Howlin - The Metallurgist's alternative perspective....

[The_Metallurgist]

Dave, I didn't quite understand what you meant by "you won't find vanilla here", but as soon as the first notes started, I understood it quite well

vanilla, to me, is taking what is there, not questioning it's relevance, it's emotional contribution, it's location in the song, like simply doing the mix without consideration of the bigger picture. sure, vanilla has it's place, but i didn't think this multi was one of them.

I love how dark you've made the song to sound, and that new point of view you've given to it. I don't know if the composer of the song would like those changes, but I do like them and for I can see, I'm not the only one here. So good job!!

spectral distribution i.e. the colour of a mix, is an objective assessment, not a subjective one, which i believe makes @jeremias666's comment an uninformed one. yep, liking or disliking the colour of a mix is of course a subjective assessment, and that's fine too.

by the time i'd evaluated all the materials before me, and managed to sort the obvious(?) distractions and Fab Dupont "decoys" from the stuff that i felt had REAL relevance to the song's lyrical composition, was i able to find the vision here. i deleted a lot of surplus noises which contributed nada to the song and simply caused clutter in the spectrum. too much clutter means instruments lose definition and presence (e.g. @jeremias666's mix of Howlin, in my opinion), and then a mix becomes difficult to engage with because everything just merges into one big splodge - not good for communicating emotion.

at first hearing this mix, one could be excused for thinking the composer might not find it appropriate, however, i've actually done nothing other than mute out the over-abundance of material that ALWAYS comes with musicians who don't know when to stop recording!! incidentally, i felt Fab intentionally put in more material...and had stuff running far too soon and in irrelevant places, simply to sort the men out from the boys

thanks for dropping in and sharing your objectivity and subjectivity here, Juan, always deeply appreciated. how're things in the Boiler Room.... the forum's been quiet without you lately!

subjectively and objectively looking forward to checking out what you've been upto with your mixing....i'm nearly up and running from a major DAW crash.

[thelongestyear]

Like the arrangement and the mood of this mix. The only thing that sticks out for me is the backs on words "Just give in..." and so on - a bit boxy for my liking with lot of "S".
But apart from that really good job.

[jeremias666]

Oh i see you are still being harsh to me.

Thanx for the very non technical just subjective pseudo intellectual and hate biased review of my mix. It helps me absolutely nothing to make a better mix but i guess that wasnt your intention.

[The_Metallurgist]

A true remix this.....one that takes listeners who are familiar with an original and takes them on a whole different experience..where one never knows what's around the next corner...but still brings us back effortlessly to the main hook.

thanks for your time, HB. yeah, the vision came from the overdose of material in the original multi....i felt Fab Dupont was overdoing it really. every track was done in stereo, even if it was mono which caused a lot of work that didn't please me!

while it sounds like a remix, it isn't, but i wouldn't blame anyone for thinking otherwise. everything here is as per the original, except where i've muted out parts which were running when they made no musical sense, or totally deleted because they didn't contribute anything to the general concept of the song in my view.

Great vision here...and execution to match. Editing is seamless to my ears....and attention to detail is excellent....each chorus having their own drum arrangement being proof of that...the hand claps that drop out at 1.04 and 1.12 left me high and dry on first listening .... yet sucked me in on subsequent listens

i drilled into this mix with a lot of consideration. i actually kept going back to that clap part and running them, then with a partial mute. my intuition put the mute in, but my logic said take it out. i went with my intuition in the end. i'm glad you flagged that up as an observation because it was a decision i spent too much time contemplating!

