Hollow Ground - Ill Fate (thelongestyear)

[gopener]

Nice mix, is on the dirty side bat in a good way.I would widen the stereo image though.
Also there is too much comp on the mix bus.

[thelongestyear]

Nice mix, is on the dirty side bat in a good way.I would widen the stereo image though.
Also there is too much comp on the mix bus.

Thank you, gopener, for the reply! I appreciate it, guys.
I didn't widen the stereo image because not much is going on in the mix therefore there would be a nasty hole in the middle and the mix would fall apart in some way. I tried it and didn't find it pleasant (for me it's just not what I want from the mix). The bus compression isn't very worked out because 1) it's kinda of a speed mix (if you can call an 1-1,5 hour mix a 'speed mix'); and 2) I like it that way because it brings everything together in a 'dirty', 'brutal' way (the only obvious, conventional flaw with this type of approch is 'choking' cymbals which I definitely hear). I agree, it could be more 'polished'. But the aim for me in this case was to bring the tonal and dynamic picture from the head to the mix which I tried and I'm OK with the results.

[Dan07]

Nice mix and nice kick!

[aaronlawrence]

great mix what is the secret in the guitars?!!!lol

[thelongestyear]

Nice mix and nice kick!

Thanks, mate! Really appreciate it!

[thelongestyear]

great mix what is the secret in the guitars?!!!lol

Thanks! The secret ingredient to the guitars is... LOVE! Lol, but seriously the secret is to use all the tracks, place them right, to EQ the amp tracks and to blend them with some Brainworx Rockrack.

[The_Metallurgist]

i recommend you apply a low cut around 100-120Hz on the side channel, 12-24dB/octave....you need to decide which is the best for your specific mix as no shoe fits all needs. to retain the power of the lead guitars in the mix, use a "mono maker", similar to Brainworx gizmo (i personally use a free plugin for windows cubase, it gives me more choices and suits my mixing style/work flow).

bass is non-directional, so if you have a bundle of it in your side channels, you are wasting science and opportunity. long story, best to research it really.

you might also like to explore some bit crushers...their sonic degradation is perfect for creating distortion-type artifacts, and of course it doesn't have negative consequences on other areas, unlike brickwall slamming. try it on drums too!

keep it loud

cheers
Dave

[thelongestyear]

i recommend you apply a low cut around 100-120Hz on the side channel, 12-24dB/octave....you need to decide which is the best for your specific mix as no shoe fits all needs. to retain the power of the lead guitars in the mix, use a "mono maker", similar to Brainworx gizmo (i personally use a free plugin for windows cubase, it gives me more choices and suits my mixing style/work flow).

bass is non-directional, so if you have a bundle of it in your side channels, you are wasting science and opportunity. long story, best to research it really.

you might also like to explore some bit crushers...their sonic degradation is perfect for creating distortion-type artifacts, and of course it doesn't have negative consequences on other areas, unlike brickwall slamming. try it on drums too!

keep it loud

cheers
Dave

Thank you, Dave! I think I need to dig more into this bit-crushing thing.
Now, for the mono-making. I know what you're talking about. I use it almost every time I mix but mostly on drum overheads and room mics (like in this case). I tried it here on the guitars and the bass as well and I didn't like it. It kind of withdraws all the anger and overpowering toward-movement from the song for me. Thank you for your suggestions!

[dcp10200]

Nice mix, is on the dirty side bat in a good way.I would widen the stereo image though.
Also there is too much comp on the mix bus.

Thank you, gopener, for the reply! I appreciate it, guys.
I didn't widen the stereo image because not much is going on in the mix therefore there would be a nasty hole in the middle and the mix would fall apart in some way. I tried it and didn't find it pleasant (for me it's just not what I want from the mix). The bus compression isn't very worked out because 1) it's kinda of a speed mix (if you can call an 1-1,5 hour mix a 'speed mix'); and 2) I like it that way because it brings everything together in a 'dirty', 'brutal' way (the only obvious, conventional flaw with this type of approch is 'choking' cymbals which I definitely hear). I agree, it could be more 'polished'. But the aim for me in this case was to bring the tonal and dynamic picture from the head to the mix which I tried and I'm OK with the results.

Nice mix but I am not a big fan of the brickwall mastering, it really makes the mix sound softer in my opinion, the power is only there when your volume is loud and as soon as you turn it down it kills the impact of the mix. Reign in Blood, Master of Puppets, and pretty well all the great thrash of yesteryear sound so brutal and punchy because they didn't use as much compression as records these days. I would really cut back on the compression and limiting and really look more into saturation and soft clipping to achieve the sound you're looking for.

[thelongestyear]

Nice mix but I am not a big fan of the brickwall mastering, it really makes the mix sound softer in my opinion, the power is only there when your volume is loud and as soon as you turn it down it kills the impact of the mix. Reign in Blood, Master of Puppets, and pretty well all the great thrash of yesteryear sound so brutal and punchy because they didn't use as much compression as records these days. I would really cut back on the compression and limiting and really look more into saturation and soft clipping to achieve the sound you're looking for.

Tanks for the reply, dcp10200!
I'm not a great fan of squeezing tracks but I couldn't resist myself to just slam it all the way. I felt like it's the only way for me to do this track. The problem with saturation is that you may get very nasty artifacts on distorted guitars (this nasty, brittle, sandy sizzling), so I tend not to go hard on saturation with this sort of material.