06-11-2015, 10:20 PM
focusing on the spectral balance generally herewith: i note there's nothing happening in the low-mids <400Hz'ish, other than the bass droner and some percussive elements. that bass can get repetitive, eh? though much of that issue stems from the arrangement, i'd explore some options in how this could be managed (eg to help differentiate between verse and chorus). at the other end of the spectrum in the treble, it's busy. for example, there's a lot of snare-type material present right up in the HM and HF area (the last octave), contributing to this zone's congestion bringing a sense of brittleness along with it? what you're fighting with because of this IMO FWIW, is the relative lack of clarity and presence in the vocal, not helped by the amount of material in the mid channel which is tending to fog things up; the percussion especially has a tendency to mask here. given the bias towards the percussive elements in your vision by making them frontal in the illusion of depth, all that spectral material, coupled with it's amplitude, and the lower amplitude of the vocal set back behind them, suggests you might have made life difficult in your vision? it's not something that can simply be resolved by pushing up the vocal fader, unfortunately, because everything has a consequence. tricky.
the [stereo] modulation of the bass-line encroaches upon the side channel quite extensively. ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem, except the weight of spectrum coming with it makes listening in headphones heavy going....fatiguing even. bring in the abundance of treble in the HF [coming from the percussion in the main] and this tends to make it difficult for a listener to want to hang in for the 4 minutes. the argument as to whether bass is directional below 100Hz, it makes sense distributing the power and energy equally across two speakers (i.e. bass mono). not many people in the real world sit in the sweet spot, and rather a lot of consumer boxes are going to be bass-shy and will find delivering it a challenge - they will try however, and in doing so it can often cause the mid range to lose focus, for example - right where the vocal is here. i'd suggest perhaps, that it might be better to lose the weight of the bass's stereo material in the sides so only the upper harmonics (say, above 200-250Hz?) are given the stereo? i've not mixed this, so i've not had the advantage of fiddling around with it, but that's where i'd look first. we can sometimes get quite drawn into bass and manipulate frequencies much lower down than we need in order to find some action, however, it's surprising how much higher up we can work it and make a better effect while at the same time giving ourselves some headroom and bringing something with the voltage. i thought this mix would have benefited maybe, from more material in the low-mids (<500Hz) besides the bass and low-percussion parts?
we humans have a sensitive spot in our audible range around the 4kHz. if you don't pay attention to it, it can be an uncomfortable frequency to endure, irrespective of duration. it's got something to do with our ear canals, apparently. this is one of the reasons the NS10's were popular....they over-emphasised it, forcing/encouraging the engineer to pay attention to it. digital signals can be a nightmare....and not forgetting that mp3 or lossy material can expose material we might not wish to be exposed by filtering out material either side. there's a synth which comes in now and again which is a likely candidate?
i'd have low-passed the percussion rather than boost it into 20kHz. and the voice intro might have benefited from more level....it would have helped to give the song impact/impression/vibe/interest on the way in? but that's a subjective thaaang..
glad you didn't push this hard into the limiter though.....you allowed the dynamic to remain, which i really appreciated.
cheers,,
the [stereo] modulation of the bass-line encroaches upon the side channel quite extensively. ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem, except the weight of spectrum coming with it makes listening in headphones heavy going....fatiguing even. bring in the abundance of treble in the HF [coming from the percussion in the main] and this tends to make it difficult for a listener to want to hang in for the 4 minutes. the argument as to whether bass is directional below 100Hz, it makes sense distributing the power and energy equally across two speakers (i.e. bass mono). not many people in the real world sit in the sweet spot, and rather a lot of consumer boxes are going to be bass-shy and will find delivering it a challenge - they will try however, and in doing so it can often cause the mid range to lose focus, for example - right where the vocal is here. i'd suggest perhaps, that it might be better to lose the weight of the bass's stereo material in the sides so only the upper harmonics (say, above 200-250Hz?) are given the stereo? i've not mixed this, so i've not had the advantage of fiddling around with it, but that's where i'd look first. we can sometimes get quite drawn into bass and manipulate frequencies much lower down than we need in order to find some action, however, it's surprising how much higher up we can work it and make a better effect while at the same time giving ourselves some headroom and bringing something with the voltage. i thought this mix would have benefited maybe, from more material in the low-mids (<500Hz) besides the bass and low-percussion parts?
we humans have a sensitive spot in our audible range around the 4kHz. if you don't pay attention to it, it can be an uncomfortable frequency to endure, irrespective of duration. it's got something to do with our ear canals, apparently. this is one of the reasons the NS10's were popular....they over-emphasised it, forcing/encouraging the engineer to pay attention to it. digital signals can be a nightmare....and not forgetting that mp3 or lossy material can expose material we might not wish to be exposed by filtering out material either side. there's a synth which comes in now and again which is a likely candidate?
i'd have low-passed the percussion rather than boost it into 20kHz. and the voice intro might have benefited from more level....it would have helped to give the song impact/impression/vibe/interest on the way in? but that's a subjective thaaang..
glad you didn't push this hard into the limiter though.....you allowed the dynamic to remain, which i really appreciated.
cheers,,
Beware...........Cognitive Dissonance!