sperating instruments in a mix

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shackrock

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alright....so i've recording all of my parts...
2-4 distorted guitar tracks
2 clean guitar tracks
1 drum track
1 bass
multiple vocals


i've heard and read a million times about "isolating each instrument to its own part in the mix".... BUT - how would i go about doing that? Right now when i mix the voulmes and pan it to sound good, it sounds good - not GREAT. I think that it sounds a lot more "garage" then "studio" i guess you could say.
with any track playing individually, it does sound great. then as i add more and more instruments to it, it gets more "lost in the mix" - as i've heard people refer to it. Also, the drums get a lot less "clean" in the mix sometimes.

So basically...is what i'm asking to do all EQ stuff that i have to work with?

thanks whoever.
 
im interested in this as well i have the same problem i get the instruments to sound great alone but when i start adding more things sound like they are getting lost even though i adjusted the volumes properly.
 
Why don't you not add all the tracks? Sometimes keeping it simple is good. Maybe 6 guitar parts is just too many.

You could also try using different eq settings for guitar parts that might be occupying the same frequency space. Maybe if you post it somebody here can give you other ideas.

scodu
 
what im talkin about is not many tracks
1guitar
1bass
1 drum track
2or3 vocal
somtimes when i have all this goin on some things arent clear i guess i have upload or somthing.
 
even with just a few tracks, i still get garage sound, and more muddy...etc.

how would i go about eqing it to where i want them though?
 
I totally have the same question and hope someone can answer it.

I'm listening to some more 'commercial' recordings and the snare drop just sits right out in front, the vocals are in a great spot and the horns don't overtake anything.

I'm trying to put each thing in its own pan. Here is my instrumentation:

2 Overhead Drums (L and R)
Snare
Kick
Bass
Clean guitar
Distortion Guitar L, Distortion Guitar R
Sax, Trombone L
Vox

It's really not uncommon for a band like ours to have this instrumentation. I've got the distorted guitar down nice and low but I can't get it to sound "clean". No matter what I do things are coming out muddy. Any input would be great. I'd love to post a couple of samples. If anyone is interested in hearing ours vs. what I'd like it to sound like mixwise, I'll do that.

Thanks folks,
-Rick, Detroit
 
Also, does anyone recommend hard panning? Left distortion hard left, right distortion hard right? Or should they be closer in? How would this sound on a car stereo, etc.?

I'm so blown away by how this is coming out.

-Rick, Detroit
 
You guys are going to have to to some serious reading as what you want to know takes a book to write.

Read up on

Compresion/Limiting
Reverb
EQ
Panning
Delay
Correct volume placement
Correct orchestration
Correct use of room acoustics

Also try and ask questions that are more specific to a specific problem to focus your problem.
 
Here are some things you might want to consider when putting all your parts together:

-Whether or not an instrument sounds good on its own should not take any serious consideration. In fact, there's a very good chance that if you were to break apart the individual pieces of a great mix that some instruments will not sound very good on their own. This may be a bit of hindsight, but the sound of each instrument should be determined based on its blended sound to the total before any actual recording takes place. In addition, the reverb added when the tracks were recorded can make mixing a headache, because it can wash out the sound of the instrument which forces you to bring the instrument up more, reducing headroom and increasing noise. If you feel you need to use reverb, then only apply it sparsely to give the track a bit of breathing room.. To get a bit philisophical, its always a good idea to remember the Gestalt theory: The sum is often greater than the total of its individual parts.

-But what good is the above going to do you now? Well, you will need to use EQ to carve out the frequencies to allow each instrument to sit properly in the mix. But you need to EQ groups of instruments. Start with the rhythm section: drums, bass, and the primary guitar tracks. Once you get as close as possible to a decent mix of the basic tracks, then add the secondary instruments, one at a time, making minor adjustments as you go along..

-Don't get in the habit of ignoring the mids on guitars. It's common for many people to cut the mids and jack up the lows and highs on guitar tracks. Doing this just adds to the low frequencies of the kick and bass and can squeeze out any character of guitar solos. Keeping most of the bass to the kick, tom, and bass guitar prevents mud. (And if you really need that extra bass for the guitar in a songs intro, keep it until the rest of the band kicks in). In fact, listen to the mix once without the bass guitar. If you can honestly say "This sounds good.. but there is a hole where the bass should be", then you are on the right track.

-On panning: I personally do not like distorted guitars panned hard left and right because the guitar's impact seems lost.. Keeping the guitars at three and nine (or a similar variation) still gives that separation, but adds a blend to both sounds on each side (this works especially well if you have two different guitar sounds), and gives a more powerful in-you-face effect. YMMV

Hope this helps

Cy
 
Cyrokk said:

-Don't get in the habit of ignoring the mids on guitars. It's common for many people to cut the mids and jack up the lows and highs on guitar tracks. Doing this just adds to the low frequencies of the kick and bass and can squeeze out any character of guitar solos. Keeping most of the bass to the kick, tom, and bass guitar prevents mud. (And if you really need that extra bass for the guitar in a songs intro, keep it until the rest of the band kicks in). In fact, listen to the mix once without the bass guitar. If you can honestly say "This sounds good.. but there is a hole where the bass should be", then you are on the right track.


Cy
Click to expand...
My mixes got noticeably better when I got this. I would add keyboard to this also. My keyboard player loves to use his left hand and it definitely crowds the bass guitar.
 
