Really nice song. My first pass on the multis. Those keys were pretty awful sounding though. And all those cute FX tracks… really grew on me ha.
Very interesting mix. I have to say that I compared your mix to Blair Hall’s, as I haven’t yet looked at the song. I’ll say that your vocals really stand out … in fact, it feels like the mic is down the vocalists throat, but I like it. 
I’m curious what you did with mixing or processing. Also, the steel guitar has an amazing presence and ambience. Those two elements really stand out, but your drums sound like they’re in another room. The drums are probably where Blair’s mix really shines. Hmm … combine the best of both mixes and there might be true cosmic bliss. 
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Probably because I slammed him with an LA2A ha… he was moving around a lot during the performance apparently. the snare has a huge verb on it… perhaps too much? Anyways thanks for checkin it out.
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Ah, good ole LA2A, that could be the magic.
The snare stands out more than the other drum elements, the verb sounds nice but puts the snare way back in the mix IMO. I think your kick is pretty present but I had to listen for it. Maybe it’s tying in with the bass really well. They’re kind of inseparable until I listen really close. The snare verb may need some pre-delay to come up front? The cymbals or overheads/rooms aren’t coming through that much though. So I think the drums in general aren’t featured prominently, but that could be a Country music genre thing. From what I know of Country (which could be very little), having the vocal and steel guitar outstanding is a defining factor. The drums could just be backbeat support. But I feel you could integrate them a bit more. My opinion might change once I try to mix it myself.
That said, I had a good feel from your mix. Focusing on the feeling people have listening to it is probably the ultimate judge of art, and the feeling is there. Now it’s maybe some tweaks on a few details.
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Pretty cool mix. It has that country-approved HUGE vocal sound. I think there maybe just a little too much 200hz in the vocal. Just a little reduction might improve clarity.
Personally, I’d like a little less room on the drum sound, and a little more space “behind” the vocal. The vocal is pretty dry and upfront, and it contrasts just a bit too much with the roomy drums, which makes the drums by comparison sound a bit “way off in the distance”.
Maybe a bit of a fatter, beefier snare sound would work better in this context too.
Nice work!
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How to beef up a snare? I am already parr comping it. Maybe the reverb is just burying it. Thanks for the specific advice!
Maybe ill try the 200 i take from the vocal and put it on the snare.
T
Really enjoyed this!
Comments (which have been almost all covered by everyone else):
- This is probably due to my country-ignorance, but I feel like the vocal is floating above the mix in the more “stripped down” sections and not just sitting at the top of the mix. As @ColdRoomStudio mentioned, the 200hz could come down… and definitely trade that for snare 200hz, that will add some instant oomph to the snare.
- I really like the drum tones, I’d bring them up and a bit more to the front. Snare sounds great to me, even with the sauce on it, but it does make it sit back further. I’d even try just bringing the snare up (with the rest of the kit) and seeing how it sounds with the reverb intact. I like the idea of having a really nice long snare verb on a track like this… but maybe that’s a bit too 80’s rock ballad…
- looooove the slide guitar and the place it takes in the mix, really enjoying how you’ve separated things in the stereo field.
It’s cool AB’ing between your mix and mine, 2 very different approaches to the track!
Cheers!
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In the cold light of the morning, here is V2 ha. thanks for all the comments guys.
I found the overheads to be really strange sounding… like phasey and also extremely bright.
This is the first time I have tried some M/S processing.
The vocal was definitely too loud so I tried backing it down.
Also tried Andrew Scheps rear bus trick…
@blairhall1974 how did you approach the overheads? it sounds so clean and controlled, which is what I heard but couldn’t find as quickly as I wanted too.
Drums are still too low meh… should have listened thoughtfully first before posting.
I just used my standard approach to OH: Pro-Q3 to hi/low pass and notch out some ugly stuff. Compression, in this mix I used Kramer Pie, because I saw someone else use it on OH and I thought it sounded cool… it’s actually VERY light compression, mostly pulling the snare down a few db… I liked the dynamics of the track so I just kinda wanted to control the louder bits. Then Oeksound Soothe to try and tame any leftover resonances.
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That is exactly what I thought. The vocals are crispy clear and they stand out perfectly.
Yes, the vocals sit in the mix now. My only thought was the verb stands out a bit on the first verse vocal. It could be great and I am just comparing it to the other mix.
Hi Taylor, somehow I missed your second mix. Nice improvement! I’m only listening on cruddy speakers, but I can already hear that the vocals are much more in the same space as the drums now…
I think James is on to something here…
I think you could draw back some of the original intimacy you had on vocal and still keep the sense of space by eq’ing some of the midrange “honk” out of just the reverb on the vocal. That would bring the vocal forward because the reverb wouldn’t be competing with it in that crucial midrange area, and it make the effect of the reverb more subtle, drawing less attention to itself.
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Wow thanks, I ended up automating the reverb down in that first verse. How often do you eq reverb?
I also did a couple more passes, with a new crappy little controller but it has 8 faders (tiny). I was able to automate vcas of all the main groups in a single pass for the first time, that was really something. Kind of an aha moment.
What’s the controller? I have had my eye on a Faderport for a long time, as well as some multi-fader alternatives. And which DAW do you use? I learned the simultaneous automation tracking stuff in Pro Tools some years ago but haven’t tried it in Reaper.
Pretty regularly…come to think of it, I’d say almost always! I’m generally HP filtering reverb; More often than not I’ll LPF it too.
Vocal reverbs sometimes also get a cut somewhere in the mids. I sometimes find plates in particular have a very “honky” midrangey thing going on that tends to stack up on the vocal and cause it to be distanced and/or take some of the “expensive sound” we’re often trying to get on a lead vocal.
Its a nanoKONTROL… did not expect it to be as seamless as it is. For the price and for me a person with very limited real estate on my desk, its perfect for now.
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Huh,… it never ends. What about something like a Lexicon where you kind of dial in the reverb times based on frequency? Thats almost like eqing already right?
So true! I’ve always been intrigued by reverb/delay/ambiance, so when Bob Clearmountain recently released his plugin, I learned so many cool things about his process from watching this video. Bob goes really deep with spacial processing… The great thing is, you don’t necessarily need to buy his plugin to do these things - it’s all about putting FX chains together.
I haven’t had any experience with a hardware Lexicon unit, or even a plugin version IIRC… But since sustained sounds have a higher average RMS and thus are generally more apparent than shorter sounds, I assume that shortening the reverb time of a frequency might diminish its apparent volume… hard to say…I suspect the effect might be more subtle than eq. Worth experimenting with!
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Oh yeah, I looked at that too. Do you have the nanoKONTROL2 (the little one) or the nanoKONTROL Studio (the bigger one)?