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Post by schmalzy on Feb 25, 2016 21:53:11 GMT -6
My first thought was: Do we know the slope of the HP Filter on the comp?
A higher-tuned kick drum can have a lot of 100hz content. If the sidechain HP Filter on the comp is at 250hz but has a 12db/octave slope, a prominent kick centered around at 100hz could still be triggering that thing. Also, I like to do a lot of slow attack and low ratio compression (meaning I have to dig my threshold in pretty far to get significant, gooey compression). How is your threshold set up? Are you trying to limit transients or are you trying to control RMS? Perhaps there's just a lot of low end information and it's simply just sitting above your threshold despite the high pass. If that high-pass is 6db/octave you might never get away from it.
Create a new track with a 70hz sine wave. Gate it to be open when the kick drum hits - 100ms hold and 50ms release maybe (just so it's short but not undetectable). Then, after the gate, stick the Klanghelm vari-mu (limit ratio, fast attack, and fast release) on the sine wave channel. Set the sidechain filter to not leave any frequencies out and set threshold to start compressing a few db. Now, move that filter until it's not acting on the 100hz blips anymore. How high did you have to go? Did it ever stop?
That should tell you exactly what's going on with the comp's sidechain.
Or...if you've got it on the mix buss maybe you've got a pretty prevalent bass instrument and that thing's pushing everything up close to the threshold so, with just a little extra low mids added by the kick, it triggers the compressor.
I'm just spitballing here trying to come up with explanations and possibilities!
Good luck getting it figured out, John! Let us know what happens!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 25, 2016 9:41:04 GMT -6
Step one should be: sample replace that garbage drummer! Addictive Drums has a great side-stick expansion pack you can use to really blast those side-stick hits. ... Just jokes, guys. I wish I had a drummer in my studio that could come in and consistently switch between side-stick and single strokes and make it sound good. Until then, I'll work with rock dudes (some of whom are very good...but, alas, they need to be smashed into dense rock mixes) and smash transients for fun! If necessary drum replacement happens... But... I work my tail off to use as many natural sounds as possible for when mixing live drums. It makes them sound.. Well... Real I'm just jokin', doc. I'd much rather stick with the natural recorded stuff, for sure! There's a very tangible realness that comes from using the natural drum tracks...and I prefer it in every case outside of "terribly recorded drums." I don't know about any expansion packs or anything. It was just a funny thought to me!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 24, 2016 21:32:48 GMT -6
I like a couple things: Cascade Fathead dead center of the speaker and a few inches back with a 57 or SM7B right next to it. Sometimes I'll do a PR40 if I want to shift the midrange to be less honky. Similarly, I like a PR40 or my SM7B with an LDC - my 4040 seems to do well - and I just line up the capsules next to each other starting with one or the other mic where the cap meets the cone and the other is right next to it further away from the cap. It's like the 4040 is the detail in the mids and can be the aggression while the PR40 or SM7B are "more-refined" SM57s. Angling toward the cap brightens it up, angling away makes it so I'll just have to brighten it with EQ in the mix. I read a thing a while back about having an LDC and a 57 (but I've liked it with a couple different dynamic mics) at a 90º angle toward each other... Internet sleuthing success! www.audiotechnology.com.au/wp/index.php/how-to-mic-guitar-amps-in-the-studio/I've used it a bunch of times and I've liked it pretty much every time. I'm typically using my 4040 as the LDC but I've used an AKG Perception 400 and had similarly pleasing results.
