I don't wanna miss a thing (Aerosmith)

[Ronron]

Let me start this with some trivia. I LOVED the film. When it came out, I heard this song, fell in love with it, and sang it over and over again. And then I forgot about it entirely. Today, I kinda stumbled upon it, and found myself singing it, and I felt like a teen again. The song fits entirely in my range, it wasn't back then, now I truely feel like I've made some progress over what I was doing when I was 16

The song fell back in place quite quickly, so I felt like recording it for fun.

I won't put my usual " the sky is falling and it is very bad " this time, because it gets old. But I truely truely am interested in hearing what you think about it. Especially since it is my first attempt at some kind of rasp or whatever the actual name is (I'd like to know actually, since I exercised mostly creak and creaking but applying this to a song...), and I'm not entirely sure if it sounds good, and is healthy. Also, this is my first attempt at patching two tracks, cause I did the end again as the first one sounded too cheap. No effect added, because I still haven't had time to figure it out yet.

Here it is : http://dl.dropbox.com/u/14571174/I%20dont%20wanna%20miss%20a%20thing%20-%20cover.mp3

[aldertate]

sounds good, nice job

[ronws]

I do liked the creak you had. And I could better appreciate your volume. I have begun to understand the timbre of your voice. And the limitations of the mic you are using. It really is cutting out a lot. In previous times, I though you were singing to softly. Now, I realize that you are singing with volume and you have a unique timbre, which is more important than your highest note, though I know you can hit some high notes. I really wish I was there to here this live. (Easily fixed. Let me make a bunch of money so that I can afford to travel across the Big Pond (the Atlantic Ocean.) A little pitchiness here and there and I think I know how to solve it. It's from a classical viewpoint, which I am really starting to appreciate again, through the texts I have been reading. The classical approach is to develope headvoice, rather than carry a high chest voice. So, I think your occasional pitchiness (it's not rampant throughout) could be solved by approaching this from headvoice, even in your lower notes, which you do quite naturally. I know some people think that the only way to sing rock is high chest but I would disagree with that. Something else I read this evening which I think is totally spot on. There are as many methods as there are voices. The method of Enrique Caruso would not work for Luciano Pavarotti, and vice versa. And while someone else might be perfectly lovely with a high "chest" resonance, that is their peculiar voice, not every one's.

I really like how relaxed you sounded on this song. You owned it, it was yours. I want to hear more yours and try it from a head voice perspective, i.e., resonating in the head, and you will find your breath management will adjust to suit what you need. And, I just like the sound of your voice. Which is something that goes along way in music. You feel this song and it shows and that is even more important than technical accuracy.

Now, time for useless trivia. When "Armageddon" was in the process of being released, Aerosmith was on tour. When they were coming to Dallas, Texas, Steven Tyler called one of his favorite dj's at a local radio station, KZPS (92.5 FM.) And he did an on air interview that sticks in my mind to this day. His daughter, Liv Tyler, had called him and told him about a script she had just received. Ben Affleck was playing her fiance and Bruce Willis was playing her dad. And the opening scene was of Bruce Willis with a driver or one wood, lobbing golf balls off the helicopter deck of an oil rig, aiming at a Greenpeace ship. Steven's words were, "Do it! That sounds great!"

She said, sure, she would love to do it but the director is a huge Aerosmith fan and won't shut up unless she would ask him of the band could come up with a song for the movie. And that is how "Don't Want to Miss a Thing" came to be. And it has become one of Steven's favorites.

Rock on, Ronron.

[jonpall]

Pros: You have a good sense of pitch, which is probably the second most important thing for a singer. You also sing like you mean the words, which is probably THE most important thing to do for a singer. So you're off to a good start. Also, the rasp at the end was pretty cool, even though you went off pitch a bit. But it sounded like you have some ability to do rasp. Pretty cool man.

