Feedback on the metal mix needed

S

stivens1991

New member
Hi all!

To be short - I'm working currently on a new metal track, and struggling to get it sound decent :)

I have this issue that the mix is souding good on my monitors, but as soon I'm listening to it on i.e. headphones I think that the kick is a bit too much on the top of the mix.

The more experienced pair of ears would be a great help ;)

https://soundcloud.com/s_t_i/mix5/s-x4j98


Any feedback would be a great help!


Thanks,
Przemek.
 
The mix is sounding good to me. The only thing is the snare is a bit low. How do you have your monitors setup in your room? Also, your headphones might have more exaggerated low end so that might be why the kick is sticking out more.
 
musicgeekandlvr said:
The mix is sounding good to me. The only thing is the snare is a bit low. How do you have your monitors setup in your room? Also, your headphones might have more exaggerated low end so that might be why the kick is sticking out more.
Click to expand...

Thank you very much for this feedback. Yeah, now I see that the snare is bit low.
I have my monitors set on both sides of my desk, 1,5m apart i guess.
 
I thought this sounded pretty good. Bass sounds really cool. Guitars, while too over-driven for me personally, sound good for the genre.

Drums sound great to me.

I'll never get Cookie Monster vocals, but I thought these sounded good.

My only nit was that the rhythm guitars are a little too loud and the lead vocal is a little too soft. Just by a db or two.
 
Vocal could use some top end. "Breath" as the say. Kick a shelf on at about 8k and just give it a couple dB boost. You may have to go up a bit (high as 12k would not be out of the norm). See if that gives the vocal a better seat at the party.
 
Yep. Definitely needs more feedback!



(No I didn't listen, and I know it doesn't help, but every time I see a thread like this I think for a minute that somebody is actually asking for help getting howling squealing screeching noise on their track. Never is. :( It probably does need some though. ;) )
 
Guys!

Thank you very much for this feedback, I appreciate it.

Conclusion, and things to check:

- 1-2 dB up for the snare
- more "breath" for the vocals with 8k shelf
- maybe cut overdrive a little on guitars
- 1-2 dB down for guitars


Again - thanks for your help, will post the corrected track soon, in the meantime any more feedback would be great.
 
What Ash is saying is certainly true. Modern metal has gotten to the point where feedback (from the guitar) is zero. Funny to me that a genre of music based on the sound of hugely amplified guitars has no natural amp sound...no ringing harmonics, no long held notes that completely disintegrate into relative tones and ...and ...well, FEEDBACK. It's all just a bit clinical for my taste anymore. Guess I'm becoming an old man. :)
 
+1 on the snare needing a boost. The other things, I'm not as sold on, but I don't think those tweaks would hurt.

I think metal diverged from garage rock at some point where metal became the genre for showing off how technically proficient you were. (Look at these complex time signatures! Look at how many notes I'm playing!) Where garage rock became the genre for showing off how loud your amps are. (with some obvious exceptions, obviously - Sunn O))) jumping to mind)
 
The toms also get buried at times. To me they need to be at the same volume as the snare. Which also needs to be 'out front' more. Especially @ 1:17 - 1:30. At 1:29 a tom seems to be very lost and that is the one that needs to be prominent for the part. It is the same the next times that part comes up.

Overall it is sounding quite good man! I agree with all other suggestions made already.
 
The term metal has never really meant anything specific. It just covers too much territory to generalize anything. I pretty much just want feedback on everything.:) Don't care what you're playing. If you can't figure out how to work in some feedback, you're not trying hard enough.

Edit cause I finally listened (mix 5)-
I think this is pretty damn good, but there's definitely something really strange with those drums. Some of this is personal preference maybe, and I understand pretty well the "industry standard" for this kind of thing.

I feel like the snare and (surprisingly) the cymbals work just about right with the rest of the band.

The kick is in its own world. It's super dry and way out front. At times it sounds to me like a kick drum with some other stuff happening behind it. I mean, it seems to be on time, but it's completely disconnected from the rest of the kit and the mix in general. Again, I know it's "supposed to be", but maybe you've gone just a touch too far?

And the toms are fucked up in a very special way. I don't even know how to describe it. Listening on my mix system, they kind of fade in and out as they pan around. They sound ok when they're quiet (from what we can hear...) but get clicky and kind of hollow sounding when they are almost loud enough. When I listened on my phone, they were a bit more consistent, but kind of sounded like PVC pipes. I really don't know how you managed any of that so can't offer suggestions on how to fix. I suspect that it's just a whole lot of plugins where the settings need to be dialed back a hair or two on each one.

Close, though.
 
