Mix Challenge

Hi everyone!

As usual I had a lot of fun. For some reason I worked on the drums first. I began with some parallel compression on the kick and the snare, plus distortion. Other than that I had a boost on the snare near 200 hz and 6k, and on the kick at 97hz and 3.2khz. This seemed to give each some low end punch where it needed it and the higher end of it to cut through. I used slight sidechain compression on guitars and bass to help the drums cut through too.

The guitars were where I struggled the most, mainly because there were quite a few of them. I tried to treat a few of the different guitar pieces just a bit differently so they would sound distinct and you would be able to hear them in the mix. On on I threw on a guitar cabinet impulse with the fruit convolver. On another I added some distortion with love filter. Still another I used a phaser effect with the sweep frequency set to zero to give it a 'combed' sound, giving it pockets where other sounds can be heard through. Other than that, a bit of eq and panning to taste.

For some reason I loved a boost on the bass at just over 600 hz. I boosted it pretty far, and it had this funkier groove going on that I liked, which might be a matter of taste. I did a little bit of compression and distortion on it as well.

For the vocals I did a bit of compression and de-essing, as well as boosting slightly with a high shelf, but a cut at about 2.4khz because it just seemed to get a bit harsh there sometimes, and my guitars were coming through strong there already anyway. Nothing too fancy.

I used the room tracks to get the cymbal sounds I wanted. Probably the main thing I did was to drop a lot of the midrange, but to keep some of the low/low-mid, because it was useful for the snare, and the high, of course. This kept the cymbals crips but the snare and kick had some extra interest too. I did a little bit of compression to keep the cymbals a bit more in-your-face too.

I boosted one of the acoustic track around 4.5khz because it seemed like where it was coming through, relative to everything else. I feel like it added a little something different from all of the electric guitars that were going on. That was pretty much it! Thanks to SilverStoned and JeroenZuiderwijk for the track!

Here is my mix: https://drive.google.com/file/d/17M5Euw ... sp=sharing

Hi everyone,

First of all a big thanks to @JeroenZuiderwijk and the Silverstoned band for a fun track to mix. Thank you once again to @Mister Fox for the organisation and tireless work that is put in month after month.

Ok, so here is my mix:
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/lp668pfj ... x877h&dl=0

When I was mixing it the first band that came into my head was The Saints as well as a bunch of early punk. It has that raw edge to it which makes it interesting and gives it that character. I also referenced Let There Be Rock - AC DC, Spoonman - Soundgarden, A little bit of NIrvana, Pixies and Fugazi. The last part really had me digging into tracks by Lard for that edge it goes into.
So yeah, it’s quite a bit of punk. I hope that comes across in a good way.

Anyway, back to the mix.

First track is the Bass:
My aim was to give it a bit more presence in the mix and be the good anchor.
I added a little Tube Saturation to give it a bit more harmonic content, followed by Klevgrand’s GoTo EQ where I gave a small boost at 40Hz and then cut a bit out at 250 and around 1K to just shape it and take some muddines out. I then fed it through a PSA1000Jnr for a bit of Sansamp flavour where I cranked the punch and drive took a little bit out of the low and added a bit to the high. I was looking to give it some edge and definition. I then put it through a IK Multimedia Mixbox using the British EQ and White 2A to give it a little more presence and consistency. Finally, I fed a C2 instance in sidechain mode from the kick drum to provide a little room for the kick drum to poke through.

next the drums:

This is where I spent most of my time working on the sounds and their balance. It was kind of tricky, but I think I’ve got to a good place with them. It’s always difficult for to know if I’ve got enough kick in there…

Kick: Basically I put a hpf on it @ 40Hz and cut a little of the bottom out as it sounded a little messy down there. After some experimentation I put a gate on it to help sharpen and clean, followed by a FabFilter C2 compressor just to level the peaks a little and then put a FabFIlter Pro Q3 and just used the outside mic punch and sustain preset to put it in the ballpark and adjusted from there.

