MIX CHALLENGE - MC104 June 2025 - Mix Round 2 until 05-JUL-2025 23:59 UTC+2/CEST

[cpsmusic]

Thanks for the feedback @BenjiRage and well done to those who made the Top 15.

Cheers!

[Kron]

Kron
Powerful and punchy drums, but possibly a bit too loud and slappy with the kick. Diva bass track has good low end but I can't really hear any of the rhythm of it, especially when it double times in the second chorus. The extended vocal delay at the start of the choruses is interesting, perhaps a feeding back for a little bit too long, but it otherwise works and I quite like it. Diva pad is too quiet so there's a hole in the mid frequency in the choruses and mid-section. K2000 piano is also too quiet and thin sounding. Also, why have you copy/pasted the vocals to the breakdown section? They should not be here! Unfortunately I think you might have DQ'ed yourself with this choice as it would class as an arrangement change.

Hi Benji,

Thanks for commenting on my mix. I didn't quite understand the rules, although they've been clarified. My intention was to fill out that instrumental section, which felt too long, and I had an idea, which, although not allowed, I think is a good fit for the song. I've already removed the vocals from this part of the song and added some effects, boosting certain frequencies to generate a little more emotion.
I always try to find a certain balance, and sometimes I have no choice but to sacrifice some instruments to highlight others. It would have been ideal to know which instruments are important to the author.
Congratulations on your song; I loved it, and that's why I decided to mix it. It's very well done.
By the way, I have a relative with the same disease as you, so I hope everything is delayed quite a bit.
I wish you the best, Benji.

Congratulations also to the 15 selected.

[BenjiRage]

Thanks for commenting on my mix. I didn't quite understand the rules, although they've been clarified. My intention was to fill out that instrumental section, which felt too long, and I had an idea, which, although not allowed, I think is a good fit for the song. I've already removed the vocals from this part of the song and added some effects, boosting certain frequencies to generate a little more emotion.
I always try to find a certain balance, and sometimes I have no choice but to sacrifice some instruments to highlight others. It would have been ideal to know which instruments are important to the author.
Congratulations on your song; I loved it, and that's why I decided to mix it. It's very well done.
By the way, I have a relative with the same disease as you, so I hope everything is delayed quite a bit.
I wish you the best, Benji.

Hi Kron,

No worries, I remember I too broke the rules on my first entry a couple of years ago so don't feel too bad, and thank you again for the kind words about the song.

In terms of the importance of instruments, really they're all important! Each part has a place in the song, without which it would be less. As I've learned from taking part in the challenges, the demo mix is always a good reference to use and gives an insight into what's important to the artist - you can gain much of the insight you're after from critically listening to these. I find the way to go is to use the demo as a starting point and apply any creative ideas on top of that. It is just unfortunate that in this instance your creative ideas fell foul of the rules.

Interesting, does your relative also have a CSF leak? How are they coping with it? Thankfully mine has almost healed up now after an intervention procedure earlier this year but I had been suffering with it for over 10 years previously so I know how debilitating it can be.

Best regards,

Benji

[Kron]

Thanks for commenting on my mix. I didn't quite understand the rules, although they've been clarified. My intention was to fill out that instrumental section, which felt too long, and I had an idea, which, although not allowed, I think is a good fit for the song. I've already removed the vocals from this part of the song and added some effects, boosting certain frequencies to generate a little more emotion.
I always try to find a certain balance, and sometimes I have no choice but to sacrifice some instruments to highlight others. It would have been ideal to know which instruments are important to the author.
Congratulations on your song; I loved it, and that's why I decided to mix it. It's very well done.
By the way, I have a relative with the same disease as you, so I hope everything is delayed quite a bit.
I wish you the best, Benji.

Hi Kron,

No worries, I remember I too broke the rules on my first entry a couple of years ago so don't feel too bad, and thank you again for the kind words about the song.

In terms of the importance of instruments, really they're all important! Each part has a place in the song, without which it would be less. As I've learned from taking part in the challenges, the demo mix is always a good reference to use and gives an insight into what's important to the artist - you can gain much of the insight you're after from critically listening to these. I find the way to go is to use the demo as a starting point and apply any creative ideas on top of that. It is just unfortunate that in this instance your creative ideas fell foul of the rules.

Interesting, does your relative also have a CSF leak? How are they coping with it? Thankfully mine has almost healed up now after an intervention procedure earlier this year but I had been suffering with it for over 10 years previously so I know how debilitating it can be.

Best regards,

Benji

In my relative's case, it was the opposite. The CSF wasn't draining, so they had to implant a valve. Fortunately, he's fine. Thank you.

[filipandrei]

Thanks @BenjiRage for your feedback.
I’m really glad you like my mix.

Everything you said makes perfect sense, and I will get back to you with my version two for the second round

Cheers,
Andrei

[Pavel Nebesky]

Thank you @BenjiRage for making the effort and doing the tremendous work of providing notes and reviews for every mix in this contest, including mine.
Wishing all the best to you, @Mister Fox, and the 15 contenders moving on to the second round.

