Original - Throwing Stones

jm67

jm67

Member
Hello. I found an old piano riff from a few years ago, and worked it into a short song. It's got a 70's Todd Rundgren sort of groove.

I'm wondering if the mix is a bit muddy though. I was having a hard time getting the piano and bass to mesh well without taking out so much low end that it lost it's "punch". Any advice is appreciated.

https://soundcloud.com/jm67dc/throwing-stones
 
The clapping,, then tambourine panned hard right are a little distracting because they are so bright. The piano is buried - often the guitar is doing the same thing as it. There's not much low end overall - can't hear the kick and the bass sounds high-passed.
 
Okay - thanks for the notes. I'll try to work on the low end and bring up the kick and bass.
 
Nice tune, workout a few issues, I think you could brighten up the guitar. Also, you could use the guitar to play off the piano.
Pigeon Oracle came on and it seems at least on my system your mixes have a muddy sound. You may want to give your tunes a bit more high end see how you like it when it opens open up on the top.

You have some good tunes working there.
 
I like the song . . . but I did find the mix disturbing . . . there was a vagueness about it, and I think I would need to hear the elements complement each other more crisply.

The kit, I think, is indistinct, and with the level of reverb on other stuff (not necessarily a bad thing), there's kind of a wash of low end noise.
 
Thanks for the input - very helpful. I've uploaded a new mix on:
https://soundcloud.com/jm67dc/throwing-stones-v2 (the old mix is still there for comparison)

Let me know if you think this is a step in the right direction.

I changed the mix by:
- changing the drum samples to a dryer, harder kit, and brought up the bass drum
- changed the piano voice to a brighter tone, and compressed slightly
- dropped most of the guitar
- reduced the claps & tambourine, and moved the claps more to left/center
- added 10-20 kHz to several instruments and the master for "air"
- dropped the vocal level a bit
 
Much better to my ears. Give the Bass a little more presence and bottom would sound good to me.
 
2nd mix is much better. I don't know if it's me or my system, but the bass guitar doesn't sound defined, murky in some place and just muddy in others.

But I dig the tune, very nice. And the playing is nice too.
 
fuzzsniffvoyage said:
2nd mix is much better. I don't know if it's me or my system, but the bass guitar doesn't sound defined, murky in some place and just muddy in others.
Click to expand...

Thanks much... Yeah, based on the first comment I added some low end to the bass, but probably went too far. Now it sounds a bit BLAT. It's also a short scale bass (Squier Mustang) so it tends to rumble.
 
Listened to both mixes. V2 is a nice improvement over V1.

I do have some feedback based on what I'm hearing. I'm not terribly experienced myself, so have a listen back to the song with this stuff in mind to see if you agree or not. What's most important is what you think.

Everything seems really dry. The vocals have an swirly, phasey thing going on from time to time as well. The piano has a very wide stereo spread to me. I don't think that pianos have to take up the full stereo spread in a mix. I'd narrow that up a bit, personally. The drums seem small compared to everything else. Perhaps it is just because the piano is so BIG compared to everything else, not just in terms of level, but in terms of the overall characteristic of it. Everything is really getting buried under the piano.

I think you have all the elements for a good mix here, but you're not quite there yet. Seems like I am just being negative, but really I hope I am not coming across that way.
 
Nice tune, reminds me of the band Chicago. Second mix is a lot better than the first. At low volume the kick is almost too present though.
 
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