Great opportunity for Queen fans

[Chris C]

Hi all,

I'm not sure how much longer the files will be available for download but there's a remix contest going on which provides everybody with the chance to download 9 original tracks from the Queen recording of the song Don't Stop me Now.

Remix Queen

I just downloaded the 9 tracks (bass, backing and lead vocals, kick, snare, etc) and dropped them into Pro Tools to have a fiddle around, and I haven't managed to get my jaw off the floor yet. What amazing vocals, and what a rare treat for a hobby recorder like me to get a taste of what the real deal looks and sounds like.

The 9 tracks are 36 meg each so a fair chunk to download altogether, but what a treat to have a piece of history like that to enjoy and experiment with.

Cheers,

Chris

[Rocket Dog]

Chris

Thank you so much for this link. I have goose bumps all over listening to this. I have downloaded them into Logic and cannot believe what I'm hearing! What a piece of history this is.

Thanks

[Chris C]

Glad you enjoyed them Rocket Dog. I certainly did.

I put them into a Pro Tools project and took them round to a friend's studio this morning and conned him slightly by asking if he could show me how to tidy up one of my early song efforts. I told him he'd probably notice quite an improvement in my vocals since last time he heard them.....

So he walked me through various ways to prepare and set up a project properly, while I waited increasingly impatiently for him to hit the play button...

Then he demonstrated something by soloing the kick drum... which doesn't give anything away. After about ten minutes he finally played the lead vocal track and twigged what was going on. But to my considerable astonishment he then proceeded to apply a variety of massages, using some very impressive plug-ins, and considerably improved the sound quality of the bass track and some of the drum tracks.

As he went through the process he explained what some of the possibilities were and what the pros and cons of the decisions might be, and so on. I learned a lot about recording and mixing in general, and about how one might go about making some of the mixing decisions. We just scratched the surface, but it was absolutely fascinating.

All in all, it was a great lesson, and a real treat to be able to use such terrific material for the lesson. I must admit I'd not thought about how long ago they were recorded and it hadn't occurred to me that some aspects of certain tracks might actually be improvable using modern techniques. He didn't touch Freddie's vocals though, I guess some things are still sacred!

Cheers,

Chris

[Rocket Dog]

He didn't touch Freddie's vocals though, I guess some things are still sacred!

Yes, I guess that's best alone

[jwmartin]

This is great, thanks for posting. I pulled them up in Reaper and listened to each solo track. Finding stuff like this helps me record my own stuff because I can see that they aren't recording as hot as I usually do. When you listen to one track you are recording, it sounds too quiet.

I listened to some of the remixes on the web site. A lot of them are changing the song quite a bit. I'd like to just do a straight mix and see what I can come up with.

[boxboy]

Thanks, Chris. Very instructive.
So these are called 'stem' files. I'd never heard that term before and went googling:

some people say they're submixes of track elements and some say they are individual mic'd tracks. People on either side of the debate seem to drop the gloves and start name calling in no time.

I'm inclined to think the term could include submixes. In this case the 'kit' stem is a combo of toms and hi hat/cymbals and it seems those would have been mic'd separately and then mixed to this state.

Does anyone know for sure?

[Chris C]

So these are called 'stem' files. I'd never heard that term before and went googling:

some people say they're submixes of track elements and some say they are individual mic'd tracks. People on either side of the debate seem to drop the gloves and start name calling in no time.

Hi Don,

Sadly, that kind of nerdy headbutting doesn't seem uncommon in the audio world...

I asked my friend what they were about and he said that they just represented a stage in the recording and mixing - as you suggested. All the early basic work would probably be done by one engineer (or crew), and then they'd be passed on to the next level of guru for their additional final magic and mixing, sometimes even to a different studio.

I'm inclined to think the term could include submixes. In this case the 'kit' stem is a combo of toms and hi hat/cymbals and it seems those would have been mic'd separately and then mixed to this state.

That's what my friend said too. He said that the track of backing vocals alone would be made of of many individually mic'ed takes, and could also include all kinds of doubling or different treatments of the various takes. That's very obviously the case with both the backing vocals and the kit tracks here.

Many terms aren't really set in stone and get used differently depending on who you talk to, but in this case it quite clearly means tracks that have had a stack of early work done. They're not just raw combinations of sub-mix takes either, they've had already had some other work done on them. What intrigued me was that, for my friend with studio experience, it wasn't just a matter of potentially adding different instruments or replaying or re-arranging sectuons, he was able to make really obvious changes just by massaging the tracks that were already there. Fascinating stuff.

Cheers,

Chris

[Chris C]

People on either side of the debate seem to drop the gloves and start name calling in no time.

Before there was even such a thing as IT, there were "Audio buffs". They were (and still are) one of the original intensely geeky groups, with an extremely complex world of sound and electronics to explore and argue about.... Then along came our modern world of IT with its programming languages and protocols, insanely complex hardware and software interactions, and a whole new army of incomprehensible geekery.

Put the two together and you get the brave new world of computer audio. For outsiders, it's a marriage made in hell. A special kind of nightmare for us ordinary mortals to try and navigate. Two sets of maniacs merged into one terrible writhing mass.. Just peeping over the rim into the fiery pits below can cause you to lose all reason. Don't expect to find anything as dull and simple as agreement on issues...

Chris

[boxboy]

Great explanation Chris. Thanks to both you and your friend.
I only wade into the odd audio forum and each time I do, I make sure to wear a crash helmet.