Feedback on mixing my first attempt at a song

Xcaliber said:
That's ok heatmiser. It's good advice for sure.

The thing I don't understand is my song sounds pretty good (the guitars even are a little less dominant) on my monitors and mixing headphones, but it sounds like crap on earbuds and laptop speakers. Then when I mix it for the laptop and earbuds it sounds like crap on my monitors and mixing headphones. I was trying to get a balance between the two where it sounds good in both places.
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That's because your room is telling you lies. If you ever get around to treating that basement, you will be SHOCKED by what a difference even just simple bass traps in the corners will make.

And for the record, it is easily doable and reasonably affordable to make acoustic treatment that doesn't look hideous and out of place. Done right, it can even accentuate and compliment the room. They don't have to be hideous blobs of acoustic materials nailed to the wall. You can make them fit the overall color and/or decor of the room.
 
Greg_L said:
That's because your room is telling you lies. If you ever get around to treating that basement, you will be SHOCKED by what a difference even just simple bass traps in the corners will make.

And for the record, it is easily doable and reasonably affordable to make acoustic treatment that doesn't look hideous and out of place. Done right, it can even accentuate and compliment the room. They don't have to be hideous blobs of acoustic materials nailed to the wall. You can make them fit the overall color and/or decor of the room.
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I think that's all true, but I would only offer that, if for some reason you can't or don't go down that path, the room that lies to you will always lie to you in the same manner, so over time, you can learn to compensate for it. Not ideal maybe, but doable.
 
heatmiser said:
I think that's all true, but I would only offer that, if for some reason you can't or don't go down that path, the room that lies to you will always lie to you in the same manner, so over time, you can learn to compensate for it. Not ideal maybe, but doable.
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Oh yeah, totally. It's the same as the dreaded mixing with headphones dilemma. No, it's not ideal and the learning curve is steep, but once you learn them very well, you can make good mixes with headphones. Same with a bad room. It's just much harder and requires a lot more trial and error.
 
These guys give great info. I do want to second what Greg posted above though. Room treatment doesn't have to look like ass and be bulky. You can make some awesome looking stuff and if you get someone involved who is good with colors and such it can look more like art on the wall than like functional treatment. Also just because you can't treat the room perfectly doesn't mean a couple of well placed pieces might not save you a lot of time and effort.

Just something to think about. Treating the room isn't always an option and I get that, if that's the boat you're in then sail that bitch into the ice cold waters of trial and error and get ready to ride that storm out!
 
Xcaliber said:
That's ok heatmiser. It's good advice for sure.

The thing I don't understand is my song sounds pretty good (the guitars even are a little less dominant) on my monitors and mixing headphones, but it sounds like crap on earbuds and laptop speakers. Then when I mix it for the laptop and earbuds it sounds like crap on my monitors and mixing headphones. I was trying to get a balance between the two where it sounds good in both places.
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Hey, off the wall here. If you mix it to sound good with buds/laptop speakers...wait, seriously? Laptop speakers sound good? That seems contradictory, but I'll live with that :D Try taking that mix and playing it on your monitors and moving the table around until it sounds the best you can get it. Even bad rooms have sweet spots.
 
So when I said "sounds good on the latop/earbuds" I mean as good as I can get it. The bass is non-existent on both of those which is the main issue. I mix it to bring it back on the laptop/earbuds and then when I put it on the monitors there's waaaaay too much bass. :cursing:
 
Greg_L said:
That's because your room is telling you lies. If you ever get around to treating that basement, you will be SHOCKED by what a difference even just simple bass traps in the corners will make.

And for the record, it is easily doable and reasonably affordable to make acoustic treatment that doesn't look hideous and out of place. Done right, it can even accentuate and compliment the room. They don't have to be hideous blobs of acoustic materials nailed to the wall. You can make them fit the overall color and/or decor of the room.
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Thanks Greg. You've been a big help to me. I hear what you're saying and I agree, but the real problem is that the location of my "studio" right now is not the ideal and long term location. In a few years when my youngest daughter gets a little older I'm planning on re-purposing their play room into a studio. It's a room in the basement (that doesn't have a door, but rather an opening to the rest of the basement. But I could put a curtain up to "close off" the room and I could treat it as needed. I don't want to take the time/money to treat the room I'm in now (the larger "main" room of the basement) just to do it again in a few years the right way.
 
