Pop-punk roughmix

[jipchen]

I tracked this about 2 months ago, did some mixing while recording and after the sessions but didn't have much time since then. And now my interface broke down and I can't do anything so I'll ask you guys what you think about the mix.

Before you listen to the song, be aware: I don't like the vocals. The singer was a nice guy but his vocals are just meeeeeeh. Even excessive "we'll do this part again" and even more excessive Melodyne-ing didn't really help.
It's not my band nor any of my friends so you can bash the band if you like

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3245929/toolate.mp3

Drums are Slate, Bass on this song was either a Fender Mexico JazzBass or a Fender Mexico Preci. Guitars are an Epiphone Les Paul Standard if I remember it right.
It has some wannabe-mastering chain on it - just to make it louder and a bit EQ for the air.

 

[oroinvictus]

It sounds pretty good off the bad. It sounds like the bass could go up a tiiiiiiiiiny bit, either on the bass tracks themselves or the guitar tone but maybe that's just me. The vocals are okay, but the guy's voice just isn't that big - maybe some reverb or echo would help. The drums sound fine if not a bit programmed.

 

[kev]

Sounds nice dude. You'll have to do something with the vocal I think- looks like you've faced one of the dreaded problems in music. Having carved out a lovely spot for him, you cant actually stand him and so try to hide him in the mix a bit

I think you're going to need bring him some more attention, use some subtle verb and cool punky delays I would. Hes not that bad at all really!

Punk is also a bitch when programmed drums are involved- it would be great if you could get some more energy in there. Whilst you have a kick ass drum sound going on, its really lacking some swing.

 

[jipchen]

Thanks to both of you

It sounds pretty good off the bad. It sounds like the bass could go up a tiiiiiiiiiny bit, either on the bass tracks themselves or the guitar tone but maybe that's just me. The vocals are okay, but the guy's voice just isn't that big - maybe some reverb or echo would help. The drums sound fine if not a bit programmed.

Ha, I think i know whats your matter with the bass(frequencies).
The guitars are so super thin sounding that even though the bass itself is pretty loud, the mix overall lacks bass (imho).
I wanted to reamp the guitars originally. Didn't get a good sound ouf of the Marshall TSL60 they gave me..
Perhaps I'll try reamping again.

Sounds nice dude. You'll have to do something with the vocal I think- looks like you've faced one of the dreaded problems in music. Having carved out a lovely spot for him, you cant actually stand him and so try to hide him in the mix a bit

I think you're going to need bring him some more attention, use some subtle verb and cool punky delays I would. Hes not that bad at all really!

Gotta agree with the points you made.
Thanks for your constructive criticism regarding the vox.
I'll try what you said (clean vocals are new territory to me)

Punk is also a bitch when programmed drums are involved- it would be great if you could get some more energy in there. Whilst you have a kick ass drum sound going on, its really lacking some swing.

Jep, I'm gonna work on the drums.


Now I know again why I love this forum, keep the suggestions and criticisms coming!

 

[setyouranchor]

As far as the bass, I think it sounds fine but the monitors I'm using are quite bassy!

For the vocals, with singers like that, adding harmonies can take vocals to another level

If you can get the vocalist back, get him to do some, if not, im sure Antares do a harmony plug in, but plug ins arnt gonna come close to the real thing aye!

 

[kev]

Yeh good luck dude- and harmonies are a very very good idea. Use them on singular words to emphasise them, and choruses are usually double tracked with a harmony.

 

[jipchen]

Thanks!
They actually wanted a lot of harmony-parts and I hoped it would make the vocals better.. but they hadn't figured out the second voice parts and so we tried a few things and yeah.. record harmonies on a fucked up vocal take is shit. There are harmonies in every song, though.. I just mixed them a lot too low in this one. Gonna update the mix soon.. but I still got no monitors which sucks (damn you RME, it's taking forever to repair my interface).

By the way, the vocals were really bad. I sat there tweaking them with melodyne for about 3 hours / song. Not kidding! And i did this three times with every song. If you change a note too much at once, you get this autotune effect, so I did it gently but three times per song. This made me really want to kill myself

 

[HandsOfDespair]

Sounds like kick is fighting with the bass, and drums are really repetitive, I'd add some variation. I don't think the bass sound really fit the song, I'd prefer a more ''dirty'' bass sound.