Snare: The snare was the trickiest sound to get sounding somewhat OK. I hope it works for you. What I did was the following:
HPF at 180.8 Hz, LPF at 4909 Hz to put it in the ballpark. I then put a gate on it to a) remove the access sounds going on b) remove a bit of the transient so it would sit better. The attack was set at 66ms the release was set to 114ms and then I adjusted the threshold to a point where I thought it all sounded right. This made a huge difference to my ear. I then had a compressor set at 2:1 to provide a little punch and body back and then added a little tube saturation. I then used the Blindfold EQ by Audio Thing to adjust the mids and highs to taste and then added a Klevgrand REAMP to give it a little more “snare”. I used the overhead channels to balance a bit of the highs back into it as well.

Overheads L and R: the overheads had an HPF applied at 1688 Hz and a LPF applied at 5366 Hz. Essentially to remove the low end out of it and to keep the highs under a little bit of control. A little bit of 2:1 compression with a fast attack and a little bit of tape style saturation. I also took a little bit out via basic EQ around the 1k to 3K range just to back off a little bit of that nasty cymbal stuff. I sent them to a short room style reverb. I also had them panned at 45 degrees each side instead of full left and right. I wanted to keep the drums in the centre more and leave the outside reaches ofr the guitars and such.

The Room track had a little bit of High Pass and Low Pass applied, a little bit of 2:1 compression and tube style saturation applied. This was then put through the Trash plugin by Isotope.

The Toms had a little LPF and HPF and gates applied to assist in tightening their sound a little. Added a little compression and tape style saturation. I then tweaked their tones a little more with the use of the Blindfold EQ.

The drum tracks were then grouped into a bus where I had a little tape style compression applied, followed by a small amount of EQ adjustment to balance the group via the DDMF6144 EQ and then compressed a little with FabFilter C2. I sent this to a Saturn 2 instance as well to add just a little more subtle saturation in parallel - just cause I could and I felt it helped the group as a whole be present in the mix.


The guitars were basically balanced via fader and panning until I thought they sounded like they were doing the right things. I didn’t think a lot about how i would go about things or where they should sit - it just happened pretty quickly and smoothly. I didn’t put any EQ on them. I bussed them all together and placed an instance of the DDMF6144 with no adjustments made and an instance of the DDMF NY Compressor in dual mono because I feel like it makes a nice subtle difference to the stereo field when you set up the compressor in this manner.
I added a delay to the solo guitar track using Timeless 3.

The synth just had a little tape style saturation placed on it and was balanced to taste.

The vocals I pretty much left as they were regarding EQ or FX.
Vox03 and Vox02 had a little bit of tape style saturation applied and an HPF at 40Hz applied.
I put them both through an instance of MixBox with the Black76 and White 2A in series to level things a little and to give a bit of bite to help them sit in the mix. There is a small amount of the Phonograph added for a little tonal adjustment.
Vox01 was pretty much the way it without too much of anything.

On the mix buss is an instance of Callum’s Tape Pro to add a little master tape happiness and an instance of FabFilter’s C2 compressor. Tape Pro also provides me a place to adjust the gain before the C2 compressor which is set to a minimal amount of compression just to assist in keeping things tight. I have the internal side chain set with the HPF set at around 400Hz so the compressor is hitting the midrange more than anything and just letting the low end be what it is.

I decided to leave the start and the end noisy as they were without editing too much to keep the punky, rock and roll attitude alive.

That’s about it.

I just wanted to add that I realise now that this description part is a really beneficial thing to take the time to do properly. It makes you think about what you’ve done and why you’ve done something rather than just doing a whole pile of stuff and not paying any real attention. It’s almost like being at school or something.

Thanks again and good luck to everyone.

Dear all,
Many thanks to the song provider and to Mr. Fox for such an interesting and fun track to mix.
I spent most of my time on the mix, striving for a nice balance and ensuring separation and clarity of the different tracks using only fader, panning, and automation. All tracks passed through an SSL 4K E console emulation. To accentuate the song's vibe, I applied (a lot of) filtering effects on the drums and guitars. A tape machine emulator was added to the master bus.
Best wishes to all participants,
Pablo
My mix ->
[Dropbox link to MC100]

Good day alltogether!

As the participation window closes I want to give it a go and want to provide my mix-version of the awesome song MrRockNRoll.


https://drive.google.com/file/d/19V0SQ4 ... p=drivesdk


First of all I grouped all instruments together and routed them in individual subgroubs before routing them into the master channel.

