The Home Made Hit Show

HMHS 216 - Not Famous Dave the Gear Head

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sun, 31 Aug 2014 18:09:00 +0000

Dave returns !!!!

Discussion of plugins and tools:

Songs from

The Actor - Les Cotton and Pete Rand Music
Won't Ever Run - David Cooper Music
Home - Dave Criddle Music
Home - Grandma Melonhead Music
I Got the Sun Shining Down on Me - Dave King Music

Some Links

Please note that all the songs played so far were sent prior to the recent request. If you've sent something in then please be patient.

HMHS 215 - The Return of the HMHS aka Home Recording Blankets

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sun, 24 Aug 2014 05:54:00 +0000

Click on the title above to play the show, right click to download.

We're back. Tony was bullied into it by Zoetrope. Dave will return next week.

Lots of chit/chat,, feel free to FF, and some great home recorded songs.

Dave King - Whatcha Gonna Do davekingmusic.com
The Cracks - Be My Friend Tonight Soundclick
Bluster - Let it Go www.blusterband.com
Andrew Richardson - Uhura https://soundcloud.com/fabkebab

The forum to discuss the show can be found here Home Made Hit Show Forum

email your songs to homemadehitshow@gmail.com

HMHS 214 - The Lonely Podcaster

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 14:59:00 +0000

I'm all alone this week so it's time for an old-school songwriting and home recording show.

There is a very little discussion this week, just music

You Are - David Cooper (and Ralph)
Samba - Stranger Than Fiction- Randall Hill and Lee Faith
Axis of Awesome - Four Chords
Without You - Daren Sirbough
Wait - James McDaniel - Extrapedestrian

You can download the Extrapedestrian album here http://www.archive.org/details/Extrapedestrian-ExitStageWest

The Axis of Awesome video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw3eYsnl31c

HMHS 213 - Subject Deficit

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 21:10:00 +0000

Balance the budget by listening to this excellent songwriting and home recording podcast with your power broking hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.

This weeks discussions and "stuff"

Making home music videos
We need inspiration
Getting the Pro Sound
Tape Saturation
Does listening to commercial songs help or hinder ?

Songs:

Andrew Spicer - Artificial Love
Grandma Melonhead - Maisy
Steven "Kern" Ramsdell - Kicking It Forever http://www.homerecordingweekly.blogspot.com/

Visit www.humblefly.net for a copy of Andrew's album.

and here's the video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-o2j5bHWZ4&feature=player_embedded

HMHS 212 - 0 - 60 in 35 Minutes - RPM Show

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 23:33:00 +0000

This week Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle narcissistically play their own songs. 7 tunes out of last months 20 created for the RPM Challenge www.rpmchallenge.com. Even more confusingly this is one without them being in the same "studio" since they can no longer bare to be in each others presence. Give it a list and you'll understand.

To find more.
http://thetones.bandcamp.com/album/the-loneliness-of-the-long-distance-strummer

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=723841&content=music

The songs:

Dave - Rich
Tony - Dressed In Black
Dave - Punk
Tony - I'm Afraid
Dave - Let's Go
Tony - Never Let Me Go
Dave - NuWave

HMHS 211 - Lyrically Speaking

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 18 Mar 2011 21:41:00 +0000

Dave & Tony return to discuss many interesting home songwriting and recording subjects.

This weeks topics include

"Borrow" a chord progression from an existing song
Recording with a click track drum then replacing with hand percussion
Playing drums is really hard http://zoomforum.us/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=16278
Laptops or Desktops for recording
Ron Sexsmith
Walk The Moon http://walkthemoon.bandcamp.com/
Why do pro recordings sound better
Rychie Floyd's songwriting philosophy.
Chordbot http://chordbot.com/
Lots of Lyrics discussion

This weeks songs

Ian Holtaway - Colour White
Mike Anderson - I'm Still Taller Than You
Rychie Floyd - Everybody Wants To Drink Your Water
Andrew Richardson - Mary Cries (words by Alan Gentle)
Edward Wainwright - If You Don't Want Me

There are a bunch of videos below related to the show this week

Walk The Moon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW7f54tVRmQ

Ron Sexsmith - See It To Believe It

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFww3fLhjl8

Justin Currie - No So Sentimental Now
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDEYxkaTZo0

Justin Currie - I Guess I Didn't Love You makes Chris Difford from Squeeze Cry
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9xS1WkJdKk&feature=related

A search for the BBC Songwriters Circle stuff on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Songwriter+Circle+BBC&aq=f

Fran Healy Buttercups (not Daffodils as I said on the show)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSRpATc0lz0

HMHS 210 - Stop Your Engines

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 02:56:00 +0000

More mysterious and deep discussion of songwriting and home recording from your master - Dave Criddle - and slave - Tony Butterworth.

