Diesel13: 'Colour Me Red'

[thedon]

Lots of good balancing going on, Don -- everything comes through clearly, with lots of definition on the main riff and the vocals and particular, which appeals to me. There's a really good sense of blend too, so whatever effects you've used here are doing something that works for me. Maybe the banjo could sit a little bit more into the track? I kind of like it as a statement, but it does pull me a bit out of the environment of the rest of the band. You've also done a great job filling out the low end of the bass, which gives the low end a nice fullness, not only when the riff arrives each time, but also during the mid-sections.

Mixinthecloud has already made a point in this thread that I think I'd agree with, though: my main criticism of this mix would be that it sounds just a bit overmixed -- if that makes any sense! For a start, the 3-5kHz region seems over-pushed, and that's often a spectral area that can get overpopulated if you keep adding it to different instruments to get them all to sound more energetic and upfront. I wonder whether part of this might also be you adding psychoacoustic enhancements or saturation algorithms to things (particularly the drums and cymbals) so that their upper harmonics actually become too dense, masking too many of the melodic/harmonic frequency components of other instruments. I suspect this may also be the reason that the cymbal and drum sustains also sound a bit abrasive overall, which makes me want to reach for either the EQ or the volume control. It's not that I disagree with giving this music a dose more aggression, but I think I'd also rather I could turn it up, which at the moment is a bit fatiguing.

As I said, I like the way you featured the banjo here, but other elements of variety in the arrangement felt a bit underplayed -- the ElecGtr02 broken chords or rhodes parts in the Mid-sections, for instance, or ElecGtr04 in Outro 1. For that reason the long-term mix dynamics seem rather static. In music that makes such a feature of a repeated riff, I think it's worth working a bit harder to draw out and highlight whatever arrangement variety there is, from the perspective of keeping the listener engaged.

Still, this is clearly a very creditable mix overall -- thanks for uploading it for us all to hear!

Thanks for having a listen Mike and detailed feedback,
Uploaded another mix V5.5 hopefully sounds a touch better.
My wife and kids keep asking why I keep playing the same song over and over again, they think I'm nuts and probably right lol.

Cheers