Mackanov just had an Accident

[Mackanov]

Here's my mix for this month's competition. I'm sure there's a lot to be improved. All feedback is appreciated!

[Ableton_Love]

Hey Mack, I think this is a pretty good mix, but the bass and the vocal FX sort of distract me.

It seems like a very bright mix, for me I like having a nice loud bass (Why I'll never be any good at mixing metal) but the bass doesn't have much presence in this. I kinda felt like the bass and the kick are what gives the song impact on the areas that the music drops in, but without the bass a little louder there just seems to be less punch. Still sounds nice and loud tho. Maybe throw some short verbs behind your guitars hard L&R or something just for a little more gel.

The vocal FX are pretty explicit, but I'm not hearing a ton of FX on the instrumental side, so It sort of sounds like its mismatched just a bit. More in the beginning than the end stuff. I'd move that delay to an aux track to automate in and out, rather than throwing it directly as a track insert (im guessing?)

Nice work man.

[Mackanov]

Hey Mack, I think this is a pretty good mix, but the bass and the vocal FX sort of distract me.

It seems like a very bright mix, for me I like having a nice loud bass (Why I'll never be any good at mixing metal) but the bass doesn't have much presence in this. I kinda felt like the bass and the kick are what gives the song impact on the areas that the music drops in, but without the bass a little louder there just seems to be less punch. Still sounds nice and loud tho. Maybe throw some short verbs behind your guitars hard L&R or something just for a little more gel.

The vocal FX are pretty explicit, but I'm not hearing a ton of FX on the instrumental side, so It sort of sounds like its mismatched just a bit. More in the beginning than the end stuff. I'd move that delay to an aux track to automate in and out, rather than throwing it directly as a track insert (im guessing?)

Nice work man.

Thanks for the bashing man!

You see, I went for a 1969-72 kind of mix (with a pinch of 2012) because that was what I thought the song called for. This means monoish, bass-light and trippy to me. So the drums aren't just overheads (since the overheads weren't tracked with that in mind) and the mix is pretty loud, differing from the mixes of that era, and the bass is still a lot louder than what they did back then. I don't know if you noticed, but the mix is pretty "mono" as well. What I think you're hearing on the vocal is the doubled-delayed vocal track that was provided. This, also, contributed to the vibe I was feeling, giving it a trippy, zeppelin-esque kind of feel.

[bholst]

I really like how RAW this sounds. Nice
Those toms were pretty flabby and I had to spend a ton of time EQing those things to get 'em dialed in. I still hear a little bit of that going on here, but it contributes to this vibe you created. Guitars sound sweet! At times they could come up a few db, particularly some of that fill stuff that's going on during the verse. I think the heavy reverb caused it to fall back a hair too far. Easy fix though. Vocals are sounding good. That's what's holding me up on mine right now. This one is quite a challenge to de-ess without losing the clarity and understandability (big word, lol) of the lyrics. Anyway, I'm liking your mix dude. I think you're making great progress, which is awesome! I think you nailed that 'zeppelin' sound that you were shooting for rather well. In terms of any other fine tuning, you may try a more agressive high pass filter on the reverb to keep the clarity since you went with that bigger, roomier sound. Overall, I think you did great. A lot of what I mentioned is pretty subtle stuff and minor tweaks. Good work!

-holster

[Leo Alvarez]

I Like the overall vibe of the song (and knowing were you took your inspiration from I think you are very close to your goal) but there's a couple of things that take me away from the ride of the song. One is the bass, you can make it louder in the mix without sacrificing the bass light vibe u were going for by cutting a bit in the 60-80hz range. That way you can make sure that the bass performance is clear on the track but you keep your original intent. At first I thought the kick was a bit boxy but after reading your comments I "got it" so no problems there. I do feel however that a lot of the harmony work on the track is lost so a little more attention to that will put it right. The only other thing is the reverb on the snare at the end didn't feel appropriate to what you stated as the vibe for the track but to be honest that's just a taste thing and in the end it's just me being a little too picky. Do the other stuff and IMO you'll be rockin

[Mackanov]

I really like how RAW this sounds. Nice
Those toms were pretty flabby and I had to spend a ton of time EQing those things to get 'em dialed in. I still hear a little bit of that going on here, but it contributes to this vibe you created.

