MIX CHALLENGE - MC087 August 2022 - Winners announced

[LughSenderson]

Hello everyone, great music this month. As always, I made everything as simple as possible. I used Bx_SSL9000J for EQ and compression, vertigo VSC-2 for general compression, Soothe to take some of the vocal irritability, Lx480 for reverbs and delay.

The general approach was to add generous amounts of treble because I wanted everything to be clear and livelier. I only compressed bass, vocals with fast attack and release and the bus out. Hope you like it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_a38uB ... sp=sharing

[aalekso0]

Hello all,
Great Song thx Ady for the opportunity.
I Use Ady's mix for reference it's a great mix bdw. Was fun mixing World Music with so many Traditional instruments.
Ribab and Jazz Trumpet are excellent, I try my best I hope I did well.
Here is my mix https://www.dropbox.com/s/cozfp8d4rp0na ... 0.wav?dl=0

[Andreas_Ko]

Hi everyone,

https://drive.google.com/file/d/15TDc_D ... sp=sharing

mixed ITB
drum loop: MM tone shaper, ssl eq
cajon: 1176, api eq
03_KARKABA_ROOM_X1: bf-3a

bass: MM tone shaper, 1176, ssl eq
gtr dist: 1176, ssl eq
gtr left: mcdsp comp, ssl eq
gtr right: mcdsp comp, ssl eq
gtr solo: ssl ch comp, ssl eq
brass: ssl eq
28_RIBAB_CLOSE: ssl eq
LV: maxim, cl1b, ssl eq
bgv: ssl eq, ssl ch comp

[dstra]

Hello everyone

Here is the link to my mix:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OzZ3In ... sp=sharing

Sound

• I like the sound of the ribab and karkaba very much and therefore gave them a prominent place in the mix.
• To emphasize the energy of the chorus, I also re-amped the guitars in the chorus.

Setup

• EQ and compression on almost all tracks
• dynamic EQs (sidechain) on different instruments in order to leave enought space for the vocals
• different reverbs for vocals, ribab, brass and guitars
• have used multi-bus compression; no further dynamic processing in main bus

Tools

• DAW: Ardour (on Linux)
• Plugins: Calf, LSP, zam and others

[Edu Cesar]

Hello! Really nice song to mix, I saw some videos about @Los_ady 's project before on Youtube and was glad to be able to mix it.
I downloaded and organized the tracks a few weeks ago, started to mix but had some health related problems, so I kind of abandoned it for a while. I caught up today and decided to finish it for the sake of it. That being said, I'm not really too proud of my mix, but it is what it is. I don't have too much hope, but I'm happy to participate. Here's my notes:

Drums/Perc:
- Some eq and compression on the sampled drums to tame the kick and to target some specific frequencies on the side.
- The karkaba, cajon and cala were kind of hard to mix because they have a lot of information, so I used the ambience to blend them and light panning to spread them out. Ended up cutting some low end as well

Bass:
- I duplicated the bass and ran through and Ampeg amp sim and added some tape saturation to get more pick attack. Blended with the DI bass and applied compression and some very light Rbass on the bus.

Guitars:
- Grouped them into sub busses and sent them to a guitar buss. The usual low cut to not muddy up the low mid and added some high end sparkle. Used an 1176 in most of them, with a slow attack and fast release.

Ribab:
- Tried to get the most out of the ambience sound but also keep it up front. That was a difficult instrument to mix because is so dynamic sometimes. My first thought was to lower it down, but it has also such a unique sound and it deserves more attention. I basically just cut some of the low end and LA-2A compression on the bus.

Brass instruments:
Grouped them all and added some ambience with Ocean Way Studios. Cut some harsh high end on all of them and then used Trackspace with the vocals side chained to tame them during the chorus. Also added some tape saturation.

Vocals:
Some specific volume automation on some parts to begin with and sent them all (with different send %) to a ducked tape delay, an ambience and a plate reverb. On the main vocals I used a 1176 and a LA-2A, de-esser and soothe 2. On the backing vocals I automated the sends and volumes further to fit them in.

Mixbus:
Minor mid-side adjustments with Hitssville EQ Master and to get a more vintage feel, added a little Tape Saturation and an API 2500 with the glue type of compression. I mixed pretty low, so I just bumped up the volume with Pro L2, but no limiting happening.

