Mix Challenge

DAW: Reaper

My mixing template is an adaptation of the famous Michael Brauer technique that I was lucky to have found online as a reaper file (some of you may know from where, and I can share the link if it is allowed).
Most individual tracks are first treated with CHANNEV by Analog Obsession, a vintage Neve component emulating channel strip loaded with a preamp, de-esser, line-amp, eq, compressor, and limiter, with a final stage of tape saturation all of which I've used extensively in this mix as the first stage of getting that vintage vibe going.
Most tracks and/or buses have Tape MELLO-FI from Arturia acting as a bit of tape emulation with mostly default settings in an attempt to emulate having all tracks recorded to tape and then mixed out of that through other gear.
I will now list most of my setup, in quite a bit of detail, and call to attention any editing I've done as I get to the individual instruments.

Mix Bus
BUSTERse (AnalogObsession) SSL style bus comp: 3:1 ratio, 10 ms attack, auto release, set the threshold till it was tickling up to but not over 4 dB gain reduction (GR)
TDR Nova: acting as a final eq, rather a HP filter to 30 Hz and LP to 20k Hz; also using the default frequency positions to dynamically eq the song to at most 3 dB GR on all bands (2:1, fastest attack, default release)
Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation with default settings except the filter is set to 1% lowpass.

Now come Brauer's famous ABCD buses:

Bus A (my keys synths and strings):
two BUSTERses running in dual mono compressing up to *checks notes* 12 dB GR! ( oof, I let that happen unbeknownst to me, I don't really check the ABCD bus compressors as often as I should )
RareSE (AnalogObsession) Pultec style eq with a slight boost on 100 Hz and a boost of 5 (somethings lol ) at 8k Hz

Bus B (the anchor instruments - DnB):
2 IK Multimedia T-RackS Comprexxors running in dual mono as well but just barely touching the 1 dB GR LED indicator - hence they're mostly used as a color box for the drums and bass
Black Box Analog Design HG-2 (Plugin Alliance) all knobs 12 o'clock
TDR Nova HP filter 30 Hz and LP at 20k Hz

Bus C (the midrange energy bus - Guitars):
T-RackS VC-670 a Fairchild 670 emulation tickling the guitar tracks between 1-2 dB GR and really gripping the solo guitar at between 7 and 12 dB GR on the right channel (due to panning) and on the left channel up to 5 dB GR
TDR Nova HP filter 100 Hz

Bus D (the warm and wide bus - BG vox and all FX):
COMPER (AnalogObsession) doing up to 3 dB GR with a 3:1 ratio, 3ms attack, 100 ms release (0.10 sec says the plugin)
NG-EL Monofilter (NUGEN Audio) HP cutoff at 80 Hz, and only filtering 40%
NG-EL Stereoizer (NUGEN Audio) 25% width

Then come the other famous buses: the vocal compressor buses

First a Clean channel for adding that in parallel to the comp buses, I left it at 0 dB, full on and only added the other parallel comp tracks underneath it

1176 parallel at -9.75 dB:
FETish (AnalogObsession) input at 12 o'clock (-48.2 dB the plugin says), output default setting; SLAM button in; slowest attack, fastest release at a 4:1 ratio

LA2A or Opto parallel at 0 dB:
LALA (AnalogObsession) Gain knob at 42%, Peak reduction knob at 57%, rest default

Vari-Mu comp parrallel at 0 dB:
VariMoon (AnalogObsession) Release knob at the fastest setting at a 4:1 ratio, rest default

Fairchild 666 opto (dw I don't have this ultra rare and arguably crappy compressor, 'tis just the track's name 'cause Brauer apparently uses it lol ) parrallel at 0 dB:
I put the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor (Plugin Alliance) on this track but actually forgot to use compression on it, so it was apparently only adding back the clean signal passing through the Steel setting ("The most distorted selection with an extremely tight boost in the low frequencies." per the manual)

Now all the other buses:

Starting with DRUMS

Kick(s)
getting rid of highs with Channev and eq-ing for that thumpy and mid-range present vintage vibe, compressing very gently and limiting the tips of the peaks, all in Channev and final sculpting with TDR Nova
One of the kicks is polarity flipped to have the bottom oomph back and then they're blended to taste with the kick-alternative.wav being about 5 dB lower than kick.wav

The kicks are then summed to a Kicks bus with:
FreeClip (Venn Audio) on Soft Clip Type (furthest right) and Clip Cealing at -1 dB, the rest is untouched
TDR Nova HP 50 Hz, LP 6k Hz; boosting 100 Hz 8 dB bell curve, and a shelf boost from 1405 hZ and up by 12 dB
Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation: with default settings except the Drive knob is at 30%, the filter is set to 10% lowpass and the gain output is -6 dB

