Power/Prog/Neo-Classical-ish metal

[grywolf627]

I know this music may not be to the liking of everyone here, but I'm calling on some fresh ears from my fellow forumites. This is a mixing project I've been working on, using the kick sample made by our own Lordcthulhu in the thread Giving a go at a kick sample (Thanks!)

I didn't track this, and have had a few gripes about some issues that are beyond my control...but I guess that comes with the territory of mixing projects. For some reason (maybe my tinnitus being a little worse lately) I'm really struggling with the EQ. Can some fresh ears please give it a listen and help me out? After a fresh listen, I'll probably be turning the verb on the snare down a little. But I like it kind of wet, a la Sneap. Any other comments are welcome as well.

By the way, the band is Bobby Williamson's (former keyboardist of Outworld) new project/band Eumeria.

Thanks guys!

The song is called Heirs Of Peril

Edit: On second listen this morning...I definitely need to turn down that snare verb. Amazing what you don't heare when you're tired!

 

[Black neon bob]

It sounds great, there is a weird sort of artifact at 1:31, solo sounds great, bass is there to fill in the low end, could be more presence in my opinion, as well as the guitars, they do the job and do it well, but i think they could be bit more out there in the mix, just try a few different mix settings in different saved projects.

Okay, the piano.. could you tweak that? if so, more decay please.. it sounds too short and therefor a bit fake, maybe nudge the keys a bit, and play with velocity if you have the MIDI files.

That's all... good job on the mix!

 

[Metaltastic]

Hey Mark, not bad! I like the guitars and drums, and while the attack of the MIDI bass is really noticeable in the very beginning (when things are sparse), it's otherwise not that bad. I feel the guitars are a bit loud, though, and perhaps too much verb on the vox (or maybe they're just too low; either way, I feel they could be more upfront, especially in the chorus, or whatever the "Secret Places no one else can see" section is). Also, in that section, it feels like there's some fighting in the low-mids; I think the kick is mainly the culprit, but it could be the guitars also. Love the solo tone and the solo itself! I have a really hard time getting a lead tone with such chunky mids like that, and it's one of my favorites. The piano really does sound quite wretched (in terms of it's obvious synthy-ness), Bob's suggestion for more decay is a good one. Keep up the good work, man!

Since the band gave you the original tracks, do you know what was used for the guitars? I like the tone, and I would've guessed Wagner (both from the sound and your track record ), but I doubt they would've used that originally. Or did they give you DI's?

 

[grywolf627]

Thanks Bob. I was thinking the same thing about the guitars. I want to try giving them just a little more presence. But it's still better than the original tracks. The bad thing is, I was given what basically amounted to a stereo guitar track, already pre-mixed/panned. And there's some panning/phasing things there that drive me completely bonkers, and I can't do anything about it. About the bass, it was just a bass from a Boss DR5. I tried putting some nice bite to it, and it sounds good with some notes, but other notes (because of the sound of the samples) it sounds reeally bad and fake. So I thought I'd just compromise with this sound. Still not happy with it though. I'm trying to play with the midi file and using my own bass samples, but not having much luck at the moment.

The piano performance will be tweaked very soon.

Thanks for listening and giving feedback! I totally don't trust my ears at the moment.

 

[grywolf627]

Hey Mark, not bad! I like the guitars and drums, and while the attack of the MIDI bass is really noticeable in the very beginning (when things are sparse), it's otherwise not that bad. I feel the guitars are a bit loud, though, and perhaps too much verb on the vox (or maybe they're just too low; either way, I feel they could be more upfront, especially in the chorus, or whatever the "Secret Places no one else can see" section is). Also, in that section, it feels like there's some fighting in the low-mids; I think the kick is mainly the culprit, but it could be the guitars also. Love the solo tone and the solo itself! I have a really hard time getting a lead tone with such chunky mids like that, and it's one of my favorites. The piano really does sound quite wretched (in terms of it's obvious synthy-ness), Bob's suggestion for more decay is a good one. Keep up the good work, man!

Since the band gave you the original tracks, do you know what was used for the guitars? I like the tone, and I would've guessed Wagner (both from the sound and your track record ), but I doubt they would've used that originally. Or did they give you DI's?

Thanks Marcus! The effects on the vocals has been an issue for me. This version has a lot less than what went out for the Prog/Power sampler CD. The singer, although an INCREDIBLE singer, insisted on tons of stuff. I don't want to cover such a great voice. So I'm trying keep a balancing act here (what I want/what he wants).

I wish I could tell you what was used for guitars. I have no idea, and don't have the DI's. Although I'm pretty sure the rhythms and first lead/harmony leads are real amp/cabs. I wanted a DI signal from him, but he didn't know how to do it. Next time! The middle guitar solo, was verrrry digital/direct sounding...almost like a Digitech RP unit of some sort. I just took a Curve EQ off of the other solo to try to get them a little similar sounding, and get rid of some of that digital-ness.

Bass and piano...see my comments to Bob.

