Doubled my Instrumental on accident and it made my mix better? Good idea or no?

G

GFunkEra408

HipHop
So I’m starting to mix the beat in it’s own session, then mix the vocals over the beat in a new session to save processing power. However today I had two copy’s of the beat in the same session when mixing the vocals. I had two beat tracks because the first beat I used the snare and kick were a little low, so I went back made the adjustments and added the revised beat back in the session. So I played back my mix and it sound really good. Then I noticed that both of the same beats were playing at the same time. It definitely gave the mix a lot more “pop” and character.

Now I’m wondering if this is good practice or not, and isn’t this what essentially parallel processing/compression is or does?

Lol I’d hate just start dubbing every instrumental to give it that extra thing I’m looking for. I know there’s no rules but I’d like to know.
 
First of all - mixing vocals to a two-track isn't really optimal, I know it's done a lot but basically out of necessity: vocals should, imo, be treated like another instrument so they need their place in the mix, not on top of it. If, for example, you'd need to cut out a bit of midrange from the guitars to fit your vocals better, you can't do that - you'd be cutting the midrange from everything. So I'd consider simply rendering your individual tracks or stems into audio for the vocal mixing (just playing back audio tracks doesn't really tax the CPU) rather than rendering the whole track.

As for using two whole tracks...it's probably a good thing to remember at this point that 99% of the time people will consider something that's a bit louder also "better", and, well, assign different kind of qualities to it (even if it really is just louder - which is what would happen if you stack two identical tracks on top of each other). So it's well possible that you're really just hearing the details a bit better and that translates into "pop and character" in your head. But if you're processing the two tracks differently, then it's a different story - just be wary that all kinds of phase issues can easily creep in (which might also be the reason why it sounds different/better).

Of course in the end it's always down to "if it sounds good, it is good", but just some thoughts to consider.
 
krushing said:
First of all - mixing vocals to a two-track isn't really optimal, I know it's done a lot but basically out of necessity: vocals should, imo, be treated like another instrument so they need their place in the mix, not on top of it. If, for example, you'd need to cut out a bit of midrange from the guitars to fit your vocals better, you can't do that - you'd be cutting the midrange from everything. So I'd consider simply rendering your individual tracks or stems into audio for the vocal mixing (just playing back audio tracks doesn't really tax the CPU) rather than rendering the whole track.

As for using two whole tracks...it's probably a good thing to remember at this point that 99% of the time people will consider something that's a bit louder also "better", and, well, assign different kind of qualities to it (even if it really is just louder - which is what would happen if you stack two identical tracks on top of each other). So it's well possible that you're really just hearing the details a bit better and that translates into "pop and character" in your head. But if you're processing the two tracks differently, then it's a different story - just be wary that all kinds of phase issues can easily creep in (which might also be the reason why it sounds different/better).

Of course in the end it's always down to "if it sounds good, it is good", but just some thoughts to consider.
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Ok thanks, I'll keep that in mind going forward with my projects. Also it makes sense to me why mixing the vocals with the beat in the same session would be better. It's just when I start using a lot of plug-ins through out the mix, my comp get's pretty sensitive and overloads frequently. Maybe I should be very particular how many plug-ins I use and what channels I use them on and I'll be smooth sailing.

Thanks for your input. I'm still new to some of the techniques that are used, and thought to myself that doubling the beat may or may not lead me to some problems which I definitely want to avoid.
 
GFunkEra408 said:
Ok thanks, I'll keep that in mind going forward with my projects. Also it makes sense to me why mixing the vocals with the beat in the same session would be better. It's just when I start using a lot of plug-ins through out the mix, my comp get's pretty sensitive and overloads frequently. Maybe I should be very particular how many plug-ins I use and what channels I use them on and I'll be smooth sailing.
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Well it doesn't have to be either or - you can do a sort of "intermediary bounce" - when you're done with the basic sound-shaping and creative fx, you can bounce your tracks into audio (or better yet - almost all DAWs nowadays have some kind of a "freeze" feature) and then maybe just add an EQ to carve space for the vocals.
 
GFunkEra408 said:
So I’m starting to mix the beat in it’s own session, then mix the vocals over the beat in a new session to save processing power. However today I had two copy’s of the beat in the same session when mixing the vocals. I had two beat tracks because the first beat I used the snare and kick were a little low, so I went back made the adjustments and added the revised beat back in the session. So I played back my mix and it sound really good. Then I noticed that both of the same beats were playing at the same time. It definitely gave the mix a lot more “pop” and character.

Now I’m wondering if this is good practice or not, and isn’t this what essentially parallel processing/compression is or does?

Lol I’d hate just start dubbing every instrumental to give it that extra thing I’m looking for. I know there’s no rules but I’d like to know.
Click to expand...

