MIX CHALLENGE - MC083 December 2021 - Winners announced

[Saccharine_trust]

Mix: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1c-Z0Da ... sp=sharing

Mix strategy: I wanted the songs mellow, etheric vibe to be the overall sense of accomplishment when going through the mix process - without covering up too much of the characteristics of the recordings, with the tight pluck- and vocal-style. The bass also has a leading-character that I wanted to be clear-cut throughout the song.
Also working with some m/s (*sum/diff) balance processing, was a new challenge for me since the concept of sum/diff has been a bit out of my grasp since analysing/reading up on it a bit during the last couple of weeks. Feedback on my process greatly appreciated!

Vocals: 1. The puffs and lows were treated mostly through a multiband-compressor and dynamic eq, also a slight overall cut with a low-shelf eq. (I do not own soothe, smooth operator or anything like it - so it takes a combination of plugins to smoothly fix puffs.) Sharpness fixed through waves Deesser and Fab MB.
2. 3-part compression on the lead to level the transients and put the vocal where I wanted it in terms of the instrumental mix.
3. Lowering the LEAD vocal by 5 db on the chorus to blend with the chorus-dub. The chorus dub got re-widened with 'waves s1' and with NI Raum (adding some cosmic reverb as well.)
Guitars: 1. Rode used for upper harmonics; centered, high-passed, lowered in dB and reverbed(valhalla vintage nonlin) (think tight overhead-backdrop.)
SM-58 used for lower warmth and guitar-body (clean transient-compression with TDR Kotelnikov.)
2. Solo guitars: Melody guitar treated with RC-20 tape wobble(using the mix-knob to create a phase-effect) and a (Arturia Rev plate-140) reverb. Harm-guitar going through Logic's stock-1176-emulation, (Phat-FX) Exciter and Saturation.
3. ALL guitars grouped and sent to a mono-instance of NI Raum cosmic reverb at 16% and waves Vitamin for a balanced stereo-width.
Bass: 3 EQ's (Pro-Q2, TDR Slick EQ, PuigTech EQP1A), Valhalla Room RV at 4%, a touch of Logic Platinum Digital compressor emulation, (Microshift) chorus at ~20%, (Fabfilter) Multiband for low/mid compression and expanding upper harmonics. Sent to a AUX with 2 instances of chorus at different hz and mix, with highpass-filter - to spread the harmonics of the stand-up-bass sound.

Sum/Diff (m/s) & Bus-mixing:
Instrument Sides: Instrument bus bounced to audio before making Instrument bus into mono and cutting all mid-info with fabfilter m/s EQ. Also high-passing side-info for a non-boomy stereo sound.
Instrument MONO-BUS: Summed to mono & Low-mid-cuts and high-boost with TDR Slick EQ.
Both instrument-busses given sonic character with RC-20 and Fabfilter Saturn.
Vocal bus: Both vocals go through a dual-mono (waves SSL) Bus compressor as well as a TrueVerb Room-preset (with more space and distance.)
Final Mix Bus: Everything going through TDR Kotelnikov master compressor, Fabfilter Pro-Q Left/Right-balancing, Fabfilter Pro-Q M/S-balancing, (waves SSL) Bus compressor (dual mono,) & Acustica CERIZE master compressor (slow-acting parallell compression.)

I hope you enjoy the results of my first stage mix as much as I do. I work on a MacBook with logic, with DT 990-headphones althroughout my mixing. Some final listens before bouncing are on an old, trashy (Creative) 2.1 desk speaker setup while making food (through the walls) just to hear what cuts through and what is over the top in the mix.
- Happy Mixing!

[Sgravone]

Hello everybody! This is my first time partecipating to a mix challenge even if I'm following this website since couple of years.
I approaced the mix with a simple mindset, on most of the tracks I've used only a SSL strip channel plugin, only on vocals I've used some more saturators and multiband compressions.
As effects I've used only a short reverb and a slap delay (but rerouted into the reverb as well).
I felt like it was a very "human" song, a bit imprecise here in there and so I decided to embrace this feeling and give it one more push in that "analog" direction replicating an old tape sound.

Hope you like it!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fVWRk7 ... sp=sharing

[harryc1344]

Hello all. Thanks to John for providing the song.

