Fade RJRMIX

[ERJEE]

Thanks Francis!

[Mixinthecloud]

Mix 4 is much better. Nice evolution. There is plenty of excitement left in your mix.

[ERJEE]

I was not entirely happy with the low mids of the vocals, made a V5!

[Franz]

Hey ERJEE, surprised that you came back to your version 4 which seemed (seems) to be a good mix.

I listened carefully to version 5 and inevitably I discovered things that I had not detected in V4 but which appear ( curiously) more blatantly in this V5.
From the beginning of the title there is intermittently a kind of background noise characterized in the following way: like a sound of fingers sliding on the neck of a guitar, a kind of "swipp" enhanced with a delay. So very audible.
On the other hand, your acoustic guitars are very powerful but practically disappear when you switch to mono (2'19). Check it.
And to finish, the guitar solo at the end of the title seems quite timid to me compared to the impressive accompaniment of the guitars, electric and acoustic.

Maybe this V5 is not a good idea. This is a phenomenon that is quite commonly seen with so many revisions. A first draft, OK, not bad, small things to correct. With a third revision, the changes appear less and less obvious and convincing. As much as we have the energy (and faith) in the first version, it disappears in future versions where we seek to improve things, which really were not to be improved. Just my opinion.

But Cheers !

Franz

[ERJEE]

Hi Franz, thanks again for listening
I think the noises come from the solo guitar that could use some cleanup. Interesting how those things do not appear to (my) the ear in the first versions.
Indeed V5 was not an improvement and returned back to V4!

I definitely agree that mix2 or 3 is often the best.. As a mixer we should be able to go to the helicopter mode (move quickly/apply broad strokes for the most important feel of the song) and go to detail mode in which we search for noises, breaths, harsh frequencies, apply some automation etc. I think the first mode is by far the most important one and somehow we should force ourselves not to spend more than 1 hour in mode 2

Cheers!

[Franz]

Hey ERJEE, I come back to your interesting comment in which I noticed something that surprises me.

You say "don't spend more than an hour on a mix"mode 2 or mode 3", that seems excessively little to me. So I understand: you make corrections and once they are done you listen (once?) to your entire mix and it's finished.                   That seems like a very short time to me. Demonstration: when I have finished a mix, I listen to it first on my near-field monitors and then on my professional three-way speakers with sub. Then I listen on headphones. Then I go to my office where I listen to the mix on the speakers integrated into the computer screen. There, very often it starts to go bad. Back to the studio. New corrections. Once again the same listening scenario described previously. Not good yet. Re-belote a third time. This seems to be OK. But to really finish the test, listen on a smartphone or a bluetooth connected mono speaker and to finish in apotheosis, a ride to listen to the mix in the car.....Phew, that's it we arrived. Conclusion: one hour seems very, very short to me...

Cheers

Francis

p.s.: I am often amazed and surprised by certain comments from our mixer friends like: I did a quick mix or I didn't spend more than an hour. Simple, rather philosophical question that I ask: why?? What is really the point of presenting work that appears “unfinished”? This is ignored if we ask the community for advice to perfect the mix. But otherwise it's better to do nothing than to present a sloppy mix for even the untenable reason of lack of time...

[ERJEE]

Hey Francis, indeed how much time it should take to mix a track from top to end is an interesting discussion!
Of course there is no 'should' nor an absolute answer - everyone has their own mixing style/speed and it all depends on the quality of the production etc.
But in general I do think, that learning to mix quickly has some advantages (not only time-wise ) : It forces us to use broad strokes, not over-analyzing everything, not focusing on details that an average listener will never hear. Besides, possibly small frequency adjustments are likely to be tackled by an mastering engineer.
I've seen pro mixers mix a song within a day- I do believe that is sort of an industry standard.

That being said, I quite often spend more time on mixing a track, but I am learning to speed up - I also really like using the the multi-tracks on this forum for that!
So I often try to mix the first draft within 4 hours (assuming no editing or tuning is needed). Then I listen a few times on nearfields/ headphones /earbuds which results in making some adjustments to the V1 mix. I think these adjustments should not take too long (maybe 1 hour is too short ) , or else in my experience its often better to start mixing from scratch. Depending on the feedback of client I make a V2 or V3, which should not take a long time.

Cheers!

RJ

ps: I agree that the quality of the 'quick' mixes on this forum varies quite a lot

[FytaKyte]

Really nice mix RJR! (as usual)... Definitely one of the best I've heard!

The only thing I could fault is that there are some errant tom drum fills that were not in the original drum tracks. The first is about 19 seconds from the end, and then again right at the end where those 2 tom hits jump out of the blue... That's a bit of a head scratcher?!?! - What happened there?

One thing I would have liked to hear louder in the mix is that "Ahhh" backing vocal part in the bridge behind the words "blinding revelation"... that's a detail that I feel is important to emphasise the lyrical content there.

In any case, great mix!

[ERJEE]

Hi Andrew, thanks for listening and your feedback!
Those tom fills... thats odd Maybe I copied the fills accidentally?

Anyways I made a V6 based on your comments, hope you like it better this way!

Cheers!