jlsc-ifc6-reviewer-03-Markus

ARTIST & SONG	COMMENTS
01-Melina S Troubles by Alicia Keys	Wow, what a great voice! A very interesting "instrumentation", which I enjoy very much. You really made this song your own. Congratulations! The only constructive critique I am able to give is that sometimes it is hard to distinguish the "different voices". Maybe it is just a matter of mixing or maybe the recording levels were not ideally set. But beside that, a great job!
02-Nancy G In My Room by Brian Wilson	What a beautiful interpretation of this song which I did not know before. Thanks for introducing it to me! I wonder how to interpret the lyrics. I think one could read them that someone tells about a private, secret place where he finds some comfort. But if you read the words like coming from someone who is just a prisoner in this room and can not leave it, the lyric's meaning becomes totally different... Your gently sad, beautiful singing makes me think that my latter interpretation is the one the song was meant to have. But I might be totally wrong.
04-James I Can't Get Next to You By The Temptations	Excellent performance, excellent recording, great song, great interpretation. I love the off beat phrases at the end. You really made this song your own!
05-Iggy Deramer by The Beatles	I did not hear the original too often, but I think your performance comes very close to the original. I would prefer the level of your voice to be higher. Sometimes it is slightly masked by the instrumental tracks. And you don't need to hide your singing, which is really good!
06-Solpig Buona Sera by Louis Prima	Thanks for reminding me of Italy with that beautiful song! I love your voice. In two weeks I will be in Triest (northern Italy) for two days. And I think when I will go to the sea after work, I will have "your" song in mind.
07-Kris S Wonderwall by Oasis	Very close to the original but though a little different. I like the effects you put on the acoustic guitar. A good song and a good interpretation.
08-Tim W Nowhere man by The Beatles	Your recording shows what it means to "play" music! To play is always fun and you guys have a lot of it. I love your very good live performance! I even love the little mistakes and laughters during the song, which do not disturb! They just make it alive! Sometimes the clean and all to perfect recordings of modern music industry do not deliver such a feeling. Thanks for sharing this with us!
09-Nigel Happier Than the Morning Sun by Stevie Wonder	Hey, you're a great singer with a beautiful voice! Your arrangement of that song is excellent. The less instruments one uses the more he has to know about the different possibilities to use them. And the way you used your guitar I liked very much. Sometimes strumming, sometimes picking... Great Job on a beautiful song!
10-EED (Emily) Every Rose Has Its Thorn by Poison	You really made your own version of that song. I like the instrumentation, especially the accordion. It delivers a very relaxing mood. Your voice sounds comfortable most time, too. Though in the lowest and the higher registers it gets a little thin and there it seems to me you're loosing the pitch sometimes. But overall a very nice cover! I know we said not to make comments on the quality of recording, but as I have seen in the forum that you are looking for some new equipment, I want to give some hints: It is not only the price of a microphone which makes a good recording quality. Even with most expensive mics, you can get the hiss on your recording when the recording level is not set correctly. Also the distance to the mic is very important. The further you are away from it the more you are going to record the "room" you are in. It seems that your mic was realtively far away from you and your instruments in your recording so that you recorded a lot of the natural reverberation of your (living?) room. In studios (most times in home studios, too) you normally don't want to get the studio's room-reverberation into your recording. Therefore, you try to damp all wall reflexions and do your recordings in the near field of the mic (as close as possible). To get then a natural sound, you would then do some post processing by adding an artificial room signal. This is done by sending the clean signal through a reverb an then mixing the clean and the wet (reverb output) signal together. Only in natural good sounding rooms (like concert halls or churges) you would take advantage of the natural room reverberation and put your mic further away from your instruments. If you once have chosen the distance to your mic, you have to adjust the recording level so that you're high above the quantisation noise of your recording device and that the loudest sections will not blast the device. I hope this thoughts can help a little bit and I didn't sound too much like a teacher :)
11-David T Day Tripper by John Lennon & Paul McCartney	Very close to the original but though different. First I missed the singing. But after hearing your version several times, I felt that the special thing on it is your synth-voice. Really a well done recover o the original version. I loved the fresh sounding drums (specially the tambourine). Great job!
12-Dave C Autumn Leaves by Joseph Kosma & Jacques Prévert	A beautiful jazz standard that you have chosen. Is that arrangement yours? That is what I really liked about it. It sounds that it was a little too difficult to play for you. I think the staccato style the whole song through was not really your intention. But don't mind, playing that song again and again will help you to let your guitar "sing" some beautiful legato phrases :)
13-Hoaby Just A Little by The Beau Brummels	Hey, great song to do for you. Reminded me to some 60's stuff. I liked the drums. They sounded like really beeing played (not like loops or a drum machine). And this goes for the whole recordig. Did you do this live with a band? Well I liked the song very much and your performance,too! Thanks for introducing a fine song to me, which I've heard never before!
14-Todd Joker by Steve Miller	Wow, you put a lot of time and work into this. Your arrangment is very creative. The beginning is so beautiful! The tempo change after the first verse is great. I think I love your version of the song more than the original. Maybe sometimes effects are used a little bit too much. But overall I enjoyed your song very, very much!
15-Meikow You Won't See Me by The Beatles	Great work on the guitars and a really good arrangment! Although I was a little confused about your slightly changes to the Beatles' melody and chords. In the verse, I was missing the strong major chord on the II, which would cause some melody notes to be raised by a half-step. But one could say you made your very own version of this song. And of course it was a very good one!
16-Hazelglow Dreams of Fast Cars by an amalgam of Tracy Chapman & Gabrielle	The fusion of the two songs created a new one, cool! I like your singing, specially the harmony parts. I did not know "dreams" before. Thanks for introducing it.