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Post by wannaplayblues on Apr 9, 2021 3:28:41 GMT -6
Bit of a rant and open thoughts - so feel free to chime in yours...
As I work on Total Rock Guitar, I can't help but feel annoyed at the backing tracks. They don't work for recording, here's why:
The guitars are panned left and right (left for rhythm and right for lead). Next you're going to say "well, just pan the opposite way for the bit you're recording!" Problem is, you can't cancel out both pans. So if I want to record rhythm, the lead will be there and if I want to record lead, the rhythm will be there. There is no "just drums and bass" backing track.
The "slowed down" versions of the complicated parts don't appear to have a tap-tempo running, so there's no sense of "time" with the notes. That's rather poor. 
I don't know how blackcountrymick did his TRG efforts on YouTube - he probably made his own and did the bass himself... wanna share them with me dude, pretty please?
IIRC - don't the BLYCU have no tempo to them? Isn't that why bluesbruce puts them to a backing track, for a sense of timing?
Basically, I just wanna point out how dependent we are on decent backing tracks that are recorded in such a way as we can use them. ActiveMelody does an outstanding job on this front. You get a track with guitar and a track minus guitar - and they're good quality!
It frustrates me to no end. You get a book/media, play along to the track, get up to tempo... and have no way to record a quality version. AARRRGGGHHHH!!!!!! 
Any suggestions on getting around the issue? Anyone know a bass player and drummer who can generate the tracks for me?  |
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 9, 2021 6:00:59 GMT -6
Bit of a rant and open thoughts - so feel free to chime in yours...
As I work on Total Rock Guitar, I can't help but feel annoyed at the backing tracks. They don't work for recording, here's why:
The guitars are panned left and right (left for rhythm and right for lead). Next you're going to say "well, just pan the opposite way for the bit you're recording!" Problem is, you can't cancel out both pans. So if I want to record rhythm, the lead will be there and if I want to record lead, the rhythm will be there. There is no "just drums and bass" backing track.
The "slowed down" versions of the complicated parts don't appear to have a tap-tempo running, so there's no sense of "time" with the notes. That's rather poor.
I don't know how blackcountrymick did his TRG efforts on YouTube - he probably made his own and did the bass himself... wanna share them with me dude, pretty please?
IIRC - don't the BLYCU have no tempo to them? Isn't that why bluesbruce puts them to a backing track, for a sense of timing?
Basically, I just wanna point out how dependent we are on decent backing tracks that are recorded in such a way as we can use them. ActiveMelody does an outstanding job on this front. You get a track with guitar and a track minus guitar - and they're good quality!
It frustrates me to no end. You get a book/media, play along to the track, get up to tempo... and have no way to record a quality version. AARRRGGGHHHH!!!!!!
Any suggestions on getting around the issue? Anyone know a bass player and drummer who can generate the tracks for me? WPB, that's probably my biggest complaint about that book, too, when I played with the first few tunes all those years ago - lack of proper backing tracks. I had made Band-in-a-Box tracks that I had recorded over. I always thought Mick had recorded over the track on the CD. Check out this guy on Youtube - he's posted backing tracks for well over half of that book, and they sound pretty decent to me: I really like that book a lot - great tunes and there is a definite progression in difficulty. Good luck with this project. I might follow you through it, starting in a few months when I retire (and anticipate having more time to devote to this hobby). |
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Post by jack1982 on Apr 9, 2021 6:46:47 GMT -6
I did "Southern Comfort" several years ago. I use Reaper for a DAW, so I put the track in there, duplicate it, then right click on the first track, choose "item settings" and "Take channel mono mode (right)." That seems to change both tracks to right channel. Anyhow, the bass and drums are on the right, so that's your backing track. So, then you turn off the grid [Alt+G]. that way you can place the cursor anywhere. So the song repeats, verse chorus verse chorus etc., and eventually you get to the guitar solo which is on that right channel. So go to the precise beginning of the song, click on it in the track, and then hit "s" for "split." Then go to the precise end of the last bar before the solo and do the same. Do a split in the exact same spot on your second copy of the track. Then you can just take your mouse and drag the solo portion out of the way, take your "split" portion of the first track and drag it into the second track where the solo used to be. You can drag it back-and-forth a bit to get the timing exactly right of course. Probably take several tries if you're new to editing.  And of course you need to check you've now got the verses and choruses arranged correctly etc. Anyhow that's how I do it. |
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Post by wannaplayblues on Apr 9, 2021 8:05:28 GMT -6
bluesbruce that is an excellent find. Thanks - I may resort to those! jack1982 does that system depend on the chords being spliced into place of the lead guitar being the exact same? Is that true of the songs? I worry further down the tracks there'll be one that has a weird chord for one bar that can't be spliced in - but the concept makes sense to me. Excellent ideas, both of you, many thanks!
