MIX CHALLENGE - MC051 February 2019 - Winners announced

[Mister Fox]

Hello and welcome to the Mix Challenge 51 - February 2019


This is the introduction post, where we directly link to the challenge corresponding files (source files, submission information, sponsors), start of the evaluation process and the first post for re-submissions for Mix Round 2.



Happy (late) new year, everyone! I hope you could enjoy the annual 1-month vacation.

Let us start off 2019 with another great production by longtime Mix Challenge participant David Talbot. This month we have the chance to work on a collaborative Rock production by David/MOA22 and French cartoonist/amateur musician Deluqc, which was written during the "Les compotes" songwriting challenge on the French music homepage "Audiofanzine". The song is called "Autour de toi" (translated: Around you).

A translation for the song lyrics are present. Read more about the production below, and in the bundled TXTs.



A sidenote for this challenge:

Please, do a proper documentation of your production and pay attention to properly naming/tagging the files. An inspiration as to how you could do that, might be via two old posts of mine during MC014 (post 1, post 2). Furthermore - keep the summing bus treatment "tasteful" - no pre-mastering! The focus of this game is "mixing".




Please take note of the following

• IMPORTANT: It is mandatory to provide WAV files (FLAC bar minimum on low internet bandwidth), files need to be accessible/downloadable, try to work within suitable work levels, document your edits (ideally with screenshots)
  IMPORTANT: please use the following naming convention: MC000_-_ArtistName_-_TrackName_-_ContestanttName.wav/mp3 and MC000_-_ArtistName_-_TrackName_-_ContestanttName_R2.wav/mp3 for Mix Round 2. The order of the tags might change in upcoming challenges - though this is up for debate
• please upload to cloud storage spaces from now on (DropBox, GoogleDrive, etc). Please consult the official "Rules and Gudelines" regarding Upload and Submission Guidelines
• It is highly encouraged to give feedback to each other, to share tips and tricks. Ideally, this should happen after Mix Round 1 has ended, to not influence each other during the main competition round

Also please take note of the following

• We're looking for new source material for future competitions (mainly the Mix Challenge). Please follow our official campaign. Your only investment is time in turn for a free mix by our very talented participants. No new tracks mean no more challenges! Please reach out!
• Social Media accounts can be found via the handles @MixChallenge (Twitter) and MixChallenge (Facebook). Please spread the word!
• if you like what the Mix Challenge (community) has been doing in recent months, please consider supporting us.

This post will be updated with the corresponding links as we progress, and of course the suitable thread headlines. So please watch this spot:


Submission Period: General Information, Source Files, Sponsors
Mix Round 2: Global Feedback and Round 2 Participant Announcement
Results of the Mix Challenge 51: Winners announced

[Mister Fox]

CURRENT CHALLENGE - GENERAL INFORMATION

Time Frame: Friday, 01st February 2019 to Thursday, 21st February 2019 (21 days)

Challenge submission will end on 21-02-2019, 11:59pm CET/GMT+1 (Germany) - until further notice.

Want to find out if you're still within the deadline, please consult the following options:
The Global Countdown on it's dedicated page or the countdown on the home page. You can also consult the World Clock at the top of the forum or alternatively the following tool - in this case please select "Berlin (Germany)" as location 1, and your location as location 2: Time and Date - World Clock Meeting Planner. We do post reminders via our Twitter account and Facebook page.



Song Provider: David Talbot, Delucq
Song Name and Length: Autour de toi (translated: Around you), 3:29min
Song Information: roughly 124 BPM / Signature: 4/4, Key of G#min
File Format: WAV, 44kHz, 24bit

GENRE: Rock


Preview of the Song:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Tr7-bR ... ko5ly/view



A word from the song provider:

The song "Autour de toi" was composed and recorded/mixed by myself in collaboration with Delucq (a well-known French cartoonist and amateur musician) for a songwriting game on the famous French website "Audiofanzine".

There was nothing to gain.... The principle was to randomly select each musician to form pairs. We had a month to put it together. I quickly proposed a guitar riff that Delucq liked, then a drum part, some variations, and Delucq wrote the lyrics very quickly. "Autour de toi" (Around you) talks about some events related to the French news (3 years ago). The lyrics are far from my favorite, but I thought the music sounded pretty good with that dirty voice. I wanted a rock sound, as fat as possible. The challenge was to mix the elements Delucq sent me (voice, bass, guitar solo), with my elements (rhythmic guitars, drums), and to produce a rather nice arrangement.

