MIX CHALLENGE - MC099 August 2024 - Winners announced

[Davias]

Hello everyone, nice track again this month, few tracks and clean.

Here is my mix : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Wp-IrnBc2tauiQc8uhz8jYKJ2HuRYTea/view?usp=sharing

So I mixed in Reaper, all tracks are running through Britson Channel and are outing into a bx_SSL Channel for some flavor.
Busses are running through Britson Buss.

Besides the usual cleaning (gate) and EQ, here are more details :

Drums :
TR5 Dyna Mu
TB ReelBus 3
bx Townhouse

Bass :
Lindel SBC

Vocal :
de-esser
ThrillSeeker LA
Imager
Limiter
(Sent to a plate reverb)

Guitar :
Opto Compression Mid Side

Trumpet :
Tilt EQ
Air EQ

Piano :
Reverb
Saturation

Marimba :
Saturation
sent to a Delay

Mix Buss :
SPL Iron
TRacks Tape 440

This was fun to mix, good luck to all participants !

[jules666]

Keep wanting to tweak this one, so have to stop and post what I have So here is my attempt on this challenge:
Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g6pUF5 ... sp=sharing

Drums: All tracks had saturation on.
Kick: SSL channel strip and transient shaper
Snare: SSL channel strip and clipper, did also duplicate the main snare track and roll everything away below 10k, then compressed the hell out of it and sent to a verb to get a little sizzle in the highend, though did end up blending it quite low in the mix.
Room: EQ/Comp, but also did duplicate this track and heavily compress and add a reverb 100% wet, mixed in low.
OH: EQ, Smooth Operator to reduce some harshness and also used an exciter for the top end. Reverb also used at the end of some phrases as I felt things were a little abrupt, so tried to use the verb to bring some natural decay in.
HiHats: EQ, Smooth Operator

All drum tracks were sent to various parallel busses which included: Compression (distressor), Saturation, Devloc (for a little more punch in places) and two different verbs.
Shaker/Guiro: sent to drum bus with just som eq and saturation.

BASS: Split low and high, with SSL channel strip, Sansamp and clipper. Also created a 3rd track that was heavily distorted pushing mainly in the intro and bridge. A phaser, delay and reverb were used in various places.

Marimba: All had some simple EQ/clipper and were processed in one folder with LA2A, EQ and some verb.

Piano: EQ/Compressor/clipper and a phaser
Trumpet: EQ (pushing mids mainly) /Saturation/Compressor/Transient shapper to push the initial sound and I also used a widener.

GTR: EQ and saturation first, did not like the tone still, so sent to two busses with one having an exciter on, and the other a sansamp/EQ rolling off lows and highs to keep midrand and a short delay. Mixed to taste into an SSL channel strip, and a widener

VOX: Decided to use melodyne here, but tried to not go overboard with tuning, if it is not liked can easily bypass. Then De-esser, multi band compressor, normal compressor (neither compressor working too hard), EQ (removing a lot of upper mids), LA2A, limiter and another de-esser. I also had various effects setup which I used in various places, some of the effects included - Widener, slapback delay, 1/4 note delay, 1/8 note dealy/ Plate reverb, distortion. I also used two Alterboy plugins, one set -3 low other +12 high, blended quite low on the chorus/bridge.
Telephone effect using extra saturation and EQ on Bridge

All instruments sent to one the following busses: Drums, Bass, Vocals,Keyboards, Gtr, which have Waves NLS/Tape Saturation/EQ/Clipper on (Bass buss also had some extra compression on the low end only).

Busses fed in Mix A: Compression/Pultek EQ/BX Digital EQ for monoing below 140Hz, then a El Jaun Limiter for colour (no limiting)which I mixed into.
Mix B: Hard compression, with certain elements of the instruments bus going into and blended in...not sure with all the tweaking I have been doing if I really need this, but was experimenting with some ideas.

Both Mix A and B were sent to my Master fader which just had another compressor (excluding the everything below 80Hz here and a multiband enhancer plugin.

Lots of automation for volume and bringing different effects up and down during the mix.

Hope you like!

Cheers,
Jules

[VasDim]

Hi all,
this is my attempt to mix:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gUJ3j- ... p=drivesdk

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

AUX Effect;
- Waves TrueVerb;
- Waves SuperTap;

Good luck to all.
VasDim

[kombainera]

@VasDim your link s not public

[VasDim]

Thank you. I fixed it.