Cons: You sing WAY to soft for a song like this. You're mostly in what CVT calls neutral OR in curbing with too soft a volume to produce healthy and convincing curbing. The vocal modes curbing and overdrive would work much better for this song. If that was the only thing you'd changed, you'd be there! Because you're singing like you're trying not to wake up the neighbours, the clip doesn't sound convincing. It's better that you hear this here than people whispering behind your back if you sing this live. Right now that style of singing is not cutting it for this song. Sorry Ronron, it doesn't sound convincing simply because your holding back your energy so much. Fortunately, this problem can be fixed. Either with just the right vocal coach, the right instructional or help from people on this forum. If you want tips from me, f.ex. send me an email or MSN at j_g_thorarinsson@hotmail.com . I'd be happy to chat with you about singing.

So, even though you're not ready to do this song justice YET, don't worry, Ronron. You have two options: Either you stick to singing only songs that have very low volume and are mostly in the chest voice, OR you learn how to sing with more power. More power - without shouting - is what you need if you want to sing tough songs like this.

I think the most important thing for you now is to STOP showing us SONGS and show to us that you can produce a single note or a scale or a siren with a powerful sound - in the tenor range, since you like tenor songs so much. A few notes between E4 and E5, something like that. Let's work on helping you with THAT first and once you've found the sound you can work on singing songs with that sound.

I'd like you to start off by trying THIS method to get that sound and then we can work on putting more twang and power onto it later if you want: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0CvItiNMsA. But this is a great start. I'm sure that after you've found out how to do it, you'll be a bit suprised, like "What? So THIS is how you do this sound? Funny, it feels much different than I thought it would feel. It does take a bit of effort but in a whole different way than I thought it would be. And what a great world it would be if everyone were to go and buy jonpall's new record. Now I'm going to practise this new sound all the time. And if you're still reading this, please pick up your price at www.zombo.com (use your headphones or speakers)".

Cheers dude! Let's be in touch. You have a good voice. We just need to hear more of it and I'm absolutely sure that can and will happen in a very short time :)

[gno]

ronnron - This is a great song! Your voice is well connected between high and low and you've got a nice tone. You're hitting most the pitches correctly, and that high rasp sounds really good. This is a tough song and the fact that your range can handle this song says a lot. You've got a lot of potential. The song seems like it is not quite "in your voice" yet, evidenced by some little pitch issues here and there and some shakiness and rhythmic inaccuracies. All that will go away as you work and work on this song. I agree with jonpall that the song could use a little more "oomph". The good news is that it seems that you've been able to sing this song with a "light" registration. That's great because I think as you keep practicing this song you'll be able to learn how to add more weight.

I'd say keep at it. I don't know about you, but I'll work on songs for months or longer depending on how difficult. I've been working on a Tenor aria for over a year now. It's all a work in progress for me. That doesn't mean singing the song every day - that can be detrimental if the song is difficult. Taking breaks from a song of several days can do wonders. I'll cultivate certain exercises that help with parts of a song and work on those. So keep going - keep practicing, recording, listening, and give us another update after a month or two.

Geno

[Ronron]

Aldertate : Coming from you, I feel warm and fuzzy inside

You're better though.

Geno : You're right, the song isn't " in my voice " yet. I hadn't sung it for like... 10 years (The film was out in 1998). And back then, I didn't care about effects, trying to sound good or anything of the like, I just wanted to relate to the song and singer. There are a few songs that I want to do great justice, and have been working on them for 6+ months now. There's always something missing, it's really frustrating. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of time to devote to singing. And I sometimes do something stupid with my voice, like singing too loud and pulling chest, or trying rasp in a bad way.

If the high rasp sounds good, then I'm happy, because it didn't feel bad. It uses muscles that had been sleeping for a long time though.

ronws : Thank you. I do my best. The whole headvoice is uncharted territory. I found today that I need a bit of volume, but not too much, otherwise it's falsetto or chestpulling. I'm not too comfortable with it (and I don't like it half the time), but am willing to do things with it, because I know there can be great things done with it. And I know I carry my " normal voice " (with some adjustments) high, sometimes too high. I have no justification for this apart from ' well I do this because I can and that's what I do '. Which is a very poor justification, isn't it ?

