Shitty attempts at mastering making my mix sound excessively muddy...

[fade_2_black]

I went to do a quick 'master' of this mix - mainly to bring the level up and to add a bit of compression, and now that its cranking it seems a whole lot messier sounding that previously...

I could have sworn it sounded much cleaner before this

I pretty much only used 3 plugs - API-2500 for some very very subtle compression, C4 to tighten up the lows and low mids a little, and the L2 to bring up the level.

If anyone could check it out and let me know what I could have done wrong / what I could do to fix it, that would be highly appreciated !!
Comments on the mix would also be appreciated..

Song is here : http://soundclick.com/share?songid=7599590

Thanks!

 

[TheWinterSnow]

your hearing the mud from not having a TS on the guitars and the guitars and drums not being in time. The actual mix itself is fine and tight, its the separation of notes and lack of dynamic in the guitars that is making it sound muddy.

 

[fade_2_black]

Ah ok.. Yeah - I dont have a TS yet but am definitely putting cash aside for one. You think that would resolve problems with muddiness of guitars quite a lot?
I know this may sound very noobish, but I have never played around with tubescreamers, and although reading that huge FAQ, Im still pretty sure I dont know what the deal is haha... So basically, are you running the guitar throught the TS with very little gain on the TS? Or is the TS used as a first stage of distortion, then compensated for at the amp?? What a noob, ha.

 

[Fox Mulder]

Ah ok.. Yeah - I dont have a TS yet but am definitely putting cash aside for one. You think that would resolve problems with muddiness of guitars quite a lot?
I know this may sound very noobish, but I have never played around with tubescreamers, and although reading that huge FAQ, Im still pretty sure I dont know what the deal is haha... So basically, are you running the guitar throught the TS with very little gain on the TS? Or is the TS used as a first stage of distortion, then compensated for at the amp?? What a noob, ha.

Try to come up with a better tone. Regarding the TS, don't be misled by the fact that it's mandatory. It never was, never will be. This is just a 'core-ish' trend that people follow nowadays. People use TS if they want to. There's no law that states that they have to.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

Its not mandatory but it tightens guitars. Basically fade 2 black, a TS will naturally roll off the bass in a way that is pretty hard to emulate with an eq. Therefore you are slamming the amp with more mids, allowing you to use more gain before the low end starts smearing the articulate sections. I myself cant stand low distortion for that reason, when your eliminating the sub lows that aren't really needed in a guitar what your saturating the the more natural bandwidth of a guitar

Bottom line it tigntens the amp up. Some people like loose amps, me I think thats gross sounding. With a TS (any of choice) the normal way of doing it is to turn the level all the way up, turn the gain all the way down and use the tone knob the get the amount of bass rolloff that you want. If the tone soudns too shrill, then bring it down, too muddy, bring it up. Don't use the TS as a distortion stage, it makes the amp noisy as hell and is actaully counterproductive in tightness.

TS start at about $30 for the SD-1 by Boss and the more expensive TS9 (which is an over priced almost iderntical version of the cheaper SD-1), they are very similar but have some slight differences with the SD-1 being a bit more edgier and the TS9 being a bit smoother.

play with it a bit, see if it works for you but if you are picky about muddy guitars, once you try one, its hard to play without one.

 

[digitalmikey]

Sweet mix. Who's the band?

 

[GarethSE]

Its not mandatory but it tightens guitars. Basically fade 2 black, a TS will naturally roll off the bass in a way that is pretty hard to emulate with an eq. Therefore you are slamming the amp with more mids, allowing you to use more gain before the low end starts smearing the articulate sections. I myself cant stand low distortion for that reason, when your eliminating the sub lows that aren't really needed in a guitar what your saturating the the more natural bandwidth of a guitar

Bottom line it tigntens the amp up. Some people like loose amps, me I think thats gross sounding. With a TS (any of choice) the normal way of doing it is to turn the level all the way up, turn the gain all the way down and use the tone knob the get the amount of bass rolloff that you want. If the tone soudns too shrill, then bring it down, too muddy, bring it up. Don't use the TS as a distortion stage, it makes the amp noisy as hell and is actaully counterproductive in tightness.

TS start at about $30 for the SD-1 by Boss and the more expensive TS9 (which is an over priced almost iderntical version of the cheaper SD-1), they are very similar but have some slight differences with the SD-1 being a bit more edgier and the TS9 being a bit smoother.

play with it a bit, see if it works for you but if you are picky about muddy guitars, once you try one, its hard to play without one.

Yeah, it's true that a TS helps, but like Maamar said, it's not mandatory, never has been and never will be.
Telling him to get a TS isn't going to fix THIS mix.

The guitars sound pretty thin on this mix and could hardly do with less low end. Sounds like the bassy is reallyy boomy at points. Multiband compress the low end on the bass and bring it up to the same level that it was before and it won't skip around as much.

Maybe try using gClip -> Limiter rather than Compressor -> Limiter for your mastering chain. I've found that usually sounds way more natural.