5 Best Audio Editing Apps?

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Adobe Audition Timeline

Lifehacker recently ran a survey trying to find the 5 best audio editing tools, and it turned up some interesting and surprising choices. Granted, Lifehacker is not a site with a core audience of audio professionals, but it's still interesting to see exactly what computer literate people consider when it comes to their audio editor of choice. So here we go:

1. Audacity (56% of the votes) - I can see why this was chosen since it's a fairly powerful audio app and the price is right (free). Plus, it's cross platform.

2. Adobe Audition (14%) - I think that a lot of people use this because it's included as part of the Adobe Creative Suite.

3. Avid Pro Tools (10%) - The big daddy in the pro world, Pro Tools has dominated music, film and broadcast for the last decade. If you're going to be a real-world pro, use anything else at your own risk.

4. Reaper (10%) - Here's a DAW that's coming on strong. The price is only $60, and so many people rave about it that I can see it taking over as the top dog if Pro Tools should ever falter.

5. Ableton Live (10%) - If you're making or working with electronic music, then Ableton Live is the center of your universe. If electronic music isn't on your radar screen, then probably neither is Live.

There was also honorable mention for Goldwave, which I wasn't even aware of, and Soundforge, which as noted in a previous blog, is coming to the Mac soon after a long run as a PC-only app.

So now it's your turn. Think the survey got it right? Oh, and if you decide to purchase any of the above workstations, help support this blog by starting from this link.
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The History of The Leslie Speaker

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If you love the Hammond organ as I do, then you're probably a Leslie speaker lover as well. The venerable rotating speaker system has been with us from even before the Hammond, and has taken on a life of its own when used by guitar players, electric violinists, and experimental musicians everywhere.

Here's a great short video on the history of the Leslie.



----------------------------------Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.
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KISS "Detroit Rock City" Song Analysis

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JW asked for a song analysis of "Detroit Rock City," the third single from KISS's hit album Destroyer. Although the song didn’t initially go anywhere on the charts except in Detroit, it eventually caught fire as the B-side of the single “Beth” during a release a year later. Today, "Detroit Rock City" is still a KISS concert favorite, while "Beth" is.........that KISS song with strings. Like with all song analysis, we'll look at the song form, the arrangement, the sound and the production.

THE SONG"Detroit Rock City" is basically a simple song based around a verse and hooky chorus, but is skillfully put together both to add some length and some interest. The song form looks like this:

intro ➞ verse ➞ chorus ➞ verse ➞ chorus ➞ 1/2 chorus ➞bridge ➞ verse ➞ 1/2 chorus ➞ solo ➞ chorus ➞ verse ➞ chorus
The lyrics tell a story and rhyme where they have to. They’re not too clever but they never seem forced in rhyme or cadence.

THE ARRANGEMENT"Detroit Rock City" is cleverly arranged to make it more interesting. The intro is a combination of a harmony guitar line played with the bass leading into the chord progression of the chorus. When the vocal enters you hear the basic instrumentation of the band with the drums playing a double time feel, the bass playing a counter line, and both guitars panned left and right and playing power chords.

During chorus, the lead vocal sings in the holes left by the background vocals harmony (quite the opposite of most songs), while the guitar power chords are augmented by a low octave piano and at the end, a reprise of the guitar intro in the left channel. What’s different from most hit songs is that both the verses and chorus are mostly identical in instrumentation throughout the song, without adding or subtracting any instruments with one exception towards the end of the song.The second chorus changes in that it’s a half-chorus vocally, then modulates up a whole step to act as a bridge with the same guitar figure playing over it, then drops back down and ends with the chords to the chorus.

After the next verse, there’s another half chorus, then everything is muted except the drums for 4 bars, then a lead guitar line plays 4 bars, which is joined by a harmony guitar for the next 4 bars. When the next chorus plays, a third harmony guitar is added and only the hook of “Gotta lose your mind in Detroit rock city” is sung in harmony.

The next chorus has the first half vocals, then a 4 bar hole with a drum fill at the end, back into the chorus with the harmony lead line playing on the right side to the hard ending with a high guitar and low piano note.