Cheers, Pavel.

[Mister Fox]

Thank you for handling the evaluation, @BenjiRage ...


Ladies and gentlemen, let us kick off Mix Round 2, which will end on Saturday, 05-JUL-2025 23:59 UTC+2/CEST

As of this moment, that is 5 days (plus the hours since @Strange's update). All Mix Round 2 participants will be sent a reminder via email shortly.


There is a GLOBAL COUNTDOWN available to check for deadlines.
Just follow this link: Global Countdown (on homepage)



The following 15 participants go into Round 2 (alphabetical order), with "Wild Cards" being pointed out (if present this month).
(all Mix Round 2 participants should have been pinged, all participants will also get a reminder via the new newsletter engine)

@Drannob
@dstra
@Edling
@filipandrei
@Henrik Hjortnaes
@JeroenZuiderwijk
@Mellow Browne
@MFTWC
@Michael_K
@Mork
@Piotr
@Rockincher
@rvalle
@scottfitz
@SDB_12



.

!	Bonus Info
	Please read more about the "Wild Card" game mechanic here Mix Challenge - Addendum: Statistic Sheet and Wild Card Mechanic All Wild Card users are not only asked to apply the requested changes, but also to fix what they had at fault with Mix Round 1 (including warnings!). Please use the following filename template: MC104__BenjiRage__AboveTheClouds__ForumUsername_R2.wav

The feedback to the productions can be found here:
Please see post #180 for individual feedback.



If you are unsure what to do exactly with your mix, reach out to the song provider and engage in a conversation here on the forum.
And please keep the Rules and Guidelines (post #6) in mind regarding submitting your entry. Please do pay attention to detail. (yes, please also check the song length of your entry!)

[Davias]

Davias
I wouldn't say the plucky synth is absent from the intro as your notes suggest, I can hear it pretty well albeit not that bright. But wow, the drums are pretty smashed! I don't think it's really the right vibe for the song, a little too rock 'n' roll?! The vocals are similarly compressed with the reverb ducking in and out on each phrase instead of being smooth. There's not a lot of breathing space for dynamic changes (says the guy that smashed the demo mix with no dynamics haha) but I do enjoy the reverbs you've chosen so at least your mix does have some spacious excitement to it.

Thanks @BenjiRage !

I agree with all your comments, without even noticing it at first, but I'm starting to know my tools and my workflow a bit after so many years lol. So indeed I used the stupid ducking of KSHMR Reverb too much, coz I can't control it finely lol.
Drum smashing is a bit a trademark for me so it is totally normal.

Actually this says to me that I always have to review my mix with cans (I use monitors mostly), because this is the kind of things that stands out when using cans, reverbs and compression. I would have noticed the pumping and overdoing better if I just used my cans once for the mix.

Also I could have used a smoother form of ducking for the voice verb (or maybe no ducking at all like the elders did at the time ? just good parameters and volume ?)

Thanks for your review mate !

[Edling]

Edling
Lovely balance between vocals/drums/synths, everything blends together really nicely. Well-chosen effects with a lovely sense of spaciousness. The spectral profile is a little thin sounding in general, it feels like there's a bit of an EQ tilt going on pushing the highs and reducing the low-mids/lows, but other than that it sounds great.

Thanks for the feedback @BenjiRage and for selecting me for the second round. I'll try to get some more body in the low-mid area without going the route of boosting them on the master bus (which seems like cheating ). On the upside, I now have an extra tool to increase dynamic movement between the different sections of the song!

[Davias]

Edling
Lovely balance between vocals/drums/synths, everything blends together really nicely. Well-chosen effects with a lovely sense of spaciousness. The spectral profile is a little thin sounding in general, it feels like there's a bit of an EQ tilt going on pushing the highs and reducing the low-mids/lows, but other than that it sounds great.

Thanks for the feedback @BenjiRage and for selecting me for the second round. I'll try to get some more body in the low-mid area without going the route of boosting them on the master bus (which seems like cheating ). On the upside, I now have an extra tool to increase dynamic movement between the different sections of the song!

Not saying your comment wasaiming at me, but since I mentioned it in my previous posts, I need to answer lol.

I was feeling that way before, and still :
I'm trying to balance the individual tracks at best.

But then I apply processing on busses, and then finally on the mix bus. And my reasoning is like "I applied this compressor on, for example, beat + bass bus, and I'm happy with the groove, the grit, the mids, the highs, but it lowers too much the lows, but I like the movement that I'm hearing in this part", so it is like an adjustment, a correction of the bus processing.

You could see it like boosting some freqs into a saturator, then lowering them after, to add some distortion where you want.

I did read that usually with Tapes, it was common to boost the highs into the tape. If you apply the tape on the mix bus, is it cheating to to boost the highs into it (and maybe lower them after ?), just my two cents

PS : I'm not an engineer, just amateur since 1996 for composition, and 2005 for mixing. So I'm just telling my current feeling about it.

Cheers.