Mix Challenge

• Unfortunately, not everyone has sent in an edit (I count 09 out of 15), we therefore have 6 disqualifications (@PonySho has withdrawn, @artisan.au, @Dodgingrain, @jaThum, @useruser and @wkanegis didn't submit anything)
• We have 2 Wild Card uses to advance into the next round (@Cadence Soundlabs and @JanLefr)
• We have 3 participants that decided on not to advance through the use of a Wild Card (05 were available this month, @PonySho has withdrawn, @Dodgingrain and @wkanegis didn't use a Wild Card)
• We have 0 submissions after the deadline
• We have 0 submission that could not be downloaded by the time of this post and are therefore disqualified (re-checked 10-SEP-2024 4:30 UTC+2/CEST)

sthauge wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 09, 2024 17:34 CEST

This is my views and it's perfectly fine to disagree. Here's the last one(at leased for today):

@cpsmusic

Your mix is to quiet. It's -16.1 LUFS so that's OK, but it's also -7.1 dBTP. The reason for this is that it's overcompressed. If you look at the wave form of your mix it's almost a rectangle square. When your compress or clipping a mix, the LUFS will raise and you have to turn down the volume to be in the range of the competition(max - 16 LUFS), this will of course also reduce the dBTP and you mix is getting quieter. Another bad result of (over) compression on a mix is that you loose air, space and depth in your mix.

General info: I think I have mention this before, but any way, everybody should listen to this music so they can hear and learn about the importance of preserving transients and be careful with bus/master compression.

Here are two examples of great mixes with great depth, air and space:

Michael Jackson ''Thriller'' and Roxy musics song ''Avalon''

On the other hand, here's a mix that is compressed so hard that it has become dead and flat:

Jonas Alaska, ''October''

(I have to tell that I know Jonas and have done some job for him that he will use on his next upcoming album(I'm doing mixing just for fun though). The song is nice but sad. Jonas and I have discussed this mix and we agree that the job done by the engineer could be better. That's why I don't have any problems using it as an example)

Back to your mix, cpsmusic. The marimba and piano are bright and upfront, but the drums and vocal need to be pulled forward and brighten up so they align and balance well with the marimba and piano.

The attack and the sound of the bass in the beginning seems strange. It's tiny and I got a feeling of a bass player that's need to practice more, so the hit on the strings are more even. When the vocal starts the bass got more of a bass sound and fill the mix, may be to much and woolly. Try to put some distortion on the bass to reduce the woolliness and add substance to it. Distortion will also add harmonics to the tone. These harmonics are important when listening on a kitchen loudspeaker that are not capable to reproduce the low frequencys. Our ears and brain hear the harmonics and make the low freq that's not there giving us the impression that they are present. This will help our mixes to translate better to different listening environments.

You can consider using a multiband compressor on the kick to emphasis the hit just a tiny bit more, but also get control over some woolly freq or alternate, try some EQing

Cymbals? Guiro? Shaker? Hihat? they are present, but quiet.

sthauge wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 09, 2024 14:26 CEST

@elements

Lead vocal could sound a bit more natural in the parts where you don't have added effects, try subtract one or two dB around 1.9 kHz(broad Q). Make it more upfront.

General information: Remember there's three freq that's problematic: 160 Hz, 620-640 Hz and around 2 kHz, so always pay attention to those freq.

A tip(but don' tell anybody ): you can make the vocal almost as upfront as you like by doing some parallel compression. Send the vocal to two buses. Put a compressor on one of them. Ratio 1.9, attack 30-32 ms(this will let the consonants thru), release 40-50 ms, threshold adjusted so the compression varying on the meter from 0 to around 4 - 5 dB(be careful, not to much), no makeup gain. Now you should be able to place the vocal anywhere you like and the volume accordingly just by adjusting the two bus faders to each other. Start with uncompressed bus at 0 dB and fade in the compressed one. You might like to adjust the release to your liking's

The kick is anonymous, It could stand out more, though the song do not ask for a kick ''in your face'' type of kick so do not overdo it. Emphasis the hit more as well. The drums could be more audible, but not to much. Loud drums do not fit the song(my opinion)

General information: A known technique is to place a compressor on the bass track and sidechain the kick into the compressor, so that the bass is ducked a very short time when the kick hits. This technique can bring out the kick without making it louder. This could also be a god thing to do if you have a bass player that do not play precis.

sthauge wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 09, 2024 12:24 CEST

A couple of more participant that did not make it to round two is open for comments. I'll try my best to give feedback if I got time. Again, this is my views and it's perfectly fine to disagree. Here's the first one:

@RonChos

First, the mix is quiet, 19 LUFS, so you could make it nearly 3 LUFS louder without being disqualified. There's some spike transients in the mix that could have been clipped with a plugin to get it louder without compromising the dBTP.

I'm not sure how successful the reverb on the bass in the start is. The reverb is ''yelling'' so if you prefer to use it, reduce the amount and decay time.

The lead vocal is lisping, turn down your deesser. It could be some more upfront, especially in the transitions and it's somewhat ''behind'' the snare. There might be a good idea to pan instruments more to get them out of the way of the vocal so they ''don't fight for space''

The Guiro could be a bit louder so the vibration at the end is more audible. The shaker could be a lot more audible.

The kick was difficult in this mix. The hit on the kick is not even in your mix. It's nearly ok some places(sounding Bom, Bom), but not present other places(sounding om, om). Automation could be one option to make the track more even. A multiband compressor is another option... or maybe both. A compressor could be used to enhance the transients and help to transform the ''om, om'' sound to ''Bom, Bom''.

A general comment on drums: The drumset is one instrument. Balance the drums according to how it will be perceived if you where in the room listening to the drums. Examples: Are there an unbalance between the snare and hihat, how are your cymbals sounding to the snare and hihat. Are the toms to loud....... When you think the drumset is in balance, listen to it in the mix, is it still in balance or do it needs adjustments? If you adjust something in SOLO, always check it in context.

A tip: if someone get a track of an instrument that sound different in different sections of the track. This situation can occur eg. if the track is recorded in different situations. Make a copy of the track, edit the two tracks so you get one track with all the parts that sound equal and the other track with the other parts that's equal. Now you have two tracks that can be processed individually so when playing them together you're able to have a instrument that have the same sound throughout the song. Hope I explained this understandable.....

Your hihat and cymbals could be more present. The cymbals sound a bit muted/diffuse. They could sparkle a bit more, but do not overdo it so they become harsh.

The mix is to some extent wet, so it might benefit from reduced reverb.

A general comment on reverb: Make it somewhat even. What I mean with this is that it's not even if one instrument plays in a ''cathedral'' and another in a ''staircase''. This will sound weird, at least to me. If you use the reverb to make depth in the mix though, the settings will be different according to where you like to place the instrument in the ''room''.