This is so powerful. Man, your guitar is so beautifully mixed. Gorgeous.
Definitely an improvement over v1. I really like the vocals being louder. It adds to the impact cuz I can hear it more effortlessly and also can hear the emotion in your voice better.
A few suggestions:
Vocals - Definitely an improvement with them being more front and center. I think it’s just a smidge too loud, though, only cuz it feels unbalanced with the rest of the mix. Doesn’t “sit” comfortably with the rest of the mix. Feels like it’s on top. My thoughts: bring it down a tad (reference that Sweet Baby James piece, above). It is very dry, which I do like, but a touch of verb would help it sit better. Or at least bring back some of the slap delay. I didn’t listen in my Sennheisers, but I hunch that a little boost in the high end would help.
Your vocals are gutsy and “real” and drip emotion. A bit pitchy though. Smooth that out and you are sittin’ good.
The other piece is to bring the BGV up. They are nice, but too soft. Actually potentially very powerful. Bring 'em closer to the volume of the main vocals. Maybe do some autotune on the vocals.
Strings - watch the cutoffs at the end of string phrases. Like at -1:49. They end too abruptly. Makes it sound very MIDI. Fade it out more smoothly.
Balances are great. Love this a lot. Nicely done. Hope that helps. Gotta run but I’ll check in later.
Thanks for listening closely and your suggestions @Tesgin. I’ll try them out.
I had them closer to the lead vocal, but brought it back down to bring the lead vocal up front. Maybe went a bit too far.
I did tune the lead vocal using Reaper’s Reatune by hand followed by the tuning program in Nectar 3, both quite lightly to keep the authenticity and emotion. I’ll check it with fresh ears to see if there’s anything left that stands out too much. I also used Nectar (the entry level version) on the background vox. Might try my newly acquired Nectar 3 full version to do some more tweaking.
Because of a comment on the lack of ‘movement’ in the strings I used a more powerful articulation. I have little experience with recording articulation (or drawing it in with automation). I tried but couldn’t get it to work. So I just changed it to a more abrupt type (forget what it’s called), and I think that’s the cut-off you heard. I should really check out how it’s supposed to be done… Right now I’m about 200 km away from my studio so I’ll have to wait till the weekend.
Oh I think I already implicitly answered your question concerning my DAW: it’s Reaper! I started out with Cubase many years ago but the updates were expensive. And to be honest, I hardly knew what I was doing . Reaper is ridiculously inexpensive and I really appreciate their business philosophy! It was not easy to learn to use, but I feel quite confident with it now (even if I only use a part of what it’s capable of).
For some reason that’s what I was thinking, that you’re a REAPER guy. As am I. Maybe I was remembering that from another post somewhere. Anyway, Reatune is awesome. I used to be a Sonar Studio guy years ago. Switched to REAPER and never looked back. Absolutely blown away with its features and the support community.
And, yeah, your comment about authenticity and emotion: I agree. You accomplished that in spades here. It’s very moving. Again, bringing the vocals up accomplished making them the focus.
If you have a moment, I’d love your feedback on my post of Wings For You. Reason being I incorporated some of your feedback on my guitar work. Same plugins. I love, love, love Stereoizer. Spooky how much that makes a guitar sound more authentic. Thanks for the tips.
But yeah, @ColdRoomStudio will have great tips for you. This is a special song. Mix is very strong. Not only is your treatment of the guitars very cool, but your playing was excellent. Like I said earlier, you did your Mom proud. This is really nice.
I haven’t read any of the other comments, just going off of your second mix and having read your comments.
Love what I am hearing so far. There is nothing I would note that is not personal taste… and if it;s ok, I will place them below after I have finished listening. The additions are great, the strings/keys work well and that piano is perfect!!! Adds warmth but is also quite unsettling in a good way that compliments the song.
Mate, I can’t hear any “issues” in this at all. It’s got great push and pull and I love how everything (particularly the vocal spread and balance once you have all the voices going) fits together.
