My Mix sounds like a wall of sound, despite EQ and compression

T

Tinseltopia

New member
I can't seem to get my mixdown right, I spent a couple of hours earlier just mixing and tweaking, EQ'ing etc. Then when listening to it compared with an earlier render, the earlier render actually sounded clearer and crisper, so I had to load up an earlier version and restart from there, wasting all of my mixing work.

Now, I've reached a state where I just want to be done with it, I've read the sticky's and posts and have dabbled somewhat in mastering and mixing, but I just don't know where to go with making this sound coherent. It's obvious I'm doing something wrong if I'm wasting 2 hours of work for something to sound worse at the end of it.

https://soundcloud.com/tinseltopia/cold-snap-original-mix

I'm using Maximus as the final mastering tool in FL, just to make sure all of the bands sound okay, but when played together, it's just a big mess
 
Are you mixing or mastering? Based on your post it seems like you might be trying to do both (if this is the case, stick with just mixing until the mix sounds right).

Also, are you referencing anything while mixing or are you working in isolation? You mentioned getting different results from different renders and not knowing where to go. A reference should give you an objective goal to work towards in your mix.

Lastly, are you taking any breaks? Ear fatigue gradually sneaks up on us and we can't always determine what sounds good until we take a break and come back to a mix.
 
The mix itself doesn't sound all too bad. I want to here more lo mids on this actually. Just a lil something to give this track some weight. It sounds more so individual elements need to be treated. You may want to try working on something new, hear how that sounds and then come back to this mix for comparisons.
 
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Adrian-MarQ said:
Are you mixing or mastering? Based on your post it seems like you might be trying to do both (if this is the case, stick with just mixing until the mix sounds right).

Also, are you referencing anything while mixing or are you working in isolation? You mentioned getting different results from different renders and not knowing where to go. A reference should give you an objective goal to work towards in your mix.

Lastly, are you taking any breaks? Ear fatigue gradually sneaks up on us and we can't always determine what sounds good until we take a break and come back to a mix.
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I agree. You probably need to move on to another mix if you have the time and come back later. And get the mix done first, mastering is done LAST.

Frankly, the mix is okay. It could use some eq-ing. My ears hurt a little listening (not dissing your track), which means that you have a lot going on in the 2kHz region (pain frequency). You probably need to do some notch eq-ing in the 2kHz range on the lead and turn up the lows a bit. If there is a bass line I can not hear it.

And don't feel like you have wasted two hours on a mix if you had to redo it. I've had songs to mix that were re-mixed over 4 times, and re-recorded twice. Over time you will be able to make calls on your mix a lot quicker and know what to do right away. Just keep mixing and don't feel discouraged if you feel like something is not satisfactory :)

Happy mixing!!
 
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You're never wasting work. It's still practice and training for your ear. :) It takes quite a bit of time, don't worry, you'll get it.
 
Thanks for all the help! I'm definitely taking a break and coming back to this later. I'm using headphones to mix at the moment, as I've moved and can't use my KRK's Rokits in my new room. But I'm looking to set them up downstairs and then be able to mix as I used to with proper audio again

I had no idea 2kHz was the pain frequency!
 
Tinseltopia said:
Thanks for all the help! I'm definitely taking a break and coming back to this later. I'm using headphones to mix at the moment, as I've moved and can't use my KRK's Rokits in my new room. But I'm looking to set them up downstairs and then be able to mix as I used to with proper audio again

I had no idea 2kHz was the pain frequency!
Click to expand...

pain frequency? lol
 
Tinseltopia said:
I can't seem to get my mixdown right, I spent a couple of hours earlier just mixing and tweaking, EQ'ing etc. Then when listening to it compared with an earlier render, the earlier render actually sounded clearer and crisper, so I had to load up an earlier version and restart from there, wasting all of my mixing work.

Now, I've reached a state where I just want to be done with it, I've read the sticky's and posts and have dabbled somewhat in mastering and mixing, but I just don't know where to go with making this sound coherent. It's obvious I'm doing something wrong if I'm wasting 2 hours of work for something to sound worse at the end of it.

https://soundcloud.com/tinseltopia/cold-snap-original-mix

I'm using Maximus as the final mastering tool in FL, just to make sure all of the bands sound okay, but when played together, it's just a big mess
Click to expand...

I can understand why you post this and why you feel the way you do about the sound of the mix, it must be pretty frustrating. It is a cold snap no doubt. I think you should start all over. Wipe out your current gear and technique and start all over. Don't see this as some kind of failure, because it is not. Every now and then engineers need to hit the reset button, and for you this is the time to do so. And when you do you will get the results you now desire, much more quickly than sticking to your current gear and technique.

