MIXING- How do you do it?

[billiamwalker]

personally i tend to gravitate towards a more dub / funk oriented bass tone so i go for LO

totally understandable. i'd shoot for the same thing IF i were doing those styles.

[mjau]

I high pass the bass at 12k. Sometimes 13k.

[cdbabel]

I just finished recording a full length in no time flat-- When I turned it over to the band, they were really happy with it but of course they've never recorded anywhere but with me.

I have some MAJOR issues with this album-- weak snares on some songs that I just didn't have enough time to re-amp. The guitars though and bass-- those are my real issues.

How much panning do you use on your guitars?
Do you shelf the guitars or cut any lo-end --boost anything ?
Where do you let the bass guitar breath the most?
The mastering guy said the drums were fantastic sounding-- its just everything else that I thought I had figured out. On this record--and I know its probably idiotic-- I cut the bass at about 80-100hz to leave a little room for the kick. I cut the guitars at about 125hz to leave room for bass, which was in the end futile.

These are the sort of questions I'm hoping it will be easy to find answers too with WikiRecording.org

Its not that there are straightforward answers to any of these questions, but a stock pile of easy to read ideas would be fantastic. If people would take just alittle time to post potential answers or ways to approach it on WikiRecording, I think it would make life easier for a lot of everyone stuck in these sort of situations.

Here's the link Http://www.wikirecording.org

[Glory_Morris]

I agree with the poster who said that you should approach each new project as if it were your first. This is absolutely correct-- and really embodies the essence of what a good engineer should be. I'm just looking for tips. Sometimes I get mixes to sound great-- perhaps thats just because some songs are just easy to record. But then there are the weak ones where I just can't get something to sit right-- like the bass issue. Bass is a hard thing to make your own as an engineer. Hard to decide on a sound and make it happen. For me its that way.
This last record I tried recording with the DI and the Amp, for safety reasons. The DI track had a lot more pluck naturally, probably too much. I ran it along side the amp track a adjusted the two as I liked them per song. I noticed that real pluck-heavy bass sounded great in the loud parts and horrible in the quiet parts. Had I been allotted more time, I probably would have done a little automation.
I used two compressors on each bass track-- one slow and with a high ratio and a second after it with a quick attack and release and only about 2 or 3 to 1 ratio. This made the bass smooth and controllable but still, with the song playing along I had to seriously reduce the low end to make it audible, or just plain "musical" for that matter. Seemed like there was just a bass rumble the whole damn song.
Perhaps I'm doing something counter-productive here. I dunno. I rolled off the DI lo-end and then rolled off most of the bass-amp track's hi end and put them together. Frustrating.

[cdbabel]

How much panning do you use on your guitars?

I just wrote an article on the "Live Approach" to panning. This might give you an idea of how to pan your guitars.

Here's the link: http://www.wikirecording.org/index.php/ ... ch_Panning

I encourage everyone to read the article and add other methods of panning.

[Dubious]

why would you pan the bass?

from my perspective as a guy who presses 12"s loud bass panned out of center doesnt track well on wax and an awful lot of clubs are wired in mono...

[Red Rockets Glare]

why would you pan the bass?

from my perspective as a guy who presses 12"s loud bass panned out of center doesnt track well on wax and an awful lot of clubs are wired in mono...

Well, I panned the bass in a mix last week because it was crowding a bass heavy piano (ala spoon) it sounds great and is toatlly balanced on the VU's.
It collapses to mono just fine.

There are NO rules.

[drumsound]

For me one of the keys is to forget that there's a solo button. You need to make adjustments within the context of the mix. Also as implied a lot on this thread an adjustment on one track has a very defined effect on the other tracks. Cutting the lows on some tracks may very well fix the bass not speaking for instance.

I consider the fist hour of mixing to be the period when I make the tones "play nice with others." After getting my frequency balance making sense I'll sometimes slam all the faders down and re balance them. Often this goes pretty quickly because the tones generally work together now and then I can think about musical and artistic balance.

YMMV.

[vvv]

...the fist hour of mixing ...

[charlievela]

That's so strange that it's the Muldoon record you're working on. I'm in one of the bands that's playing their CD release shows with them next month. Good friends of ours. I work at a studio about 3 hours south of you in the ever lovin' Rio Grande Valley.

In fact, before i knew they had already been recording their full-length I had been hoping to work with them on their next project. I'd love to help out if I can. Feel free to email me if you wouldn't mind a second set of ears.

Sincerely,
Charlie Vela
charlievela@gmail.com

[mjau]

That's so strange that it's the Muldoon record you're working on. I'm in one of the bands that's playing their CD release shows with them next month. Good friends of ours. I work at a studio about 3 hours south of you in the ever lovin' Rio Grande Valley.

In fact, before i knew they had already been recording their full-length I had been hoping to work with them on their next project. I'd love to help out if I can. Feel free to email me if you wouldn't mind a second set of ears.

Sincerely,
Charlie Vela
charlievela@gmail.com

Something is not right in this world if Muldoon is not big one day.

[I'm Painting Again]

If you realize that a good mix is in the way you actually track and that recording is a cumulative thing, i.e., everything you do at the beginning effects the end result, you will be in good shape for a healthy mix..i think..

[MikeCzech]

It helps to begin by putting every group of instruments on it's own sub group, especially guitars if there are lot's of tracks, as there always are in my recordings.

Generally speaking - I like to start with the drum overheads and room mic first (wait for the rest of the drums), then I like to move on to full range instruments like keys if they have any, then mid-range like guitars; and then the bottom end - bass.

Then I bring up the spot mics on the individual drums, I like to make sure I hear every single kick, and every single snare hit.

At this point I like to listen for the loudest track and bring it down.

Now I bring in vocals.

[billiamwalker]

It helps to begin by putting every group of instruments on it's own sub group, especially guitars if there are lot's of tracks, as there always are in my recordings.

Generally speaking - I like to start with the drum overheads and room mic first (wait for the rest of the drums), then I like to move on to full range instruments like keys if they have any, then mid-range like guitars; and then the bottom end - bass.

Then I bring up the spot mics on the individual drums, I like to make sure I hear every single kick, and every single snare hit.

At this point I like to listen for the loudest track and bring it down.

Now I bring in vocals.

this is a very good techique. if you mix drums first (which is kind of instinct) you'll notice that when you start bringing other insturments up that your drums really aren't mixed good at all. i usually do overheads and room first (if the room is present) then i do guitars followed by bass. THEN i add the keys (since keys usually don't structurally carry a song) and then start mixing the individual drums in. followed by vocals.

[mwingerski]

I recently started setting up multiple channels for compressing drums and run all the drums through them... 3 stereo channels total.. one uncompressed, one with 2:1 and quicker attack and one more compressed 6:1 or more, with a slightly slower attack... occasionally i have one that's just smashed to bits and i'll vary which compressors and settings depending on the song and the tone, but I find it you blend the sound of the compressed and uncompressed drum mixes together, you can usually get something that has more punch and requires less eq than if you start working with individual drum sounds ... Makes the whole drum kit act more like a single instrument that way in the mix...

also allows one to vary up the drum sound for different sections of the song depending on the dynamics by adjusting the blend of what compressors you're using... i've only been doing it this way for about a month, but i'm MUCH happier with my mixes since i started doing it...