[RonChos]

Hey Everyone,

This is my mix for the song:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FgDcFb ... sp=sharing

I liked the song and enjoyed mixing it, cool rhythm, great melody and very catchy!

Few main points as to what i did in this mix:

Vocals
Used pretty much a lot of compression on the vocal, to give it consistency and punch (take it a little bit forward in the mix)
Used cla76, cla2a, pro-mb for taming some of the lows, Desser for sibilance , eq and FX like delay and reverb to give it special sound.
(I think the song needed it, the vibe of the song is calling for some spacey feeling on the vocal. some automation on the chorus for little changes between verse and chorus.

Drums

Did some heavy processing, because i felt that in the dry mix they are very quiet and in the back of the song. took it forward with eq, heavy parallel compression, and some fx like room\chamber reverb for the whole kit, and plate on the snare to give it a vibe.
Marimba and guache both routed to the drums bus and added some compression to all of the rhthm elements as one.

Bass

Some compression and rbass to give it some push in the lows. treated the mids of the bass in a second Chanell to give it some fx as the song was calling for it (like it's on the guide mix). the fx is specially on the intro.

Acoustic Guitar

Needed a lot of process, to make it sound much clearer and upfront, a lot of eq to lift the mid\highs and compression.
Some fx to make it sound in a space, and wide it a little bit. compressed each side of the stereo field independently to balance the stereo field a little.

Mix Bus

api 2500 for a little bit compression, multiband compression, some eq , and saturation.

That's it, hope you will like it and good luck to everyone:)

[Martial32]

Hello everyone!

Here is my MIX version. The vocal was the track on worked the most on. I took the liberty to add harmonies on the chorus and i adjust the pitch a little also.

Link to download:

https://ln5.sync.com/dl/ab506ecb0/zxynv ... 2-wjrr9jqj


DRUM:
Kick EQ + LA3A limit mode to even out kick level
Snare EQ, MAAG4 for air and DBX comp
BUS got an A800 Studer + SSL G comp

BASS:
EQ + 1176
Ampeg amp sim
Verve analog machine for a little disto

ACOUSTIC:
EQ + Distressor + Verve analog machine
Echoboy delay

SHAKERS:
EQ HPF

GUIRO:
EQ + 1176 to catch peak

VOCALS:
Melodyne for tuning
Deeser
1176 compressor + LA2A
MAAG 4 for air
NEctar for harmonies
A800 Studer

MARIMBA:
1176 comp


PIANO:
Pultec EQ
1176

TRUMPETS:
1176 + MAAG 4
EQ

Master BUS
SSL G Compressor 3 db


I used the reverb ValhallaVerb plate + LExicon for Room

Good luck to all!

Thank you

[DSBotez]

Hello Everyone, and thank you to the song provider


This is my version

I really spent most of my time on the vocals, bass and guitar, and felt more comfortable mixing the Marimba and the saxophones.
For the first part I struggle to empahise with some of the timing decisions in the vocal phrases and some of the stems felt a little misplaced, which did not help the draggy pitc appear as intentional as it would in a context of the other instruments being tight in their timing.
The second aspect I focused on was the space of the mix. While the drum room and the marimba room provided a starting point of general space from the demo, I still felt that the saxophones,guitar, and even the bass needed to find a way to glue better in the mix with some space.

So, for the bass there was a strong focus on body and grit, and I spent some time trying to find the best bass cabinet/amp combination. But this usually rendered the bass quite soft and lacking in the plucky and upfront character that it plays in the absence of a lead and rhythm guitar. So I ran it through a clipper and a punchy compressor.

the acoustic guitar sounded quite dull and draining at one point, perhaps because of its unchanged part throughout the song, however I tried to give it fullness of groove and also some sparkle of excitement to combat this factor.