The voices, solo and bass guitars were recorded with little care I must say, and I had to import MP3 tracks (!) into Logic.... (dynamic microphone for the voice, weird and over-processed amp). Huge editing work (time, tone). Half of the notes in the bass part were out of range....

For the competition, I suggest you have fun with this mix, and let it sound (a little) less traditional. It has to be powerful, not too clean !

Keep in mind that the drummer probably has big whiskers, and doesn't shower every day

Have a good time!


(more technical details in the Mix Pack bundled TXTs)

A few words by the Mix Challenge staff:

Another production by David Talbot that is telling a powerful story. I highly recommend you to read the lyric translation first, to get a picture of the "meaning" of this song (if you're not fluent in French).

This Hard Rock production is scratching the surface of Punk Rock. The guitars are crunchy (if you want to re-amp the DI tracks), the drums are dirty, the vocals not perfect. Although you can try a declip tool on the vocals first, to have a bit more flexibility during editing.

There is really not much to add this time other than "let's rock".

Please also consult the TXT files that are bundled in the source files package below. There you can find more information about the individual files and changes to the time signature.

Special Add-On Rules:

• try to create a mix that complements this production (in your own style)
• Clean / Alternative versions can be used if you need more flexibility over a certain sound (if present in this production)
• No rearrangement or pitch shifting of the song structure, with the exception of the following add-on rules
• PRODUCTION RELATED: make the best out of the provided audio material (EQ, compression, transient tools, etc) before reaching for supplementary drum sample treatment, "enhancement" is not necessary
• summing bus processing is allowed, as long as the dynamic range (average signal strength to maximum signal strength) doesn't suffer - use of this method is artistically!
• try to not(!) pre-master the track (please no overuse of mix bus treatment, no loudness adjustments / limiting) - read: NO MASTERING

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Source Files:

Main Mix Package - Mirror on the Mix Challenge Homepage (320,45 MB, LZMA compressed, zip)


The provided files were packed as ZIP with LZMA compression.
File size extracted: 726,09 MB, packed 320,45 MB (ZIP, LZMA)
In order to extract the files, we can recommend these programs:

Macintosh:
The Unarchiver - get it here
Keka (open source) - get it here

Windows:
7zip - Installation / Portable


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Please take note of the official rules - they can be found at the following thread:
Mix Challenge - Official Rules and Guidelines

Please address any OT question in the official Gossip thread:
Mix Challenge - Gossip and Discussion

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SPONSORS (Prizes):

Prizes for Mix Challenge participants:

Note: All licenses are NFR (Not-For-Resale), except where noted.
Changes to available prices on short notice may be possible and will be announced separately.



Acon Digital is kind enough give away a single plugin of winner's choice.
License will turn into NFR
More info on Acon Digital: http://acondigital.com



Hornet Plugins is kind enough give away one license from the depicted tools (see image) to the winner
License will turn into NFR
More info on Hornet Plugins: http://www.hornetplugins.com



Metric Halo is kind enough to give away a single plugin of winner's choice.
License will turn into NFR
More info about Metric Halo: http://mhsecure.com/metric_halo/



MuTools is kind enough give away one license of MUX Modular 7 of winner's choice (until End of 2018)
License will turn into NFR
More info on MuTools: http://www.mutools.com/



NOS Audio is kind enough give away one license of NOS Roomer to the winner
License will turn into NFR
More info on NOS Audio: http://www.nosaudio.com/



Tone2 is kind enough to donate a license of Ultraspace to the winner (until further notice)
License will turn into NFR
More info on Tone2: https://tone2.com


More sponsors to be announced during the course of February...



THANKS FOR THE LICENSE DONATIONS!
And also a thank you to all former contributors as well.

If you want to sponsor content (please have a focus on mix plugins, bundles and the likes), please get in touch with the Mix Challenge staff.

Please spread the word of the challenge on social media.
For example with our dedicated Twitter Account or Facebook Page

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Good luck to all participants.
And most importantly, have fun!

[korte1975]

hi there,

here is my mix of the song:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Qq0ip ... Jp6vLIoPnU - 32bit high resolution wav. /file has to be downloaded to play , mastering ready/

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1fk9MG ... nCQQ9jN8Px - 256kb/s mp3.

Documentation

screenshots

[JonasLasse]

Hey there, moin.