This weeks discussions

A charity CD ??
Home Made Soundbooth (from John Poulton)
Covering your own songs in a different style
Revisiting Tunes
More structure helps Dave
Having a strong theme helps Dave

This weeks tunes.

Back To The Beginning - Ronnie Marler
Peoria - Frank Canonica
Windwalkers - Richie Floyd
Wave - The Experiments

HMHS 209 - A Pile of Steaming Home Made Hits

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 21:57:00 +0000

Back for more home made songwriting and recording goodness it's your fantastic hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.

This week we discuss

Pro Sounding Home Recordings
Our RPM Challenge Experiences
Dave stole my song :)
Dave at Church
Dave Murdered His Amp
Simplifying Your Equipment
Why no Pop Songs in home recording
Mario's Site at http://lets-go-digital.blogspot.com/

Visit Zoetrope's new Backstage area of the forums for songs in progress, ideas, lyrics and anything else that's musical but not a full song http://zoomforum.us/viewforum.php?f=40

The video for Bruno Mars doing a Nirvana/Michael Jackson mashup is at the end.

Songs this week

Make Me Crawl - Mario Gozum aka Pill
The New Risk of the Foot Soldier - The Lions
Relative - Yesterday's Addiction

Relatives song info is here:

Lyrically, the song is about love- well, more to the point, breaking up. A relationship has to be collaboration between two willing people, and some women don’t seem to be capable of seeing how good they really have it- “you find sorrow in your treasure”. But, in the end you realize that you are better off moving on- “In the dark, I find the sun”. It was inspired by a close friend of mine who was going through a divorce, in spite of the fact that he completely built his whole life around his wife. So, the song was built around those ideas, and written on an acoustic guitar. After the rough song was “sketched out”, Mike Mitchell, our lead guitarist, recorded some rough guitar takes which were uploaded to the “SendSpace” file sharing site. Jim Tamburini (his real name, by the way) downloaded the .wav files and imported them into his DAW, and put together the drum tracks. He sent back separate .wav files of the kick, snare/hi-hat, toms, and cymbals, which Mike and I re-imported, and then set about the task of recording all of the finished guitar and vocal tracks.

Bruno Mars

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvYxZAwc1F8&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSNSg2ogpx0&feature=player_embedded

HMHS 208 - The Return of the Plugin

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 16:56:00 +0000

We're back for more of those hi quality distant vocal recordings from Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle, your self appointed ringmasters of the home songwriting circus.

This week discussions include:

Dave's Rondo Bass
Rewiring a guitar
Dave's attempts to record from a netbook
Dave's Shure Beta 52 mic
Reorganizing your plugins

This weeks, all important, songs

Randall Hill - In Between

Sugarspin (Jim Daly & KV( - There For You

Exactly What You Need - Hobey Kuhn

HMHS 207 - The Return of The Fantastic Two

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 22:06:00 +0000

Yes we're back. Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle here to spin your tunes and harm your ears. Apologies for my sound quality as I have forgotten how to use my PS-04.

This weeks discussions

Plans for the show
What we've been doing
Stuff we've "aquired"
RPM Challenge - SIGN UP NOW AT http://rpmchallenge.com/
Writing Music First

This weeks songs

Brother Luke - Everything To Me

Spots - Tegen De Wind (recorded by Jerome Fygee)

David Cooper - Sweet Lady Luna

There will be an RPM Challenge thread at www.homemadehitshow.com/forum for you to post and listen to stuff.

Dave's Top Albums of 2010

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 04:50:00 +0000

Teenage Fanclub - Shadows

Devo - Something For Everybody

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs

LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening

Cee Lo Green - The Lady Killer

Broken Bells - Broken Bells

Deerhunter - Halcyon Digest

Tony's Top 10 Albums of 2010

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 20:26:00 +0000

Here's a list of my top 10 albums released in 2010 (in the US).

I get so frustrated by so many people claiming there is no good music these days. Truth is the system has become fractured and it's much more difficult to find music you might like, but please rest assured, it's definitely out there.