Thanks man! I appreciate it, especially coming from you.
Yeah, with the drums, the first approach I took (which was to rely on the overheads a lot and just add a tad of snare, kick and toms for punch) didn't work out so well, so I ended up scrapping it. Turns out I was working against the tracks and not with them, trying to chase a sound that simply wasn't there. So I just accepted what I was given and the processing turned out to be pretty minimal. I also had the opportunity to try Studio One's gate which I'm liking very much.

Guitars sound sweet! At times they could come up a few db, particularly some of that fill stuff that's going on during the verse. I think the heavy reverb caused it to fall back a hair too far. Easy fix though.

I have to admit that the sheer amount of guitar tracks, each one doing more or less their own thing, made me a bit confused. The reality is that I got a bit lazy with them, and should have automated a bit more.

Vocals are sounding good. That's what's holding me up on mine right now. This one is quite a challenge to de-ess without losing the clarity and understandability (big word, lol) of the lyrics.

Strange that you mention this, because I found them pretty easy to work with. Apart from some tuning (I'm a bit anal about vocal tuning), I don't think I had much trouble there.

Anyway, I'm liking your mix dude. I think you're making great progress, which is awesome! I think you nailed that 'zeppelin' sound that you were shooting for rather well. In terms of any other fine tuning, you may try a more agressive high pass filter on the reverb to keep the clarity since you went with that bigger, roomier sound. Overall, I think you did great. A lot of what I mentioned is pretty subtle stuff and minor tweaks. Good work!

I tried "tucking in" the backing vocals to give them a bit of distance without relying too much on stereo field separation, so they ended up with some quite aggressive low passing as well as high passing, and maybe that's what causing the loss of clarity. I don't think I had any track without a high pass filter, and most were upwards of 200hz.

Thanks again for your comments, I really appreciate the feedback!

[Mackanov]

I Like the overall vibe of the song (and knowing were you took your inspiration from I think you are very close to your goal) but there's a couple of things that take me away from the ride of the song. One is the bass, you can make it louder in the mix without sacrificing the bass light vibe u were going for by cutting a bit in the 60-80hz range. That way you can make sure that the bass performance is clear on the track but you keep your original intent.

Awesome! Thanks for the review man.

Yeah, I'm having quite a battle with low end lately (aren't we all? I think we can blame LSUTigh being pissed off), but on checking the mix against some material from before the 1990s it's really not that far from the era. The bass track is high passed at 80hz, and I can hear it fine on my systems (and even on my cellphone), although it's more present above 120hz than below it. I have a bit of LoAir going on there to bring some of the low end back, though.

At first I thought the kick was a bit boxy but after reading your comments I "got it" so no problems there. I do feel however that a lot of the harmony work on the track is lost so a little more attention to that will put it right.

Do you mean the guitar harmonies? As I said in reply to holster's post, the guitars were the major headache I had in this mix, as they are different from what I'm used to and there was a lot going on.

The only other thing is the reverb on the snare at the end didn't feel appropriate to what you stated as the vibe for the track but to be honest that's just a taste thing and in the end it's just me being a little too picky. Do the other stuff and IMO you'll be rockin

Yeah, that verb... It's actually there throughout the whole song, but I think that at the end the combination of the "mastering" chain and the balance of the tracks made it pop out more. That verb is a big part of the snare sound though, it's something I've done a few times, but in this case maybe cutting the tail short would have made it more subtle without taking too much from the sound.

Thanks a lot for your time!

[Leo Alvarez]

I was referring to the vocal harmonies, glad to be of help

[TopBobSecret]

Hey Mack,
Nice mix! I'm missing the b/u vocal in the 1st verse.
It seems you did a good job with the separation
This does seem a bit on the high end side.
Good luck! -TopBob

[willj]

Nice job here man. A little bit on the bright side but nothing brutal. Here is what is standing out to me in your mix.

