Public Mix Contest #3!!!

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Could someone please give me some feedback on my mix so far?

link

it's got no vocals yet, I was hoping to see what needs fixing on the instruments first...

Thanks very much...
 
lascalaboy said:
Could someone please give me some feedback on my mix so far?

link

it's got no vocals yet, I was hoping to see what needs fixing on the instruments first...

Thanks very much...

your page says this...


"Please be patient!
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This song hasn't been cleared yet. Please check back tomorrow."


Thats what it said last time i tried too. Not sure what to say Lascalaboy..
Get it workin' and ill critiqe it i promise.:)
*
 
Oh u missed that dialogue a few pages back huh. LOL If not then I didnt read your post that siad dont upload this mix :) and I apologize for my oversight.
 
blue bear

So Doulos' -3 "magic number" is really a moving target. It assumes a very balanced and well-distributed mix (in terms of frequencies) -- get the mix wrong, and the meter numbers don't mean shit!

i totally agree. If the mix is balanced then -3 db is where the mix should be sent in for mastering and there is no doubt that apparent volume and peak or even vu level is not a constant to what our ears tell us is loud or soft but i don’t think my mix should be considered to quiet when it is mixed not mastered and about every other submission has a l1 l2 maximum or any other loudness plug in and or compressor on the master fader i dont pretend to be a mastering engineer but i don’t doubt that some of these mixes sound off simply cause they tried to use mastering techniques in an inadequate room something i wished to avoid so i didn’t try to master this mix as my room is not fully acoustically treated yet

Incidentally - nowhere in his book does Katz say you should mix to -3dBFS...... he suggests leaving "some space" for the ME to do his work, but doesn't target a specific number, mainly because it would be meaningless. I'm not sure where Doulos gets some of his info from, but I'm happy to correct it......

humm good thing i have this book handy
page 284 from his book mastering audio under level check in the appendix3 ill start quoting

level check
as described in chapter 5, mix with conservative levels, which is not a problem with 24-bit media. Print the mix with levels well under the top and no OVERs! I recommend -3dbfs maximum. Roger Nichols reminds mix engineers using DAWs to visit each plug-in, reset the clip indicator and check the mix. If there's a clip then redo the mix to avoid internal clipping, which can cause pops and snaps that usually aren’t heard until mastering

good enough blue bear?
say it with me i was wro wro i was wrong you can do it

also to the guy saying my mix was bass shy i agree to today’s metal standards it is i haven’t extended the low end like some metal mixes i left it alone possibly cause i don’t think it would gain anything from the extended low end and seemed to play find on all the bass boost stereo systems i would leave that up the ME and hopefully get feedback from the me so i could mix it better the next time

my mix is not perfect i don’t expect to win i did have a blast with the tracks and i have enjoyed and still enjoy listening to how others mix the same song as you have noticed i haven’t given one comment on anyone else mixes cause i haven’t evaluated them on the monitors i plan on downloading all of them and playing them over my monitors making comments on each one mine included and giving a honest opinion to all of them without bias and hopefully finding out how some of you came up with your sounds i have found some very awesome elements I’ve enjoyed from about everyone’s mixes which to me is the fun in this and the fun in learning ill even take your critical review blue bear i love when you trash my mixes espially cause i know you hate me and all its great cause i do learn from it see sides from another point of view and usually agree with your opinions like the last one on the drum rooms sounding to lively and the reverb stacking on top of one another i have learned that i seriously need to study and learn depth perception in mixing and I’m not there yet i have a long long way to go I’m glad there are people like you who will tell it like it is and not sweet talk about it as long as my brain and my ears work i do believe there is always a chance to improve my mixing and audio engineering and will continue to take every opportunity to do so
 
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doulos said:
I recommend -3dbfs maximum.
Doulos, try reading with your mind, not your eyes........ :rolleyes:

With that statement, Katz is not saying that all mixes should be at -3dBFS SPECIFICALLY... Katz is simply saying that you don't want a mix to be anywhere near 0 (avoiding overs), and that there should be some space left for the ME to work with at the mastering stage (without incurring another unnecessary digital process having to reduce a hot mix back down a few dB for headroom.)

