you are the one (mixed by Sardhouse)

[sardhouse]

Hi everybody,
this is my mix. (no loudness war here). it was very difficult to find the right "blend" and i can hear that tape was played until the death 'cause a lot of hi frequencies is almost missed, they also recorded softly so i cut out 5 db of noise on every single channel. i cut out only 5 db 'cause NR can destroy sound if it's pushed too far.

this is my second revision.

enjoy the music,
Sardhouse

[azwayne]

No joke, I approached the noise on this one by using Audacity's NR algorithm to cut it in half. I was actually surprised it came out okay instead of royally munging the tracks.

Man, I just love this tune! I need to learn some more and then go back and take another run at it from a fresh editor session.

I have two headphones at my reach just now. One very bass heavy but drops off above 12k and one that's very bass light but carries up to about 18k (and which will also slice your head clean in half if you have a tune with gobs of 2-4k boost and you forget to pull your volume knob back before you press <play>.) The bass was quite prominent in both. That's a fair indicator to me that you might wanna dial it back a notch or two... Also try getting more attack and less sustain out of it. It's a good bass line and I think it serves the tune well but the focus is that lead guitar so it needs to stay out of its way.

The delay is interesting but perhaps you need to bring the effect down a bit when everything comes in. It starts to become a little distracting and makes it harder to pick out the various parts. Here's a thought I just had while I was typing... I wonder what it would look like to set up the delay through and aux and then instead of hearing the delay directly, run it through a separate reverb processor with a pretty long predelay and having ONLY the reverberation of that delay in the mix and then removing like 90% of the guitar's reverb. My thought is, "what if the delay sounded more distant but was still more than reverb, contributing but making it sound more like the guitar (and just the guitar) is in a cathedral type space?" Just randomness...

Good job getting that hammond up front at the climax. I think I was too concerned about keeping the other instruments there and sacraficed it more than I should have since it is otherwise just tonal glue, not melody.

I'm curious, did you do any gating or expansion on the drums? (I'm listening to the cymbals at about 5:58 and there abouts.) I wasn't quite sure how to treat these and it didn't help me to find that the kit seems to have been set up with the snare slightly off to one side of center...

[sardhouse]

Hi Azwayne,
i'm using AKG K 702 headphones since 2005 (previously i used AKG K 701), humbly i tell you this 'cause i'm pretty sure about the sound, maybe it's a matter of taste... 'cause surely we are different, but please tell me which kind of headphones you're using!!

let me explain:

GUITAR'S DELAY: i'm listening to my song right now and i'm comfortable with it... not just because i did it... but just because i spent a lot of time and finally i choose a good EQ/effect/volume. usually i use an equalizer before the delay, in order to model the right "delay's shape" and to give more room for the other instruments. yes, i can hear a solid guitar's delay but i can also listen without fatigue the other instruments, the voice and so on. this is the most important thing when i'm mixing a song

KICK and SNARE DRUMS: i choose a good EQ balance (they are MONO), i just insert a very soft compressor, i also used some volume's automation where needed (in some part i just keept a soft kick 'cause i felt this need),

OVERHEAD: i choose a good EQ balance then i reduced a bit the "stereo overhead" field (stereo correlation meter was every-time on zero (must be between -1 and zero), i took time to blend it well with the mono overhead channel, then i inserted a limiter on their "overhead BUS", finally i used some volume's automation where needed. now i used the overhead bus (stereo and ambience) to enhance kick and snare (mono, strong support). no more effects.

BASS: i used equalization, compression, limiting and volume's automation in this exact order. you can hear a strong, solid bass but you can also hear a solid kick.

hope i helped you!!
cheers,
Sardhouse