Tobias, not only do I think it's on topic, I also feel it could be taken a step further.
FJ has posted some vocal only video/audios of the actual recordings. There are MANY of these. It might be really useful to use those as additional reference track.
BTW, they have them for many instruments as well.
Great thread.
Chad (Hope that makes it easier)
TEMPO TANTRUM: What a lead singer has when they can't stay in time.
I have a tool in IK Multimedia called "MasterMatch" that will analyze a reference and then give you a starting point for comparison before you begin to "turn the knobs" so to speak.
I have found (and this may tie back to what Jim said earlier about CDs though) that in some cases I am not all that fond of the reference track though I remember liking it at some point in the past.
Has anyone ever had the experience of listening to a reference track and saying "I can do better than that"?
Maybe WAY off topic, I don't know.
Here is an example, from Glen Campbell's last album, the title track Ghost on the Canvas. I loved the song, but it was mixed WAY too hot for my personal tastes--and over-compressed.
I guess what I am saying is the more you study and investigate the more you learn all around.
I thought David Cuny's last post was a study in a great mix. Man you could hear EVERYTHING on that one.
David Snyder Songwriter/Renaissance Man Studio + Fingers
The point I am trying to make is that SOMETIMES I have gone to grab a reference track I THOUGHT would be perfect then learned something about what I didn't want to do.
Funny how learning works when you keep your minds and ears open to unexpected observations and ideas, huh?
Enjoy those pitted olives, remember D minor is the saddest of all keys and say a prayer for Stumpy Joe boys.
David Snyder Songwriter/Renaissance Man Studio + Fingers
David Snyder quote I was shocked when I recently re-listened to Carolina in My Mind by James Taylor and realized it is mostly bass and drums and very faint guitar.
In my memory it was all guitar.
Guess my memory was off!
That's the way good song writing/producing/lyrics/vocals all mixed in to one stereo track should do to all who listen.
I found out that fact by listening ..Instead of commenting.
Last edited by beatmaster; 06/29/1801:00 PM.
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Yeah this will be my last one and then I will shut up because I know I am off topic, but it is funny that we sit around sometimes talking about very delicate changes on dials when Jimmy Page was stuffing a mic into a tin can and then putting the tin can and the amp into a box and running the whole thing to a speaker in a nearby bathroom while being totally toasted the entire time.
And we go "is there a free VST plug-in for that?"
Should I do a low shelf on my Waves compressor??
Ha ha ha.
Oh, well. Back to the factory!!!!! Over and out!
David Snyder Songwriter/Renaissance Man Studio + Fingers
There is no correct way or we would never have the historical path that is music today.
Now what song was it the drummer used the fridge instead of drums.
A cardboard box instead of drums.
Granted; for some creative mixes there may not be an example. As a polar example to your cardboard box drums there's Tropea's Muff, with Rick Marotta in left channel and Steve Gadd in right. It's a pretty All-Star band for the day. If it works it works! For the first 50 seconds you'd think this was 1 drummer (with some panning effects) .. but around :45 you can hear them start to play off each other and vary. If I remember you are a drummer and thought you may enjoy this.
They have identical time for most of this performance and play together very well, at least in my opinion.
And to keep this even farther off the topic; here's Ramblin' On deconstructed. My opinion; each track sounds pretty bad on it's own. Put together it's an orchestra.
Back in the day when I worked at General Motors, we periodically used a consultant (Dave Clark - not of the '5' fame, but the somewhat famous audio engineer) who had a great list of tracks for audio system subjective and objective evaluations.
As it turns out, it was also a great list of reference tracks.
The closest thing I can find is Bob Katz' list of dynamically well-mixed and mastered songs. I like some of these songs, so I have made it a point to obtain several on CD.
There's quite a wide variety of music styles in the honor roll that Bob lists.
Reference tracks also work well for the other side of mixing which is arranging. Taking the time to list out the likely tracks, their processing, when and where they appear in the mix and overall song, is also instructive. This takes some patience to audibly deconstruct a mix and arrangement but always worthwhile.
Someone way back in the thread mentioned Led Zeppelin. I was listening to my 2-CD compliation I have of theirs this past week on some really nice in-ear monitors, and it's funny how many times you can hear a squeak coming out of Bonzo's kick drum pedal. LZ has always been about the feel, however - not so much the sound quality.
The most obvious what volume the different instruments should be. I've found that I always overestimate the volume of vocals, and place them too far in the front.
On the other hand, drums are often quite louder that I expect them to be.
But you should match for frequency as well. That means deciding which instruments live in which frequency. There are various tools to help with spectral matching, such as the Reaper's free Spectrum Matcher. While it's not a good idea to simply apply spectral curves, it can be quite instructive!
Once you've decided who gets to live where in the frequency range, the simplest thing to do is high/low pass those instruments outside of that range. It's amazing how much you can remove from an instrument that's never noticed in a full mix.
Finally, reference tracks can tell you how many instruments to use. It's a lot easier to balance a song with fewer instruments, and floyd jane's latest reminded me to put less in, and make more from what I had.
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