Anyone want their beat mixed?

Iron Keys

ILLIEN MBAPPÉ
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 645
. I'm so so on the bpm change tell me more that you're thinking if the og is too slow for a groove!
HA

FUCK SAKE

My initial thought on your beat - "oh this is quite uptempo, nah i can fuck with that tho, got some real energy to it."

I should have maybe clocked something when i said "lemme check the tempo for this --- oh 120, same tempo as page default"

--- As my Studio One is a fresh install and didn't keep my user settings, "stretch audio to project tempo" is on by default

:headache:

I've just taken it all off, gonna take me time to get used to it now... but I think mix-wise it all still works. Dunno if that's just 'cause I'm used to the textures.

Surprised it didn't fuck me with other mixes yet!

Gonna remove and reupload
 

Dusty B

ILLIEN
Battle Points: 37
HA

FUCK SAKE

My initial thought on your beat - "oh this is quite uptempo, nah i can fuck with that tho, got some real energy to it."

I should have maybe clocked something when i said "lemme check the tempo for this --- oh 120, same tempo as page default"

--- As my Studio One is a fresh install and didn't keep my user settings, "stretch audio to project tempo" is on by default

:headache:

I've just taken it all off, gonna take me time to get used to it now... but I think mix-wise it all still works. Dunno if that's just 'cause I'm used to the textures.

Surprised it didn't fuck me with other mixes yet!

Gonna remove and reupload
I thought maybe you mixed it on the treadmill.

haha but I should have sent the YT/MP3 reference too! will listen asap, on the go on my phone rn
 

Dusty B

ILLIEN
Battle Points: 37
love it and just on my ear buds.

love what you did with the kicks while controlling the snare.

what immediately stood out was how well the crashes are mixed and how you were able to maintain the downtempo/pitched down crashes but they still come through and are big without it sounding too harsh. lmk how you go about processing overheads. really adds to the whole anthem feel of this track to have the big crashes also be clean

curious how you went about mixing it, what you did and why! dope. if you're cool would love to post it on my YT and credit you as the engineer man
 

Dusty B

ILLIEN
Battle Points: 37
love it and just on my ear buds.

love what you did with the kicks while controlling the snare.

what immediately stood out was how well the crashes are mixed and how you were able to maintain the downtempo/pitched down crashes but they still come through and are big without it sounding too harsh. lmk how you go about processing overheads. really adds to the whole anthem feel of this track to have the big crashes also be clean

curious how you went about mixing it, what you did and why! dope. if you're cool would love to post it on my YT and credit you as the engineer man
now that it's mixed right bro...

this is like if Griselda dropped a mixtape tonight on DatPiff

we can dream
 

Iron Keys

ILLIEN MBAPPÉ
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 645
So far in this mix thread journey...

My initial observation on why some of you may struggle with your mixes;
Source sounds. - pick good and 'right' sounds
Some of those sounds were so rough to work with, it takes some real effort to get them to sound good --- before you even think about mixing them.
I would really advise on trying to make sure you select really good and the RIGHT drum sounds; especially in Hip-Hop these are the foundation and main factors in a Hip-Hop record --- Hip-Hop music was built on drum breaks. GET THEM RIGHT. You want the punchiest fullest right textured drums for whatever you're doing.
If your track does not really have a main bass, make sure your kick drum is providing a hefty amount of low end.

A Hip-Hop record typically, it's all about the drums and vocal. Make sure your drums are right.

I found that a lot of you had issues with the drums, lacking punch/definition.

Make sure the sounds you use, musically too, are all serving their intended purpose. Some of this will just come with experience.

I didn't do too much fancy in these mixes, they were mostly rescue jobs... rescue the sounds to make them workable, then just fit them in balance them.

All the beats were very good and had strong vibes - I fuck with them all. All very different too, love the variety.
 
Last edited:

Dusty B

ILLIEN
Battle Points: 37
So far in this mix thread journey...

My initial observation on why some of you may struggle with your mixes;
Source sounds. - pick good and 'right' sounds
Some of those sounds were so rough to work with, it takes some real effort to get them to sound good --- before you even think about mixing them.
I would really advise on trying to make sure you select really good and the RIGHT drum sounds; especially in Hip-Hop these are the foundation and main factors in a Hip-Hop record --- Hip-Hop music was built on drum breaks. GET THEM RIGHT. You want the punchiest fullest right textured drums for whatever you're doing.
If your track does not really have a main bass, make sure your kick drum is providing a hefty amount of low end.

A Hip-Hop record typically, it's all about the drums and vocal. Make sure your drums are right.

I found that a lot of you had issues with the drums, lacking punch/definition.

Make sure the sounds you use, musically too, are all serving their intended purpose. Some of this will just come with experience.

All the beats were very good and had strong vibes - I fuck with them all. All very different too, love the variety.
cheers, appreciate that! I've def senses over the last year how I would spend too much time trying to mix something to the way I wanted it... where the root "problem" is probably not the best sound selection! ty!
 

Iron Keys

ILLIEN MBAPPÉ
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 645
Yes, please.


I use Serato Studio. Let me know what I need to send you.

In this mix, first thing I needed to do was just get a nice balance between all the elements.
As it's a sparse mix, really important to get the balance right so it sounds cohesive, and make sure it tickles all the right parts of the freq range.

In your initial mix, the hat was too loud - I addressed this in the balance, but put it louder than i typically would due to it being louder in some of the references i used.

