Mixing This Muck

[Lunch Money]

Update:

Bass-- Since I didn't need distortion or EQ or anything in the amp, I swapped it out for mda combo, as suggested. Then I added a high pass filter above the minimum 10Hz (strangely, 16+ Hz started to have a negative effect) which removed some 'subliminal' muck. Then set a low pass filter below 2100Hz, filtering out some of the 'air' that I didn't want. With 2 distorted guitars and some vocals, I had enough air.

Rhythm Guitar 1-- Added a high-pass filter for above 80Hz as suggested, which didn't drastically affect the sound of the guitar. What seems 'missing' when it's soloed is compensated for by the bass. And then when the second rhythm guitar comes in, it's not missed at all.

Space Boy had to be tossed because I don't have time to automate it for my needs-- but I highly recommend people to check it out. For those of us who are a bit EQ-tweak-challenged (I like tweaking other things, but EQ starts to piss me off) it's worth the paltry $12.95.

Anyhow, the result:

Success! Dave's crap-tastic bass playing now sounds better than mine did.

You guys rock-- couldn't have done it without ya.

Of course, the deal's not done yet. Somewhere along the way I lost my drum settings (rendered to audio and must have done a 'replace') so I have to build them up from scratch again in order to shift drum parts around.

Anyhow, I'll keep you posted, and I'll probably be looking for last-minute help for Saturday's deadline. (please don't skip this thread! I'm a desperate man!)

Cheers,
Greg

[Lunch Money]

Update:

My ears are very tired. Trying to mix on a deadline isn't working for me, and I don't have proper monitors. My computer speakers and 3 different sets of headphones are all I have to go by right now, and while it sounds "fine" through one of the sets of headphones, it doesn't sound great through the other devices.

To me, that indicates that the mix sucks. <chuckle>

For people with fresh ears:

I need a few last minute opinions. This time I have provided audio, both 128kps and 192. The 128 REALLY colours the sound I find, so take that into account.

Since I only have about an hour at most [edit: ie. an hour tomorrow when I wake up; suggestions welcome up until 1pm EST, and then more in-depth suggestions will be helpful because by the time I get to them it'll be after the wedding] to do one last mix, you'll have to limit your suggestions to EQ, Levels, and Panning. The vocals are an exception, as it's still easy for me to also change the reverbs/compression/delays on those.

As I mentioned, the song is an 80's track. My friends and I try to do a tribute for other friends' special occassions. In this case, my buddy's getting married. As a result, we're recalling some of his past "exploits" and recommending that he stay unmarried and find a girl who likes to-- pardon my french-- chug cock. Hence, the name of the song.

There ARE explicit lyrics, so sensitive ears should not listen.

We can't sing. That's not something we can fix. In this case it was the thought that counts.

The bass player cannot play, as I mentioned.

The left-panned guitar is the Rhythm 1 I've been referring to. The right-panned one has made me pretty happy since day 1.

Er...

Well, here are the links:

Chug Cock 128kps

Chug Cock 192kps

So far, the project has been both wonderful and horrendous. You can tell by the laughter at the end of the track (unrehearsed, we cracked up once while yelling "chug cock!") that we had a good time; however, since I'm the main musician, producer, engineer, etc., this has taken up a LOT of my time. Somebody owes me some beer.

Note: I forgot cowbell! I have a fever-- and the prescription is MORE COWBELL!

Shoot. I'll add some in tomorrow.

Thanks for any quickly-implementable suggestions; in-depth suggestions still welcome as I'll be doing a more polished mix that I can give to him at a later date.

Greg

[RustedMonkey]

Damn! That song is great! I love the “Comon feel the noise” intro beat. You guys should do a collab project with Rusted Monkey. I think you may be being overly critical about the song since it has a deadline.

The only suggestion I have to make it sound more “80’s Metal” is reverb on the guitars. There were certain things bands could not get enough of in the 80’s. Jack Daniels, Cocaine, bad lyrics, Satan, and reverb.

I did a quick master of the song for ya. Brings the bass and vocals out a bit more.

http://rustedmonkey.com/music/Chug_Cock_192_m.mp3

For an example of polluting the guitars with reverb… here is the song I entered (disqualified for length) into this months KVR contest. The theme was Metal.

http://rustedmonkey.com/music/07-07-04- ... _lover.mp3

[jens]

Update:

Bass-- I added a high pass filter above the minimum 10Hz (strangely, 16+ Hz started to have a negative effect)

strange With what speakers are you monitoring?

Usually you can safely cut everything below ~30hz because most of the speakers can't deal with frequencies lower than than anyway...

In other words: Even if with your speakers it has a slightly negative effect (because you loose something
of the lowest end) the 'real life' of your song
(outside your lab) should benefit from it...

[valley]

Usually you can safely cut everything below ~30hz
...
the 'real life' of your song
(outside your lab) should benefit from it...

No crap!

It's worth runnign a few 'pop'[1] songs through a spectral analyser, and looking at the signal lower then 40hz. Typically you'll find that a lot of songs really don't carry much low frequency audio at all.

[1] IE doing this test with club or drum'n'bass music will not wield useful results.

[jens]

[1] IE doing this test with club or drum'n'bass music will not wield useful results.

Yes - definetely, as they aren't mixed'n mastered for home/supermarket/car-use but for the big'n bad sound-systems of our favourite local clubs

[Lunch Money]

Thanks for the feedback! I'd happily collab with Rusted Monkey. Cheers for the mastering example! Great job with the balance... when I try to boost the high end too much, the hats sound ultra-robotic, so I dunno what you did here!! Well done, though.

I'll throw a bit of 'verb on the guitars.

jens and valley: You're absolutely right. I'm only monitoring on crap-tastic computer speakers and a decent set of headphones (monitors will be my first major purchase when I start work again). Cheers for that. I have some cutting of frequencies to attend to.

Greg