Circa Survive Band • Page 35

also the new B&C album didn't sound right to me either production wise now that I'm remembering

 

I thought Descensus sounded great, same with Light We Made

 

I get the complaints for Descensus' production. I feel like the toms really get muddled at times. It becomes really obvious to me on Only The Sun with all the fills Steve does, as well as on Nesting Dolls in the song's outro. I feel liken the guitars aren't brought to the forefront as much as they could be too. Listening to OLG and BSN (which both have their own issues) and then Descensus, you can hear how muddy the production is. Now, I don't think Yip did a bad job necessarily. It works when the band is trying to be gritty and aggressive. I think the production does the album some favors and disservices at the same time. I'm confident for LP6 though because I think Light We Made sounds good as well as other albums he's worked on since 2014/2015

 

Descensus definitely would have stuck with me more if the drums were better, can agree. I do hope they worked with a producer that fit their sound better though, even though Yip's really passionate.

 

Totally forgot he did Light We Made. I honestly really like the mix on it even though the bass/drums are kinda too loud.

 

I don't think I really have any complaints about the production on Descensus, but I'm also not bothered by that sort of thing unless it's extremely egregious (thinking about Cope here). The production certainly isn't immaculate, but I was listening to it just this morning in the car and nothing stood out to me as being particularly troublesome. Yip has been getting consistently better, so I have faith that he did this new record justice.

 

Did he produce and mix Violent Waves?

That record in comparison to the others is just flat everywhere.
Descensus is certainly an improvement over that, but the dual leads get lost sometimes and drums aren't perfect.

Hoping these new songs have more "space" and less frantic instrumentation. I love schema, but don't need another opener like that.
I think Yips style will cater way better to that type of Circa Record.

 

Violent Waves does not sound good. But Decensus' drums make my brain itch. VW doesn't have anything that obviously annoying.

 

VW production is awful. Songs like The Lottery just have all the life sucked out of them

 

Saw the bump, was hoping for some kind of news :'(

After the Party has good production, so at least Yip is coming off of a successful effort with this one.

 

Descensus doesn't have good production... but literally none of Circa's other releases do, either. Juturna is the most tolerable, but not great. At this point, I've just come to expect production to hold back their music to some degree. If it's middling and doesn't hold it back significantly (which is how I see Descensus), I'll call it a victory.

 

I thought BSN's production was pretty dope. Juturna's production definetly fit the mood of that album so I liked that too.

OLG is my favorite from them and probably my least favorite production haha

 

My ranking of their albums would probably be

On Letting Go
Juturna
Descensus
Blue Sky Noise
Violent Waves

 

I'm with you on OLG - my favorite record but least favorite production.

BSN was mixed better than any of the others, but the excessive compression and clipping totally kill the deal, for me. For example, just press play on "I Feel Free" and right off the bat... grotesque clipping distortion on the drums that I can't even stomach. The quieter parts of the record like "Stairwell" sound great, though.

 

Rookie production question: how do professionals mess up something like that? Bc that sounds more like a mistake as opposed to a questionable sonic decision. I said this in another thread and I say this with a novice ear, but how do you get bad production from a professional in 2017? (Or any time this decade+)

 

It's baffling. your guess is as good as ours

that was fucking Rich Costey too. fucking clipping cymbals and a real competitor in the loudness wars to boot. disgraceful really

 

Bright side of ignorance is I probably wouldn't have even noticed if someone didn't say it.

 

Juturna's probably is the best, tbh. And it gets slightly worse on OLG but it actually works sometimes. BSN sounds like lifeless radio-rock, which is partly the song's faults too but still really rigid.

 

There's nothing wrong with the songs on BSN, but the clipping on that album is ridiculous

 

That's one complaint I definitely understand.

 

After listening through the OLG instrumentals, I think I'm pretty sure that it's their best album from a guitar standpoint.

 

i can't remember which podcast it was but Colin mentioned they did some really cool things with guitar octaves on these songs.

Like they would play a very similar part, one octave apart, and it would just sound cool as hell.

 

Yeah, the different guitar tracks compliment each other soooo well.

 

Here's an interview that stuck with me where I believe, iirc, Colin talks a little bit about their older unorthodox melody work. He goes so far to say why they're interested in that approach and what they wanted to actively avoid sounding like. I find the idea really fascinating and I primarily gravitate towards artists that take similar approaches.

 

Not hearing each other's parts of Juturna is craaazy, haha