiment with mic positions etc until you get a good sound. 

Yup, we understood that, guess I just didn’t make it clear enough. We’re about to go back to the studio (again: basement) and try laying down all the groundwork track by track. And we will mic up the drum set with 3 mics (all we have for now) and see what I can do with it.

this might help u out:

http://www.hometracked.com/2007/05/12/recorderman-overhead-drum-mic-technique/

GREAT little video, Max! I'm gonna try that myself....