I mixed this song back in November of last year and decided to mix it again to see the difference between my skill then and now. Since then I've also gotten a decent pair of monitors which I do my mixing on now, still using my headphones to reference and touch some things up around the low end. I've also switched from FL Studio to Mixbus.
Attached to this post is the new mix; The new mix is cleaner, more energetic, bigger, tighter and overall more lively in my opinion. Tell me what you think! If you'd like me to talk about what I did differently this time around, ask and you shall receive.
Huge difference! I love the drum overheads! There's a lot of eagerness and excitement there. I think the vocal could still be a bit brighter, maybe a slower attack time to let those consonants pop through. I also feel like the guitar could be brought down to make some room down the center. It feels a little loud for a swing band like this. Guitar is really there just to be there in my opinion.
Most of my critiques were presence. You did a great job.
(05-09-2016, 01:49 AM)JadeWilliamson Wrote: Huge difference! I love the drum overheads! There's a lot of eagerness and excitement there. I think the vocal could still be a bit brighter, maybe a slower attack time to let those consonants pop through. I also feel like the guitar could be brought down to make some room down the center. It feels a little loud for a swing band like this. Guitar is really there just to be there in my opinion.
Most of my critiques were presence. You did a great job.
Thanks for the feedback! I decided that I wanted to make this mix sound "modern", so I spent a considerable amount of time cutting out the bleed in the various tracks so everything could cut through as cleanly as possible, and I also looked up some pictures of this band's live set so I could get a good idea of their vision with the song. The end result (according to my ears) was very breathy.
The vocals were interesting the second time mixing this song. I tend to mix the vocals last in tracks like this, and that's what I did this go-round. When I got to the vocals, they sat so well in the mix that I almost didn't touch them. I ended up just hi-passing them (as per the usual) and running them through a warm compressor simply for the color. My monitors run cold so to speak, so the high end sounded just right to me. Our monitoring is probably different too. Variance is a beauty of engineering right?
As far as the guitar goes, I found it added a nice groove to the song. My musical tastes lie primarily in guitar heavy music, so I couldn't let it go unheard.
Again, thanks! Glad to hear some comments on this.
05-09-2016, 08:29 PM (This post was last modified: 05-09-2016, 08:35 PM by JadeWilliamson.)
(05-09-2016, 08:48 AM)Jwood Wrote: My musical tastes lie primarily in guitar heavy music
Mine as well. I mostly listen to heavier music like metalcore and post hardcore, so I love guitars too. Don't get me wrong, the guitar in your mix sounds great! It's purely preferential that I brought the guitar down in my mix and that I thought yours was loud. That preference comes from years of trumpet playing in concert bands.
And you're right; there is a beauty in the differences between mixes and monitoring systems and our own ears. I just found the website yesterday, and it's very clear to me that subjective discussion is the entire point.
There are good things to your mix as well, of course. Even though I feel like the trombone trio (I'm just assuming it's a trio; there's clearly a lead trombone player then a small trombone section) was panned a bit hard, you had your reasoning and I respect that. It adds a certain dimension that my mix (attached) lacked.
Regardless of how each of us processed the vocals, I think we can agree that this singer is super good. I'm just glad they didn't track the vocals in the room with the band.[/i]
Thanks for replying! I feared this website might be dead when I found it and I'm glad it's not. I replied to you since I saw that you posted this very recently.
(05-09-2016, 09:54 PM)takka360 Wrote: I think the brass is too over powering .Lay back on that a bit and i think you would have a bitter mix.
The snare hits also sound dodgy
I'm honestly not trying to mindlessly undermine your entire post but it's definitely just gonna come out like that.
The song is 90% brass. Blame the arrangement, not the mix engineer. If he turned down the brass he would be turning down almost everything.
Also the snare didn't get its own track and it made me cry when I mixed it. I wish there was a full mix down of the drums but I guess you can't win em all. There are only a kick track and an overhead track. There's next to nothing he could do with the snare. Unless there's something I don't know, which is fine too!