In terms of observations...i listened to this both at the level presented and at a reduction of 4db - which yields +3db on the K14 meter - a level i mix to and normalize mixes that i listen to.

i'm not sure what this means. the greatest variable to making a critical analysis is the level this stuff comes out the speakers. given our ears are non-linear, any changes in volume at the monitors will majorly affect our perception of a mix especially regarding the bass and treble detail. if the monitoring system isn't calibrated (c-weighted pink noise at 86dBSPL), your criteria becomes academically meaningless within the scheme of things....but a bit closer compared to not doing it.

for those who use only headphones while mixing/critical listening, they are denied this crucial part of the mixing process. similarly, those who's speakers begin to distort before they ever reach the calibration level, are likewise out of the game.

one of the issues my mix will have, especially if it's compared to other Howlin examples, is the extreme dynamics which a process of "loudness normalizing" would struggle with [and monitoring at 86dBSPL calibration regime]. when the chorus kicks in, there's a pretty heavy degree of compression, far heavier than i'd normally engage in but i wanted the transition to bang. the effect on the meters would appear as increased current loudness, but with a somewhat limited impact on integrated loudness. it all makes direct comparisons rather challenging to say the least.

loudness matching is an important factor because of the huge effect it has on our perceptions, i'd certainly agree. when we are using reference tracks and trying to get a realistic handle on what we are listening to by endeavoring to make things equal and therefore directly comparable is an essential task, otherwise we are comparing apples with oranges, but unfortunately it's still something of a challenge. however, i must say that i complement your work regime in working to k14.

The only thing that I really observed between the two levels was that at the lower level, the lead vox in the 2nd half of the 1st chorus and all of the 2nd chorus occasionally seemed slightly buried underneath the snare and synth respectively.

over my gear, it's not a problem however i can see how it might be a close call depending on the monitoring arrangements and listening levels. but i'd certainly agree the center vox is a subject for discussion! my mixing practice is actually to monitor at about 70-75dBSPL calibrated, and in the DAW run at k14 before mastering (during mastering i normally aim for somewhere around -14LUFS integrated, depending on genre of course and what my ears like). yes, you'd be right to bring to my attention that 70dBSPL is far away from recommended practice if i'm concerned about this non-linearity-Robinson-Dadson stuff, but sometimes the mix gets cranked for around 20 seconds, and other times i drop it right off until i can only hear the mids...for 20 seconds. my ears are too sensitive to endure mixing for long durations at anything higher than 75dBSPL.....especially if the supplied material has some poorly recorded and/or high treble, ear burning stuff going on....until i've been able to get to it with the filters! know wot i mean?

but going back to the vocal point you raised....
the center vocal has a dubious quality about it's level. normal custom and practice is to have the lead down the middle dominating over the backing vox which we are all aware of, of course. however, it's also custom and practice to have any double-tracked lead vocals panned somewhere in stereo (just off center, normally)....the definition of what constitutes lead and backing in this song could be arguable on occasion....at least i was arguing with myself sometimes! i liked the stereo in the panned vocal so dropped the center off, not only for space reasons but aesthetics also. i'm still actually arguing with myself over that decision. i think there's some scope to automate their balances more and with additional time and energy i might have got to do it - i blew the budget on this one by miles....greatly underestimated the demands of my vision here!!! this mix actually exhausted me....just sorting out what was stereo and what was mono hidden in the stereo tracking nearly nailed me! thank goodness for coffee, eh?

but i sincerely thank you for this observation, even though it didn't quite validate my original decision! perhaps that's one of the risks of creativity and breaking away a bit from tradition...all good fun, eh?

Could you dance to this mix?...probably not....is that important?....absolutely not....i would say this is a mix for listening to rather than dancing to....and there's nothing wrong with that imo. I think of this as a chill-out mix...something that reminds us of a previous experience yet allows us to experience the moment differently...and that's what i love about music.

