If you run out of gain mixing tracks , should you compress it for more volume?

[LazerBeakShiek]

The solo in this Zwan song clearly shows it is perfectly acceptable to go nuts with distortion on the guitar. Listen at 1:15



Of coarse I still love you..

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

. Did you also say you are recording at 192KHz? why? Clearly we cannot hear it? It stresses the machinery and is, in my humble view - totally and utterly pointless - even more so on your loud wash of sound music. There is no subtlety where the supposed benefits of crazy sample rates might, just might, be heard.

Last couple of months I was squaring away timing and latency. 192/24 gives the lowest latency. It was a fix that worked for me.

 

[bouldersoundguy]

Last couple of months I was squaring away timing and latency. 192/24 gives the lowest latency. It was a fix that worked for me.

If you're talking about live input monitoring, higher sample rate will give lower latency for a given number of buffered samples. But if you're talking about overdubs lining up, increasing the sample rate isn't a solution, it's a band-aid.

 

[Farview]

The solo in this Zwan song clearly shows it is perfectly acceptable to go nuts with distortion on the guitar. Listen at 1:15



Of coarse I still love you..
View attachment 111778

A solo that lasts a few seconds of a 4 minute tune is completely different than having that ghastly distortion on a couple rhythm tracks for the entire song.

Context is key.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

Farview, this mix is for you. I transcribed it into the key of 'context' . No distortion guitar #2. See if this helps the mix.

 

[Farview]

Why would you take all the distortion off a guitar that is supposed to have distortion? Why wouldn't you just use distortion that sounds good within the context of the song?

Do you hear all that fuzzy high end in the distorted guitar? If it doesn't sound overbearing and ear splitting, then you need new monitors or you may need to get your hearing checked.

One of the reasons I stopped doing this professionally was because I'm getting old and my hearing isn't what it used to be. You must be around the same age, seeing as how all your favorite gear seems to be 30 years old. It is a possibility that you may have lost some hearing above 6k.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

This weekend I will record different tracks for the distorted guitars.

 

[rob aylestone]

I have to say I went back to the jingly distorted other one and thought ........ my god, the guitar sounds so much better without the distortion, then I re-read Farview's post and came to the same conclusion - it's just a really awful distortion. So sizzle and jingly it just fills the entire thing up. Without it, there are other instruments that sound good, balance that is easier to hear - just that dreadful spectrum filling unsympathetic, nasty sounding distortion. Seriously though, you made a good guitar sound worse with it.

I know I'm old, but if I had that sound, I'd keep it. Then, as typing this, the other guitar came in with it's dreadful70s thin distortion - played a few bars then cleared off for a coffee. The distortion just doesn't work - for me. The solo guitar also has this very thin - weedy distortion. It sounds a little like the colorsound fuzz pedal I had in the 70s.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

Seriously though, you made a good guitar sound worse with it.

I know I'm old, but if I had that sound, I'd keep it. Then, as typing this, the other guitar came in with it's dreadful70s thin distortion -

So I should have used a slicer effect with it? I would go auto-wah, but Rob's right, a slicer should make it nice and smooth.

 

[Farview]

So I should have used a slicer effect with it? I would go auto-wah, but Rob's right, a slicer should make it nice and smooth.

What? The distortion is the problem. Change the distortion. Don't add more effects to something that is awful, get rid of the awful and replace it with something good.

 

[Papanate]

Yeah, but...It all sounds like crap.. So, shut it off? haha.

I turned the make up gain off in the above mix. That didn't help? Not as much as I wanted.

I waited a day, my ears still hear -16Lufs as quiet. Overly so compared to the -8 LUFs mix.

Start over with the mixing. Now if your recorded tracks aren't good by themselves then you need to start completely over.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

In the title it clearly states ,I'm running out of gain. I need more.

You think I'm on the wrong side of this thing?

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

Never mind, doing the math with the years. I'm only 50.

If I removed the distortion guitars and replaced them, would that work? Is anything salvageable?

 

[JamEZmusic]

Never mind, doing the math with the years. I'm only 50.

If I removed the distortion guitars and replaced them, would that work? Is anything salvageable?

