Looking for help on my mix - too claustrophobic and muddy

ClearedToPlay said:
It's good! The string squeelches from sliding your fingers on the guitar strings is fairly piercing to the ears...
Click to expand...

Thanks - this was actually recorded in my living room using a single SM57 haha. I boosted around 2000KHz on the guitar to try to make it more "sparkley" but I'm not sure it worked - I'm not sure what else I can do to balance out the frequency space on the higher end.
 
Hey man sounds great to me. I tried it on my phone because it exaggerates muddiness but I didn't detect any. I agree the string squeaks are prominent, maybe a little surgical eq could help.
 
I didn't know they made gloves for guitar, I just lick my fingers before each take, that works pretty well.
 
easlern said:
Hey man sounds great to me. I tried it on my phone because it exaggerates muddiness but I didn't detect any. I agree the string squeaks are prominent, maybe a little surgical eq could help.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Nice avatar - haven't listened to that album in years!
 
easlern said:
Hey man sounds great to me. I tried it on my phone because it exaggerates muddiness but I didn't detect any. I agree the string squeaks are prominent, maybe a little surgical eq could help.
Click to expand...

Hmm just tried do EQ it with no avail... found it around the 2-3KHz range but ducking it a little bit didn't seem to help. I think we will probably just have to re-record the guitar with a different mic placement.
 
It's solid songwriting and the recording is nice. It doesn't sound claustrophobic or muddy.
The only thing I'd recommend is a little reverb on the vocal. Like a "small room" reverb with just enough to hear it.
 
I like the song. Mixwise, you've got two different songs almost. Once the full band with piano comes in, it sounds pretty good. Maybe a little more ambiance on the vocal. In the part leading up to that, your levels are chaotic. First the acoustic guitars are very loud, then the vocal is right in your face. Some of that crops up again later in the song.

First things I would do is get the levels consistent within each track. Just a guess---did you comp these tracks together from takes recorded at different levels? Anyway, once you get that sorted, it should be easier to pull the mix together.
 
Nola said:
It's solid songwriting and the recording is nice. It doesn't sound claustrophobic or muddy.
The only thing I'd recommend is a little reverb on the vocal. Like a "small room" reverb with just enough to hear it.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice. I was going for as much intimacy as I could, which is why the vocals are completely dry. I'll experiment with some small room verb and see what it sounds like.

Robus said:
I like the song. Mixwise, you've got two different songs almost. Once the full band with piano comes in, it sounds pretty good. Maybe a little more ambiance on the vocal. In the part leading up to that, your levels are chaotic. First the acoustic guitars are very loud, then the vocal is right in your face. Some of that crops up again later in the song.

First things I would do is get the levels consistent within each track. Just a guess---did you comp these tracks together from takes recorded at different levels? Anyway, once you get that sorted, it should be easier to pull the mix together.
Click to expand...

Thanks Robus - I think I agree with you there, the guitar does seem a bit too loud at the start. Are you saying that it's fine when the band comes in?
I've only got one acoustic guitar take but there is a lot of dynamic range in it. I can bounce parts of it onto another track and bring the levels down again - same for the vocals during the quieter parts.
 
Yeah, when the band kicks in, it's a much more pleasant mix overall. In the first part, it feels a little mono. It's mostly just vocals and guitar straight down the middle. Maybe double-track and hard-pan the guitar.
A bit of something on the vocal with the full band would probably help. It's good dry in the beginning, but it doesn't match the space of the rest of the band.
 
Sounds nice. Reminds of something that would play at the end of a movie.

To my ears, the drums seem a tad low in the mix, but more of a matter of taste, I think.

The vocal sounds nice, too, but I think it could use a slight roll-off of some high-mids, like 2k or 3k. Could be a matter of taste also.

I think I would pan the piano a tad more to the right, seems to be competing a little with the lead vocal.
 
Great tune. Well written, well performed.

I think its great as is.
:D
You got a winner, any mix critique is just a matter of bias and personal taste.
 
I agree there was some serious string skreeching. I think you need to retrack the guitar to get rid of it.

I thought the singing was quite good. The vocal recording had a cheap mic sound to it. It's also much dryer than the rest of the tracks. It was over hyped in the 4K-5K range. The vocals are quite a bit louder than the rest of the tracks. They're sitting on top of everything.

Things get just a wee bit sloppy timing wise around 2:13.

I like the bass part. But it's a heavy bass sound for a song like this. It sort of a lite song, and the bass is big and fat and almost rumbly. It doesn't fit to me.

The drums are especially buried.

Nice song. I liked it.
 
TripleM said:
I agree there was some serious string skreeching. I think you need to retrack the guitar to get rid of it.

I thought the singing was quite good. The vocal recording had a cheap mic sound to it. It's also much dryer than the rest of the tracks. It was over hyped in the 4K-5K range. The vocals are quite a bit louder than the rest of the tracks. They're sitting on top of everything.

Things get just a wee bit sloppy timing wise around 2:13.

I like the bass part. But it's a heavy bass sound for a song like this. It sort of a lite song, and the bass is big and fat and almost rumbly. It doesn't fit to me.

The drums are especially buried.

Nice song. I liked it.
Click to expand...

We're recording in an untreated room and a tight budget, so the vocals were tracked with an SM57 in my living room. I think we could get a better sound if we recorded with less gain (can hear awful sounding reflections on this one). Thanks for the tips. I think you're right, the sub-bass probably needs to be cut from the bass. All and all we will probably re-record most of this - this is essentially a demo version.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top