First proper mix - any advice?

[adamadamattack]

Hey guys,
Stumbled across your forum just recently, it's absolutely brilliant, picked up a lot of useful tips off here!

My name's Adam, I live in the UK and I'm studying a BTEC National Diploma in Music Technology. As part of my final project I have to produce a portfolio of 15-20 mins of recorded material, and this is the first song of that portfolio recorded for a local band where I live. They're kinda going for the sorta-Paramore, New Found Glory vibe, which is kinda cool I guess, but much of that particular genre is very heavily produced! I'm trying to produce something fairly close to that kinda thing, but I'm having some trouble.

I've attached a copy of my mix so far. It was done in 3-4 hours in Pro Tools and I was fairly happy with it when I bounced it down on Thursday. I like to listen to and songs I make a lot until anything really starts to bug me. Listening to it today, I think the recording sounds kinda hollow? I also think I've used a little too much delay on the guitars in an attempt to give that 'big guitars' feel, and too much reverb on the kit?

Can anyone part some insight into what I might need to do? And general thoughts on my mix too? Feel free to be as brutal as you want, I'm very much still learning and would love to hear what my recording peers make of my first steps into this game!

Thanks guys!

[heyheymymy]

Here are my thoughts on first listen:

Good song, but could do with some polishing.

- Vocals are too dry
- Snare sounds like it's in a completely different space than the rest of the kit
- Yes, too much reverb or something on the guitars. But this may be a relative statement when comparing the guitars to the vocals, snare, etc.
- Some strange stuff going on with the bass tonally. Also, do you have it panned pretty far left for most of the song? If so, personally, I'd bring it back to the middle.

Decent first mix. Looking forward to hearing some subsequent adjustments.

[Old Cane]

I tend to agree but at least you can hear the snare in this nightmare. Not directed at you or your mixing but these guys are not good (I'm being nice tonight). I don't know if anyone can make a good mix with this kind of crap. I'm hoping your marks don't rely on the quality of the players.

Seriously, you seem to be doing quite well and just keep going until you hit on what you want. I would try to work on it alone as much as I could and not involve them until you have it sounding more, uh, like music? I have a feeling they are all over you telling you to do this and that and not helping at all. Time alone to experiment can only help.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by heyheymymy

- Vocals are too dry

Thanks for the reply dude. Agreed the vocals are a little dry. I thought it might have to do with the fact I had to squash the bejeezus out of it to get the singers voice louder in the verse. When she was really going for it, she'd get closer to the mic, and farther away in quieter sections. I did try to tell her not to do this, but I guess she didn't take to it. Do you have any suggestions to make it a bit more 'sparkly'?

Originally Posted by heyheymymy

- Snare sounds like it's in a completely different space than the rest of the kit

Interesting. I'll look into that.

Originally Posted by heyheymymy

- Yes, too much reverb or something on the guitars. But this may be a relative statement when comparing the guitars to the vocals, snare, etc.

It's a small delay I added to give the 'big guitars' feel. It really doesn't work at the beginning of the song, but does serve it purpose in the choruses. I'm thinking maybe I should automate the track so that there''s less delay in the verses but that amount in the choruses, what do you think?

Originally Posted by heyheymymy

- Some strange stuff going on with the bass tonally. Also, do you have it panned pretty far left for most of the song? If so, personally, I'd bring it back to the middle.

The bass does sound a bit flabby, definitely. I really wanted to run it through a SansAmp, the bassist was using a really nice Ashdown amp, but EQ'ed all out of whack. If I had more time and the SansAmp available to me, I would have had a little fiddle with that as far as the performance goes. I'll have another tweak with the EQ though and see how it goes.

Originally Posted by heyheymymy

Decent first mix. Looking forward to hearing some subsequent adjustments.

Thanks for the advice dude I really appreciate it! I'll keep you posted when I can come up with something better.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by Old Cane

I tend to agree but at least you can hear the snare in this nightmare. Not directed at you or your mixing but these guys are not good (I'm being nice tonight). I don't know if anyone can make a good mix with this kind of crap. I'm hoping your marks don't rely on the quality of the players.

Thanks for the reply. No my marks aren't affected by the performance quality! =) I didn't think the tunes they came up with were that bad, but obviously it's subjective. I'm trying to get some inspiration from the work of Romesh Dodangoda (MySpace.com - Long Wave RecordingStudio-Producing FFAF NEW ALBUM - 89 - Male - Cardiff, UK - www.myspace.com/longwave), the tracks he produces are everything I'm looking for in this project, and the guys from Blasting Room. They produce my favourite (from a production/mixing standpoint) records of this sort. I actually really loved the drummers snare so trying to get that forward in the mix was a priority for me.

