Lacuna

[sano]

I think you made a pretty good job of separating out all the synths and the overall balance is good but I agree Olli H that your mix overall sounds a little polite. Maybe setting the master bus compressor a little more aggressively to give more attitude and pump the mix ever so slightly would help it. Adding more low end to the bass would help a lot too.

You mentioned about it being electro and not needing it to sound natural. Well I think that's the key !! That's the fun for me mixing this style of music. You can distort, mangle, high pass filter the life out of it etc, to get it where you want, no one's gonna complain that it sounds wrong.

thanks for listening and your suggestions! I should capture some pictures of the EQ work I did, because it's pretty ridiculous

right now I'm pumping to the kick at about 3 dB gain reduction... you think perhaps I should go further with that, or compress the entire mix again on top of it? I didn't use a limiter either since I usually wind up ruining my mix so that might also be a problem.

When you say you're pumping to the kick are you pumping the bass track to it, or do you mean compressing the entire mix from a side chained kick? ....and did you use a compressor at all across your master bus?

[pauli]

Sano: I sidechained the entire mix to the kick, except for the lead parts, but I sidechained the bass to compress a teeny bit on the kicks too for balance purposes. The mix is only compressing about 3 decibels, though... maybe I should push it a little harder than that.
in comparison with the references I've checked, it'
The only compression going on the whole mix otherwise is just a mild tape saturation type compression... but I think it's only a couple decibels. pretty obvious this genre needs more attitude. What sorta master bus compression... it sounds like medium attack, fast release, might be the way to go?... but I'm not sure where to shoot for as far as gain reduction goes. Where do you think you'd start?

Serg and Don: Thanks guys!

[sano]

Sano: I sidechained the entire mix to the kick, except for the lead parts, but I sidechained the bass to compress a teeny bit on the kicks too for balance purposes. The mix is only compressing about 3 decibels, though... maybe I should push it a little harder than that.
in comparison with the references I've checked, it'
The only compression going on the whole mix otherwise is just a mild tape saturation type compression... but I think it's only a couple decibels. pretty obvious this genre needs more attitude. What sorta master bus compression... it sounds like medium attack, fast release, might be the way to go?... but I'm not sure where to shoot for as far as gain reduction goes. Where do you think you'd start?

Serg and Don: Thanks guys!

It's hard to say if pushing more than 3db reduction for such a lot of the mix would give it more vibe or start to have an obvoius and negative effect on the mix. Personally I would be cautious going over 3db on such a big part of the mix.

The master bus ...yeah a faster release time, just to move and react to the transients of the drums will make the whole mix move and breath a little more. As far as gain reduction go's, it's hard to call, all depends on the processing that come before it, but you don't need much to get the effect you are wanting and again would be cautious going over 3db

[pauli]

awesome man, thanks so much for your help! I was trying to dial it in just barely to where it was noticeable buit seems the power is really beefed by a master bus compressor in addition, which in most situations I'd avoid.

thanks for all the awesome feedback and taking time to listen to my work, guys