Hi!
One of the bands I play in has just finished an album in the Bandshed Records Studio to be released in January. My bandmate gents are lifetime musicians in their early to mid-70’s and play with as much fire and vitality as ever. They have selected a collection of Cover tunes with our own spin on the arrangements. I’m sneaking out one of the tunes to post here, our arrangement of Grover Washington Jr./Bill Withers “Just the Two of Us”…
Hi,
Very nice rendition of this tune.
What impressed me the most is that, I don’t know where you are from ( I guess America, but it might be elsewhere?), but, as a non native English speaking guy, I have understood every single word throughout the song, and it is meaningful for me, because, when you hear a song, appreciate the overall sound and everything, but you don’t get the meaning of the words, due to accent, or mike placement or whatever, it’s cool, but there is the feeling : « mmmh, I must be missing something! ».
Here, your voice tone is so clear and the way you « speak » the words is so simple, that you make me almost believe I should be able to understand English language.
Thanks a lot.
Olivier
Drums in an open sound also sounds interesting on this song.
Thanks for the kind words @olivmusic
From Canada BTW… 
It’s a double compliment because what I have always admired about the singing of Bill Withers is exactly that, the ‘soul’ came from his direct and conversational style of singing, no pretense, no affect just the straight goods. If I have managed to retain the clarity which Bill Withers brought to his songs then I am very happy to hear that! Thanks so much for listening
Hi,
Good ears! The drum bed tracks were tracked in a fairly large room with a vaulted ceiling and quite a bit of ambience.
But they still need a lot of training in mixing.
Very classy. Vibrant.
Love the gentleness of the interpretation, the intimacy of the atmosphere; it really suits the mood of the song. Well done !
And as a sax player, I must congratulate you for bringing out the warmth of the instrument. Beautiful sound ! And congrats to the sax player for a tasteful interpretation.
sounds awesome, and very ‘true’, as others already stated.
Good job and thanks for letting us listen 
Thanks for sharing, loved it 
Nice work. Some critiques though:
You best hear what I mean between the end of Chorus 1 and begin of Verse 2, where suddenly the (verse) vocals sounds significantly louder than in the chorus.Best regards.
Thanks for the input. 
I’m letting the whole project sit over the holidays and am going to hit the mixes with fresh ears in January before we submit the album, I’ve made a note of your suggestions for the final pass.
Is it a conscious choice to keep a number of instruments front and direct, while the main vocals are pushed somewhat to the back? Would you care to try it the other way around?
I can accept (and kinda like) the sort of vintage (bandlimited) sound of the main vocal… but the other instruments around it are then almost jarringly “too much studio” in contrast, so they feel just a bit like… an afterthought; like they were tacked on separately… they just don’t gel acoustically. Which can totally be a valid and conscious artistic choice, invoking how studio albums sounded decades ago… but then the the double-tracked wide-panned guitars sound too modern (and way more boasting than they are actually important musically… kinda like badly done remasters, or covers where you hear a definite distinction between what was the old recording, and what was tacked on modernly).
Hehe… choices, choices.
Musically I like it a lot though!