The vocals were also quite extensively processed, at one stage I felt very unsure about the pitch, but was not comfortable, nor content, with how pitch correction made it sound, so I did play around a bit in Medolyne, trying to rid the takes of small abnormalities, artifacts, and ill intervals that could have been placed slightly better. Along with this I tried to make the volume of certain phrases more consistent in level with surrounding sections. I had some Tubetech CL-1B compression stabilise the vocal further, and then diagnosed it as having too little distortion for the feel, and message, of the song. I really sort out that gritty,punky feel, that you almost get with those UK bands who looked like they had not eaten their vegetables in forever and only had coffee and ciggarettes for breakfast and also probably lost most of their healthhy fat due to breaking out in sweats of heroin withdrawal. I feel I should mention that I tried a lot of distortion plugins, but the one that gave me the best results and control was with the Joe Chiccarelli vocal strip plugin, it really comes in handy to have the 'Body' and 'Air' dials to get good tone-shaping results without much hassle. Although I did not use the compressor section, it is usually very helful and there is also a de essor.
(it even has reverb and delay settings that usually work with vocals and I used it for the majortiy of the time before I substituted them with dedicated reverb and delay settings. )

now speaking of tone, I actually still think my vocal might still sound too nasally, but sometimes you can't jsut scoop up some mid and still expect the same kind of emotional turmiol as what is being expressed. So I depended on an exciter, and distortion to blur the nasal tone with as much fullness and "Otherness" that it could handle without losing its essence. Meh I dont know


The Marimba was nice, i did not eq much, instead, I just had a little delay as I thought it would have been nice if it played a more complex role than simply padding the chords so at least with a little ping of delay I have it fill in some illussion of there being more in between. Then I had some EQ to make the piano sound like it was playing through an old jukebox or intercom while also adding some slapback delay to give it character.

The saxophones all just went it a room reverb with some chorus and some widening effect.

Could proably have done some more gain on the froggy sound from the verse,
Anyway, the drums were just bus compressed and EQd with generally stock compression on kick and snare and some distressor squashing on the room mics. yeah that is it.
Maybe the kick could have sounded more pop and less roomy, but it serves its purpose.
OHH and the piano could probably have also been placed a little softer in the mix, but I feel if you like the gernal vibe, then I can be more specific with the easy fixes for a possible round two.

[_StillBorn]

neither any changes to the arrangement (copy/add/move/remove parts)!
(unless otherwise stated). Micro-adjustments are allowed within
reason

Would adding or removing a hihat part to the chorus be considered a micro adjustment?

[PonySho]

Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Y6k6ZU ... drive_link

Hi Guys. My first mix on this forum.
Thanks for the opportunity, and to Isaac for the song.

NOTES ABOUT MY PROCESS

PRODUCTION
Many listens to the song gave me the feeling that the arrangement was incomplete. Isaac made the comment in "A word from the song provider," that "Definitely more opportunities for creative decisions..." was an option. I understood that Isaac was allowing the opportunity to creatively tweak, which is what I did. This involved creative muting and regenerating his vocal and other instrument parts to create backing vocals, vocal throws, and musical fills etc. I did not record anything new or do any drum replacement. I hope this is within the rules, but if not, then the Isaacs notes are at odds with the Mix Challenge requirements in my opinon.

VOCAL
These were the most challenging for me. The vocal track seemed harsh, out of tune, lacked articulation, and parts of the delivery seemed slightly out of time to me. In particular, the esses and consonants were almost inaudible in the mix. I feel I fixed all of this but struggled with the harshness as EQing out harshness removes elements of clarity.

Processing: adjusted the clip gain of every word (yes, you read right) then reamped the vocal through a hardware CL1b. Added plugin corrective EQ and a limiter at the end to shave off a few peaks. A smidge of reverb and delay added. Vocal track split into three sections; one for verses, choruses and bridge and all got different fx treatment to add a little colour.

DRUMS
I felt the need for variation during the song, so I duplicated the kick drum and had a softer spacious kick for verses and a punchier kick for the choruses. Muted one or two percussion parts at different stages to add contrast.

Processing: I groupled all the tracks and sent them to a buss with a little compressioin. Added reverb to the snare.

INSTRUMENTS
Processing: Each track got corrective EQ, opto style compression and a limiter to control peaks. Reverb added to most tracks.

BUSS PROCESSING
Mix sent out to hardware Heritage audio successor for compression.

FURTHER PROCESSING
The mix was run through a BX_masterdesk to meet the LUFS and peak level requirements.


Thank you again, for the opportunity. It was fun. I'm very keen to do a round two as getting feedback and revising the mix would be very helpful. Mixing this song felt a bit like mixing in the dark due to not being able to talk to the songwriter.