How to not make a song into "sound soup"?

jparker1888

New member
I am a casual home recorder with little knowledge of the intricacies of recording. I believe my songs sound pretty good, however I have never been able to make the individual pieces of my songs stand out. The bass, drums, guitar and piano always sound meshed together with no drive. You can never hear the instruments Individually it sounds like one meshed "sound soup". How can I make my tracks stand out more?
 
Have you got the voice central'ish and the rest of the instruments panned across the sound stage?

If the above makes no sense to you (and I suspect it might not!) you have a ways to go friend!

Dave.
 
EQ and panning, as suggested, are often the first tools I think a lot of us pick to make sure tracks have their own space in the mix.

After you record your tracks, what's your workflow for getting the mix together?

I tend to start with that "static mix" concept, even if it's just me and my guitar, hitting the faders (and often "clip gain" or equivalent) and panning, followed by EQ if needed (usually with my baritone voice) to fix obvious sonic overload/conflicts. If it's not hanging together at that point, (I know it's probably best to retrack something, maybe with better mic placement, etc.)
 
I am a casual home recorder with little knowledge of the intricacies of recording. I believe my songs sound pretty good, however I have never been able to make the individual pieces of my songs stand out. The bass, drums, guitar and piano always sound meshed together with no drive. You can never hear the instruments Individually it sounds like one meshed "sound soup". How can I make my tracks stand out more?

Is your name Phil Spector, by any chance? Ha! I am just kidding!

Mr. Spector built a whole career with his "wall of sound" productions, but I'm assuming that is not the kind of sound you are trying to achieve. And that's just as well because...well it's not 1963!

Without hearing your mix, it's difficult to give a single concise answer, but I can throw a few ideas at you based on an experience I had within the last year. I recorded the basic tracks for an original song that seemed to call for a lot of instrumental parts going on at the same time. Then I added more tracks, and then even more. By the time I got my vocals recorded there was absolutely no more room! I spent hours and days trying to mix the song in a way that would make room for the vocals. Trying to do it all at once proved pointless; too many instruments competing to be heard. So I started over (mix-wise) by muting everything but the rhythm and bass. I paid close attention to the eq, reverb and any other effects. I also kept them at a low volume. That is very important when layering; you can always boost the master volume on the final mix.

Next I added the rhythm and ambient instruments, and mixed them as if this were the final mix, still giving each instrument a unique treatment. In one case I realized I had a track that wasn't even necessary, so I dumped it. It was an organ track, which wasn't really benefitting the song, but it was hogging up a lot of headroom. Then I moved on to lead tracks.

Did this solve my problem? Well, I can't say at this point because I'm still working on it. But it is flowing together much better.

I hope this example helps in some way. If not, just disregard!
 
Is your name Phil Spector, by any chance? Ha! I am just kidding!

Mr. Spector built a whole career with his "wall of sound" productions, but I'm assuming that is not the kind of sound you are trying to achieve. And that's just as well because...well it's not 1963!

Without hearing your mix, it's difficult to give a single concise answer, but I can throw a few ideas at you based on an experience I had within the last year. I recorded the basic tracks for an original song that seemed to call for a lot of instrumental parts going on at the same time. Then I added more tracks, and then even more. By the time I got my vocals recorded there was absolutely no more room! I spent hours and days trying to mix the song in a way that would make room for the vocals. Trying to do it all at once proved pointless; too many instruments competing to be heard. So I started over (mix-wise) by muting everything but the rhythm and bass. I paid close attention to the eq, reverb and any other effects. I also kept them at a low volume. That is very important when layering; you can always boost the master volume on the final mix.

Next I added the rhythm and ambient instruments, and mixed them as if this were the final mix, still giving each instrument a unique treatment. In one case I realized I had a track that wasn't even necessary, so I dumped it. It was an organ track, which wasn't really benefitting the song, but it was hogging up a lot of headroom. Then I moved on to lead tracks.

Did this solve my problem? Well, I can't say at this point because I'm still working on it. But it is flowing together much better.

I hope this example helps in some way. If not, just disregard!

Back when I had just moved from recording on a stand-alone 8 track recorder to an 'infinite' track DAW (Reaper) I recorded an old song that ended up having 15 guitar tracks (3 for each instrument I had) plus mandolin, bass and vocal tracks. The instruments kept coming in during the song, starting out with just 3 tracks. Seemed like a good idea at the time! That version of the song never did get fully mixed. The (eventually re-recorded) final version of the song had 2 rhythm guitar and one lead guitar track, plus vocals.
 
"I am a casual home recorder with little knowledge of the intricacies of recording. " Well, that's your problem. You need to work on it more. Likely for years. That's a fact. You will, by turns, if you stick with it, start getting your stuff to sound good. I might not be representative, but it took me 5 years to get merely acceptable (by my own lights). I played guitar with other musicians, all the while recording sessions, jams, whatever. I would mix it. It was not often good. But I learned a lot along the way, reading whatever I could (and can) on the subject, and staying abreast of what was going on.
I did my first mix in 2005. I love doing this more than ever, so of course I'm still doing it, and I'm much better now than when I started.
 
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