Am I on the right track with this one?

Jordon

Jordon

Member
Sep 14, 2008
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I've been seriously disliking my mixes the past few weeks, and after a frustrating 8 hours in the studio today building up the first round of mixes for the album I'm currently working on, I decided to step away and get an outside opinion.

This is still in the rough stage, but before I do any more to it, I want to see if I'm on the right track in terms of overall balance. The snare is killing me, and I'm avoiding replacement like the plague with this project. It's reinforced with a sample to enhance the ring, but that's it. I fucking hate how the toms sound.

I don't know, am I being too harsh on my own work? Should I just shut up, sit down and mix the fucking thing, or are my "it sounds like shit" concerns justified?

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/42828743/INTIMIDATION FM.ROUGH.4.21.12.mp3
 
Im listening on KRK headphones, The balances sound great, the guitars and bass sound great, the vocals sound pro as fuck. The toms do have a boingy-ness about them, this is how real miced toms always end up sounding for me though, so I dont know that i have any great suggesions, maybe try boosting slightly less and scooping some mids pretty hard. OR you could just use the samples of that amazing tama kit that you posted a while back. I dont think they are distractingly bad though, just not amazing. The snare sounds fine, If it were me i would blend a big fatty sample with it though, it just lacks the boom, and it would take it from good to great imo. All in all no need to be down about it though. It sounds like a pro mix to me man.
 
Thanks dude! This is actually another Tama birch/bubinga kit with a ported OCDP snare. Not my favorite wood combo on a kit. I was fairly aggressive with the cutting I did on the toms EQ-wise, and didn't boost much except a bit around 8k for some snap. Maybe I'll have to really tear them apart. I'm not a huge fan of replacing toms...they never feel right to me in the mix at that point. These were trimmed and faded to get rid of the kit bleed in the tracks.

I agree with the comment on the snare that it needs something to help that low-end smack and punch. The drummer and I were aiming for something that cuts like a knife instead of blunt-forcing its way through the mix....Usually I like those super tight, dry big-assed snare sounds. That might be why I'm subconsciously fighting myself on it.

Thanks again man!
 
I know what you mean with what your shooting for with the snare. Recently I was listening to the Snot record "Get Some" and that snare is an amazing example of that kind of cutting but full sound, not layered but just a perfect representation of a good sounding snare. I would love to achieve something like that.

Also I totally feel you on the tom replacement thing, it always feels a bit disjointed but I think in the mix its not the kind of thing you notice. Its more one of those you solo it and sort of notice it but once its buried a bit it matters way less than you think, that said ive had the best luck using the superior engine for realistic sounding tom samples, something about it sounds way better than just using trigger and raw samples for me. Good luck man, as i said before though, it sounds pro, I would be proud of that mix, it sounds as good or better than many things ive purchased.
 
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I LOVE that record. That snare has been like the elusive white whale for me.

As far as the vocal chain, the lead was done through an AT4033a into a Neve Portico then through a hardware LA2A. The lead was multed twice and panned 30 left and 30 right. The mults were done through an SM7b, through the Portico and through an 1176. The singer was AMAZING at doubling. He could nail timing, pitch and performance. Most of the vocals on their record were one-takes, with the clean singing taking a bit more time.

The choruses on this song have one more track on each side, with the singer about 10 feet away from the AT4033a. These were panned 60 left and 60 right, just to fill the choruses a bit.


The lead guitar work was really simple. All of the solos were doubled. The verses and choruses were run through my Diezel VH4 and my Rivera K412 cab. The left side is Channel 2, the right is Channel 1, both were pushed with a Maxon 808. The solo in the bridge and in the outro chorus were done through Channel 4 of the Diezel and then doubled through the Orange Channel of a Triple Rectifier. I can't remember what guitars were used for what parts, but we had various ESP and LTD models laying around. There may be some PRS and Ernie Ball in there as well. Delays were either a POD XT Pro with the tube delay model through the effects loop, or EchoBoy.

Thanks again guys. I think I'm going to work with the direction I have going here, and tweak the snare and toms a bit more...Then automate to hell and back.
 
The bass is treated similar to how Ermz explains in his mixing guide, but I like to retain as much of the character of the bass amp as possible. There's a track of the bass that was run through my Diezel VH4 Ch4, and I ride that fader throughout the song. Everything else is just a great bassist, bass, and amps. Warwick P-Nut sig split to a DI, Ampeg SVT5 Pro, Mesa Big Block 750 and the aforementioned VH4.

The kick was re-sampled with a sample of the kick drum from the sessions and another sample..Slate 10, I think. Then it was cut to death with an EQ. There's a little bump at 75hz, with a corresponding dip at 75 in the bass.

The bass was lightly side-chained to the bass (something I do quite a bit), but I'd have to check the mix to see if I actually had it doing anything in this song. I also had a really wide chorus on the bass to help fill things out a bit.
 
The toms sound alot better now. I would still like more attack on them but they dont sound bad at all now. Snare sounds a bit more defined through the whole thing as well. When you sidechain the kick to the bass guitar what kind of ratios, attacks and releases would you recommend as maybe rough starting points? Ive been dicking with this technique for a while with minor success but I have not had a result that seems as natural as yours. Ive been doing a fairly low 2-3 ratio with the fastest attack possible and a pretty fast release. I dont tend to involve my grit track in the matter either. Also any favorite vst comps for the job?
 
I use a similar compression setting on the bass when side-chaining as I use for my kick compression. Seems more "natural" to me, if that makes any sense. I compress all of the bass tracks (clean amp, DI and grit) together, so that they all duck. I checked and was using about 2db of reduction at a 4:1 on the bass side-chain. I tend to like slower release times, again, because it just feels better. Couple that with corresponding EQ dips and boosts on the bass and kick, and you end up with what I have (as long as everything else is working properly). A lot of my bass "mix" comes from my use of a chorus aux that the bass runs through, compressed to the point of almost no dynamic movement. As far as comps on the bass, an 1176-style compressor and the LA2A that I have in the rack next to me seems to work well. I print quite a bit, due to only having a few pieces of outboard to work with. The studio I mix at bought the Waves CLA Classics pack a while back(owner is a huge CLA fan), and I really like the "Blacky" for snare and bass. Nearly all EQ on the bass is the stock ProTools EQ.

For the side-chaining, I just use the stock ProTools compressor/limiter. It's worked well for me for years, and doesn't take up much processing power. I don't always side-chain the kick to the bass, it's really mix-dependent. In this mix, I ended up side-chaining the kick to the bass with the comp, the snare to the OH's with the comp to kill the attack of the snare, and the lead vocals to the lead guitar with a multiband compressor set between 2k and 8k so the guitar didn't step all over the vocals.

Any other questions, just ask!
 
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