this is an observation that took me a little by surprise. i don't think i could chill out during the chorus sections, especially the final crescendo where everything was banging, but i'd certainly feel more relaxed from the laid-back delivery of the verses (even though the tempo didn't change here)....bring the audience up, fulfill their expectations.....then bring them back down so they can get their breath back ready for the next emotional onslaught! my goal was to have some transition here and importantly for me, to have the music drive the emotion and crucially the lyric. the original tracking lacked direction to me, not helped by the insane amount of tracking and the odd, even contradictory instrumentation which i thought didn't fit in with the concept. the synth during the intro for example, really got on my nerves! the original stuff also had an insane amount of percussive elements, complete overdose, which got in the way a lot; so much of that got deleted or muted and brought in as and when i felt appropriate. thanks for your observations/comments on the way i approached the drums too.

the drums dropping out during the verse was good news to my ears. if there was a major weakness in this arrangement it was the percussion section. it didn't help drive the emotion but kind of sauntered along almost detached from the emotional intention of song itself - the lack of accents refers. i liked the gentle rhythm in the acoustic guitars during the verse sections, it helped keep the groove present, but not dominating. the dominating bit came in during the choruses, a signal to switch up the emotion within the lyric. to me, if a song just rambles along without any apparent transitional elements between the sections, then it isn't a song. the music should be there to support the lyric, though often is the case in dance-based genres that the lyrics are totally and utterly meaningless. clearly, the lyrics here had meaning and there was a story-line that delivered the concept. all i wanted to do was to have the music support this. if i was aiming for a dance genre, i'd crank the tempo up. 120BPM isn't a dance tempo in my books.... but my partner had no problems swinging and dancing to it....but she's a dancer, or was in a previous life (Flamenco, but don't let that fool you.....she's a bit of a grunge lover, on the quiet!).

it's a classic situation in DIY or home-project music, that far too much content is recorded, simply because it can be. in the absence of any Production Manager who'd help ensure that what got done was focused and totally relevant, it was down to us to fulfill that role? of course, having to do so AFTER tracking makes the task a bit like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. i think those in the forum who just went in with sleeves rolled up and mixed what was there, failed to understand the simple challenges that come from this sort of project. Fab knows this, and i think it was all part of the plot in the competition - i didn't enter it, by the way!

thanks for sharing your vision and having the courage to do so...it has certainly opened my eyes (ears) to other possibilities. Top job

it is i who should thank you for your very focused, attentive and thought provoking feedback. it's stuff of this sort of quality that is invaluable in the forum; i just wish that it wasn't in the forum's minority. i found your balance between the subjective and objective to be especially helpful here because of the nature of my vision and it's departure from a more traditional approach many have taken with this song. while i fully understand that one man's heaven is another's hell and that taste is a personal and subjective thing, getting feedback is still important to me in this regard because i need to know if the elements i've paid specific attention to, have been interpreted in the way i intended or wished. the more opinions are shared, the better i can get a handle on it.

thanks again
catch you later's...
Dave

[The_Metallurgist]

Oh i see you are still being harsh to me.

Thanx for the very non technical just subjective pseudo intellectual and hate biased review of my mix. It helps me absolutely nothing to make a better mix but i guess that wasnt your intention.

you've completely missed the point. oh well....

[The_Metallurgist]

Like the arrangement and the mood of this mix. The only thing that sticks out for me is the backs on words "Just give in..." and so on - a bit boxy for my liking with lot of "S".
But apart from that really good job.

sorry, i've just this moment spotted your feedback!

by the "S" and "boxy" notes, are you talking specifically about the intro section where i dropped the vocal in? this was intended to be shaped to give it a different feel and get the audience's attention and interest - to engage them in those crucial first 10 seconds. it was high-passed (among other things, no doubt) along with some obscure ambiance to give it a change of character. this had the effect of making the sibilance more "essy" but it wasn't the sort of traditional piercing sibilance that causes fatigue, at least not on my gear...... i liked that effect actually

can i ask what play-back device you are using? was it a notebook by any chance?

thanks for popping in....i'll take some time to have a listen to your work meanwhile.
cheers
Dave

[The_Metallurgist]

I love to hear a remix and I think you've done great job here. I love the verse/chorus dynamics you've created.

