MIX CHALLENGE - MC082 November 2021 - Winners announced

[satchboogie]

Hi !

Thank you for the song and opportunity.
Here is my mix: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11fruSt ... sp=sharing

My main goal was to emphasize the natural characters of the instruments while maintaining a natural separation as well. I was playing with panning and stereo levels a lot. Stacked together: some frequencies easily got overwhelmed. Overall i was trying to use soothe2 this time on most of the channel to see what results i can get. I used paralell stack on lead vocal and double LA2A plugin to share the compression levels. I was playing with opticom XLA and MC77 on the drums and basses to adjust the punch and tail. For the flute i wanted to make it audible but not harsh the whole time so i did some cuts. I used reverb only on the main flute to bring the flute section closer in the verse. Bridge: guitars hardpanned left-right to give width. Vocals, drones: panned individually, was trying to match a musical scene. Bells: panning and level settings.
Masterbus: Vertigo vsc3 (around 1dB comp for glue), Studer uad

Plugins used: soothe2, bx_digital v3, LA2A uad, opticom XLA3, MC77, vertigo vsc3, Studer uad, adaptiverb, comback kid

cheers,

satch

[monjeco]

Hello to everyone!! it been a while since I had the time to do this. So I´m very excited about this!!!

Here s my mix.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nmr-Cv ... sp=sharing

Well.. tried to keep it simple, I wanted it to sound organic and folky so i didnt use too much fx and stuff like that. Its a great performance and recording... so I wanted to stay true to it.

So... I did some carving with the fabfilter EQ individually in order to smooth the interaction of the instruments in the mid-range.

Also used some group processing on the drums with the SSL bus compressor along with the FabfilterMB

Did a little bit of leveling and transient control on the strings with the scarlett compressor after some clean up with the FAbfilterEQ (individually)

Also used NLS for taste and harmonic excitement. (ssl in some channels, EMI on the mixbus)

Used Rob Papen s Reverb on the flutes and lead vocals and a little bit of trueverb for ambience on the vocal harms

Added some tape mojo, neve compression and transient control on the vocal bus

Finally I added some glue and clarity on the mixbus along with a little bit of transient control

MAX -17.2 LUFS
MAX TP -4.2 dBFS


Good luck to everyone!!!!!

[dadomachado]

Hi All,

Very interesting song to mix this month. Really enjoyed it. Follows my take:

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

I went with Slate Digital's VMR on most tracks using the Bit N emulation. I started top down doing moves on the busses. Used EQ, Saturation and Compression.

On the track level, the main moves were:

Drums - Subtractive EQ and some low end boost with passive EQ
Bass - A little EQ and RBASS on the bow one
Acoustic Instruments - EQ and sent them to a Room Reverb (ValhallaRoom)
Flutes - EQ, a little compression and sent them to a hall reverb (Verbsuite)
Lead Vox - EQ, Deesing, compression using RVOX and PuigChild. Sent it to a paralel channel to add some body. Sent it to a Room and Plate reverbs (TR5 Seunset and Sevebth Heaven). Also sent it to a delay that feeds into the plate reverb.
Choir - Used Melodyne to fix some pitching that were bugging me. Compressed them on the buss level and sent it to a Plate reverb (Verbsuite)

Master - VMR Bit N emulation, SSL Compression to glue it up, then I used bx_2098 EQ for tame the high end and a little boost on the lows. Finished it up with Kramer Tape.

I hope you like my take and I look forward to some feedback.

Cheers from Brazil !
dadomachado

[MFTWC]

Here is my file.


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


I started by cleaning the tracks one by one with a hipass filter, then I grouped Drums, Bass, Drone etc. together.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drum bus: Added some lowend at 110 Hz, made everything from 220 Hz down mono with the
bx control plugin, then I used a bus compressor to even out the volume.

Bass A: Added some lowend at 164.8Hz with a pultec style lowshelf curve, compressed with the
bx opto plugin, used a sidechained dynamic eq at 220 Hz to dip down when the main vocals hit.