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
The National - High Violet
Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More (2010 release in US)
Manic Street Preachers - Postcards From a Young Man
Gaslight Anthem - American Slang
Biffy Clyro - Only Revolutions (2010 release in US)
Sunshine Underground - Nobody's Coming to Save You
Jonsi - Go
Marina and the Diamonds - The Family Jewels
Lightspeed Champion - Life is Sweet Nice To Meet You

HMHS 206 - A Bunch Of Fools

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 23:09:00 +0000

A slightly different show here. This is a conversational and music show featuring Les Cotton, Ralph Tonge, Pete Rand and David Claridge. They discuss writing and recording music.

The songs and links are

Les Cotton - Photograph
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=8406215

Ralph Tonge - Give Your All This Xmas
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=8407022

Pete Rand with David Claridge - So Long Ago
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=7454106

David Claridge - The Garden
http://www.myspace.com/davidclaridge

all recorded last December, with some bottles of wine and Skype ;)

HMHS 205 - Half a Surprise

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 21:49:00 +0000

A spur of the moment one man home songwriting and recording podcast from your host Captain Tony Butterworth.

This week I briefly touch on

Why there has been no shows and what the future holds
Why I'm not doing much recording
More instruments makes us sound amateurish
Crap singers using their voices = Mark Knopfler
Jack White says we need deadlines & limitations to be creative
Memorable lyrics
Writing songs with a casio/yamaha keyboard

Remember to post your memorable lyrics at www.homemadehitshow.com/forum

This weeks tunes

Robert Hall - Ghostly Traces
Robert Weber - Every Day
The Tones - Clock Strikes 12
The Tones - The Station
David McConnell - You Knew It Then

HMHS 204 - Frauds

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 21:18:00 +0000

Welcome to one last summer show for David Criddle and Tony Butterworth your fraudulent home songwriting guru's.

This weeks discussions include

Giving away your best ideas
U2's songwriting approach
Doctor Horrible and Buffy Musical Episodes
Breaking a slump (write an easy, silly song)

Tony has been listening to: The Whigs, Drive By Truckers, Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zero's, The Submarines and Green Day.

Dave has been listening to U2

This weeks songs

Sahara - Lochinvar (www.lochinvar.net)
I've Given Up - Dave Chick
My Addiction - Marvin Kanarek
Which - The Rotary Dial

Marvin's video.

HMHS 203 - Dave Likes Frank's Organ

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 21:50:00 +0000

Welcome to your source of home recording and songwriting entertainment. Host by the songwriting fraud's Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.

This weeks discussions include

Sing your lyrics when writing them
Rewriting songs
Inspiration and playing existing music

Tony has been listening to Lissie, Scissor Sisters, Roots and Wolf Parade.
Dave has been watching Phoenix live on MTV.

http://seanfellowes.com for Sean's downloadable CD

10 Hallmarks of Amateur Recordings
http://www.hometracked.com/2006/12/22/10-hallmarks-of-amateur-recordings

This weeks tunes

Frank Canonica - Water For Tears
The Continentals - Working Man's Blues
Laurier Tiernan - Ransacked
Sean Fellowes - World Peace

HMHS 202 - Snazzy Jazzy

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 19:41:00 +0000

Tony Butterworth and Dave "Jazzmaster" Criddle return for more home songwriting and recording goodness. We need your songs so get them sent in to homemadehitshow@gmail.com.

This weeks topics include

Using strings in home recordings
Repeating verses
Using harmonies that are lower
Justin Currie reverses cliche's
The Knack on Rock And Roll Geek Show and Netflix http://www.americanheartbreak.com/rnrgeekwp/2010/05/09/classic-albums-revisited-get-the-knack-with-berton-averre/
Tony has been listening to Gaslight Anthem, Hanson, Codeine Velvet Club
Dave has been listening to Punch Brothers, Nada Surf and Teenage Fan Club

Songs

Losers Street - The Legendary Ten Seconds
Make a Birthday Wish - Those Dreaded Gnats
I'm Still Taller Than You - Mike Anderson
Dan Brown in Town - The Pocket Gods

HMHS 201 - Content Free

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 21:43:00 +0000

Back again after my intensive training for the World Cup.

This week we discuss:

Rock Band: Green Day
Rock Band 3
Jack White's songwriting tip
Lack of motivation
Inspiration and obscure lyrics
Dave has been listening to Nada Surf, Hot Hot Heat, LCD Soundsystem
Tony has been listening to Hot Chip, Green Day and Teenage Fanclub

Some great tunes for you:

Barricades Rise - Gave Up The World
Here Today – The Cracks (with Steve Nylander)
Frank Canonica – I’m Not Myself with intro
Mat Wilson (Widerenie) - Debtors are Us

HMHS 200 - The Forgotten Anniversary

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 28 May 2010 21:22:00 +0000

Home songwriting and recording talking heads Dave Criddle and Tony Butterworth return for more waffle.

