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[Mixinthecloud]

Hello,

I listened briefly to mix 2.

Regarding the count-in, what was your reasoning behind it appearing only in one channel? Do you also think it could be louder, especially for an audience listening at low level with a high background noise (levels of up to -50dB can be pretty common, even in domestic surroundings)? Thinking about it, does it's inclusion add to the concept of the song, especially in context of a studio-type production as against a live performance?

Are you not finding this busy?

How did you envisage differentiating the verses and choruses musically and instrumentally? How did you plan to help keep listeners engaged for the duration of a relatively long song?

I recommend you back off from the limiter, you appear to be pushing it hard on occasion because I can hear distortion. Why the need to limit to 0dB?

Love your LED layout in the avatar. Out of interest, what size are the screens?

Thanks for the listen too

Max,
Thanks for the comments. If I may respond:
The location of the count off is the location of the guitarist who counted it off. It was meant to grab your ear. I believe in that endeavor, it did so. You do make a good point about it being out of context with a more 'produced' version, but that does not mean it does not work. I thought it lent intimacy to the song.

As for the levels you mentioned, this mix was done for the active listener. Passive listening systems may add their own levels of compression to suit their environments. For the audience here, it was done with as much dynamics as the playing defined. Which is your answer to your question about differentiating verse from chorus. I felt the differentiation the artist wanted was inherent in the arrangement and playing. My enhancements to that were to modulate the mandolin and pedal accordingly. Neither the guitars nor the Hammond have any automation. In this particular mix, the lead vocal was compressed multiple times and de-essed as well. Taming some of his phrases could have been done with automation but I went with the compression instead to balance level and expression. I think we may disagree on that balance.

There was very little limiting on this mix. The pre-mastered mix had no limiting on it. I always add a limiter as the last device in my mastering chain but typically only to catch true peaks in this genre. I did some modest compression with gain to raise the level of the finished song. I may have pushed that too much as normal playback level on this is a bit hot. Your assistance on a better approach to this would be greatly appreciated.

Listening to posts you've made under previous avatars, there is no doubt you are a master at this craft, far beyond my meager skills. If I may ask, when you get creative with a paying artist's material, is this something they hired you to do or is it something you took on as your interpretation of the artist's work? Some of the things you have done are genuinely impressive. I wonder how the artist felt though.

As for the distortion, I am having an issue with this from a system standpoint. It may be Dante related, which is being used in my environment, but as it is only a transport mechanism for audio, the file produced should be unaffected by monitoring audio across the wire. My feeling is an external clock would be invaluable. Again, any input you have here would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks and please continue to listen and critique.