I think you should change genre too. Look, I think this is the best possible scenario for breaking into where you want to be. It's actually good to come to the conclusion, OK this sounded like this, now let's try this. Mobile phone manufacturers do this all the time, they combine all of their skills into their flagship product and earlier older products beat it.

So, trust me, this is what you need now. You need to leave that sound behind you and break into a totally different sound that creates totally different emotions within you. You must be exhausted right now, but once you get some nice sounding conversion, some nice sounding monitors/cans, some nice sounding hardware, a better DAW etc. and combine that with an emotional production you'll just smile at were you were right now.
 
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Kalm said:
The mix itself doesn't sound all too bad. I want to here more lo mids on this actually. Just a lil something to give this track some weight. It sounds more so individual elements need to be treated. You may want to try working on something new, hear how that sounds and then come back to this mix for comparisons.
Click to expand...

What's the reason for going back to this mix? The only reason for that is so that OP can understand what does not work and I think he understands so already. I think this mix should be recycled and not much thought, time, energy and stuff should go into it. Frequencies actually impact you, it's not healthy to input these kinds of frequencies into the system, OP must be pretty drained of energy from having tried to sort this out. That's one thing, beating yourself with it more and more, it's not good for you. But this is not something unusual, mixes fail all the time out there. Some combinations of frequencies simply just don't work, it's no more dramatic than that. But failing quickly and moving quickly forward, that's what separates the pros from the newbies.

Look Tinseltopia, there are engineers out there that cannot understand or hear that this kind of mix does not work. You are not one of them and that tells me you can sort this out very smoothly, you just need to be sure it is what it is. Once that is clear, then it's just not going to matter what this mix was or was not.

I think what you should do is to take a small break. Upgrade all gear you are using for listening to music and especially the mobile phone, start with that. Choose an iPhone 6s and combine that with high definition audio and video using Tidal Hifi subscription on a 4G connection and a set of great headphones. You'll be amazed at the sweetness of that and that will inspire you to take your productions to the next level.

You're good, you just had the gear against you.
 
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DarkRed said:
What's the reason for going back to this mix? The only reason for that is so that OP can understand what does not work and I think he understands so already. I think this mix should be recycled and not much thought, time, energy and stuff should go into it. Frequencies actually impact you, it's not healthy to input these kinds of frequencies into the system, OP must be pretty drained of energy from having tried to sort this out. That's one thing, beating yourself with it more and more, it's not good for you. But this is not something unusual, mixes fail all the time out there. Some combinations of frequencies simply just don't work, it's no more dramatic than that. But failing quickly and moving quickly forward, that's what separates the pros from the newbies.
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There's no such thing as taking knowledge back to an old mix and see what's changed and where problems lie is a pointless reason. What separates pros from newbies is the ability to recycle information, creating a cycling learning process.
If he produced this track, then he has all power to go back and reproduce the song with different instruments, or whatever he needs to do. But you don't EVER substitute growth.
 
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Kalm said:
There's no such thing as taking knowledge back to an old mix and see what's changed and where problems lie is a pointless reason. What separates pros from newbies is the ability to recycle information, creating a cycling learning process.
If he produced this track, then he has all power to go back and reproduce the song with different instruments, or whatever he needs to do. But you don't EVER substitute growth.
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I did not say recycle growth. I said leave the mix and mix setup behind, I meant do a full reset, take this as a learning lesson, no big deal, just move forward with a totally new setup and production. Because it is important that when things are not working one should not get stuck on that. I can assure you that root causes that are not dealt with when it comes music creation, can be very energy consuming. From that perspective a failed mix is really nothing. Mixes fail sometimes. But you don't want to be stuck with it.
 
Just sounds super compressed or limited on the master track. No biggy.

Try putting a compressor on the master track and doing like 2-3db compression instead of Maximus.
That'll provide the "mix glue" while not sounding smashed. Then if you really want to have it mastered, save your time and get it done for like $3 online instantly. It's hard to get a more accurate master than that using the acoustics most of us have at home.

Cheers!
 
DarkRed said:
I did not say recycle growth. I said leave the mix and mix setup behind, I meant do a full reset, take this as a learning lesson, no big deal, just move forward with a totally new setup and production. Because it is important that when things are not working one should not get stuck on that. I can assure you that root causes that are not dealt with when it comes music creation, can be very energy consuming. From that perspective a failed mix is really nothing. Mixes fail sometimes. But you don't want to be stuck with it.
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In which I agree, I do that constantly, but he should still take a look back and see where things actually went wrong after he's done a couple more. Look at the difference between his new sessions versus the old one. Take what worked and abandon what didn't. And if he's a producer, it's a great way do produce a remix track.
 
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