This weeks topics include

Filling the gaps in your head
The contest winner (you have to listen to know if you won)
The demise of LaLa (I hate Apple)
Dave's Buzzcocks tune
Tony remixes John Poulton's Gravity
Keith calls in
Tony has not been listening to much (thanks Apple) but was underwhelmed by Band of Horses)
Dave has been listening to New Pornographers and Kraftwerk

This weeks song:

The Splinters - The Game Of Lying
Lucas - Hanging At The Forum
The Pocket Gods - Come On England
Jay Regain - Motherearth

Band Of Horses
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGmoOSyFe8I

New Pornographers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxMCaU83QKs

HMHS 199 - Heavy Breathing

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 14 May 2010 20:51:00 +0000

Back for more heavy breathing and incessant home recording and songwriting babbling, it's Tony "Vader" Butterworth and Dave "Skywalker" Criddle.

Remember to send an email to homemadehitshow@gmail.com with Contest in the subject if you want to win a Korg Nanopad (winners announced next time).

This weeks subject matter include

Check the mastering thread on the forums
No show next week
www.homerecordingweekly.blogspot.com, make sure and visit to enter the songwriting contest
Dave's a street performer
Dave's bands plays Baby Doll
Polly on speed
Tony has been listening to The National
Dave has been listening to Super Furry Animals

This weeks songs

Randall Hill - More Than Friends
John Poulton - Gravity
Leisure - Baby Doll
James Bryson and Steve Nylander - The One Who Owns My Heart

The National
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IprgVNlFIqM

Super Furry Animals
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BANdftxuqlM

HMHS 198 - Now with free Korg Nanopad

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 07 May 2010 20:49:00 +0000

Yes you can win a Korg Nano Pad simply by sending an email to homemadehitshow@gmail.com. with CONTEST in the title line. If you're in the US shipping will be covered, outside of the US we will review once I know the cost. Read about the Nanopad here watch the video below.

This week Dave Criddle and Tony Butterworth discuss

Tony's inactivity
Being in a band is not always that great
Balanced Cables
Toneport presets
Tony's EZMix review
Read Kevin Selby's R16 site here
Tony has been listening to - Marina and the Diamonds, Genesis, Kate Nash
Dave has been listening to - Quasi

Songs:

Joe Holtaway - We Go Sailing
Kevin Selby - Wonderin' (R16 Demo Project) -
Leigh Wright - For An Hour or Two
David Partrick - (I Unfriended You on) Facebook

Sonic State Nanopad Review
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktCKcPWwHPw

Marina and the Diamonds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_oMD6-6q5Y

Genesis - Dancing with the Moonlight Knight
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKIkzGGAG9s

Quasi - Peace and Love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dj_Nao5LuA

HMHS Video Special - 3 Home Made Home Recorded Videos

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 18:36:00 +0000

The week got away from us this week so there is no normal show. Instead how about a show of videos I've been sent.

Also make sure and take a look at my review of the new Toontrack EZMix product
http://show.homemadehitshow.com/2010/04/toontracks-ezmix-review.html

James Donn - All I Ever Got

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwQodVc1JW0&feature=email

Michael Lyzenga - Coal River Blues

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9II-EoUdxZg

Bryan Eddy - You Won't See Me Cry

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bov7JxIr2bI

Toontrack's EZMix Review

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 18:29:00 +0000

EZMix Review

What follows is a text based review of the new EZMix product released by Toontrack. I would like to thank them for them sending me a copy for review.

EZMix is a liberating and at the same time frustrating product. It's a product that will be perfect for some and will drive others crazy with it's limitations.

First I need to set the stage by describing my own personal background and use case. I am a home hobby musician, who records music purely for the fun of it. My operating mode is to find something that works (a sound, a product, FX Chain or technique) and stick with it, I really don't like to tinker that much so in principle EZMix should be perfect for me. I do use Line6 products for modeling and hence a number of my tracks, most commonly guitar, are recorded with effects already applied. I usually record bass, vocals and keyboards relatively clean. I use mostly clean drum loops or VSTs for drums.