Maybe it's just me but I feel the fade out came a little too early? I think maybe you didn't want to drag the song out? but I felt the song had reached it's climax and then it was pulled away from me. I think I would of been satisfied hearing another eight bars.

hi Sano, many thanks for your comments and time - sorry i'm late getting back on this.

you are absolutely, totally and impeccably right! i put the fade out almost at the beginning of the mixing process and left it like that without even giving it a second thought...or second listen all the way through to silence! i did indeed feel it was all going on for far too long without any real purpose or benefit...i'm wondering if that was an intentional mixing trap of Fab's for the competition? at the time, it didn't appear too short, but since i've changed the delivery and intention of the song, hearing it now suggests it's way too short. yes, i think 8 bars would do it too; good judgement, well spotted.

thanks for your input here,
i'll catch you later's
Dave

[The_Metallurgist]

It's hard to objectively evaluate something so very different from what I've heard about 6 million times while mixing this myself. That might stop better men from chipping in. I'm not one of those men, though!

sorry for the late here,

i know what you mean. i don't normally listen to other's mixes before i have a go at a project, at least not intentionally. and it can be quite difficult being objective with other's once i have. i'm not sure how i am personally influenced by another's approach and i guess it would vary from mix to mix, depending on which bits particularly resonated with me, consciously or subconsciously. that's a debate for the psychologists...i expect it's been done already.

but being familiar does bring with it some issues. i'd highlight by way of example your note about the clappy snare which i've discussed below. if we have a perception or an image, sometimes it can be difficult seeing a different picture. there's some interesting graphical conundrums out there that illustrate this quite well....like the Rubin's Vase? is it a vase, or is it 2 people facing each other? it's all fascinating stuff......

whatever, i'm really glad you came aboard and gave this one an airing with your critical ears.

So I have to say, from beginning to end I found your vision bold and courageous. There are a lot of risky tactics at play in this remix, and they pay off... the first time? I think my point here might be related to what jeremias666 mentioned, in that the beat drops a little too often, but I'll take that a step further. A beat drop is of course a brilliant tactic, and you've used it well here... when the chorus kicks in, it really KICKS the hell in! And I love that. However, I think you've overdone it a bit- the first time it made me smile from ear to ear, but I found each subsequent drop to be a little exhausting. There is a similar experience with the various effects and subtle details that are always so profoundly present in your mixes: they're very effective at creating musical tension and pulling the song in a forward direction, and I respect the hell out of that because it's a weak point for me. In this case, though, it's a bit uncomfortable at times, because the tension builds very quickly, is released all at once (in the explosive choruses) and then almost as soon as it's let me go, it assaults my senses yet again!

putting aside the music and instead focusing on the emotional element of the song, would you still feel the same way? listening without engaging in the lyric has me forming the same conclusions, but when i focus on the vocal and the story line, i don't have the same feeling.

i thought the original arrangement was almost complacent in it's delivery. to me it lacked key transitional elements and failed to drive the emotion present in the song. i got the feeling the music was there to fill a space rather than to support the lyric and the song's concept. i think Fab got up to some serious mischief and had a lot of fun laying out the traps for the competition.....like all those darn stereo tracks...even if it was mono-stereo! this is what a novice musician would do who's not familiar with mixing...or tracking properly in a DAW for that matter. was this perhaps a clue to how much work needed doing?

