Please help me nail this down

[Uladyne]

I'm working on a huge project, (think Devin Townsend as far as track count and layers) but my computer is a bit outdated for the task. Therefore I'm trying to nail down all the rhythm elements as much as possible before bouncing them down and starting on leads, vocals, synths, etc.

I know I can always bring back the original tracks and tweak later, but I'm trying to get everything as close as possible to the final sound as I can.

The Drums (DFH Superior 1.0 & 2.0) have already been bounced to stems (kick, snare, toms, OHs, and room mics), bass (Podxt, Podfarm, & tech21 VT Bass "Reamp") has been mixed to a single track, and Jaymz (The Shred) reamped the guitars for me with his Dual Rec and Dave Mustaine Signature Marshall cab.

I'd still like to take it a step further and bounce all these elements to a single track before I go nuts with everything else, however.

If the guitars sound good, credit goes to him. If they don't sound good, it's my fault for mucking them up with some EQ.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1238743/ignitiontest1.mp3

Thanks for any input, guys. And don't hold back! Someday every one of you will have a free download of this project if you want it, so I don't want anyone to be unhappy with it, haha.


EDIT: Oh I forgot to mention, I still have Aptrigga on the kick and snare tracks, so changing samples on those isn't too late, but unfortunately I don't have very many cool drum samples for the task. The Snare sample I'm using is just a processed version of the same DFHS snare I loaded into Superior. The kick sample is from my old Ddrum4 drum module.

 

[Uladyne]

Changed some stuff around a bit.

Tried to pull some low mids out of both the guitars and bass for more clarity, and I replaced the snare sample with Joey Sturgis' "snare 1" sample from his website. I also added a low passed kick sample as an extra layer on the kick to give it a bit more thump.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1238743/ignitiontest2.mp3

 

[AerialThesis]

The mix sounds a bit cloudy at times and swindles left and right a bit. I believe it's caused by the kicks low-end and the bass itself. I suggest you solo the bass' and kick's tracks and you try to make them fit together a bit more, you could probably take out a bit of the kick's rumble and add a bit more growl on the bass so the mix will feel likes it's punching all togheter. I'm curious about attempting a master on your mix when it's mostly done.

 

[Jaymz]

As discussed via PM, I don't think you need to add any extra growl to the bass, just take out the mud and that will sort it.

Quick EQ'd version to hear: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/451140/Ignition_eq'd.mp3

 

[TheWinterSnow]

My only complaints are that the overall mix is too dark and that is saying something considering I am an advocate of darker mixes. The snare, kick and guitar don't have enough bite and there is definitely too much going on in the upper lows. Sounds raw as fuck which is a very good thing for the Devin sound.

 

[Mago]

awesome bass grind going on there!
Also I think that it's a bit dark overall, was it on purpose as there's going to be a lot of other layers?
Really cool song too, and noice guitars Jaymz

also +1 to jaymz's de-mudding

 

[Uladyne]

I think I just have a tendency to make things dark on accident. Must be my ears or maybe my monitoring situation is just overly bright. I tried to add some more bite to the guitars and generally brighten everything up a bit and de-mud everything on the track level, using Jaymz' EQ'd version as a reference. Hopefully this version sounds better:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1238743/ignitiontest3.mp3

I think I'm going to try mixing with the "high trim" switch on the back of my monitors set to -2db. Maybe that will help brighten my mixes up a bit. Or perhaps I should use references a bit more, haha.

EDIT: I think The guitars sound a bit thin on the last one so I added a bit at around 1600 to give them a bit more snarl and bark:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1238743/ignitiontest3b.mp3

 

[Uladyne]