I have very little experience recording and mixing songs, but I do it with my band as a hobby. Can you guys pick this apart and try to give me some pointers on how to make the mix sound better? It feels like it’s lacking, but I can’t figure out where. I have tried adjusting things, but I don’t feel like I am making any progress.
Is the tone of the rhythm guitar that comes in at the start crap? Are there some frequencies that I should shave off of the entire mix?
Thanks!
I kinda dig the rawness of this mix. Reminds me of something off Nirvana’s Bleach album, sonically, not musically. Sounds like the guitar that starts it off could use a more intense high-pass filter, and maybe a boost in the midrange magic. The drums sound like they’re over compressed, particularly the cymbals which sound warbly. If you don’t have much experience the best advice I could give you would be to use the “less is more” philosophy, and just try a bunch of settings and see what sticks. I will say the rhythm guitar down the middle sounds like it’s clogging up the vocals and drums, I’d pan it left since you got another guitar in the right.
I’ll have to check it out on my monitors,but on my initial listen, it seems like the guitars have a bit too much hair on them. That’s just my own personal taste. Overall, it feels like some upper mids stacked up in the mix. Makes it a bit fatiguing, but I’ll check it on my monitors 
For being new to mixing, you’re off to a great start! Keep it going!!
I kinda like it, makes it sound aggressive. Not sure if that was the intention, but I think it works. They are mixed a little too loud, but I think that could be remedied if it was panned to the left and brought down a hair.
I went with the less is more approach and got rid of some stuff. I did a bit of EQ and pan adjustments, got rid of some drum compression, and fixed the rhythm guitar a bit.
better or worse?
I am usually a compression person but i think this secound version better serves the song. I think that the vocals do need to come up a bit and i would try cutting more around 400 hz.
Cut a little more around 400 Hz, increased the vocals a little bit, as well as a little bit of volume and oomph on the bass.
Yeah i think that is the right direction. It may be a little too much but i think it is just a case of needing to pull back the volume on the vocal a tad. For some reason I still feel like it is not sitting right yet. I like what you did with the bass.
I just shaved a bit of the harshness off of the vocals and added a de-esser to the main vocal track. Also put a tape sim on the main bus and I think it kind of tied it all in a bit more. Thanks for all the help so far!
man you are working fast at this. it is almost like you are anticipating what i am going to say. I think the overall output is a little hot but that is definitely sounding better.
Hi I heard this track right off, but I wanted to hear others takes. It sounds much better on all fronts right now. Please take this with a grain of salt. You are singing a little flat in the verse. You last words are on, but the first wander a little. You are on in the chorus. That is getting very picky, but when you come down to the final mix, you could check that. It is easy not to say anything and I know folks have no problems tweaking instrument tracks, but when it comes to their voice, it gets personal.
Sincerely
Paul
I liked your first and second mix much better than the third. The vocals sound way too loud on the third mix. and the guitars sound smaller and muffled. I’m listening on a laptop, though, so take my word with a grain of salt.
My first impression was that the guitars are very full in the lower mids …maybe too full, but the biggest issue that hit me, was that your vocals aren’t sitting very well in the mix. It could be that the guitars are eating up all the space in the mix, and maybe your vocal could use a little reverb or delay effect to sit better.
If I had to pick a favourite mix of the first 3…I’d pick number 2.
Turn up the lead guitar licks in that last mix.
Sounding pretty good now.
Did you just backpedal?
No, I just listened to his 4rth mix…?..or was it his 5th?
Hard to compare them all back to back.
Maybe the OP should post them altogether, so that they’re easily accessed, without the need to scroll around to find them. Actually, this is often an issue when listening to the alternate mixes that people post. Maybe there’s an easy fix for that…?
How many mixes we got on this ship anyhow?
Let me count…One second…Brb…
Looks as though we’ve got 4.
I like the track - The chorus especially. (Actually, I just realised that the chorus reminds me of The Greg Kihn Band’s “Breakup Song”)
For me the bridge is the weakest point in the song - Somehow, the guitars all mellow out, but the drums keep thumping away with the same earnest enthusiasm of the verses. I think the track could be greatly improved with a bit more creative effort by the drummer there.
Mixwise, you’ve taken a few steps forward and a few steps back in subsequent mixes. The first mix sounds a bit harsh,the vocals seem a little distant compared to the upfrontness of the instruments, and it sounds a little too squashed overall, but frankly I think I prefer the overall attitude of it to the subsequent mixes. I especially like the crispness of the drums in the first mix, & I think the slightly oversaturated sound of the guitars suits the attitude of the song.
Mix 2 is probably the most “balanced” mix, but it isn’t as exciting, and you have some mud building up in the low mids. The vocals sound better in Mix 2, though.
Unfortunately on all the mixes, it seems apparent that the achilles heal is the overheads, as the cymbal crashes tend to poke out quite a bit when you brighten the drum sound. This is something that can be remedied with careful compression, but it can be tricky - automation may be the best option.
Another thing I can hear across all the mixes is a slightly “papery” over-saturated edge that sounds like you might be using some sort of tape sim or saturation plugin across the mix buss(?) In any case, it sounds like there may be some gain-staging issues on a few different things in the mix, where the input going into some plugins is too hot. Maybe check whether you are clipping the inputs on some of your plugins - “emulated analogue” plugins really need to gain-staged carefully, so that is worth checking out.
I have to agree with @feaker on the vocals - the bridge in particular caught my ear as being quite flat pitchwise in many spots.
Overall, cool track!
Thanks. I was on days off and the GF was working, so I was living in my studio. I’m back to work for the day, but will hopefully have a bit of time tomorrow to keep working on this.