Snare
Channev adding that vibe with preamp, line-amp and final tape sat, de-essing and slightly eq-ing highs up and comp and limiting barely tickling upto -1 dB

This goes into Snare bus (technically didn't need to due to lack of snare samples to use to enhance this one, I swear I didn't, don't disqualify me ):
FreeClip again with same settings as kick bus
TDR Nova upward compressing (forgive me if it's technically wrong terminology, all I know is the dynamic mode is on and the arrow is pointing up) boosting at 167 Hz by about 3/3.5 dB
Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation: with default settings except the filter is set to 1% lowpass and the gain output is -8 dB

Toms
have been pan automated (drummer's perspective as was given in the tracks) even more, to get that stereo image nice and wide when they hit; and have been individually processed with Channev to get more body out of them and less mud in them with TDR Nova doing final sculpting.
They all then go to the Toms bus where they're shaped and compressed together with Channev, TDR Nova and Tape MELLO-FI.

Hihat
has been de-essed, compressed, limited, eq-ed and saturated by Channev, TDR Nova and TDR Kotelnikov with a final touch being Tape MELLO-FI with a 10% LP filter for a bit more lo-fi vintage vibe.

Overheads
just go through heavy saturation by Channev (all the saturating knobs to the max) and Tape MELLO-FI with all default setting

As the drums had no Room
I added them all to a Room bus and added a gated drum room convolution through MConvolutionEZ (MeldaProduction) and tucked the result down -10 dB in the mix

But that's not all for drum reverb:
The Snare goes to a plate reverb (Rev PLATE-140 by Arturia, model 2 (classic EMT), 20ms pre-delay, 2sec decay, -12 dB drive knob, HP up to 220 Hz, LP from 5k Hz);
the whole Drum bus goes to another Drum Room emulation through MConvolutionEZ, a Studio alpha.flac, that I've set down at -18 dB on the send so in the mix it peaks at -30 dB;
and yet another Drum Room, this time long, again through MConvolutionEZ, a Zep Room.flac, set at -20 dB on the send, peaking at around -35 dB in the mix.

BASS

Separated the bass into "lo", "mid", and "grit" tracks using TDR Nova as the HP/LP filter and running each track trough, you guessed it, Channev for some saturation, eq, and comp/limiting.
The "lo" bass is sidechain compressed by the Kicks bus at 80 Hz in TDR Nova for a very light less than 2 dB GR.
The "mid" bass got a hefty dose of saturation, compression and eq from 800 to 1k Hz and above with Channev and TDR Nova and was additionally compressed with LALA for 3 dB GR.
The bass "grit" track was first treated with TuPRE by Analog Obsession at maximum settings, before being subdivided into its frequency spectrum of 200 Hz up to 4.6k Hz and heavy saturation and eq in Channev (almost everything to the max).

The bass tracks then go into a Bass bus with RBass (Stereo for some reason lol) by Waves at 80 Hz and the slider down at -5, then getting additionally sidechain compressed by the kick with up to -4 dB, this going into Tape MELLO-FI with all default settings except the filter is set to 3% lowpass.
This then goes into Room041 by Analog Obsession a room reverb plugin, at -18.4 dB wetness, 0.5 sec decay; all because I thought a lil' room can't do no harm, seeing as it was a little too dry originally.

All the bass tracks got some volume automation for impactful choruses and laid back verses.

GUITARS

EL Guitars
It is my understanding that it was allowed to blend the DI and processed tracks together, and I believe I was also allowed to process the DI as well, and then blend them, which is what I did for the rhythm guitars (the solo, panned 40%R, is just the provided processed one going through Channev with no processing, just for the color of the emulated circuitry and Tape MELLO-FI at default settings).

The DI first has Channev driving it with a ton of saturation and bringing in a bunch of high end, then running it through bx_rockrack V3 by Plugin Alliance on Crunch Jazz preset adjusted to my liking (highest gain, not a lot of highs, boosting bass and mids, adding a 1/4T delay with its lo-fi knob at 50-ish%) and finally there's TDR Nova again to shape the day (gettit? save/shape the day nvm... ).
Then I panned the (now processed) DI track 60% to the left and brought it down -12.5 dB to sit beneath the:
Original processed track which I've also processed with Channev taking out the highs and compress/limiting a bit (I dunno ) and HP filtering with Nova at 200 Hz.
The Original is dead center but pan automated to the right by 30% when the solo and final chorus hits.

