kind of "earthy" rough mix. alt prog metal i guess??

[aramism]

http://66.181.209.3/ARAM/mahavatar.html

ok so this was recorded in the fall on my older gear and i started mixing it recently. there were a lot of band lineup changes, song arrangement bullshits, you know the usual lol. so we kind of put a lot of the stuff on ice as a i upgraded a some stuff in my studio and worked on other projects in the meantime. but once they had all their ideas straight we wrapped everything up and i finally started mixing it recently. this is a rough mix. just trying to get a feel for the balance of things. a few edits to do with the vocals in the middle and a lot of automation left to do. but the core is somewhat there. just gotta fine tune a bunch of stuff and again, do a lot of automation... this is also pre mastering so crank up your speakers.

they were pretty specific about a very raw and kind of "sloppy" sound ala bands like soulfly, sepultura, soad, white zombie etc... but make it sound a little more modern so i don't know i tried to go in that direction leaving it kind of earthy. they have some other tracks that are heavier with screaming and stuff i kind of really went older soufly on those. this is a little more of a proggier sound i guess.

 

[mr.L.]

Nice music and tracking. Some things that you might change a bit:
The overheads are rather low most of the time and the guitars also lack a bit of high end, which makes it sound a bit muffled. The snare an bass are very prominent. I don't have big issues with this, but the snare might become annoying if you listen to a whole album of this stuff. So maybe turn that down a bit in the less guitar heavy sections. I think the prominent bass suits the style and the tone is pretty nice, only thing you might change is give it a bit more high mids to give it some more pick attack and definition.

 

[aramism]

yeah i was flirting with the guitar a bit. i noticed the lack of "bite" so i will address that for sure. as i said it's still a work in progress. as far as the OH, i usually like to ride all the hits manually so i have yet to do that. if they still seem low they can go up a bit i can see that. but usually once i automate them they seem more in focus. and on the snare yeah, once again, when i ride the levels on stuff surely the snare and kick get a bit loud during non guitar parts. i kind of work backward in some mixes where i'll work on the fullest sections first then work backwards from there. i dunno, i guess it's kind of retarded but i'm used to it. but thanks for the kind words and advice...

 

[aramism]

http://66.181.209.3/ARAM/mahavatar_hatefactory.html



ok i took a bunch of notes and bounced around some songs and this was the last song i worked on. i kind of settled for this general sonicness for the majority of the songs that are heavier and am going to be going off this mixing template for most of them. still wanna work on the kick a bit and some more stuff to do this is a "getting there" mix and i still have yet to really work on the vocals and run it through outboard and work on the effects and whatnot. i think the vocals are just standard reverb now running through waves ssl ch strip so no real vocal compression yet. lot more work to do there. there is a lot more automation left and gotta work on the end and the tom parts. like i said i think this is a better direction, not the final mix or even 50% of the way there. just a direction.

 

[aramism]

bump?

 

[Metaltastic]

These are some weird freakin' vocals, damn; where's this dude from? Mix sounds pretty cool, though the drums feel very close to the center in panning, especially the hat; it just feels like they're inside the guitars, which have an excellent spread (hard-panning will do that ). Cool guitar tone, though perhaps a tad thin; the bass fills it out nicely but I can still tell; did you use your Road King for these? I really like the snare btw, great pop. I agree the bass is a tad loud, though maybe just pulling out a bit of 200 would get rid of some of the mud, which is mainly what I think needs taming. The kick is pretty cool, but I think the boost that I'm pretty sure I hear should be shifted up to a clickier range (it's got a bit of a dull thud right now). Ooh, the trippy psychedelic part just came in...bro Overall, nice job!

 

[aramism]

well lol the singer is not a dude actually. its a chick. a cool one at that. but i mean everyone goes "that's a chick? damn" i know i know i was surprised when i met her too. but hey what are you gonna do?


which one you talking about the first one or the second clip? the first one is obsolete that was the first time i touched this album mixing after a few hours of just tryign stuff. the second clip is closer to the direction i'm going in.

as far as the cymbals yeah i mean i've always had them panned i wanted to have the hi hat a little more centered at timesin some songs. other songs it's panned. i don't know. not final decisions, and i usually ride cymbal hits so in later mixes they will be louder and panned on hits. i kind of want that "roomy" drum sound with fizy guitars. they are into the whole system/soulfly/sepultura/white zombie thing so i had freedom to go a little unconventional.


funny thing about the guitars, the road king actually blew up in the middle of guitars. literally. so we ended up recording with his marshall and i reamped with my rectoverb combo -> 4x12 mesa cab. it's a ballsy little fucker i have to say. i think the tranny blew on the road king i don't know. i tried a whole bunch of amps both mine and borrowed before settling for the recto. i have some marshall jcm2000/jcm900 and mark iv on leads and other parts.