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 24, 2016 9:26:13 GMT -6
Now you're dabbling in my world JohnKenn. I have mixed many a smooth jazz single with the exact same issue and I run across this issue a lot. Just did one with side stick and snare hitting alternately every bar. Usually step one is automating the snare hits, combined with light drum buss compression and also light master buss compression or limiting. Step one should be: sample replace that garbage drummer! Addictive Drums has a great side-stick expansion pack you can use to really blast those side-stick hits. ... Just jokes, guys. I wish I had a drummer in my studio that could come in and consistently switch between side-stick and single strokes and make it sound good. Until then, I'll work with rock dudes (some of whom are very good...but, alas, they need to be smashed into dense rock mixes) and smash transients for fun!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 11, 2016 10:48:38 GMT -6
Kinda on the same lines but take an electric guitar don't plug it in and Mic your right hand strumming just for the click or chicka clack or whatever. You want to call it and mix to taste Can be with original or counter part usually mixed low of course I did this with a picked bass guitar part a few years while back. LDC right near the bridge (if I remember correctly) and let 'em go at it! Distortion, compression, and a pile of low end boost later - a cool tone, for sure. Useable as the only bass tone? No. Mix it with a DI or a reamped track? Useful, for sure!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 10, 2016 10:19:23 GMT -6
The technique is pretty simple in practice though there are a few different ways of getting it done. Here's the method I've found success with: Step 1: Get your singer to stand in the position they'll be singing in, headphones on, general body shape how they like to sing. Instruct them not to sing - to be as silent as possible. Then, play the song down and record. All you've recorded is the track bleeding into the microphone. We'll call this track "Bleed." Step 2: Track the vocals exactly as you would normally, except without headphones. We'll call this track "Vocals plus Bleed." Step 3: I always like to repeat Step 1 after the vocals are completely tracked. Inevitably, the mix levels will change and you want the track bleeding into the microphone when the vocalist is not singing to be as similar as possible to the track bleeding into the microphone while the vocalist IS singing. Then, all you need to do is flip the polarity of the "Bleed" track. Playing the polarity-reversed "Bleed" at the same time as the "Vocals plus Bleed," you'll theoretically get near-perfect phase cancellation of the bleed out of the "Vocals plus Bleed" track. It worked great recently when tracking a group of dudes shouting at a Mid/Side mic setup from across a room. It should work equally well or better for a single vocalist singing into one cardioid mic from a semi-close distance. Making sure the vocalist doesn't change their position too much while singing is pretty helpful for this. As they move, they'll reflect sound differently and the cancellation of the bleed will be less dramatic. –––– Another version of this technique I've heard about but never put into practice includes setting up a microphone directly in the middle of two monitors pointed toward each other delivering identical mono signals (speakers are pointed toward each other - east and west - and the microphone is pointing south). The mic capsule is in the very center point of two identical but physically phase-reversed signals - again assuming the summed sound will effectively null. The singer should hear the music (because their ears aren't coincident in the middle of their head) but the microphone should effectively hear "none" of the music from the monitors but all of the vocal. A couple quick notes on this technique: The signal sent to the monitors shouldn't have the polarity flipped between one and the other - their physically opposing directions will do that for you. Also, heads reflect sound - especially the gigantic heads singers can have. There will still be some bleed that isn't phase-cancelable simply because the sound bouncing off the person's cranium, unless they're freakishly symmetrical, won't be identical side to side so won't phase cancel. Give 'em a shot and see what you think! Good luck! yes, this is great, the only thing i'd suggest is to have the singer NOT wear headphones, it will change the reflections off his head affecting the quality of the phase reverse nulling, as he won't be wearing them on the keeper track. Right! I'm fixing it now...my brain was thinking backwards and I left out the "like they had" in front of "headphones on." I must have mentally moved on to the next step by then! Thanks for the catch!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 10, 2016 10:11:21 GMT -6
