The Song Fight Bulletin Board

I liked a lot of these tweets

https://theproaudiofiles.com/mixing-tips/

Those are some good tricks to try out! Thanks.

Rather than make yet another mixing thread, I thought I would post this Sweetwater "top 10 mistakes" list here:

https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/rooki ... -mistakes/

#4 should say "what you're really hearing on the vocals in professional recordings is mostly delay, not reverb".

#5 should come with a caveat, because if you slice the vocal and crank a soft spot to match a loud spot, EVERY bit of audio in that soft spot gets cranked-- and it can easily make your vocal sound like a patchwork rather than a single take.

#6 should have a callback to #2-- backing vocals are a good use of correction software.

#7 https://youtu.be/OEy5LBHq6OQ?t=140

Lunkhead wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 11, 2020 1:14 pm

Rather than make yet another mixing thread, I thought I would post this Sweetwater "top 10 mistakes" list here:

https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/rooki ... -mistakes/

Politics aside, some folks at Sweetwater keep making great informative posts, like this one which is a very comprehensive list of tips for "pro sounding" vocals, from performing to mixing etc. Lots of good stuff in here IMO:

https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/tips- ... ng-vocals/

These are two YouTube channels I’ve found Incredibly useful as I try to figure this shit out.

The House of Kush. Popped up in my recommendations feed a month or two back. Thought I might regret it on the first click. Do not regret it at all. https://www.youtube.com/c/TheHouseofKushTV

Produce Like A Pro. I pick and choose what I want to watch from this channel, and have learned some really useful things. https://www.youtube.com/c/Producelikeapro

These two are ten billion times better than that one video I clicked on to figure out how to use EQ one day, where the guy, in the middle of a very dry, straightforward video decided to draw boobs with his EQ as a “joke”. So funny. So hilarious. Made me feel so welcome as a woman trying to learn stuff.

crumpart wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 03, 2020 9:53 am

Produce Like A Pro. I pick and choose what I want to watch from this channel, and have learned some really useful things. https://www.youtube.com/c/Producelikeapro

Produce Like a Pro is great. Also have found a lot of good stuff via Musician on a Mission - particularly their videos/articles on parallel compression, and I've been trying out their reverb setup for my last couple of tracks.

I'm a fan of both of those too! It seems like most times when I Google some mixing/production question or topic one or both of those channels have informative videos on it.

That sucks about the boobs drawing idiot though. Ugh.

Apparently this visual analogy helped someone. Maybe it will strike a chord with someone else.

Lunkhead wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 03, 2020 1:01 pm

That sucks about the boobs drawing idiot though.

Actually, it was quite useful, imo. It's easier to ignore ppl who are blatant asshats. It wastes less of my time if they let us know up front.

How much do folks here know/care about "internal clipping" within a signal chain, meaning, when a plugin is boosting its input signal such that its output is >0db and/or the input signal to a plugin is >0db? It's something I had not paid any attention to until reading some recent mixing tips info. After reading about it I noticed that it's happening a lot in my mixes. I started trying to "fix" it but I guess I also don't know why other than that I read it was "bad". I don't know what to listen for to see if I can hear the difference between when it's happening and when it's not.

Lunkhead wrote: ↑

Sat Aug 15, 2020 8:00 am

How much do folks here know/care about "internal clipping" within a signal chain, meaning, when a plugin is boosting its input signal such that its output is >0db and/or the input signal to a plugin is >0db? It's something I had not paid any attention to until reading some recent mixing tips info. After reading about it I noticed that it's happening a lot in my mixes. I started trying to "fix" it but I guess I also don't know why other than that I read it was "bad". I don't know what to listen for to see if I can hear the difference between when it's happening and when it's not.

I do it deliberately to push distortion plugins sometimes. Like I'll put an overdrive on my bass signal, not cut down the post gain at all so the signal is stupidly loud, and then let the next plugin (usually some kind of distortion) handle getting the output level down to something more reasonable. Is it "proper?". I don't know. But I don't really care lol.

For floating point engines it only matters if the DAW clips the signal coming out of a plugin, or the plugin does it (floating point can go above 0 dB). In any other case it doesn't matter. That said, if you want to make extra sure not to do it, just trim everything by 10 dB before you set up any plugins.

Lunkhead wrote: ↑

Sat Aug 15, 2020 8:00 am

How much do folks here know/care about "internal clipping" within a signal chain, meaning, when a plugin is boosting its input signal such that its output is >0db and/or the input signal to a plugin is >0db? It's something I had not paid any attention to until reading some recent mixing tips info. After reading about it I noticed that it's happening a lot in my mixes. I started trying to "fix" it but I guess I also don't know why other than that I read it was "bad". I don't know what to listen for to see if I can hear the difference between when it's happening and when it's not.

When a waveform gets large enough that it exceeds the maximum supported size (too loud), it just stops at the top. This changes the sound, and the tip of the peak is "clipped" off. This creates harsh harmonic distortion. Certain effects pedals (such as the Boss Metal Zone) use this for distortion effects. Analog gear clips in a different, less harsh way that tends to create warmer, softer distortion effects, where the waveform's clipping has a knee to it, curving its way to the top and back instead of hitting the top like a car into a brick wall. Depending on whether the plugin is meant to simulate this effect or not, you may be missing out on great character from your plugins.

A great example is the "Rare" Pultec-style EQ from Analog Obsession (free!), which you might actually want to push the signal on to get some of that analog distortion sound. Other plugins will probably just brickwall.

If you think you might be getting internal clipping, you can find free VU meter plugins out there and place them inbetween each plugin to check that you're not clipping anywhere, and if you need to gain stage after one plugin to get that analog goodness out of the next one, you'll know how much juice you need to give the signal.

Wouldn’t the “out” meter (and gain control) on most plugins show the clipping if it is occurring?

Yeah, most of my plugins have output meters, and many have input meters too (which alert me that the previous plugin's output is too hot if I'm not looking at the previous plugin).

Oh yeah totally, you would only need a VU meter plugin in the case that your plugin chain has a plugin with no output meter followed by one with no input meter.

This is almost like the Bible:

That's a great video! Thanks for sharing. I am definitely guilty of thinking about the kick and bass in terms of carving out separate EQ bands for them. But I'm glad to hear that it's "OK" that I use the same process (kick -> snare -> bass -> oh -> guitars -> vocals etc.) for mixing every song, haha. Also nice to hear the opinions about monitors and room treatment. Room treatment has long been on my to-do list but I've been intimidated about how much treatment I thought I was going to need. Maybe it's less than I thought after all and I can just get away with 4 2x4 panels on my back wall.

If anybody wants access to that guy's mixing cheat sheet but doesn't want to give him their email address for him to spam, let me know and I can share it with you.

I'd be interested in the cheat sheet for reference if nothing else.

My recording room sucks. Maybe a bit more treatment is in my future this year. (My dream of building another room seems very distant with the youngest kid living in my basement.)