Case Study 2

For case study 2, l decided to investigate an 80's Christian Band called Stryker. Stryker is an excellent band for me to use as a case study. l can use the production values and the audio engineering examples to learn from, and apply that knowledge into the main project artist that Phil and l are recording. The artist's name is Nick J Holmers. Nick is a Christian artist who is heavily influenced by the Christian artists of the '80s. One of Nick's songs is titled Thank You. It's a tribute to his faith in Christianity and his personal connection to his faith. The song reference I chose is titled "I Believe In You."

Overall sound

This song is right up there with the trends of the 80’s big rock ballads. The puffy hair and spandex outfits that were all part of the show for the heavy metal hard rockers in the genre aesthetic style. This ballad has all the classic trimmings of the era with the sonic values being tailored to create a hit.

There was a huge controversy within the Christian faithful who dismissed the virtue of the song at the time, because of the heavy metal presents. They questioned the band morals and social consciousness towards their faith in Christianity.

I Believe In You – Rock Ballad

Tempo 78 per Crotchet note

4/4-time signature

Key – E Major

The guitars and bass guitar have lowered their instrument tuning by a semitone from the stock standard tuning. This tuning technique gives the instruments a fuller sonic sound and it also allows the vocalists in the band more vocal range and depth in their vocal tonality.

Production

· Michael Lloyd and Stryper - Producers

· Dan Nebanzal and Carmine Rubino - Engineers

Intro

It starts off with a piano and a synthesizer. The piano sounds like a grand piano as it plays an introduction melody scale runs and is complemented with chords. The synthesizer supporting the piano with an airy sonic sound. It gives the impression we are listening to a ballad song straight off the cuff.

The panned instruments sound slightly stereo. The piano is raised a little higher in volume in the right speaker with the synth sitting just underneath and in the left speaker, they have the synth mixed slightly higher than the piano. This suggests they were aiming for a stereo intro that would allow the vocals to be placed in the phantom centre of the mix.

Verse 1

The piano continues with the classic grand piano sound. It also sounds as if the piano player is using the sustain pedal to embellish or color the chords just a fraction, as he plays the melody over the top. great classic 80’s piano sound. It has a rich natural quality tonality to it.

The synth/ keyboard player is still using the airy sound, which l feel is orchestral sounding, and in the second half of the verse they bring in another synth sound. It sounds like a brass quartet is being played on the synth. The synth brass is sitting about the same level as the synth airy sound.

The panning of the instruments has continued through the intro into the verse. The tonality of the instrumentation hasn’t changed.

The singer’s vocals sound very clean, l can’t hear a great deal of vocal processing being added to the texture of his vocal, except for reverb and slight delay to give the vocal a warm natural sound. The vocals have been placed in phantom centre and sits basically in front of the instruments.

The melody structure of the song is gradually raising to lead into the chorus and gives a feel of the melody going somewhere. Just love the way they bring some energy at the end of the verse to introduce the chorus and let’s not forget the classic drum roll to give it some punch.

The singer’s vocals sound very clean, l can’t hear a great deal of vocal processing being added to the texture of his vocal, except for reverb and slight delay to give the vocal a warm natural sound. The vocals have been placed in the phantom centre and sits basically in front of the instruments. peaker and transfers to the left-hand speaker to complete the drum roll into the chorus. The chart below is a general guide to how they divided the drum frequencies to achieve their sound.

I found this chart helpful in getting a general knowledge on frequencies for a drum kit. They also have sound references on the website, were you can compare the average drums on this site to the sound of a drum kit in a song you are listening too. Link below

https://www.musical-u.com/learn/percussion-frequencies-part-1-drums/

Chorus

Sound & Level

The drums sound full of energy and the player is playing with commitment. The kick still has a full thick thud frequency sound to it. The snare sounds as if they are using the springs on the bottom of the snare have been tightened to bring out the treble frequency which gives it a snappy sound.

The drums overall have a tight treble sound and yet they still have full tonal sound about the kit. Just love the 80’s ballad drum kit sound. They’re added slight reverb to give it some warmth and presents in the song. I think the drums have been positioned to sit slightly under the bass guitar for the chorus mix, but when the drummer plays a roll, they mix the kit a little bit higher to add some dynamics into the song.

The bass guitar sounds full and has a round tonality that complements the sound of the kick. (At this stage I’m thinking the mastering engineers has added treble to give the song some sparkle. It defiantly has an 80’s ballad vibe about the sound.) When the bass guitarist plays the low note, the notes sound full but not booming and has its own pocket in the mix.

The piano is sitting in the background as more of a filler, rather than the main instrument. They haven’t adjusted any of the sonic tonality of the piano, all they have done is pulled it down in the volume mixing level.

The synth is still playing an airy sound, l wonder if it’s meant to represent an orchestra as it seems to change into a string sound like an orchestra. I also observed that the synth is covering the mid to mid-high frequencies which help support the vocal sound. They have placed the synth level a little high than the vocals in some parts of the chorus.

The rhythm guitarist sound is a typical 80’s full distortion sound that was popular in the day. It sounds very muddy and the tonality is very middle sounding. They have mixed the guitar level between the synth and drums. Since the guitar is being used as a support filler instrument to complete the sound, it sort of gets lost in the mix a little. I think they did this a lot with distorted guitars, to make them sound more pop than metal for the mainstream market.

The chart below shows that distortion on a guitar has a different harmonic frequency width to the clean sounding guitar. It’s amazing how effect pedals can alter the sonic values of an instrument.

The vocals have a high tonality sound about them and because the vocals sound high, it seems that they have turned down the vocal a fraction in the mix when he gets up into the high vocal register. I think by putting the vocals in the phantom centre with the instruments around the vocals that this gives a little leeway without losing the vocals in the mix.

Panning

The drum kit is basically panned to the right speaker slightly, the exception is the toms, they are panned centre, right to left, to give the illusion of sitting in front of a drum kit. I really like the way the drum kit has been slightly panned to give it a more dynamic effect.

The kick has been panned slightly to the right speaker which has the bass guitar in the same neighbourhood, but to the left. The snare is panned a little further to the right speaker than the kick drum is. This gives the rhythm section (drums and bass guitar)some space to breathe in the mix and also stops the kick and bass guitar from canceling each other out due to frequency similarities. At the same time the bass guitar player can let his strings sustain which gives the bass sound a better feel without interfering with the drummer. (Defiantly will be trying this technique with some of Nick’s songs we are recording at the moment.) This is probably just a rough guess on how they have panned the drums and bass guitar. Kick – 25% to the right, Bass guitar 25% to the left and snare 50% to the right.

The guitar is sitting slightly to the left side of the speaker and is being used also as an ambience instrument at this point. I think they have panned the bass guitar and rhythm guitar to the left speaker to help give the instruments some frequency space.

The synth seems to be sitting in the phantom centre region of the mix, but a little wider spread so it doesn’t crowd the vocals

They never alter the singers vocal panning; it remains in the phantom centre position. They are creating a full sound by not panning instruments not too far from the phantom centre. Just enough to create a stereo effect.

So recapping, on the panning so far for the chorus, I think that the panning positions are basically set like this for the rest of the mix in the song. All the frequencies are set for the instruments and now it’s raising the volume levels to create the vibe of the song progresses through the song composition structure with synth ambience.

Bridge

In the bridge, they raise the guitarist volume level up to take advantage of the guitarist playing quaver down rhythm strokes, which gives the song a fuller dramatic sound and helps support the vocal lyrics. The guitar sound hasn’t changed in tonality, but it has changed with the strings being muted to give it a different texture and add some dynamics.

The synth has now changed from the airy orchestral sound into the orchestra string sound. This change seems to add heaps of drama support for the vocalist to deliver the lyric content. By these two instruments changing their feel and sonic texture for this part of the song, they have now opened the door to resolve the tension of energy they have created and prepare to go into the chorus.

The bass guitar and drums are now mixed under the guitar and the vocals have been bought up to sit just in front of the guitar and synth.

2 Choruses

They use a synth orchestra string sound to modulate to another key. The mixing volume level hasn’t changed a great deal. Now they bring in backing vocals to bring the song to a crescendo and the singer alters the melody structure by keeping some parts of the chorus up high. The harmonies sound very similar to what Reo Speedwagon were using in the 80’s for their hit songs. The vocal harmonies take it from ‘plain Jane’ to sophistication and showing how much talent they really have.

Outro

Outro finishes the way it started, with piano, synth, and vocals. This time they bring the synth volume level right down in the mix, so the vocal and piano are featured. It’s a great 80’s pop metal ballad.

Conclusion

This song has given me ideas on how to approach the production and mixing for Phil and my main project (Nick’s songs). I really like the way they created a full sound for all of the

instruments and the way they kept the vocals sounding clean and natural with minimum effects. The mix complemented the genre style of the music and they ticked all of the aesthetic boxes that created the sonic audio production.

This producers and audio engineering team knew exactly what they wanted to achieve for the band. ‘we are going to create us a hit’.

Reference:

Case, A. U. (n.d.). Recordingology the study of recording - Guitars. Retrieved March 24, 2020, from http://recordingology.com/in-the-studio/guitars/

Koulakos, F. (2017, February 22). Percussion Frequencies Part 1 - Drums. Retrieved March 24, 2020, from https://www.musical-u.com/learn/percussion-frequencies-part-1-drums/