The simple answer is no, it doesn't sound better, it's just louder that's why you might think it sounds better. As mentioned by Krushing, it will just create phase problems.

So make sure that your beat sounds good on its own. Even when you want to use parallel compression, parallel compression should only enhance your sounds not change them completely. Go back to your mix to try everything you can to make it sound good on its own just like what you were hearing when it's doubled. That should be your goal from here on.

GFunkEra408 said:
Ok thanks, I'll keep that in mind going forward with my projects. Also it makes sense to me why mixing the vocals with the beat in the same session would be better. It's just when I start using a lot of plug-ins through out the mix, my comp get's pretty sensitive and overloads frequently. Maybe I should be very particular how many plug-ins I use and what channels I use them on and I'll be smooth sailing.

Thanks for your input. I'm still new to some of the techniques that are used, and thought to myself that doubling the beat may or may not lead me to some problems which I definitely want to avoid.
Click to expand...

I also can't see how one would mix the beat without the vocals then bounce the instrumental to mix the vocals on top of the beat. I don't believe that's a good approach.

To save CPU, simply export/bounce the sounds that you've already processed, replace them with the bounced audio, save the project with the bounced audio as mix-2 for example so that you can go back to mix-1 to make any changes if necessary.

I'm failing to understand how someone can get a professional mix if they have to wait till the end to mix a specific sound. Mixing is all about going back and forth between sounds. You don't process one sound then that's it, you'll obviously have to go back to it maybe change the processing completely or just improve minor details.

For example, if you realize that the keys and the vocals are fighting for the same space in the lower mids maybe around 200Hz then you cut that frequency on the keys and then your mix opens up and your vocals are starting to be more audible. At that point you're happy. Then later you realize that damn the snare needs to dominate that frequency then you simply cut the vocals in that area as well to help the snare pop because you know it's a muddy area for vocals anyway.

My point is, you'll always go back to change something and I mean always. It could be a reverb, compression, levels or other processing issues it's not just EQ that you'll need to revisit.

So when you've bounced the audio you can fix the problem easily even when you're at mix-23.

Hope that helps.
 
Nytshade said:
The simple answer is no, it doesn't sound better, it's just louder that's why you might think it sounds better. As mentioned by Krushing, it will just create phase problems.

So make sure that your beat sounds good on its own. Even when you want to use parallel compression, parallel compression should only enhance your sounds not change them completely. Go back to your mix to try everything you can to make it sound good on its own just like what you were hearing when it's doubled. That should be your goal from here on.



I also can't see how one would mix the beat without the vocals then bounce the instrumental to mix the vocals on top of the beat. I don't believe that's a good approach.

To save CPU, simply export/bounce the sounds that you've already processed, replace them with the bounced audio, save the project with the bounced audio as mix-2 for example so that you can go back to mix-1 to make any changes if necessary.

I'm failing to understand how someone can get a professional mix if they have to wait till the end to mix a specific sound. Mixing is all about going back and forth between sounds. You don't process one sound then that's it, you'll obviously have to go back to it maybe change the processing completely or just improve minor details.

For example, if you realize that the keys and the vocals are fighting for the same space in the lower mids maybe around 200Hz then you cut that frequency on the keys and then your mix opens up and your vocals are starting to be more audible. At that point you're happy. Then later you realize that damn the snare needs to dominate that frequency then you simply cut the vocals in that area as well to help the snare pop because you know it's a muddy area for vocals anyway.

My point is, you'll always go back to change something and I mean always. It could be a reverb, compression, levels or other processing issues it's not just EQ that you'll need to revisit.

So when you've bounced the audio you can fix the problem easily even when you're at mix-23.

Hope that helps.
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Wooo! Hell yeah, I thank you again for the wisdom and guidance man. Seriously, this stuff is pretty simple but you guys got me thinking better now.

Appreciate you guys with the lengthy responses. It’s always good reading material for me and probably others.
 
Yeah. Just to reiterate - the whole "vocals on top of a finished mix" thing has come up from the relatively new thing of people downloading beats and rapping over them, or otherwise "bypassing" the traditional mixing process. In other words, it's done because you don't have access to the individual tracks. Somehow it's turned into a normal thing to do in amateur circles, even though it's never been a good idea, just something that's occasionally done out of necessity.
 
krushing said:
Yeah. Just to reiterate - the whole "vocals on top of a finished mix" thing has come up from the relatively new thing of people downloading beats and rapping over them, or otherwise "bypassing" the traditional mixing process. In other words, it's done because you don't have access to the individual tracks. Somehow it's turned into a normal thing to do in amateur circles, even though it's never been a good idea, just something that's occasionally done out of necessity.
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For sure. I rather not go that route. That last song that I mixed that, but oh well. I’ll move on and learn. Now that I have an idea how to save power on my computer I’lll mix with the beat and vocal together.
 
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