"Light The Fuse"

Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 3:12 pm

Yeah I know you might feel that but don't forget sample replacement is generally only genre appropriate and depending on the sample it can sound amazing or terrible.

If you don't have any samples (or any that you like) a good trick can be to process the kick (or sound) that you want, eg eq, comp, etc for just one hit and then sample replace with that.
Or just kick a very loud, punchy hit and sound replace with that then do your processing!

That way you can get a "natural" sound of the drum kit!

Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 5:04 pm

Thank you guys for all the responses and help. I will try and take all this advice tonight and work on the mix.

Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 6:45 pm

Here is the updated mix. "Light The Fuse" Mix 2.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=881542

Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 7:04 pm

Ok. That snare sounds much better but could still use a bit of tweaking personally. It sounds a bit nasal but considerably better than before. The vox and guitar sound great and to be honest I prefer this mix over the myspace one. It sounds more natural to me. You just need to work on that kick now. I would try some parallel compression to bring out the whack of the beater. You could try sweeping the mid between 200-500hz to see if you can bring out the boom just a tiny bit to give it some body. A tiny bit of verb might help the drums a bit but dry is cool too. Again just ideas. Add salt to taste. Oh yeah the bass sounds much better too.

Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 10:02 pm

The snare is prob a touch loud. I can hear the bass alot better now but it could prob be brought up even alittle more. (1 or 2 db?) Some verb on the snare would rule as well.
Just nail that kick drum and you will have a much much better mix! I think the vocals need to be abit louder and the gang vocals down abit.

The song could do with abit more panning imo. This is something you could do with the vocals to make it much more interesting.
For example with the backing or gang vocals try sticking on a stereo delay, making the left channel 100% dry and the right 100% wet, panning them hard left, hard right and changing the delay time on the 100% wet channel till you get the desired effect.
If you don't do the above try panning the gang vocals out muccch wider. Chuck on a stereo widener if they are already hard left hard right. (Im assuming they are doubled)

There seems to be a timing issue in the drums in the intro but I think thats not so possible to fix.

Also the final hit of everything together at the end is slightly out of time with each other.

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 10:20 am

I did a new mix of the song, and I addressed pretty much all of the problems that you guys suggested I fix. Hopefully, you guys will like this mix better.

Here's the link-

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=881542

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 4:08 pm

Sounds great man. I suppose someone might nitpick but I like this mix way better than that myspace mix.

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 4:53 pm

I really appreciate all the help and tips and what not you all have given me. It really has improved the mix a lot. I am always looking for constructive criticism to make myself better at recording and mixing.

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:57 pm

Everything sounds very audible and in its right place in the mix. Although overall it sounds a bit boxy to me. But that might also be that "old school" sound. I think its the guitar and vox but I'm not completely sure. I have no help for you as I am having this problem on some of my own mixes at time. I like the drums.

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