As well as the artist’s references, I also referenced ‘For The Sake Of The Song’ by Townes Van Zandt. I love the high-low-left-right lopsided wonkiness of the acoustic being panned 100% left and the bass being panned 100% right.

Acoustics and Bass– I used the Rode mic for the main acoustic sound (panned left), the SM58 mic was turned into a reverb/room sound using a Valhalla Vintageverb chamber (panned right). The bass is panned to the right. There’s nothing too unusual here – some saturation, eq, compression.

Guitar harmonics/Guitar melody lead – These tracks were treated relatively similarly. They are high and low passed, and they both have a slight tremolo effect. The lead guitar is also going through an Ampeg amp sim and Soundtoys’ Radiator.

Main vocal – The vocal is de-essed at the start and end of the chain. There is some standard EQ, compression, and saturation. I cut out any distracting breathing or mouth sounds and I also used selection based processing in logic to manually de-ess anything that wasn’t caught by the de-essers.

Vocal chorus double – I used flex editing in logic to align the sibilant consonants of the double track to the main vocal. I decided to make the double into a soft, woolly, reverby thing rather than a more conventional doubled vocal – I wanted it to sound like the recording engineer was opening a door to a big chamber behind the vocalist during the choruses. I heavily de-essed the double track to stop any sibilance from splashing about in the reverb.

I struggled to get the very start of the song to sound natural due to the guitar and bass being cut right on the transients. I ended up using the ‘speed up’ fade in Logic to emulate the sound of a turntable starting up.

Good luck to everyone.

MIX: https://www.dropbox.com/s/heu1xohb2ea75 ... 4.wav?dl=0

[alelachowski]

Hi there audiolovers,

I got this challenge when I received an e-mail from admin saying I am out too much, lol. So, with a short time, what can I say? Well... I didn't spend much time doing cleaning and etc. Since this song was recorded as it is, and there is not much tracks, I did the basic.

Acoustic Guitars: To solve many issues about phase and to get a different tone, I used IR in both mics simulating a Taylor 314ce and 814. This trick is saving me a lot when I receive a low quality recording. Not everytime... Next I creat a bus and inserted SSL Channel Strip, Q3, some harmonic exciter and an EQ again.

Bass: Well... some will throw a rock, but to easy put the bass in the scale.... Melodyne it!!

Guitars: Slate and Amplitube Amps... for the first part a let a stereo guitar in background, when the second starts, a clean amp for each one and 80% for each side.

Vox: My little basic setup: Any EQ high passing, LA-2A to reduce the peaks, a desser, 1176 and just an Q3 in the voxbus to correct some frequencies.
The doubled vox I just used the Revoice PRO to sinc it and tune as the main vocal. I inserted a vocoder in those parts to give some air and, body, but very very lower, just to sum.

My master bus I just put the dbx with low ratio, just to hold some peaks, an stereo spreader...just a little bit, and I turn on the HEAT in Pro Tools.

Fx were just Slate Verb, the classic DVerb, and some other stuff like H-Dlay.
Well, thats it,

here is my mix, remembering there is NO mastering tools.... I let all the peaks bellow -3dbfs.

Cheers and nice to participate here again,

My mix:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_QkIO- ... sp=sharing

[rvalle]

Hello!

Submitting my mix:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vhBAKj ... sp=sharing

BASS: Equalizer (Acon Digital Equalize 2) for little cleaning in the 230hz region, in order to give some space to the acoustic guitar; Shelf cutting around 65hz to balance the subs. BX_console SSL 4000 E for character, clearing with eq in the 1200, 300 and 100 Hz regions, plus slow attack compression, achieving approximately 4db of gain reduction; finally, I put in Xfer Records Dimension Expander to expand the bass, with the size at about 30% and the drywet at about 25%.

ACOUSTIC GTRs: Both acoustics received only equalizer to clean the bass (high pass) and a small cut in the 5khz region. They were distributed on the sides, with gtr 1 at 91%R and gtr 2 at 66%L. They were grouped into a channel that received most of the processing: a new eq was applied, with a closed cut at 5.3khz and a wider cut at 340hz; another eq cleaning even more at 170hz; then the SSL 4000 E, with eq cutting smoothly at 120hz and 1.5khz, plus a smooth gain at 6khz; aggressive compression in SSL itself, with fast attack and very deep threshold, but with a ratio of only 2.5:1; followed with Neold v78u73 for a little more compression, now with slow attack; a little saturation with the PSP MixSaturator2 to soften the highs; with Wavesfactory Trackspace, I adjusted the balance in the interaction with the bass.

