Hey guys!
Thanks a lot for the amazing feedback. Some of you guys are too kind - it's just an EP after all! Have yet to get around to releasing the full-length projects for the year (which you guys will be the first to hear, of course).
First thing: The band have uploaded another track called 'Force Fed' on their Myspace.
http://www.myspace.com/untruth1
Second thing: The clipping was one of the first things I noticed too, but Plec assured me it was the best compromise he could get when shooting for the sort of RMS levels we were going for here. It's due to the long chords being held. The rest of the tracks don't have it quite so bad. I'm cool with it, as long as the band are, and being an EP, which is ultimately a promotional tool, it needs to 'stand up' to other hot commercial releases.
Third thing: Here is the 'unmastered' version of Drones. With the stereo bus chain I was mixing through:
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/285689/drones-test-2-altending.mp3
Okay, so Adam asked for some details, so I'll give you the rough outline here. There's a lot of source-specific stuff going on in the mix, so that won't help as much as knowing what was used to track and start with.
1. Drums: We started with the drummer's normal kit, and I've completely forgotten what it was, or what the cymbals were. All I recall was that one of the toms wouldn't hold tune, one of the chinas was cracked and the drummer hit very softly, so it was a foregone conclusion that a lot of sample replacement would be necessary. Overheads were captured with a spaced pair of NT5s. Here is a picture for better illustration:
In the mix I converted all hits to MIDI via Drumtracker. I used it to trigger Slate Kick 15, and blended some more 'ticky' high-end from some sample or other I had lying around. Snare was the SD2.0 Nir Z, with a very large dose of room mics blended in. Toms were also the standard clear SD2.0 toms. This was the first time I used SD2.0 on anything other than messing around.
Bass: Some low model BC Rich or whatever with passive PUs run right into the DI on my Millennia Origin. He is a finger player, and played with a lot of ferocity, hence where all that gorgeous fret grit is coming from. I wanted to feel that filth all over my face in the mix, so I cranked the high end on the NSEQ (on the Millennia) and the Opto comp on the way down. In the mix I band passed in standard Sneap forum fashion and treated the highs with Audio Damage Kombinat's 'Saturation' for more grit. I did a lot more shit than that, but I can't recall off by heart. This was all summed back on a group, which was treated with Ampeg SVX for tone shaping, a heavy dose of L2 limiting, Stillwell Rocket and a bunch of EQ and multiband. I was flying blind at this stage because my room has horrid low-end and I can only guess what is happening down there.
Guitars: Schecter Blackjack w/ a JB in bridge. Run right into the DI on the Millennia (a mistake I will not make again) and taken right out into the Multiface. Guitarhack's reamping chain was listed above. The processing in the mix is too numerous to both list and be useful to any of you. Only few people in the world have the necessary amount of self-loathing needed to pull this off.
Vocals: Here is my favourite, and the ONLY part of the EP that was tracked right. U87 into Distressor into API 512c. That really says it all. Distressor was on Dist 3 mode, giving me grit on the way down. Up to 7dB reduction - I wanted this slammed so I didn't have to fuck it up with shitty ITB compressors. The chain was glorious, the vocalist amazingly tight, and I really couldn't have asked for anything else.
So I think that's about the core of most of it. I hope it's somewhat helpful, and thanks once again for all the responses! Please keep em firing.
Also, just a massive thanks towards GH for doing those last minute reamps. They really saved my ass and are the reason impulse rhythm guitars aren't featured in the final mix.
Though I should mention all the leads and solos are done with 6505 directly into Catharsis fredman impulses