As requested I tried to "unsharpen" the snare using "Sys Transient Shaper" (Hofa) [-34.4% Transient / +14.8% Sustain], I dynamicly limited 290Hz (Q12,5) at -26dBFS and compressed it again.
Furthermore I added a PlateHall to the snare and routed Snare dry and Plate Hall signal in a seperate Group before routing them in the Drum Group. While Mixing I found out that basedrum and snare provided phase issues so I switched their phase.
Overall Drum group is slightly compressed to bring it together and I added full sidechain compression in a drum FX group.

Regarding the bass I tried to shape it's sound sololy by using the StripEq and stabalize it in a seperate group using static and dynamic compression. Trying to give the basedrum room I dynamicly limit certain frequencies via sidechain signal.

For the guitars I used three subgroups while individual guitar channels are untouched (except for Fader positions, panning and send effects -such as roomeffects and stereodelay) groups are "guit main, guit solo -> guitars". In guitars I slightly compressed and saturated all guitars by Cubase channelstrip Tools (Standard compressor/magneto II) trying not to over do it.

In vocals I added some light room effects and one eq effect both are automated since vocals are in stereo already containing room information (I tried to base the mix on that already existing room effect)

For my personally the most enjoyable part was trying to bring all tracks together and shape the mix while doing so.

I guess I spent the most time on the drums and bass.

For my mix I can provide a pdf full of screenshots with all routing ways, insert settings, eq settings and so on (if necessary).

Thanks for this great mixing opportunity and to Jeroen and the band SilverStoned: I really like your song!

With best regards

Stefan

Hi all! New here. Enjoyed the challenge!

YouTube video reviewing my mix:

https://youtu.be/_sXyFyZFxLk

Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/cf4mf4dn ... re5qj&dl=0

Hi everyone! this is my first post here and I want to wish you luck to everyone and luck to me in this challenge. here ill leave you my version of this mix. It was tricky work on the drums and really easy to overdo some things so i was careful with that. at the end I think everything its sounds good and with more energy than the original mix just adding more bright on the overheads and bringing them to the front and fixing the that clicky snare transient and giving more body and presence to it.

Wav File: https://drive.google.com/file/d/14ULKkc ... share_link

and here a summary of my workflow on this Mixing. Im open to give more detail if you need it because its a lot of info to write here so,

Drums:
- Drum Bus: VCA comp (glue) / EQ (corrective) / Eq (creative)
- OVH: EQ to highlight >6 KHZ
- Room: HPF to cut Lows belows 20 Hz / VCA Comp to Get all the room sound to the front
- Kick: Duplicate signal and apply EQ on both (One signal to highlight the transient / One signal to highlight the low end. Both signals sent it to a bus and apply VCA comp to glue them, and eq to shape the form on the bus (Mono track).
- Snare: Gate to reduce transient, EQ to shape the sound, Tube Compression to unify the sound / Sent to a bus with Reverb
- Toms: gate, EQ, transient shape to enphatise the attack and Eq to enhance the lows


Bass: (Mono track)
- Duplicate the signal and apply amp sim to one of them to recreate the fully lows on the amp sound and another signal with the “DI signal”
- Both Signals With separate EQ to clear the sounds ( low end + crispy clean)
- Dynamic Eq with side chain with the kick

Guitars:
- A lot of panning here trying to make some sense between the verse/chorus/ outro and make everything more involving and dynamic
- Guitars are divided in groups ( Intro/ Verse/Chorus/ Outro) and apply full automations of volume and panning in every group making a “bigger” sound to the chorus and making the verse more audible and avoid exceeding Integrated LUFS
- Eq on each Group of guitars (more of them with the faders to shape the sound)
- Applied Dynamic EQ with side chain to reduce masking with the Synth
- Applied Dynamic Eq with side chain to reduce masking with the voice
- Finally a VCA Comp to Glue all the guitars on the guitar bus and a final eq to enhance some lows frequencies
- Sent it to Bus reverb

Synth: NOTHING AT ALL

Voice:
- Lead voice :
- Corrective EQ to remove some resonance
- Tube compression to add some character
- Saturation to add a little bit crispy sound
- Desser
- Colorative EQ
- Backing Vocals:
- Duplicate signal and panning to the sides
- Saturation to blurry a little bit due the facts of those are badly recorded
- Multiband Compression to reduce artificial sounds on certain frequencies and make it sound more natural
- Colorative EQ to fit the tracks on the mix
- LPF to Reduce highest noise
- VCA comp to Glue both signals
- This bus was sent it to a BIG reverb, Delay and chorus to make the sound more “bigger” but at the same time fit it on the mix without taking so much space on it.