I will try, but I will need to work on some headvoice more. I'll speak in it again and be called madam on the phone again if need be.

jonpall : I guess I will have to make my own " Tadaa this is the umpteenth curbing mixed middle high but not head mix in between voice plz helpz mez ", but prior to today, there were already 1D4+1 of them.

The truth is I've spent my whole life in Neutral. What I'm doing is loud to very loud by my standards, however skewed they are. Like up to 8 times louder than when I speak. But then I speak with very low volume and have a hard time getting understand over loud noise. And family (and even neighbours) have already made it clear they can hear me.

I've seen this video before. I've tried. I've tried googs and gugs. I've tried sirens. I've tried sad, whining, crying, the tommy ache, the headache, the omg I've punched myself in the face ache, and while it can be plaintive, it's not really it. I've tried the hold and lost my midrange, too, I've tried a lighter hold and you labelled it as neutral or curbing with too low a volume. I FEEL there's something, not too far, I step on its toes sometimes, but I can't grasp it. I've read the curbing part in the CVT's book a hundred times, listened to the sound library, did it, to hell and back, and it's STILL THAT STUPID NEUTRAL GRAAAH ! So I'm down to what I'm doing now. And playing with my voice, trying to recall what it was like when I was 15 and did not care.

I will try again, it will happen at some time, I have faith.

Anyway, I accept your invitation, and added you to msn. I'll contribute to a better world when your album is out.

In the meantime, this is how I feel :

[jonpall]

I understand that you might feel like that, but what you need to do is very simple, like I said before:

Post yourself doing simple notes or exercises or sirens and let us take a look at THAT before you go back to singing songs.

But I didn't see your MSN invitation.

[Ronron]

Sent it again, then. It starts with a syralica and ends in a hotmail.fr

As I said, I'll do it. I just need the breathing room and time to do it, which are and will be a little tricky for the next 2 years at least.

[ronws]

I should add that when I say headvoice, headvoice doesn't have to be soft. But here's a classical thing to remember. Headvoice will involve some air in the nasal cavity. In fact, one sounds more nasal trying to block off sound from the sinus. Anyway, I still think you did pretty good. And I believe you when you say that you are singing fairly loud for your voice type. Because I have begun to appreciate and understand the timbre of your voice, as best as I can hear it through your mic. As best as I can hear, your voice has a natural rasp that the mic is not catching very well. So, the next time you try some rasp, make sure it's relaxed. You've got the feel of this song, from what I can tell, but the mic is not up to the task. As I said, I wish I was there to here it live.

[ronws]

Some more trivia.

One of my favorite lines in the movie from actor Steve Buscemi. "Just think ... we're sitting on a bomb of 13 million parts, all made by the lowest bidder."

Another one from Bruce Willis describing one of his co-workers. "Bear is not too hard too find. He's the only black man in North Dakota on a Big Dog (american brand of motorcycle.)"

Captain of the shuttle Independence ... "Will you please get off the thermonuclear device!"

[jonpall]

Ronron, send me your MSN id and I'll add you. Your message doesn't show up for me.

[Ronron]

Sent you an email.

[jonpall]

I didn't get your email. You must have had it wrong.

[Ronron]

j_g_thorarinsson@hotmail.com

I copypasted this ---^--- into my dear hotmail thingy, so it should have been good

(have you tried your ... Undesirable/spam (?) mailbox ?)

[devaitis]

Great song. Hard key to sing when we talk about chorus.

My proposition is: more Twang, more self confidence!

[g0dvollie]

Too much air man. Hold your breath when you sing, like you're holding your breath underwater. I can hear your chest resonance in the sound which is good. You really need to hold back the air though, you're drying our your chords and are very pitchy. I think it will also improve your confidence by giving you "something to hold onto." I don't hear any diaphram or compression. Nice attempt, TOUGH song. When you did that "yeahhhhhhh" towards the end your chords compressed if that helps you understand compression at all. If you want to get breathy after you master the compression thing go ahead, but you have to be careful, espeiclally in the mix and high notes. You almost have to hold your breath completely when you're higher up in your register, for rock anyway Holding your breath will also make you stronger, MAKE SURE you're not holding from your throat though! It's a lower feeling of holding your breath, like at the base of the neck or the top of the chest. Good luck!

