Hey @terryhesticles I’m not into metal but it sounds good to me. Nothing obvious that’s wrong to my limited ears. Snare makes sense now, for me the synth stuff could be more prominent imho. Lyrics are clear except for the intro "cheap . . . " part, I’d never get that without the lyric sheet, could be louder? Art work is cool, did you do that? 
Good work!
Hey @ingolee haha yeah, I’ve been so focused on trying to get the vocals to work the synths are pretty much inaudible now.
I’ll definitely make a point of addressing that next time I dive back into the session.
Upon reflection it looks like there’s a few different words throughout the song that could do with some level automation, including that part you mentioned. I’ll get onto that for sure.
I used a text prompt within Adobe Firefly and had AI generate the image, then I did all the layout with the text etc in photoshop, so I guess I can take credit for half the artwork hehe
Cheers mate, appreciate the help.
Hi Terry, this is coming along really nicely! The vocal sounds really good and fills out the mix really well.
Overall, the mix feels like it is missing low mids. I’m missing that connection between the upper harmonics of the bass and the low end of the rhythm guitars that has the effect of gluing the frequency spectrum together. It has the knock-on effect of making the guitars sound a bit harsh, I think.
It might be a tad too heavy in the subs too. The floor Tom in the left channel actually sounds more subby than the kick drum - maybe a bit of judicious high passing on the drums would help there.
I wish I could hear all that cool bass a little better overall - it seems to be a little buried now that the whole mix is going.
This is a really cool track. I can imagine the mix will be a bit of a challenge, though. Nice work so far!
Hey there Andrew, thanks a lot man that gives me a nice bit of direction to focus my attention when i jump back in to the mix. Getting a solid bottom end has never been one of my strong suits so I’m not surprised it needs attention.
I’m almost contemplating outsourcing the mix, and get someone who actually knows what they’re doing to have a crack, for the benefit of the track.
I’ll see if i can’t implement your suggestions first and go from there. Thanks a heap mate.
I’m no expert on metal, Terry, but I have a lot of respect for it as a subgenre of Rock. It perhaps is still one of the more socially critical of the status quo genres out there. I don’t listen to hip hop/rap either, but there are some artists who take their messages seriously, and I ought to pay better attention to those who are trying to alert the masses of what’s going on.
The words remind me of the writers/actors strike, and other strikes this year. I feel we have been living in an age where billionaires and corporate greed is spreading the lie of how much they are hurting, so much they can’t even pay a living wage, and silently believe with AI and robots can obsolesce workers entirely from the economic equation, and they seem to forget that without people to buy their stuff there is no economic growth to be had after some windfall profits. Most people believe they won’t be affected by this right away, that their livelihood is safe for now, and they give them a break they don’t deserve. People do have the ultimate power; alas, they don’t know how to wield it. They rarely feel entitled to it, and maybe that’s just normal human behavior, and I’ve often wondered if we simply need to make our improvements steadily and gradually so people can get accustomed to having a little more money and time and not feel guilty about it. I think gradually reducing the full time work week by 1 hour a week for the next 20 years whilst increasing pay by $1/hour over this same time might achieve that guilt free transition that needs to happen and soon. A 20 year plan. as opposed to a revolution.
The song itself is sounding really really good, too!
There IS a bit going on @steban you’re absolutely right, and there’s quite a bit to unpack in your post but I won’t do it now because I haven’t got the time to give the reply that it deserves.
I think it’s important so I’ll be sure throw my 2 cents in in the near future.
After a bit more pretending to be a producer and finishing off some synth parts, as well as getting a couple of session guys to help out in spots (guitar solo & acoustic section) I think the track is finally starting to sound like an actual song.
It’s a pretty hot mix, but I wanted to see if it would hold up under pressure, and thankfully I think it sounds okay, but it’s still very much a work in progress so please don’t hesitate to point out anything whatsoever that may need attention.