Originally Posted by Old Cane

Seriously, you seem to be doing quite well and just keep going until you hit on what you want. I would try to work on it alone as much as I could and not involve them until you have it sounding more, uh, like music? I have a feeling they are all over you telling you to do this and that and not helping at all. Time alone to experiment can only help.

Thanks man! I know they are after a really slick sound and I'm trying to give this to them as best as I can. I'm not so much under pressure from them, it's more that I'm a perfectionist and will always strive to get the absolute best out of what I have. I'll definitely try that though, thanks for the input!

[redfivestudio]

This is cool, because i produce/mix same kind of stuff. First of all there is far too much distortion on the guitars and too less middles. They´re lacking punch. Bd and sd does not fit at all together. Vocalsound is ok. Maybe little bit too tight and out of tune. If i mixed this id trig the snare and bassdrum and put some autotune on leadvocal.
Share the second mix also.. :)

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by redfivestudio

This is cool, because i produce/mix same kind of stuff. First of all there is far too much distortion on the guitars and too less middles. They´re lacking punch. Bd and sd does not fit at all together. Vocalsound is ok. Maybe little bit too tight and out of tune. If i mixed this id trig the snare and bassdrum and put some autotune on leadvocal.
Share the second mix also.. :)

Hey thanks for listening! Interesting, any tips you might have for adding punch to the guitars? I'm interested to hear especially considering you do the same kinda stuff. I'm going to have a second look at the bass drum and snare, as you're not the first to point this out. I'm not a huge fan of triggering, I much prefer to get the best sound I can out of the drummer's kit naturally. I could try layering another bass drum sample underneath the existing ones maybe? Autotune would be lovely unfortunately this costs a lot of money which I simply don't have. Fair point though, it could do with some. I'll keep you posted when I come up with something better. Thanks again!

[dwall]

For the vocal I would suggest treating it differently in the different sections (you mentioned that you squashed it so it worked in the verse). You could automate, or just give it two different tracks. As is it sounds like a recorded band practice (especially her vocal), and adding different effects in different places (ie, adding texture) could make it more like an album cut....like if you have multiple takes of her voice (or was it all tracked live?) you could double her vox in some parts, or use a different take to create a reverb texture.

If you end up readjusting the compression, listen to the S's again and consider de-essing or not. They sound a bit sharp in some spots, but it could partly the compression setting.

I hesitate to comment on anything else because I'm listening on earbuds. But, yeah, a better band would have resulted in a better recording, but that's always going to be the case. This is a good way to practice your skills for the real world where most bands need some help in the studio.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by dwall

For the vocal I would suggest treating it differently in the different sections (you mentioned that you squashed it so it worked in the verse). You could automate, or just give it two different tracks. As is it sounds like a recorded band practice (especially her vocal), and adding different effects in different places (ie, adding texture) could make it more like an album cut....like if you have multiple takes of her voice (or was it all tracked live?) you could double her vox in some parts, or use a different take to create a reverb texture.

Sounds good, I'll give it a try. Everything was tracked live, so I only have one take of her voice. We had discussed bringing the vocalist back into the studio so I could work with her and come up with some vocal harmonies for some of the parts. I'll try a little automation on the track I have already though. Any effects you reccommend?

Originally Posted by dwall

If you end up readjusting the compression, listen to the S's again and consider de-essing or not. They sound a bit sharp in some spots, but it could partly the compression setting.

Hadn't thought about this at all. I'll definitely have a look where I could use that, thanks!

Originally Posted by dwall

I hesitate to comment on anything else because I'm listening on earbuds. But, yeah, a better band would have resulted in a better recording, but that's always going to be the case. This is a good way to practice your skills for the real world where most bands need some help in the studio.

Definitely, not every band that I'll work with is going to be a studio hardened veteran, so this like you say is a good way to practice for those not so brilliant bands who come in! Thanks for the the advice, I'll bare all that stuff in mind.

To everyone, all the advice so far is brilliant! Thanks so much!

[dwall]

Originally Posted by adamadamattack

Sounds good, I'll give it a try. Everything was tracked live, so I only have one take of her voice. We had discussed bringing the vocalist back into the studio so I could work with her and come up with some vocal harmonies for some of the parts. I'll try a little automation on the track I have already though. Any effects you reccommend?



Hadn't thought about this at all. I'll definitely have a look where I could use that, thanks!



Definitely, not every band that I'll work with is going to be a studio hardened veteran, so this like you say is a good way to practice for those not so brilliant bands who come in! Thanks for the the advice, I'll bare all that stuff in mind.