Here's my mix:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/16bAWmO ... sp=sharing

[zed999]

Nice track to play with.
I had to mix this very quietly on 5" speakers/in tracking headphones
Here's my mix

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hqiA96 ... sp=sharing

Percussion and desert beat, I tried to reduce the thump in favour of the percussion, eq, compression and panning.
Bass I distorted the HF a little.
Guitars, eq and panning.
Brass eq, ducked out of the way of the vocals in places.
vocal eq, compression.
reverb - short for things that weren't already in a space, long for effect on some tracks.
Some limiting and HF limiting to take the peaks of some tracks.

[alan_mix]

I didn't have lot of time to mix this time so aimed for bit of balance and try to get the overall sound to sound right.
So did not use lot of plug ins or processing.
Bit of Waves comp, reverb. Used SSL Flexverb on the vocals. Amp simulator to spice up the solo guitars.
I was just scrambling to get the loudness at the right level but I definitely need to prep better for this as last time I disqualified due to LUFS and hope I got it within the allowed numbers this time.
Would appreciate any feedback.
Thanks.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1F1mAkZ ... sp=sharing

[jetwolf]

Ady,

Thank you so much for sharing the track.

Here is my submission.

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

I have been testing Softube Console 1, so the basic SSL Channel is used on all tracks, except for master bus, where the TG12345/TG12413 was used.

I have both the Console 1 and the Console 1 Fader. I do really like being able to use two hands to twist knobs rather than clicking a moust. On the flipside, I am using Pro Tools and have been very disappointed to seemingly not be able to get the Console 1 Fader to work with Pro Tools, other than adding Drive and Character to Tracks.

If anyone has had success in getting the Faders to work with Pro Tools for mixing fader track levels, please let me know how you set that up.

Great sounding vocals - no tuning at all. In addition to the basic SSL, I used ProQ3 for cuts and split tracks with RS124 on one track and then used an 1176 and Devil Loc to mix in a slightly more distorted side to get some width. Room, plate, and slap added.

Bass - split to two tracks DI with Puigchild and Limiter and second with an Ampeg B15 emu.

Added a bit of phase to the beginning track. Automated the horns a bit.

Room reverb added to most tracks.

Guitars have a bit of slapback added for depth.

Note: I had a very short timeframe to work on this mix, and there were a couple of tracks omitted that would be added in round two.

[Mork]

Hi!

Thanks for the song, great vibe!
I had a great mix going at home, but didn't finish it in time and had to leave town for work. I decided to give it another spin just on my laptop with headphones and Realphones (which I never used before). So this is kind of mixed blindly.

I just got the Softube American Class A channelstrip, and it's all over here. Basically every EQ is Class A apart from the occasional Pro Q, where just a high pass is needed. The drive is also in good use. I wanted to give the song a vibey and slightly gritty feel. I don't know why it reminds me of From Dusk Till Dawn, but a little in that direction. The most important part for me to achieve that was the vocal. It's exactly how I had it in mind, forward and and gritty. For the vocal sound I used Pro DS, smart comp 2 to get it in shape, then Class A EQ, comp an drive (!) for tone and grit. A little extra grit comes from the cool Apogee soft limiter freebie. After that a second Pro DS and that's it.

I think the other important part was to maintain focus, which is hard to do with this arrangement. The main tool for that is balance (thank you Cpt Obvious), but also eq, verb and drive to put things into the background. There's also a little automation, like a parallel drum loop comp in the choruses to give it a slight lift.

That's basically it. A lot of tracks only have the American Class A channel on it, using EQ, drive and maybe compression, nudging things into their space.
Mixbus is BAX eq for a little smiley curve, Weiss compression (parallel mode) and Elevate to catch the occasional peak and a little bit of its transient thing.



https://drive.google.com/file/d/1x3Qgpj ... sp=sharing

[Davias]

Hello everyone,

long time no see for those who remember me.

Here is a last minute mix : https://drive.google.com/file/d/12pJOTT ... sp=sharing

Hope I'm not too late, as I tried to go to KVR forum first, and I had to register a new account here very quickly lol.

About my mix I made some use of sidechaining and ducking, my goal was to give it a pop/club feel, and tying to make as much instruments hearable at some time or others, despite it being a busy mix. Very interesting and groovy track, a real challenge !

Glad to participate.

Cheers