Comment on my mix

[luctellier]

Please give me your comments or suggestions on this mix. It's a song I have recorded for a band friend of mine called Florence. This song was recording 3 months ago and I decided to remix it for fun...

http://download.delsondrive.com/luct...mix_sample.mp3

[Jake68]

Like it, the mix sounds sonically good.

My only crit if that OK is that the guitars are over played (quite a bit imho) and its f-ing impossible to get real clarity in their ranges if thats the case. But hey..they may not be down to you ?

Hope thats OK ?

[PhilRanger]

Sorry, I know I'm a bitch when it comes to sound:

1- Way too compressed mix
2- Guitars overtake the drum too much, and almost take over vocals in the bridge? after 1:00
3- Snare sound is too thin and compressed




But, hey, it's already "major label relese quality..."

[Jake68]

Originally Posted by PhilRanger

Sorry, I know I'm a bitch when it comes to sound:

1- Way too compressed mix
2- Guitars overtake the drum too much, and almost take over vocals in the bridge? after 1:00
3- Snare sound is too thin and compressed




But, hey, it's already "major label relese quality..."

This is modernity

[ez135]

Nice job Luc !

[luctellier]

Originally Posted by PhilRanger

Sorry, I know I'm a bitch when it comes to sound:

1- Way too compressed mix
2- Guitars overtake the drum too much, and almost take over vocals in the bridge? after 1:00
3- Snare sound is too thin and compressed




But, hey, it's already "major label relese quality..."

Dude, that's fine, that's what I wanted to hear!

I agree with your 3 points. Regarding the snare, it was a pain. I had to use a sample since the drummer came in studio with a snare over tightened using a Kevlar head (like marching bands use). Thanks for your input!

[luctellier]

Originally Posted by Jake68

Like it, the mix sounds sonically good.

My only crit if that OK is that the guitars are over played (quite a bit imho) and its f-ing impossible to get real clarity in their ranges if thats the case. But hey..they may not be down to you ?

Hope thats OK ?

Yeah I understand your point, There was a lot of guitar! Thanks

[RainbowStorm]

luctellier, I listened to your mix. Nice song! I'll try to list some guidelines:

- Monitoring problems

I think you might have monitoring problems because the mix is very dull in the upper mids over a pretty broad frequency range. A/B against some commercial CD playing the same kind of tune. This problem also seems to cause too much mids.

- Frequency integrity

The instruments, mostly the guitars, overlap each other causing low frequency integrity, eventhough you have panned them to opposite channels. Frequency integrity means giving the listener a good perception of each tone. The result of frequency integrity is good instrument separation, high dynamic range and a good stereo image. Use fewer elements, cleaner sustains/chord changes, less effects.

- Track volume balance

You might be familiar with the fact that at least 70% of a mix consists of track volume balancing. This process is a matter of compromise, you decide how to distribute the mix signal such that the mix meets your goals. It's a decision making process. When you lower the track volume the size of that sound source shrinks, but you make that happen to allow some other instrument to be big enough. The goal that an engineer has with rock mixes is often that it should have balls. That's impossible if the track volume on the drums ends up too low. Lower the volume of the guitars and raise the volume on the drums and vocals. Keep in mind how big different elements should be in the mix and work against that.

- Sound source quality and configuration

A mix is only as good as the worst sounding and configured sound source. I think you need to de-mud those guitars a lot.

All for now! Keep exploring and growing, thanks for sharing your work with us!

[luctellier]

RainbowStorm, thank you so much for your comments. I am really open and always willing to receive tips from other users. All I can say so far is that I agree with all the comments you made on this mix.

They were 2 guitar players on that song. One that was really good and tight (soloist) and the other one who kept bending his chords (rythm), therefore sounded out of tune. When I bypassed his tracks, everything sounded so much clear but.. since the he was the second guitar player and also most of his part were used as the rythm and overdubs, I could not just mute it.. The day we recorded that song he was leaving the band for personal reason...

In the overall, I think my mix was overcompressed and too muddy in the low-mid range. Guitars were too lood and therefore, drums and vocals not enough. Bass was lacking definition too... That song was recorded as a demo with 2 other songs (to send to a label) and they didn't want it to be mastered (money issue) so I had to do it myself. There is nothing like sending your mix to fresh ears and an objective person I know...

