First full track I post from the coming album - check it out!

[Erkan]

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/585020/BilOVE_Final_1.mp3

Working my way through the album now, finalizing synths and background stuff etc. I'm pretty happy with the mix and it's way better than what I posted some couple of months ago where it sounded really flat and mashed. This suits the music nicely

So looking forward to getting everything done and out to you guys!

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http://dl.dropbox.com/u/585020/CynDj_test_2.mp3

New version and it's getting better and better but somehow the snare is maybe still too paper-ish. Been spending many hours on the snare but it doesn't seem like it wants to become a fucking man! :<

Feedback appreciated!

 

[Djunn]

Mind=blown.

 

[sawtooth]

Sounds great Erkan! What guitar amp did you use? Love the little bit at the beginning where you plug in the guitar and pick up sticks hehe

 

[Erkan]

Haha well that bit is not supposed to be there This isn't a final version... even though the name says so but it's Final "1"... haha, lots more finals to come!

Uh I used Steinberg WarpVST Totally uncool amp to use, most people don't even know what it is.

 

[drew_drummer]

I could do with a bit more bass personally, but sounds really decent otherwise!! Music kicks ass.

 

[sawtooth]

Ah I remember Warp Vst. Really old now, still whatever works

 

[AEL89]

Really solid man! Not my thing but I can totally appreciate the quality and how much you've put into this. Its really paying off!

2 small things (as I'm only on mac speakers at the moment) - are you definitely sold on that snare? I think there's some room for improvement. And I'd cut some 3k from a few sources - sometimes the vocals are getting a tiny bit lost. The level of them is ok I think - its just a frequency thing. In fact, maybe you probably could ride them a little more? If it needs it - I go full on and automate every syllable just so the vocals are the clearest element.

I like the kick but I think it could be a tiny bit wetter and more scooped. It already is both, but for this sort of music I love super scooped kicks with loads of 2k slappiness. Maybe a 10k shelf boost too. In fact I'll listen in mono later too - maybe it could come down a half dB..?

Again - awesome job. I'll listen on monitors again later because I'm not getting a huge amount of bottom end (even for mac speakers) but you might have some tasty subs going on that I simply can't hear at the moment.

 

[Nuno Filipe]

Sounds great dude- Good song too. I can hear the low end very well. The snare has something annoying, like plastic... I think the voice is a bit low.

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

Warp? What the fuck Erkan, did you sacrifice a maiden to the Dark One to get it to sound like that? What ever it took, good job!

The vocals aren't quite my thing and I agree with Alex about them getting lost. Otherwise this is really, really awesome.

 

[Erkan]

Really solid man! Not my thing but I can totally appreciate the quality and how much you've put into this. Its really paying off!

2 small things (as I'm only on mac speakers at the moment) - are you definitely sold on that snare? I think there's some room for improvement. And I'd cut some 3k from a few sources - sometimes the vocals are getting a tiny bit lost. The level of them is ok I think - its just a frequency thing. In fact, maybe you probably could ride them a little more? If it needs it - I go full on and automate every syllable just so the vocals are the clearest element.

I like the kick but I think it could be a tiny bit wetter and more scooped. It already is both, but for this sort of music I love super scooped kicks with loads of 2k slappiness. Maybe a 10k shelf boost too. In fact I'll listen in mono later too - maybe it could come down a half dB..?

Again - awesome job. I'll listen on monitors again later because I'm not getting a huge amount of bottom end (even for mac speakers) but you might have some tasty subs going on that I simply can't hear at the moment.

Awesome points man!

I've looked into the vocals and snare and I agree with you. This is why feedback is so important because I was more or less blind to this issue. I have now decided to listen through all tracks and automate every word I find to be too low.

The snare however was a bit harder than I thought. You know when you've reached the point where you just can't think of any more ways to change the sound? I'm there now. If I do more tweaking with EQs and compressors, it just seems to make it worse. I agree it sounds a bit plasticy - there is no bottom mic, only top mic + a few custom made samples to reinforce the sound with.

Not sure what to do with the snare... I'll see if I get creative with stuff. You are very welcome to give tips if you like dudes!

But now what I have made some room for the vocals by EQing tracks like Strings, Synths and lower the drums' OH mics a tad, the vocals have their own space to sit in. I have also made pockets for the kick drum in the bass guitar, and for the bass guitar in the kick drum. They now gel better and both can be heard and compliment each other rather than working against each other.

I can tell it's been a while since I was mixing. It was way easier to mix that black metal dude's albums I was working on a couple years ago haha. Now when I'm working on my own stuff, I feel pretty lost to be honest! But hopefully, I haven't made anything worse since last version now, except the snare. I'll post a clip from a different song so you can give some tips on the snare guys. I'd appreciate it A LOT.

