To set tracks deeper in the mix...............

  • Thread starter Thread starter JMarcomb
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JMarcomb

JMarcomb

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Does anybody know if you should mess with the volume of a track (besides fades) or should you try compressing or eq'ing it deeper into the track?
 
Generally compression is used to bring things out of the mix, not push them back. EQ, in this case, is similar; you probably wouldn't want to dull down a sound to make it less noticeable.

Simply pulling down the volume is the first way I'd try. You probably will need to compress vox so that they don't jump out at some times and hide in others. When something is back in the mix it's important that it's as consistent as possible, unless you're looking for an unconventional effect, and it sounds like you're not.

Ken Rutkowski
Outer Limit Recording Studio
 
Reverb is often used to push stuff back a little. It's common to cut the EQ on the reverb over 10khz and under 500hz as a basic guideline.
 
Thanks guys-- thats seems to make sense.

One more thing.... I was planning on getting a Focusrite 7 pre and I was wondering if that will color/warm up my acoustic guitar tremendously... "pleasing to the ear" I know it cant hurt, but what is your guys view on a acoustic guitar chain? I'll be using a akgc3000 and internal acoustic mic stereo pan into a Mackie board


Thanks a bunch for the time
 
If you compress a background track (i.e. take the volume of the peaks down) without raising the overall volume of the track, you will, in effect, make the track a bit quieter. The more you compress, the quieter (and less dynamic) the track will become. The bulk of the sound will still be there, but it won't jump out at you during the louder parts.

Squashing the dynamics of backing parts is probably a decent way of making them less noticeable but still present. Watch that you don't kill them, though. Its pretty easy to do.

Take care,
Chris
 
There's a good reverb trick to create the illusion of something being back farther in a mix.

Use the same type of reverb on all of your tracks . . . nothing too outlandish . . . just something that will place everything in relatively the same "virtual room," so to speak.

Now mess with the pre-delay a bit. The tracks that you want to pull forward should have a longer pre-delay, and those that you want to push back should have a much shorter pre-delay time (or even a slap-back). The reason has to do with the time it typically takes the sound of something to reflect off of the back wall. If your instrument is being played towards the back of the room, obviously it's sound will bounce off the back wall a lot sooner (since it is closer). Those that are closer to the front will reach your ears a lot sooner than it will the back wall . . . hence the longer pre-delay time.

Get it?
 
Backing of the mids will push it back a bit too.
 
Hold on, now... I think we're talking about two different things. We started talking (I think) about pushing the volume back so that the track would be less noticeable in the mix, then we switched to talking about pushing it farther back in the stereo field - that's where the reverb comments came in.

Just thought I'd try to stave off confusion a bit.

Ken Rutkowski
Outer Limit Recording Studio
 
Hmmm (headscratch). Uh . . . yea . . . I would say that messing with the volume would be a good way to uh . . . make something not as loud in the mix. :) If that is what we're talking about.

Please tell me it isn't.
 
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