Need help fixing some tracks...

P

purplepeople

Member
Two years ago I recorded an album. Long story short I used a different mic than usual and it was terrible. Since the vocals sounded so lifeless and dry I added EQ. It caused sibilance issues rending my recordings incredibly difficult to listen to. Like it's painful even after applying de-essers, tape emulation, soothe, etc.....
After over a 1,000 hours trying to fix these tracks I have absolutely no other ideas of what to try. Can anyone listen to this and possibly give me some ideas to try?
I realize these songs are never going to sound great. At this point I just want to remove whatever is causing the pain/headaches from listening to it.
Thanks!
 

Attachments

  • Reference Mix-Master.mp3
    6.4 MB
I'm not hearing anything drastically wrong here. Are you listening on neutral speakers/monitors? Are you playing it super loud? Higher frequencies will almost always sound harsh at higher volumes. If you expect people to crank your songs to 11 (like dance music) maybe just trim the entire upper frequency range a bit to account for that (like rolling off maybe -3db above 4khz?).
 
Thanks for listening. It cuts my ears no matter what I play it on. Headphones, phone, laptop, monitors, etc.... Like it immediately causes pain in my ears/brain and I'm listening at moderate levels.
Like just five minutes yesterday gave me a terrible headache for the rest of the day.
Is it likely just an EQ issue?
 
purplepeople said:
Thanks for listening. It cuts my ears no matter what I play it on. Headphones, phone, laptop, monitors, etc.... Like it immediately causes pain in my ears/brain and I'm listening at moderate levels.
Like just five minutes yesterday gave me a terrible headache for the rest of the day.
Is it likely just an EQ issue?
Click to expand...
For your listening, yes EQ'ing as I described would help but I played the track on my primary headphones (ATH-M50, very standard stuff) and had zero issues. Are you having issues with your ears/hearing? There's absolutely nothing in that mix sonically that would come anywhere close to "pain inducing".

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Pinky said:
For your listening, yes probably but I played the track on my primary headphones (ATH-M50, very standard stuff) and had zero issues. Are you having issues with your ears/hearing? There's absolutely nothing in that mix sonically that would come anywhere close to "pain inducing".
Click to expand...
I wondered if I was having an ear problem.... But I went to the movies yesterday and had zero issues. It's just my own personal music that causes the pain lol...... But yeah when I turn it on within like 15 seconds it feels like someone's stabbing me in the brain and I get sort dizzy.
 
I didn't think that there's anything major wrong with it although I did wonder if there was something going on in the 5-7kHz region. It sounds a bit like some kind of saturation process has been used which has smoothed out the shakers and the sibilants in the vocals which means that they lose a bit of definition. It doesn't take away from my enjoyment of the track but it might have something to do with your frustration.

When that sort of thing happens to me I tend to remove all the processing from the problem tracks and start again - keeping things simple if possible.
 
jamesperrett said:
I didn't think that there's anything major wrong with it although I did wonder if there was something going on in the 5-7kHz region. It sounds a bit like some kind of saturation process has been used which has smoothed out the shakers and the sibilants in the vocals which means that they lose a bit of definition. It doesn't take away from my enjoyment of the track but it might have something to do with your frustration.

When that sort of thing happens to me I tend to remove all the processing from the problem tracks and start again - keeping things simple if possible.
Click to expand...
Maybe the tape emulation or Soothe plugin? I also have the Sibilance plugin twice in the chain. Can that make the sound less pleasurable to listen to?
You didn't hear any noticeable frequencies that hurt your ears? So weird to me that two of you think it's fine.
 
Hiya, cool song.

For me the mix isn't bad but it's pretty bright and I'd be looking to tame it around 9K.

Just as an example, having pulled down 9K by around 3.5dB:


View attachment A.mp3

Screenshot (6).png

P.S. I don't think you should just put an EQ on your master bus and tame it that way, it's just an example, fix it in the mix!

P.P.S. You can ignore that boost around 300Hz, it won't help in this case I just couldn't help myself...
 
HumanPlanet said:
Hiya, cool song.

For me the mix isn't bad but it's pretty bright and I'd be looking to tame it around 9K.

Just as an example, having pulled down 9K by around 3.5dB:


View attachment 119427

View attachment 119433

P.S. I don't think you should just put an EQ on your master bus and tame it that way, it's just an example, fix it in the mix!

P.P.S. You can ignore that boost around 300Hz, it won't help in this case I just couldn't help myself...
Click to expand...
Do you think the problem is more the vocals, beat, or both?
 
I've tried it on everything and find nothing I'd consider a problem. So I thought about what I'm hearing.
The synths are wide band and clean.
The Bass is very clean and wide band.
The drums have have a nice bottom end and some sparkles
The guitar is prominent and very clean and details. The BVs are blended very well so it's difficult to tell sometimes how many there are and what sex - so they're wide band.

