Leaf Summerghost kinda 80s vibe

[jeremias666]

Hi, i tried to give the song some 80s vibe but not so overdone.

The bg vocals needs automation and i am not really satiesfied with the drums, i find pretty hard working with programmed drums pretending to be real drums, but i liked the song so i mixed it anyway.

Feel free to make any observation.

Cheers.

[grizwalter]

Hey jeremia. In your comments to my mix, you mentioned that in yours you used Abbey Road Drums? Is this correct? I don't really hear any particularly natural (real drums) sound to them in the mix. I've never actually heard Abbey Road drums, but they have a very good reputation from what I understand.

Your mix is pretty good. In reviewing my mix you noted that the vocals needed some more excitement or high end; is it possible that your speakers are a little weak in that part of the spectrum. I've listened to a bunch of other things (here and commercial), and your mix, while having plenty of lows and mids (so not thin at all), definitely seems a little too bright around 6k or 7k and up.

If it were not for that, I'd say you nailed it pretty much. Only other thing is that the vocals in the long end part are a good deal too quiet, almost as an afterthought. Of course, this might have been intentional--a personal preference--in which case it is fine.

[jeremias666]

Yes i used the abbey drums 80s version it sounds more processed than the 60 and 70 versions. And i used some gated reverb on the snare and transient designer to make the snare rattle have that white noise drum machine quality, that was the main idea behind the drums, give it a little drum machine vibe. It seemed better to me than trying to make programmed drums sound natural.

The guitars have lots of 5-6 k, the voice not so much, more in the 10k i added to them, the reverb might have added some hi mid presence. The cymbals are a little harsh in the hi mids in the final section.

The vocals in the final section i tried to make them more buried but you are right i overdid it, my idea was to make it seem like a dreamy never ending final. Maybe a fade out or a sequential muting of the instruments one by one until the vocals are the last thing sounding would work better

thanks for listening.

[grizwalter]

You totally nailed your drum goal then! Only reason I'd mentioned it at all was because when someone says abbey road drums to me I assume they're talking about going for realism. lol Also, I noticed that gated reverb, which definitely added to the effect you were going for.

Not a bad idea you have regarding the fade out to vocal only thing at the end. would be an interesting finish.

[HbGuitar]

Good job with female vox in the first part with the male vox slightly low. Overall both vocals in the 2nd part of the mix feel a bit low

I liked the sound of your snare and I think you could bring the kick level up a little to help give your mix a bit more bottom end .

I liked your use of synth in the 2nd part.

nice job overall

[Amphibian]

+ Wow, sounds fantastic at first listen! Wow, is the word.
+ Great job on the 80's connection.
+ Love the reverb, what ever it is you put on it. What type of chorus is that on the guitar?
- Cymbals/Hi-hat sound a bit loud/out of place. Push them back a bit. Make them a bit warmer/rounder if you can.
- Background vocals are a bit too low. Either make them heard or cut them out.
- Bass could be a bit more up front/present. It's the element that's driving the song.

Great job!

[jeremias666]

The chorus is Audio Damage "Vapor" plug in. Works great on guitars.

[pauli]

hey jeremias. in many ways, this sounds great, but there are a few things hanging me up a little.

The drums sound a little too much like a beatbox to me, but I can't really fault you for that because their presentation in the tracks isn't ideal... I'd personally suggest more naturalistic samples, but that could well be a matter of taste. I'm not normally one to get too hung up on naturalistic sounds in pop music, but the reverb situation is a little odd. To my ears it sounds like there's a lot of "effecty" reverb (which is great, I love the concept you're working there) but I'm missing a unifying global ambience... and that'd help glue everything together, make it sound more like a mix and less like a collection of tracks, if that makes sense.

It'd probably also be beneficial to compress things a bit more during the mix (and not at mastering) to help glue things together a bit, too. On a finished mix the best way to do this (in my very humble, non-expert opinion) is to mute everything but the drums and bass, then set a compressor on the master buss to respond (a dB or two, slow attack, slow release) to those... then unmute the rest of the mix in order of importance, tweaking the level (and maybe the EQ and compression, but it sounds like you did well in that department for the most part) as you go... and the level of compression shouldn't exceed 3 or 4 dB. Some people don't like compressing the master (even during mastering) and I understand/respect that, but still, give it a try and see if it helps tighten things up a bit.

Last thing that's hanging me up... the guitars are a bit too abrasive and sandpapery from 2000 to 4000, and the mix as a whole is a touch bright from 4000 all the way up. Try to aim for more energy in the 500-1000 area on distorted guitars, and be careful about anything higher than that, because the harmonics are going to get thicker the further up the spectrum you go, and pickup noise on as guitar starts feeding appreciably into the distortion around 1500 or so... so in the high mids and treble, the sound is going to be more noise than tone, and that can get a bit wearying on the ears. Been there, done that... countless times!

Apart from those, I'm hearing pretty reasonably good mix values... there's separation and clarity, and your mention of the 80s connection certainly indicates vision as well... keep it up!

[jeremias666]

The beat box quality is on purpouse. I dont like programmed drums trying to sound real. And i went for an 80 goth pop vibe, most of those bands have very artificial sounding drums.

The mix has master bus compression. Subtle but is there.

I agree on the guitars, i went too far with the midrange and they sound abrasive.
The cymbals are what is making the mix sounding bright, they are a little louder than they should, and brighter than i would like.

You are spot on about the unifying ambient observation.


Tanx for the review.

[pauli]

Alright, well if you're going the drum machine route, I still think it could use some glue. In addition to any sort of global ambience, it might help to put a little extra space around the drum sounds. I think anything at all that reduces dynamic range or beefs up harmonics will be your friend, if you use it sparingly. I'm thinking verb, distortion, aliasing, saturation, even plain old compression or a bass boost.... Pick your flavor, hell, pick a combination of flavors if you like, and you'll be able to blend them into the production as a whole.

So the situation granted you the choice of going for a closer to natural sound or something synthesized, and you chose the latter... Fantastic! That also opens a great many doors toward how you can treat your rhythmic sounds to slot them into the mix creatively, so I say go for it . Keep it subtle enough to blend the beatbox into the mix, but give it enough flavor to make itself known and the sky's the limit.