Right so first off. I did not go into heavy edit mode for this track at all. I did do just a tiny bit, but nothing on the level of some of the other folks. With that out of the way.
The initial thing that struck me with this mix was actually the vocals. They're really harsh and very easy to make extremely brittle sounding. I feel mine are on the brittle side. But to me it made sense given the context of the track. Feel free to hate on it because I can certainly think they're too brittle.
The next thing that really struck me was the complete difference in the drums. On the one hand you've got these real drums that actually sound pretty good, which surprised me at first given the vocals and guitars (which for IMO were way too darn bassy). So, to give them more "character" they're run through some simple bit and sample rate reduction. Just giving them some crunch. This was actually a nice thing to do because then I noticed the chorus sections.
The chorus I really just tried to utterly and completely juxtapose it against the verses to give it the most "impact" I could. Also, this part of the song has the most processing of all. The background vox have chorus on them which again I felt was quite befitting to the idea of the track. Additionally, for anyone who has mixed this track no doubt noticed that the last chorus starts off pretty much completely naked and I felt required something to bring it to life or at least make the transition smoother. Rather than do heavy editing I utilized some simple filters sweeps and a couple of other FX to make it drop in. Turned out all right I think.
At this point I really need to take a break from working on the track which means I feel it is time to post it up here.
Rip into it guys. This song seems to generate mixes that people either love or hate.
Starts really nicely, but then goes a bit wrong (for me, at least).
First verse sounds great - really nice balance, good vocal sound.
The explosion into the chorus works well, although the reverb on the exposed lead vocal is a bit much (and too bright - although maybe that was intentional, to match the lyric...)
In the chorus, the kick is way too prominent, and completely takes the attention way from the vocals. The sounds are all good, it's the level of the kick for me that's the problem.
In the first part of verse 2, the vocal is completely killed by the stereo synth. Also in the middle 8 bit, the vocal seems too low.
I like the vocal effect going in to the 3rd chorus.
In writing this, I've realised that there were fewer issues than I thought, and they're not complex - so, I guess it's just the problems that stick out for me are significant enough to mess up the whole song for me! i.e. 5 minutes of tweaks, and this would be a mix that worked really well for me.
The reverb on the vocal at that point is completely purposeful and I fed it into algorithmic reverb with just a bit of pre eq to enhance the top. To me it made sense to give it a big "uplift" (almost) before the chorus and then have the energy drop slowly to create that explosion effect. So, I didn't change that. I did however raise the vocal levels slightly and did something I should have done in the original, raising the side volume of the background vox to give it a bit more "width". Kick volume unadjusted. Though I did try that just to see how it sounded. It actually lost power and I didn't want that. So, giving the vox like a 1-2dB jump seemed to fix it and give keep it at roughly the right power level IMO.
The drums in the second verse are actually not treated at all differently then they were in the first verse or the breakdown. However, it appears that the snare is being hit harder which actually caused the bit reduction to act more aggressively. So, since I already treated the rhodes differently (gave it a nice little delay to enhance its arpiness) I figured I'd give a try to letting the bit reduction stay off. I had to raise the level a bit and now they're pretty much all natural. The problem I feel with it now is that it sounds just as off at least IMO. Another thing to keep in mind is that I monoed the drums as well so they don't sound as "full" as if they were stereo.
Oh and I gave a lift to the vocal level in the second verse which is not any different than I did in the breakdown.
The vox effect going into the last chorus was almost an act of desperation honestly. I did not like letting the track hang and then explode. So, I thought what I might do in an electronic composition to make it sound more interesting. First, I'd probably try some filter sweeps. I tried it on the background vox initially and was quite pleased. Then I applied it to the lead. Though I felt it was still lacking so I tried some rhythmic gating that you might here in a Trance track. To add just a little bit of extra I moved one of the cymbals and reversed it. Seemed to work quite I felt.
Thanks for the listen and comments!
Check this post for an updated version of the mix and here for a 16-bit WAV.
The vocal is brittle, yes, but having worked on it myself I dunno if there's any way around that without blunting it (too much) the way I did on my version. Sounds better than some other mixes though... it's tricky.
So I actually laughed when I listened because intro verse sounded to me way too subdued.... but then the chorus kicked in and HOT DAMN. The choruses in your mix are sonically disorienting in a very good way IMHO. The crazy pumping from the kick is perfect for the style, the impact is incredible. I wonder if the difference in level between the chorus and verse might be just a bit too much, but wow. Great stuff.
In the verses the guitars seem to be clouding the vocal a little bit, and the vocal itself comes across a teeny bit dull, like the high end is being masked a bit. Sounds like there's some really massive compression on the verse snare that's taking a bit too much of the snap out for my taste. Both of these are probably creative decisions though? to help the choruses come across stronger. It's a good tactic, but I'd personally ease up on it just a little because the first verse almost lost me. What I found interesting about this song is that the verses are "real" instruments whereas the choruses are pure electronic, but the processing in the verses on this mix blurs that line a little bit by making the "real" instruments and vocal sound less convincing real, so in trying to enhance one form of contrast you're sort of losing a bit of another contrast. That's not to say it's wrong, but something to consider.
In all, this is great. Dunno how sonically polished anyone could possibly get this without a cleaner vocal, and I think I wasted too much time trying to improve that situation and lost sight of other important things I actually COULD change on my own effort, but I like this. Still trying to catch my breath from that first chorus Great job.
I'm grateful for comments and suggestions. Thank you for listening!
07-02-2015, 02:38 PM (This post was last modified: 07-02-2015, 02:38 PM by APZX.)
Pauli,
As I said in another post about this track. I think people were over complicating the verse chorus mechanic. Just let the darn chorus breathe.
I agree the vocal is brittle. But really short of getting heavy handed with a lot of processing it won't get much better sounding. So, yeah.
The first verse. Think about it for a second. You've got what going on in that first verse? A rhodes, a simple bass, overheads, snare, kick, and a guitar. Then in the chorus, you've got a synth bass, a heavily effected rhodes, a polysynth, kick, snare, hat, and crashes. The thing anyone mixing this has to figure out is how to make them different. Some people decide to get into editing, some people decided to straight up drive it nice and hard. I went with the latter option. The other major problem with doing either is how do you get into the chorus. So, really it just comes down to how you want to achieve it.
The masking of the guitar is intentional as to stop it from being too brittle all the time. Think contrast. Perfect solution? Nope and honestly it is a bit of a lazy one, but it works all right. Now, the real drums. Honestly I could make them sound so much better then they are. But I really didn't see the point making the flawless and all perfect sounding. I want them dirty and non polished to mostly match everything else. It is just kind of the way I approached the mix in general.
Thank you for the nice comments though and good to see that the chorus is doing exactly what I want.
Great job.