Old Dog. New Tricks

ido1957

ido1957

9K Gold Member
Been super busy with work and home renos so haven't been around much lately. I also had to play my first gig in 10 years a few weeks ago which required a bit of wood shedding. Rusty, rusty, rusty.... Anyway, had a break this past week and thought I'd remix this song using some new ideas which Mike and I tossed around. I see a few people using Google Play so I thought I'd give their player a try this time. Let me know how this mix sounds. :D:D:D:D

Edit - new mix 3 up

Tell Me 20161105 MIX 3
 
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Hey ido,

This sounds really good!! Very clean and everything has its own space.

If I had to make some suggestions. Please note I could be wrong, my room is not treated

1. Maybe add a mix bus compressor to glue everything together and sound tighter.
2. The guitar could use some distortion. Sounds a bit boomy.
2. Vocals could use some high end so it sticks out a bit more.

Thank you for posting!
 
Thanks for the listen and comments anoopbal. Good suggestions on the mix - I'll put them on my list. :D
 
Sounds good, Gerry. My one and only suggestion would be to cut the sub-freqs on the kick and/or bass. Not sure which one, I'm having trouble separating them out from each other.

Okay, another super small nit, I wouldn't mind if the overheads were slightly louder.

Everything else sounds good to me. Nice balance, good performance and your vocals really shine. They have come a long way over the years.
 
Thanks Chili, I'll check out the bass/kick relationship. The drums are a stereo file that Jason mixed for us so, no individual mic adjustments unfortunately. :D
 
Great to see you posting again ido. Good song and performance. Some of my suggestions are going to be ones you're familiar hearing from me, but here goes:

1. Overall, the mix is dark and boxy. As Chili said, the overheads could come up--see #4 below. The rhythm guitar sounds dark and muffled. The vocal needs more air. The ambiance on the drums, vocal and rhythm guitar isn't flattering to any of them.

2. The mix is quite narrow. The guitars are crowding the lead vocal and stepping on it in places, especially the guitar on the left. The harmony vocals are competing with the lead vocal more than they are complimenting it. The whole thing feels close and claustrophobic. You need some air and space. I'd pan that rhythm guitar out farther (then again, that's what I always say) and work on blending the lead and harmony vox better.

3. There's quite a bit of mud, surprisingly for an arrangement as spare as this one is. I think it's down the rhythm guitar and vocal again, as well as your drum bus. The bass sounds pretty clean but is pretty loud and might be contributing to the problem. Some more high-passing all round, but especially on the vocals and guitar, might help.

4. Buy, beg, borrow, or steal the raw drum tracks if at all possible. Working around a pre-mixed stereo drum track is going to limit what you can do here. Your snare sound is anemic and distant. It needs immediacy and body. The reverb on it isn't helping matters. I thought I heard a little flutter echo in places, made worse by ambiance.

Hope this helps.
 
I'd call this 9X% solid. A clean mix overall, anything I point out is really nitpicking.

I don't know if I'd raise the OHs so much as give them more definition if possible. More attack on those cymbals would be nice, but if they came up overall, I think things would get messy.

The guitars don't feel like they're in the same space as the rest of the band. They're a tad mid-rangey and close. Maybe some 'verb would help that.

Harmonies sound particularly nice.
 
Cool stuff Gerry. Mike's bass tone is a million miles better than a year ago and that makes a massive difference.
 
On my listen using headphone.

Bass could come up. Sitting closer to the guitar. It is doing a lot of support for the tune I would like to hear it a bit more. Not forward, but closer in volume to the guitar, but still sitting back.
 
didn't read the other comments. it sounds to me like the drums are further back than everything else. they aren't sitting as tight as they could with the guitars, but a little better with the bass. vocal needs some higher energy, it seems. something, somewhere needs to open up. the top end of everything seems stifled. good hook, great playing and leads
 
Thanks for the listen and comments VHS, Ray, DM60 and andrushkiwt. Lots of things to look into based on all the helpful comments so far. I'm making a list of everything and will look into each item - both individually and together as it affects the mix. :D
 
Sounds good man. Cool tune. I listened twice. Generally agree with the comments provided - especially Chili's about the bass dum and bass.

I feel like the drums could be a little brighter and wider.
 
Thanks IBB, appreciate you listening - twice ! :) I have all the comments including Chili's jotted dwon and will be looking at them over the next little while. :D
 
Mix #2 now up in the original post. Had a little time this afternoon, so I addressed a couple of the items that were mentioned about the first mix. Let me know what this one sounds like. Thanks :D:D:D:D
 
On headphones, sounds good. Vocals sound really clear, and at a very good level. Bass is coming through, I can't speak any low rumble since I am on HPs, but everything sound very tight and clean. Sounds like a pro mix to me.
 
Thanks for checking it out DM60. There's a few edits left to do but in the meantime I'll be auditioning this on various systems to see how it translates with the latest changes. :D
 
Thanks Ray - the mic I used seems to stack backing tracks pretty well.

I've done a couple of small edits on the vocal and bass and just uploaded Mix 3.

Edit - uploaded the wrong mix - now Mix 3 is the correct one.

:D:D:D:D
 
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