My first semi-successful recording job...advice & Critiq

[will.record.for.food]

I was given the opportunity to record a band.

This is the second band I've recorded (besides all my day to day self-demos and such).

The fist band I recorded wanted to do 3 songs in 4 hours, and took all sorts of first takes, out of tune guitars, bad tone, and so on.

I didn't want that to happen this time. We recorded 5 songs over 2 days. They are all young, ages 14-16. The drummer wasn't always on with the kick. But, we took our time and did many re-takes. They are a hard rock/screamo band.

I was wanting some critique on my mix. On my monitors (Samson Resolv 65a's) it sounds wonderful. But on listening to it for the first time on my work computer's eMac speakers, there isn't as much low end as I thought.

http://www.aisd.net/crow/reflection-new-2.mp3

I tried to keep everything as dry as possible. I used compression and ONLY subtractive EQ except on the vocals for the most part. In the case of the band I recorde before these guys, I had to way over-process things to try to "fix" the mistakes, and it sounded like poo...so I tried to stay away from that this time.

Any advice and critique would be greatly appreciated...I really want this to sound good.

[will.record.for.food]

Is it that bad

[will.record.for.food]

....really? nobody has advice?

Overall mix too treble heavy? To thin bass?

[jlipham]

i think it sounds pretty good. i know sometimes it difficult to record such dynamic vocals and music, so kudos for taking on that challenge. I believe the problem that sticks out most with this recording is simply the performance. Sometimes bands are not ready to be recorded. Sound wise, I here clarity between the instruments, which I like. I would have worked on the snare and kick sounds a bit to try and make em 'slam' a bit harder. Anyways, good job and keep on recording.

[will.record.for.food]

Thanks

One thing I did notice, is that in certain parts of the song, the snare gets buried. I might throw the snare and kick on an aux channel and compress it to death

[orbb]

Liked the recording, thought the song is not bad, even for my 42 year old years, liked the lead vocal, didn't like the scream vocal, and wondered if the drummer was playing to a different song.

Keep up the good (and brave) work.

[ashcat_lt]

sounds like you did pretty well, considering what you had to work with.

That drummer sucks! (...hope it's not you...) My dad tells a story about a drummer in a band he was in once "He'd drop a beat in one measure and make up for it by adding a beat in the next. Didn't want to be a beat-off."

The drums seem to come and go in the mix. I suspect this is at least partly due to overzealous master bus compression. When the guitars are really pounding, both vocals belting, there's no room left for the drums.

In this type of music you'd probably be better off getting a good consistent drum and vocal level throughout the song and bringing the other instruments in to suit. Use sub-bus compression if necessary, and maybe just a tiny bit on the master bus to smooth everything together. Better yet, leave the master compression to the mastering engineer.

[thethingwiththestuff]

i'm really impressed by the nice full range of this recording. that chunky guitar that comes in mid verse sits kinda weird...i think its a little more high-mid heavy than i'm used to hearing with this kind of stuff. the drum playing is atrocious.

overall though, a pretty nice balance tonally. if this was performed competently, a mastering engineer could probably really push this over the top.

[will.record.for.food]

Wow...thanks

I was really expecting a lot of comments saying it was junk. I think it sounds good, but I'm not as experienced as many of you.

Thank you so much for the kind words.

thingwiththestuff, I agree...the guitar (after the intro) does sound a bit harsh. It should be a smoother sound.

If there was no kick, the drums wouldn't be as off...but the kick is terrible. Ashcat...I was not the drummer. I do have quite a bit of compression on the master, but not on very much of the single drum channels themselves....Im not too familiar with the term "sub-bus compression" Does it sound waaay overcompressed overall? What would you recommend to fix it?

orbb...Screaming is not my thing either...at least when its that loud. I wanted it a bit further back, but they did not.

jlipham, these guys (kids) are pretty young...the oldest is 16, the drummer is 14. I did want to 'slam' it a bit more as you say...but this time, I really tried to keep it true to the source. It seems, everytime I try to re-shape a sound (and its generally true for anybody), it looses its natural feel, and starts to really get wierd.

Thanks for the encouraging words...I guess I'm not as bad as I thought, but I do wish I could get this to sound a bit better.

[ashcat_lt]

i'm listening on computer speakers. There not really bad, but not the best. It's also an mp3. These factors, plus the fact that "over-compressed" is pretty much the norm nowadays make it difficult for me to answer that question.

What I can say is that it sounded to me like the drums were ducking out of the way of the other instruments.

Sub-bus compression would be if you mixed the drums seperately and compressed them seperately from the rest of the instruments. Mixing boards often have "sub-buses," sometimes called groups. Most DAWs have this feature in their mixers as well. Very often you can get better results by splitting the instruments into groups and doing your more drastic compressing on those groups, then mixing the groups together and applying a smaller amount of compression to smooth the final mix.