Pedaling Prince Mix: Butterfly Effect - Preach Right Here

[Pedaling Prince]

I was surprised, and pleased, to meet another Atlantic Canadian here. Marc Gosselin, who graciously provided this multitrack for the site, was originally a guitarist for the Atlantic Canadian alternative rock band The Butterfly Effect, formed in the late 1990s; this is one of their songs. I hope he likes what he hears us doing with them; with luck, our work will encourage him to post more of The Butterfly Effect's tracks.

I actually wrote to Mr. Gosselin while I was working on this mix to give him a heads up that his was the next multitrack I planned to tackle. He gave me some very interesting information on the history of these tracks.

He and the band recorded them on December 31, 2000 in his parents' basement on two Tascam DA-88s. That caught my attention. I was familiar with the DA-88; I've never used one but I learned several years ago that the DA-88 was used for dialogue mixing on the later seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Of course, as both a Star Trek fan and a filmmaker, once I learned that I had to learn more about this machine. Given the era of its heyday I was actually very impressed with its capabilities; its only real shortcoming quality-wise was the fact that it's limited to 16-bit (hence the reason this multitrack, unlike all the others here, is not 24-bit). This is the first time I've ever worked with digital recordings from a multitrack machine of this vintage and, as anyone who's listened to my mixes of Street Noise's work knows, I just love working with old recordings.

But there was one thing he said about these tracks that really got my attention:

The biggest monster on this session is the bass track(s).. it's almost subsonic and if you're not careful, they'll consume a ton of real estate in the mix, resulting in a muddy sounding mix.

Oh really...?

Anyone here who's been listening to my mixes and reading my posts knows how much I love bass. So I took the above statement as a personal challenge.

When I heard the bass for the first time I had to admit he was absolutely right. This has to be the fullest, thickest bass I've ever had the pleasure of working on. It also sounded next to impossible to combine with anything else without totally swamping it. But I wanted that bass. It was too awesome to tame! I wanted it to rattle the rafters! I was bound and determined I was going to find a way to give it the sonic space it needed without dragging every other instrument into a quagmire of doom. So I hi-passed the bajeebles out of anything that moved a level meter, with the exception of the bass tracks themselves, of course, and the kick and toms. Everything else? Any low frequency energy on a track that didn't need it was quickly slapped in handcuffs and hauled away.

It took quite a while, not only hi-passing everything but making more liberal use of EQ than I generally do, but this was a special occasion where I had to push the envelope; I had my dream bass track in my hands and be damned if I wasn't gonna find some way to make this work!

I think it turned out remarkably well. Gotta warn you, though: if bass isn't your thing you're not going to like this. If bass is your thing, you'll probably love it... but for the love of God if you live in an apartment or something have pity on your neighbours and don't listen to it when everybody's sleeping! I guarantee you, unless you're in a high end acoustically damped studio specifically designed to absorb bass it will rattle its way through several floors of any building...

One other thing Mr. Gosselin pointed out was that many of these tracks were quite noisy. Well, they are a little, but for the most part I think they're on a par with Dolby A-type noise reduction treated tracks so they're quite workable without the need for any noise reduction. The only exceptions were the shaker and the first two FX tracks. The FX tracks stand on their own a couple of times in the mix and their noise was distracting, and the shaker is extremely noisy. So those two tracks I treated with aggressive noise removal using Audacity; the remaining tracks, I kept as is and simply cut out silent portions so tracks not in use at any given point won't be adding unnecessary noise.

It's after midnight here right now and I have to go to work in the morning so I can't review anyone else's mixes right now, but I'll be sure to have listen over the weekend; I'm very curious how all of you handled that elephant of a bass track...

I'm really looking forward to getting comments on this one, good or bad...

[Marc Gosselin]

with luck, our work will encourage him to post more of The Butterfly Effect's tracks.

I have 3 other session multitracks that I will be contributing over the summer from this project.

So.. back to the mix,
this mix can't be rushed, it takes time to make it all work together.. sounds like you spent some time on it.

the good news is.. I hear no negative artifacts from compression

overall the clarity is quite good, that's an achievement on itself.

To me, the acoustic guitars and dulcimer in the intro are too thinned out.. the low end warmth is gone.. I would clone all those tracks with a less aggressive high pass filter for the intro only.. and then jump over to the existing tracks you have with the current EQ for when the drums and stuff all kick in.

The relationship between the kick, snare (and toms) is very contrasting.. not sure if that was your intention.

the kick jumps out a bit unevenly.. I would say that it's the loudest thing in your mix... and the snare is waaay back there along with the toms.. the problem with bringing up the snare in your mix though, would result in masking the lead vocal.. so if you decide to do that, be aware of that.