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Post by jack1982 on Apr 9, 2021 10:52:33 GMT -6
bluesbruce that is an excellent find. Thanks - I may resort to those! jack1982 does that system depend on the chords being spliced into place of the lead guitar being the exact same? Is that true of the songs? I worry further down the tracks there'll be one that has a weird chord for one bar that can't be spliced in - but the concept makes sense to me. Excellent ideas, both of you, many thanks! I only did the one song, but it seemed like the parts (verse, chorus, bridge etc.) were the same each time around. Whatever rhythm part was under the solo was the same as it had been the previous time through. Of course you just have to take each song individually - as you're playing the rhythm part along with the full track, you'll know which part is under the solo and then know how to splice things together correctly. |
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 9, 2021 12:56:33 GMT -6
Tbone, where do you come up with this stuff? LOL! Jack, I like your idea - seems like it would work for most of those tunes, if not for all of them. The BT's off Youtube would be pretty easy, but I'm not sure how you could get them into your own DAW and record over them. I think there are some web sites that will rip audio from Youtube and let you download it as an mp3 (and maybe get some malware at the same time!). I might just set up one computer to play them into my audio interface, while recording them into my DAW on another computer. I don't know if those might be posted somewhere for download.
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Post by joachim on Apr 9, 2021 14:41:52 GMT -6
Tbone, where do you come up with this stuff? LOL! Jack, I like your idea - seems like it would work for most of those tunes, if not for all of them. The BT's off Youtube would be pretty easy, but I'm not sure how you could get them into your own DAW and record over them. I think there are some web sites that will rip audio from Youtube and let you download it as an mp3 (and maybe get some malware at the same time!). I might just set up one computer to play them into my audio interface, while recording them into my DAW on another computer. I don't know if those might be posted somewhere for download. Bruce, if you're using Linux (like I am) then it's pretty easy to download the audio parts from Youtube using this Python library in safe manner free of malware: yt-dl.org/Being a Python library it works on Mac and Windows as well, but it is not easy if you are not used to programming or using command-line tools. I don't mind helping downloading some backing tracks that way. Just let me know which ones. |
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 9, 2021 15:22:45 GMT -6
Bruce, if you're using Linux (like I am) then it's pretty easy to download the audio parts from Youtube using this Python library in safe manner free of malware: yt-dl.org/Being a Python library it works on Mac and Windows as well, but it is not easy if you are not used to programming or using command-line tools. I don't mind helping downloading some backing tracks that way. Just let me know which ones. Joachim, I am on a Mac computer. I am NOT used to programming, and consider my computer skills to be pretty rudimentary. I do remember the command line - from MS-DOS! Guess I'm really showing my age. That guy who's BT I had posted above has BT's for 17 of the songs from Total Rock Guitar, and if you wouldn't mind, I'd love to have mp3's of them. Of course, there is absolutely no urgency about this - I don't see getting to this until after I'm retired. They are in a Playlist "Troy Stetina - Total Rock Guitar" on his main YT page: www.youtube.com/user/Flamenco096/playlistsI don't even know what a Python library is (but I'm going to Google it when I get done with this). |
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 9, 2021 17:05:06 GMT -6
My report back after reading about Python libraries is that I'm not sure I'm much more knowledgeable than I was before I read about them...
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Post by joachim on Apr 10, 2021 0:02:50 GMT -6
I'll try to get it working over the weekend and share the MP3s via Google Drive.
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Post by joachim on Apr 10, 2021 9:43:42 GMT -6
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 10, 2021 10:20:59 GMT -6
Thanks a million, Joachim. Worked like a charm, and I was able to download them all! Having tried making BT's for R&BYCU, I can appreciate the work that goes into making these, and trying to capture some of the nuances of the tune (drum patterns and fills, bass runs, cymbal hits, etc) - and these are just drums and bass. Imagine if you were trying to copy other instruments (keyboards, horns).
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 11, 2021 7:08:42 GMT -6
Joachim, I don't want to seem like a PITA, but he just posted an 18th BT from Total Rock Guitar, and if you find the time and wouldn't mind, I'd love to get that one, too... Here's a link: |
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Post by joachim on Apr 11, 2021 7:59:59 GMT -6
It's no trouble at all. The additional track is in the same Google Drive folder.
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Post by bluesbruce on Apr 11, 2021 8:58:20 GMT -6
It's no trouble at all. The additional track is in the same Google Drive folder. Thanks again! There are actually 4 more tunes in this book, and it looks like he's been posting these periodically since December, 2019, so I may be hitting you up again in the future. I hope I can eventually make it this far in the book. |
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Post by Marc on Apr 11, 2021 10:57:11 GMT -6
That book is 20 years old and all the guitar work was done on a Line6 POD. It's kind of a agent of the times. Back then I don't think we minded the bleeding tracks and such but today it's unacceptable.
I posted a while back about a software program that isolates tracks called spleeter. It's what I used for making backing tracks to practice too. It's not perfect but does the job most of the time. Some times it can be wobbally.
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