Alt-Rock/Emo Mix

[prabblerabble]

https://app.box.com/s/y98wlainm262m6wtq6mu

I'm mixing/mastering a song for a friend, he's going for an early 90's emo (American Football) meets more contemporary pop-punk (Paramore, My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy) feel. The guitar tone is pretty jangly, but I thought it fit the music style he's going for. I'm using LePou's HyBrit through LeCab and God's Cab impulses blended with some Marshall impulses I found on another forum.

The drums are SSD 4, Chunky Rock Kit blended with some other SSD samples. I still have to mix the vocals, but I thought I'd do a quick master with the instrumentals to get an idea of the final product. I'd love some feedback on how it's sounding so far, and any tips on mixing vocals, cause frankly I'm pretty new to that field.

Thanks a bunch,

Prabhu

 

[prabblerabble]

Any thoughts?

 

[schismatic]

Guitars feel a bit too detached from the rest of the band, a bit too upfront. There's loads of room and space going on with the drums, but the guitars don't sound like they are there as well. I mean this mainly for the 'lead' / melody guitar. The more backing guitars fit well. Maybe try to sit that upfront guitar a bit further back? You may find when the vocal is there that you want to do this more readily because the vocal will become the focus in your mix.

Maybe you coul also just glue it all together a bit via a suitable compressor on the master buss after pushing the guitars back a bit, I'm talking a very small -1-2dB GR.

The tone is good - really fits the sound they are going for, a sort of pop-punk approach on early 90s emo - HyBrit was a good choice. Where did you get the Marshall impulses from? (I'm interested as my band has similar influences).

 

[prabblerabble]

Hey, thanks a bunch man. Yeah I pushed back the rhythm guitar a tad and brought out the melody because it was definitely too quiet. I'm having some troubles getting the vocals to sit with the mix, do you have recommendations as far as usual chains for this kinda stuff? Also I doubled checked, the "Marshall" cab impulses are apparently from a PodXT impulse response zip. I can't find the link but I could email you zip or something. Thanks for the feedback!

 

[schismatic]

Could you maybe post an updated mix to see how it's getting on? Would be good to hear the vocals to see what can be done.

 

[prabblerabble]

Could you maybe post an updated mix to see how it's getting on? Would be good to hear the vocals to see what can be done.

https://app.box.com/s/yshpgq4k37ftpvd84x7n

Sorry for the delayed response. My internet has been really bad recently. I changed up the instrumental mix a bit and brought out the lead/melodic guitars. Here's the vocal mix as of now. I would love any feedback. Thanks a bunch for the help man!

 

[schismatic]

Cool. Those guitars need to be spread out a bit - more width needed! They had better width in the first mix..........

Drums: Try use some parallel compression on the whole drum bus and blend it in so that they poke out a bit more - they're a little flat at the moment and don't lead enough.

Vocal: Firstly, EQ - it needs much more top I think, try a very broad, slight boost at about 3 kHz, then try a high shelf from about 8kHz upwards. Cut lower frequencies that should be reserved from your guitars and bass (stuff about 800-900 Hz downwards).

Secondly, the vocals are far too dry which is why they don't sit properly. They need some reverb, possibly some faint unnoticable delay. Listen to your guitar intro and you the reverb on it that puts it in that room. Your vocal feels completely detached from that right now. Try sending it to a couple of verbs - maybe a room/hall, and then a plate type. Blend them in as appropriate. Do this after the EQing.

Finally, if you feel you can't get levels properly, use Hornet AutoGainPro to automate the vocal level above the instrument mix. It's about $20-25, can't got wrong: http://www.hornetplugins.com/plugins/hornet-autogain-pro/

Let's see how we go with that! Coming along nicely though dude

 

[prabblerabble]

https://app.box.com/s/9y22witmye5wazomlp44

Very very helpful feedback. Haha I usually have an opposite problem with the drums; they always stick out because I'm too used to mixing metal. But in my first mix, my friend told me to cut the drums back. I'll try out the parallel compression technique though.