The lead electric guitar is low, it is a supportive role after all.. everyone on the forum seems to be ditching that part in favor of the other stuff.

I wouldn't put that bass guitar any louder than where you have it sitting.. it sometimes suffers from the same effect as the kick, some parts are a tad uneven in the bass guitar, the 2nd bass track (staccato shots) are a bit strong as well.

If you we're to make the bottom end more consistent and glued together.. you would only have two choices:
dynamic compression of some kind.. or.. automating all those parts till you go cross eyed silly or get cramps shooting up your arm.


Anyways,
there's a lot of good fundamental techniques happening in your mix.. as far as clarity goes (which I'm very critical of) it's the best one yet.

[takka360]

I think most people have kept the guitars down because they are problematic with noise and out of tune to start with.
For me its hard for someone to judge your work when you don't think that their mix was that good in the first place.
The snare is well well to loud ,the bv are totally lost etc its all down to preference really.
Nice mix well done enjoyed it.

[Pedaling Prince]

with luck, our work will encourage him to post more of The Butterfly Effect's tracks.

I have 3 other session multitracks that I will be contributing over the summer from this project.

Ooh! Looking forward to that!

the good news is.. I hear no negative artifacts from compression

I certainly hope not; if you did I'd start to worry this place was haunted by the ghost of an overzealous mixing engineer who decided my mix needed "mastering." The only tracks that had any compression at all were the toms (to thicken them up a little) the acoustic guitars (to help them stand out among all that bass ) and, of course, the vocals where I always use just a touch of compression to keep them from being buried alive by the rest of the tracks.

overall the clarity is quite good, that's an achievement on itself.

I'll say! Getting the other tracks to "step aside" to make room for the big fat bass was not easy...

To me, the acoustic guitars and dulcimer in the intro are too thinned out.. the low end warmth is gone.. I would clone all those tracks with a less aggressive high pass filter for the intro only.. and then jump over to the existing tracks you have with the current EQ for when the drums and stuff all kick in.

Good idea; I did just that in the attached revised mix.

The relationship between the kick, snare (and toms) is very contrasting.. not sure if that was your intention.

the kick jumps out a bit unevenly.. I would say that it's the loudest thing in your mix... and the snare is waaay back there along with the toms.. the problem with bringing up the snare in your mix though, would result in masking the lead vocal.. so if you decide to do that, be aware of that.

OK. What I did here was double track the acoustic snare with the same EQ settings it had but added a gentle 4.5 dB cut at 950 Hz on the second track to keep the midrange from swamping the vocals.

The lead electric guitar is low, it is a supportive role after all.. everyone on the forum seems to be ditching that part in favor of the other stuff.

Hm. I think the reason people are doing that is because, by itself as a mono element, it's not very exciting (no offence; I imagine you played this part yourself). So what I did here was hammer it with some fairly aggressive EQ to brighten it up and help it stand out against the bass, then I added a subtle chorus effect to spread it across the stereo field a little.

I wouldn't put that bass guitar any louder than where you have it sitting.. it sometimes suffers from the same effect as the kick, some parts are a tad uneven in the bass guitar, the 2nd bass track (staccato shots) are a bit strong as well.

If you we're to make the bottom end more consistent and glued together.. you would only have two choices:
dynamic compression of some kind.. or.. automating all those parts till you go cross eyed silly or get cramps shooting up your arm.

If you were my client I would have no problem addressing that just as I addressed your other concerns. However, myself personally I like the "uneven" quality of the bass and kick drum; to me they sound more like organic, natural playing that way. I did dial back the staccato bass shots a tad, though.

Of course, this is your music. Well, yours and your bandmates'. If the uneven bass is really bothering you, let me know and I'll see what I can do about smoothing it out. However, for the attached revised mix, I kept the bass and kick exactly as they were in the previous mix.

there's a lot of good fundamental techniques happening in your mix.. as far as clarity goes (which I'm very critical of) it's the best one yet.

Thanks. I am rather proud of it. I knew, in principle, that I was on the right track as far as my approach, but I must admit it turned out considerably better than I was expecting.

I'm looking forward to taking a stab your next multitrack.

[takka360]

I don't mean this in a nasty way but I think this is a terrible mix myself.

[Pedaling Prince]

I don't mean this in a nasty way but I think this is a terrible mix myself.

One of the creators of the tracks, who himself teaches classes in audio mixing, disagrees with you...

I have to be honest here. Your opinions are so often diametrically opposed to the opinions of everyone else that I have to wonder if you deliberately take the opposite position just to see what people will say...

[takka360]

If he thinks that is good well il say no more and be thankful he's not teaching me.

[Marc Gosselin]

Hi John

I finally got a chance to hear a couple of re-mixes today, including yours..

yep, you did tighten up the bass indeed.. I like the tighter bass, very nice.

but for some reason, the bass overall has come up too much.. I would definitely say that the bass guitar(s) and kick now need to come down about -6db or so.. maybe more ??
My big ol' JBL's are pumpin' like a concert PA

The intro sounds nice.. rich and warm through my monitors.. very good improvement there.

and.. the lead vocal did suffer from a hotter snare, vocal needs to come up when the drums kicks in.

Hm. I think the reason people are doing that is because, by itself as a mono element, it's not very exciting (no offence; I imagine you played this part yourself). So what I did here was hammer it with some fairly aggressive EQ to brighten it up and help it stand out against the bass, then I added a subtle chorus effect to spread it across the stereo field a little.

BTW - I'm only playing the Dulcimer on this track.. this band had 3 guitar players, one bass player and a drummer.. the singer mainly played rhythm, I mostly played ambient guitar stuff (and sometimes leads, rhythms and dulcimer, lol) the other guitar player was a very technical player, he could play more complex electric leads and melodies.. but in this song his part is more supportive than anything else.

Question:
Is your goal to practice mixing music, so it sounds commercial ?
or
Are you just having fun mixing music on those rainy days ?

If your is goal is to make it sound commercial.. it still needs a bit more work for that commercial flare.


my 2 cents worth.. and keep up the good work

[Pedaling Prince]

yep, you did tighten up the bass indeed.. I like the tighter bass, very nice.

Um... no I didn't... aside from backing the staccato bass shots a tad the bass exactly the same as it was in the previous mix.

but for some reason, the bass overall has come up too much.. I would definitely say that the bass guitar(s) and kick now need to come down about -6db or so.. maybe more ??
My big ol' JBL's are pumpin' like a concert PA

That was my goal.

As a compromise, I'll leave the bass where it is (I just love it ) but I'll take that kick down a bit.

the lead vocal did suffer from a hotter snare, vocal needs to come up when the drums kicks in.

OK. Let me try something here. Instead of bringing up the vocal let me try pulling down hard on the EQ at 950 Hz on the doubletrack of the snare to get that frequency range out of the way while keeping the reinforcement in the other frequencies.

Question:
Is your goal to practice mixing music, so it sounds commercial ?
or
Are you just having fun mixing music on those rainy days ?

If your is goal is to make it sound commercial.. it still needs a bit more work for that commercial flare.

Well, as I say in my profile I don't like the sound of modern commercial mixes; even with music I like I keep thinking to myself, "This would sound so much better without all that compression" (a thought I have frequently listening to Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell III in particular). That's why I prefer to mix music myself.

As far at working in professional audio, to be more specific my goal is to become an independent filmmaker. The very nature of the way sound is mixed for cinema is quite different from mixing music so many of the principles that apply to commercial music mixing, like the aforementioned abuse of dynamic range compression, just don't apply to cinema sound mixing. But if I ever do have the opportunity to work in professional audio my goal will be to discourage the excessive use of compression so prevalent in the industry these days.

In other words, I'm more interested in getting my sound to sound good, not "commercial;" I want to push the envelope of fidelity possible with digital sound.

[pauli]

The main issue I'm having here is overall balance. There are a lot of elements of the mix that I like a lot in their own right that don't blend convincingly for me.

For my part, the bass/sub bass over the course of the mix feels distractingly lumpy and uneven and is eating up too much real estate. Electric Guitar 1 is really really harsh on my ears and it's chewing up the vocal pretty profoundly. I dig the chorus effect you've applied to the guitars, but for one instrument to be that strong in the high mids droning the same note in the same rhythm and rather out of tune at that... all while competing with the lead vocal for the most sensitive part of our ears' natural frequency response, well that's asking for trouble in my opinion. The overall skew of the frequency response in my opinion is so different than you'd expect from the same music being played live that it's hard for me to "suspend disbelief" if that makes any sense. In my humble, completely subjective, possibly irrelevant opinion, your mix would benefit greatly from tightening the relationship between the bass and kick and reducing the bass level overall, as well as upper mids cuts on almost everything except the lead vocal. And for me personally, electric 1 is too loud and electric 2 is too quiet.

On the plus side, though, the chorus effects sound great and the treatment of the SFX is suitably creepy and dystopian. Apart from overall brightness in tone, most of the instruments sound well cared for, and the mix is nice and clean as well. I mainly think your effort just needs a bit more referencing because it's so easy to lose perspective sometimes. Or maybe I'm wrong either way I enjoyed listening.