Sounds like there is a bit of a top end artifact with the vocals and overheads. The vocals carry it the whole way thru the track and its much less noticeable on the overheads.

The snare and toms are taking on an overly boxy sound from the compression. Its most noticeable on the snare i guess because it plays such a dominant role in the mix. It sounds like the compression is hurting the bass a bit as well. Especially in those areas that are so important to the bass' clarity. Its almost inaudible in the first verse and lacks intensity throughout the song.
I would try compressing everything from 200hz down with a slow release until its all pretty even, and then hit it all again with faster attack and release times, and about 1db of gain reduction.


The guitar is pretty bright and kinda hard on the ears. Probably the biggest reason for this track sounding bright. It needs a cut at 2 and 3k. I like how your outro guitar sounds. The one at the very end. Its nice and smooth on the top end and about where i think you should be aiming for all of your guitars.


At the end of the song you have some clipping. I think its being caused by the guitars, but the overhead track may have something to do with it as well. A little hard to tell. I hear it in a few places throughout the track but its evident in the last 30 seconds of the song.

Youve got good seperation between most of your instruments. Its plenty loud. These are the things that jump out at me right away and fixing the few issues would put this up there with any of the better mixes ive heard this month.

[Mackanov]

Nice job here man. A little bit on the bright side but nothing brutal. Here is what is standing out to me in your mix.

Sounds like there is a bit of a top end artifact with the vocals and overheads. The vocals carry it the whole way thru the track and its much less noticeable on the overheads.

The snare and toms are taking on an overly boxy sound from the compression. Its most noticeable on the snare i guess because it plays such a dominant role in the mix. It sounds like the compression is hurting the bass a bit as well. Especially in those areas that are so important to the bass' clarity. Its almost inaudible in the first verse and lacks intensity throughout the song.
I would try compressing everything from 200hz down with a slow release until its all pretty even, and then hit it all again with faster attack and release times, and about 1db of gain reduction.


The guitar is pretty bright and kinda hard on the ears. Probably the biggest reason for this track sounding bright. It needs a cut at 2 and 3k. I like how your outro guitar sounds. The one at the very end. Its nice and smooth on the top end and about where i think you should be aiming for all of your guitars.


At the end of the song you have some clipping. I think its being caused by the guitars, but the overhead track may have something to do with it as well. A little hard to tell. I hear it in a few places throughout the track but its evident in the last 30 seconds of the song.

Youve got good seperation between most of your instruments. Its plenty loud. These are the things that jump out at me right away and fixing the few issues would put this up there with any of the better mixes ive heard this month.

Thanks for your always spot-on comments, man... Where the fuck where you before I submitted the mix anyway?

[wireman957]

Man, I have to say, I think these are the best sounding drums I've heard yet in this comp. I think you accomplished your objective quite nicely. I like the way you kept your guitars pretty raw sounding,too. The only, and it really is the only thing I will say regarding the guitars is that I think you may have high passed them a little much. They start to sound just a little brittle in places and the tonality between them is too similar, in my opinion. There were some subtle differences between guitars 1 & 2 in the upper mids, too, that could have helped had you emphasized them, or de-emphasized some of the "ganky" freq's just a little more. That's pretty much a taste thing, though, and it sure doesn't really take away from what you accomplished with the rest of your mix. One of my favorites this month - great job!

[Mackanov]

Man, I have to say, I think these are the best sounding drums I've heard yet in this comp. I think you accomplished your objective quite nicely.

Wow, thanks!!

I like the way you kept your guitars pretty raw sounding,too. The only, and it really is the only thing I will say regarding the guitars is that I think you may have high passed them a little much. They start to sound just a little brittle in places and the tonality between them is too similar, in my opinion. There were some subtle differences between guitars 1 & 2 in the upper mids, too, that could have helped had you emphasized them, or de-emphasized some of the "ganky" freq's just a little more. That's pretty much a taste thing, though, and it sure doesn't really take away from what you accomplished with the rest of your mix. One of my favorites this month - great job!