Both tracks then go to an EL Gtrs bus which has them sidechain compressed by the Solo track when it hits; then TDR Nova for a final bit of shaping and sidechain compressing/dynamic eq-ing (in Nova) of the lower frequencies of the guitars by the Bass bus at 220 Hz, wide Q (0.40 says the plugin), reducing the 200-600 Hz area by about 3 dB (or more at times lol); this goes into MJUCjr (Klanghelm) to compress the guitars a little more (again, I dunno why ) to bring up the delays that were otherwise inaudible (oh , that's why lol ); before going into Tape MELLO-FI with default settings except the filter is set to 1% lowpass and the drive knob is at 80% and the tone button is on and it is at 0.368 (meaning a darker tone).
The EL Gtrs bus has a send to a general reverb (FAST Reverb by Focusruite: 2 sec decay, 50% width; sent only about -22 dB so that it's quite low in the mix, but it's there ); the bus is also volume automated for certain sections and also for licks to be more audible when they hit.

AC Guitars
I wanted to preserve their natural tone for the beginning of the track but also have them not muddy up the rest of the song with their low end so I automated the Channev and TDR Nova processing to be 0% at the start of the track, only turning on after the intro ends (when all the other instruments, like bass and EL Gtrs come in).
They were shaped individually and together at the bus level with the usual suspects (do you want me to name them?), in addition I added BUSTERse to glue them together and added Rev PLATE-140 at 2.5 sec decay, a little modulation post reverb at 0.380, HP 300 Hz, LP 4k Hz a little, all blended at 0.200 on the wetness knob (20% I guess).

AC Gtr 1 & 2 have been panned opposite each other 60%L and 90%R respectively.
AC Gtr 3, i.e. the acoustic_guitar_sampled.wav has also been volume and eq automated for coherence and audibility and to clean up some noise, as well as pan automated from 60%R throughout the song to 100% Right in the final chorus.

WURLITZER
I opted for the cleaner factory preset wav file instead of the additional tube drive wav, because the tube one was too grating to my ears at first and I wanted a more mellow tone I could saturate myself, which I did, in Channev by boosting the tape saturation to the max and adding a ton of high end with its eq, then I compressed it a bit and sent to a KEYS bus, but since I didn't have any more Keys, I just saturated it more with Tape MELLO-FI's Drive knob to the max and the explosion button in, as well as the tone button and it set to the darkest color setting (0.00 says the plugin) ( no more highs...)
It still sounded too straightforward, so I added Room041 (AnalogObsession) for a little room reverb, with a 41 ms pre-delay, at 2 seconds decay and -18 dB wetness.

I automated its volume to pronounce certain of its own licks and phrases, and for general better audibility.

STRINGS

I didn't want to change them too much being as they were handcrafted by the song provider but in the end, it was not to be , I processed them pretty heavily

Violins (High strings)
I first separated them out onto their own mono tracks panned left right, as they were which I think helped me make them sit better in the stereo field, I could be wrong lol .
Processed them individually first with TDR Nova HP at 143 Hz, compressing with Kotelnikov to achieve up to 3 dB GR.
Then brought them to their own bus with Channev adding some saturation, eq shaping, poking the mids up, highs up a bit, compressing even more again, then into KolinMB (AnalogObsession) a multiband compressor which allowed me to deal with the harshness in the very top end, before I put on MConvolutionEZ with a Rich chamber.flac chamber convolution reverb at 100% wet (at first trying out other room and studio convolutions to try and get a "cinematic" or "real" sound for them).
They were volume automated throughout the song for effect.

Cellos
Cello 1 panned 50%R, Cello 2 panned 60%L; both being touched by Channev, the one with sat and comp, the other not at all and HP 77 Hz in TDR Nova before going into their own Bus with a lot more sat, comp/limiting, eq and de-essing in Channev, then hit with LALA 70% Peak reduction, 30% Gain (default position), and also going into MConvolutionEZ with Rich chamber.flac chamber convolution reverb at 45% wet.

The strings then all go into a Strings bus where they meet some more sat and comp/limiting in Channev, then going into NG-EL Stereoizer (NUGEN Audio) at 25% width before Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation with default settings except the filter is set to 1% lowpass (yes, I copy-pasted this from the top, how did you know ).

TRUMPETS
I panned them opposite each other 40% L/R respectively; they both got hit with Channev's saturation and a bit of comp/limiting before going into their bus with more of the same, then eq shaping with TDR Nova, adding a bit of room to them with Room041 (41 ms pre-delay, 3 sec decay, -11 dB wetness), then some more compression with LALA (Gain 30, Peak Reduction 60%), and finally Tape MELLO-FI but this time the drive knob is set at 92.8% and lowpass is at 10%.
Some notes were volume automated up too.

VOCALS (finally lol )
I already explained the parallel comp buses for the lead vocal but there's more, so much more behind the hood...

