New song, it's metal, it's fast, and I need opinions!

[KingDiamond]

So the band and I have finished recording our newest song, it's titled "Out of Control" and it's about racing cars / driving fast. I used Amplitube 2 to do the guitars and Toontrack EZDrummer for the drums. I mixed both the Standard and DFH drum expansions for the drum sounds.

Anyway, you can download it here:

It's a 6.31MB download.

So what do guys think about the mix and songwriting in general?

 

[jrhager84]

Ok, first off, good song (I'm not a huge metal fan, but I can respect it).

There seems to be quite a bit of mud coming through on my cans (cause it's late and I can't use my monitors). I'll double check tomorrow, but my cans are pretty good at representing audio...

The vocals are also a bit hard on the ears (treble freq) I'd cut between 1-6kz (do a sweep to see where the offending noise is coming from)

Very very very nice guitar work. I'm very impressed. The rhythm guitars seem double-tracked, but slightly out of time.

I think a good mix would get that bad boy sounding phenomenal.....

I personally think everything's too squashed or just loud. A new level mix would make everything sound less harsh, and more musical. Just my .02

-Joel

 

[Greg_L]

Ok, first off, good song (I'm not a huge metal fan, but I can respect it).

There seems to be quite a bit of mud coming through on my cans (cause it's late and I can't use my monitors). I'll double check tomorrow, but my cans are pretty good at representing audio...

The vocals are also a bit hard on the ears (treble freq) I'd cut between 1-6kz (do a sweep to see where the offending noise is coming from)

Very very very nice guitar work. I'm very impressed. The rhythm guitars seem double-tracked, but slightly out of time.

I think a good mix would get that bad boy sounding phenomenal.....

I personally think everything's too squashed or just loud. A new level mix would make everything sound less harsh, and more musical. Just my .02

-Joel

I agree with most of this. For fake programmed drums, they sound pretty terrible. What's up with that snare? The kick and bass seem to be wallowing in some mud. The guitars sound pretty good and have some nice riffing, but they're too compressed and loud. The vocals are mostly unintelligible and have way too much sibilance.

The song itself is pretty decent, but the intro is way too long and monotonous.

These are just my opinions.

 

[eighteez]

Cool tune.

Guitars - the thing about the rhythm guitars sounding out of sync is true for me too. Just here and there. I think its an attention to detail thing. Its pretty obvious when it happens. Just a riff tht wasnt quite nailed the second time thru. For this kind of music that stuff has to be dead on or its glaring.

The guitars are a bit too loud. They are making the drums sound weak. I use EZD too and it can sound better than this. Take the guitars back some and let the drums come up a bit.

Vocals - I like the mix of the vocals. And the tone. And the singer. Metal isnt known for its vocals usually, but I dig these!

Bass - is there some? It is down in the mud.... EQ the bass a bit to get it to be audible.

Try this.

Lower the guitar volume so the drums can sound like metal drums. Bump up the volume on the crash cymbals.

Cut the rhythm guitars 3db at 200hz, Boost the Bass 3db at 200hz Cut the kick drum 3db at 200hz, boost the kick drum 3db at 100hz cut the bass 3db at 100hz.

See what happens.

Post the new mix when you can.


Cool song by the way.

 

[Erockrazor]

The mix is good. I want a lot more balls on everything in these headphones. I think it would sound a lot tougher with more bass on the rhythm guitar. I can't hear a bass. I know you like the click kick drum but I'm not hearing much click at all. Excellent guitar performance in my opinion. I'm sorry if this stuff is more intentional and I'm unaware of the music's style. Cool stuff though.

 

[KingDiamond]

Alright I did some mixing on it, turned down the guitars a bit, turned up and EQ'd the bass, work with the drums a little. Compressed the whole a mix a bit for a fuller sound. What do you guys think about it now?

 

[Jouni]

...I think I liked the first mix better..

There's a bit middley quality to the last mix.. The song is great! Moves on like train, like it's supposed to!

Yeah, I'd retrack the rhythm guitars to sync, awesome solo!


Drums might be better at last mix... or then my ears just got used to them..

 

[ido1957]

The compression seems a little heavy to my ears but not totally squashed or loud like some mixes I've heard. The mix sounds pretty evenly balanced, wherein evrything is easy to hear and distinguish. The vocals are a nice blend of grit and scream, and it's nice to be able to actually understand the lyrics . You have got the vocals sitting in an interesting place in the mix - hard to describe but I think it's the effects that push it away from the front but still completely audible -almost out of phase. The playing is great, especially like the solo work, but the rhythm is also impressive.

 

[BeNt]

Love your user name!

So, being that your username is King Diamond (one of my favorites), I compared your mix to "Blood To Walk" and "Give Me Your Soul Please".

Foremost, the mix is very quiet - a brickwall limiter would help.

The mix is missing a lot of midrange on multiple tracks, there is waaaayy to much high freq. boost on the overheads, the vox would benefit greatly from the use of a de-esser, the guitars have too much LF (200 and down) boosted (or too much Mid cut, depending on your outlook).

The placement of the instruments is good.

Overall, with some EQ adjustment, and a brickwall on your stereo output, you would be very close to sounding like your namesake's last 2 albums!

>Edit: This is based on your first post. On the second mix - I agree with Jouni, the first is better...

 

[rayc]

The bass really needs definition or is it MIA?
Bottom end my friend - it needs some.
Vocals are fine by my ear.
THe high tag to the riff doesn't work as well as the others - it gives a sense of dynamics & in fact points to a lack of use of thsoe frequencies -but doesn't really press any buttons for me.
the scaled solo is well played but needs something in its tone to lift it.
Good work so far.

 

[BeNt]

Oh, one other thing:

eighteez said:
>Metal isnt known for its vocals usually...<

Uhhh,
Are you kidding me?

Please tell me that's a joke!

 

[BushmasterM4]

me want cookie

 

[Nakatira]

Sounds cool to me.

the guitars especially, magnificant playing.

I would like to hear some more bass prescence.

If I were to give any song critiqe it would be to start with the vox earlier.

anyways cool tune