To everyone, all the advice so far is brilliant! Thanks so much!

I should point out that I don't really deal in this style of music, but based on what I've heard before and what I'm hearing here, in terms of effects for the vocal, there's so much space being taken up by the guitars that I don't think I'd land on longer verbs, and would instead try some short delays, roomy verb's (short decay, and mess with the pre-delay time, mess with eq'ing the low vs. high end just on the verb) and some flange in parts to thicken it up. Do you have a doppler or doubler? That could help. You can send her voice to multiple effects as well, and it still be subtle yet do a lot to get her voice more on top, give it more depth and polish. For example, you can pan a reverb to the right and a delay to the left, matching the volumes. You could also use something like Antares Tube to subtly add some thickening harmonics to her voice, especially on the louder passages, where it could smoothen out some of the higher frequencies in her voice.

Also, don't forget about automating the gain of vocals. Words that are popping out too much get nugged down, words getting swallowed can use a tad boost (if it's a word starting with an "s", you usually don't need to boost the "s").

It may be that you can dip the guitar eq's just a bit in a couple of freq's to make a lilttle more room for her voice, but you'll have to experiment with that. They have a lot of distortion, the effects of which can sometimes be made less drastic by cutting some spots in the high end (4k, 8k for example).

If you add harmonies, her voice is already getting pretty abrasive in spots when she gets loud, so I'd definitely have her either sing very softly (in which case she can be closer to the mic, perhaps 6 inches away and a little off-axis) or, if she must sing loudly, get like 3 - 6 feet away. Either way will help so that you don't just have a build-up of the same potentially offending higher frequencies in her voice, and will lend to separation and yet more texture, which is always important. I really believe texture is super important, especially in the digital realm, which means a lot of tiny things adding up to a bigger picture.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by dwall

I should point out that I don't really deal in this style of music, but based on what I've heard before and what I'm hearing here, in terms of effects for the vocal, there's so much space being taken up by the guitars that I don't think I'd land on longer verbs, and would instead try some short delays, roomy verb's (short decay, and mess with the pre-delay time, mess with eq'ing the low vs. high end just on the verb) and some flange in parts to thicken it up. Do you have a doppler or doubler? That could help. You can send her voice to multiple effects as well, and it still be subtle yet do a lot to get her voice more on top, give it more depth and polish. For example, you can pan a reverb to the right and a delay to the left, matching the volumes. You could also use something like Antares Tube to subtly add some thickening harmonics to her voice, especially on the louder passages, where it could smoothen out some of the higher frequencies in her voice.

This is fantastic. I have a doubler plug in actually, but plug in wise I'm restricted by the fact that there aren't a lot of plug ins on the computers at college, nor are we allowed to install our own. I could really do with my own set up at home! I'll give it all a try and see what works out, the last 2 points you made I think are particularly interesting and I'll give them a try.

Originally Posted by dwall

Also, don't forget about automating the gain of vocals. Words that are popping out too much get nugged down, words getting swallowed can use a tad boost (if it's a word starting with an "s", you usually don't need to boost the "s").

Again, very interesting. I'll give it a try.

Originally Posted by dwall

It may be that you can dip the guitar eq's just a bit in a couple of freq's to make a lilttle more room for her voice, but you'll have to experiment with that. They have a lot of distortion, the effects of which can sometimes be made less drastic by cutting some spots in the high end (4k, 8k for example).

I'm fairly sure I've cut them already? I'll have another look.

Originally Posted by dwall

If you add harmonies, her voice is already getting pretty abrasive in spots when she gets loud, so I'd definitely have her either sing very softly (in which case she can be closer to the mic, perhaps 6 inches away and a little off-axis) or, if she must sing loudly, get like 3 - 6 feet away. Either way will help so that you don't just have a build-up of the same potentially offending higher frequencies in her voice, and will lend to separation and yet more texture, which is always important. I really believe texture is super important, especially in the digital realm, which means a lot of tiny things adding up to a bigger picture.

Great advice. I think she was coping much better when she was singing loudly, so I'll give your second suggestion a try and see how we get on. I'm totally agreed, texture is very important to me also, and it's definitely something my mix so far could do more of. Thanks again man!

[dwall]

Cool, hopefully some of these suggestions gets you trying some new things that lead to discovering some other new things that will work for you. Regarding the doubler, I'd use that as a send and tweak it separately, maybe even giving it its own reverb or delay. Subtly is often key, like you can't really hear it's there till you remove it. But to each their own, of course. You just want to watch levels and frequency build up as you start adding effects sends (pre or post fader).

