About This Multitrack

[Mike Senior]

You can find the multitrack files for this project in the 'Mixing Secrets' Free Multitrack Download Library.

Before posting a mix, please read The Three Commandments!
Please post your mix as a new thread, rather than as a reply to this sticky.

Here's some more project info you might find useful:

• About The Raw Multitracks: As befits a multitrack showcasing a mic manufacturer's products, there's more multi-miking on this project than some, which makes it a good one for tonal experimentation.
  • The drum tracks comprise two pairs of stereo overhead mics, two mono room mics (front, back), and additional close-mics for kick (in, out), snare, hi-hat, ride, and two toms. A further three tracks are given over to multi-miking a single ensemble handclaps performance.
    
  • The bass guitar part is provided as a simple DI, whereas the acoustic guitar overdub is triple-miked and the electric guitar overdub has four close-mics and two room mics.
    
  • The piano overdub has been captured via three close stereo pairs and another stereo pair for the room.
    
  • The lead vocals (a great performance, this) are provided as three separate recording passes, providing a total of six different mic characters for you to choose from.
    
  • The two backing vocals are both triple-miked.
    
  • For more information about the performers and some photos of the recording sessions, check out this page on the Telefunken site.
    

• Challenges You're Likely To Face:
  • With so much multi-miking going on, phase/polarity issues can easily catch you out if you're not careful.
    
  • There's a lot of tinny-sounding ride spill on the outside kick close-mic.
    
  • You lose a lot of brightness and level from the hi-hat and cymbals when collapsing either of the stereo overhead recordings to mono.
    
  • Two of the piano close-mic pairs also have quite strong out-of-phase components, so you need to take care with mono compatibility if you pan them wide.
    
  • The snare top mic has caught quite a strong drum resonance that doesn't seem to fit the key of the song. Whether that's a problem is largely a question of taste, though...
    
  • The vocals feature quite a bit of recorded-in room sound, which may tie your hands a bit if you're looking for a drier or more compression-heavy presentation.
    

• Some Mixing Tips: Although this isn't a mix I've attempted myself, here are some suggestions that come to mind:
  • The front-of-kit room mic has a great kick 'thump', so I'd personally try to make the most of that, rather than just high-pass filtering the room sound (as many people typically do to keep the kick-drum tight). This kick sound also seems to fit quite well with the raw bass guitar.
    
  • A notch at 269Hz on the close snare mic can tackle that dissonant ringing, and may therefore help the blend if you plan on using a lot of that signal in the mix.
    
  • Each tom only has one fill, so most of the time you can just use the tom close mics as extra spill/ambience mics if you want, and then just mult out the fill sections for their own separate processing/panning.
    
  • Just because you've got lots of multi-miking options available here, that doesn't mean you have to use them all! In particular, I rarely recommend combining vocal close-mics because of the danger of variable inter-mic phasing as the singer moves around while performing.
    
  • Whichever vocal pass you choose, remember that you can use the others as double- or triple-tracks if you wish. Trying to comp between the passes may prove a fool's errand, though, given that none of the passes use the same mic.
    

If you have any other general questions about this multitrack, just reply to this post and I'll see what I can do.