It might work in the track with boosting the crap out of 350-800hz maybe even 100hz to 800hz if your rhythm loses balls, and cutting the crap out of 1000khz+ and LPF at 8-11khz to taste. An electric guitar is not an organic sound and extreme EQ settings can work. But if you can try some other tones then I'm sure you will find one that will suit your track better. Don't give up on adding the distorted guitar. Work it in. Unless you wanted to that is.

It's easily salvageable if you got your recorded DI track. Which I recommend you do always.

Maybe your raw electric guitar with no plugins on sounds good? I dont know what your raw guitar track sounds like so it's hard to judge.

and I really don't understand how you can run out of gain. I'm now confused. Almost every plugin allows you to gain up like 30db. not that I've ever needed to gain up anymore than like 5 because of bad judgement on my part. If you mean you are clipping and you want to raise your drums for example by 4db but you can't because you go into the red, then you just turn everything else down 4db, there is really nothing more to it than that. I only started talking about routing all of your tracks to those main faders because it makes it very easy for you to turn whatever you want up and down but it's not necessary, you can do it with however you have your DAW set up, template or not.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

..yeah

I havent gotten anywhere with mixing. Not possible with infinite choices. I will need private instruction. AKAI makes these sample systems, where you play phrases already radio ready. That is more fun for me. Although I can play all the instruments...so its most unfortunate. hmm.

 

[JamEZmusic]

..yeah

I havent gotten anywhere with mixing. Not possible with infinite choices. I will need private instruction. AKAI makes these sample systems, where you play phrases already radio ready. That is more fun for me. Although I can play all the instruments...so its most unfortunate. hmm.

I feel the same way, I struggle every day with it.

I was getting fed up not knowing the best mic to use in my room with the best mic position/pre-amp settings etc. and I shit you not, I recorded the lead part 60 odd times and solo'd each one out in context of the song to see which one sounded the best. Arduous task but.... I learned a lot that day. Felt like quitting a couple of times. It's natural.

Mixing is only hard if you do things out of order, and it becomes doubly so when you are trying to fix tracks that don't sound great straight from recording. I am really impressed with your other tracks by the way it's just the electric guitar. I struggle recording acoustic guitar and you got results that have been much better than mine in the past. for sure.

I'm sure there are free produce like a pro mixing tutorials online. You can follow along to warren huart from start to finish mixing a whole song with all the instrumentation that you have here. A lot will fall into place for you if you go through that, you can copy how he busses his tracks too. You don't want to be messing about doing too much trial and error and getting nowhere because it takes all of the fun out of it. Look up some tutorials, I think he did one on a song called (Stay New) that might be free. download the multitracks, load them up and do exactly what warren does.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

, I recorded the lead part 60 odd times and solo'd each one out in context of the song to see which one sounded the best. Arduous task but.... I learned a lot that day. Felt like quitting a couple of times. It's natural.

Oh, I did at least 30 drum mix renders. Too soft...Too soft..Too loud..haha

. I am really impressed with your other tracks by the way it's just the electric guitar

Nahh, thanks.

I'm sure there are free produce like a pro mixing tutorials online.

I just downloaded an ebook and some pdfs from Roland and UA. On recording and mastering. The recording engineers handbook and mixing handbook. They are pretty wordy and basic. Some nice stories. Most of it I have, but occasionally there is some new bit. .

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

Why do distorted guitars so sound loud, while showing relatively low output numbers on the display? How do I use this to the mixes advantage?

 

[Farview]

Why do distorted guitars so sound loud, while showing relatively low output numbers on the display? How do I use this to the mixes advantage?

Because the perceived volume and the peak meter readings don't have much to do with each other. Perceived volume has more to do with the duration of the sound than the transient peaks. Distorted guitars sustain isn't that much lower in level than the peaks. Clean guitar or any other instrument that has big peaks and lower sustain, will sound quieter than distorted guitar with the peaks at the same level. The more distorted the guitar, the louder it will be at the same meter level.

That's one of the reasons to stop looking at the meters when you are mixing, they don't tell you what you need to know. You set the relative volumes in the mix by listening. You set the eq by listening. And you don't worry about the final level until after the mix.

 

[LazerBeakShiek]

Is this going in the right direction? I know the atmosphere is all wrong. The drums are suspected of being loud and quiet. The master limiter is in the drum track. In hopes, it catches the peaks.

I gave it a quick GCD. Is that better with all the high end turned down? I boosted 100-800hz and cut after 8k. Using a warmer tube voicing on the ADA.