I never monitor with the comp version, but I almost never use headphones either. Usually just set the mic up in the room and crank the monitors till the singer is happy. I don't really pull out the cans unless the arrangement is sparse or the vocalist wants their vocals very heavily affected, or some people are divas and just want to feel "Oh I'm in a studio today, look at me wearing big headphones!". I'll just do a pass with them standing there with the vocals muted, just recording the monitors. Flip the phase and you're good to go, the bleed is usually about the same as headphone bleed but less fuckacting and more comfortable singing. Reading here, are we all wasting our damn time multing out? I'll admit to never having ever used the uncompressed version. Can anyone else say the same? Please start another thread about this. I'd like to know more about your method of no headphones. Thx!! The technique is pretty simple in practice though there are a few different ways of getting it done. Here's the method I've found success with: Step 1: Get your singer to stand in the position they'll be singing in, like they had headphones on (but of course are not wearing them), general body shape how they like to sing. Instruct them not to sing - to be as silent as possible. Then, play the song down and record. All you've recorded is the track bleeding into the microphone. We'll call this track "Bleed." Step 2: Track the vocals exactly as you would normally, again without headphones. We'll call this track "Vocals plus Bleed." Step 3: I always like to repeat Step 1 after the vocals are completely tracked. Inevitably, the mix levels will change and you want the track bleeding into the microphone when the vocalist is not singing to be as similar as possible to the track bleeding into the microphone while the vocalist IS singing. Then, all you need to do is flip the polarity of the "Bleed" track. Playing the polarity-reversed "Bleed" at the same time as the "Vocals plus Bleed," you'll theoretically get near-perfect phase cancellation of the bleed out of the "Vocals plus Bleed" track. It worked great recently when tracking a group of dudes shouting at a Mid/Side mic setup from across a room. It should work equally well or better for a single vocalist singing into one cardioid mic from a semi-close distance. Making sure the vocalist doesn't change their position too much while singing is pretty helpful for this. As they move, they'll reflect sound differently and the cancellation of the bleed will be less dramatic. –––– Another version of this technique I've heard about but never put into practice includes setting up a microphone directly in the middle of two monitors pointed toward each other delivering identical mono signals (speakers are pointed toward each other - east and west - and the microphone is pointing south). The mic capsule is in the very center point of two identical but physically phase-reversed signals - again assuming the summed sound will effectively null. The singer should hear the music (because their ears aren't coincident in the middle of their head) but the microphone should effectively hear "none" of the music from the monitors but all of the vocal. A couple quick notes on this technique: The signal sent to the monitors shouldn't have the polarity flipped between one and the other - their physically opposing directions will do that for you. Also, heads reflect sound - especially the gigantic heads singers can have. There will still be some bleed that isn't phase-cancelable simply because the sound bouncing off the person's cranium, unless they're freakishly symmetrical, won't be identical side to side so won't phase cancel. Give 'em a shot and see what you think! Good luck!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 9, 2016 12:57:36 GMT -6
Oh man...here's where I get flamed!!!! ... Well, at least I'm honest!! I'm have the same vocal-treatment mindset as you it seems; I'm just not as commitment-ready as you are. I end up treating vocals (in a dense mix) in much the same way. I typically bang them up against a few more compressors in the mix, I'm just a bit afraid to do it during tracking. I'm always nudging toward finished in tracking but never going all the way. I think a one-room studio like mine has to have that little bit of undercommitment because I can't truly hear what anything sounds like during tracking - source in the room with me, yada yada. After tracking, I'm smashing the vocal into a fast compressor (1176-style is good for that) and then into a slower, more leveling-style compressor. I'll often toss all the vocals into a parallel buss if I need a little more smashing together after that. It's nice to have an "all vocals" buss to lift them over the louder sections of the song.
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 9, 2016 11:38:50 GMT -6
I find my vocalists are typically happiest monitoring a compressed track. I'm happiest when I've got a parachute: I'm too paranoid not to take a dry vocal. So I mult it and print both.
I end up using the compressed takes most of the time but, for the few times the compressor did something weird or the vocalist jumped on something too hard, that dry vocal track saved my ass!
Pretty fast attack. Medium fast to fast release. Fairly low ratio. 6db reduction at most. Smooth and controlled is what I'm going for. Lots of waves getting just a little compression. Louder sections getting a fair bit more.
