Adam Miller wrote on Sat, 13 March 2010 18:30 |
Spike - bottom end is thin and bit pinched, but the balance is pretty good. Jangly guit melody bits are a bit distracting. The mix as a whole needs to be a bit bolder and assertive- harder panning with the guitars, more punch with the drums. Do I hear some sample flamming on the snare fills? Kick needs work to make it punch as well. Overall vibe is cool though. Whereabouts do you work?
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The Way Studio, over near London Fields... but at the moment I'm in NYC doing nothing but pop/rap sessions which is a far cry from the rock and jazz back home, probably why I'm a bit rusty
Thanks for the comments, I'm curious as to the "harder panning" comment as the rhythm guitars are panned 100 % left and right! As for the sample flamming.. the samples are placed correctly but since I knocked this out about an hour between sessions I didn't get round to automating the samples to match the levels of the original, giving that lovely artificial drum machine-gun fill feel and flams with both hits at the same level. Also it means that the reverb (which is where most of the sample is going to) is fed too hard off the sample, making it sound like the sample is misplaced...
I know that you were asking more after Jhall's and McSnare's equipment/time use than mine, but seeing as you gave me a fairly positive review it's probably worth mentioning that this was mixed on an mBox and headphones (ATH-M50s) using only the default plugins that ship with PTLE and a single snare sample...
I can't really speak as a mix engineer as the vast majority of my paid work is tracking, but:
I can't emphasize enough the importance of getting a good sound when tracking (these raw tracks were really great and fun to work with, except maybe for the snare) as well as being able to get a decent balance with a minimum of fuss, fancy processing (both hardware and plugin) and time. I don't know what kind of environment you guys work in but since coming to NYC to do pop I've learnt the hard way that sometimes the reference mix you make at the tracking stage can make or break a song to an A&R. It can determine whether the song lives or gets nipped in the bud. In pop only a handful of songs that you track with songwriters track will get cut by the artist, and of those only a handful will be sent off to mix. You have to have things sounding good and balanced as soon as possible because while some A&Rs are good enough to know a good song regardless of the engineering, some A&Rs will get really put off if things aren't sounding nice when they stroll in at any point. I've had to learn this by having beatmakers and songwriters look like they want to kill me because I was gonna leave the balancing til "when I've finished tracking" and an A&R has passed through. Also the better the balance from the get go the better whoever's in the booth will track. Just a little early morning hours random insight!
But, since people were kind enough to listen to mine, some impressions. Disclaimer that I'm listening on headphones, am a tracking engineer and my notions of how things should balance (especially in terms of vocal levels) have been severely warped by working pop for two months... I'm also a firm believer that reverb should be missed when it's gone but never super-obviously heard in rock!
Before I go in too deeply, in most of these submissions I felt the vocals were too far back. I know it's an "indie" thing but every single engineer I've worked with over here has hammered into me that the vocal treatment is crucial to making something a bestseller, and that you can get away with a lot if the vocals sound amazing. Secondly, if I didn't say something good about your track I apologize - a lot of these mixes are passable but when you're trying to listen to all of them in one sitting and type comments you will invariable focus on the bad. It's great that so many people took part and I hope that everyone learns something from the process (me included). These views are purely my opinion and in no way a suggestion that you suck or that I can do better! (well.. listen to my submission and let me know!)
yoink - weird transition from the intro into when the band kicks in... sounds like slightly late panning automation move on the guitar? Otherwise I like the guitar sound and general balance, but the snare doesn't have enough beef for my liking. For some reason at the end of the track the backing vocals don't feel properly tucked behind the lead. But pretty good
caintorst - the track feels stripped of upper upper mids and treble overall... is your listening environment really bright? Also maybe a touch too much reverb, stuff felt a little bit cavey, for lack of a better word
Gabriel-F - trim your tracks dude! No A&R will wait 7 seconds between you hitting play and the first chord to coming in! Um, this has a lot of reverb, the drums lack definition and the whole thing is super mid heavy... If that's the sound you were going for then please don't take this personally but it's not really my thing. However, your vocals somehow fit nicely into your mix, considering how pronounced the low mids in the guitars are. Just not a sound I'm into
lluis - ohman! Yes, it pays to look at the format that the original files were... That said the I prefer the vocals at this pitch! I'm sorry man, I really can't give much comment on this because I was cracking up at the slowed down version and actually quite enjoying it at this speed..!
fala (? sorry guys I'm just going through the folder from the top, not the submission thread) - vocal is buried! If I didn't know the words from doing this myself and listening to other submissions I'd say that it's hard to understand the words under the thick guitars and snare hits. Guitars are super forward, and the the everything lacks "air". Also the kick feels super exaggerated
DMc - In the intro I hated the amount of verb on the guitar, but when the song kicks in it makes sense. Great overall balance but what's with the slapback?? (wait...looking back over the thread would you be McSnare?) I think the problem is that the new transients from the slapback interrupt the flow of the lead vocal... it's a shame because otherwise the balance is great
Rune - verb! So much verb! And the snare is too much pop and not enough body. HOWEVER one of the few tracks where (dare I say it) the vocal is floating too far in front
The Straws - intro has a weird distortion effect on it? I'm not too keen... but the rest of the mix would be ok if it didn't feel like it was pumping a bit and was lacking top end...
