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Metallurgist goes Homebound
#1
this project afforded some fantastic opportunities for exploration, despite only being 2 tracks, though i ended up with a few more by the time it was finished. i heard the song firstly in LondonMatt's thread, so thanks go to him for firing up my inquisitiveness in the song and it's arrangement.

mix notes:
the Vox+AcGtr track was down-mixed to mono, which gave a clear lead vocal, with the illusion of the vocalist playing the acoustic. this was of course, panned centrally. a spin-off of this was to lose the tendency for the acoustic guitar to hang a little heavy on the left channel when in stereo. the track was to be the anchor for the song. the banjo was muted in the first verse, as it was felt that with both instruments running all the time through the song it might be a little sonically intensive (i.e. lack variation, or interest). this meant the banjo track could be used for it's vocal as a form of backing vocal as well as enable placement of the banjo while working some automation into the groove to aid the push and shove. mid-side processing was fundamental to achieving the vision and working the stereo as much to one's advantage as possible. there's also some polarity switching engaged here, and some widening techniques (the consequences on mono playback was of no concern).

the backing vocal was fader ridden. a negative of this was the fact that on the push, the banjo wanted to appear wide in the depth field. this would be an inevitable compromise for the benefit of gaining the BV's.

there's a foot stomp in the back of the banjo/vox track, which can be heard in the background during the instrumental section (and the stretched outro!). unfortunately it doesn't play ball at being brought out in the mix without radical intervention.....and that has it's own unwanted consequences, so this wasn't pursued. there was a plan of donning the hog-nail boots and miking up some stomps and leg slaps to the beat, and blending it in at certain places..... this song is crying out for something with a beat like this to hook in to.....

the acoustic gtr was a slight nuisance; the danger's lurking at 7kHz and 8.9kHz respectively (as well as some serious low-end build up). and of course, the banjo has a whole tonne of honk which needs pulling out in quite a heavy handed fashion. nothing that can't be fixed though and generally, depending on your approach, it won't mess with the vocal. what did cause some consternation was compression within the mix. because the attributes of a vocal are different to that of a banjo or acoustic guitar, and because these are locked together in the raw material, it wasn't going to work without a train wreak. some exploration was engaged out of interest, though unsurprisingly nothing proved satisfactory to the ears.

if one attempts notching out the problem frequencies of the guitar with static EQ, it will have a negative effect on the spectral balance and timbre quite dramatically - with only 2 stereo tracks, even the simplest of processing really stands out. so dynamic EQ was chosen; the notches would only be working relative to the amount of 'problem spectrum' presented.

the raw stuff was pretty warm, but that's a reflection of the genre. the treble was marginally tweaked to get the guitar a little brighter for "English ears", but it needs REAL care otherwise it starts to get harsh. some delays were used (fader ridden) on the guitar during the instrumental section to give it some space and to give a little more stage presence.

there's a total of 5 reverbs running, though not all at the same time. the 5th is a spring dropped on the stretched'n somewhat distorted banjo at the end - who's the bad boy?!
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this was great song concept and refreshingly different in it's delivery too, and i totally loved it. the "expression of voice" was superb. and what a great chance to push some voodoo and get dirty with the Science of Stereo too. for a relatively simple project, i probably haven't had this much fun for ages! the load of enthusiastic words herein probably confirms it, eh? And, i haven't even had my coffee yet Smile

if you folk are not familiar with Seasick Steve (WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?????), i recommend checking out his music, and especially his guitars!


if you want to explore the mix, i'd encourage you to take advantage of this download otherwise you'll be hearing the mp3 artifacts, especially when engaging side channel analysis. i'll leave the link for as long as possible (normally a minimum of 4 weeks after the thread post).

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1565...-16bit.wav

loudness stats:
Prog loudness: -14LUFS
LRA: 6.2
TP: -0.4


.mp3    BoogieSnakes_METALLURGIST_jobbie.mp3 --  (Download: 4.43 MB)


Beware...........Cognitive Dissonance!
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#2
Hi Dave, can't quite believe the amount of work that has gone into this on your part! I like the approach of making the vox/ac track a definite "lead" with the banjo man (who is, of course, the same man) providing BVs. Listening back to mine leaves me wanting something sitting right in the middle - you're right in guessing that I was going for a "two guys playing two instruments both slightly either side of a stereo mic" approach, but I can definitely see the value of having a single main vocal in the middle. Also like the approach of muting the banjo track to vary the arrangement - I haven't got into muting/rearranging things yet in mixes I've put on here due to limited time but I'm aware I should keep that in mind.
Overall I appreciate the width you've managed to create whilst keeping it really organic (like you, I eschewed any form of compression, apart in my case from the mildest touch of stereo buss) - I'm not too sure about the top end though, the voice sounds just a little muffled to my ears, but then again listening back to mine I reckon it sounds over-bright. So hey ho.

Anyway, great stuff, glad you had fun with it despite (or because?!) of the idiosyncrasies of the source material.
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#3
(01-06-2015, 11:38 PM)londonmatt Wrote: I'm not too sure about the top end though, the voice sounds just a little muffled to my ears....

i'm not sure either.

i had a CD recommendation from a regular forum participant concerning a mixing technique that i found interesting. i took a quick preview on some dodgy 128kbps streamer then went out and bought it. within seconds of the first audition, i felt robbed! it was as muddy as hell and i actually found it fatiguing in the low end. i checked out some reviews....2 from the US and 2 from the UK. only one commented on the warmth, it was the Brit. our ears are used to a more balanced spectral distribution, but it was the genre which characteristically necessitated it's uncharacteristic warmth of delivery....uncharacteristic that is, to my ears. i'd never come across a master like this before. ever. but the genre is outside of my Terms of Reference. but i am a fan of Knopfler's...harping back to the Dire Straits days, so that's perhaps why i was caught off guard by the mastering.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privateering_%28album%29

it would have been interesting to know the tracking signal chain with the Secretariat material. the reason for doing so concerns my challenge in seeking a brighter presentation. the first thing that happened was the revelation of harshness in the guitar. it's not helped by the fact that we have two entirely dissimilar instruments on one track, of course. naturally, each will necessitate a different approach in the sound shaping, and while applying one EQ to help the vocal, the same parameter will simply nail the guitar and release a few gremlins; something of a vicious circle then commences. same with compression too, of course.

difficult choice...so i took the coward's way out and cried genre! yeah, it's cheating, but this part of the mix process had me well beat. though perhaps we were trying to fight something that didn't need fighting? it would be nice to get some ideas and views, especially from our American cousin forum participants on that.

thanks for dropping by and sharing your ideas and so forth. appreciated.
Beware...........Cognitive Dissonance!
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