Consistency is the key to success in the music industry. Whether you are a band, solo artist, producer or mastering engineer, consistently showing up to work, creating content, honing the craft and practicing your instrument is what drives your progress.
We get tired, anxious, burnt out or unmotivated. Someone – rarely, others – often.
Physical exercise, mental practices, meditation, keeping habits in check helps to maintain the energy.
However, at time that doesn’t work. Then you just do it anyways. Because you have one life to devote to music, and every moment is precious for your growth.
My first impressions of Bogren Digital AmpKnob Rev C. Guitar Playthrough, comparisons with ML Sound Lab Amped Roots and Custom Audio Amplifiers OD 100. Hope that you dig my thoughts!
Devolution – Enjoy The Silence (Cover) ft. Jon Howard (Threat Signal, Imonolith), and Christian Olde Wolbers (Fear Factory). Produced by Doctor Mike Trubetskov at EOL Studios
The DEVOLUTION project started mid last year, when Nathan reached out to me to just have a casual chat about the music and do some remote production and mixing. We jumped on a few Zoom calls, refined what guys were after, and did some production sessions. Eric played MIDI drums in real time on Zoom with me, and I suggested some minor changes. Fast forward for today, Devolution lads have come a long way! I produced their EP, including this insane ENJOY THE SILENCE cover. Nathan reached out to Jon Howard who kindly agreed to do vocals, mixing and co-production with some synths. The lads have recorded real drums and collaborated with Christian Olde Wolbers on massive bass duties. Apparently, my coaching works and allows musos to grow and reach some heights!!
Tags: Recording Heavy Metal Guitar, Bass, Drums, Vocals. Mixing Metal at Home Studio. Metal Arrangement, Production, Producer. Getting Modern Tones with Get Good Drums, Nail the Mix, Nolly, Superior Drummer, Neural DSP, Ibanez, Jackson, Engl, Mesa Boogie, Peavey, ESP, and so on.
There is a trend that I’ve been noticing for years, and that has crystallised into a succinct summary in my head just recently. 📈
Heavy Rock and Metal field is massively saturated these days. Too many bands fight for the attention span of listeners that is limited. 🥊
The problem is, however, that musicians are not actively trying to stand out. Some deliberately race to sound like band X, which is OK (although I personally think that bands form a niche by discovering their own sound, and it’s hard to break into an already pre-occupied niche). 🚥
Others, though, simply fall into a certain sound by using software (and hardware) that everyone else in the field is using! 🍃 As the technology has grown so much recently 📲, we have a few go-to very high quality plugins for shaping the guitar and bass sounds, and enhancing drums with samples. These modern tools are really easy to use and get results in no time.👌
These results, however, sound very similar! And because of their wide spread and limited sound libraries, we basically get 2-4 major studio sounds across all modern metal productions. The final sound has a staple that gets recycled forever! ♻️
As magnificent as it is for the creators of these plugins (and I have the utmost and greatest respect for their hard work and outcomes! ✊), this, unfortunately, does great disservice to musicians and bands who desperately need to stand out in the crowded market! 🔉
My takeaway would be – always experiment! 🧪 Try weird shit, new approaches, or simply spend time tweaking buttons on your plugins, actively listening and engaging with these tools, and making sure that these sound great FOR YOU and YOUR MUSIC, and not just good in general. 🧬
This will allow you to power up your sound 🧨 and move towards discovering something special, something that your fans will remember for years, carve out your own niche and rocket up your live and studio career. 🚀
Ever struggled when listening back to your recording against the click, or getting tight enough for pro metal level? This video explains what to look for when recording into the click track, and how to improve your playing.