Stop with the fucking "absolute numbers" already... the numbers don't matter a whit! Try to understand the rationale behind what Katz is getting at.

Crimony!!! :rolleyes:


In any case, as I pointed out in the last "contest", I don't judge mixes with respect to each other, I only listen to each mix and judge on its own merits... so overall level from one mix to another doesn't factor into it at all.

As to "no mastering" being specified in the rules, again, the idea is to produce a good-sounding mix, by whatever means one has at their disposal.

Doulos - it sounds like you subscribe to the "throw a mix together and let the mastering engineer fix it" ethic. Personally, I believe the sound quality of the track had better stand on its own merits at the end of each stage in the process. So if the mix sounds weak or bad, re-fucking-mix it! The ME doesn't want to deal with an AE's lack of mixing skills either, so why pawn it off on them and make them wholly responsibility for a track's sound quality?

The tracking engineer should be getting great-sounding tracks down... the mix engineer should be producing a mix that sounds fucking-amazing when he's done.... the mastering engineer then takes that fucking-amazing mix and makes it sounds un-fucking-believable........

THOSE... are the rules! ;)
 
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Lol Blue Bear

This Is What I Get From Reading Katz Keep Your Levels Under -3db So The Mastering Engineer Can Get More Volume Out Of The Mix Acceptable Volume That Is With His High End Gear That You Dont Have If You Make The Mix To Loud The Mastering Engineer Has To Bring The Volume Down To A Useable Level Thus Creating A Generation Loss That Didnt Have To Be There In The First Place
And If There Is 2 Buss Compression On The Mix Sent In They Have To Work Around It Which Is A Headache Say The Bass Is To Low An Un Bussed Mix Could Be Run Under A Multiband Compressor At The Mastering House To Bring Out Just Those Parts On A Bussed Mix Good Luck Doing That Without Audible Effects Between The Bussed Mix And A Multiband Compressor

As Far As Let The Mastering Engineer Fix It Im Saying This For Mainly 2 Reasons 1 I Dont Know The Acoustics Of My Room
And 2 I Havent Heard This Mix In A Proffesional Acousticly Treated Mix Room If I Had I Could Make The Adjustments At Home
Getting The Me's Input On Whats Actully In The Mix
As Well As A Spectrum Anayalizers Comparasion I Could At Least Know How To Compensate My Mixes Till I Can Fully Treat My Mix Enviorment Which Im In The Process Of Doing Its Not Cheap Im Looking At Spending Around 1,200 Just For The Basic Portable Acoustic Treatment As You Should Be Able To Tell Im Trying To Do This Right Ive Spent Over 4,000 In The Last 6 Months On My Studio Upgrading Everything Basicly Starting Over In Every Way Including What I Think I Already Know How To Do Ive Bought Every Audio Engineering Book I Can Get My Hands On Im Spending All My Free Time In My Studio And Audio Forums And Im Trying To Be As Serious About This As I Can Be Wanting To Make It A Career Oneday But I Dont Consider Myself An Audio Engineer Yet ,but I Do Hope To Be One One Day And I Hope Ill Know When That Day Comes Untill Then Ill Continue Doing What I Have Been Doing And Trying To Learn From Mine And Others Mistaskes And Exsperence
 
Mix Contest Mixing Critices Using Sennheiser Hd600 Phones And Mackie Hr624 Monitors This Is Just A Quick List Running Though The Same Song For An Hr But Its My Opinion Only Take It With A Grain Or Two Of Salt

Bulls Hit
To Much Vocal Effect
Vocals To Loud
Kick 2 High Toms To Loud/compressed
Solo To Quiet
The Bass Gets Swallowed By The Kick

Claudio
Guitars To Boxy Sounding
Guitars To Forward Over Powering
Tinny Back Ground Vocals

Disposable
Mix To Tinny To Much Cymbols
To Much Eq On The Kick You Can Hear An Unnatural click In The Kick From To Much Eq