I have a little extra time on my hands.

I'd be willing to walk some of you through the process if you'd like. First off, though, I need to know what you're using . . . what kind of eq do you have? Are you mixing on a DAW, or are you using a real mixer?
 
Check out and contribute to the ongoing spectral analyzer thread which I believe is directly relevant.
 
Well, I was actually going to mention that you should get a spectral analyzer. :)

Unless you have extemely god monitors, great accoustics in your playback room, and golden ears, you're going to need one.

I'll post more over on the spectral analyzer thread.
 
Having created some god-awful mixes, I think that I can hang in this conversation. I used to have this same problem with the mixes that I've worked with, but then I figured out 3 things:

1) Too many guitars sound BAD.
2) One guitar recorded with a good mic sounds a million times better than 80 guitars recorded with mediocre mics.
3) EQ isn't always the answer to fix your guitar sound.

When we recorded our band's last demo, we made some terrible mic choices on the amps - then again, we didn't have much. Alesis AM-51 on the amps, and an Audio-Technica MB3000C. And my monitors were pretty sub-par, so that certainly didn't help me realize that I could get a better sound farting into a radio shack mic (see the recording techniques board for details on how to make your own fart noise!)...

Lessons learned and a few hundred $$ into equipment, I just got done recording a great 3 piece band with a classic rock style. Ya know, we're talking Les Paul and Marshall half-stack. They wanted to come in and record "live". I only have 8 channels down to play with, so it took some strategic planning... 4 tracks for drums, 1 for guitar, 1 for bass, 2 for vocals. I put a Sennheiser MD 421 on the amp and played around with the position of the mic until we got the sound we wanted right off the monitors. The bass sounded great with the 4X10 SWR rig miked with a D112. Drums sounded great, but let's not stray from the guitar talk.

At any rate, I was able to take the 1 guitar track (which we had gotten sounding correct from the start), add some delay and a "Quasi-Stereo" effect, lightly sprinkle some reverb... Viola! This one guitar track sounded big, punchy, and overall better than the 80 tracks I had recorded on my band's last demo. We barely had to EQ it at all.

I guess my point is that if you get the sound that you're looking for from the start, you don't need to fuss with a lot of EQ - and you get a much more natural sounding recording. I personally don't use EQ on guitar unless the voice needs to be too dominant to be heard. And mic position on an amp kind of acts as "EQ" in a way...

I think it took me 5 years to get out of the "fix it in the mix" frame of mind. It hurts! I fear it, now!

Peace.

Rick
 
It also depends on the part

Getting back to shack's original post...

In reading the post, you may be thinking that each instrument should be given a frequency range. While that's an important thing to consider, you also need to consider the *part* that's being played/sung. Instruments and voices have wide frequency ranges. So you shouldn't just say, "where should I put the guitars, where should I put the voices, etc."

You need to consider the part being played/sung and find what frequencies you want to bring out and which ones you don't. It will vary on each song. For example, you'd probably EQ Jim Morrison's voice (if he were still alive) differently than Maria Carey's voice because they exist in very different frequency ranges.

To get started, you might consider that an open A string on a guitar is 440Hz (right? can someone fact check?). An octave above that is 880Hz, etc. From that starting point, find where the vocals are, and boost them in that range. Do something similar for the other parts.

Free advice, you get what you pay for. Take it for what it's worth.
 
i think i'm beginning to understand....and sadly its stuff that i feard i would hear.

basically - with the knowledge that i have right now, and the equipment i'm using too - my mix's are as good as they can get. haha
i'll havge to read up on tons of stuff...then maybe i'll come back to this ok? thanks everyone though.
 
Hey shack,

There is one peice of gear that you already have. All you need to do is learn how to use it. It's your ears.

I have had problems with mixes and still continue to. But if it''s one thing that I've learned is thast I need to spend time listening.

It will probably take me 2 to 3 times longer to get a fairly decent sounding mix than someone that is more trainined, but at least I am starting to hone in on it.

Just take your time with it. Try doing a mix, play it back on other systems to see how it sounds and listen very closely to details. If there is something thast doesn't sound good, go back and try and focus on that issue. Then you can start all over with another mix and do the same thing. This may sem to taked a lot of time, but none of us can become good mixing engineers overnight. the more you work with it, there better you will get.

One last note. As you are tweacking your mixes, you may want to jot down the verious things that you try and whether or not they worked. That way, when it's time to mix another song, you have some reference.

I know this is not an push this button and all is well answer, but at least it's a start.

Peace
Joe
 
do you recomend using a 3 band on each track till they still right or should you use a 10 band or larger?
 
Actually, I think my ears have something like 18,000 to 20,000 bands. BWA HA HA.

All kidding aside, you try to use the gear that you have. Of course if you have the money you could start buying all kinds of gear such as eq's.

As far as your question about bands, The first thing to point out that there are 2 types of eq. There is graphic and parametric. When you talk about 10 bands you are probably refering to a graphic eq. With a parametric, you will be able to hone in on specific frequencies where as graphic you can only adjust the frequencies within the range of the particular band you are adjusting.
 
ok
i have sonar 1.3
i have timeworks plugins
waves native gold plugins
and the plugins that came with sonar
which do you recomend i use for eq..ing?
and if you are familar with them
which particular plugin do you recomend with int the program?
 
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