This brings me to another question: what do you tell to your clients that have no idea about what mastering is and how much important it is to include this process. Or when they know what it is but they didn't planned any budget for it? Most of the time the clients ask "could you just do it youtself?" but the first thing that come to my mind is "no" and I would lend them Bob Katz's "Mastering Audio" book...

[theblue1]

Off the top of my head and without reading others' comments:

The guitars are too overbearing for my tastes; I'm not crazy about how they sound in the stereo field. The drums sound small and "cardboardy"... they don't sound so much distant as just small... as though each drum were about half size. It also felt like at least a few of the snare hits were truncated somehow.

I could have also stood a touch more bass impact... I could hear most of the bass notes, which is not always easy in this kind of music... but I just wanted a little more bass. It's a taste thing, to be sure.

I'm not a fan of "overcompression" but I recognize that a whole lotta compression is, indeed, the style on much modern hard rock. ("Hard rock." I said, "hard rock." It's baaaack.)

You're not too far away, from my point of view, but I can't help but feel like overall balances need some work and the drums may need some special attention to make them fit with those huge guitars.

(I'll see what everyone else said, now.)

[I'm back..] Yep, my comments were pretty superfluous... but that's good, I guess, it shows something of a consensus.

[redddog]

I agree with most. My take was that I also felt the drums, as far as instumentation goes, need the most attention. They feel dead and small. Bass, with more definition, would sit better and do a lot to clear up the image. Bring guitars down a c-hair and focus on the stereo image. Ease off the compression on the mix buss.

This may be taken as in insult or not, but it sounds fairly close to radio ready as is.

Good job, Brother.

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by redddog

[snip]...

This may be taken as in insult or not, but it sounds fairly close to radio ready as is.

...[snip]

Dude -- there's not call for savaging the poor guy's mix.

[luctellier]

Originally Posted by theblue1

Dude -- there's not call for savaging the poor guy's mix.

Not sure to understand this one....

[barryjohns]

I think the mix sounds good. You may have too much panning going on in the guitars for universal playback. The balance is good, it does sound a little dull as the other guy mentioned though, while it has very good clarity, you can hear all the instruments, there is some spark missing. Some Creative Reverb could be used to give it more space as well.

Now for something you can't control, is it me, or is that drummer way off time? I felt like his playing really took the song down. He is trying to do more than his skills allow.

Let us know the details about what the song was recorded with and the process you used.

You did a very good job on this, especially if you're technically not a PRO. Hum?

[George Necola]

I like the mix,

but..

the snare is dull, too loud, wrong frequencie balance. full drumagog?

the guitars are too much panned in my opinion.

but hey! good one:D

cheers

[luctellier]

Barryjohns,

think the mix sounds good. You may have too much panning going on in the guitars for universal playback. The balance is good, it does sound a little dull as the other guy mentioned though, while it has very good clarity, you can hear all the instruments, there is some spark missing. Some Creative Reverb could be used to give it more space as well.

I guess I used to much of stereo expanding on my master buss.

Now for something you can't control, is it me, or is that drummer way off time? I felt like his playing really took the song down. He is trying to do more than his skills allow.

Might be that!

Let us know the details about what the song was recorded with and the process you used. You did a very good job on this, especially if you're technically not a PRO. Hum?

This song was recorded in a rush with also 2 other songs. They are my friends and they needed 3 songs to send to a label ASAP. So they came during an evening and we recorded the songs. I had to mix it quickly and had no time or budget for mastering so I was during all the work on the master buss at the same time... tutt

And no I am not a PRO at all! I play drums and sing in a band called DelsonDrive and also have a dayjob. I do this only for fun and to help other bands here in the local scene. I've started doing this for my band at first to save money and found myself a hobby! Since then I've always been self-producing our band... (http://www.delsondrive.com) and record other bands friends with us to help them and also gain some experience for myself.

[luctellier]

Originally Posted by George Necola

I like the mix, but.. the snare is dull, too loud, wrong frequencie balance. full drumagog? the guitars are too much panned in my opinion.

I think every agree on that, guitars were way too much panned! Regarding the snare, I had to use a sample because like I said in the post above, the drummer came in with a snare too tightened with a Kevlar head (like marching band). So I made a sample with my DW snare to fix it quickly...