[ronws]

Ronron, do not hold your breath. That is the most g0d-awfully advice.

[jonpall]

He's talking about holding BACK the air, not stopping the airflow completely. See the other thread where you're talking about the same thing.

[Ronron]

@ g0dvollie : It took me three days to understand what you're talking about

While I totally agree on the compression thing (And believe me, I've tried everything ), while I can admit I'm pitchy (but I attribute that more to my formidable habit of chestpulling everything through unless there's a break)...

I had to fight very hard to get rid of breathiness. I can be wrong, but I think I'm mostly there. Most of the time, when air sneaks into my voice it's more a sign of " you should stop, cause you're tired " than bad support. Though it could be. I mean I try to not think about support at all and let my body handle it however it wants. It's been more succesful than all of my attempts at controlling it I'll check it out, though I'm most of the time under the feeling that, if I tried to get less air out, my voice would just stop, or distort.

Also you say there's a " yeah " that has compression... Except I remember it sounding very very thin on a take, hence the quantity of rasp put onto it. Now I'm left wondering. Is it doing some kind of annoying buzz ? Cause if that's the case, I've been avoiding it like the plague lol

*adds it to his to post list*

[jonpall]

Just sent you an email, Ronron.

[HotWheel]

RonRon, you need to put more strengthness on that cover, you need to really scream , you sound like you are trying to

but you need to do it real hard

[HotWheel]

just did a small tyler scream here just for fun

http://www.mediafire.com/file/88a2iiadi21pu11/tyler.mp3

[ronws]

Here's the original.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v626CMvM5Q

I think Ronron was closer to the original. Hotwheels, your "scream" sounded like compressed air, rather than a sung pitch, as both Steven Tyler and Ronron can do. I tried to stop myself from commenting but was powerless to do so. Let the flame begin.

[Jugulator]

Here's my cover Come on check it out: http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=10931241

[ronws]

Oh, Lord, into Thine hands do I commend my spirit. For surely, I am on the highway to Hell ...

Consign me to flames of woe. I know the evil of which I speak. I have my own parking space in Hell. I don't have to worry about my underwear burning because I am not wearing any ...

Once more, into the breach ... (thank you, Shakespeare.)

Okay, enough elipses involving the Queen's English and various liturgical and relgious connections.

First, Jugulator, you should really start your own thread for your cover of this song. This thread is about Ronron's journey through this song.

Second, you have a great voice, technically perfect in a number of ways. And, for once, you didn't sound like Klaus Meine.

That being said, your style was totally wrong for this song, in my purely personal, stylistic opinon. You sing way too thick and european for this song. Ronron, who is also european gets closer to this spirit of this song with his naturally raspy voice and is able to affect a more american accent, somehow. And I think he communicates the feeling better. Yours made me think of a lounge singer. and I don't mean that as insult, just that it was, for my redneck opinion, not quite the right feel.

I don't say this to defend or uphold Ronron in anyway. He just has "that" sound or feel. For this, and this is where I shall incur the greatest wrath from others, is a perfect example of what I mean that not every song and every voice will match. You can do some things with Scorpions and even Iron Maiden that Ronron might not be able to do, at least, just yet. And this is a case where he can do something with this Aerosmith song that is outside of your skill set. Which is not an insult. Basically, it is like comparing apples and oranges (american colloquiallism.)

In fact, it wasn't until I heard Ronron do this song that I realized, though he had the range for "Sweet Child of Mine," he really had the feel for "Don't Want to Miss a Thing," naturally, even though he doesn't really sound like Steven Tyler.

However, Jugulator, you deserve points for singing this song in your voice and I am glad that you did.