Improvement Series Final

[pauli]

This one is a bit of a head scratcher and it's important you listen to every track in solo from start to finish. We should be doing that on every mix anyway, but everyone gets lazy from time to time, and this isn't the project for that.

Many of the pads, loops and instruments on this project serve entirely different musical purposes in different parts of the song... and in the case of the pads/synths, some of them change character entirely! If you don't catch that and mult the synths from the very beginning, it's really easy to "mix yourself into a corner" and have to backtrack.

Another pressing issue is the dodgy timing in the female vocal and strings. On the female vocal there are also some pretty bad edits that need correcting. Since a very lush backdrop of ambience is required in this genre, timing correction becomes ever more important as a means of helping you keep the reverb under control. I worked for a good while on timing edits where I didn't the first time, but since this was a monitoring test from the outset... honestly, life's too short... but at least the still poor viola/violin timing will illustrate my point as to how bad timing can make a mess of a long reverb.

A final note for any new mixers who might be reading... there is a time and purpose for master buss reverb... and this isn't it. My first effort that I'll link to used a simple master reverb to achieve the ambience, but the significant drawback of a long ambience on the master is that you can't control how much each channel is feeding into it, so consequently, the vocals are quite washed out. In the new version, I used a more controllable strategy of layering reverbs... a short chamber for blend, a long and spacious hall for the dreamy texture and depth, and plates/delays assigned to individual channels or small groups for sustain, tone, or "effect." Using this strategy, you can specify exactly how much each channel should blend in with the mix, it's depth within the mix, and the individual effects can help you alter the character/tonality of your tracks in a way that EQ and compression can't... if you can't seem to find an EQ or compressor that shapes a signal the way you want, short plate reverbs can really help.

Here's the link to the original thread:
http://discussion.cambridge-mt.com/showt...p?tid=3522

As always, if there's anything I can do... if you like it and want to try for some of these sounds, if you hate it and want to avoid these sounds if at all possible, feel free to drop a comment.

[juanjose1967]

another big advance in comparison with your first mix of this song. I've been paying close attention to the reverbs and delays used. Yes, just like you, at first I was using one reverb for the whole mix and soon I realized that I had little control over it; so I started using different reverbs for different effects.

In this last mix, I only would change the reverb on the violins, I think they are too far away and by placing them a little bit closer, I believe that it would benefit the mix.

[pauli]

Thanks for your comments, buddy. Reverb is always tricky, especially when you need a really lush texture in the background and several synths with printed effects.

You're right about the strings, of course. Like I said though, life's too short to waste 3 hours fixing dodgy timing when you're simply trying to learn how your new monitors/absorbers affect you perception, so I pushed them into the backdrop a bit to keep them from distracting me too much. The female vocal, though, there was no mixing this without taking the time to correct all the wacky timing and bad edits. The backing vocal tracks are also a bit ridiculously disorganized.. it really pays off to move takes around and adjust the gain accordingly from the get-go so you don't have to spend the rest of your life automating everything at the end.

That's another good thing to touch on for any newbies who might be reading... if things need editing and organizing, try to do as much as you can before you start mixing. In the end, this is part of gain staging, which I touched on in the first "improvement mix" thread. Moving backing vocal takes around, either multing or moving a take to an existing track with a more similar musical purpose, can really save you a lot of time during the automation stage. Just be sure to adjust the gain of any take you move to an existing track to match the other content so you can keep a more static fader level (and the same compressor settings if applicable) throughout the mix... it really helps a lot, and while it seems like a tedious chore when you're wanting to start leveling and EQing, it's much more painful to dial in all that automation when you're trying to finish up. An hour or two in the beginning can save you from blowing your Saturday afternoon trying to sort this out after processing.

Please, if you're new to mixing, LEARN FROM MY ERROR and read as much about gain staging as you possibly can. I remember having to automate every friggin' syllable of the lead female vocal to get less satisfactory results than you hear on this version which employs far less automation, compression and EQ.

[manuke]

Nice one pauli, sounds good to me. First thought was that the strings were a bit quiet, then I read the comment above and now I understand, cause I did the same thing. Several times I thought about going back and editing them but really couldn't be bothered, so mine are a little quiet too. Think the synth strings could come up though, esp during the male voc verse. The wide stereo snare bothers me a bit but that was the way it was recorded I guess, not sure why. Everything else is really well handled though, nice intimate vibe. Obvious you put some work into this.

[pauli]

Hey manuke, good to hear from you. Editing is a hell of a chore, especially on legato strings . Normally I would try to fix them, and I did correct a few really distracting bits, but when I chose to remix this tune to help learn my new monitoring, it was having forgotten how tricky the female vocal situation was. I edit before I start doing any serious mixing, and after the couple hours I spent fixing bad edits, timing and re-ordering on the backing vocals, I'd already gone over budget :p

The wide snare is odd isn't it? The thought of slicing up the loop to narrow the snare image occurred, but if you reference similar material, that wide "snare" sound is everywhere. I read up on Bollywood film and music a bit to prepare for this mix, and learned that it's industry standard in the genre to eschew realism in favor of taking the audience on a sensual journey... So I left it alone, and quite like it . We all secretly love ridiculous, lush unrealistic reverbs and spaces, and this is a great mix for experimentation.

[manuke]

and after the couple hours I spent fixing bad edits, timing and re-ordering on the backing vocals, I'd already gone over budget :p

Ha, yeah I hear ya! Interesting you studied up on Bollywood beforehand, thought of doing that but decided to go in blind, whether that worked....

[pauli]

I'm looking forward to your version... You always surprise me with your creativity and there's lots of room for that here.


I like to do a little research for some projects to help me find my angle, if that makes any sense. But if there's nothing to research and I can't figure out where to start, I just throw faders until an idea shapes, then start over with that idea in mind. That Bravestar mix went that way... Couldn't figure out where to start, so I got halfway through the mix twice before I figured out what the song was trying to do :p

[manuke]

Thanks pauli, I appreciate that, didn't get too creative with it, spent more time stripping little bits out though thinking of doing a real remix too, you're right, plenty of room to play with it. Will check out your Bravestar mix, that was a weird one huh? Didn't now where to start either so just went the whole hog on it.