Bass Bow: Compressed with the vc-2a plugin, used a sidechained dynamic eq (tb-equalizer 4) at 220 Hz to dip down when the main vocals hit.

Drone: Panned them to taste, compressed them with the spl iron plugin.

Flutes: On the Flute Ranveig track I added some space with the scheps mono upmix plugin, sendt them to the bus, compressed with the vc-2a plugin, used a sidechained dynamic eq (tb-equalizer 4) at 880 Hz to dip down when the main vocals hit.

Latina 1: Compressed with the vc-2a plugin, added some space with the scheps mono upmix plugin.

Bouzouki 1: Compressed with the vc-2a plugin, added some space with the scheps mono upmix plugin, used a dynamic eq (tb-equalizer 4) at 330 Hz to remove some mud.

Bouzouki Flagoette: Compressed with the vc-2a plugin, added some space with the scheps mono upmix.

Bouzouki.L & R: Panned 65, compressed with the vc-2a plugin.

Background vocals: Compressed with the vc-2a and the bx opto plugin.

Bells: Panning.

Saga Lead Voc: Compressed with the bx opto plugin, used the bx masterdesk classic for some sweetening, some deessing with the tb sibalance 3 plugin, reverb used where the nimbus and the valhalla room plugins.

Saga choir high end: Used some lpx hall reverb plugin.

Rest of the tracks: Nothing spesical.

Stereo bus: Some gluing with the spl iron plugin and some balancing eq with the tdr slick m plugin.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Intergrated loudness at -17.4 LUFS.

True peak at -1.4935 db for left channel and -1.3855 for right channel.

[DIVESPANNER]

Hi here is the link to my submission to MC082

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cxo576n71y5h1 ... 9.wav?dl=0

This month I have tried to curb my excessive use of all the plugins available and restrict myself to mainly the Amex eq 200 and Amex 9099 with a single reverb and a Klanghelm MJUC.
I have used a lot of high and low pass to try to give all instruments their space and tried to keep a handmade vintage sound to the instruments by not being too clinical with compression and allowing the natural sound of what I think the instrument should sound like I hope to of captured a more medieval style hope you all enjoy and good luck to everybody

[Mister Fox]

A friendly reminder:
We're in the final 24 hours to submit your mix.


IMPORTANT (final reminder):
See Rules and Guidelines (post #6), most notably "Upload and Submission Guidelines", and please don't forget your documentation.

[pursgo]

"drums" eq 600 dip , 4k boost. limiter and compressor
"bass" dip 400 , 120 /2k boost . limiter
"guitar" dip 1.3k , 180/5k boost.
flute dip low , boost high. 1 and 2 panned left right. 3 up the middle
drone panned around. two verbs
vox panned around one verb
main vox cut low end 230 boost , 1.5k cut high shelf boost one verb
adlib verb and delay

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4fwb0mykjnj59 ... o.wav?dl=0

[cpsmusic]

Hi Everyone,

Here's my entry for Mix Challenge 082.

What an interesting song to mix! Thanks to the song provider and to the contest organisers.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S12gla ... sp=sharing

Before starting the mix I had a think about the overall direction - to me, it was either going to be "realistic" (i.e. like a real ensemble performing), or more "cinematic" and so a bit more exaggerated. In the end I opted for a roughly 80/20 split so that the mix is mostly realistic with a few extra dramatic elements.

One of the main things I tried to achieve with the mix was a sense of the music being "in a large space" and also for there to be some front-to-back depth. To do this I used individual Predelay on the reverbs for each instrument group to enhance the perception of front-to-back positioning.

Before starting the mix I preprocessed the tracks with Softube Tape and Acustica's Black Geranium preamp. The "non-transienty" tracks were smoothed with MAutoVolume. The percussion has no dynamics preprocessing.

The mix was organised into eight instrumental groups:

Drum
Bass
Bell
Flute
Bouzouki
Latina
Choir
Lead Vocal

The processing for each channel was quite simple and limited to a few plug-ins - TDR's Kotelnikov, TB Compressor 4 and TB EQ 4. Kotelnikov was used for either peak or RMS compression while Compressor 4 was used for upwards compression. EQ 4 was used for general EQ duties (HPF, LPF, etc.). Even though Kotelnikov is primarily a mastering compressor I wanted to try it on a mix as it has a reputation for being transparent, something that I wanted for this mix.

