Basschat Mixing Challenge - VOTING!

[MacDaddy]

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1400264784' post='2452487']
Just to let you all know that I've listened to all the mixes and voted for my favourite one at some point during the last week.

There's a lot of interesting interpretations, and I'll give you all my full views once the results have been announced.
[/quote]

Have the rest of the band heard them?

[GrammeFriday]

6, no brainer

eh, am I too late?

[Dad3353]

[quote name='GrammeFriday' timestamp='1400355669' post='2453209']
6, no brainer

eh, am I too late?
[/quote]

[GrammeFriday]

[Skol303]

[size=5]See original post for details of the entrants... well done ironside1966!![/size]

[lurksalot]

[quote name='SubsonicSimpleton' timestamp='1400171415' post='2451451']
I voted mix 3, I felt that the vocals had good clarity on this mix, and that the bottom end was nice and tight. Sounded less modern than the other mixes in a good way IMHO.
[/quote]

Thats brilliant , the first time in the history of the challenge that I have had the privelidge of a vote .
I am pleased that it struck a chord , many thanks .

[Dad3353]

Congratulations, Ironside (... or should I call you 'Perry'..? ), for your convincing win this month. Any chance of a breakdown of your process, so that we may learn from your success..? Congratulations, too, to all the other contenders for entering, firstly their interpretation of the mix and secondly, into the spirit of the thing (the essential is to participate...).
Some of you had already spotted my 'faux-pas' in my original posting. I had intended to have the drum track increase very slightly in volume (1 db..!) from the solo, but, by inadvertence, the volume was dropped to zero..! Easily corrected, one might think, and indeed it was, once recognised, but I only twigged after having, not only posted my entry, but re-listened to it several times..! Talk about deaf (and me a drummer, too..! ). Thankfully, Skol was kind enough to allow me to upload a revised version; thanks, Paul.
My only real work for this month was to separate out, laboriously, the snare, which I wanted to reinforce and give extra 'snap' to. A gate helped, but it was mostly done by hand in the end. Once I was happy enough with the drums, I married the bass track, looking to allow the 'burpy' tone to come through. The guitars I decided to keep somewhat in check, basically to be able to 'release the horses' for their solo spot. I don't know if I succeeded in keeping the vocals present in the forefront quite enough; I certainly didn't want it buried behind the guitars.
No special effects were used anywhere, simply mild(ish...) doses of compression and EQ, and adjustment of levels. A couple of automations, and that's all. I found the quality of the initial stems to be very high, which helped considerably. I did try to eliminate (or at least reduce...) some background noise from the silent breaks, but found no suitable method which sounded natural, so I left them in for the final mix. I heard a couple of entries that did, in fact, manage this detail very well. Could I ask how you arrived at such a clean result, please..?
Yes, I also cheated, by introducing a lighter note into the piece, which I found to be too dense. No, I did not obtain permission (my apologies, BRX and Co..! , no disrespect intended...), but 'injected' a 'middle eight' of string quartet (well, quintet and tympani, actually...) to bring down the pressure before launching into the solo guitars. Did it work..? Hmm... I'm not sure that the TerrorTones will be adopting this version any time soon. Sorry if it grates, but I had fun fitting it all together.

Anyone else willing to 'post-mortem' their efforts..?

[ironside1966]

A big thank you to everyone who voted for my mix and another big thank you to everyone who had taken part be submitting a track, voting or taking the trouble to comment. but the biggest thank you goes out to Skol 303.
Another great song this month , Dick Venom and the TT seem to be far more than musicians bagging out songs their Image, publicity and concept are all excellent,. I bet this band are brilliant live and deserve to fill out every venue. The song is short and sweet no waste or waffle. This is a band that a lot of people could learn from.
Some great mixers this month I particularly liked mixes 8, 9 and mix 1 the orchestra breakdown sounded great.
For those who are interested I will go into more detail of my mix later so if anybody got any specific questions feel free to ask.

[lurksalot]

Well done Ironside , and may I concur with what you said .

I made some notes but they were all similar in the context that I think a lot were bass heavy and the vocal didn't really cut through.
I went for No8 as I thought it got the balance about right .

with mine I did not overly complicate my mix I just EQ'd but tried to wide pan the guitars so it sounded wider with a bit of autopanning in a few places to move it around a bit , I did a bit of side chain compression on the guitars using the vocal so that it gave it a bit more space , it did give a bit of a pulsey feel which I quite liked. I probably could have brought the bass up a bit , but it sounded quite rounded to me , and once again thanks to Subsonic for the vote

[ironside1966]

I mixed this track using Cubase 7.5 and monitored using headphones.
The first thing I did with the tracks was to set the input gain so that I hit the meter at around -12db I did this to most of the tracks unless there is a reason not to, like a high noise floor or a very quiet track. Then I got a rough mix.
[b]Drums: [/b]
The drums were enhanced with samples from Steven Slates drums. Just to be clear enhanced, not replaced. A trick I often use to add weight to a kick drum is, trigger a sub kick part from a multi sampled drum library such as BFD or Steven slate drums. I also use the PSP Mix Saturator to add a little thickness to the bass and kick drum but you need to use very sparingly and only a little is needed. be careful with the sub sample it may cause phase problems, reverse the phase and see if it sounds better.
FX on drums consisted of Valhalla Vintage Verb - Fat drums preset and a convolution verb of a wooden church which was then heavily compressed then fed into a drum master buss I used that like I would room mic's .
[b]Bass: [/b]
Nothing special apart from the PSP Mix Saturator to add a little thickness and an extra compressor side chained and triggered by the kick.
[b]Guitars: [/b]
Nothing special again although I added a couple of tracks of my own and all sent to a bus with a SSL type compressor and extra compressor side chained and triggered by the vocal, both only taking a couple of db off. then sent to reverb 1
[b]Vocals: [/b]
The chain used was A DBX 160 type compressor set at 4 - 1 but with about 3db of gain reduction, Esq. slight boost between 100hz and 200hz a dip around 500hz and a shelf boost at 5kh to add air. I also used saturation to give the vocal more attitude.