Ok, personal taste things
The main one is the bass. To me, a couple of notes get lost at times, but the main thing is (in my humble opinion) it is not strong enough. The bass could be your most emotive tool here but I feel like we hear the main note and it fades very quickly and is set back some. I don’t mean that the playing should change, but maybe fiddle with the compression and eq to even the notes out more and bring out more sustain.
I have pasted a link to a James Taylor song that highlights what I mean. The bass is simple but it moves you and carries the strength of the song. I tried to find one that fits in the zone of what you’ve done here.
That’s really about it. I love it! Well done, what a stellar rework. It is so hard to rework a song you love, let alone one that is unbelievably close and personal to you! Kudos!
Yep, this is great Evert! Sounds great on my studio system. Here’s my only suggestion: Add a little space behind the vocal for the choruses. Whether that be some subtle, dark delays, or some heavily pre-delayed reverb, it will just lift those choruses ever so subtly, and really bolster the sonic “scene change” that happens.
Thanks Dan, appreciate your comments, including those on the bass. I know what you mean! I’m not a bass player and find it difficult to keep it simple on the one hand (comments from @Lophophora) going back to the root note when I can, while the notes tend to be long and the sustain I would like is simply not available from the sampled instrument I use. I do have a real bass guitar, but when I try to play it I always end up with dud notes and such… Just not a bass player I guess.
Anyway I’ll give it another try. Maybe repeating some of the notes so they seem to have a long sustain? How can such a basic instrument be so difficult to get right?
Thanks Andrew! Well I have a room and a small hall reverb going as well as a slapback delay, but I’ve intentionally made the lead vox a lot dryer to get it to come forward more. The background vox already have quite a lot of verb on them. Are you saying I should put more reverb (or delay) on the main vox or the background vox? Or should I make the space their in even larger (large hall)?
Not necessarily. I actually prefer delays for this sort of thing. The best way I could explain it is by way of demonstration. Check out what I’m doing on This Vocal
Obviously that is a much noisier, raucous song, but the same principles can be applied in a subtler way.
That is a great thread which I now wish I hadn’t missed when it came around. I will try some of the more advanced tricks you have up your sleeve Andrew, sounds fantastic!
I wouldn’t re-record it as to me, there is nothing wrong with the playing. I’m wondering more if you can perhaps get some parallel compression or similar going (I’m no good with multi-banding although I love the concept).
I’m sure there is a better name and way to explain this but I often do the following:
I send the bass to another track and put a low pass filter on it so that I only get the low lows (maybe 150-200 and below but I can’t recall off the top of my head exactly). Then I put a pretty solid compressor on it to even it out and bring out the sustain of the note. Then I can set (or even automate if needed) that low end independently to taste.
But don’t re-record it as it is simply a personal taste thing and it is absolutely fine as you have it.
Thanks again for all your great comments. I finally found some time to make what I hope is now my final mix. I think I took heed of most of your ideas. Had a lot of fun trying out Andrew’s delay and reverb tricks. I do think it improved the vocals on the whole, and specifically in the chorus. Even added a few (very subtle) throws in there. I redid the compression on the bass track with some sidechain comp (from Boz’s Manic compressor). I also noticed the piano track was not well in sync with the bass with a few notes way off, so I fixed that. The strings have a little more movement to them (mainly volume automation) and I panned them further out to the sides with some large room reverb (I’d forgotten the sends on the strings!). Lastly I added some more ‘air’ (from about +4 dB to +9 dB at 9,2 K) to the lead vocal with my go-to ‘character’ EQ (TDR Slick EQ). I’m not quite sure about that last move. In an earlier mix I emphasised the presence at around 1,8 K. Adding a lot of air seems to take away from that emphasis.
I just tried to add version 3 to the first post, but for some reason it wont work. So I’ll post it here.
. Reaper is ridiculously inexpensive and I really appreciate their business philosophy! It was not easy to learn to use, but I feel quite confident with it now (even if I only use a part of what it’s capable of).