How can I make this mix more "interesting?"

mhoiland · Post by **mhoiland** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 7:18 pm

I always seem to end up in this place - I spend so much time cleaning up the performances, vocal pitch, and all else that I forget to think creatively about the mix. It always seems "safe", as if it's the actual performance.

This track was to the "safe" point when the client asked for "more reverb,.. like Fleet Foxes."

Now, this song isn't in the vein of Fleet Foxes, but how can I make it more interesting and more creative?

Link:
http://www.villageten.com/bin_of_doom/S ... v24_RU.mp3

Thanks in advance!

mc437 · Post by **mc437** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 11:20 pm

Well, it's a very "safe" song to begin with, so if you want to avoid safe, you're sort of starting at a disadvantage in a way. That said, it is beautiful. The vocals are lovely. All the instruments are very clean and pleasant. Maybe, try panning differently. There is a lot of space in between the individual tracks, and everything lives very safely in the stereo field...if you tended a little more towards mono you might get a bit of messiness, in a good way. Sorry I can't offer any more than that.

Snarl 12/8 · Post by **Snarl 12/8** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 11:40 pm

I kinda feel the opposite. It is very "safe", but I don't think that it necessarily hurts it. I feel like it needs to be wider and deeper. More lush. It feels very down the middle, compressed and bandwidth limited. Can you add "air" to the highs and boom to the lows and articulation to the mids and width to the stereo spread. Make it bigger, deeper and more sparkly. It almost sounds like midi on a circa 2000 soundblaster to me as it is now.

mhoiland · Post by **mhoiland** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 12:03 am

It almost sounds like midi on a circa 2000 soundblaster to me as it is now.

Well said. It seems that most of us are either consciously, or unconsciously fighting back that early digital sound card sound in our digital mixes.

Make it bigger, deeper and more sparkly.

Who makes that plugin?

Thanks for the suggestions!

Snarl 12/8 · Post by **Snarl 12/8** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 12:57 am

mhoiland wrote:
Make it bigger, deeper and more sparkly.
Who makes that plugin?

Thanks for the suggestions!

I hope you don't think I was being flip with any of my remarks. I was just trying to be honest with you. I totally think it sounds "fine" and I almost felt like the "flatness" gave it an interesting quality that made me lean in a little bit to hear it. I don't think the song or arrangement is really calling out for "danger", more lushness is all I'm really interested in hearing from this piece and in the end, I think it needs it to retain a [this] listener's interest. I really was thinking "easier said than done" as I typed my earlier comments. No offense intended. Mokay?

Edit with regards to:

Who makes that plugin?

Aural exciter maybe? Some tasteful distortion on some of the lower pitched parts? http://messageboard.tapeop.com/viewtopic.php?t=68047 or http://messageboard.tapeop.com/viewtopi ... amp+entire

mhoiland · Post by **mhoiland** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 1:02 am

No offense taken at all. I was being lighthearted in my comments and appreciate your comments.

I'm going to work on the mix again tomorrow with your suggestions. But I'm only wondering at what point I should allow the mastering to widen the mix and add sparkle.

Thanks again, and sorry if I came across ungrateful.

Jitters · Post by **Jitters** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 4:25 am

I'm with Snarl...push it a little further in the direction that it's already heading. Maybe listen to something like Takk by Sigor Ros for inspiration? I hear a little bit of that kind of treatment. Really nice...

sad iron · Post by **sad iron** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 8:05 am

While I agree with a lot of what folks have said already (the overall sound of the mix is pretty 2 dimensional, etc), I keyed in to something you said in your description of your process. You mentioned that you spent a lot of time cleaning stuff up, fixing parts and all that and it occurs to me that that might have something to do with why your stuff feels safe. In some ways, you are making it safe before you ever get the the mix stage. This is something really easy to do in the computer age and I have been guilty of it myself, but now I don't fix anything until very late in the game and then I only fix what's sticking out like a sore thumb in the mix. And even then I try to find the most musical way to fix it (masking with other parts, slight adjustments in level or eq, etc.).

For this particular track I'd be interested to know what you fixed. There might be other ways to work around what you did with the software that wouldn't compromise the integrity of the performances (I firmly believe that little warts=integrity). You said in the original post that you felt like this sounded like the original performance and, though I haven't heard the original performance, I find that hard to believe. This is a nice, polished mix, but it has no angles, no rough edges, and while you don't want so many rough edges that they draw attention to themselves and break the illusion of the song, the ear begins to mistrust sounds that don't have them at all. Those idiosyncrasies are what makes the songs human and humans aren't safe, in my experience.

Does any of this make sense?

