First Acoustic session, need some suggestions on Mix

  • Thread starter Thread starter LemonTree
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LemonTree

LemonTree

Suck 'em and see!
I've just finished recording a 5 track demo for a friend. All tracks are acoustic guitar and vocals.

studio projects B1 through an M Audio Tampa to Delta 1010 into Cubase SX is my signal chain.

Can I get feedback on one track as they're all mixed pretty much the same way. I'm looking for feedback on the EQ of the guitar and vox mainly, but any other feedback would be welcomed.

The song is called Penny , many thanks

Alec
 
nice..
i like the acoustic works....
well balanced
what did u do to get the sound?
 
systmovadown said:
nice..
i like the acoustic works....
well balanced
what did u do to get the sound?
Click to expand...

Just a bit of mild EQing and a plate verb. I compressed on the way in.
 
Budo said:
Lovely guitars! Song ruined by vocals though.
Click to expand...

I slightly disagree on both counts - well, the guitars are lovely, but the mix doesn't give the vocals any room. I'm only a beginner at this but I can hear all sorts of fighting and masking going on.

LemonTree - feedback on your friend's vox - he can sing, but he is untutored and doesn't now how to use his voice properly. It's potentially very good and a few lessons would do wonders. Singers talk about the "gate", which doesn't mean what we take it to mean, but it's the pitch level when they flip from singing in the chest to singing in the head. It takes some skill to control, and if you listen you can hear his delivery wavering as he moves across it. Hear how he has better control of some notes than others?

Persuade him to take a few lessons, drag him kicking and screaming, he'll thank you for it.
 
Thanks for that Gary. He's been singing for years in pro and semi pro bands, this is his first attempt at some solo stuff. He asked me to record him cause he wanted to work with someone he already knew and felt comfortable with. I fit the bill cause I was the tour manager for the band he played a few years back and he knew I was into home recording back then.

You think the vocal is fighting for space?

There's another one up from the same session called STAR same idea...probably the same problem if there is one....I can hear everything fine.
 
I thought it was fighting, but I'm hoping somebody better experienced than me will comment. On the topic of his singing, that is something I feel more confident about, and he is not coming across like a pro singer - apart from the points I made last night, he is not hitting the notes cleanly and confidently. I'll try to listen to the other one later.
 
Bravo.
Good recording and a good song.

Did you haave one the guitars panned further than the other?
Or were the two guitar parts tracked at different volumes?
Lopsided stereo image is why i ask...
Fix that, and its all butter.

Did you do this on your new monitors?
 
xfinsterx said:
Bravo.
Good recording and a good song.

Did you haave one the guitars panned further than the other?
Or were the two guitar parts tracked at different volumes?
Lopsided stereo image is why i ask...
Fix that, and its all butter.

Did you do this on your new monitors?
Click to expand...

The guitar panning I guess you listened to STAR......It's two different takes one paned left, one right. One might be louder. This was just the rough mixes I done for him. I wanted to get them posted up and get some comments on the EQ. There's actualy a few problems. I think the SP B1 was a bit on the bright side and gave me a lot of sibilance problems.

I'm still on the old HiFi speakers, but think I always mix something that I've tracked myself closer to the original source....helps if you know how it's supposed to sound before you start. The Wharfdales I pick up on Friday

I was really pleased with the guitar tone. For an old 2nd hand Tanglewood he picked up for £100 them Elixir strings with the polyweb coating sure breathed some new life into it.
 
LemonTree said:
The Wharfdales I pick up on Friday
Click to expand...

Do me the entertainment favor Lemon.
Let me hear the new mix done with the new monitors.
Im very interested to hear the difference.
When "and if" you remix with the Warfedales, dont compare on the old (hi-fi) monitors please.

You certainly dont need to, your mix sounds fine as is.
But i would appriciate the entertainment value of it.
Thanx in advance.

And again, nice work. :cool:
 
pick them up tomorrow afternoon after work, Finster.

The idea is to hook them up and start from scratch. Remix all 5 tracks from the session over the weekend then burn to CD. Take them out and play on different systems (about 5 mates hifi's I've already visited, the car CD system etc) and get my own thoughts. That should be a good test for my own ears. arter THAT I'll post up.

Monitors are a growing experience. I'm still getting used to the new freq's my Tampa is pulling out of my SP B1. When you start taking off with this shit it's full fatholm five. Love the learning curve.

I'll keep you posted

on a side note..... these too basic for a mix comp? 6 tracks max in the fullest one



Alec
 
I like your acoustic sound, too. What kind of guitar is that? I'm always in search of which acoustic guitars record well. I am often suprised at which ones do.

Whoops I just read about the guitar. But exactly what I was talking about.:)

H2H
 
Penny:

Hey lemon. My starting Q's are what kind of Gtrs and what kind of strings???

Sounds like steel strings (very bright ones) but I;d like to know.

So far as the vocal it is a bit buried. the right kind of reverb (room if going for intimate sound) will give it dimension and help it set better in the mix :) And maybe a db or so of boost. :)
 
Star:

Is better vocal placement. I think the gtrs are too Spread. Better to narrow the field and let the delay pan out to the edges (if you have on there)

Vocal needs a bit more character. (the right reverb) It isnt drawing me in.

Technically your colors feel good. I like the darker vocal against the bright gtrs helps give a mid color thing to rivet the listener to the center of the sound field. :) Hope that helps :)

I do hear some of the Gtr chorusing a bit. and later on in the mix the vocal starts getting lost. Are you automating????

That ad lib vocal is too murky for my taste.

Ok enuff of my opinions :)
 
still on the old HiFi speakers till I pick up my new Wharfdale 8.2 actives tomorrow Giles.

The guitar was a 2nd hand Tanglewood 6 string (£100) as I posted further up the thread. New set of Exilir strings gave it the punch. Mic was a Studio Projects B1 and I was trying out my new M Audio Tampa Mic Pre....one more session and I'll have it right.

I used the digital S/PDIF outs straight into the delta 1010 to record ay 24/44.1 but was monitoring at the same time via the analog out to the desk (Allen & Heath Saber) sounded warm in the monitors but sounded exactly the same streaming back the digital recording. Very impressed with the unit over all.

It's really easy to see how newbies get totaly into the over compression thing with cheep compressors. It's hard to hear what inferior units actualy do until you make them distort the sound. The comp on the tampa is very transparent, I now just found out what to use it for after a year with behri composers......hello eBay 8) good bye bheri.


Those strings....Acoustic Exilir polyweb coated, accept no substitutes. and yeah,,,vox can come up and get sweetened some too I think.

Thanks for the listen and the comments Giles. Next up...room treatment ;)
 
giles117 said:
Star:



I do hear some of the Gtr chorusing a bit. and later on in the mix the vocal starts getting lost. Are you automating????
Click to expand...

No, no automation. That's two seperate guitar takes. Maybe a phasing problem is it sounds chorused? Never recorded acoustic before I need all the help I can get here.

No delay either, natural difference from track one to track two
 
Ok. it just was sounding a bit out of tune so i assumeed chorus.
 
To my opinion, guitars are great, don't touch them anymore.

The voice, even though you can hear that he's done this kind of thing before, doesn't not that professional. My guess is that this is a singer who has been doing this for a while now and therefor has gotten used to sertain things that are not really that great about his voice, but has never really sat down, listen to himself and decide to take lessons. My advice to him is to kind of "withdraw" from the music he sings, listen to himself, and then reflect 100% honestly. Then he'll find out he should take lessons.
 
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