• The Foundation: drums

• The Rhythm: bass

• The Pad: power chord guitars

• The Lead: lead vocal, guitar line in bridge

• The Fills: background vocals in the chorus

THE SOUNDThe lead vocal is doubled, but singer Paul Stanley does a great job because the double is so close to the lead vocal that it almost doesn't sound like a double at all. The vocal also has a short regenerated delay and very bright long reverb on it. The sound is state of the art for that period in time (1976). Stanley has a pretty dynamic voice, and you can sometimes hear the compressor flattening it out as a result, but it doesn't sound too bad in the track. When you're listening, check out how apparent the vocal double becomes in the chorus at around 2:10.

Both the drums (especially the toms) and the lead guitar lines have a long reverb on them, probably the same on as on the vocal.
THE PRODUCTION“Detroit Rock City” is a great production job by Ezrin, not for how good it is but for how bad it could have been. Just about all the instrumental parts are shaky. They’re pretty good, but they’re not precise in the articulations, and certainly not as good as the band would become in later years. As a result of the playing, the song just doesn’t have much of a groove, although everything is in time. Still, several million kids at the time could care less, and loved the song anyway. Chalk that all up to Bob Ezrin's most excellent production.

----------------------------------Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.
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What To Change When Things Don't Sound Right

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Recording is an interesting business in that each situation is unique. When it comes to music, the song, the arrangement, the players, the performances, the signal chain, and the acoustic environment all vary in one way or another each and every session.

Because of this uniqueness, there are times when you're recording when you find that a part doesn't fit well in a track, or fits too well where it can't be distinguished. Here's a list of things to try in order of importance the next time you run in to either situation.

• Change the source (the instrument you are miking) 

• Change the mic placement 

• Change the placement in the room 

• Change the mic 

• Change the mic preamplifier 

• Change the mount of compression and/or limiting (from none to a lot) 

• Change the room (the actual room you are recording in) 

• Change the musician 

• Come back and try it another day

Take notice that nowhere one there is there mention of equalization. Unless you have a lot of experience, it's best to follow the above points before you ever reach for an EQ knob. You'll be surprised how much better things can sound.

----------------------------------Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.
You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.
Don't forget to check out my Music 3.0 blog for tips and tricks on navigating social media and the new music business.

New Music Gear Monday: Neil Young's Pono Music Service

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Many of you might not have heard that music icon Neil Young gave a sneak peak of something that might turn out to be really cool last week on David Letterman's show (see the video below). Neil has railed for years against the poor quality of MP3s, the iTunes Store and streaming music, and has now put his money where his mouth was with the new Pono music service.

We don't know all that much about Pono, but here's what we do know:

• All the files in the service are at 192kHz/24 bit.

• There's a new player that goes with it, similar to an iPod, but with much higher quality digital to audio convertors (see the graphic on the left).

• The Pono player has two headphone jacks, presumably for sharing.

• Dolby and Meridian are involved, presumably to license the Meridian Lossless Packing (MLP) codec to Pono to decrease those big 192k files to about half their size.

The major labels are already on board (with Warner Music licensing their 8,000 album catalog to Pono) and the release is scheduled for sometime in 2013.

It appears that this is a download service, but a major question is how consumers will deal with the long download times of such a huge hi-res audio file. Even if MLP encoding is used, we're still talking about a file much more than twice as large as a regular CD file at 44.1kHz/16bit. According to one account, when asked the question Young replied, "That's what overnight is for." That may be so, but in this new Music 3.0 world of instant gratification, I don't think that will cut it for most of the potential audience.

That said, you have to love that we may be getting a new hi-res audio format that may actually have a shot at catching on. For more on the industry implications of Pono, check out today's post on my Music 3.0 blog.



----------------------------------Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.
You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.
Don't forget to check out my Music 3.0 blog for tips and tricks on navigating social media and the new music business.

