Let's Hear It

[Alex W]

I'd appreciate any feedback on any of the three songs at:

http://www.hueromusic.com/MUSIC.htm

This is about the third try of a mix and maybe about the best I can do with what I've got.

All recording was done on 8-tracks with a Korg D1600. The songs were recorded "live" at a warehouse with SM57's on the guitars and a CAD drum-mic package on the kit routed through a Mackie CR1604 run out it stereo. Guitar mics went straight into the Korg. Vocals were running live through the PA with direct outs from the Mackie to Korg. As you might imagine there's significant bleed through the vocal mics and I don't have any control over the individual drum mics at this point.

Previous mixes were either very muddy or too thin. Let me know.

Alex

[Evildick]

Take What I Want:

-Club sound. Sounds like a B-Side.

-Drums kind of kill the song, they seem to lag. The recording isn't bad but I wish there would be a flurry of sticks on the toms and the snare every once and awhile. Think Bad Religion and you'll hear what I'm talking about. Personal preference.

Flying Robot:

-Reminded me of Angry Samoans a little

-get in a studio and you'll get a better critique

-Also reminds me of a certain studio on Beecher Street.

4th of July

-Vox is off from the band

-would probably be a pretty good small club sound


It's damn near impossible to critique any of these songs. They sound pretty good but they also sound like they're recorded at a club with mixing being a low priority. It is a good start though but it's hard to say anything about the recording quality.

[participant]

Take What I Want -

Nice cool song! It's like hard rock, done by Angus Whats-is-name from AC/DC and Dave Mustaine.

Interesting choice to mix the guitar right in the center. Playback level is very low, so I'm not sure if I can trust the monitors on the bass and high ends. Bass does sound wimpy, but that (again) could just be the level.

Vox sound good, but like they were recorded in a separate room with a very quiet instrument bed. Guitars almost sound over-compressed... like the release setting is too fast, or the hold setting (if you have one). The lead transient on any guitar lick makes it thru, but then it's smashed like a pertater... at this point, the guitars seem to duck under everything.

Possibly lengthen the release setting on the compressor? Then raise the guitar volume, or lower the vox a bit because the voice is what peaks out your range; or, it's what would peak out your range if you normalized the wave file.

Did you set the master fader to 0db, and check for clipping on mixdown? What was the peak volume of the left/right channel, if so? Probably should try to raise each of the tracks a bit, then back them off until you're a few db under 0. This would nearly eliminate the need to normalize the mixdown .wav.

The snare has a fairly nice sound to it.

Just some initial thoughts.



-C

[Alex W]

Thanks for the feedback.

I'll run back through the setup on my Korg whent I get a chance but I'm pretty sure I didn't have any compression on the guitars or the overall mix. I threw some reverb on the vocals and applied a final EQ balancing effect on the whole thing but that was about it. The recordings were made in a large open warehouse--I don't know if this might have something to do with it. The guitar cabinets were close-mic'd with SM57's but they also bleed through the vox mics quite a bit, so it's difficult to get complete separation on the tracks.

The vox were actually recorded while we were playing, without much monintoring feedback. That is to say we play pretty loud and it's sometimes difficult to hear the vox when we're playing. This can lead to the somewhat disjointed sound since the mics are taken direct into the recorder.

As for the overall level, that's just a peculiarity of the Korg's burn-to-CD feature, which for some reason ends up recording at a low level. This gets translated to the MP3 file when it's converted. I don't know an easy fix for this given my present set up.

We've recently recorded drum tracks at pro studio up in Burbank and I'm completing a home studio where we can track the guitars, bass and vox separately. I'll repost when these get finished.

Thanks for taking the time to listen and give your feedback. The current songs are what I have to work with in terms of learning how to mix.

Alex