By Jeanette Arsenault
First thing I think after listening to *Cupboards* by Sea Legs is “This is a good song” and the second thing I think is: “This is a really good production”.
Full disclosure – I don’t have alt indie rock on my playlist. But I can appreciate a good song when I hear it no matter the genre.
I think that should be a minimum for every band wanting to be discovered amid the noise of the world. Fans are way more sophisticated now and good production matters. They may not be able to recognize how a voice sits in a pad or where the bass is placed in the sound or how many mics it takes to properly record the drums, but they know when they hear something good and they like it.
I am impressed with both their arrangement & the production value – there are a lot of interesting layered elements in the song like the instruments they chose for starters.
I like it when a band can separate out the instruments so you hear each one individually but yet they sound cohesive at the same time. Each has its own space in the sonic landscape blending in perfectly. That’s a tricky balance to achieve and I think they nailed it in *Cupboards*.
The song starts off with a cool guitar riff (reminiscent of Eskimo One “Kandi”) and the mix is superb. Sign of a good producer in my opinion. Now there is someone the fans don’t often hear about but good producers can take a good song and make it great Or maybe the band produced it themselves – if so, kudos to them.
I like how the vocals sit perfectly in the mix. Everything sits well in the mix for that matter. Nice pad supporting the instruments. Personally, I am a big fan of the perfect chosen pad that unifies it all. Makes their song sound dreamy but still delivers a punch.
Like how they pulled back to just guitar & a pad. The bridge really works for me – what springs to mind is “sonically sound”.
Dreamy, big wash of sound and then they rock it out – great guitar riffs here. Full on drums, the kind of rock sound you come to expect from an indie rock band. They deliver.
I have to say that I like how the vocals are not overpowered by the full weight of the band rocking on. Good singers can do that along with a good mix.
So there they go, rocking it out with the guitar full on then… silence. Whoah. Can you say sense overload? My ears need a break. Ok – breaks over – let’s do it again! You need to hear this song.
The Music Files 