...unless it's my vocal, then I'll print both the dry and the compressed and let that compressor bang 12 db off without raising an eyebrow. I'm not a great vocalist, I'm not even sort of OK (understatement of the year - I'd describe my singing as "not good") but I'm willing to get some scuzz on the the front end.
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 9, 2016 11:01:36 GMT -6
Re-reading my posts, I guess I didn't mention it: I talked to the band about it.
In fact, I talked briefly with the band about it after the tracking day was over and we had just finished listening to the tracking day mixes. Those guys had a hard out time and we were right up against it (they traveled 4+ hours to record with me and needed to leave so two of 'em could make it to work) so they had to split. I said basically what I mentioned above - something along the lines of "it feels like it's losing some power right when it needs to pick up intensity rather than lose it. How would we like to handle it? We've got a couple options:..." I didn't push hard because I wasn't 100% sure but I was fairly certain we were going to need to fill out the arrangement in those spots.
Then, when I was putting together the rough mixes, I heard all I needed to hear to be certain the arrangement was lacking. I sent the one rough off, explained my concerns, and sent another rough with my additions. Now we find ourselves where we are currently: one song's mix is approved (with my additions), one song's rough mix is approved (with my additions - it needs automation and some extra finishing with effects) and a third song that the band hasn't heard my rough mix for yet.
Sorry for leaving some details out, guys! I'm already long-winded (long-worded? long-fingered?) enough and I didn't want to make you all read too many more details!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 8, 2016 17:19:34 GMT -6
That's exactly what I'm thinking in this case. I'm trying to go the extra mile to make sure these guys are happy and make sure whomever hears the songs will say "those turned out great." If "I wonder who produced it?" is the next thing to come out of their mouths, then that's great, too!
That's pretty close to what I'm doing. Some octaves of root notes filling the space between the bass and the guitar parts. "Make the blackness behind the guitars disappear" is a perfect phrase for what I was trying to do. I used a slow-ish attack pad and rhodes with some time-sync'd tremolo. The pad is filling the space and the rhodes is quietly reinforcing the prominent rhythms.
For the biggest moments in the songs I'm also adding wide-panned semi-distorted guitars playing the chord changes. A little thickness, a little scuzz, a bit of sustain, but not a lot of volume.
Thanks for loaning me the reinforcement and the insight, guys!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 8, 2016 15:49:52 GMT -6
It was just me and the band on tracking day and I was the only one managing the performances, trying to tailor the sounds, and trying to steer the songs when questions came up. So I guess I had considered myself the engineer and producer. I'm not necessarily looking for "how do I fix this situation;" I'm going to write and record the parts I think the songs need, put 'em in the rough mixes, and let the band have the final say. I'm more interested in "how do all you full-time professionals in the recording industry handle this sort of thing when it comes up?" Thanks for helping clarify the situation, ExponentialAudio!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 8, 2016 15:23:21 GMT -6
Yo, y'all!
I have a question for you all: How do you handle a situation in which you, the producer or mix engineer, have to track some extra parts to fill out arrangments?
A band came into the studio not long ago. We got a lot done in the short amount of time we had but I'm now halfway into the mixes and some of the sections of the arrangements need to be filled out with extra instrumentation.
I felt it when we were tracking but I wasn't sure. I'm 100% sure now. They're an independent three-piece rock band calling back to Joy Division with their sound - think Interpol or Slowdive. They wanted to keep everything as true to live as possible while cleaning it up a bit for the purposes of a good-sounding recording. As it turns out, they use crazy amounts of distortion, reverb, noisy playing and sheer volume to achieve the fullness live but wanted to get away from that crutch of "batter people with noise and volume." Now, under the microscope of recorded sound and in an environment with a loudness ceiling, certain sections of the basics get a little thin or sparse when the song is calling for more power or fullness.
Sooooo...I'm adding some extra parts. Mostly guitars or keys - whichever is most appropriate at the time.
