I’m not sure if this truly counts as a “cover” as its just tabs that are available online and entering the notes into a midi-interface. That being said, it was fun to do and a good way to start delving into this end of music creation/production, and also exposed some limitations that I’ll make note of in the future. For some added fun, ripped the vocals from the original and synced them into the mix.
equipment used: AKAI MPK mini MK3 midi keyboard, Reaper, virtual instruments for rhythm guitar, lead guitar, bass and drums and lastly, Moises.ai to create a vocal stem. Tabs from Ultimate Guitar (pro version).
Some issues I’m making note of and will not be fixing for this particular project (just chalking it up as part of the learning process): some parts with guitar the picking effect gets very intense and overwhelms the actual guitar sound, making those parts feel like they’re full of audio artifacts; timing on vocals are slightly off, this seems to be caused by the fact that the master track has numerous tempo changes in it; drums feel like they’re a bit too low in the mix, its difficult to get them mixed in and not red-peaking the master; there’s a few minor transcription errors (either with my inputs or the tabs) which I’m also calling “good enough” for now; lastly I did not input the rhythm guitar 2 midi, as there were only slight differences (a couple fuller chords, is all I really noticed), it didn’t seem worth the effort to enter the full tab in.
So, without further ado, here’s the file: 2023-07-23 - Metallica - Shadows Follow (from Tabs - VSTi Only)_9.mp3 - Google Drive
Feedback welcome.
Original song for comparison:
