Dark Ride - Burning Bridges

[pauli]

Another little tip comes to mind... When you're tweaking the reverb settings and you have a drum room track supplied alongside the kit, it's a good idea to model the reverb based on the early reflections on the room track.

Sometimes I'll feed a little bit of the drum room into the global reverb aux and that also helps establish a more convincing space... I don't think I did that on this mix, but it's generally a good strategy.

I think the important thing that needs the most consideration is that this song is too fast and busy for a prominent reverb tail... And reverb with any low end seems like a profoundly unwise idea. It'd kill all of the micro dynamics and detail, and you'd get none of that attitude you'd get with a buss compressor. And furthermore, I'd wager there's some really serious potential for the mix to go thin from comb filtering if the ambiance is too heavy

[Debellatoris]

@mixingdrummer, there the original tracks. Been real busy moving sorry i hadnt answered any sooner

[Debellatoris]

[quote='pauli' pid='22627'

Hopefully some of this is helpful, keep at it!
[/quote]

PAULIIIIIII, big help also. The technical side of things is where i really lack the know how, you should see my protools setup, just barely organized enough to keep me from getting confused. Also, some of the info like the fact that theses tracks where recorded in different places at different times, (i knew but only because i read it) but i didnt know this would make a difference in areas like reverb. When listening for stuff like this what do i listen for? Im experimenting right now really hard on different ways to bring in fx. One that id love to learn is on alice in chains - hollow. Wtf did they do with those vocals, freakn amazn man. im really focusing on making a song feel like its living. But now i know i need to slow down and step my basics up. I really want to mix on that lamb of god level to. So for real just the feedback from you guys is awesome. I wish i knew how to show each and everyone of you guys my appreciation. Im sending a pm to. Again thanks man.

[Debellatoris]

Thanks Pauli, the language barrier is my biggest problem in terms of advice. I don't always find the right words so I have to use the english words and phrases I know which are pretty basic compared to my german vocabulary. This is a little bit frustrating because I´m the chief editor of two german magazines and therefore used to be very precise with my advice in my day to day work

But yeah, you are absolutely right about reverbs. The thing is: There are three reverb/ambience tracks for the drums: a mono room, a stereo room and a snare reverb. They'll give you all the ambience you need for this song.

And you're spot on with the general advice to lower the level of your send as soon as you start to "hear" the reverb. Unless you are using reverb as a special fx I always find it distracting to clearly hear reverb on vocals or any other instrument. Too much reverb is like adding a new instrument that suddenly gets all the attraction.

@blitzzz, im always afraid on the room tracks, stereo and mono, ill make a mess of the mix, but there is aleays a sound in there i want to bring out, but honestly dont know how. Like on the stereo room, im gonna call some sustain or the tail from the kick drum that i want but i dont want to cut any freqs or bring the volume up to loud because of the band in the next room sound. Any tips. The stereo room has a lot of sounds that i want to come out and be noticeable but not prominent. I really like this song and i can hear how i want it to sound, just having trouble, getting things spot on. Almost like a sharp pinpoint mix on top of a ghostly mix you can get lost in on top of a heavy mix that sounds like its breathing and it all surrounds you. Bringing out the emotions of the song, theres alot in this song, if the person who wrote this song actually means what this song is about and didnt write it because it sounded good, then i want to bring it out. Not to be some emotional simp or whatever, but i want to feel what the artists felt when this was written. Thats how i like my music, to me, commercial is what it is, for the masses. Not trying to change anything, i just want mix a song to how it makes me feel. Sorry to ramble. ANYWAYS, I feel like i am missing alot of the technical parts so any help you guys can offer will be awesome.

[pauli]

Cool trick with room tracks: Compress the living hell out of them, and fade them in slowly until your drums are massive.

For an example of this effect, check out "When the Levee Breaks" by Led Zeppelin.

[pauli]

I gave Hollow a quick listen, and it sounds to me like they're mainly using a simple parallel pitch shifting technique, a fifth interval from the source note. It's possible and likely they're using automation to change the interval here to avoid any dodgy off-key harmonics, but a fifth interval is my overal impression

To set this up in your DAW, create a blank track and insert your choice of pitch shifting plugin. Set it to 100% wet and set the interval to a 5th interval (or +7 semitones on some pitch shifters), and turn the volume all the way down. Insert and auxiliary send to the pitch shifting channel, and fade that channel in slowly until you get the desired effect.

More commonly the interval will be set to +1 octave and faded in at a much lower level, such that it blends with the source track more-so than sounding like another distinct set of notes. Give that a try to add some sparkle/air to a dull sounding track... it's great on snare drums and vocals with a too-dark tone.

There's probably more going on with that vocal (seems to be double-tracked and spread out for one ) but they're too subtle to pin down. Parallel distortion seems likely, because it gives a vocal a hard, edgy tone that really suits rock styles, and you can EQ the aux channel to pin down where you want the extra harmonic beef. I'm pretty sure I hear a very short delay, too, and it's quite compressed.

[Debellatoris]

got a new mix and was wanting some opinions on it. thanks to all of you guys for your comments, i think they have helped me alot