Doulos
Not Enough Cymbols In A Few Areas You Should Have Used Automation!
The Toms Could Use More Beef And Posibly A Lil Louder
Though Id Recommend Compression Over Bringing The Lev Up To Getmore Of The Ring From The Toms They Need To Cut Better Not Be Louder

Fatt Musiek
Loud In The Wrong Was Fateiging
The Kick Is Buryyied In Parts
The Vocals Need To Be Brough Up
Less Vocal Effects

Mix Master
Not Enough Bottom In The Guitars
To Much Bass For This Style Of Music
The Guitars Are To Small And The background Vocals Are To Loud

Nl5
A Lil To Much On The Intro
Overal A Lil Muddy In The Low End
The Backgroud Vocal Effect Is Dirty an grainy
Overproduction
Again To Lil Low End On The Guitar To Much Bass Guitar

Jsandlin
Again Boxy
Compressed
Unclear Undefined To Small Of A Stero Image To Much Snare Verb
Snare Way To Loud More Bottom End On The Guitars

Jtvrdy
Great Balance Vocals Are Right Bass Is Good
Guitars Are Full Range Id Like To Hear Less Bass In The Guitars To Give Room For The Kick Though The Vocal Effects Arnt To Over Done Perhaps A Tad To Much Tom Volume In Parts Only Thing I Can Say I Don’t Like Is The Volume Of The Mix Its Loud In A Way Which Is Fateiging To The Listener Hard On The Ears
This Is My Fav So Far Even Over My Own Mix

Ocnor
To Much Cymbols Guitars To Far Back Snare To Loud
Weird Over Compressed Sound Hard To Explain
But Its Like The Guitars Are Choked

Pro Tools
Snare To Loud Kick To Loud And Toms To Muddy
Vocals Way To Loud

Sedstar
Muddy Low End Real Muddy
No Guitar High End To Much Bass
Voclas Are To Quiet

Tekker
Didn’t Play

Track Rat
Painfully Tinny In The Begging
Guitars To High End No Bottom End
Overal Mix Is Tinny And Painfull To Listen To

Dcwave
Again Muddy The Kick Is Hard To Distinguish
To Not Enough High End On The Guitars


Doug_h
Hard To Hear The Kick
The Vocal Panning Is Cool But I Don’t Think You Could Tell Which Was The Main Vocal No Focal Point
In Metal mostly The Focal Point Is Centered Around The Vocal
Good Guitar Balance Though The Snare Is To Poppy Inmho Not Enough Of The Body Of The Snare

Caryindy
To Much Cymbols The Vocals Are Burried By Guitars And Bass
In Parts I Like The Bass Tone I Think The Toms Could Come Down More
I Don’t Like The Poppness Of The Snare And The Bass Is Way To Loud
I Do Dig The Toms Tone Though
 
(grabs popcorn. Kicks back and reads last 2 thread pages)
:p

....usually i wouldnt subscribe.....but this is just too good.
 
Oh Doulos easily wins round one.

Hey Blue. LOL The boy is accurate in his understanding. Heck even my Mastering enginner spanked me for bringing him a file that was as hot as -.9 dbfs back in 1999. BTW the guy I use is a glenn meadows graduate. ;)

Since then I tend to bring my mixes to him at -9dbfs. I like to mix like I am gonna print it to 1/2" or something. :)

BB, I understand his point, let the man mix. LOL, Heck we all used books as a reference then over time developed our own personalities.
 
doulos said:
Track Rat
Painfully Tinny In The Begging
Guitars To High End No Bottom End
Overal Mix Is Tinny And Painfull To Listen To
Ouch! Sir, you wound me so! :p
 
giles117 said:
Heck even my Mastering enginner spanked me for bringing him a file that was as hot as -.9 dbfs back in 1999.
I'm not suggesting to run mixes to 0dBFS at all- quite the opposite actually.

I AM suggesting that Doulos improve his understanding of the concept that the numbers are NOT absolute and that he needs to understand the underlying concept of gain staging/planning instead.
 
