Cyber Mower mixed by Dcp

[APZX]

Thanks man, glad you liked it! The compressor I used on the bass is actually a dbx 160 emulation (ala Eddie Kramer Tongue) so I really don't have much of a release control. First I went to an 1176 emulation to get my pumping but found it really didn't give me the that I wanted to get, the dbx seemed to be the one to go with. Those emulations were within Guitar Rig 5 (also where I got the amp sims from) as they were the only emulations that do Sidechaining with Reaper, my general Waves CLA 76 and the Pye Compressor emulation don't have sidechain capability. I did find a free dbx plugin clone with a release control so I'll give that a spin.

Hehe, no problem. As I said I really didn't expect the direction you went with it. So, for my sidechain needs I use Cytmoic's The Glue 99% of the time. Why? It just works and is super fast and simple. Sure, it is $99, but man I use it all the time. I mix in Reaper too and if you want a simple sidechain option that'll work without much of a problem use ReaComp. I used The Glue in my mix of the track. Personally, to compress the bass I used Fabfilter's Pro-C (haven't bothered to upgrade to Pro-C 2 yet), but I did run it through a Pultec emulation first to give it some extra "oomph".

The snare if your wondering has a gated reverb on it and is distorted by a 1073 emulation to give it some character. Generally, when it seems that alot of electronic dudes go for a drier sounding snare so I blended the reverb in more conservatively and I'll probably look at some verb for some other parts of the mix.

You're right that a lot of electronic folks keep their snares pretty dry, but me I like them a bit wetter. However, I tend to be pretty conservative with how I apply it in that I don't necessarily want it to be heard most of the time. I kind of try to make my drums sound as if they were in fact in a room. You know tight controlled reflections. Now, with my snare I didn't distort it. But I did run it through some saturation rather than a typical compressor because I simply couldn't find one I liked.

About distortion/clipping/saturation: The way I look at distortion is like an extreme compressor rather than an effect. Sometimes a normal compressor will do it's job of being an automated volume knob/fader but lack a certain grit, this is where saturation comes into play. I'll generally grab a console emulation or a tape emulation and use it in place of or with a compressor, that way I can kill 2 birds with one stone. Also in a weird way saturation is abit less obvious than compression, put it in and it doesn't really seem like there's a change but take it out and it feels like somethings missing from the track. Also who doesn't love pushing electronics to their breaking point ;P

Hey man I'm with you 100%, but I typically don't apply distortion quite like you did. Normally, I try to hide it. Though sometimes I'll get overt with it. As I said above I used saturation on my snare. I used a Transformer simulator though. I really really like the sound of transformers though. Though yeah trying to break electronics is fun. I mean with my mixer sometimes rather than relying on a compressor, which I don't have many channels, I'll simply run it hotter into the mixer and there is a certain point where it gets a compression like effect. So, yeah it definitely has its uses regardless of where you go.

I noticed the leads in the track are actually pretty guitar like, kinda reminds me of the way old game consoles used to emulate guitar sounds, what did you use?

It is funny that you mention that old game consoles and even your first post about chip tunes and such. First, because chip music is awesome. Second, because this is actually a remix of a chip tune track from a video game lol. This one is from the SNES and a game called The Lawnmower Man which in turn is based on a terrible movie from 1992 which then used the title of a Stephen King short story for the movie's title. Talk about confusing huh? Lets not even get started on the different composers for each version of the game hehe. Anyway, the track I based this on is the very first level, The Streets. So, if you've ever seen the movie I kind of took some inspiration from that in that it is kind of mean to sound like retro-ish cyber & computery. Now, I wasn't going for a guitar kind of sound, but I really like sweet solos regardless of what they are. The first lead to come in at the end that you distorted so wonderfully is from Admiral Quality's Poly-Ana, which is still one of my favorite softsynth VAs. The Second lead to come in is from sonicprojects' OP-X Pro II, which is a simply awesome sounding Oberheim emulation. I guess what you're hearing here is just my love of a good lead line.

Thanks again for the critique, I'll be tinkering with the mix for a bit to iron some things out. The electronic stuff is quite interesting to mix in that most of the time is spent finding ways to add character to things rather than than contesting with clashing elements like in Rock and Metal.

No problem! Thanks for taking the time to try mixing it. I'm pretty dense when it comes to composition. But when I do compose I'm really focused on if a sound is where I want it in terms of voicing more so than anything else. I mean I kind of get spacing as I go, but the thing is not every sound in a track I compose is meant to be heard necessarily, but rather kind of layer with at least another sound. For me when I mix my own stuff I'm not typically looking to add character, but rather really emphasize what I like about the composition. In this for instance I really built up that mini-crescendo in the middle a lot. I also put a lot of emphasis in the end section on the leads because they're the focus in that section. They're not heard anywhere else and they are meant to really lift that section up.

Best,
-APZX