The last one before the main release, I promise ;)

[RobRideout]

Ok, so here's a preview, and I'm not sure I like the mix. I have about 7 days until the hand in date (it's a university project) and I can't tell what's missing from the mix. Can anyone give me any pointers? I'd really appreciate it

 https://soundcloud.com/flying-machine/w ... view-to-be

[E.S.]

Since I'm involved I guess I can be critical. Please don't sue me, but you want fresh ears, so...

Needs kick drum and sub in general. A bit of drum bus compression could be a nice thing too. Drums can take a lot of abuse, and heavy sounding drums often make the track. A limiter can help you push the levels up a bit if you don't overdo it. Especially snare needs to be tamed in all mixes.

Vocals can easily be compressed a lot too, and maybe scoop some of the low end and honky frequencies out. Often around 300-500 and 800-1000hz but I'm just guessing. The same with bass, scoop out the bit where the guitars have the most "weight", that area is covered by the guitars anyway. A "rule" in mixing is to take out a lot of 250hz, it's known for adding mud to the low end.

It all depends on the quality of the recording, of course. I know it can be a bit of a struggle with real instruments. We don't all own 76357435£ pre-amps, mics and things like that.

Apart from that you can do a lot with a master EQ. If you want amateur level mastering let me know.

That said, damn... sounds pretty epic. The playing is excellent!

Working on the solo right now btw. Just came home after a weekend of gigs.

[RobRideout]

That is MEGA helpful, thanks very much.

I've got a pretty extensive list of things to fix in the mix on tuesday, and a lot of people have mentioned the lack of sub. I don't know why it never occurred to me to boost the sub, I've only really done cuts in EQ there's very little boosting there, but yeah that could sound much better. Looking forward to getting the keys mixed in. I'll send you a version through Dropbox just before I hand it in so you can point out any glaring last minute errors.

Again, really appreciate it, thanks

Rob