Lady Gaga "Born This Way Ball" 2013 Tour

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Lady GaGa concert (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Lady Gaga has announced her world tour "Born This Way Ball" starting out in the United Kingdom. The tour will take her to Ireland, Netherlands, France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Mexico, Brazil, Canada and finally the United States. The tour is promoting her Album "Born This Way", which had many hit singles such as 'Marry The Night', 'Judas', 'The Edge of Glory' and many other great songs. The tour will be coming to Canada and the United States starting in Vancouver at the Rogers Arena on January 11, 2013. The following is a schedule of the Lady Gaga 2013 tour for the United States and Canada.

Jan. 11, 2013    Rogers Arena             Vancouver, Canada
Jan. 14, 2013    Tacoma Dome              Tacoma, WA
Jan. 17, 2013    HP Pavilion              San Jose, CA
Jan. 20, 2013    Staples Center           Los Angeles, CA
Jan. 23, 2013    US Airways Center        Phoenix, AZ
Jan. 25, 2013    MGM Grand Garden Arena   Las Vegas, NV
Jan. 29, 2013    American Airlines Center Dallas, TX
Jan. 31, 2013    Toyota Center            Houston, TX
Feb. 02, 2013    Scottrade Center         Saint Louis, MO
Feb. 04, 2013    Sprint Center            Kansas City, MO
Feb. 06, 2013    Xcel Energy Center       Saint Paul, MN
Feb. 08, 2013    Air Canada Centre        Toronto, Canada
Feb. 11, 2013    Centre Bell              Montreal, Canada
Feb. 13, 2013    United Center            Chicago, IL
Feb. 16, 2013    Palace of Auburn Hills   Auburn Hills, MI
Feb. 19, 2013    Wells Fargo Center       Philadelphia, PA
Feb. 22, 2013    Madison Square Garden    New York, NY
Feb. 25, 2013    Verizon Center           Washington, DC
Feb. 27, 2013    TD Garden                Boston, MA
Mar. 02, 2013    Boardwalk Hall Arena     Atlantic City, NJ
Mar. 06, 2013    Barclays Center          Brooklyn, NY
Mar. 10, 2013    Bridgestone Arena        Nashville, TN
Mar. 11, 2013    Philips Arena            Atlanta, GA
Mar. 13, 2013    Tampa Bay Times Forum    Tampa, FL
Mar. 15, 2013    BankAtlantic Center      Sunrise, FL
Mar. 16, 2013    American Airlines Arena  Miami, FL

2012 MTV Video Music Awards

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One Direction (Photo credit: Eva Rinaldi Celebrity and Live Music Photographer)

Thursday night at the Video Music Awards Show, One Direction stole the night with three awards. The British Boy Band won the Best New Artist award, the Best Pop Video Award and the Most Share-Worthy Video Award. The Host of the show, Kevin Hart, did mention the friction between Brown and Drake in his opening monologue, making it a little uneasy for some. All in all, the night went well. Here is a list of the VMA Awards winners:

Video of the Year:  Rihanna, "We Found Love"
Best New Artist:   One Direction, "What Makes You Beautiful"
Best Pop Video:    One Direction, "What Makes You Beautiful"
Most share-Worthy Video: One Direction, "What Makes You Beautiful"
Best Hip-Hop Video:  Drake feat. Lil Wayne, "HYFR" (NSFW lyrics)
Best Male Video:   Chris Brown, "Turn Up The Music"
Best Female Video:   Nicki Minaj, "Starships"
Best Rock Video:   Coldplay, "Paradise"
Best Electronic Dance Music Video:  Calvin Harris, "Feel So Close"
Best Video With a Message:   Demi Lovato, "Skyscraper"
Best Art Direction:   Katy Perry, "Wide Awake"
Best Choreography:   Chris Brown, "Turn Up The Music"
Best Cinematography: M.I.A., "Bad Girls"
Best Editing:   Beyonce, "Countdown"
Best Visual Effects:  Skrillex, "First of the Year(Equinox)"
Best Direction:   M.I.A. "Bad Girls"

Check out tour information for One Direction's upcoming 2013 tour.