[brandondrury]

If you actually had the budget for 128 tracks in just one of your songs (humor me, think of replicated tracks doing the same thing) how do you make sonic room for them?

That's funny you mention "budget". The most expensive recordings of all time were from a day when 24 tracks were the limit or it you really needed more tracks, you could sync 2 24 tracks together.

I think the answer to your question is reverb and eq.

Not yet it isn't. It's an issue of arrangement. What is on these tracks? Let's say we give the drums 20 mics, the bass 3, the guitars 6, the vocals 10, synths 8. This is already a HUGE production and we haven't cracked 40 tracks yet. Anything after this point is going to be a black guy saying "Hey!" on every other down beat or a triangle going ding every once in a while. It's all noise that really isn't required.

so, the real focus is on the core. Let's break this down to just the guitars. If we have 5 tracks of guitars (all doing different things, not layering) how do we get them to fit? It's safe to say that in this kind of production may be one guitar is a high gain amp hitting big sustained chords. You hear this all the time in the old Michael Jackson records they were just kept low in the mix. Maybe one guitar is clean and a syncopated strumming thing. Maybe one guitar is picking out a melody up higher. Maybe one guitar is just hitting a little sustained note somewhere much like a synth. I don't know what the other guitar is doing.

In that case, we've made room for each element in the tracking process. It had nothing to do with EQ, reverb, or compression. It was all on the musical side of the fence.

I think you have jumped the gun with 128 tracks. You should have asked "How do I get drums, bass, guitars, and vocals" to work in a mix. That is hard enough!

Is it just a matter of setting your mixing volume low so that the listener has to turn it up to compensate for all your tracks?

No. A) Listeners don't like quiet cds. B) The relatively levels will still be an issue.

Is it just compressors and limiters?

That's like saying the rubber on the tires is the reason a car moves. There a trillion factors involved here. Your best bet is to do a mix and post it in Recording Reviews so we can help.

Compressors limit dynamic range. They don't do your arranging for you. A compressor can, however, make the RMS signal louder for a specific instrument (always vocals!) so that it can be heard in a dense mix.

I read the article that the Ipod is changing how producers and engineers record but why?

I check all my mixes on Ipod earbuds when I'm almost finished. That's the extent of it. I know of no engineer who mixes differently because of the Ipod, but maybe I'm hanging out in the wrong circles.

can we do what the big boys do and not go broke for the rest of our lives?

The tools of today are INCREDIBLE for the money. If the music is there, it comes through easier than it ever has at home for relatively little money. How much you choose to spend depends on your vulnerability to marketing. It has little effect on the actual music in my opinion.

Kate Bushs "Running Up That Hill".

This sounds like a standard 1984 production to me. (Just a guess on the year). I'm hearing a lot of reverb.