I used Cubase 8 and Soundtoys Bundle, NI Bus Compressor, Slate VMR,Waves VocalRider and GEM EQ550.
For Reverb i used LittlePlate and REVerence.

The specialities: Bass is overdriven by Decapacitator & side-chaincompressed by kickdrum (3dB GR) . Kicks lowend is from Sie-Q. Drumrooms are heavily compressed and darkened. Lead Vocs are delayed and reverberated. Also compressed with Waves VocalRider and VMR. Drum-snare and toms are reverberated.

WAV (16bit)
https://www.dropbox.com/s/id6a8fbrx13pz ... e.wav?dl=0

Mp3
https://www.dropbox.com/s/yzkp3w1nlpnc7 ... e.mp3?dl=0

Mixed on Bose Soundlink & AKG K702

[Clueless]

Here is my first attempt @mixchallenge

Used Airwindows bits and pieces

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

https://www.dropbox.com/s/znd3901osrjg7 ... 3.mp3?dl=0

Basically, i m nota fan of guitars, apart from bass
So have centralised the mix and added something, not editing of stems and used the mono room as the main drum elements.

Hope this is enough Info, will update if necessary.

[the_mazeman]

This was a fun experience and I got to use some of the the techniques I learned for the past couple of months.

WAV File - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-PVFjL ... sp=sharing
MP3 File - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1b_tW-C ... sp=sharing

I used equalization and compression very sparingly on the tracks and used a doubler on the vocals to give the lead vocal a little extra (or as the French might say je ne sais quoi). I used distortion but at the same time I wanted to preserve the clarity in the track.

All in all it was a great production and I hope I have contributed something to it !

P.S.- If anyone want to ask any questions about my mix please feel free to do so.

[OctopusOnFire]

Here's my entry for the contest.

For the music, I went for a punchy and raw-ish mix. I kept the printed guitars and only used the DI for adding an extra layer to the third guitar. No samples were used, but for artificially enhancing a single tom hit in the last part.

For the voice, given its particular nature, I kept it raspy, distorted and raw, while controlling the tone and the energy. It doesn't have big delays, just a very prominent slapback to add depth and texture.

Overall, it's a very open mix with L/R guitars and punchy drums, keeping space in the middle for the bass and voice.

Here are 2 screenshots showing the mix board. I'm still experimenting with the Airwindows suite. What you see in the buses is all the channel receives summing up into a dedicated bus plugin. There's also a parallel mix track next to the 2bus.




I uploaded the tracks to soundcloud. Here are the private links for preview, you can download the source.

MP3
https://soundcloud.com/user-86312367/mc ... ot/s-S2gKh

WAV
https://soundcloud.com/user-86312367/mc ... oi/s-Wm7em

I loved the recording and the delivery, full of attitude and commitment.

Comments and questions are welcome, as usual.

[Jamesirving]

Hi All

Here's my submission (my first!). Chased my tail a lot if I'm perfectly honest but I'm just about happy with it now. Thought the raw sounds were pretty great on the whole. I felt the drums kinda driving the show along so they were the anchor to hand everything else off of. I did add a supplementary kick and snare but more to add some ambience than anything, the raw mics sounded super cool and were easy to work with. I tried to add as much ebb and flow as I could and build to that last chorus. I did use the gtr DIs to define sections. The vocal was what it was and I went with it. Great attitude and I just tried to round it off and make it prominent without being harsh. I went to town on the solo guitar and duplicated and reversed it and threw the kitchen sink at it with fx. All the other edits you see are just for clarity on the bass removing noise, the same on the vocal and then dipping the gtrs in and out. Lots of automation all over the thing on the tracks, the groups and the master. Nothing too crazy fx wise. Looking at it as a jpeg (a harsh light for any mix!) lots of plugins but they're all doing just a little bit for the most part. Fun song and thanks for letting us all at it.

Mp3: https://www.dropbox.com/s/grvnq5uua9892 ... g.mp3?dl=0

Wav: https://www.dropbox.com/s/j67e659hyrqmq ... g.wav?dl=0


Screenshots:

[RichardClarke]

So heres my entry I really enjoyed the feel of this one, weirdly it reminded me of The Stranglers mixed with Pavement at points!? I actually think the original mix was great too and thanks for providing a such a fun track to work with!