ELECTRIC GTRs: no processing on individual channels of electric guitars; they were grouped in a channel that received all the processing, as follows: SSL 4000 E, with cuts in eq in 200hz, 1.4khz and 3khz, in addition to a shelf boost at 4khz; moderate compression with fast attack, medium release and 5:1 ratio; Equalize 2 for a little more cleaning, having high pass at 90hz, bell at 400hz and low pass at 9khz; more compression with UAD 1176SE Legacy for transient control, with fast attack and medium release; finally, a little bit of saturation with Kush Audio's Omega Model TWK.

VOCALS: First process on the main vocal was an amplitude balancing with volume automation; then I submitted it to Melodyne Essential only for a few punctual adjustments, mainly on certain vibratos; I opted for an almost zero tuning treatment; then, I controlled the ssss with Waves' Sibilance, applied AudioThing's Type A to saturate the mid-highs and highs; Equalize 2 for high-pass at 150hz, bell clear at the 7khz region and a small gain at 1.3khz; compression with UAD LA-2A Silver, achieving around 4db of gain reduction; for a final fix on the sssss of certain parts, I used a very interesting plugin, from a new company called Techivation, T-De-Esser Plus, which is the smaller and free version. It is a deesser that features a very fast release, which makes the compression act more precisely on the sssss and not invade other regions of the vocals; worth the search; on vocal double, I also applied Sibilance and Equalize 2, now with low-pass at 170hz, cut at 500hz and an aggressive shelf at 9khz; compression with the Purple Audio MC77 with about 5db of gain reduction; finally, I used Nectar in the double for additional voices distributed on the sides; The main voice channel and the double were grouped into a group channel, which received more processing, using the Neutron Advanced Sculptor module to soften the treble, character and a little more treble control with the UAD Trident A-Range, more compression with PSP MicroComp, saturation with SoundToys Radiator and a final compression with Acustica Audio El Rey, which is very smooth and has an exceptional sound.

AMBIENCE: I used five instances to process the ambience of the music: three reverbs (chamber, plate and spring) and two delays (one as a voice effect and the other a tape delay style); Chamber (Lexicon MPX Native) and Plate (Exponential Audio R4) received guitars and lead vocals; Spring (PSP SpringBox) received the guitars; Effect Delay for Voice is Native Instruments Raum; Tape Delay (soundToys Echoboy Jr.) also received only lead vocals. All ambience channels were grouped into another channel, which received saturation with Brainworx's Vertigo VSM-3.

Beside the volume automations on the voice channels, I also automated the signal sends from their group channel to the ambience channels: as the music progresses, the amount of signal sent decreases, making the voice more evident, brighter and closer. Thus, one has the impression that the difficult moment has passed and that the situation has improved over time.

The guitars have a lot of presence in the ambiance, which gives the feeling of being involved by them.

Extract the L/R file and open another instance of Reaper to adjust the final volume: I used UAD UA-610-B gain.

Congrats @Johnny_Fingers for the beautiful song!

[hjchjc]

Not to insert too much of my personal life In a mix challenge post haha, but this song really touched me. I'm a member of the Class of 2020 and spent the first year of my post-college adulthood locked inside. this song beautifully captured when the lockdowns began to ease and I could see my friends again.

You gave me an opportunity to reference the National, my favorite band - thank you!

Aside from the National's "Not in Kansas" and other indie folk like Foy Vance's "Be The Song", I was also inspired by the ambience on Mumford and Sons' song "After the Storm." (whatever you think of them, you can't deny how gorgeous that production and mix is.)

I worked on a more polished, brighter version of this mix, but after revising too much I decided to go back to an earlier draft that fits better with the tenderness of the song

Guitar:
bx_console, Logic EQ, F6, sent to PuigChild for parallel compression and Abbey Road Chambers for reverb.