Too bad you don't have more plugins to work with, but, again, it might just make you work a little harder.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by dwall

Cool, hopefully some of these suggestions gets you trying some new things that lead to discovering some other new things that will work for you. Regarding the doubler, I'd use that as a send and tweak it separately, maybe even giving it its own reverb or delay. Subtly is often key, like you can't really hear it's there till you remove it. But to each their own, of course. You just want to watch levels and frequency build up as you start adding effects sends (pre or post fader).

Sweet, I'll give that a try and see how it goes. Thanks!

Originally Posted by dwall

Too bad you don't have more plugins to work with, but, again, it might just make you work a little harder.

You know what? I really hope it does. I love challenges!

Thanks again so much for the advice.

[sheever]

Originally Posted by adamadamattack

Hey guys,
Stumbled across your forum just recently, it's absolutely brilliant, picked up a lot of useful tips off here!

My name's Adam, I live in the UK and I'm studying a BTEC National Diploma in Music Technology. As part of my final project I have to produce a portfolio of 15-20 mins of recorded material, and this is the first song of that portfolio recorded for a local band where I live. They're kinda going for the sorta-Paramore, New Found Glory vibe, which is kinda cool I guess, but much of that particular genre is very heavily produced! I'm trying to produce something fairly close to that kinda thing, but I'm having some trouble.

I've attached a copy of my mix so far. It was done in 3-4 hours in Pro Tools and I was fairly happy with it when I bounced it down on Thursday. I like to listen to and songs I make a lot until anything really starts to bug me. Listening to it today, I think the recording sounds kinda hollow? I also think I've used a little too much delay on the guitars in an attempt to give that 'big guitars' feel, and too much reverb on the kit?

Can anyone part some insight into what I might need to do? And general thoughts on my mix too? Feel free to be as brutal as you want, I'm very much still learning and would love to hear what my recording peers make of my first steps into this game!

Thanks guys!

i am not a competent in this music style but in the bass section is something strange going on.
may possible to take some bass from the kick and give it some little boost around 1khz.than it not will be so bumpy and the kick gonna hit better..

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by sheever

i am not a competent in this music style but in the bass section is something strange going on.
may possible to take some bass from the kick and give it some little boost around 1khz.than it not will be so bumpy and the kick gonna hit better..

Great tip, I'll try it out. Agreed, the bass is realy starting to grate on me now, it definitely needs a bit of tweaking. Cheers!

[adamadamattack]

Hey guys,

Sorry to revive an ancient thread from the dead. Thanks for all your help in the first mix I did of this song, it's been a few months now and I've learned a lot since then, and now I've completed my college course (just finished my BTEC in Music Tech), and I've been working all through this time on the mix for this band.

I've attached the latest mix of that particular song. I think due to the amount of time I've spent on it now being not happy with it, I've cooked the mix and now pretty much anything I do with it I'm not happy with! I've done a few other bands since then which I think I've had more successful experiences with, but this mix is still not finished and it seems I can't get it right!

So once again if anyone's willing, I could use some fresh pairs of ears on this. What sticks out for me are a) kick is way too loud and sounds 'flabbly'. I couldn't get the natural kick to sound right so the kick on there is two samples (drumagog) blended together, b) vocal is still too dry, tried a few things but wasn't particularly inspired by anything. I've invested in Melodyne since and have tried to autotune the vocals but not sure if this had been as effective as I'd have hoped. Also there's a couple of tracking errors from where my humble PC is battling under the heat of all the plug ins!

Again, please be as brutal as you feel necessary, and your honesty is once again appreciated!

Cheers, Adam

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by TroyTempest

I think you should turn the high hat up.. wow....

ok 12k + is a bit insane well listening more 5khz + is a bit insane.... you are getting some wash with the cymbals and the guitars cut them at 5khz... that will help all around, try ducking that fking HH down a bit see if it fits better hard to tell from where it is... then post that.


EDIT.... And control the vocal SSSSS SSSSS SSSSSSSSSSSSTTTTTTT thats a 15khz problem..

Oh man, the hi-hat. What the problem is, is actually it's bled insanely into both the overheads and the hi-hat mic is so quiet it doesn't make much of a difference to where it is in the stereo image at all. This was totally my bad when miking the kit, luckily after getting so frustrated with it so long I've been careful to the point of bieng anal with that every session!

Yeah does sound a little crazy at the top end. Thanks for the tips, I'll get straight on to it.

[Ed1234]

You've got two guitars, right? To me they sound unbalanced volume wise which detracts from the mid range wall of guitar effect, if ya' know what I mean.