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Had a little time to give a quick listen to a few of the submissions this morning. I will post comments on the rest when I get a chance. Let me preface these comments by saying that I do not listen to this genre regularly. I do actually king of enjoy it though. For me, it's the vocals that throw it over the top and prevent me from listening to it (sorry Finster, not you personally, just the style). I find the music very listenable. I like the way it "grooves". I don't know if that is common to this style, but it seems to me, whenever I do run across this music, I find that I like the way it "moves me". Anyhow, here we go:

Bulls_Hit:

I think this mix gets better as it goes along. At first, I find the reverb tail or delay on the guitar in the left channel a little distracting. Later in the song it gets masked, I don't think it goes away. Also the delays on the lead vocal tend to clutter the mix. They aren't so bad later in the song. Overall balances are pretty good. Nothing really seems to jump out at me. I think the low end is pretty decent. The kick and bass are sitting well together. I think there is a little too much "thud" in the snare drum. I also don't really care for the "stereo" lead guitar. I think it lacks focus, and sound kinda phasey, as a result of the stereo effect. Overall, I think this mix is pretty good.

Caryindy:

I think this mix is quite nice. I do think it lacks some real low end, it a more "Mid-Range" type of mix. I think the balances are excellent. I like the snare sound. Lead guitar sits pretty well. I would just like a little more meat on the low end. Nice mix Caryindy.

Claudio_Leite:

Another nice mix. Everything is pretty well balanced. Again, I think this mix leans a little too much on the mid range, and not enough in the low end. Maybe it's just me. I don't listen to the genre. I think the overall tones on everything are nice. I do not like the wide panned vocals, I would bring them closer to center.

dcwave:

I think this mix has the low end I was looking for. Balance is pretty good. I could use a little more cymbal definition. I think the guitars are a touch on the brittle side, just nit picking. I would like to know what happened to the guitars as the song went. Somewhere along the way, they got behing the rest of the band. Was that intentional? If so, why? Just curious.

Disposable:

Nice low end. I would watch the "click" on the kick. I think it's just a tad too much. It almost sounds too me like someone is hitting a wood block along with it. I think you found the attack just fine, you just boosted a little to much. Other than that, nice mix!

doug_h:

This mix is a little on the dull side. I think the balance are pretty good. I think the mix gets more and more vocal heavy as the song goes on. By the end of the song, the vocals have taken over.
 
Well bear, we all have to start somewhere. You can tell a guy to not be SUPER technical till YOU are blue in the face. (No pun intended. LOL) but he has to learn on his own sometimes. :)

Dont mess with his refernece point as he is not where you are at. Let him learn and then let him expand as he grows. 23 years in this biz has taught me that lesson very well.
 
OK, here is my mix. I do not intend to enter the contest. I would just like to offer up my "interpretation" of the mix.

Do NOT ENTER IN CONTEST...thanks

 
giles117 said:
Well bear, we all have to start somewhere. You can tell a guy to not be SUPER technical till YOU are blue in the face. (No pun intended. LOL) but he has to learn on his own sometimes. :)

Dont mess with his refernece point as he is not where you are at. Let him learn and then let him expand as he grows.
True...... at least he finally admitted that he's more or less starting-out, rather than the front he's been putting on for a while now......
 
blue bear

starting out? I’ve been doing this since I was 15 lets see 15 -16to 24 id say I've been at it for at least 8 years however I will say this I’m trying to take my mixing to a higher level and the results I've had in the past pale in comparison I've noticed that a good engineer with good gear in a modest recording environment can get about 90% the way to professional records even after pro mastering id say im about 85% the way there and that to me is just not good enough unfortunately its that 10% after 90 thats the most expensive in gear and the greatest learning curve to overcome awesome engineers know audio inside and out and I lack in this department I have many areas in engineering I’m not familiar with nor have the gear to see the difference but will this stop me? nope ill get the gear and ill continue mixing till its second nature and the day i turn out professional results is the day ill call myself a true audio engineer
 
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