How do you typically deal with that? Is it part of your "producing" duties or are you charging extra for your music-writing and musician talents? How does that change if you're only mixing and are now needing to deal with that arrangement issue? How are you being credited afterwards? "Additional [instruments] by [your name]?" "Music written by [band] and [your name]?"
In my particular case, I think it's too late to go back to the client and say anything like "well, it's going to be more money" when our arrangement was pretty much a flat fee per song situation. I'd love to know how others handle this sort of thing for the future, though.
So, like I said: How do you handle this sort of situation?
Thanks for the info and opinions, all!
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 8, 2016 10:25:23 GMT -6
Yeah, I've actually always prefer to track a player playing into an amp real time. I definitely prefer to track amps real-time as well. Maybe, if you had a DI box with a DI output and a thru output, you could have an amp in the room so the guitarist can react to the amp sound but you're still taking a clean DI to reamp later. That's the way I typically do it.
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Post by schmalzy on Feb 8, 2016 9:42:55 GMT -6
I have the older version of that DIYRE reamping box. It works great for my purposes. Caveat: I've never reamped another way. But, truth be told, it sounds like a guitar plugged into an amp. That's all I'm looking for in that piece of gear.
The only real note I'd suggest you think about: you might have to play with your gain staging bit to get your amp to respond to your reamped signal the way it responds to a from-the-guitar signal.
If you have a high-output guitar and record the DI at a reasonable level on the way in you're not necessarily going to have a high output signal on the way back out. Adjust your output level out of the DAW and find a clean guitar level boost pedal and you should be able to get as hot as you'd ever want. Similarly, a lower output guitar DI into a pushed preamp yada, yada, yada...
It's also not a bad idea to experiment with DI methods (assuming you've got a few different DIs and preamps at your disposal). Most of the time I prefer to get as clean a DI as I can when I know I'm going to reamp - I'm often going with my Countryman Type 85 into my interface pre for that. Every now and then I'll want a little fattening or perhaps some rounding of transients, etc. - that might look like a Type 85 into a transformer preamp or a passive DI into whatever.
It seems obvious but, for some reason, my brain didn't think of it right away (probably because a DI sound is so unlike an amped sound): the acquisition method can have a big impact on the tone coming out of the amp when reamping.
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Post by schmalzy on Jan 29, 2016 16:04:24 GMT -6
And with that metaphor.. Try turning a performance car quickly when it's going really fast.. Understeer and crash. Or.. A slightly unbalanced wheel.. Oscillation. Turning a box van quickly is going to be relatively more stable, without understeer. Slightly unbalanced wheels are also felt a whole lot less. Moral of the story is that there is a fine line between "fast enough" and "too fast". As with opamps, feedback caps that squash oscillation and RFI ingress also slow the slew and gain-bandwidth product, effectively like driving your performance car at speeds that are easily handled.. Super true. There are definitely upsides and downsides to each end of the spectrum. That level of detail can be unusable. To add yet another metaphor to the pile: Reducing the amount of detail in a photograph of a person's face makes their skin look a lot better.
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Post by schmalzy on Jan 29, 2016 9:50:57 GMT -6
I was talking with an acoustician for an acoustic treatment manufacturer and he told me that, in my room, my best results are going to come from pushing my monitors as close to the wall as possible.
It doesn't "get rid" of the problem, it just changes where that problem lives. His thinking was, as he explained to me, by moving the problem dips/nulls into an area of the acoustic spectrum that is more easily handled (higher frequencies), you don't need to lose as much space to bass trapping. It's a lot easier to absorb 150hz than it is to absorb 50hz.
It's definitely not the traditional "few feet between the wall and the speakers" thought process but it seems to have helped my room significantly.
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Post by schmalzy on Jan 25, 2016 12:20:48 GMT -6
Echoing what a lot of these other posts are saying (but living in a lower-end world myself): I'm seeing two types of speed/slew rates in my studio.