 

[lordcthulhu]

Hey Mark, I really like what you've done, in fact you should teach my favourite prog/power band Evergrey to mix, as their soon-to-be-released album Torn suffers from some pretty bad drum mixing and muddy 7-string guitars. I agree that the snare verb needs to be lowered a bit...I usually loooove a huge wet Sneap-esque snare, but it obviously depends on whether it fits in with the other tracks or not. It seems you're not a huge power/prog aficionado like myself, but for an example of perfect drum mixing production (in my opinion) for the genre, listen to Pagan's Mind's "Enigmatic:Calling", especially the instrumental called "Coming Home" where you can hear everything on the kit (except the octobans, boo!). I'd like the toms to have more punch, but I don't know how the drum tracks were split, so you might not be able to do much there. I have no problems with the guitar stuff even if some stuff comes off too "digital", but Bobby Williamson (keyboardist) should really invest in quality VSTs (or get a Korg Triton)...his stuff was compositionally good, but sounded quite cheap at times (not only the piano, but the keys at 3:15). Then again, that's not your problem.

Well done!

 

[grywolf627]

Hey Mark, I really like what you've done, in fact you should teach my favourite prog/power band Evergrey to mix, as their soon-to-be-released album Torn suffers from some pretty bad drum mixing and muddy 7-string guitars. I agree that the snare verb needs to be lowered a bit...I usually loooove a huge wet Sneap-esque snare, but it obviously depends on whether it fits in with the other tracks or not. It seems you're not a huge power/prog aficionado like myself, but for an example of perfect drum mixing production (in my opinion) for the genre, listen to Pagan's Mind's "Enigmatic:Calling", especially the instrumental called "Coming Home" where you can hear everything on the kit (except the octobans, boo!). I'd like the toms to have more punch, but I don't know how the drum tracks were split, so you might not be able to do much there. I have no problems with the guitar stuff even if some stuff comes off too "digital", but Bobby Williamson (keyboardist) should really invest in quality VSTs (or get a Korg Triton)...his stuff was compositionally good, but sounded quite cheap at times (not only the piano, but the keys at 3:15). Then again, that's not your problem.

Well done!

Thanks Dwayne! I just love metal, of all kinds. And I LOVE Pagan's Mind, especially Celestial Entrance. It's one of my favorites.

I don't think the piano sound is a problem, it's a really good sample set I used to replace the original. It's wonderful sounding on it's own, but it's been a little bit of a problem for me to make it sound right in the song. The main problem is the sustain of notes. It's not completely naturally sounding. That will be tweaked out very soon when I have time for Bobby to come over. And I think he does have a Korg Triton...some sort of big Korg...never really paid attention to what model it is though. I think he's still feeling his way through all the sounds on it. I'm trying to gradually bring him into the midi world so he can easily changes sounds at a later time. (if you're reading this Bobby...yeah....I'm looking at YOU bro! )

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! I'll try to address all of these after a short break from the song. But no one has mentioned anything about EQ issues, in particular the highs and upper mids. So maybe it's just my ears playing tricks with me?

 

[Metaltastic]

Yeah dude, I read what you were saying in your PM about being concerned about harshness, and I absolutely don't perceive any; the only things frequency-wise that irked me were the low-mids of the kick/guitars, as I mentioned above. So you need not worry! (or maybe you do, if you're hearing harshness that to me isn't there...)

 

[Unavailable]

Very early Sympony X-ish. I like it.

The snare drum is my only complaint. It's too obviously sampled.

 

[Black neon bob]

if you're hearing harshness that to me isn't there...)

Same here... no harshness.

 

[grywolf627]

Thanks Marcus and Bob. My ears are so screwed up at the moment it's causing a hpyer-sensitivity to upper mids. I think I finally found that culprit that started my tinnitus in the first place...my beloved Grado SR80 headphones. Since I no longer have a real studio setup (long story) I have to work from our 1 bedroom apartment, which means I have to work extensively with headphones. Which makes sense, because Bobby (keyboardist/songwriter of this song) developed tinnitus around the same time as me...right after he got the same headphones. I hope if I take a break for a little while it will at least calm down to its previous level that I've learned to deal with. It's really got me bummed at the moment.

Very early Sympony X-ish. I like it.

The snare drum is my only complaint. It's too obviously sampled.

Yes sir, I hear you. But I wasn't given the raw snare or kick files. The were already replaced before my friend Bobby even got the drum files from the drummer. Any suggestions?

 

[grywolf627]

Since the band gave you the original tracks, do you know what was used for the guitars? I like the tone, and I would've guessed Wagner (both from the sound and your track record ), but I doubt they would've used that originally. Or did they give you DI's?

Hey Marcus...you're not gonna believe this...it sure had me fooled! POD XT, Recto patch. Plus some various "plugins". I don't know if that means he used impulses or not. I did some EQ'ing on the sound, and ended up trying (and liking!) parallel compression...but the tracks were already pretty good sounding in the first place...just needed a little help here and there.