All Along the Watchtower Cover

GuitarGuy610 · Post by **GuitarGuy610** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 8:53 pm

Hey everybody! My friend Zak and I recorded some covers over a weekend through a Tascam US-122. They need some leveling (please advise on how to do that best) but I think this is our best one. Let me know what you think. Thanks!

All Along the Watchtower.mp3

PS - That is Zak singing and playing hm, and myself (Zach, not to make things onfusing) playing guitar.

davembfan85 · Post by **davembfan85** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 9:46 pm

Hmmm, you need to add some style in there... it's kinda... robotic? I dunno... put some emotion into it or something

Buck · Post by **Buck** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 9:48 pm

You need a pop filter

GuitarGuy610 · Post by **GuitarGuy610** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 8:29 am

davembfan85 wrote:Hmmm, you need to add some style in there... it's kinda... robotic? I dunno... put some emotion into it or something

I'm not too sure how to take that....I thought Zak had a good deal of emotion in it. Was the comment sarcastic? I'm confused!

Any other critiques?

gravesRR7 · Post by **gravesRR7** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 9:06 am

the vocals seem a lot more like talking than singing. especially during the intro. it seemed like the singer was scared to hit some of the notes and just kinda brushed some of the harder parts away by replacing it with talking in a lower pitch

i also agree that it seems robotic. you might want to try (during the intro) to add some little fills after the F where it switches quickly back to the G.

the harmonica was the strongest part i thought, nice job on that. and the quality of the recording is pretty nice.

overall, not bad, but could use a little brushing up.

c_tietze · Post by **c_tietze** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 9:09 am

Cool man.

Watchtower is one of those songs you really have to "go for it" - yell if you have to.

Remember, Dave Matthews isn't a singer in the true sense, he's an amazing performer who does it his own way and he really projects those big notes and thats what really turned me on to the tunes of DMB, this cat who shares a namesake with the band who always goes for the big notes.

GuitarGuy610 · Post by **GuitarGuy610** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 1:36 pm

gravesRR7 wrote:the vocals seem a lot more like talking than singing. especially during the intro. it seemed like the singer was scared to hit some of the notes and just kinda brushed some of the harder parts away by replacing it with talking in a lower pitch

Oh, I see what you were referring to now, thanks for clarifying that. Yeah, I totally see what you are talking about now.

Raif2032 · Post by **Raif2032** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 6:44 pm

I didn't really dig the way it was sung...it doesn't work with the way dave plays this song. If you're going to sing in that talking manner, i'd play the song like the original bob dylan version, just a thought.

GuitarGuy610 · Post by **GuitarGuy610** » Sat Jul 02, 2005 11:16 am

Raif2032 wrote:I didn't really dig the way it was sung...it doesn't work with the way dave plays this song. If you're going to sing in that talking manner, i'd play the song like the original bob dylan version, just a thought.

We weren't trying to play the song just like Dave does... Zak sung how he interpreted it/felt right for him. In another thread a long time ago, there was a discussion like this about not trying to sound like Dave, and letting your own voice/style come out and making it your own. Just like Dave didn't cover bob dylan's identically we didn't do that to either. Thanks for the comments