The blip you hear at 03:40 is because I'm turning on SketchCassette II for some subtle dropouts and distortion effects towards the end.

Also a sent to a drone created by the SoundToys plugin "Little Plate" set to 'infinite'

Bass:
CHANNEV
bx_Subfilter
Maag EQ4
Arturia Chorus

Guitar 1:
Pro-Q 3
AmpliTube 5
TSAR-1R Reverb
Fielder Audio Stage
one more Pro-Q to notch out resonances

Guitar harmonics:
Logic Amp
Echoboy
EQ
PuigChild
Trackspacer sidechained to vocals

send to TSAR-1R Reverb/EchoBoy panned to the opposite end.

Channel EQ
Waves Tune
Dangerous EQ
Maag EQ4
F6-RTA
RDeEsser
TDR Kotelnikov,
Airwindows Preponderant (a plugin I discovered by accident but it's a neat filter for making things stick out)

Sent to BPB Dirty Spring, and 1989Verb (underrated reverb plugin imo)

Mix bus:
Hornet TheNormalizer
Maag EQ4
Black Rooster Audio Magnetite on "Red" mode
Airwindows Infrasonic

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KtZANA ... sp=sharing

[likemucas]

Thank you for the opportunity. This song was fun to mix. It is a challenge because there are so few tracks.

I added minimal plugins, mostly compression, reverb, slap and ping pong delay, and EQ. Enjoy!


https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-JOqW_ ... sp=sharing

[YvesK]

Hello guys, my first post, just registered.

To enter a mix, I need to post a link to my .wav-file. Is a cloud storage like MediaFire, SendAnywhere, DropBox or DriveOne fit for this purpose?

Thanks for enlightening me,
YvesK.

[VasDim]

Hi all,
this is my attempt to mix:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/jiz6z9if2n905 ... m.wav?dl=0

For all track are used:
- Waves Q10;
- Waves C4;
- Db ProComp.

AUX Effect;
- Waves TrueVerb;
- Waves SuperTap;

Good luck to all.
VasDim

[jules666]

Hi All,

Here is my attempt at this months challenge.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XUWYMs ... sp=sharing


Vocals: I used some pitch correction on the main vocals (ever so slightly), the CH vox I aligned manually with the main vox to get a more "Glued" together sound.
Main: EQ/Compression (3 different compressors doing a small amount each) finished with a clipper to tame the higher peaks.
Ch: Placed an RX de-noise on this track to see what it would do, noticed a subtle improvement so left on. Then used similar chain as main vocals but also added a desser in.

Vox Effects:
Sent various amounts of the main and CH vocals to the following buses (some of this was automated):
Pultec: Pultec - LA2 - Pultec
Pitch: Soundtoys Microshift
Verb1: CLA Epic for a room reverb
Verb2: Arturia Plate reverb
Delay:Echoboy
Saturation: Elysia Karacter


GTR:

Harmonics: Panned slightly to the left. SSL 4000G (plugin alliance) console for EQ and slight compression. Followed by a ADA stero delay and also a clipper.
Melody: SSL 4000G (plugin alliance) console for EQ and slight compression and then a clipper.
Accoustic 1 & 2: Panned hard Left & Right, and just a SSL 4000G (plugin alliance) console for EQ and slight compression

GTR Effects:
Doubler: Used the Waves ADT2V for this, blended subtly.
Reamp: Sent accoustic rhy GTR's here (pre effects), and used TH3 to created another tone from both guitars which I left low in the center.
Chorus: Used Microsoft for a chorus effect
Verb: Pheonix verb

Again automation to send more or less in places of the song.

BASS:
Duplicated tracks.
One track had Lindell 80 channel strip for eq and compression, further 1176 and EQ also added with a roll off of frequencys above 800.
2nd track has a bassdude (plugin alliance) to give a little grit, low end rolled away and blended in.


All tracks were sent to a corresponding bus :"ALL" vocal/bass/GTR, which had compression/saturation/EQ/limiter, these effects were blended in to taste.

These busses were then sent to the Master and also a parallel compression bus which was then blended back in at the Master bus.

MasterBUS:
Just some EQ to roll off everything below 30Hz and some light compression, 1-2db of reduction at most.