Cheers
This is sounding like Metallica’s thinking man’s metal’s grandchild. I just relistened to both versions, first the newest, and I really love the acoustic/orchestral interlude, really impacting the dynamics in this new version. All too often metal can be so sustained at fullspeed/drive it becomes difficult to listen to too much, but Metallica showed it was okay to be more melodramatic and still be true to metal. And the previous version was still sounding great to me, chockful of tasty details and amazingly quite clear diction in the musical maelstrom without ever sounding too loud.
.But I feel the new version, maybe overall a louder mix, is somehow not too loud, vocals somehow sound even clearer possibly. But the brief soft bridge at 2:38 was well worth it. I won’t be surprised if you still tweak the mix because you are kicking ass in the production department, dude, but I think this is very close. Everyone has really stepped up to the plate performing on the song.
Haha, I’ll take that 
Yeah it was a bit of an after thought that section, and probably somewhat inspired by Megadeth’s ‘Holy Wars’ Flamenco break. I’m still waiting on a dude I hired to send me the flamenco solo for that part, and that should really be the icing on the cake.
Yeah I agree, I get quite bored by a lot of full-speed modern metal, especially with Cookie Monster vocals, it’s all a bit tiresome and played out.
I like a bit more melody with my metal, probably why I enjoy Mastodon so much.
Yep for sure, although they were fairly heavily criticized at the time for doing so.
I’ll have to take your word for it, It’s extremely hard for me to self-analyze my mixes, and they always end up sounding like shit to me.
So much so, I’ll probably end up outsourcing the final mix once all the instrumentation is locked in.
It’s definitely sounding better than where it started, but I still think it could be even more so, but not with my limited mixing chops.
Hey cheers @steban I really appreciate the words of encouragement, I agree the players who jumped onboard have done an insane job, really stoked.
Little update:
Finally got the last piece of the puzzle in today in the form of a pretty damn cool Flamenco guitar solo, so I think, as far as writing and instrumentation goes that’s pretty much a wrap.
Seriously, how bad is this mix? I’d really be interested to know (I won’t get hurt feelings i promise haha) so I can decide whether it’s worth getting someone else to mix it. I think it’s a good enough song that it almost deserves a pro sounding mix.
Cheers ya’ll.
After listening to the progression of the tune through all three mixes, all I can say is that this is really, really good. All the performances are precise, as they would need to be to compete for a spot in the mix. The drummer has at least four feet to keep the kick going, the flamenco solo adds a lot, and overall you’ve created a monster.
As to letting someone else mix it, I think you would have to give very specific input as to what you would change before turning it over, if anything. My only thoughts on what would make the mix better would be that each section of the performance should have an element that draws your attention a bit more specifically as the driver for that part. In addition, if there is in fact any way of doing it, bringing out the precision of the drum track a bit more would be nice, especially the machine gun kick.
All in all, you’d need to find somebody really good to improve on this. Great job.
It’s kinda weird the direction that the track has taken, from when i initially began, and in all honesty i never sought to get this many different players jumping on board to help out, but after the vocals went down I felt kind of obliged to try and take it to another level.
Haha yeah It’s certainly taken on a life of it’s own that’s for sure
After a bit of hunting around on Fiverr I stumbled across an engineer who works specifically within the genre, and he actually thought my mix was pretty solid, but reckoned there were certain elements that could be improved upon, specifically getting more clarity in the vocals and lifting the guitar tracks. And as you rightfully mentioned getting more attack and clarity out of the drums (apparently my room track wasn’t helping in that area), so it looks like we’re definitely on the same page as far as where the mix should go.
He’s got all the files now, so it’s out of my hands at this point. His demo reel sounding pretty tight so fingers crossed he hits a home run for me.
Yeah i agree there, for sure, and I did have that in mind when i was writing, and trying to maintain momentum by adding different elements as the track progresses, so we’ll see if he manages to convey that in the mix.
Hey cheers for the feedback, it’s been great getting input from everyone on here, it’s been been really helpful in the decision making process while creating this ‘monster’.