Mix Bus: VCA compression to Glue evertything

Hello, nice Forum and everything else surrounding it! I saw it a while ago but realized only on Friday that there is a Challenge going
So here is my contribution: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ai396bgz ... 7w6zb&dl=0

My Gearaproach may look otherwise but i am really not a Pro in Mixing (Maybe one far day when i close my company) so have mercy

What did i do?:

I use Cubase as a Multichannelplayer into an SSL AWS 948
The only Plugins used where:

Drumsilencer (Snare, Kick, Toms) with automation on the length setting. Longer in the Intro and shorter in the heavy parts.
Fabfilter Pro Q3 to pull some resonaces on the Guitars and do some lowcuts.
L2 and Mamoth on the Bass

The Rest is Outboard EQ, Compression, Reverb, Chorus and Delay.
Overheads: SSL EQ and 1178
Room: SSL EQ and elysia mPressor 500
Toms: SSL EQ and X-Rack SSL Dynamics and Gate
Snare: SSL EQ and X-Rack SSL Dynamics and Gate
Kick: SSL EQ and X-Rack SSL Dynamics and Gate
Bass: 1176 and SSL EQ
Vocal1: SSL EQ into Bluey into DBX Deesser
Vocal2: SSL EQ into 1176 and La-2a into DBX Deesser
Vocal3 in Chorusses: SSL EQ into VAC Rac TSL 4 into DBX Deesser
Guitar Riffgroup 1: SSL EQ into LA3a´s
Guitar Riffgroup 2: SSL EQ into V3a´s
Guitar EFX and Solo: SSL EQ into JLM LA 500 A´s
Synth: SSL EQ and Xrack Stereo Comp.

Neve 5043 for paraleldrumgroup (Snare,Kick,Toms)
2X1176 AE for an analog REARBUS Version with: Vocals and Guitars

I duplicated in Cubase the Snare 3 times and send each to a dedicated channe on the console.
1. left original
2. pitched down 4 tones
3. cutted away and faded in the initial transient to trigger my reverbs with what was left over.
I did the same to a duplicated kick track and sended those modified signals with different values and return automated into:
1. Bricasti m7
2. Sony R7
3. Yamaha Rev-1
4. EMT 246

I used a Dimension D on the Bass followed by an Edison
And the APIVersion of the AMS RMX Reverb for Toms.
Effects used on Vocals and Guitars: Eventide H8000, Moog 500 delay, PCM 42´s, Echo Pro, Lexicon 960 for Plate and Tape Delay, Ursa282
Outboard Effects get summed and automated over an SSL Sigma into the Desk.
Pair of Pultecs and a Blue230 on the Mixbus
Mute and Volume Automation used on the Board.

Again, this has filled a boring weekend with lots of Fun! Thanks for cool the Song and the provider! You gave me the Chance to do what i love the most besides designing! Good luck to everybody! Looking forwar to feedback and the next Challenge!
Have a good time!
Dennis

Here's my mix. I fattened up the drums and added some parallel compression, added a little distortion on the bass with Decapitator, brightened up the guitars, some compression on the vocals, and ran the mix through a Manley Pultec to add some midrange, Neve and Dangerous Compressors with a few db of compression on each.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/8in5oy5y ... zumbl&dl=0

Peter Savad wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 13:32 CEST

Hi all! New here. Enjoyed the challenge!

YouTube video reviewing my mix:

https://youtu.be/_sXyFyZFxLk

Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/cf4mf4dn ... re5qj&dl=0

wow this sound awesome in my headphones
Great mix

Thanks for the tracks,here is my mix used the BX SSL E channel on all tracks
1176 0n vocals
CLA 3A on guitars
Decapitator on snare
link https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GEZ4nh ... sp=sharing