Like Rogier, I thought this mix could be brought to life both tonally & dynamically. I summoned up the metal in me & put myself in the front row of their concert, head banging the line array in time to the double kick... haha not really, however I did want to give the mix some balls & aggression, my key listening areas were the guitars, drums & vocals. Hopefully I succeeded in giving the track some life, something that would impact the listener & make Nanna cringe in fear.
I had fun as I don't mind a bit of metal mayhem once in a while, now where did I put my b.c rich Warlock... RAWK!
Mix was converted from 48kHz to 96kHz with Sample Manager using iZotope's SRC. From there it was into Pro Tools HD where I set up my routing & processing chain. Throughout the session I also used Sonic NoNoise to manually declick a few areas & I also used de-crackle on bad tom fills to reduce the crackling distortion, same with some guitar distortion. I also did some volume automation pre limiter to ride the verses lower, so the choruses had more impact, it's not very noticeable but enough to give the track a bit of movement & life to counteract the high RMS levels. All I up I probably spent an hour on this track.
First insert was the URS A Series 48bit TDM plug +
3db@50Hz fixed Q, +
2db@500Hz fixed Q, +
1db@3kHz fixed Q.
Second insert was the PSP Master Comp RTAS in expansion mode 0.5 Ratio, 0.01 attk, 0.1 rel, threshold -7.79, unlinked, soft knee, S.C. filters set to 50Hz HPF & 16kHz LPF.
Third insert was DUY Wide TDM to widen the guitars & enhance the ambience a little, amount 14%, 9% boost at 1kHz.
This was bussed out through my HEDD 192 D/A to a Sontec MES-432C with the following settings... +
1db@50Hz Shelf, +
3db@36Hz Q6, +
2db@13kHz Q5. then recaptured through the HEDD A/D with the following HEDD processing Triode +3.8, Pentode +5.6, Tape +1.2
From here it was back to digital processing starting with the Weiss EQ1 Mk2 in M/S mode... M channel +
1.5@73Hz Q2.6, +
1.8@1.24kHz Q1.7, +
2.2@5.27kHz Q1.3, +
2@19.9kHz Q1.2 S channel +
0.8@180Hz Q1.2, +
0.7@554.4Hz Q1.7, +
2db@3.73kHz Q1.2
From there it was into a parallel compression set up, the compressed signal had 2 TDM inserts, the first was a Waves LinEQ Lowband with a -8db low shelf @ 117Hz in low ripple mode with dither on. The next insert was the new URS Channel Strip Pro (I'm currently demo'ing) The settings are too laborious to write out so see the attached screenshot.
This was then combined with the uncompressed signal & summed on the master fader with the following inserts...
Analog Channel 2 in dual mono mode, roll off set to 35Hz, bump 16.9 USA A model, -1.1 bias, 265 release, 30ips IEC2.
Ozone 3, -4.1 threshold, output -0.3 Character 'very fast' 0.4, MBIT+ dither with no noise shaping set to 24bit & 'prevent intersample peaks' ticked. Limiting was done post SRC to 44.1kHz.
Looking back on the settings it seems like some excessive boosts in the low end on a number of EQ's, but there really was very little low sub content in this mix so I had to dig deep & no one said in their comments that my bottom was too excessive so that's a good sign that my room is translating quite well. I also rarely use the 'Triode' knob on the HEDD but it worked on this track as did cranking the 'Pentode' knob for the harmonics it brought out on the guitars. In hindsight I may have gone a little overboard by adding the AC2 tape compression (haven't used this plug in awhile), as it glued things a bit too much, but I liked the harmonics & energy it brought & it also bumped the perceived levels.
It's been fun boyz!
Matt
