MIX CHALLENGE - MC048 October 2018 - Winners announced

[will.newton08]

Hi All:

Here is my mix, simple and to the point. Tried to keep it musical accross the spectrum and added some vintage effects to vocals and some instruments.

All I can say about my approach is that I tried to keep it organic and vintage with some detuning accross the spectrum.

16-48
https://www.dropbox.com/s/p42zamcq3cxx3 ... _.wav?dl=0
16-44
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ymq0gq1k5nb1o ... n.wav?dl=0
mp3
https://www.dropbox.com/s/uqxezm6db8n51 ... n.mp3?dl=0

Feel free to msg me with any questions.

Best,

Will Newton

[thomasberg]

Hi!

Very nice song to mix..!

My approach was to balance everything around the waltz keyboard/synth and music box, and the hook of the accordian.
My thoughts about this was to emphasize the waltz feeling, and be a little more subtle about guitarlics and rytmic things getting in the way of this.

Used a lot of Slate; console/tape on just about all tracks, and VMR on vocals and drums.
To get a more "older" feeling I used Kramer tape on busses; akkgit, synths, master.

My main challenge was to get a good room to put it all in. I wanted to get a feeling of a little space, and also didnt want long audible "lexicon" reverbs.
Ended up with tweaking a snare plate from Bricasti, and using a spring reverb as the most audible (both convolution).

This is what i came up with:

MP3:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/r6x36xv5hmkhb ... g.mp3?dl=0

WAV:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/zn9p0ug6ujzt9 ... g.wav?dl=0


Good luck to us all!

-Thomas

[Mister Fox]

A friendly reminder
Including today, 7 days left to submit your edit

[westcoast2]

Hi,

Nice song. The guitar playing is really good.
I listened to the original mix, Neil Young and Pink Floyd's Us & Them.
My first thought for the mix was a painting. A street band and dancers outside a taverna. This pictured morphed into a more formal ballroom setting, somewhat like the ballroom in The Shining', where the music could increase in impact, rather than drifting into the air. This suggested the music began to engulf the dancers who were initially inside their own bubble.
Musically the positioning of the instruments and vocal interaction were tricky.

Here is the mix:
Wav: https://soundcloud.com/dwgh/mc048-fese- ... stcoast2-1
Mp3: https://soundcloud.com/dwgh/mc048-fese- ... westcoast2

Here are some screenshots:
http://homepages.force9.net/infinite/MC48/MC48pic1.png
http://homepages.force9.net/infinite/MC48/MC48pic2.png

Details.
Mixed in Reaper. All plugins are Waves except where stated.
All channels have blue cat's gain for initial gain staging
To begin with each channel had a TDR Nova Eq which was used to sweep for bad frequencies. This was later, in most cases, replaced with ReaEq for notching out specific frequencies.

Vocals:
Individual Vocals: Tune LT, API-2500 compressor and Redd37-51 channel strip.
Vocal: Had an in-line H-Delay at the end of verse 3.
Susan and Backing vocals have a DeEsser.
Vox Verb: reaEQ, IR-L plate and TrueVerb plate.

Bass:
reaEq (notch), VEQ 4, Kramer Tape, waves C1 compressor with sidechain fed from the AD2Kick drum.
Then fed to a Waves Metaflanger (set to chorus)

Drums:
- Drum Grp: TG12345 channel strip.
-- AD2Kick: LinEQ, ReaEq
-- AD2Snare: REQ 6,
-- AD2HiHat: Q4 eq
-- AD2Overhead: TDR Nova eq, C1 Gate (as expander) sidechained by AD2Kick and AD2Snare, Q4 eq.
AD2Room: Q6 eq, TG12345 channel strip.
Tambourine: Reverb

All the below instruments were sent to an Eq'd TrueVerb

Music Box: ReaEq (notch), Q6 eq.
Zebra Bell Piano: NI Solid Eq, C6 Mb compressor
Akordian: ReaEq (notch), Q3 eq
Phospher HiPad: ReaEq (notch), 2Tap Delay

