You Know Better - Devilskater Mix

[Devilskater666]

Hi Devilskater666 -- that opening vibraslap delay is certainly a statement! Other than that, though, this is a very sensibly balanced mix (very solid on the vocal and bass, despite the challenges you correctly identified!), with sensitive use of mix effects to blend things together and give an appealing sense of space. A few thoughts, though:

• There's some kind of funny little edit that causes a little 'bump' of vocal tail at 2:45. I'd try to get rid of that, because it anticipates (and therefore weakens) the off-beat Chorus entry just afterwards. It also sounds like there's some kind of strange crossfade an eighth-note after that Chorus entry hit -- the bass kind of pulses. Don't know what it is, but again it seems distracting.
  
• I wonder whether the kick and snare/sidekick could come up in the balance a little, and have a touch less of the very initial transient. It just feels that the body of those sounds isn't quite solid enough to match the bass.
  
• The place I'd concentrate the most attention on now, to be honest, is the automation. In one respect, I like what you've done already, in that the instruments and vocal stay where you've put them -- in other words, the short-term balance is great. However, over the long term the mix feels a bit static. I don't get the sense of the sound changing to support the section changes -- the verse feels too much like the chorus and reintro, so I feel a lack of momentum through the song's duration. And the other automation thing I'd do is work at pulling out more of the interesting details (the little Hammond syncopation at 3:26, for instance) so that they poke the listener in the ear more and demand their attention. There's lots of fun musical stuff going on here, but I think you're asking the mainstream listener to work too hard to pick it all out.
  

Hope a few of those things are useful for you. Another strong competition contender... Thanks for joining in!

Thank you so much for your feedback Mike.
I tried to follow your advise as best as i coud in my updated mix and definitely learned a lot in this competition.

So thanks again!