So this is where the first issue arises. I think the product name and the marketing are a little misleading. Even though I now realize it was impossible, I imagined this as some kind of product that I could apply to my project and it would give me a great mix. A magical mastering tool. In reality it really isn't a mastering tool at all, though there are a few presets and it could be used that way. Most of the time the intention is to apply the effects to clean, or in the case of guitars, post amp tracks and to control them by applying EQ, Compression and other relatively simple effects. The result is that in a project like mine, with 40 different tracks I have to apply EZMix separately to every track and choose how to process it.

Lets take a step back to summarize the product. You can find lots of details at the Toontrack site. http://www.toontrack.com/products.asp?item=69 including the video shown below. It costs $69 and is purchased via a download. You buy the product, then download it and activate it on first use. You can have it active on two computers at any time, and you can add and remove computers from your account up to five times. The product installs easily and automatically is added to the folders necessary to make it work on your PC (providing you haven't gone all non standard on your VST folders). I use Reaper and it showed up first time with no issues.

EZMix uses sixteen different effect types (listed towards the end of this article) that are combined in various combinations to create the presets provided by the product. These effects are not really modeling based, there are no guitar amps etc, but are more post processing based. Your ability to customize these presets is very limited. There are three controls two of which behave differently depending on the preset you are working with, the third one sets the volume level. The UI is presented very nicely and is easy to understand and follow, once you have selected a preset a window shows you what is included and what the control sliders are set to. You can modify the sliders to get a sound you like then save the preset with your own name. You can also click any preset and flag it as a favorite for easy access.

EZMix seems very low CPU intensive. I ran a project where it was running around fifteen times on different tracks, including two copies on a single track and Reaper reported minimal increases in CPU usage on those tracks.

I have not counted them but EZMix comes with a lot of presets, probably a couple of hundred. This is both a bonus and a disadvantage. To truly be EZ that's too many, you still have to search through and many of them are meaningless without some knowledge (for example "LPF 12dc OCT" really can't qualify as EZ). In addition many of them are useless in a popular music based production, such as all the bit crushing related presets. Presets are categorized into sections such as "vocal", "Bass" etc and are easily searchable but so many of them fall into the category of "All" that it's a little confusing. I think this would best be dealt with by the user spending some time to work through them for each instrument and favoriting the one's they like, allowing for a bit more EZ access.

So how do they sound ? Well I hope to have an audio review soon for you to hear for yourself but I'll try to cover it hear. Again my disclaimer, I really am no sound expert. I can make these tools work but at the heart of it I really don't have a great understanding of how everything works. I tried the effects on various instruments. I will provide a summary for each one and talk about how it sounds against my normal approach. In all cases I took the presets and used the sliders to modify to taste.

Bass has always been a problem area for me. I have a cheapo bass, can barely play it and I don't believe that Line6 provides a great bass setup from it's standard offerings (not including the bass pack). I tend to record my bass relatively clean then add a little EQ and compression in Reaper. The bass presets in EZMix made a great improvement. I forget now exactly which one it was but I felt I found the perfect bass sound for a recent song by using it, there is plenty of variety of choices also.

Electric Guitar usually I record electric guitar with extensive effects already applied and rarely do much in the mix beyond cutting low frequencies. To that end I didn't find much to use in the EZMix setup that helped the guitar too much other than the limiting and EQ based sets.

Acoustic Guitar usually recorded pretty clean and some reverb, EQ and compression added. I found the EZMix Acoustic presets to do a good job and I would definitely use them again.

Drums Most often I use audio loops with minimal effects. I then add some reverb, EQ and a I use the Camel Crusher plugin to, cleanly, beef it up. I didn't really feel like I found an EZMix plugin that really helped too much with the drums. I suspect I need to spend more time in this area. It was the first section I tried and I really didn't try that hard.

Keyboard (Piano) Usually recorded from a Yamaha home keyboard through the Toneport with some reverb and compression. I did not find the EZMix presets to have a significant impact on these tracks.

Vocals This was the real winner. I used to double track all my vocals to thicken them up but about a year ago I switched to using a delay to do that tasks. My vocals are always recorded clean then I use EQ, Compression, a stereo delay and sometimes reverb to beef them up. I applied one of the delay based vocal presets from EZMix and thought I had matched the sound well. However listening to my original mixed tracks back to back with the EZMix version I found the EZmix version significantly better and once the full mix was played back the vocals sounded great.

Mastering Starting out I misunderstood EZMix as a mastering tool, in truth it really is not but it does provide four mastering presets. Usually I master using PSP Vintage Warmer. I am not really knowledgeable of how it works and just use a preset to limit and "warm" (whatever that means). I found the EZMix mastering presets (at least one of them) to do a great job of achieving the same thing (for much less cost).