That is very nice!
So who did this guitar solo? It sounds like something I would have done. Sounds great! (3:25 guitar solo, until 3:55)
The intro feels like a direct copy of Pink Floyd “Money”, which may be quite appropriate, but seems ‘appropriated’ … ?
Some of my thoughts:
It seems like there’s too much going on, the intro vocal and digeridoo getting ‘lost’, and the too ‘modern’ sounding elements in the “high range” in mix elements competing. All the elements themselves are awesome! It’s just getting them all to work together, or to share the ‘stage’ at just the right time, is the key to the mix IMO. The original synth bass parts are great, but they tend to compete with the bass guitar performance. As I say, it’s all great “parts”, but they have to “play together” in an ultimate performance. No small challenge there, it’s aiming for “song of the century” in a sense. 
It will be interesting to see how this evolves. I’ll be very curious how the outsourced mixer handles it!
Ha, interesting framing, since “this monster” alluded to in the title is the globalist Kabal trying to tear everything down! The purveyors of the Planet of the Slaves. We used to marvel at “Maui Wowie”, now we’re repulsed by “Maui Howee?” (DEW). Prayers for Maui natives and residents at this time, stand up to the BS imposed on you! Mahalo!
Hey Stan, yeah he’s a hired session muso by the name of Martin Dalesio, based in Chile. Super cool cat, and faarking amazing player.
I don’t think i could get my fingers to move that fast playing air guitar 
“Pink” who? Nope never heard of him 
Yep, couldn’t agree more, and seems to be a problem I face with every mix I attempt. Things start getting cluttered, and all of a sudden you’ve got a hot mess with no real clarity and definition.
Which is why I felt the song deserved a lot better than what I could achieve hence the reason I’ve decided to hand it off to a mix engineer.
I’m really excited to see where he takes it to be honest.
Cheers mate.
Interesting characterization. If you see me post something in the near future, you may get credit for the prophesy. 
I like that you’ve brought in other people, collabing can be really productive. I think it’s smart that you’re using pros, obviously they have some kind of track record that qualifies them but it also puts you in control because they’re obligated to try and make you happy. It’s hard sometimes to tell a buddy or a volunteer that something’s not working and there’s probably some hard decisions to be made as Stan says. But there’s a lot of great stuff here and the flamenco is a nice touch for sure. You have our attention!
You mentioned using AI on the graphics and to me the credit belongs to you, whatever you did led to the results that are good; the software is just a tool that did nothing until you came along.
Yep absolutely, it defintely makes the entire process a lot smoother that’s for sure. And the thing I’ve found working with pros is so long as I’m clear with my direction, mood and intent of the song at the outset, it becomes a very hands-off process. I haven’t had to ask for any revisions from any of the guys who worked on this track and thankfully they all nailed it first time around.
It’s a great way to work if you don’t mind spending money haha
I know man, for sure. I’m pretty sure we’ve all been there, waiting…and waiting on buddies to lay down a part. Shit, I’m still waiting on a mate to lay down a guitar solo for me from 3 songs ago 
Cheers @ingolee it’s nice to see a plan come together that’s for sure. It’s great to have a platform such as this to bounce ideas around too with such knowledgeable people, it’s really helped move the song in the right direction.
Okay man I’ll take credit for it haha, coz i know the AI won’t. Now that intro on the other hand, that’s another story 
Indeed I have. “DEW blast”, dedicated to Maui. They have to tell you what they are planning. It absolves them (supposedly) of the karma. Implied consent. I’ve been diving pretty deep into the whole thing, I could probably write a small book at this point, but so could many other people. In fact, multiple books were published on Am-z-n as early as Aug 10 about the tragedy, and about how it’s due to “cl-m-t- change”. Yeah right. The timing is suspicious, since just to get a book ISBN could take several days. And the ‘blast’ happened on 8/8 … the “Lion’s Gate portal” date. The books were apparently written by AI, which only takes a few minutes? Strange days indeed.
