That’s funny! And it’s just my opinion of course 
If you lowered the reverb to clarify the vocal, you could always just increase the pre-delay of the reverb to keep the vocal intelligible.
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Hey, thanks JJ! @Jon-Jon Appreciate those how-to clips, will give those a spin later today. I totally get that one can practice and train one’s voice to better abilities, and I’m actually pretty happy with the improvement I’ve made in recent years. But there is always room for more improvement! 
First of all thanks for having me on this one! I’ll take any chance I can get (within reason) to test out a new piece of gear. Opportunities like this are good to get your system in order because you’re forced to use your stuff in a practical realistic manner, but free from the pressure and expectations of on-the-clock billable hours.
As of late, I think your mixes by large are showing pretty good instincts on balance and continuity. The biggest improvements probably being the rhythmic and groove related elements are less buried, which shows the foundation you’re building your mixes on is coming together. And I think you’ve figured out how to get the dynamics of the vocals under control. Having the music intuition but not all of the technical tools (skill set wise) is actually a real good place to be in. Because its much easier to learn DAW/plugin technique and how to develop flavors than it is to learn how a mix ‘ought’ to be balanced. If someone doesn’t have that, then all the mixing bashing in the world won’t make much sense. That’d be like trying to train a scientist to do a project but they can’t quite grasp the objective of a research project. lol.
To nit pick a little, I’m glad you cut the intro shorter. Didn’t even think to suggest that actually. I wish there was more definition in the bass. A little more bright high end air that catches the nuances of finger slides and pickup noises on the strings. Even if you have to add a smidge of overdrive to get there. To me that gives the mix character and suggests to the listener that they’re not hearing a midi track (even if they are).
If you’re going to go back and play with this, definitely save that mix. On a second round (if you do one) I might try scooping just a little more mids out of those toms and maybe trying to add a little more sustain. Hard to say what frequency, but if you can get them just a little brighter without taking away the boominess I think it would help. But by subtracting low mids, you’re not gunning to eliminate problem frequencies. You’re subtracting mids to make the low bottom and high end stand out. …and this is being anal, but I think the ride cymbal gets lost on the choruses.
If you end up re-shooting, I was wondering what it’d sound like if you jumped up octave and doubled at the third verse. So you have two vocals going at once, one at a high octave and blended with another at a lower octave. Its a little trick that used at times to add energy.
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Hey man @Chordwainer this is good. The singing is fine. I think that you have captured yourself well. I mean can and will you improve as a vocalist with practice? YES. but that will take a lot a while. I would say mix wise the first thing i noticed is that the vocals need to have some mids cut to mesh it with the vibe of the instruments. Too boxy making it sound nasally. I think you could also add a little grit to the vocal in the chorus’s. otherwise i am digging this.
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Great comments @Jonathan and Eric @redworks, thanks! There will unquestionably be a revision, I would never expect anything to be entirely right the first time…! I like the ideas about getting the vox to mesh better and the EQ suggestions are good ones.
I also like the idea of maybe doubling an octave-higher track for the last verse to add interest-- just not sure I can hit the notes without sounding way strained, likely outside my narrow range. Will check it out though. I could also ask my wife to do that because that’d be right in her wheelhouse in terms of range.
And just for info, aside from some automation through the song, the vocal’s treatment is the same from end to end, I haven’t automated any other fx changes – honestly, I’ve never done that on anything that I can recall, just haven’t ventured in to trying to learn the ins and outs of doing that yet. But I see lots of commentary about approaches like that to add interest, so maybe it’s time I did. 
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Right not hard to do in most daw’s and it can make a big difference in a subtle way. unfortunately it does require automation and as we know we both are automation phobes.
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Really nice song Chordwainer.
Every elements sound good. Only some advices :
- i was distract by the disparition of the hihat during choruses
- i can ear something distorted at the right in my Focal headphone, is it a saturated guitar, an organ ? It is too far to be really clear.
- you need maybe some movement during the choruses
- the balance is pretty good but you should maybe improve the paning (in general)
- the delay on the solo is nice !
