Behemoth Cover Tracks Reflection

After doing a couple of mixes of the songs I think i can safely say that I have achieved my goal of producing high quality metal tracks, I truly am very happy with how they have turned out and this whole process has given me more confidence in producing metal tracks. I have already talked about a couple of issues I had with the recording of each element in the individual blogs I have done but the main one would be, paying more attention to timing when recording drums and checking to make sure microphones aren't moving, this means I don't have to spend so much time editing and time shifting certain sections that are too far out. Also the recording of the vocal tracks with my first session not really being of a usable standard and making the decision to go back and try recording them again even though there was the potential to not be able to do any better. Leading on from that I was surprised with how much better the vocal tracks sounded in the second recording session which shows I have the potential to grow as an Extreme Metal vocalist if I choose to pursue it more in the future.

The biggest positives in this project was spending a good amount of time recording each element especially the guitars to get them as tight and in time as possible, the final results show just how important it was to do this to get a more professional product. For future projects I will need to put just as much time and focus into capturing audio for Metal songs as I have because I know the results will be a lot better if I do. Another big positive was getting other engineers to assist me in the recording process with setting up microphones and working out guitar amp tones to produce a better sound than what I could do just by myself, it also saves on setup time which provides more time for actual recording. Due to the fact that I had such a good experience with getting other people in my sessions this is definitely something that I need to do more of in future projects and also for me to help other people out more as well to get a different perspective on how they would go about setting up and running a recording session. Overall there wasn't any major negative things that happened apart from not paying enough attention in the drum recording session and having trouble performing the vocals but they were just minor problems that I managed to resolve in the end anyway.

Doing this project has forced me to research certain production techniques and editing techniques that really come in handy for Metal productions such as the dream gate technique I discuss in my drum recording/editing blog, having the ability to easily and quickly remove all of the unwanted noise and spill from a Kick drum for example and then normalise each hit is something that is invaluable in a Metal production. I have also learnt that there are a lot of people who are willing to work with me and help me out in recording sessions and I think that I have strengthen good working relationships with multiple engineers of whom I will most definitely work with again. I know that I can produce a great Extreme Metal tone from my own guitar amp which is good because it validates my reason for purchasing it, I had done some recording with it previously and I wasn't happy with the sound I got which obviously shows that what ever I did in that session wasn't working and I have grown enough as an engineer to actually produce good sounds and results. This could also mean that I might be able to pull even better sounds out of the amp as I continue to improve my engineering skills.

The main creative processes I have used was predominantly just trying to get as close to the original versions of the songs as possible, which was quad tracking guitars to get a fuller sound, extreme editing on elements like the Kick, Snare, and Toms to make them sound as clean as possible, making a distorted Bass tone that helps to fill out the distortion of the guitars even more, having at least 2 vocal tracks which again fills out the sonic characteristics of the tracks. Everything I did was really was to really make the tracks sound super dense but have clarity between all the individual elements and I believe the creative choices I used helped to achieve this.

I ideally would have liked to had started mixing everything a week earlier than I did to receive more feedback and refine my mixes even more but the one reason why I couldn't do that was because I had to do the second vocal recording session. I was probably a little to sure of myself and underestimated just how difficult performing extreme style vocals are, in hindsight starting this process sooner would have been a lot better and left me more time at the end to do more recording if things didn't go well, like they did. I am thankful that I didn't leave the start of recording vocals a week later because that really wouldn't have given me any time to do mixing and with a genre of music like this having a bunch of time to mix is a must, even more as I'm still perfecting my mixing style and workflow.

All I can say now is that I'm really very happy with what I've produced, I have enjoyed my experience and journey throughout the whole process including the tedious act of quad tracking guitars of which it will be interesting to see what its like recording other bands with these same processes. I just need to keep on expanding on the things I have learnt whilst doing this project and hopefully now start applying my knowledge to producing Metal records for bands and musicians that are not myself.