Last edited:
Ok, so here we go with second version :)

Things I've changed:

- Snare is up 2 dB,
- Guitars are down 1 dB each side,
- Toms are 1,5 dB up
- Added a 8k high shelf on main vocal
- Added a high bell eq on snare to get it pop a little more on higher freqs
- Kick is 0,3 dB down (slighty noticable)
- Limiter is 2dB up to get it a little more compressed in overall and to avoid anything appearing too much.

Hope I'm heading the right way ;)

https://soundcloud.com/s_t_i/mix7/s-m5NZ7
 
Better. I do feel the kick it a bit loud. Still, at 1:21 especially, there is a tom hit that needs to be way up in volume. I think they all do still but that is an obvious dropout to me.
 
ashcat_lt said:
The term metal has never really meant anything specific. It just covers too much territory to generalize anything. I pretty much just want feedback on everything.:) Don't care what you're playing. If you can't figure out how to work in some feedback, you're not trying hard enough.

Edit cause I finally listened (mix 5)-
I think this is pretty damn good, but there's definitely something really strange with those drums. Some of this is personal preference maybe, and I understand pretty well the "industry standard" for this kind of thing.

I feel like the snare and (surprisingly) the cymbals work just about right with the rest of the band.

The kick is in its own world. It's super dry and way out front. At times it sounds to me like a kick drum with some other stuff happening behind it. I mean, it seems to be on time, but it's completely disconnected from the rest of the kit and the mix in general. Again, I know it's "supposed to be", but maybe you've gone just a touch too far?

And the toms are fucked up in a very special way. I don't even know how to describe it. Listening on my mix system, they kind of fade in and out as they pan around. They sound ok when they're quiet (from what we can hear...) but get clicky and kind of hollow sounding when they are almost loud enough. When I listened on my phone, they were a bit more consistent, but kind of sounded like PVC pipes. I really don't know how you managed any of that so can't offer suggestions on how to fix. I suspect that it's just a whole lot of plugins where the settings need to be dialed back a hair or two on each one.

Close, though.
Click to expand...

Agreed. There is something strange with the toms for sure. And also the kick needs to have a different sample IMO.
 
There are toms? Wow, I'll have to listen again. :D
They are a bit quiet...all the way through.
I think the sound of the kick is perfect for the track (I may be alone here) It's different from a lot of metal kicks with the flappy heads and the 45Hz boost, but it really sounds good, especially in the "master of 64th notes" sections.
Really like the direction this took. Head bang and shoulder mosh above the first mix (5).
The vocal really stands out now. :cool:
 
BroKen_H said:
There are toms? Wow, I'll have to listen again. :D
They are a bit quiet...all the way through.
I think the sound of the kick is perfect for the track (I may be alone here) It's different from a lot of metal kicks with the flappy heads and the 45Hz boost, but it really sounds good, especially in the "master of 64th notes" sections.
Really like the direction this took. Head bang and shoulder mosh above the first mix (5).
The vocal really stands out now. :cool:
Click to expand...

Thanks man, that's really big for me!

So it seems that toms are still the biggest issue in here. I've think that I don't have any plugins on them, only clear samples, so first of all I'll try to:

- play with some EQ's
- change the base samples for toms


Issue is that when I have a basic idea how the kick and snare should sound, I'm not really good with toms. Anyone can send me the sound examples that will fit in there in your opinion?

Thanks,
Przemek.
 
stivens1991 said:
Anyone can send me the sound examples that will fit in there in your opinion?

Thanks,
Przemek.
Click to expand...

I'd try to match it up to this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KY5KHMorJCw

Sounds really good where you're at. Great playing and writing all around. I'm definitely more of a melodic fan, like the full track for the song I referenced above, but your sounds are good. Kick too loud, imo, but snare is fine a little lower like it is.
 
Which drum rig are you using? Superior? SSD? Drum Drops? Sample Tank? Someone around here should have some good ideas about base toms from any of those...I have the same problem. I listen to really good samples, then put them in my mix and they don't sound like really good samples...takes work and experimentation. Keep at it and you'll get there.
 
andrushkiwt said:
I'd try to match it up to this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KY5KHMorJCw

Sounds really good where you're at. Great playing and writing all around. I'm definitely more of a melodic fan, like the full track for the song I referenced above, but your sounds are good. Kick too loud, imo, but snare is fine a little lower like it is.
Click to expand...

...and that's partially what I'm talking about. The crash cymbal he rides all the time in that clip sounds awful to me, but I bet it's nice in the full mix...and I REALLY don't care for the china he uses at all. Personal taste, I guess.
 
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