David
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Hi folks, I’ve added V2 to the OP, incorporating the comments thus far. Some really good input, thank you to all! Here are steps I took for this rev:
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Did some EQ work in the low-mids to decrease mud and oversaturation in the lead vox, bring out the definition of the bass more
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Increased the mids and grit on the bass to also enhance its definition
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Added some ride cymbal in the second verse and chorus for a little ear candy, to make it sound a little different from V1/Ch1
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Added a harmony vox track to the third verse and chorus, again to add interest and change it up from what came before
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Adjusted reverb on all vocals
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Adjusted bgv levels & EQ to make them a little more prominent
I don’t plan to completely re-track the lead vox at this stage; I think these additions have helped significantly in providing more of an arc to the song than was present before (that was probably the biggest key insight). That said, I definitely plan on taking advantage of the tips that JJ @Jon-Jon provided for improving my vocals, but as Eric @redworks pointed out, that’s going to take time. But per @Jonathan’s suggestion, an octave-higher doubled vocal for V3/Ch3 was just too high for me; the harmony line gets the same thing done though, IMO.
Please let me know what you think of these changes. Again, thank you for listening!
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Nice improvement on the bass.
The vox sits now more nicely in the mix.
Harmony vocal is really cool.
Just you should maybe quantize a bit the drums i can ear imprecisions. We’re not robots but i found it disturbing.
Don’t be afraid to push up the crash and ride cymbs !
Nice word ! Congrats
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Hmm…do you have an LA-2A plugin?
Thanks David! @Moa22 Looks like I was posting my revision just as you were making your first comment. I appreciate your listen and suggestions.
Funny about the drums… I actually used the “humanize” function to build in some variation because I thought it was too much on-grid at first… I really don’t like it when things are rigidly on tempo all the time (just ask Patrick @ptalbot!).
Also on the cymbals, you are correct, they’re a bit subdued. Honestly, I am always a little concerned to push them too hard, because I have substantial hearing loss in the high frequencies and I’m afraid of putting to much high-end sizzle into the mix. I need hearing aids!
No, afraid not-- but from the analog summing thread, I have a few plugs I am planning to audition to see if they make any improvements in my sound. Would that be how you’d envision using an LA-2A plug @Jonathan?
just throwing it out here as a general thing. Not necessarily for this song but could be a possibility
one way to “build” a vocal…is to start off really small, lol. If you start off and you are already near the top of your range and volume etc…then where can you go?
If you feel that vox are a temporary weak point for you, maybe try some stuff where you have the verse at a near whisper
If you start off small and intimate and then build along with doubling and processing the chorus etc, you can work around some limitations
This song came to mind. Even though this guy has a stupid crazy range, he still starts off really small and weak to emphasize the build even more
warning, I find the song very depressing lol. I just post it for education. i wont listen to it all lol
Na…no biggie. Was wondering what would happen if you threw it on the electric rhythm guitar. The piano was completely uncompressed. Did you end up mashing it at all?
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OH! WAIT! I just remembered…do you have the izotope vintage compressor?
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Sounding tighter. I reakon you could bring the volume of the vocal down to start with. It is cutting through nicely and is sounding good to me now. Man this is sounding good once you get those volumes sorted out.
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Nope, used all three of your tracks as-is, no processing. They sound awesome, I had no reason to mess with 'em.
Yep, sure do. Comes as one of those break-out-able components in Ozone. Do tell, what do you have in mind for it?
Uck. That is the most non-vintage sounding compressor I’ve heard. Never mind. Sorry. I assumed it’d mimic a 1176/La2a or something. Just tried it on several things (I’ve never actually loaded it before).
I was gonna suggest mashing the electric to try and get the rhythmic strikes a little chunkier.
I did figure out a way to mimic one though. Don’t you have a Voxengo Voxformer? (thought I remembered you picking one up but that could be someone else). Try this.
The key is how the two compressors work together. Three simple steps to mimic. The key is twiddling the attack knob on step 3.
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Yep, sure do, that was my go-to vocal treatment plug before I got Nectar. Happy to hear what you have figured out!
-open an instance on the electric rhythm track
Set comp 1 and comp 2 about to where I have them 10:00, 2:00 wish
Open the editor
Adjust the attack…and be amazed at how the guitar jumps forward
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We were typing at the same time… afraid I’ll need a little more verbiage to go along with the screengrab. There is nothing labeled “1” for example, just 2 and 3… it’s not clear to me what the three simple steps are supposed to be.
Oops, we’re still typing simultaneously! I see your list-- will give it a go!