My Focusrite interface's preamps, when paired with an SDC, feel very immediate. The spike of the transient coming off a snare drum feels like the spike of the sound coming off the drum in the room (minus the physical punch from the moving air). Sharp. Sometimes too sharp. An acoustic guitar can sound very "live" - almost in a "warts and all" way. I can almost pick out the time differences and inconsistencies between every string of a strum.
My Chameleon Labs 7602 Xmods have transformers on the input and output. My Presonus Eurekas have transformers only on the input. The same SDC setup on them feels almost like the snare has a little limiting on it. The transient doesn't spike as sharply. I'm sure it's a little of the transformers saturating, too, but it's just not as immediate (most of the time, in a good way...but that's a different topic). An acoustic guitar sounds a little more together and, when strummed, like the individual strings are standing out less. Almost covering up the inconsistency from one string to the next that I was noticing in the transformer-less preamp.
A metaphor that translates the different preamp speeds looks like this to me (though I'm no golden-eared expert or technical genius - I'm just a low-end dude trying to make some cool recordings):
Imagine a sports car and a box van driving at 60mph, not being allowed to slow down, trying to follow a curving line on the road as exactly as possible. The line has some long curves that are smooth and some curves that turn fairly tight and are difficult to manage. The sports car will be able to turn a little more sharply and, because of its better handling, more accurately follow the line. The box van will have to round some of the sharper corners in order to miss as little of the actual line overall (if it tried to turn as fast as the other, it would tip over).
You're following me. The line is the sound wave in the air. The sports car is a faster preamp and the box van is the slower preamp. The path the vehicle actually travels is the sound wave after it comes out of the preamp. Both are giving you a somewhat accurately represented sound afterwards but one of them is more like the original sound and one of them is a bit more sluggish in its handling of the original sound's details.
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Post by schmalzy on Jan 21, 2016 10:06:32 GMT -6
I didn't realize they were "gone." I'm pretty pleased with my two 7602 MkII XMods. I find myself curious. Less high end than the rest of you cats typically get into but I've liked everything I've heard from them (minus a few service issues that took a little longer than would have been ideal). It looks like they're introducing some new products. Call me "interested." en.audiofanzine.com/chameleon-labs/news/a.play,n.21953.html Is anyone on the floor there? I find myself, in North Dakota, wishing I could find myself at NAMM.
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Post by schmalzy on Jan 6, 2016 13:13:24 GMT -6
I'm considering it.
I'm not in the same ballpark as many of you cats are but it would be cool to hear my mix against others' when we have the same source tracks.
I've got a client coming in to record a few songs in the middle of the month. Depending on the turnaround time (I don't remember right off-hand) I might throw my worse-sounding-than-a-lot-of-yours hat in the ring.
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Post by schmalzy on Dec 28, 2015 12:31:17 GMT -6
Ahhh...my apologies. Note to [my]self: read things more thoroughly.
Either way, I got to sift through a lot of ideas about how to handle this sort of stuff.
Educational for me!
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Post by schmalzy on Dec 28, 2015 9:50:30 GMT -6
Johnkenn,
As far as correcting it now, maybe you could play with the Side vs Side Ø track levels. It won't be as "perfect" a stereo sound but it isn't really that anyway.
Another thing you could do is use some sort of stereo imaging tool (or anything else that will do it) to just bring down the overall volume of the louder side of the M/S trio. Buss it to an Aux and adjust the left vs. right volume there.
Third option: bring the Mid volume up louder than the Sides and you'll concentrate things more centrally - downplaying the width and the discrepancies from side to side.
Option four - and maybe this is only really applicable when M/S is further away than a close mic'ing situation: take an impulse response of the room and send the Mid mic to a reverb with that IR loaded up. Pan the reverb to the side with the lower side level and it'll even it out some. Not ideal. Not perfect. Not even a great idea. But it evens out the levels with the sound of the room it was recorded in so it's not too weird.