 

[Erkan]

Warp? What the fuck Erkan, did you sacrifice a maiden to the Dark One to get it to sound like that? What ever it took, good job!

The vocals aren't quite my thing and I agree with Alex about them getting lost. Otherwise this is really, really awesome.

Hahaha that made me laugh for real No but I did sacrifice way too many hours though... and I couldn't have done it without Jonas and Sickan. Jonas and I tweaked back and forth over MSN and he has given me a lot of tips. Sickan made an impulse for me which "disables" the built in crap cab in WarpVST so I can use f.ex. Ryan's impulses.

 

[Erkan]

Alright, a special clip for you guys :> I wasn't going to post more but now I feel I could really use some help from the Sneapsters. What I'm about to write is probably affected a whole lot from me wearing headphones all day and sort of suffering from fatigue but I feel like:

The kick is slightly nasal - this could be because I boosted the 2k region by 2-3 db
The snare is buried during the parts where there are vocals and when there aren't any vocals, it's too loud
The vocals are overall a bit too high - even though I haven't boosted the volume, I did make more room for it frequency-wise so it now protrudes more.
Guitars are a bit buried - I did make a little cut in the 1-2 khz region here so the vocals would have more space but maybe I should back off a little bit. I don't want the guitars suffering because of the vocals... they are both important to me.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/585020/CynDj_Meeeeh.mp3

 

[Nuno Filipe]

^ Not my favourite style of music but this last song is fucking awesome.

 

[JayB]

Sounds pretty cool man!

 

[Ensi]

Damn! This sounds amazing! I'm at the point where I can't find anything wrong with your mix AND be objective about it, haha

 

[The Front Studio]

Alright, a special clip for you guys :> I wasn't going to post more but now I feel I could really use some help from the Sneapsters. What I'm about to write is probably affected a whole lot from me wearing headphones all day and sort of suffering from fatigue but I feel like:

The kick is slightly nasal - this could be because I boosted the 2k region by 2-3 db
The snare is buried during the parts where there are vocals and when there aren't any vocals, it's too loud
The vocals are overall a bit too high - even though I haven't boosted the volume, I did make more room for it frequency-wise so it now protrudes more.
Guitars are a bit buried - I did make a little cut in the 1-2 khz region here so the vocals would have more space but maybe I should back off a little bit. I don't want the guitars suffering because of the vocals... they are both important to me.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/585020/CynDj_Meeeeh.mp3

I think the snare isn't THAT buried tho, sounds perfect to me.
Vocals... my god they sound so much like Refused and I love it!

 

[Erkan]

Yeah it's because I had headphones on me the whole day yesterday. Now that I listen to it at work (through a mono speaker) the snare is kind of loud. I'll still try to experiment with the sound though but as I said, I've been running out of ideas. I will try running a ReaXComp (multi band compressor) on the miced snare and see if I can compress some of the ringing sounds instead of brutally cutting them out with a narrow EQ, thus making the sound less full. Worth a shot.

One thing I notice when I check the mix in mono is that the guitars sort of turn into a smeary mess and drops beneath everything else in the mix. I think drums, bass, and vocals sound upfront - which is good. The synths and stuff seem to do ok in mono so it's mostly the guitars. I'm not an experienced mixologist, so what should I be looking for here guys? Are hard panned left/right guitars often smeared out in mono? Check it out in mono for yourselves if you can - it might teach us all something.

 

[Blue Wall]

Smooth vocalspart (0:50 until 1:50) bit too quiet in the slow passage; also vocals low mids collides with the e-piano.
Suggestion: Cut low mids of either vocals or e-piano
Would be interesting to hear, if vocals in the whole song are compressed more intensively.

Personally like this kind of snaresound especially the ringing tone, but cutting its volume slightly migth help to make the drums homogeneous. Additionaly try cutting snaredrums low mids a touch.

Like the little reverbtail on kickdrum in slow passage.

Guitars in mono: volume decrease in mono is caused by phase cancellation. Generall problem, if two or more very similar signals are summed into one bus. The more different the signals are (e.g. different guitar-apms), the less is the phase cancellation.


Again: Great music and sound, great performance! Like the the musical arrangement, nice dynamic and dramaturgy.

P.S.: Listening in mono is one of my favorite tools to check the balancing. Another method is leaving the room and listening to the music from a another room (maybe some kind of acoustic mono)

 

[Firaxis]

Another method is leaving the room and listening to the music from a another room (maybe some kind of acoustic mono)

I had an old lecturer in uni (70's guy I think) who swore that the best way to check vocal mix was to see if they were still intelligible when you are listening in a different room lol.

 

[Erkan]

Smooth vocalspart (0:50 until 1:50) bit too quiet in the slow passage; also vocals low mids collides with the e-piano)

I'll reply later when I have time to experiment more but just a fun fact, that's a clean guitar, not an e-piano :-D