Been away for awhile - New mix for review - My Captain

dewhitt

dewhitt

Dave DeWhitt
Hi All, it's been quite awhile since I've posted anything. I've been working on my recording and mixing skills, and trying to soak up anything I can that will improve what I'm doing, and I have a new song and mix to share that I'm excited about and hoping that you kind and generous people will give it a listen and provide any feedback.

This tune was recorded in my home studio, which I call Midnight Muse, and we tracked the song as a trio with guitar, bass, and drums all done together in the same room. The singer overdubbed the LVX later, and I added a second guitar part as well. I also added BGVs.

The song is on the audio page of my website, right at the top, it's called My Captain: Audio - Midnight Muse Media

Let me know what you think!

Thanks!

Dave DeWhitt
 
Thanks for the feedback, CrowsofFritz. I was wondering if the backing vocals were too low, so that point is well taken.
 
I thought the lead vocal was good. Good performance and good tone.

I thought the snare, kick, and hats sounded pretty good. The crash cymbals get a bit hyped in the high end - like 5K and above. So they get kind of splashy.

Bass sounded pretty good. Slightly sterile - like it's missing a few low-mids. But the low end is nice and tight.

The rhythm guitars, to me, could use a little more gain and a little more low end. They are a little thin. I thought the two parts should be in tighter sync. They bounce back and forth in spots. Not exactly ping-pong like, but they're hitting chords at slightly different time.
 
great mix and tune, really enjoyed listening to it, , can't really talk about the mix though but to my ears it sounds pretty good.
 
This is really good, especially as it was mainly recorded live(ish)

There's a cymbal that his me in the right ear near the start, in fact the placement of the drums is often a bit strange - like you've got a slightly weird set up with the reverbs on it. Someone else will get it and be able to explain this shit better than me.
 
Solid mix. Guitar tones sound pretty good. Good vocal work.

+1 on the bgvox being quiet tho. I didn't even notice them until I started listening for them.
I might pan the left lead a little closer to center. It is the main voice in a few places (intro, solo, etc.) and so should probably be clearly audible in both channels.
The hi-hat is also a little overwhelming.

Yeah, this is especially good for mostly live.
 
Thanks for the feedback. I put a new mix up (v2) with minor tweaks. The hats and cymbals seemed to hit everyone as too harsh, so I applied a side chained compressor that's triggered from the crash frequencies to pull down the heaviest crashes and even out the hats. I had Waves Vocal Rider on the lead vocals in v1, and I have applied them to the BGVs too in order to help them stand out. I also had aggressive low shelf filters on the guitars to keep the low end free for bass and kick, but I changed the cutoff for that high pass from 200Hz down to 120Hz instead for the v2 mix. I also applied a touch of saturation to both L and R guitars. I'm pondering the panning suggestion. I agree that solos are usually front and center, but I kind of like the 2 guitar, separate parts, each on their own side approach to this. I will have to consider that.
 
Oh, and one more very important thing I forgot to mention...in v1 I had been playing around with a M/S EQ setting intended to reduce hiss in the side channels. I did not intend to leave that engaged when I bounced because I didn't like what it was doing to the overheads, but when I went back to remix for v2, that plugin was still engaged. Oops. I turned it off for v2.
 
Listening to mix 2 and Oh!! the hats, they are THERE. They just dominate. Otherwise, great performance, great song. The singer has a great voice and great control.

Good to see you back. I still listen to the signs of life cd every so often.
 
The hats are too loud. The cymbals generally have brittle lo fi sound which doesn't suit the rest of the mix. Everything else sounds good to me
 
Mix 2 is definitely less dark, and those BGVox are in a much better place.

The hi-hat is still loud. It's the loudest piece in the kit.

I'm also hearing some crackling on the crashes. Is that clipping? MP3s being MP3s?
 
Listening to Mix2 now. Agreed on the cymbal harshness...HHs in particular. At high volume through phones, they're pretty piercing. It might be ok in another mix, but all of the other tones seem so warm by comparison.

Good, tight performances. Very cool that so much of it was captured live. Some interesting panning choices here, but I think it works as a whole.
 
Hey Chili, thanks so much. Yeah, I am happy with this mix overall, but once you hear that hi hat and start to notice it, it's brutal! It's a common problem I guess with recording live drums, and especially if your drummer bashes the heck out of them like mine does. For the life of me, there doesn't seem to be anything I can do mix-wise to really fix it either. If I pull down the OH levels, which is where most of the hat is actually coming from even though I did have it also separately mic'd, then it changes the whole balance of the mix and I can't seem to get it back to where I want it. If I try to use EQ or side chained compression to target it, it's just not that effective without also changing the overall tone of the OHs, which again messes up the mix. Who knew one hi hat could cause so much grief!

The real fix is to record it better in the first place, maybe with some baffling between the hats and the OH mics. Actually, maybe the real fix is to have my drummer play it differently, but I know that's probably a tall order :)

Thanks for listening!

Dave

P.S. Thanks a ton for mentioning Signs of Life , you made my day!
Chili said:
Good to see you back. I still listen to the signs of life cd every so often.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks Bull Hit, and VHS, and Heatmiser, I really appreciate you taking the time to listen. My takeaway from this is to really change how we record the OHs and hats going forward, because this is not the first time I've had this challenge. This track was recorded with XY overheads. Avantone CK-1s into a Focusrite ISA Two, and the XY config is a change from my previous method, which was kind of a hybrid Glenn Johns and Recorderman placement of OHs. The XY helped some other challenges I was having, mainly phase issues, but man, the hi hats!!! I'm also dealing with a small, bad-sounding room with low ceilings here, so I may be somewhat limited in what I can coax out of the recording.

Thanks again!
 
dewhitt said:
I'm also dealing with a small, bad-sounding room with low ceilings here, so I may be somewhat limited in what I can coax out of the recording.
Click to expand...

Maybe the solution is more close mics then? If the room doesn't sound good, try to get it out of the equation as much as possible. Plus it'll give you more control over each piece individually.
 
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