MP3 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Stw-s ... NOJ3uf-nap
WAV - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Cavyr ... jdytaAQ8HN

Drums - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1oAY_4 ... Ai3p5WBGAQ
Bass and Guitars - https://drive.google.com/open?id=12Qf54 ... sNJ_ewm7k6
Vocals - https://drive.google.com/open?id=14OJB2 ... FwDpnYCsUI
Output meter - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1jIJfs ... _HAellUQHE

Drum notes

Kick drums fedd to a subgroup, i used a SSL G channel bass drum preset to give them thump, then put H-comp on for a bit of thump (punchy drums preset), then F6 on the end for a bit more EQ enhancement (top and bottom).
Snare mics fed to a subgroup, a bit of EQ with SSL G channel and then H comp punchy drums preset to give them some smack (only a little compression)
Both of these are fed to a parallel compression group and then compressed a lot 6-10 db.
Hats H comp - little bit of compression to make them poke up a little.
OH used some EQ to remove some low end rumble and add some high frequencys, cut some low mids
Same on the Mono drum room, but then compressed heavily with H comp 6-10 dbs
Toms used SSL to remove some low end and add some presence, then compressed same as kick and snare
All toms send to parllel compression group
I then fed snare and toms to a Snare Verb, and gated the verb by side chaining it too the Snare and toms.
Didn't use the druns bleeding group, the mono room was ok for me.

Bass
Duplicated the DI channel
On the first one I just 'reamped' with a quite clean sound as my main low end
On the 2nd I put Overdrive and Fuzz on it on max and made a super fuzzy bass sound which I really liked, however it was a bit crazy noisy even when they are not playing so I gated it using the clean bass side chained to the gate.
Then fed them through a buss

Guitars
Reamped the DI's main guitar and 2nd guitar and send them to the opposite side of the original guitars. I used a lighter tone and just wanted this to balance them out at different points so everything was not leant to one side of the mix at certain points of the song.
On all the guitars I removed some really low frequencys to make some room for the bass and added a little bit of high mids.
The solo guitar I did mellowed the upper mids slightly and compressed it with a good 4 dbs, then added some slap delay and also tape delay to try and make it a bit more fun and enhance the idea of a punky trashy solo.
I did play with some reverb but got rid of it in the end as the guitars just got too smooth and I wanted to keep the bite and direct energy feeling.

Vocals
Main voc I did a little SSL EQ (high pass) and a bit of air. Added a DeEsser. Then I sent it to ADT (Abbey Roads tape doubler) for a bit of width and doubling texture, then sent to the slap delay to rock it up a bit

The chorus vocals I low passed with EQ and hard panned and put them through a group. I put some EQ on that group to later just to add a bit of air (could have just used that one EQ for everything in hindsight).

The high pitch vox had similar treatment but I sent it too the slap as well.

The Ad Voc I did the same but but a lot more slap on it as I liked the more distant tanoy effect it created low in the mix, I like the way he drowned under the messy lead guitar and wanted to add a bit of punk psychedelia.

They all went through a CLA-76 compressor and I sent that to an Abbey Roads plate.

Main Stereo out.
I put the SSL Bus compresson on it but with the threshold set to make so it only occaionsally grabs the odd transient. It barely moves and when it does it brings it down by 1db or so. However it does give the whole mix a little bit of extra lift and power which I can't bring myself to take away once its on. I just put the brickwall limiter to grab any stray transients and to prevent distortion.

I'll admit I wanted to submit now I got to this stage so I can't fiddle with it later (as I am always tempted to do!). So now I want to see if I can focus enough time to get something together for the Song Writing Competition as I think its a fun theme this month!

[ladislav]

Ok here is my final mix and contest submission (this time with headroom for mastering engineer):

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lzlOv5 ... sp=sharing

I was going for a fair balance of sound, somewhere in between Celine Dion and Morbid Angel. I left in some "dirtiness" - all mixing imperfections are completely intentional. Unfortunately - I was unable to use the massive amounts of vintage outboard gear I own, as the tubes were heating up the control room too much. I mean, I don't mind mixing in my underwear but whats next?! The plugins may not sound the same, but are definitely more "global warming friendly".

Anyway, as usual - Spent first hour balancing things (meaning: turning the knobs until it sounds like a crap and then turning them back a notch). When I was happy with the levels and the panning, I have used green plugins, red ones, black ones, and even found a brown one!

Hope you like the result.

Regards,
-Ladislav