As for the vocals, I hope improved them, but I'm still learning. I feel that they sit a little better in the mix now. I hipassed pretty heavily and added a slight boost to 3kHz, cut around 650Hz, and high shelfed at 8300kHz. I added two reverbs, one was for a slight roomy effect, and the other was a plate (as you recommended) and I could tell a difference. I added a slight tibe delay, around 5% wet and the delay time was around 10ms. It added a little lift to the vocals in my opinion.

I guess my ears were super exhausted before because I couldn't tell the issue with the guitar width, but after you mentioned it it stuck out like a sore thumb. I think I got the guitars to be a little wider and brighter now.

I really appreciate the feedback dude, it was extremely helpful. Sorry for the noob questions, I've spent too much time mixing instrumental metal so this territory is very new for me haha. Let me know what you think.

-Prabhu

 

[schismatic]

Definitely an improvement dude, but with the vocal I'd even try upping the reverb/delays further still, I still feel the vocal could sit back further and it's still fairly dry. Be bold and get it in the room with those guitars!

The backing vocals feel good now. Guitars also good, and drums a bit better too. Moving in the right direction!

 

[nezvers]

I would say that for me problem seems that guitars are too much faint with that reverb (althought I'd like to know how you got them so, I can't get it that clear and ambient like you). I would leave REALLY almost unnoticeable reverb on rhythm guitars. But lso they kinda lacks mid meat - I love to use 1,4k boost, but for your track I think you need some 300hz too. To get bit meatier I love it give touch of VOS Ferric vst saturation and comp (free vst).
Next problem I hear is kick - not cutting through. Put lowcut/hipass on EVERYTHING (I'd like 115-130hz ) and check if your bass have something against kick (I like cut out bellow 70, so 60 from kick can kick back).
Than your snare seems to have too much snap and that made it out of balance against punch. Probably your guitars interfered against snare top (my experience show that it's mostly at 4k).

 

[prabblerabble]

Updated mix:
https://app.box.com/s/z54nfb4snp79pfsd9l4l

First off, i wanna thank you guys so much for all the feedback, it's been super helpful and I love how much this forum has helped. As for the instrumentals, I did some heavier hi-pass filtering on all the instruments and did some slight eq boosting (around the 150Hz and 3200kHz) area for the kick and I think it's cutting through a lot better, and in general I feel that the bass is sitting better in the mix. I did some slight high shelfing during the master stage to brighten up the guitars and in general the whole mix and I was satisfied with the results.
I took your advice and increased the delay and reverb, if I went beyond the amount of reverb I put on this mix, the vocals were getting slightly too echoey in my opinion, and I probably could have done more with them, but to play it safe I increased the reverb more conservatively. Your input on making them less dry really helped, and I was surprised by the results of increasing it even by a little. Let me know how it's all sounding now, and thank you so much for the help!

-Prabhu

 

[nezvers]

It's huge improvement! For that lo-fi vocal effect I'd suggest to cut out hi-end (to remove that top unpleasant fizz) and maybe to cut out lows (thining it out you'll get like phone effect).
but what you use to get ambient rhythm guitars?

 

[prabblerabble]

It's huge improvement! For that lo-fi vocal effect I'd suggest to cut out hi-end (to remove that top unpleasant fizz) and maybe to cut out lows (thining it out you'll get like phone effect).
but what you use to get ambient rhythm guitars?

thanks a bunch dude! I hipassed the vocals pretty hard, but I'll try cutting more from the low end, and I can hear what you're saying about the high-end.

So for both the rhythm guitars and lead guitars, I used Poulin's HyBrit, with some impulses from the God's Cab IR pack mixed with some Pod XT Marshall IRs. I do this trick with my rhythm guitars (regardless of the genre) where I have my normal chain without any reverb, or with slight reverb, and send it to a seperate buss with a 100% wet reverb (I've been using GlaceVerb) and an EQ, and then mix in the buss to let the guitars breathe. I've found this trick to really bring out the clarity of my rhythm guitars, as well as distance them and let them sit with the mix. For the leads I used a stereo widener (set pretty wide), delay, and reverb. Thanks for the input man.