I've done a few small projects before that turned out ok, but I decided to record our band's new album in my garage and have started working on some mixes. Everyone seems pretty happy when thy hear them, but I know there's some areas that I need help with. When I A/B with more commercial recordings, they seem to have more brightness overall, and I feel like I have some "boxiness" or "muddiness" in the low/mid-low area, probably between 75-250Hz. I've messed with the eq on the bass, guitar, and kick around there, but can't seem to get rid of it. Just really need some outside ears that understand recording and mixing, and can help me to understand how I can make these mixes better. Any advice or feedback is greatly appreciated. If you want the basics of what I have done so far, read on. The drums were recorded on a digital set, but with live cymbals miked at the same time. The triggered sounds are through Superior Drummer for toms, snare, and kick. Bass was direct from his processor, and now has compression and eq. Guitar was quad tracked. No compression, just some eq; rolled off at 140Hz. Two panned hard L and two panned hard R. Vocals are quad tracked and have de-esser, compression, and eq; rolled off at 105Hz. The vocals are recorded just yesterday and only have a little mixing done to them. Right now, they are all panned to the center. If you have any more questions, please ask. Thanks.
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Working on a mix. Any advice is appreciated.
- Thread starter elsachmo
- Start date
madpsychot
New member
From what I can hear, there's not a lot of separation between the bass and drums. Maybe open up the drums with some reverb and send the hats and cymbals further left and right. Some EQ'ing would help get more out of the toms and especially the bass drum. The bass is a little muddy to my ears, so some EQ'ing there could tighten it up. Some compression might help there also.
From what I can hear, there's not a lot of separation between the bass and drums. Maybe open up the drums with some reverb and send the hats and cymbals further left and right. Some EQ'ing would help get more out of the toms and especially the bass drum. The bass is a little muddy to my ears, so some EQ'ing there could tighten it up. Some compression might help there also.
Thanks. Just realized that the overheads were only panned 55 L and R, so I think I can get more separation there. I was having a little trouble with mixing bass and drums, so an acquaintance of mine stopped by a tried to help me out some. I realized we didn't get to where it needed to be, but here's what we ended up with, and what is reflected on the clip I posted.
Bass: Sent to a group channel in Cubase
On group: Compressor 1: 6 to 1 Attack 5.1 Release 10 (just set to tame the peaks)
Compressor 2: 4 to 1 Attack 20.1 Release 10 (for the overall compression)
EQ: Bass roll off at 55Hz
2.6 at 150Hz 1.0Q
-11.1 at 3000Hz 5.1Q
highs rolled off at 6000Hz
Drums: (all processing done inside of Superior Drummer at the moment)
Kick-Inside Mic: 5.0db at 52Hz 2.8Q
-15.5 at 280Hz 2.8Q
5.0 at 7000Hz 1.0Q
Kick-Outside Mic: -17.0 at 420 2.8Q
Then both sent to group channel
Kick Group: Compressor 4 to 1 Attack and Release at 50ms
EQ1: -14.5 at 220Hz 4.0Q
-14.0 at 560Hz 4.0Q
EQ2: 4.5 at 55Hz 4.0Q
5.0 at 100Hz 4.0Q
5.0 at 520Hz 4.0Q
6.0 at 8700Hz 1.0Q
He also suggested a parallel compression to send the kick group to again set to 7 to 1 with 50ms Attack and Release that allowed some more "punch" when you add it in. Not using much of that though, and it was not something I was familiar with. Very little done to the toms, but they do seem like they need to sound "bigger" with maybe some more mids and mid-lows? Just didn't want to try and add anything to them until I got the lows and mid-lows set between guitar, bass, and kick. I know each sound is different, but maybe someone will see something here that shows whee I'm maybe going wrong trying to get the bass and drums working together and getting rid of some muddiness. And I also only have the Izotope 5 "CD Mastering: Exciter and Widener" preset on right now for listening purposes. Thanks again.
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