Three reverbs were used:

A separate L/R early reflections reverb using Valhalla Room.
A separate L/R Hall reverb using Flux Verb.
An additional Plate reverb for the "lead" instruments i.e. Flute, Lead Vocal using Acustic's Silver 240. The idea of using a separate reverb for these "lead" instruments was to try to separate them from the other instruments in the mix.

As mentioned above, the Hall and Plate reverbs were sent via an additional bus that added a per-group Predelay. The idea of the this was to create an enhanced front-to-back separation. In addition, the L/R reverbs all had slightly different settings in order to enhance their stereo width.

All spatial effects were sent to their own bus which had Fieidler Stage for additional width, and TB EQ 4 for HPF/LPF.

The percussion instruments were sent to their own bus which had no processing.

The other instruments were sent to their own "music" bus and were processed with MTM's Animate using the Grow section for some dynamic stereo expansion and contraction.

The Mixbus processing consisted of TEOTE, VPRE-2C, EQ323D, TB EQ 4 and Bassroom.

Specs:

44.1kHz/24-bit
-18.1 LUFS (int.)
-1.1 dBTP


Good luck to all contestants.

Cheers!

[tiptoe3]

hi,
i would like to thank the song provider. It is a nice tune.

On my first listen, i decided to go for a modern type of sound. More of a pop sound
with upfront vocals as an old style warm glued version you have heard thousand times. i heard
the rough mix later on and did some adjustments to reflect the levels between the instruments.

My mix is a „regular“ covid mix madness, done in three steps.

I did pass the tracks through a SSL J with inserted api pres from a 1608. I need three passes.
No eq was used, just high pass filters and the right levels for the api. that gave me the forward sound
I’m looking for.

Two days later i did a basic mix. Listening to some „problem zones“:

There is an annoying hum on one flute. I got rid of the lower part with RX. I left the higher noise part
in, cause it took too much out of the performance.

The main flute had a lot of breaths in, which sounds nice but was too much with the rest of the tracks in place. Lowered it manual.

The rest is dog work. getting rid of dirt all over the place. Low cutting vocal tracks, levelling and panning.


A week later, i came back and set the song up again. Half finished room and my Euphonix System 5 in, on a pair of cans. really strange…

I thought initially getting the groups out through my ssl 4000e channels plus sum and comp, but the setup needs a bit more work. Well, i tried my best to get the sound in the box.

flute 1 and 2 got some ambience verb for dimension for a „back wall“. flute 1 a small delay for left right difference.
flute ranveig: eq for resonance treatment, Sta-Level with 5db compression. ambient verb and some lexicon big hall.

drums got some eq, transient designer for more attack and a bit distortion. paralell bus with 1176 4:1 for some length.

bass: dbx160 and l2. bass bow- eq and 1176 bus for length

bouzouki and latina: eq and LA4 comp on 2:1. kissing the needle

lead vocals: eq, resonance eq, ssl comp 2:1 a db, LA2 and LA4, deesser- Lexicon mid room

vocals: eq with low cuts, 360hz cut, 1-3khz cut, high shelf -2db- to get some room for the main vocals- lexicon big hall

Main bus is ssl bus comp 4:1 3db reduction. Pultec 30hz and 10k boost. TC6000 dig in/out to bring the level up in the -16LUFS ballpark.

Link to the file:

https://c.gmx.net/@317237882228053658/i ... VZ0XvqkohA

[okayzon]

This kind of music really strikes a chord in me, perhaps being a norse descendant ;-) - I'm a Dane.
Overall I've tried to keep the dynamics as untouched as possible. Just keeping it from going through the roof.
My take on the song is definitely more etherial, than the dry sound on the original,
I must agree with PauPau - the recordings were great! Normally I don't use room mic tracks,
but these were great. Must have been a killer studio they recorded at.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g3hiv4 ... sp=sharing

cheers
okayzon