My take on Wesley Morgan's 'Flesh And Bone'

[luc8004]

As per subject - any feedback appreciated!

[electricladyLAN]

Hey! This is your first post, so I get to say 'Welcome!'.

Obviously this is a classy, tasteful song and needs a sympathetic mix.

Vocals sound really good, de-essed to perfection. You buried the accordion about the same way that the preview mix did, and no argument there ; ).

You have really filled out the sound very well, in the frequency domain and in the spatial positioning. I haven't compared your mix to mine yet but I'd say your bottom end is better than mine, however I think it may have come at a price. The compression you are using on the bass is really a bit too obvious. I'll try to get back with suggestions after I have listened again and when I can identify the problem better.

Apart from that though, a great mix and sympathetic to the material imo.

Hamish

[luc8004]

Thank you Hamish! Really glad I found this site, otherwise I'd be mixing my own music in a thousand different ways, which isn't that much fun.

I appreciate your comments - I do realise the bass is far from perfect, I'll definitely have to go back to that. I'm not an expert mixer, as you see, and I have to admit I was slightly confused by three different bass tracks and, well, I may have overdone it a bit! You have to start somewhere though - I think I'll be a frequent visitor here!

Thanks again and looking forward to suggestions - the more detailed the better!

L.

[electricladyLAN]

Luc, you can use all the bass tracks or not. All are recorded from the same take.

If you do use them all you probably want to time align them to minimise comb filtering.

Here's how I processed the bass tracks:

01_Bass DI : 8ms delay, mic (compressed and EQ)

02_Bass mic 1 : 1 ms delay (my main track, no compression, slight treble shelf, 10 dB up from other two tracks)

03_Bass mic 2 : zero delay (compressed, EQ)

Then the three tracks were fed to a bus for more compression.

So what I did was parallel compression. The DI and mic 2 were compressed for sustain, but the main sound I went with was mic 1 which had only the bus compression.

I'll beef up the Bass next mix I do of this, so it was great to hear your version. While I like your level of bass around 30-40 Hz, you would notice around 2.54 - 3.00 where there are some exposed bass notes, the sound of the compressor is very obvious, and not natural, there is like a 'thwakk' on the attack. You might try a longer attack time on your compressor, or just different threshold and ratios.

[luc8004]

Great, thanks for that! I used all three of the bass tracks but only the DI was compressed individually (LA-3A), taking off around 5dB on the exposed notes you mention. However, all three then go into a bus with pretty heavy compression on it and this is where it gets ugly - it's a Fairchild emulation and I have to admit that I don't quite understand its attack/release settings so maybe I'll just swap it for something with a more transparent GUI. I haven't done any time alignment at all - makes perfect sense though, I'll try it out.

As for the accordion, yes, I felt it was, well, sticking out a little too much... I only introduce it after a minute, then take it out and bring it in again a couple of times but always deep, deep down As you would have noticed I also panned it slightly left, unlike the original (not as far as you did, but still left), because the main guitar takes up the whole right channel and I thought it would leave it more room to breathe. Having second thoughts on it though - for some reason it wants to be panned slightly right in my head, even though left has more space - and oddly enough the mix is still balanced when I do that! I can't quite explain it, just feels right...

I cleaned up the vocal from breaths and es's directly on the audio file and then put the Oxford SuprEsser on top - sounds a little extreme I guess but seems to have worked! Hardly any compression though (1dB at most on louder notes), as it seems to have been quite substantially pressed on the way in already.

I struggled with the guitar. Maybe it's because I never played myself (vocals, piano, cello - yes; guitar - not a word...) - I always seem to have problems getting a guitar to sound right - or rather I don't quite know when it does, or what it should sound like, which is very frustrating! On this instance I ended up putting one of them (again, I used all three) through another amp (plugin) and mixing in with the other two. When I listen to the original though there is this clarity that I can't seem to get even on the completely naked tracks... Any general guitar tips welcome - obviously also from anyone else reading this!

I also played a lot with various individual reverbs, some compressed and panned, paired, etc., standard HPFs on each track, I added delicate saturation here and there and on the mix-buss, but I guess that's already too much for one post!

[Mike Senior]

This is a strong creative vision you've got here, and I have a lot of time for what you've done, especially because you've not used 'character' as an excuse for shoddy balance -- that aspect of the mix is pretty accomplished, I'd say. You might perhaps be able to control the bass levels a bit more, perhaps with some automation, because it does feel a bit lumpier at the low end than I'd probably want to settle for myself.

Overall, though, I can't really fault most of what you've done here from my perspective. It's a risk to take the sound this far from the artist's raw tracks, but it's been a calculated and well-executed risk, and that's what mixing's all about in my view! Thanks for posting that -- I enjoyed listening to it a lot.

[luc8004]

Thank you Mike!

I'm a singer first, then I write and produce my own music (which is probably why I took the creative freedom to a different level!), and only trying to teach myself to mix now, so it means a lot to hear from someone like you that I got some of it right. The internet is my only source of knowledge BTW so double thank you for everything you put out there!

I took another shot at the bass, if you find a moment for this please let me know if there is anything specific you think it needs, if not - no worries. I removed a lot of compression and played a little with the balance between the three tracks, but I think I've listened to it too much now and I don't know what's right or wrong anymore...

[WesleyMorgan]

Grittier than the original mix, which is a cool direction. My favorite part of this mix is how the pedal steel and accordion poke out of the mix at different times. Very cool, and it keeps the mix super interesting.

The only change I would suggest is that the reverb on the vocals be more of a small room, near reflections vibe. The really long decay and super rich tail makes things feel a bit off to my ear. But again, this comes to style.

Good job on the automatin on the pedal steel and accordion.

[luc8004]

Thanks Wesley! Yes, I've experimented with the automation a bit, glad you like it. I'll look into the reverb and post it on here again when I find a moment. I couldn't get anywhere near the clarity you have in the original mix though - I'd be curious to find out how it's done...? Great music BTW, don't stop!