called Roxy Swain

we're almost done tracking our album

this is an almost final mix (not mastered yet) of one of the songs from our debut

http://www.myspace.com/roxyswain

any feedback would be greatly appreciated

Its pretty slick. The voice grew on me a little as the track went on.

Rachael has a helluva voice.
Amazing, really.

Rachel says thanks Todd

She knows what I think.
And, please pardon my spelling.

If she has a helluva voice, she needs to show it. Sounds to me like she's holding back on a lot of it.

When you initially said slick, did you mean a synonym for "overproduced" or a synonym for "cool".

Thanks for listening...really appreciate any feedback positive or negative. I wrote this as a straight forward power pop song and I'm also a very vocally-challenged singer, so my instincts were to underwrite the vocal part on this tune. Working with someone in my own band who can actually sing is a totally new thing for me.

There's at least one ballad on the album that I'm really hoping will showcase her vocals a lot more effectively than this song.

another power pop band.

yes.

I do think the music is a little overproduced, yeah, but that may be a stylistic thing between you and me moreso than a complaint. To wit, I think that sonically, it does sound good and well mixed...just a little too antiseptic for me.

And I can tell that the singer is talented, it just sounds to me like she's holding back some which may be what you were looking for, not sure.

Excellent. It's cool, I know this is not exactly your cup of tea from what I know of your music tastes. I really do appreciate the constructive comments.

Yeah, I'd agree. I bet this song would really swing live with a slight increase in urgency and tempo.

that sounds pretty good. and yes, she could sound a bit less relaxed in the mix. but what can I say, you are miles ahead of my own mixing efforts...

The song is pretty good.
Pump up the guitar and bass volumes a bit.

I dig her voice, but it seems like she is struggling for a balance between relaxing and letting it really rip. She should do 1 or the other and maybe that comes across better on other tracks on the album.

I think the whole thing sounds a little restrained but I like the tempo. However, At some point in the song the vocals and the guitars need to let loose.

Also, I think she could be a good singer but she needs to find her own voice apart from what every female lead singer in indiedom sounds like today. I can tell she wants to, but then she drops back into Feist territory (not necessarily bad but it's ubiquitous at his point)

Tell her to live a little and then re-record the vocals.

An all-nighter in a new town, preferably, snort something peppy to get her chain-smoking, then wake her up early, two bloody marys, and get her to sing.

Just ain't got enough soul as it is.

I'm not being deliberately mean here but the track sounds like it was made by 9 to 5 wage slaves.

Where is the passion, the excitement, the emotion, the sense that the people involved in making this were having a good time? It's called 'Dressed to Kill' so how come its sounds about as sexually alluring as a cob webbed maiden aunt?

The 'hooks' are fairly timid, I don't like the rhythm guitar at the beginning and generally its bland and kinda sounds like a demo version of the theme tune of a Nickelodeon sit-com about a 14 year old girl and her incredibly sanitized suburban 'I'm so nice' life involving other 14 year old girls, 14 year old boys and her 'wacky', comedy out-of-touch parents.

So yeah, 08:26am in the morning and already I've stomped all over someone's feelings. Great start to the day!

Ummnnnyea, kinda gotta agree. Not my preferred genre. The song is not so bad. It needs to be reworked and sound a little more spontaneous, urgent or capture something that's not there now. I know pretty vague.

I can certainly address some things listed here, like making the vocals sound more passionate (which was also addressed earlier)...but to address all the things you're criticizing here...short of rewriting and then rerecording the song I'm not sure what you expect me to do

Personally speaking, the song is actually executed exactly the way I wanted it to be, as-is. I've almost never had that experience with my own music, because usually I don't play the guitar as well as I would've liked or the vocals are a bloody mess.

I'm not sure I'll change very much, but it's certainly interesting to hear all the takes. Thanks everyone!

But seriously, who do you see listening to this? Because if it isn't the market Konstantinl alluded to, you're going to be disappointed.

you know, the same people that like uneventful rock music.

This is indie rock, so the less people you make music for the better.

I learned a long time ago that you can't please everyone, and so it's best that you make a record that you're ultimately satisfied with, and hopefully others are too. Ultimately, I have to live with this. If that means I'm a 14 year old girl who watches Nickelodeon, so be it

if that's who this is geared towards, fair play.

You always have to be satisfied with your efforts, but at the same when 10 people tell you basically the same thing, you might want to consider it because they're probably on to something.