New Song - Almost done!

Holy shit dude, this is incredible, so open and airy, and yet dry and upfront, one of the coolest mixes I think I've ever heard, truthfully :headbang: And of course, the music is stellar, definitely big-time Townsend vibes :headbang:

Wow, thank you and I'm glad you liked it. Its funny that you mention its dry because the guitars have quite a bit of delay and reverb the whole track through. You can't really hear it in the mix except for a few parts but it makes a huge difference when its disengaged. They guitars are really naked without it.

And a big thanks to all of you that took the time to listen and comment.
 
Here's another mix using a demo version of IK's 1176 compressor. I used the compressor on the bass group, guitar group, parallel drum compression group and the snare track itself. The original just used Cubase 6's stock compressor for everything mentioned above, with the exception of the guitar group. I like the character the IK plugin adds quite a bit. I may consider picking this one up when the demo expires.

Soundcloud seems to degrade the audio quality a bit so here's an dropbox link.

1176 compressor mix

Man, I don't know if I'm hearing it just because I want to, but this just sounds so much more ... glued. The kick punches more, the bass is clearer, and the snare sits better. I may have to look into this compressor.

Any details to share about the snare and kick samples and processing?

Great song, and I can't wait to hear it with vocals! I'd settle for "Sand On Fire" if it's gonna be a while, though... :D
 
Yeah, its definitely a nice compressor and I'm going to pick it up. I don't know how it compares to the Waves 1176, but I don't really care. I like what I hear from it. I think I could still glue to snare in a little more so its not so spikey, but I just might be clipping it too much. The kick is 100% Slate Kick 10Z1 (most overused kick ever) with a steep high pass at 48 HZ. Slight boost at 60HZ, big boost at 10K and a huge dip at 300HZ. Then just a couple dbs shaved off with Cubase's compressor with 8ms attack, 50ms release. The snare is mostly DFHS's Hit Factory snare. Without opening Cubase I can't remember the name of the snare - in the drop down list, there's two of them, but one is a 'higher tuned' version. I use to regular tuned version. For EQ, just some boosts at 2.5k and 8k. About 6dbs of compression with 10ms attack, 100ms release followed by the 1176 compressor and then clipped. The snare is augmented with Slate's Led Zep Snare Z1 with some 1176 and no EQ. I send all my drums/cymbals to a group and then parallel that whole group with the 1176.
 
Cheers for uploading to it to dropbox. Like being able to listen to your stuff without going into soundcloud/soundclick every time.

Many bands/artists these days seem intent on making the most complicated/heavily layered music they can possibly string together , and it always ends up with this really washed up, somewhat lifeless and dull sound because everything is struggling to fit into the sonic space.
Devin Townsend was mentioned earlier in this thread and his music tends to suffer from that problem.
On top of that, musically speaking, I feel it makes the song writing just seem so unfocused too.

What you're doing with the music is like the total opposite, I don't get any Townsend vibes at all.
You always seem to have an incredibly professional and well thought out sense of your arrangements.
Everything in the songs is there for a purpose, not just to fill space and sound more 'complex' and 'cool' for the prog kids, and as a result it just breathes so well and sounds so lively. Absolutely just punchy sounding by the time it's all put together and mixed.
 
Wow, thank you and I'm glad you liked it. Its funny that you mention its dry because the guitars have quite a bit of delay and reverb the whole track through. You can't really hear it in the mix except for a few parts but it makes a huge difference when its disengaged. They guitars are really naked without it.

You know, while I was listening to it I suspected as much but I assumed it was only in my head because no one would be crazy enough to put delay/reverb on rhythm guitars...I guess I was wrong :D.


What you're doing with the music is like the total opposite, I don't get any Townsend vibes at all.
You always seem to have an incredibly professional and well thought out sense of your arrangements.
Everything in the songs is there for a purpose, not just to fill space and sound more 'complex' and 'cool' for the prog kids, and as a result it just breathes so well and sounds so lively. Absolutely just punchy sounding by the time it's all put together and mixed.

I can't "+1" this enough... that is exactly the reason march hare is my favorite band on this forum. Plus the singers are great!
 
holy crap just noticed this thread - Matt stop being so damn good!!!!!!!!

seriously, I loved the sound of this - the Guitars in particular sound awesome mate!