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Anders Erisian said:
I've listened to both v2 and v4 a few times each over the last few days, both on headphones and speakers. Suppose you're well into your next mix but i'll pitch in a couple more observations.

I thought v4 was an improvement.
Snare sounded fuller, vocals seemed to sit better and backing vocal didn't jump out so much with the shock value thing. Bass had more impact in the very bottom end.

No issue with the guitar tone or playing, but i thought it did still have too much delay/verb. Too much for it to sound good as an intentional effect anyway.

I still think the whole track was a bit lacking in low end ( c. 100hz and below). Kick was pretty light on, if you wanted the bass dominant in the bottom end i'd probably just overcommit and give it almost the lot (leave the kick alone and bring the bass up, as long as it didn't totally mask the kick). It's a bit of a catch 22 though, last mix i posted here i wanted the kick to really hit hardest in the sub 100hz region, and have the bass round out the low end ambience and 'fill the gaps', so to speak. People said it sounded undefined, and the kick had too much. Guess the opposite is the case with this track. Regardless i would still want to hear a touch more of the bass guitar in this.

As a general comment i thought the song was a good listen, didn't remind me of any other particular artist or style, i guess all songs are unique, so it would be pointless to say it sounded unique, but it certainly didn't sound derivative to me.
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Okay, I didn't ignore you, I was just getting some things done before addressing the mix in the light of what you said. I thought you'd listened carefully and had useful things to say, so I tweaked accordingly. I'm really curious about the drum sound now - I've got it the way I like it, but I'm sort of not hearing the mix right now, if you know what I mean.

 
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Okay, last one for the time being - I promise. I've been obsessing over this one cuz the whole album pivots around it, plus I've been learning stuff in the last couple of days and trying it out in the mix. All comments are very welcome, although right now I'm fretting over the toms - EQ and level and panning. How's the whole thing sound to your ears?

 
The separate levels sound fine. I personally don't like the phasing guitar thingy.

It's definitely a good mix. There aren't any obnoxious or obvious flaws.
Cool tone on the lead guitar.
 
Much the same as schwarzenyaeger said as far as the whole mix goes, nothing really stood out as flawed. Sounded pretty good to me. Suppose you could keep tweaking but you might have reached the point of diminishing returns, which i think is what you mean when you say know what i mean.

Just guessing you gave the kick a bit more bottom end punch, it's a few days since i listened to the earlier version, toms sounded ok to me.
Anything else i've got to add would be subjective personal taste stuff about the level of the vocal and bass, so i'll refrain.
 
Overall this sounds really nice. Percussion and vocals sound great in all aspects. The bass tone is nice, although I think you could benefit from making it a little more beefy... I'm not saying go crazy, but making it a little wider I think would help the song. The rhythm guitar sounds like it has been recorded fine, but sounds a little lifeless, like maybe it has been overly compressed? Levels of everything compliment each other very well.

I'm pretty new at mixing so take my comments as a grain of salt.

Edit: Bass sounds great in headphones... I listened to the song first through some questionable speakers. Bass sounds really nice actually.
 
TheLurker said:
Overall this sounds really nice. Percussion and vocals sound great in all aspects. The bass tone is nice, although I think you could benefit from making it a little more beefy... I'm not saying go crazy, but making it a little wider I think would help the song. The rhythm guitar sounds like it has been recorded fine, but sounds a little lifeless, like maybe it has been overly compressed? Levels of everything compliment each other very well.

I'm pretty new at mixing so take my comments as a grain of salt.
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No, I'm taking your comments seriously, I don't care how new you are. The idea you have about the bass is the last thing I'll look at before I sign off on this one - thanks for that. The rhythm guitars were recorded that way, so there's nothing I can do about it now. It was the first time I'd used that pedal, and I didn't realize how much I was compressing the signal - I just liked the sound. Anyway, that's why I got that swirly sound going on that part - to get it moving a bit. I think it gives the song a trancey feel as well.

Thanks for weighing in - good stuff.
 
Hm, that bass flub (a millisecond too late) at 0:07 is bothering me. Is this the last track I sent? HistoryPedullaNew?
 
Yeah, it's HistoryPedullaNew. If I solo it, it's fine. If I solo the drums, they're fine. Put them together, and it sounds like a tiny infelicity. I can do an edit if you like - it's not a biggie, but I have no objection to airbrushing out imperfections. I wonder which version of the tune you were listening to when you recorded your parts - I made some edits to the start of the tune at one point.
 
Cool track with a pretty infectious groove. Listened to the most recent version.

The following is all subjective based on my environment, ears, and impressions of course...

To me, the vocals feel like they are sitting on top of the mix right now. I'm getting the sense that a reduction in the body of the vocals around the 280 - 320 range will drop them in a little. How much compression are you using on the vocals? This sounds like a very dynamic vocal performance in that there are lots of notes trailing off. I'm hearing the lower level details, but the louder bits seem too loud. If this was on my desk, I'd be looking at multiple stages of compression and shaving the body with EQ.

Great lead guitar tone!

Drums are a bit dull and don't really have that powerful impact that could really make this track feel badass. More snap on the snare with a little more room and more snare sound might work well. The kick has a very nice thud, but could use some punch.

I'm a little bit torn on the upper end of the mix. There is stuff going on there, but it feels just a little bit restricted, like the upper end is reigned in a bit too much and very mono. I'm not getting a sense of openness from the top end. Where is your overhead positioning?

Bass sounds great.

Levels all good.

Love the emphasis on "there never is enough" at 2:32.

Didn't notice the toms one way or another.

Cool stuff. I like this track.
 
Hey, thanks very much for the comments. They're interesting, so sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. (Been busy eating and drinking and talking.)

kindafishy said:
To me, the vocals feel like they are sitting on top of the mix right now. I'm getting the sense that a reduction in the body of the vocals around the 280 - 320 range will drop them in a little. How much compression are you using on the vocals? This sounds like a very dynamic vocal performance in that there are lots of notes trailing off. I'm hearing the lower level details, but the louder bits seem too loud. If this was on my desk, I'd be looking at multiple stages of compression and shaving the body with EQ.
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Good ears - I used parallel compression to bring the quiet bits up, but I didn't compress the peaks. l'll try the compression staging thing you mentioned - I haven't gotten into that approach yet. I'm already cutting the vocal at 400 and 200 - I'll play with a cut at 300 instead and see what's what.


kindafishy said:
Drums are a bit dull and don't really have that powerful impact that could really make this track feel badass. More snap on the snare with a little more room and more snare sound might work well. The kick has a very nice thud, but could use some punch.

I'm a little bit torn on the upper end of the mix. There is stuff going on there, but it feels just a little bit restricted, like the upper end is reigned in a bit too much and very mono. I'm not getting a sense of openness from the top end. Where is your overhead positioning?
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Left and right 50. I'm kinda new to mixing drums. I mixed the drums on this one, and then when I was done watched a mixing tutorial series by Kenny Gioia that spends a *lot* of time on the drums, and learned everything I did that was wrong. Things like 'snap' and 'punch' are just words right now - I don't know what they mean. I'm done this one for a couple of months, but I think I'll come back to it later and see if I can coax a bit more clarity and separation out of it.


kindafishy said:
Love the emphasis on "there never is enough" at 2:32.
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Happy accident. I was trying out different approaches to backing vocals and recording everything. At one point I unmuted everything I'd done and thought 'that'll work'. lol
 
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