Xcaliber said:
So when I said "sounds good on the latop/earbuds" I mean as good as I can get it. The bass is non-existent on both of those which is the main issue. I mix it to bring it back on the laptop/earbuds and then when I put it on the monitors there's waaaaay too much bass. :cursing:
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Unfortunately that's the problem with laptop speakers (what I was trying to say), they don't have any bass. Burn a cd and listen to it in your car, home stereo, play the mp3 on your smart tv. That might give you a little better idea of what it is sounding like. I had a laptop with a beats audio subwoofer built in, and the thing still sounded like poop. A little nicer poop, but still poop. :D
 
Laptop speakers are the worst. Well, a phone speaker is probably the worst, but laptop speakers are right there with phone speakers. You might as well just guess what the mix will sound like without ever listening to it.
 
What other speakers do you guys check your mixes on? Broken_H listed in the car, home stereo, Smart TV...anything else? Is that something I should check before mastering (if I even get to that stage)?
 
Anything that you've heard music played on many, many times will help you. It's because you're used to how it sounds with many other professional songs / recordings. I personally like to play a familiar CD (or a CD similar to what I'm working on) through the same monitors I'm mixing with. It gives me a good comparison to work with for bottom end especially. A word of caution if you use your car or even your living room stereo. DO NOT use FM / AM broadcasting to compare your sound with. That sound is subject to all kinds of compression and other factors at the station. Stick to CD's.....mp3's.....etc.
 
Beyond what I listed: My wife's 5.1 system on her computer. The Bose Companion set on my laptop. Our Pioneer home audio system. The PA system at the church. I try all sorts of listening environments.

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Mickster said:
Anything that you've heard music played on many, many times will help you. It's because you're used to how it sounds with many other professional songs / recordings. I personally like to play a familiar CD (or a CD similar to what I'm working on) through the same monitors I'm mixing with. It gives me a good comparison to work with for bottom end especially. A word of caution if you use your car or even your living room stereo. DO NOT use FM / AM broadcasting to compare your sound with. That sound is subject to all kinds of compression and other factors at the station. Stick to CD's.....mp3's.....etc.
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Very, very sound advice!
 
Does SoundCloud compress the audio that you upload? I've been checking my mix on other computers from the mp3 I uploaded, but I'm thinking that might not be a good idea either (now that I think about it).
 
From what I've read on a few different boards, SoundCloud grinds the audio down to 128Kbs for the free accounts. I was wondering about that earlier after having listened to a mix I upp'd the other day. Yuck!
Edit: Also just read that if the download button is enabled, it gives the unmodified file for download.
 
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Well...........yes....SoundCloud does compress the file..........but that's not the real point or problem. Even though a SoundCloud file does have some alteration.......it's not drastically changing enough of the sound to lose any sort of at least basic judgements you might make for overall mix progress. What is more important, however, is what you play that SoundCloud file back on. I'd rather use a SoundCloud file played back on a good monitor system in a decent room...........than have an excellent file played back on most commercial desktop speakers..........when I'm mixing.
 
Can you guys take a listen to this one and let me know what you think? I played with the levels (mostly trying to back off the volume of the guitar) and added some EQ presets from Studio One).

New mix:


Here's the original for comparison:


Thanks.
 
The guitar sound Good the only thing is the drum....NO Power at all!
The song screams for POWER ! :-)
So fix the drums and it will be good
 
If this is meant as part of a backtrack to a vocal, or other lead instrument, it's best to have that (vocal) recorded as well to act as 'reference' as to where the levels and EQs of the backing instruments should be. Else you're mixing 'in the dark'.
 
Nic du Toit said:
If this is meant as part of a backtrack to a vocal, or other lead instrument, it's best to have that (vocal) recorded as well to act as 'reference' as to where the levels and EQs of the backing instruments should be. Else you're mixing 'in the dark'.
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No vocals for this track. I'm just messing around with riffs and learning the recording and mixing process.

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hellstens said:
The guitar sound Good the only thing is the drum....NO Power at all!
The song screams for POWER ! :-)
So fix the drums and it will be good
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Do you mean they need to be louder? Or is there something I can do to make them more powerful with compression?
 
Xcaliber said:
No vocals for this track. I'm just messing around with riffs and learning the recording and mixing process.

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Do you mean they need to be louder? Or is there something I can do to make them more powerful with compression?
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I think you need to process every drum, Kick Sneer and the rest, with a compressor and EQ to get the right punch and sound of the drum, and yes a bit louder to :-)
 
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