Guitars:
AGuitar Mic: ReaEq (Notch), VEQ4
AGuitar Solo: ReaEq (Notch), VEQ4, 2nd ReaEq to soften the Hi notes. A 2Tap Delay is added on the 2nd Interlude.
EGuitar Grp: No reverb, individual instruments sent to reverb.
- EGuitar DI: ReaEq (notch), Q3 eq
- EGuitar: ReaEq (notch), Q3 eq
EGtr Fin Grp: reverb sent as group.
- EGuitar Finale DI: Q3 eq
- EGuitar Finale: Q3 eq

Automation:
Panning:
After the introduction the centered Akordian is shifted right to make way for the solo guitar.
During the the 3rdVerse and Chorus the Main vocals swap postion. They return to orginal panning after the interlude. (The idea was to simulate dancing)
The musical box moves to the centre towards the end of the finale.

Volume:
Vocals: To raise dropping end of words.
Drums: Volume changes for emphasis applied to snare and overheads.
Guitar: Various volume changes for emphasis.
Zebra Piano & Guitar: Volume changes together when the piano does arpeggios

FX:
Vocal & AGuitar Solo: Switching Delays on and off.

Timing:
Timing Corrections applied to AGuitar Mic during verse 2.

General Comment.
While writing out what had been done I realised that what I thought I had done wasn't what I had actually done. I also spotted a routing error when doing the screen shots.

It can be a chore to do the write up but it can be useful for yourself, and others, in the absence of individual feedback.

Best to all.
west

[SergioITASCO]

Hi all,

as you'll hear I love to pan stuffs in a "creative" way.

I haven't done anything particular to audio, just trying to preserve the original recording.

Anyway, I'm available for further detail.

At least, I hope you'll enjoy it... in some way.

Thanks

Audio Files:

Wav:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Q70Ous ... sp=sharing

Mp3:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Y5Ss7c ... sp=sharing

[fese]

My main challenge was to get a good room to put it all in. I wanted to get a feeling of a little space, and also didnt want long audible "lexicon" reverbs.

Yeah, that's what I was (and still am) struggling with my own mix, too. Space, but not audible reverb.

[fese]

Two other things I'd like to address, because it happened here and there.
1. Please provide a download link to the files where I don't have to login to d/l (in this case soundcloud, where out of sheer laziness I didn't delete my account yet, but that might change )
2. There is a naming convention for the files (see first post). Please stick to that. Files named "MC048v2.wav" or so are not very helpful.
Thanks!

[Mister Fox]

We're at MC048 at this point (48 months / more than 4 years of mixing challenges!)... so I'm sending out a warning signal.


In the future

• if there is no access to your edit (due to: login needed, expired link, etc) - you'll be disqualified
• if the files are not properly named, therefore this file can't be affiliated to your name - you'll be disqualified

I do want this game to make fun. But we have Rules and Guidelines for a reason.
I think it's about high time that those that constantly bend/break those, experience the repercussions.

[westcoast2]

Hi fese & Mister Fox,

I was totally unaware that soundcloud required a login. It does seem to be the case that to download it is a requirement.
I thought I was doing the right thing, as 'in the old days' (MC4-11) many did use sc and I just picked up where I left off.

It would have been easier for me to just put the mix files in the same place I put the pics and will do so in the future.

Edit: fese, do you need a new link or is it ok this time?

Apologies for the inconvenience,

west

[fese]

Hi fese & Mister Fox,

I was totally unaware that soundcloud required a login. It does seem to be the case that to download it is a requirement.
I thought I was doing the right thing, as 'in the old days' (MC4-11) many did use sc and I just picked up where I left off.

It would have been easier for me to just put the mix files in the same place I put the pics and will do so in the future.

Edit: fese, do you need a new link or is it ok this time?

I've already downloaded it, no need to reupload...
What I usually do when I need to make sure that files I put up for download are accessible for anyone is copying the link into another browser where I am definitely not logged in.