Teleric - too much beater click on the kick for my liking, overly accentuated by the reverb in the intro. For some reason the mix sounds disjointed, like everything is sitting in its own space (good) but not locking together (not so good)
Adam Miller - YES! Those vocals are in the right place. The cymbals seem a bit lost though? (I've just listened back to mine and realised I'm guilty of the same thing though...) The bass seems a bit slappy... where are you based?
JHall - The guitars are great but holy fucking RMS batman! Vocals seem to take a backseat to the guitars... This may be the result of being a tracking engineer but watching my meters constantly flash red made me feel a little queasy, and it may have been expectation bias from that but I feel like your mix was fatiguing to listen to all the way through. The instrument balance is great but the vocal just feels too low...
slash5969 - From the intro I could see that kick is gonna be a problem... drums feel a bit muffled maybe? Again, vocal feels obscured, for some reason I feel like your mix would have worked better with a less hyped kick and the vocals cutting through telephone vocal style. There's also almost no cymbals in the mix and everything seems really concentrated in the low mids...
Scott Featherstone - That kick sample is really strange... it seems to be truncated? The decay is not right on that. Toms feel weirdly overstated. Again, like a lot of these tracks, it feels like you've ignored everything above 12k... However, other than the toms for some reason the drum sound reminds me of Nirvana and that's not necessarily a bad thing.. the rest of the song has to match up to that though!
2pulse - again, vocals low compared to guitars... and the cymbals (especially crashes) are almost completely gone. There's no real sense of dynamic change between the verse and chorus, as in, nothing MORE happens in the choruses which leaves the whole track feeling flat...
DCombs - I really like the bite on the guitars. However as a result the other instruments feel subdued in comparison. The bass also feels like it needs a bit more in areas other below 100hz to give it more definition. The drums sound like they're pumping quite hard and, yet again, vocals are so down in the mix...
mkane - Nothing is punching through on the mix and everything feels like it's a bit behind a blanket. Worth maybe mentioning at this point that it feels like most people here are scared of bringing out frequencies above 10-12k... they are there and they need to be there for balance's sake. Again I'm curious as to how much is to do with people's ears and their listening environment... I can imagine a room with a lot of hard reflective surfaces would cause overly dark mixing
willf - I can't get your mp3 to load? Strange. Sorry
iCombs - the balance seems decent, maybe a bit too much on the bass guitar and snare (very snappy) but the whole thing seems crushed to hell... it feels robbed of transients. I tried listening to it at low levels and it feels like the mix is competing with itself
b-undo - I like what you were trying to do with the intro but for some reason it almost feels like the final frequency the flanger settled on set the tone for the rest of your mix. Just feels like everything needs to be bigger, somehow...
Meverylame - The guitars are weird dude, what did you do to them? No top end and a bit lacking in definition BUT I will say your vocals were just about high enough for me
h2o2 - considering how much you came off as a dick in your critiques (no need for personal attacks) I don't even feel like I should bother with yours... funnily enough your vocal is the right level but then the guitars are nowhere to be found and the drums are seriously screwed up by the snare sound... the balance is full of seriously frequency holes... ugh whatever, next!
mafigi - I really like what you tried to do in terms of making a huge dynamic change between the intro and everything kicking in... the transition is sloppy and the sounds either side I don't agree with but so far it's the only mix that tried to make such an ambitious dynamic leap. As for the mix itself... there are just huge gaps in the frequency balance, too much compression and reverb
hallams - guitars a bit fizzy in the intro maybe? Ok they work better when everything is in. Vocals are around the right level! The snare distracts me for some reason, there's no body for it and it pokes out of the track
BillyBehdaz - Vocals maybe even too loud (did I just say that after all my bitching?) The mix was really fatiguing, too much of everything, and I'm not just saying that because you're the however manieth mix I've listened to...
NelsonL - trim those first few seconds off! I know this isn't a professional context but it's a good habit to keep, if it's a ref mix that's being played to people and not just for the mastering house TOP AND TAIL. Mix feels like you balanced it ok then added a shitload of bass for no reason, which also made everything sound quieter
DanDigby - For some reason the mix feels dry, and even though I usually like my mixes really dry it just feels like there's not depth to it. The snare kinda goes "pok" too...
Graham - I quite liked this one... maybe the snare is too prominent because it's so toppy? It feels like you could dry it up a touch to give it a bit more aggression
southboundloco - Guitars are nice and big... but they're all I can focus on. The snare also has too much crack without the subsequent body
Gio-fixed - vocals didn't grab me, which is crucial. Seems bass-lite in my cans and missing some frequency where the bass should meet the guitar
Ok... my sincere apologies to those I didn't get to... my ears are exhausted. Also possible my last few comments are not as vaild because I've was in a session all day and then have spent the past however many hours listening to these mixes on cans.. hopefully I'll have some energy to do the rest tomorrow