I can't hear the kick drum at all, which is killing the songs drive. Also, the bass guitar is really weak, sounds as if there's too much distance on the mic (did you mic it?)

To sort out the hi-hats, couldn't you automate the level of the overheads for when they're really intrusive?

One last thing, for what's worth, I'd actually bury the vocals a little more, once you've got a solid sonic bed sorted for the track. That's pretty subjective of course, but it sounds as if you're making a feature of her vocals, and they're not worthy of it.

Good luck though!

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by Ed1234

You've got two guitars, right? To me they sound unbalanced volume wise which detracts from the mid range wall of guitar effect, if ya' know what I mean.

I can't hear the kick drum at all, which is killing the songs drive. Also, the bass guitar is really weak, sounds as if there's too much distance on the mic (did you mic it?)

To sort out the hi-hats, couldn't you automate the level of the overheads for when they're really intrusive?

One last thing, for what's worth, I'd actually bury the vocals a little more, once you've got a solid sonic bed sorted for the track. That's pretty subjective of course, but it sounds as if you're making a feature of her vocals, and they're not worthy of it.

Good luck though!

I'm kinda hearing it, but not really? Maybe the one on the left is slightly louder? Interesting that you say that though, I'll have another look.

Yeah the bass amp was mic'ed. Bad idea. The amp's making this terrible 'fwabawabawaba' noise that just sounds appalling, so I'm trying to mask it as much as I can without losing it completely.

Good idea on automating. I'll have a looksee.

That kick drum is the bane of my life! I'm trying to get that clicky bass drum that you hear in bands like this today, and it's simply just not cutting through despite all my best efforts! Does anyone have any tips on how I can get that kick cutting through, with that signature 'rock radio band of today' clicky bass drum?

[always_ending]

1st of all, their drums aren't "clicky"....they just have alot sharper attack/release which you can get using simple compression. making the kick "clicky" IS the prob bro

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by always_ending

1st of all, their drums aren't "clicky"....they just have alot sharper attack/release which you can get using simple compression. making the kick "clicky" IS the prob bro

So you think that I should just stop concentrating on EQing to get the sound and just try to nail the compression? I'm already using compression using Waves RComp, fast attack, fast release, fairly small threshold and about a 6:1 ratio...

The comments I've had on this are fairly interesting. Something I might try is bouncing down without the iZotope Ozone mastering plugin on. I think the way I've got this set might be what's causing some of the problems.

[always_ending]

well you do want that attack, but remember, you still ultimately are looking for a thicker booming sound on the kick than that which was recorded. This is the painful part for ALL of us working on recording things....that you will learn that first and foremost you MUST have a solid sound on entry (the sound coming through before you press record without ANYTHING else done ie. eq's, comp, etc). Now that that kick is already recorded, you have a few options imo to get a better sound. If you have the drum tracks seperated, which by god I HOPE you havent bussed down yet or youre screwed, go into the kick track and use redrum and find a good kick, just completely wipe this one off and work on small (key word) changes to comp, eq, etc.....you dont ever want to over process it too much, it'll show.

[adamadamattack]

Originally Posted by always_ending

well you do want that attack, but remember, you still ultimately are looking for a thicker booming sound on the kick than that which was recorded. This is the painful part for ALL of us working on recording things....that you will learn that first and foremost you MUST have a solid sound on entry (the sound coming through before you press record without ANYTHING else done ie. eq's, comp, etc). Now that that kick is already recorded, you have a few options imo to get a better sound. If you have the drum tracks seperated, which by god I HOPE you havent bussed down yet or youre screwed, go into the kick track and use redrum and find a good kick, just completely wipe this one off and work on small (key word) changes to comp, eq, etc.....you dont ever want to over process it too much, it'll show.

The kick you're hearing is Drumagog'd. The kick (actually, the kit as a whole) was miked terribly and the kit is all out of tune so I felt 100% sample replacing was the way forward. In my Mix window, I have 2 tracks of kick with 2 different samples, I'm using Andy Sneap's kick sample for the top end 'clickyness' and I've got a Sonor 3005 kick blended in underneath for the low end beef.

This has all been routed down to a 'Kick Aux' in PT (but not bussed down). I've got a boost in at 100k, cut at 300k and boost up at 2.5k on a EQ on the insert on the Kick Bus. I've got a TransX in there too on the Mega Kick preset to bring out the low end and RComp is working at 4:1, quick attack, quick release, and threshold of -4.0.

I understand the low end is important which is why I've been trying to enhance it all the time, but I'm just making it sound flabby and awful. If you've got any suggestions on where I can go from there, that'd be awesome.

Thanks for all the advice so far by the way. As usual, everyones been really helpful.