MIX CHALLENGE - MC071 November 2020 - Winners announced

[patrlord]

Hi Mark,
Sounds way more sophisticated than my little setup, I tend to use headphones so as not to disturb the rest of the family !
For Pandora, I can share the stems if you want to have a go at it. I make music for the pleasure of it, and it's cool to share and collaborate. The only thing is that now I've done it once, I realise it takes a fair effort to 'unmix' my tracks and I have to be careful to preserve the original sound design.
Cheers!

[Mark Andrews]

Hi Mark,
Sounds way more sophisticated than my little setup, I tend to use headphones so as not to disturb the rest of the family !
For Pandora, I can share the stems if you want to have a go at it. I make music for the pleasure of it, and it's cool to share and collaborate. The only thing is that now I've done it once, I realise it takes a fair effort to 'unmix' my tracks and I have to be careful to preserve the original sound design.
Cheers!

Well I'm up for it but don't wish to pressurise in any way - if you make it happen that's brilliant, otherwise I've had fun with this one!

[patrlord]

I have personally received a lot feedback telling me my mixes have a "dark" feeling (twice this Mix Challenge, thanks @canese).

Since this is not the way I feel about the mix (I personally aim for impact and space i.e. overuse of compressors, delays and reverbs until satisfaction), I would like to know makes a "dark feeling" mix for you (and maybe end up with a standardized reference like "Hierarchical ontology of timbral semantic descriptors" [Pearce 2016]).

Hi @alavault !
'Dark' is maybe not the best descriptor I could have used; but that was my gut feel as I listened to your mix. I would say that it's mainly the industrial / deep foghorn sound of the bass that does it. It sounds like it would fit well in a film score to a thriller. The insistent, deep sound reminds me of some of the score to Inception towards the end of the film.

I just checked out that scholarly article, very interesting. It doesn't have 'darkness' in its graphic showing the 'Sunburst plot of the Hierarchical Structure of Timbral Attributes'. We should write to them and get the term added !!

[alavault]

Hello everybody,

Here's my mix for round 2 :[https://drive.google.com/file/d/15fEKnA ... sp=sharing
I stayed on the same idea while incorporating the requested changes :

• Reduced the feedback on the delays and the overall return.
• Taming the riser to the guitars (-4dB + reverb)
• Lots (and lots) of automation on the basses. Using a mult of the bass stab to have a clean signal. Oddly enough, I think the "monster" side of the bass comes from the flanger they are sent too, not so much the saturation I put on. It's been automated too. The multed signal is slightly saturated (because it was a bit too "plain" for me...)
• Bass hold has been automated following the suggestion from the feedback.
• Blue In Gray pad : pitch shifted reverb into hall + automation. Hope it's enough.
• "Make the lead sounds like an electric guitar" : might as well use a guitar amp. With gain. A lot of gain (Fredman Be50 emulation). Added an automated tremolo.
• No more monsters under bed the end of the song.
• More master fader automation for more volume variation. (+ the basses).

[JohnK]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/rzz1powf3oh0r ... K.wav?dl=0

JohnK you did a great job indeed, good luck next time.
Ps: I don't know him but his mix is a very good one, and I'm shocked when I didn't see his name in R2.anyway good luck with R2 everyone.

Thanks! That was kind. Mixing is subjective and sometimes it doesn't work for the producer/songwriter.

[kirurg]

Hello everyone,

Thank you @patrlord for giving everyone the feedback.

Here is my version for the round 2:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/umsoxvz1l2auu ... 2.wav?dl=0

To get Pad Blue in Gray to sound more pad'ish, added a long reverb, and a kind of ensemble style chorus
fx as well. Also made some volume automation changes for different parts. The bass got a bit low eq cut.
Final lead got more saturation/distortion. Edited manually RG track to get rid of some noises.

[Waleed Morris]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/rzz1powf3oh0r ... K.wav?dl=0

JohnK you did a great job indeed, good luck next time.
Ps: I don't know him but his mix is a very good one, and I'm shocked when I didn't see his name in R2.anyway good luck with R2 everyone.

Thanks! That was kind. Mixing is subjective and sometimes it doesn't work for the producer/songwriter.

You deserved, actually, you know what, the good mix in my opinion when the sound engineer decided to use his brain with his ears.
but unfortunately, sometimes the client needs ordinary things, there is a lamp behind your mix and I like lamps anyway good to see you here, and I know we will challenge soon

[rvalle]

Hello my friends.

This is my version for the second round:

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

I improved the pad, eliminating the modulation of the panorama and softening the attack of the timbre, so that it is more like a pad. As the autopan effect, in this case, was an inverse movement between L and R, the best solution was to isolate the Mid signal. Then, I inserted a reverb, which helped to solve both problems. First, it brought the stereo image to the pad back; and also minimized the attack, as it reduces the intensity of the early reflections. The reverb was inserted into the pad track, 100% wet.

I had simulated a lo-fi effect on the vocal, when the singer says "there is only static", with a noise and a bit reduction; the idea was good, but the execution was terrible . This maked the voice dull and I removed the effect.

I changed the processing on the solo instrument, replacing the previous one with Native Instruments' Guitar Rig. I removed the volume modulation. The timbre became more evident.

That's it.

I'm glad I reached the top 10. Good luck to everyone!

[VasDim]

Hi all,
this is my mix for 2Round:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ekvs5ws7rwzo3 ... d.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

[patrlord]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/rzz1powf3oh0r ... K.wav?dl=0

JohnK you did a great job indeed, good luck next time.
Ps: I don't know him but his mix is a very good one, and I'm shocked when I didn't see his name in R2.anyway good luck with R2 everyone.

Thanks! That was kind. Mixing is subjective and sometimes it doesn't work for the producer/songwriter.

You deserved, actually, you know what, the good mix in my opinion when the sound engineer decided to use his brain with his ears.
but unfortunately, sometimes the client needs ordinary things, there is a lamp behind your mix and I like lamps anyway good to see you here, and I know we will challenge soon

Hi Waleed !
I'm a complete noob on this forum, I joined because of the mix challenge (thanks Mr Fox for your tireless dedication to this cause). I can see that you've a lot of experience and you won a number of mix competitions here, so I really appreciate your thoughts !
There are also quite a few regulars here participating in the competition, and I'm truly thankful for all of your contributions.
It may sound cheesy, but every single contribution (63 of them) helped me refine how I listen to and evaluate a mix, to identify what I like and don't like and how to translate that into feedback (which was maybe a bit rough around the edges, I'm working on that ). I have learned a lot about the kind of 'sound' I am looking for, and that there are numerous alternative styles that I would never have considered but work really well, starting from the same set of 'raw' tracks.
It's really interesting what you're saying about the client's needs and how they express it. We are focusing a lot in this competition on how to best respond to client's needs. I understand that it's set up this way to try to simulate a mixing engineer - client relationship. I would be interested in learning, as a mixing engineer, what questions to ask of your client in order to better clarify what they are looking for and thus make your mixing job easier ?
Great to 'meet' you !
Cheers, Patrick