Pedaling Prince Mix: Human Radio - You & Me & The Radio

[Pedaling Prince]

I am self-taught both in video/film editing and audio engineering, having been experimenting with audio and video since my teen years back in the 1980s.

My guiding principle in mixing I call the "principle of least treatment."

Having heard the crystal clean sound of CDs from the earliest days of consumer digital sound in the 80s, comparing it to the overprocessed, overcompressed mess many commercial mixes are today, I have come to believe that current mixing techniques rely too heavily on processing, particularly in the use/abuse of compression in mastering.

In general, I go as gently as possible on all processing, using only the minimum EQ, automation and compression necessary to get everything to blend smoothly, and under no circumstances do I EVER apply processing or compression of ANY kind at the mastering stage; my goal is to preserve 100% of the dynamics of the original recording.

I joined this forum in order to get all of YOUR thoughts on what I've done with these multitracks. Criticism is welcome so long as its polite and constructive.

This is my mix of Human Radio's "You & Me & The Radio."

[Cefe]

Lovely mix John! I would only say for my taste the fx on the vocals is too much and at parts I cant understand the words, it make it too blurry.
The balance you got on the instruments is really nice. And the kick sounds great! Good job mate

[Pedaling Prince]

I would only say for my taste the fx on the vocals is too much and at parts I cant understand the words, it make it too blurry.

I was trying to duplicate the vocal effect found in the preview of the song. Actually, I had more trouble with the vocals on this mix than any of the 128 mixes I've done so far.

Normally, whenever possible, I avoid automating vocal levels; I prefer the vocalist's own dynamics to drive the dynamics of the song. However, in the case of the vocal on this song I had no choice but to automate levels; the dynamics of the vocals were just too wide. So even without the effect it was a challenge to keep the vocals audible in this one.

Fortunately, I still have the project for this one; this was one of my earliest mixes and, after listening to it over time on my iPhone, I started to feel that it could use some polishing so I held onto the project. I'm nothing if not flexible so, as per your suggestion, I decided to see what would happen if I just used a basic, subtle reverb treatment on the voice and took all the phasey effect out entirely. I'm not a big fan of the way it came out; I prefer it with the phase effect so I don't think I'll save my changes in the project, but I still mixed it down so you could hear it here.

What do you think now?

[Cefe]

I like more the second version.
But maybe if you narrow a bit stereo image of the effect or automate the effect, could be nicer. The effect is really magic at parts.

Nice mix! Thanks for sharing