(05-09-2016, 09:54 PM)takka360 Wrote: I think the brass is too over powering .Lay back on that a bit and i think you would have a bitter mix.
The snare hits also sound dodgy
Jade's response to this comment covered most basses.
This song is nearly entirely brass. Maybe you have an issue with the high end being so present?
The snare wasn't properly recorded, and it bled into every microphone near it. I decided to counter this by simply editing out the snare hits in the tracks they didn't belong in so that I had a solid recording to sit in the center. "Fix it in the mix" only goes so far, though. At times where the snare was hit and the brass was active, I couldn't cut out the bleed and the bleed made the snare lean to the right. To counter this, the drum kit should've been isolated and given a standard overhead, snare and kick mic setup.
(05-09-2016, 08:48 AM)Jwood Wrote: My musical tastes lie primarily in guitar heavy music
Mine as well. I mostly listen to heavier music like metalcore and post hardcore, so I love guitars too. Don't get me wrong, the guitar in your mix sounds great! It's purely preferential that I brought the guitar down in my mix and that I thought yours was loud. That preference comes from years of trumpet playing in concert bands.
And you're right; there is a beauty in the differences between mixes and monitoring systems and our own ears. I just found the website yesterday, and it's very clear to me that subjective discussion is the entire point.
There are good things to your mix as well, of course. Even though I feel like the trombone trio (I'm just assuming it's a trio; there's clearly a lead trombone player then a small trombone section) was panned a bit hard, you had your reasoning and I respect that. It adds a certain dimension that my mix (attached) lacked.
Regardless of how each of us processed the vocals, I think we can agree that this singer is super good. I'm just glad they didn't track the vocals in the room with the band.[/i]
Thanks for replying! I feared this website might be dead when I found it and I'm glad it's not. I replied to you since I saw that you posted this very recently.
Right on, what are your go-to bands at the moment?
There are three trombones used by The Abletones, and I believe you're spot on with thinking there's a lead and a couple background/rhythm players judging by pictures I've found.
Dan is a great singer, and the recording is superb. The Telefunken U48 is a god among microphones.
No problem. This website isn't dead nor super active. It's pretty easy to spark a discussion.
Well fortunately snare is only used for accent in a band like this. I would've loved an isolated drum kit with 10-20 mics for a full mix. Granted, I think it's a good thing, at least for me, that wasn't the case because I would've been scared to death and had no freaking clue what to do!
Bayside, Pierce the Veil, Our Last Night, and The Devil Wears Prada are top bands for me.
I've also found a guilty pleasure in Ice Nine Kills and Gift Giver.
As far as bands in the vein of the bandthis thread is about, I like Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Blood Sweaty and Tears, and, of course, Chicago. Come to think of it, I should've referenced some of those for this mix of mine. Did you reference anything?
(06-09-2016, 12:37 AM)JadeWilliamson Wrote: Well fortunately snare is only used for accent in a band like this. I would've loved an isolated drum kit with 10-20 mics for a full mix. Granted, I think it's a good thing, at least for me, that wasn't the case because I would've been scared to death and had no freaking clue what to do!
Bayside, Pierce the Veil, Our Last Night, and The Devil Wears Prada are top bands for me.
I've also found a guilty pleasure in Ice Nine Kills and Gift Giver.
As far as bands in the vein of the bandthis thread is about, I like Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Blood Sweaty and Tears, and, of course, Chicago. Come to think of it, I should've referenced some of those for this mix of mine. Did you reference anything?
I adore huge mixing projects. There's so much freedom with them.
OLN and TDWP are great! My favorite bands are Mastodon (favorite band overall), Tool, Black Sabbath and Jimi Hendrix.
I always use reference tracks for all things engineering. For this song I referenced Seth MacFarlane's first album "Music Is Better Than Words". "It's Anybody's Spring" is a great song; It's very lively and simplistic. Here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPHmbM9VmQA