[b]Vocals FX: [/b]
reverb 1 a medium tiled room
Reverb 2 A EMT250 type set at around 1.7seconds with a 70 second pre delay
Delay 1 - set for ADT
Delay 2 tempo synced at 1\4
All tracks have a high pass filter and many have a LPF also.
I use tape saturation on quite a lot of tracks but it's very subtle it helps the tracks to gel together better.

Hope this is some help

[Skol303]

Sorry guys! Work has gone kerr-azy this week and I probably won't have the new mixing competition launched until this coming weekend.

We already have a track 'in the bank' for this one (all will be revealed), so it's good to go as soon as I find the time time to upload everything.

I'm also aiming to post up some notes on the previous one. Again, well done to Ironside and all involved!

Paul

[Sean]

[quote name='ironside1966' timestamp='1400531641' post='2454772']
I mixed this track using Cubase 7.5 and monitored using headphones.
The first thing I did with the tracks was to set the input gain so that I hit the meter at around -12db I did this to most of the tracks unless there is a reason not to, like a high noise floor or a very quiet track. Then I got a rough mix.
[b]Drums: [/b]
The drums were enhanced with samples from Steven Slates drums. Just to be clear enhanced, not replaced. A trick I often use to add weight to a kick drum is, trigger a sub kick part from a multi sampled drum library such as BFD or Steven slate drums. I also use the PSP Mix Saturator to add a little thickness to the bass and kick drum but you need to use very sparingly and only a little is needed. be careful with the sub sample it may cause phase problems, reverse the phase and see if it sounds better.
FX on drums consisted of Valhalla Vintage Verb - Fat drums preset and a convolution verb of a wooden church which was then heavily compressed then fed into a drum master buss I used that like I would room mic's .
[b]Bass: [/b]
Nothing special apart from the PSP Mix Saturator to add a little thickness and an extra compressor side chained and triggered by the kick.
[b]Guitars: [/b]
Nothing special again although I added a couple of tracks of my own and all sent to a bus with a SSL type compressor and extra compressor side chained and triggered by the vocal, both only taking a couple of db off. then sent to reverb 1
[b]Vocals: [/b]
The chain used was A DBX 160 type compressor set at 4 - 1 but with about 3db of gain reduction, Esq. slight boost between 100hz and 200hz a dip around 500hz and a shelf boost at 5kh to add air. I also used saturation to give the vocal more attitude.

[b]Vocals FX: [/b]
reverb 1 a medium tiled room
Reverb 2 A EMT250 type set at around 1.7seconds with a 70 second pre delay
Delay 1 - set for ADT
Delay 2 tempo synced at 1\4
All tracks have a high pass filter and many have a LPF also.
I use tape saturation on quite a lot of tracks but it's very subtle it helps the tracks to gel together better.

Hope this is some help
[/quote]

Please could you explain the bass compression triggered by the kick? Does the compression happen momentarily while the kick is played? What's the thinking behind this and how do you do it?

[Dad3353]

[quote name='Sean' timestamp='1400929151' post='2458233']
Please could you explain the bass compression triggered by the kick? Does the compression happen momentarily while the kick is played? What's the thinking behind this and how do you do it?
[/quote]

Good afternoon, Sean...

Have a look here...

[url="http://www.sonicscoop.com/2013/06/27/beyond-the-basics-sidechain-compression/"]'Ducking' a compressor...[/url]

Be aware that there's a controversy over the popular use of the term 'sidechain'. Merely semantics, and I'll not take sides, but just sayin'; the term has other implications in audio treatment. Hope this helps...

Edited May 24, 2014 by Dad3353

[lowdown]

I posted in another thread about this rather useful Sidechain Fx that people might
Be interested in. It works very well (Very cheap as well, about a tenner).
http://www.kickstart-plugin.com

Also something very similar, more to do with volume shaping,
but also does ducking/sidechaining.(again, quite modest in price, twelve and a half quid).
http://www.cableguys.de/volume-shaper.html

Both tools that I have found very handy, and work very well.
Demo available for each FX.

[ironside1966]

I can't add much more to what the Sonic Scoop article except to say don't overdo it, use 3db or 4db of gain reduction maybe less.
Set the attack quite fast, release so that the bass sounds natural and doesn't jump up in volume but doesn't compress any longer than it needs too. Use your ears.

[Skol303]

[b][color=#b22222][size=6]The next Mixing Challenge is now on![/size][/color][/b]

[b][url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/237588-june-mixing-challenge-now-on/"][size=5]GO HERE[/size][/url][/b]