Lead Vocal
At first I did a little manual esses and noise cleanup and then took the idea from @BenjiRage to take a little piece of a good sounding "tsch" (or [tʃ] for you phoneticians out there ) sound from one of the first choruses to enhance the weak one that starts the final chorus, I couldn't bare hearing it so weak, I had to help it (and if that disqualifies me, then so be it lol ).
Then I decided to start my, by now usual, processing: Channev sat, comp/limit, eq, then HP at 100 Hz with Nova, then brought in LALA to even out the vocal a bit (Gain 30, Peak Reduction 60%) which goes into a Lead vocals bus with Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation with default settings except the filter is set to 1% lowpass .

Lead Vocal FX
That being done I had to send it to some reverb and delay.
I chose the primary reverb to be the Rev PLATE-140 with a little over 3 sec decay, classic EMT model 2, HP filtering at 244 Hz and LP at 6k Hz; but in order to have the reverb sit behind the vocal when it's going, I set up a sidechain compressor going in from the clean track and ducking the reverb at about -6 dB; like that wasn't enough, I automated it to hit after certain words a bit more and to be more pronounced in choruses and the bridge and outro especially, and to be less audible in the verses, except the first of course.
The secondary reverbs are a room (MConvolutionEZ - Vocal room.flac), and a long hall (MConvolutionEZ - Dark hall.flac) which I've also automated in the bridge to basically jump out at you and hug you with its lusciousness

The primary delay I chose for slapback was YS - Tape Delay LoFi by Yuri Semenov set at 82 ms and 400 ms; its send has been automated in the mix to fit different sections better, e.g. less of it in the choruses and a bit more in the verses.
The secondary, a wide slapback: SuperTap 6-Taps Stereo by Waves: sent at -16 dB, peaking at around -30 dB in the mix; set at maximum width, L 100 ms/R 120 ms.
Both have been HP and LP filtered to get rid of the low lows and the high highs of the vocal going into the plugins (as you do ).

BG Vocals

The vox_under is a weird one, completely autotuned especially at the ending of its phrases hahah , I love it, but it does kind of interfere with the vibes of this song, so I automated those parts to duck down a bit. Then of course my tried and true sat, comp/limiting and eq in Channev and TDR Nova with its best-supporting-actor-Oscar-winning eq moves and a bit of LALA to smooth it out a little, sending it to its own slapback delay and reverbs with similar settings, although, it being panned 30% to the left, I panned its delay send 50% to the right to fill out the stereo field a bit.

The vox_wail has beautiful lines and melodies , it's a shame there isn't more of it throughout the song; as for its processing, I forgot to put Channev on it , but still eq-ed a bit with Nova and Leveled with LALA the Leveling Amplifier. Of course, as you can no doubt hear, it is imbibed in lush reverb of the same kind as the lead vocal, and as automated as the lead vocal, especially in the bridge.

And finally, the Harmonies of the Choir section

Panned like so: the lows 30%, the highs 60% from each other.

Individually Channeved, LALA'd and Nova'd, with a hint of Izotope Vocal Doubler with 100% separation and only 50% wetness, each choir harmony track got a taste of it in equal measure, then they’re thrown into the Harmonies pot (bus lol) where they were cooked to perfection (of course there's no such thing, I still feel like I can touch them up more, but don't know how *shrug*) with even more Channev saturation, equalization, de-essing, compressing, limiting, then being hit with a sprinkle of 1176 spice through FETish by Analog Obsession, more LALA, more Nova, some NG-EL Stereoizer (NUGEN Audio) at 25% width, more Nova, only this time in multiband dynamic eq compression mode, compressing each band a meager 1-2 dB GR, before going into yet another Izotope Vocal Doubler with 100% separation and only 50% wetness, all together now, joining into a final Tape MELLO-FI (Arturia) acting as a bit of tape emulation with default settings except the filter is set to 10% lowpass and the drive knob is all the way to 100% with the explosion button in. In the end, even that wasn't the end, because they were then blasted through FAST Verb by Focusrite on the final word of the final chorus where the reverb reaches a 5 second decay, maximum width, in the furthest position.
To get it to sit just behind the lead vocal, (because I thought it needed it ) I set up a sidechain compressor to duck the choir a couple dB when the lead hits.
Oh, and the choir is also sent a bit to the BG vocals FX (-10 dB in the sends)

Note: when I mention comp/limiting, I usually mean to just barely limit the very peaks and compress no more than 2-3 dB GR, but in some instruments, the limiting is used for total gain control, such as in the strings...

Final loudness results:
TPM -3.9 dB
LUFS-I -18 dB

Anyway, that's all I did.
I know I didn't need to write all this. It took me 4 hours too just taking my mix apart lol.