Hard rock mix advice

My primary criticisms are the drums.

I'm not sure how they were recorded, but all I can really hear are the cymbals, toms, and a little bit of snare. The kick is barely there at all. If you mic'd the kick by itself, I'd try boosting one of the clicky frequencies (4k-5k or 10k, maybe a little bit of both). I can tell during the end ("Lied to... lied to...") that the drummer is running on the kick but I'd like to be able to hear it.

In general the kick could come up quite a bit.

The snare could maybe use some slap (Maybe a not too narrow boost at around 4k?). The snare could come up too.

If all you recorded was a couple of overheads or something you might not have this option, but you can do a lot to even out a drum kit with mic placement and the room the drums are in.

The toms sound pretty decent to me.

As far as everything else goes, everything is pretty wet, lots of reverb. That's a creative decision (that I happen to like on this song) but I think some of the distorted guitars are a little too wet. Others sound just about right.

Clean guitars sound cool, but too high in the mix during the verses.

The singing is nice, just a little pitchy in a few spots. Otherwise very good.

I really dig the song itself a lot. For some reason I get a Sisters of Mercy meets Metallica vibe.
 
Very, very helpful ! I can't thank you enough for being so detailed. I'll try to put your advice to good use.

one question though.....you mentioned......
"some of the distorted guitars are a little too wet."

The lead or rhythm ?

Thanks again for the help !
 
I'd like to hear your thoughts on how to improve this mix ? Any advice would really help. I wrote and performed this so I probably shouldn't even be mixing it. Any advice would really help.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=952916&songID=7595029

Why not, we do that all the time here...?:D

This is a damn good song and except for the drums I don't find anything wrong with it. The rythm guitars might have a bit too much verb on them but that's taste.

Joey :):):):)
 
The drums dont fit. Like Steve pointed out. You have some effects (reverb or what ever you used) on the guitars and the drums are dry. Slap a reverb on the drums mix and set it to match the vibe of the guitars. Also I would throw a HPF (high pass filter) on the bass track and drum/kick track. Set both filters to around 50 to 80hz. I hear alot of low end and the HPF will help tame that.
 
Yeah however you recorded/mixed the drums, go back to square one. The drums kill this song. Turn everything down and make the kick and snare your main priority. Build your mix around them and see what happens.
 
Thanks, to all of you, for the advice. You guys have been a great help...... For some odd reason I'm getting the feeling that maybe some of you don't like the drums.;)
The drum samples are addictive drums . I played a roland TD6 and then did some editing here and there. Maybe I'd be better off just using the Addictive Drums loops and choosing some better samples. I've been struggling with the drums for quite a while. I think my best bet would be to find a real drummer to do a drum track for this song or someone with more mixing experience to mix it. Thanks again for your help!
 
I agree with the drums comments, and the only other thing that I didn't much care for was the fade out at the end. I would have preferred some kind of non-fade ending, more along the lines of what would be done live. But other than that this is a great tune. If most of the BS that passes for "hard rock" on the radio these days was replaced with stuff that sounds more like this, it'd be a great help to humanity.

Matt
 
If most of the BS that passes for "hard rock" on the radio these days was replaced with stuff that sounds more like this, it'd be a great help to humanity.

Matt

I didn't even know how to categorize this song. To tell you the truth, I haven't willingly listened to the radio in years. There is definately more crap on the radio than stuff that I can listen to so I don't even bother anymore.
Thanks for the comments. Glad you liked the song.
 
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