Snarl 12/8 · Post by **Snarl 12/8** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 8:55 am

I wanted to add. My daughter walked in last night while I was listening to it and thought it was a kindof weird tune. I think it caught her ear because it's not at all my usual fare. I explained to her that I was trying to figure out a suggestion to help the mix. At first she suggested retracking things or adding tracks. Her suggestion for these particular tracks was to "bring up the second vocal, that'll make it pop." She also said, "get rid of that poppy thing, that might help." I couldn't get her to define "poppy thing", but I think she was referring to pop the genre, not pop the sound.

My daughter's a little bit savant when it comes to music, so that might be something you want to try. Bringing the backup vocal = to the main vocal could be just the risk you need to take.

mhoiland · Post by **mhoiland** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 11:22 am

You guys are all great! Thanks for the direction. I'll make some changes tonight and repost a new mix.

Thanks for taking the time to listen.

T-rex · Post by **T-rex** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 12:23 pm

I can't really comment on the sound as I listened quickly here at work on my computer speakers, but if you really don't want to play it safe, I would suggest one or both of these things, both related to drums.

One, maybe drop the drums out after the intro when the vocals come in and only bring them back in aroun 41 sec or when the chorus type part comes in, or not even then, but after the break down. Then the whole song would build more, maybe draw people in with just the voice and other sparse instrumentaiton before bringing the percussion pattern in. You could leave the crashes, but take out the tom or percussion rhythm.

Two, maybe try some crazy compression on the drums. Not distorted (or hell, maybe distorted?) but I was thinking like really nailing the drums to give them a completely different sound, like sucking in tons of the room sound on the drums. Just to give them a different feel, without having the drums overwhelm the rest of the track. Or make them sound like they are coming through an am radio and fade them in till they sound normal.

Try stuff you think may never work in a million years and see what happens? It may sound awful, all of the above may be a horrible idea, but you may stumble on somehting great on your way to my terrible idea!

Anyway, my two cents! Good job BTW, I think the song is well done and sounds good.

vikingrecording · Post by **vikingrecording** » Wed Nov 25, 2009 9:01 am

I'm leaning twards T-Rex, the drums could definitely have some more shape/funk/mojo, whatever. Compression, room mics, or even a pre-fader send to the reverb. Bring some tone/body to the drums, toms esp.
I think this is going to sound great once it's done!

JohnDavisNYC · Post by **JohnDavisNYC** » Wed Nov 25, 2009 11:58 am

please take this with a grain of salt as nothing about the mix is actually 'bad'...

this to me has all the characteristics of an ITB mix where way too much time has been spent cleaning everything up and tuning everything (especially that second bg part that is panned to the left... cher time)... and it sounds too clean...

'now that it's perfect, it's boring'

it sounds like an old navy ad, and it needs to be put up on a good console with some good classic outboard and a real plate and some analog delays, and maybe print it to tape at 15ips... it needs funk and depth , but the type of funk that comes from good compressors and eqs.

aside from mixing on a console to tape, or having someone else mix it, i think getting rid of some of the super extended highs from the vocals would be good, and taming the cymbals a bit... let mastering open the top end up across the board... always sounds better to deliver a murky mix to mastering and let them open it up. a super bright mix is a good way to piss off a mastering engineer.

it basically sounds good, i was just typing everything that came to mind.

john

mhoiland · Post by **mhoiland** » Wed Nov 25, 2009 12:38 pm

I was using UAD-2 plugs (Fatso, Plate 140, Neve 1081, 1176, LA-3A, Neve 88RS), and summing 8 stereo stems through the Metric Halo (not quite analog summing, but better than ITB).

This is my first mix with this new setup, and it already has more depth and width than my previous Apogee Duet and mixing ITB with Logic.

But I do think that I'm going to remove the pitch correction on the vocals, or at least tone it down. I didn't touch any timing-wise, except for nudging the drums for phase coherency, but I did use a lot of gating on the drums. I'm going to take those off altogether and hope that vibe comes back.

Thanks again for all the tips and suggestions!

JohnDavisNYC · Post by **JohnDavisNYC** » Wed Nov 25, 2009 12:52 pm

cool. always good to know the setup!

i would maybe just change the settings on the toms, before you just get rid of the plugs all together... it might be that having like 3db of reduction between the hits gives just enough definition without taking away the vibe...

also, maybe your 'phase coherency' drum nudging actually removed the depth... if you did stuff like sliding the room mics to match the close mics, that is a sure way to end up with no sense of depth... the distance and size cues come from the time delay and phase differences... as long as nothing is out of phase, you shouldn't need to slide anything, and i think a polarity switch is always better for fixing phase issues than moving things.

a 6db/octave high cut on the vocals at like 12k should smooth things out nicely.

i look forward to hearing the next version... definitely 'Save As...' as what you have sounds good... just could use a bit more grit.

john

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How can I make this mix more "interesting?"

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