One of these days I'll nail everything
Thanks a lot for your comment!

[fHumble fHingaz]

How do you say "nice mix" for 5 millionth time?... er... well... Nice mix! I really like the drums on this, & the vocals have some really cool ambiance, yet they are not distant at all - you've managed a kind of "organic silkiness" with them - something I really haven't heard on any other mixes.

At the risk of sounding well and truly redundant, my only beef was that the guitars are too edgy. My suggestion would be to try tape emulation to get some "forwardness" out the the high mids in the guitars - I've sometimes found that it canly beef up those frequencies negative effects being introduced higher up in the spectrum.

Definitely one of the better mixes I've heard here.

[Mackanov]

How do you say "nice mix" for 5 millionth time?... er... well... Nice mix! I really like the drums on this, & the vocals have some really cool ambiance, yet they are not distant at all - you've managed a kind of "organic silkiness" with them - something I really haven't heard on any other mixes.

At the risk of sounding well and truly redundant, my only beef was that the guitars are too edgy. My suggestion would be to try tape emulation to get some "forwardness" out the the high mids in the guitars - I've sometimes found that it canly beef up those frequencies negative effects being introduced higher up in the spectrum.

Definitely one of the better mixes I've heard here.

Wow! Thanks a lot man!

I think, with the vocals, tuning was a key part of that "organic" thing you talk about (as weird as that may sound). It made the backing tracks and the lead track gel better, IMO.

Turns out I did use tape emulation on the guitars, but I opened the mix after you posted this and for some idiotic reason it was set to 15ips instead of my usual 7.5ips on guitars. I love using tape emu on guitars and overheads exactly to tame the high end a bit. Thanks for the tip, though!

[danmanisa]

Very cool mix! Love the snare sound. Great balance between air and meat (Maybe a new Subway line of sandwiches "air and meat"?)
The reverb has been dialed in perfectly here. The tom sounds are the weakest link and I too had a great deal of trouble with them! They just sound a little flabby (not sure I even know what that means) and weak but they are not terrible by any means. Vocals are nice and light and sit well on top of the mix, very well done there. The guitars feel a touch bright, especially during the first round of solos. Again, not a deal breaker, but could use a little bit more body to reduce their harshness. Your punches and impacts into each section work really well, so it appears you have the compression of the overall song down! Well done!
The final solo is not as harsh, maybe because both guitars are not dueling like before.
Nice mix, very little wrong at all! A real contender!

[danmanisa]

I love using tape emu on guitars and overheads exactly to tame the high end a bit. Thanks for the tip, though!

Not sure if you'll understand this, but being an Australian, you cracked me up with the 'tape emu' remark! I just pictured an Emu (Aussie bird, similar to an Ostrich) with a set of headphones on at the side of a stage pressing buttons with its beak! Nice one!

[Mackanov]

Very cool mix! Love the snare sound. Great balance between air and meat (Maybe a new Subway line of sandwiches "air and meat"?)
The reverb has been dialed in perfectly here. The tom sounds are the weakest link and I too had a great deal of trouble with them! They just sound a little flabby (not sure I even know what that means) and weak but they are not terrible by any means. Vocals are nice and light and sit well on top of the mix, very well done there. The guitars feel a touch bright, especially during the first round of solos. Again, not a deal breaker, but could use a little bit more body to reduce their harshness. Your punches and impacts into each section work really well, so it appears you have the compression of the overall song down! Well done!
The final solo is not as harsh, maybe because both guitars are not dueling like before.
Nice mix, very little wrong at all! A real contender!

Thanks man! Yeah, the toms were very flabby but they kind of worked with the feel I was trying to give, but maybe I could have tweaked them a bit more. I really appreciate your comments.

[Jeronimo Mora]

Wooooooooah. Explosive entry.

