Engagement Song - Need Help with Mix please

[Alexrkstr]

Hi guys,

I just recorded the song with which I proposed to my fiance and I was hoping I could get your feedback on what I can do to improve the mix and the song overall. Any feedback is welcome!

https://soundcloud.com/rocknpop-1/engagement-song

[YamahaGuy]

Hello and congrats! The piano/keys to me sound really good throughout. The drum mix toward the beginning and the middle sounds a little over-powering. And the guitar melody line sounds a bit out of time. Maybe they're not, but that's how my ears heard it. Best of luck!

[Alexrkstr]

Originally Posted by YamahaGuy

Hello and congrats! The piano/keys to me sound really good throughout. The drum mix toward the beginning and the middle sounds a little over-powering. And the guitar melody line sounds a bit out of time. Maybe they're not, but that's how my ears heard it. Best of luck!

Hi YamahaGuy, thanks for the listen! I will revisit the drums. I was debating that. I think it’s the compressor I added to the drums group.

The guitar line is a little bit lagging intentionally, but there may be some timing issues since the latency was really high when I recorded that part. Thanks so much for the input.

[DupleMeter]

It's a nice piece. I like the mood & texture you're going after. I find the mix crowded and unfocused. I would work on giving everything it's own frequency space (with EQ) & it's own physical space (by panning).

I think that if you get those 2 things worked out you'll find balancing everything much easier.

Also - EQ & duck your reverbs & delays. It keeps them from mucking up the mix without having to pull them way back. Time based effects have a way of building up in the low mids & masking things. I typically start with a HPF at 400 & LPF at 6k and adjust from there. The reverb on the non-lead instrument also gets a dip around 2k. I generally run my reverb & delay busses in this order:
1: feed from instrument track
2: EQ with HPF & LPF (and 2k dip on non-lead instrument)
3: Reverb (or Delay)
4: Ducking compressor (fed from the main instrument track, fast attack medium fast release, 4:1 ratio, adjust threshold so your seeing 5-6dB of reduction)
5: out to 2-buss

HTH

[Alexrkstr]

Originally Posted by DupleMeter

It's a nice piece. I like the mood & texture you're going after. I find the mix crowded and unfocused. I would work on giving everything it's own frequency space (with EQ) & it's own physical space (by panning).

I think that if you get those 2 things worked out you'll find balancing everything much easier.

Also - EQ & duck your reverbs & delays. It keeps them from mucking up the mix without having to pull them way back. Time based effects have a way of building up in the low mids & masking things. I typically start with a HPF at 400 & LPF at 6k and adjust from there. The reverb on the non-lead instrument also gets a dip around 2k. I generally run my reverb & delay busses in this order:
1: feed from instrument track
2: EQ with HPF & LPF (and 2k dip on non-lead instrument)
3: Reverb (or Delay)
4: Ducking compressor (fed from the main instrument track, fast attack medium fast release, 4:1 ratio, adjust threshold so your seeing 5-6dB of reduction)
5: out to 2-buss

HTH

Thank you so much for the detailed feedback! I will play with this tomorrow and see where it takes me!

[dylanheeg]

I gave it a listen - nice work! I really like the piano and drums together in the beginning and the end. I will say the main guitar melody didn’t seem to quite fit for my ears. Like someone earlier mentioned, something sounds out of time and is a bit distracting - could be the delay also mucking things up. Around the 1:00 minute mark particularly and after. A bit better blend/mix of the guitar lines would probably tighten things up.

Also, Congratulations!

[Chipotle]

Originally Posted by DupleMeter

4: Ducking compressor (fed from the main instrument track, fast attack medium fast release, 4:1 ratio, adjust threshold so your seeing 5-6dB of reduction)

So you side-chain the reverb to the main track so the reverb is pulled down when the main track is playing? Just want to be clear on that step. You don't hear the reverb tail "jump up" when the instrument stops?

[jim1960]

ZOMBIE ALERT!!!
This thread is from 2018.

[dylanheeg]

Lolol. I still found the link - Wonder how it turned out?