Comments on this track please?!

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junkmanistan

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This is a ROUGH mix of the first song I've ever fully recorded. It's a 4-piece band w/ 2 vox, guitar, bass, drums, and a GEM Model P combo organ. I used my E-Mu 1820 system with a bunch of 57's, a 58 and a Studio Projects C1, also using the mic pre's of my friend's M-Audio interface (1814?). Anyway, I know that there are plenty of issues here, and if some knowledgable individuals could give me some hints on how to improve this I'd be ever grateful! :o

http://brachiation.com
click on "Chasing Dragons"
 
i'm not too knowledgeable about improving mixes so i'll just say that i think your song's pretty cool--funky time, jangly guitar riff... keeps me a little off centered. ok, maybe i will comment on the mix: perhaps bring up the vox a couple db more? and although i love the organ sound, it's a little overbearing when it hits that one certain note and holds it...
 
I did like this song, but personally, I wouldn't have mixed it this way.

But that depends on what you're going for. This has kind of a psychedelic or The Doors feel to it.

I listened on head phones and honestly, I would change about everything, but then it'd be a different song. For the tone and general feel that I'm guessing you're going for, maybe we wouldn't change that much.

Everything could be louder. The high treble drums seem off to the right, with the bass drums off to the left. It sounds like two different drum tracks if that's what you wanted. I would center them and fatten them just a small amount to mix with the guitars better.

So other than fattening everything up to make a completely different mix, I don't know what small things I would do to this mix.

Cool song, though and original mix. It's just VERY echo-y.

It just occured to me that in that main guitar riff, when it strums with the cymbal crash, that would be a great opportunity to show off the tone of it, with less of an echo and a bit more distorted and definately louder. Seeing as that strum is half the riff, I think doing that would make it sound much cooler.
 
I would like to hear this through my monitors, instead of these crappy phones, but I can't. The panning gives the song an interesting feel, for sure. If I was mixing this and going it keep it panned as such, I think I would try reversing the panning of the guitars. Just a thought.
 
Thanks for your responses!
As far as the drums go, I only used three mics: a 57 on the snare/hat over the drummer's shoulder (panned hard right), as 57 angled down and across the kit at the floor tom (panned hard left), and my C1 out front about six feet and low (centered in mix). This would definately acount for what swatsds is talking about. I did this to try and give some weird spacing to the drums and make the individual pieces of the kit more distinct since I used so few mics. I'm not sure if I'm so happy with it though..... :(

The guitars are also a little problematic. When we play this song live, the guitar is pretty chincey sounding so I didn't want to beef it up too much. I use a digital reverb stop box and this Carl Martin(?) vibrato pedal to give it that erie, distant effect. When I tracked the guitars I played one take with two channels with my usual guitar setup (panned hard left and right) and then another take into two channels just using the clean and distorted channels (also panned hard left and right). THe whole guitar mix ended up being panned a little to the right, but I still can't really get the punch out it that I'm looking for.

Speeking of "fattening" things up, how would I do that? I've just been playing around with different Waves plug-ins but to not much avail.....
 
As far as techniques go, I have no idea. But the track has a real "crisp" or treble-y feel to it. Maybe you could just play the guitar with more distortion or add a distorted filter to it. I think most musicians would say if they want a really good guitar track, they would play the same riff with about 2 or 3 different guitars and try to sync it up to just sound like one really cool texture. that'd be interesting.

as far as drums, I don't know. I'm sure they don't sound that light when they are played so something is lost in the recording. I just am not familiar at all with any good editing techniques or terminology to be practical about it.

you should post anything else if you happen to have it. your band is cool.
 
I'm gonna keep posting my mixes as I learn more. My band is called Brachiation and we're from Baltimore. brachiation.com is gonna be our new website (some time or another), so I'll try and find another place to post these "unofficial" mixes so home rec people can help me out.

Does anyone know a place that hosts such posts? :D Free? Easy?
 
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