while removing the drums from the verses, the song still retains it's 120BPM tempo (though it might not feel like it, eh?), but instead of the drums driving the rhythm, i asked the guitars to provide it instead. it gave a different feel during the crucial transitional elements for me so i exploited it willingly. yes, the chorus does kick eh? to me, THE major ingredient of the song was missing; with all that wood i couldn't really see the trees? there was nothing that took me on a journey of varied landscape, just a flat land of openness. if a song doesn't have transition....with elements that build, sustain, deliver expectation, and lower again for momentary relief to get one's emotional breath back before the next anticipated/expected cycle, then it's not a song i can engage in. most people are wired this way too, and so i set about trying to maximise it. normally in a well thought through arrangement that's had the luxury of going through a Producer, we wouldn't normally have to think about such things, but i strongly suspect Fab was forcing that job upon us. it's not the ideal time of course, normally all this occurs in the embryonic stage, and certainly NOT at mixing....but in these times where many musicians are doing their utmost to cut out cost and minimise financial exposure, more and more mixing engineers are, or should be, taking an active role in helping determine what is [and what isn't] too much content, relevant, irrelevant.....but it's still too late, in my opinion. but that's another discussion......

Obviously my feelings here are related to how I experience music, because I think a lot of people, especially nowadays, really respond to sensory bombardment of this kind. And again, I've heard my much smoother rendition many, many times and I still don't have much distance from it... but it as always you've developed a very ambitious vision and executed it with competence. Your editing skills are quite apparent as always, and the overall sonic signature very much bares your personal stamp... which of course is a compliment in my book.

yes, i liked the smoothness in your approach and i think you did a very admirable job in containing a lot of what i'd call "sonic distractions" which were present. however, the potential danger lurking with such a strategy is that in trying to keep everything "in and present", there's a risk that the clutter/busyness can obscure the key emotional drivers by clouding the mix. technically the song is "mixed", but does it give an audience something to remember it by and have them coming back for more? this was the problem i felt when i first hit the play button in the project to see what i had to work with......i had one of those "Yeah, and....?" moments. sure, the song had something going for it, but it didn't get my emotions going - no EQ, compression or panning was going to fix that. my challenge, and i have to say it didn't come easily, was to get a bit lateral in my approach to the sections of the mix, and seek out those instruments which gave me the sort of stuff that would deliver my needs [as a member of the audience] and support this all-important lyric. without those emotional transitional phases present in this song, it goes nowhere for me. we expect to be taken on an emotional roller-coaster (though it doesn't always need to be a roller-coaster in the drama sense, but it at least must be a journey worth experiencing); an intro that engages us, then transports us through key stages of build, tension, delivery, release....or that sort of thing. the original didn't do this for me at all. not one bit.

we are working under constraints here too...like the length of verse vs chorus, and in a set pre-planned arrangement we can only do so much in the spaces....unless we start doing a real remix the Oakenfold way, in the fullest definition of the word. but like i said, decent Production Management would address and resolve these issues too. i completely understand where you are coming from though....there's some great observations you are making here, deep attention and it's valid.

A couple little oddities I wanted to flag up: The shifted vocal in the intro is a cool idea, but it sounds like it's been rendered out of context because the rhythm lines up with the piano in an uncomfortable way... probably because the original was recorded with the drums beneath. A little bit of nudging a few of the syllables around so that things line up a bit more comfortably would improve the already interesting effect.

i laughed my head off when i read that bit! i actually started messing around with it.....it doesn't help when your ears are brought up on a decade's worth of MIDI I knew it wasn't sitting quite right, however, the disparity between the vocal and instrumentation wasn't too far out to be a real problem for me. in fact, i actually found the contrast engaged me even more........ despite fiddling around with it, no matter what i did i could only make it sound worse. so, i hit the back button and pulled my partner in for her objective assessment. i didn't tell her the problem(?), but simply played the song through (we're talking the final stages of the mixing process, by now). then i said...."What do you think about this bit, i've brought the vocal across and dropped it in?". looping it a few times, she didn't even raise an eyebrow. but she did have me go back into the mix and challenged some timing on the piano....which i also had noted but on reflection was OK about - i don't think it was wrong per se, but it did sound unusual? i fixed those bits for her, made her happy. but still this darn intro was irking me somewhat! she's a professionally trained vocalist, has played congas for a few years, had a go at the Cello and was a Flamenco dancer for quite a while (a student of an acclaimed dancer, no less). let's put it this way, she knows about beat/rhythm and timing. nevertheless, i still disagreed with her....but i decided to leave it. and then you flag it up? FANTASTIC MATE! you made my day.....i thought i was going mad or something....like hallucinating? the piano has a weird timing and the vocal just won't sit with it, no matter how much it's pushed around (have a go for yourselves, chaps, and see if you can crack it). but i think the song needed it desperately.....so i made a concession. in the world of jazz for example, the vocalist can often be heard playing with timing and it has a subtle effect because it draws attention. an intro is a great place to do it.