Was the M/S pair pointed straight toward the guitar from directly out front or was it at the 12th fret and angled back toward the body of the guitar. In your situation, it sounds like one lobe of the 8 was pointing more toward the guitar getting a bit of direct-ish sound and the other lobe was pointing across a room and catching a quieter, diffused, delayed sound. The amount of variance between the two must have been enough that it buggers your situation up. What you're hearing IS a fairly "accurate" (as much as mics can do that sort of thing) picture of what the stereo situation was like at the spot you put the mic.
When I'm using M/S, I try to be cognizant of what the sides are hearing. I don't mind the differences in the room as observed by the M/S pair's position as long as they sound like they're in the same ballpark. If they're too wildly different, I've got to move it or go to a different technique. I nearly always move the mics because, damn, I love the sound and options an M/S pair can give me.
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Post by schmalzy on Dec 22, 2015 17:10:17 GMT -6
Yo, y'all!
Thanks for all the advice and guidance. I'm definitely going to try to find a way to make these guys happy (I actually just talked to one of the guys earlier today - two of the three dudes are super happy with the sound, just the drummer is being difficult about his kick).
Also, thanks for giving a shit about a chachi like me. I'm still fairly new to this end of the whole thing (I feel like 29 was a late start so, two-and-a-half-years on, I still feel really "behind"). I have/had bands that played a bit but I practically threw away a few years of music, development, and opportunity because of some shady band members.
I'll try not to force you guys to listen to too much of what I'm doing - only when I'm really at a loss!
Thanks again for all the good words and good advice!
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Post by schmalzy on Dec 22, 2015 14:27:19 GMT -6
Ok, here's my thoughts. You have too much mud. There is something droning in the low mids on your mix that isn't in the reference mix. Find that area in the kick (probably around 100-180hz) and cut fairly narrow. Now do the same with the bass. You'll find that stuff starts gelling better. But honestly, the sloppy off time drumming is making it super hard for me to even listen.. Hey, Svart! Thanks for the listen! I've been asked to add that stuff back in to the bass and guitars. The Mix V1 had less of that. I could take a bit of it out of the kick, though, and see if they'll let that fly. Thanks for the heads-up! The comments about the sloppy drumming just made me think that perhaps he's just trying to bury the kick so you can't tell how sloppy it is. Honestly, the drums are edited a lot to get them where they are. I'm slip editing in Reaper - I'm not a fan of time-stretching - so I think this is about as good as it's going to get before we start hearing some (more) odd cymbal and snare decays.
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Post by schmalzy on Dec 22, 2015 0:28:31 GMT -6
Good thoughts, all!
I work in video in my "regular" life and I've been able to divorce myself from the awfulness that clients can sometimes inflict. In this situation, though, I guess I'm just having a tough time saying "they're your songs - screw 'em up how you want."
A few reasons, I think:
1) These guys are friends of mine. They didn't pay me much and I didn't ask them to. I want them to be excited about the recordings now and I want them to be excited about it later. In the future, they're going to listen to their previous recordings (complete with non-existant kick drums from guys who just said "sure thing, boss, I'll take out everything over 500hz" and other not-so-super great decisions) and be annoyed that they sound like they do. I'm certainly not the best possible person to record/mix their stuff and if they were super serious about having a fantastic-sounding couple of songs they'd have gone to someone else - but I also don't want the guys to be as disappointed in the work we did together as I think they will be of their previous recordings.
2) I'd love the credit for the recordings. My portfolio is pretty light, this band has a lot of friends, and this band has spent a fair amount in the past on some pretty bad-sounding recordings. Being able to get them saying "this guy really made us sound the best we've ever sounded on a record" (or something along those lines) then be able to show the songs proving it would be beneficial to my studio. All my work has come from referrals and this is finally a band who's actually making noise (pun 100% intended!) in their musical community.
3) Artwork's already done. I'm in the credits. Bands are going to think "what a weird choice on that kick drum sound...no snap to cut through..." and I kind of need the word of mouth to keep being good rather than have a mixture of good and bad.
So all I need to do is control their minds from a couple hundred miles away...
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