Nice! The snare sounds a little boxy to me, as do the toms. An EQ sweep and dip on them would have helped take out the offenders. My best bet would be somewhere in 200-500hz. Removing the BG vocal in the first part was an interesting choice. I felt the guitars had a little too much presence. Backing off 3khz helps dull them out a bit. The vocals and guitars fight during the faster bit. Duller guitars would have led to a clearer vocal.

Great job!

[redworks]

have not read what others have said so i will probably repeat some stuff. overall the mix has really good feel except the drums (in particular the snare) are a little too in your face. actually at times i feel like the drum kit is in front of the singer. the other stuff is cool. you have gone for a much more centered mix and still been able to get most of the elements working together (especially if you had pulled back on the snare). that makes the mix have a more direct approach and it seems to have worked pretty well, giving it a different feel from others mixes. dig the vocals, what you have going there sounds pretty right. good stuff.

[Mackanov]

Sounds like there is a bit of a top end artifact with the vocals and overheads. The vocals carry it the whole way thru the track and its much less noticeable on the overheads.

I have listened to the mp3 instead of the wav and I've got some things popping up that didn't on the export (I'm gonna blame Studio One's mp3 converter for now )

This will be very likely the harmonic exciting at the mastering phase. I'll be more careful from now on.

It sounds like the compression is hurting the bass a bit as well. Especially in those areas that are so important to the bass' clarity. Its almost inaudible in the first verse and lacks intensity throughout the song.

That bass was mixed lower than I ever did, and on top of that, it's even lower at the beginning. I should have mixed it 2dB louder. Oh well.

At the end of the song you have some clipping. I think its being caused by the guitars, but the overhead track may have something to do with it as well. A little hard to tell. I hear it in a few places throughout the track but its evident in the last 30 seconds of the song.

This is not present on the wav file, only on the mp3. I should have checked before I uploaded. I'm guessing S1 isn't very keen on inter-sample peaks when converting to mp3. Bummer.

[Mackanov]

have not read what others have said so i will probably repeat some stuff. overall the mix has really good feel except the drums (in particular the snare) are a little too in your face. actually at times i feel like the drum kit is in front of the singer. the other stuff is cool. you have gone for a much more centered mix and still been able to get most of the elements working together (especially if you had pulled back on the snare). that makes the mix have a more direct approach and it seems to have worked pretty well, giving it a different feel from others mixes. dig the vocals, what you have going there sounds pretty right. good stuff.

Thanks for your review and input man! You actually didn't repeat almost anything, so I'm gonna take this as a good sign

[belleym]

There is a lot of click in the kick drum compared to a low pass on the snare drum. In my car, the guitar solos had a little too much high end eq and added distortion for my tastes. This caused the guitars to become piercing at certain points. Great balance of instruments in your mix. I didn't lose anything with any of the instruments throughout.

[chckn8r]

Yeah baby... YEAH!!!! Now, that's an explosion of a start! That got a HUGE grin on my face.

This mix really sounds as though they're playing live in a nice big auditorium. I like the direction you took with the vocals - they're sitting nice in the mix. I'd have probably made those delays muted through the phrase and let them come through as throws at the end - the delay feedback sometimes poke through the main vox a bit too much in the first section.

This mix is incredibly bright. It brings out the definition, but also can get a bit biting in the larger parts of the song. Sounds as though you put some heavy EQ on the guitars - I thought they might sit a bit better with everything if they had a bit more "meat" in the low-mids.

Just loving the energy you've eeked out of the drums man! That is just simply killer!

Cheers, D

[Minianimal]

Hey Mackanov, Fellow Studio One user

First off, How are you liking Studio One? I have made the jump and I am only mixing in Studio One right now. I got a chance to use some of the audio stretch/quantize features for the June mix and it worked almost flawlessly! I love it

I really like the vibe you got here. I think you were able to get pretty close to what you were aiming for. It sounds raw yet put together. The use of the second vocal throughout the track was a smart decision. The only real distracting thing to me was the biting frequency in the guitars. They sounded a bit harsh. I ended pulling some 2k-3k out of mine to smooth them out a little bit and make some room for that area in vocal track. Solid mix overall!