another way of looking at it? perhaps it's not so much singing...but more of the "spoken word"...the preamble to the song....setting the scene.

i think looking back now even if i could place the timing, i'd still prefer how it is in it's original form. the contrast appeals to me even though my MIDI ears are logically arguing with the intuitive/creative side in me.

Also, there's a strange interplay going on between the snare that's playing the rolls in the loop and the clappy sounding snare that's presented separately... I'm not 100% sure what it is that's happening to be honest, but "it doesn't sound right" whatever that means. To my ears it sounds like the clappy snare is far more aggressively EQ'd and in an entirely different manner. Perhaps that was intentional to create a distinction between the two, which is cool, but a little additional finesse would help, because right now it sounds like the two sounds are originating in different rooms.

ah, i think you might be struggling with your own conceptual understanding/familiarity presented by the raw materials which could be biasing your view here unintentionally i.e. that "Vase, or two faces?" thing. the clappy snare was turned into a clap as best i could without resorting to a sample (i didn't want to go there...trying to stick to the brief of the competition). the problem i had was that as soon as i touched the treble region to make the clap appear more present, the clap got lost and the snare came back. my solution to that problem, was to keep the high-cut filter in place and take a hit on the tone, but to make it blend in the depth perspective with the appropriate psychoacoustic signals i had to push it back in the mix more than i would have liked.

the snare, or rather the Snare Drummer Boy as i called it, i took in my vision to be a real snare drummer boy. being such gave him mobility in the mix, so i could pan him off to the opposite side to the claps and while doing so, detach him from the drum kit without the mix sounding daft. this helped me to retain spectral balance in the stereo field and keep a symmetrical mix, especially for ear bud and headphone consumers. if you listen in the final chorus, you can just make him out panned somewhere right while the main drum kit is doing it's thang.

on explanation, does it make sense?

Bold, courageous, and very brutally effective, Dave. I will now with much difficulty resist the temptation to open this one up again and wear out the mute buttons

Pauli, your critical listening skills are very obvious here and i complement you on your ability to really drill into the detail with absolute fanaticism. but then to type it as well deserves a medal. there's some fascinating principles you've touched upon....it would be interesting to hear if the wider audience has views or opinions they'd like to share on these points, in addition to the greatly appreciated feedback thus far contributed.

thanks again for your valuable time, and thanks for the complements...this mix consumed a lot of coffee!

catch ya laters..
D

[ptalbot]

That's a great version, Dave!
It will probably not mean much to you but I had to say it.

I really love your artistic approach to the mix, and how you've been driven by the emotional content more than the given elements.
I also found the snare in particular to be obnoxious and deserving the song more than helping it... I don't know what they were thinking...

All I know is that I like you version better than the more 'vanilla' approach I've heard (no offense to the others), and you've succeeded in letting me hear that song with a different perspective. I must say that I was never tempted to try and mix this song, because I was not emotionally attached to it, and that's one of the obstacle I have when mixing, and also why I rarely attempt to mix other's songs, it has to talk to me, musically. Now your version made it tempting!

I cannot give you any worthy technical feedback because I'm not a good mixer myself, and I would love to be as skilled as you are to be able to produce at that level... I'm working on it!

Now I need to listen to other songs you've mixed. If you had the same approach to all of them, I might learn something!

Keep it up!
-Patrick

[takka360]

The more I listen to this the more I like it.