04-03-2024, 07:24 AM
This song is very cool! I enjoy its funk vibe and its nice there are many guitar tracks.
I wish I could have made the vocals a bit more clear
I wish I could have made the vocals a bit more clear
04-03-2024, 08:01 AM
06-03-2024, 08:15 AM
(04-03-2024, 08:01 AM)jtbStudio Wrote: [ -> ]Thank you for all of the info! I usally have separate groups for drums, bass, gtrs, vocals, etc. then I like to group everything to a separate track besides the vocals, and either add some dynamic eq or compression or what ever fits to the track(side chained from the vocals), and it gets the vocals sitting nicely with the mix. The trick with adding saturation and blending it back in, high-passed is nice and an old one! Some great exciters do this well. I've done it a few times when I wanted something to carry more weight with presence on a track. Blending back in saturated doubles can also help if you don't want to mess with the dynamics of the original.(04-03-2024, 07:24 AM)401kBC Wrote: [ -> ]I wish I could have made the vocals a bit more clear
The vocal seems quite heavy in the lower end (~370 Hz), which is always going to clash with the guitars. Scoop out the vocals a lot in the low end - it'll sound really bad in solo, but much clearer in the mix.
Another thing I almost always do for vocals (and snare/kick/bass) is add a "hype" track - I create a new track and send a copy of the vocals to it. High-pass it at, say 2 kHz, add distortion, then compress the living daylights out of it (10-20 dB). If you blend it back it in, it's almost unnoticeable in solo, but makes a big difference in the mix. You can also automate this track, so you e.g. get more of it during the choruses, when the band picks up, and you need the vocal to cut through more.
A more advanced technique is to buss everything other than the vocal, drums or bass together, and then side-chain the vocal in. I add a compressor or dynamic EQ that listens to the side-chained vocal, and ducks the combined track whenever the singer sings something, which makes a little bit of room for them. I also do a similar thing for snare and kick, and sometimes bass, which makes them much clearer in the mix.
This mix could use some love in the low mids, I usually get the low mids all over the place when I mix with headphones. There are probably many things I could improve on. I tried to be very minimal with the effects used, so I didn't do many things I probably would have done otherwise. I've been experimenting making plugins, so I tried out a few of them on this mix. The goal is to slowly move to using my plugins only. I used reaper plugins in combination with my own for this mix. I currently have a compressor, delay, reverb, noisegate, Summing Saturator, and a Phase Spreader.
The phase spreader is neat it just rotates the phase of one of the channels, making the audio much wider without delaying anything. its heavy on CPU though that needs improving. the Summing Saturator adds a nice flavor of 2nd or 3rd harmonics and with a little expansion in lower end of the signal, and also a smooth limiter at 0dbs. Its light on CPU and nice to throw on anything to give it a boost. It's similar to SSL saturator, but more transparent and 3D. a very subtle saturator that's good for many uses.
I also made a clone of the stageline vu800 hardware in VST format, and a handy another Meter plugin. Currently trying to get an EQ worked out. The inspiration for making some plugins was to make some things I currently don't have, or that might not exist, and to make some nice utility plugins along the way
07-03-2024, 04:28 AM