Common feature clean, sparkly and wide band - as in they are what is filling up the sound field, leaving ....
The vocal. The voice fits the song, and the very band limited Vox track is also compressed to give that robotic style filtered sound that is quite popular. I think that once you've chopped the bottom of and chopped the top of and squashed it, there's not very much left to EQ. Maybe the sound we are hearing which is a stylistically processed 'manufactured' sound, not a real one - is too far from your own voice that you can't relate to it, where we can, as we have no idea what you really sound like. It's not too loud or too quiet, but maybe a bit far back in the mix - maybe because you didn't like it so much?

Personal taste wise - the only thing that stood out for me was the guitar riff - which I found a bit prominent - but that's it. My wife is into more modern music styles than me - she came in and told me to turn the damn thing down, then stopped and said - "who is it?" She never commented on not liking it, or another of those forum things ....... which she usually does - so without knowing it was a problem piece, she just moaned because it was loud in the room with door open. She's not an expert in recording, but she always comments on bad stuff!
 
rob aylestone said:
I've tried it on everything and find nothing I'd consider a problem. So I thought about what I'm hearing.
The synths are wide band and clean.
The Bass is very clean and wide band.
The drums have have a nice bottom end and some sparkles
The guitar is prominent and very clean and details. The BVs are blended very well so it's difficult to tell sometimes how many there are and what sex - so they're wide band.

Common feature clean, sparkly and wide band - as in they are what is filling up the sound field, leaving ....
The vocal. The voice fits the song, and the very band limited Vox track is also compressed to give that robotic style filtered sound that is quite popular. I think that once you've chopped the bottom of and chopped the top of and squashed it, there's not very much left to EQ. Maybe the sound we are hearing which is a stylistically processed 'manufactured' sound, not a real one - is too far from your own voice that you can't relate to it, where we can, as we have no idea what you really sound like. It's not too loud or too quiet, but maybe a bit far back in the mix - maybe because you didn't like it so much?

Personal taste wise - the only thing that stood out for me was the guitar riff - which I found a bit prominent - but that's it. My wife is into more modern music styles than me - she came in and told me to turn the damn thing down, then stopped and said - "who is it?" She never commented on not liking it, or another of those forum things ....... which she usually does - so without knowing it was a problem piece, she just moaned because it was loud in the room with door open. She's not an expert in recording, but she always comments on bad stuff!
Click to expand...

I honestly don't have effects on my voice. Some auto-tuning might actually make the track better, but I don't really know how to do that stuff. It's just compression, noise reduction "because the mic I used was terrible" eq, and light reverb. It's not that I don't like how it sounds. I think it sounds fine, which is the problem.
The problem is that it hurts my ears and gives me headaches. All 12 tracks from this album do, but nothing else does.
Many years ago I made some songs and had a similar issue. It turned out the limiter I was using on the vocals was causing it. I guess maybe because it was over compressing it.
But I don't have a limiter on the vocals on any of these songs.
I thought maybe it was sibilance, but it makes little difference if I use a de-esser or not.
I shot the stems over to 10 "mixers" on Fiverr and all returned versions far worse than mine. But in many cases they fixed the frequency/pain, but it muffled everything else.
So you're saying your wife likes the song? Lol.....
 
HumanPlanet said:
This is weird to me too, I'm hearing an obviously fatiguing over bright mix with a big build up around 9k where others aren't, weird indeed...

I'll listen again when I get the time.
Click to expand...
I made some tweaks like you suggested. Is this better? I think it is, but I might need to rest my ears a few days before I attempt to fix the rest of the tracks.
 

Attachments

  • Almost Perfect EQ reduction.mp3
    6.4 MB
purplepeople said:
Maybe the tape emulation or Soothe plugin? I also have the Sibilance plugin twice in the chain. Can that make the sound less pleasurable to listen to?
Click to expand...
Yes, all that stuff is probably getting in the way. Try taking it off and just using a basic eq - maybe with a little automation if you need to do some de-essing.
 
I don't hear anything that should cause headaches, that is likely just you being over critical of your own voice.

I do hear an imbalance. Vocals in my opinion are too loud without a bit of air (verb) to place them smoothly in the mix. With them coming down, the next thing I would address is the snare sample. It is thin and could be better with something with some more beef. Just my opinion though. I'd rather hear a more rock type snare here to thicken it up, but that is just me.

When I work with rap type artists, I always try to work in the rock feel. The typewriter sound to me is just aggravating.
 
jamesperrett said:
Yes, all that stuff is probably getting in the way. Try taking it off and just using a basic eq - maybe with a little automation if you need to do some de-essing.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I don't think I have ever used a plugin other than a compressor twice in any chain ever. One could only assume there could be some conflicting artifacts by doing so.
I get what the OP is saying, but all I hear is that something aint right. Can't put my finger on it though other than the things I mentioned in my other post. I have heard more processed vocals on other recordings that work, so it might just be a bit overcooked with something....

???

Oh, and I also can't recall the last time I used a de-esser. But then I am more of a dynamic vocal mic user so maybe I just haven't needed it? YMMV.
 
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