An area of weakness for me, mostly based on my mixing habits, is that I like to clean a mix near then end by cutting frequenicies on tracks to allow them to sit together. For example I tend to cut everything less than 200hz on everything but drums and bass and I cut most tracks except vocals around 2khz. I found using EZMix difficult for this since I didn't really know what all the presets were doing.

So should YOU buy this product. It's $69 in the US, around 45 Euro's. It's definitely a question for you to answer for yourself as it is definitely not the answer for everyone. People consider this good value, and it is when compared to the Waves bundle or PSP Warmer, but less so when you consider you can purchase Reaper or Mixcraft for less and these products come with many many effects and more. If you believe it's the answer to all your problems you might be disappointed, if you believe you can use it with no knowledge of mixing or no work you'll be disappointed. But if you believe it will solve some problems in specific cases then it could be perfect for you as another weapon in your arsenal. For me it's improvements in bass and vocal processing were outstanding, it's mastering an added bonus. Others may find other parts of it very useful. If you like to spend money to improve your sound then this is good value and will help you. If you're a cheapskate then I don't believe you will feel you got your value from this product.

One final note. While I understand the reasoning it is a shame that Toontrack has decided not to provide a limited demo of this product.

You can find this and more like it on the home page for our weekly home recording and songwriting podcast at www.homemadehitshow.com

EZmix includes the following effects type:

Overloud: A tone enhancer processor which adds warmth and vibrance to the tone by
a combination of compression, EQing and harmonic generation.
Parametric EQ: 5-band parametric equalizer for tone shaping of the signal.
LPF (Low pass flter): A low pass flter passes (allows through) low frequencies whil
attenuating high frequencies.
HPF (High pass flter): A high pass flter passes (allows through) high frequencies
while attenuating low frequencies.
Compressor: A compressor is used to reduce the dynamic range of the audio signal,
typically with a ratio of 2:1 to 9:1. A compressor ratio of 9:1 means 9dB goes into the
compressor and results in 1dB out.
Limiter: Similar to a compressor but with a ratio of 10:1 or higher.
Bit Crusher: Reduces the bit resolution (ex. 16-bit to 8-bit) and simulates a lower
sampling rate resulting in a distorted type sound.
Transient: Shapes the signal by exaggerating or attenuating the transient (attack) and
the tail (sustain) of the signal.
Frequency Gate: Used to control the level of the audio by only passing signal above
the threshold. It is also affected by a HPF or LPF.
Tape Simulator: Simulates the effects of a tape recorder including bias, tape speed,
and wow and futter.
Chorus: Simulates the effect of multiple identical instruments playing the same part
(for example, 3 violins playing in unison). It results in a shimmering and thickening
effect to the sounds.
Inverse Reverb: Produces a reverb sound that fades into the original sound as
opposed to a traditional reverb that fades out.
Hall Reverb: Provides the sound of a ‘Hall’ type acoustical space.
Tape Delay: Produces an echo type effect. Typically a tape delay results in echoes that
get increasingly more distorted with each echo.
Filter Delay: Produces an echo effect where the frequency of the echoes can be adjusted.
This allows the echoes to react to different frequencies from the original signal.
Distortion: Produces the sound of the input of the audio being clipped which adds an
‘overdrive’ sound. This can add richness or fullness to the sound. In extreme settings
distortion can sound ‘thin’ or ‘buzzy’.

HMHS 197 - Keep It Short and Sweet

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 21:28:00 +0000

Welcome to more ~~babbling~~ discussion of our great home songwriting and recording subject from your hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.

This weeks discussions include

Working with a lyricist
Tony the rhymemaster
A Nanopad was donated to Tony
Tools for helping (free/easy/webased) screen catchers

More songs without vocals discussions
Dave wants to mimic a song, including the mix
Dave's blanket vocal booth
Toontrack EZMix www.toontrack.com/news.asp?id=171
A great segment from Dave Chick from www.insidehomerecording.com on arranging

This weeks music

Scott Walker - First Night
The Morrisons - John Ray
Basczax - Sexy Robot

My short NanoPad Video

Videos from the what I've been listening to. Please make sure and check them out. Featuring. Kate Nash, Avett Bros, Nickel Creek, Trampled By Turtles, The Hollaways, Burning Hotels and Aqualung

EZMix Video

This blog has moved

noreply@blogger.com (Tony Butterworth) — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 16:34:00 +0000

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