As you had two different kick drum sounds playing at different times, I had to ensure getting the balance between them right so they worked musically.
I also made sure they both had enough thump and low end to both sound related and also make up for the lack of bass on the record.

I liked the idea of keeping the vocal fairly dry and up front, but experimented with having some verb/delay on it (how i typically would in my own tracks), thought you may like how it sounds so thought i'd keep it on, it also helped add some dimension to the mix and fiill up some of the space.

SNARE - this is what I think I did the most work on, I EQ'd out some of the high end (the typical snare snap range) then raised the overall volume, this gave the snare more weight that it was missing, given the track a bit more mid range weight. I might have done some transient boost if the eq didnt fully resolve issues, as the snare sounded pretty smeared and not snapping enough.
as I progressed the mix I eased off some of the high cut that i applied, but ultimately the snare still had a cut in the highs.

'bass' I was surprised this was more likea tenor bass, did not have any lows really, the way it sounded musically sounded like it would be nice moving about a little, so i added the panning.

Fun little funky beat, love it. Seems to be your style from what I'm noticing!
 

Iron Keys

ILLIEN MBAPPÉ
ill o.g.
Battle Points: 645
It's on the Tube. If you're scrolling, smash that thumbs up to give some love to the illmuzik.com collabo.


love it and just on my ear buds.

love what you did with the kicks while controlling the snare.

what immediately stood out was how well the crashes are mixed and how you were able to maintain the downtempo/pitched down crashes but they still come through and are big without it sounding too harsh. lmk how you go about processing overheads. really adds to the whole anthem feel of this track to have the big crashes also be clean

curious how you went about mixing it, what you did and why! dope. if you're cool would love to post it on my YT and credit you as the engineer man
View attachment 7037
I thought you said mix notes, not a love letter :love:


So, was really excited to approach this one, as I love the whole NY mixtape scene and early 2000s era.

So first thing I needed to address was those DRUMS - like you requested, and as I'd expect.
So they were really lacking some weight and punch and as you know, we really want that kick punching and that snare cracking, want them drums jumping out the mix.

SO, first, I approached this with some dynamic EQ to poke the kick thump and snare crack(and punch) when they hit. I used dynamic EQ and transient shaping to achieve this. This helped a lot. important: drums were mostly provided as a drum stem file ... kick snare etc as one file, so no individual control.

Later on in the mix, I decided it wasn't enough, and I also reflected on a different method I may have liked to try - originally thought of mixing from the start, but decided to just try add it where im at...

So DRUMS pt. ii. I then created a duplicate of the drum track at least twice ... first dupe I hi cut all the way down to just the kick thump, maybe massaged it a little, then raised it up until that kick weight became present... I then did the same with the snare. I basically re-mixed the drums from the drum stem that was provided.

Interesting to note... I had a transient shaper on the drum buss to add the transient punch in... reducing the sustain helped, HOWEVER... boosting the sustain did not take away from the punch, but brought the drums to life a bit like you would hear in a Just Blaze track, brought the details out. So I kept it.

Crashes
So, for me this is somewhat second nature to mix, as I use them a lot, and in this style. Basically, I find where I want them to sit from L-R... usually I pan; panning makes them very audible, quite an aggressive sound, so i was able to turn them down a bit as the width keeps em loud and big, I also wanted to keep them bright enough to not sound like smushy nonsense.
So... my approach, I find the listening/playback that will highlight the most harshness... I then boost their high/air frequencies until it sounds broken or painful, I then back it off until it sounds fine. --- I then find that, with the panning etc, they usually just sit right. they usually have a few db range to play with at this point to either have them slightly louder or quieter to taste without losing their impact. Maybe adjust to meet the tone of the record. Could even very very high cut just to round it off if you've got enough brightness but want a bit of darker quality.

I referenced a bunch of Just Blaze records, Dipset etc - mainly just for fun, but looked for ones of a similar makeup and texture. Enjoyed this --- even if I did mix it all about 30bpm faster haha.
 
Last edited:

Dusty B

ILLIEN
Battle Points: 37
So, was really excited to approach this one, as I love the whole NY mixtape scene and early 2000s era.

So first thing I needed to address was those DRUMS - like you requested, and as I'd expect.
So they were really lacking some weight and punch and as you know, we really want that kick punching and that snare cracking, want them drums jumping out the mix.

SO, first, I approached this with some dynamic EQ to poke the kick thump and snare crack(and punch) when they hit. I used dynamic EQ and transient shaping to achieve this. This helped a lot. important: drums were mostly provided as a drum stem file ... kick snare etc as one file, so no individual control.

Later on in the mix, I decided it wasn't enough, and I also reflected on a different method I may have liked to try - originally thought of mixing from the start, but decided to just try add it where im at...

So DRUMS pt. ii. I then created a duplicate of the drum track at least twice ... first dupe I hi cut all the way down to just the kick thump, maybe massaged it a little, then raised it up until that kick weight became present... I then did the same with the snare. I basically re-mixed the drums from the drum stem that was provided.

Interesting to note... I had a transient shaper on the drum buss to add the transient punch in... reducing the sustain helped, HOWEVER... boosting the sustain did not take away from the punch, but brought the drums to life a bit like you would hear in a Just Blaze track, brought the details out. So I kept it.

Crashes
So, for me this is somewhat second nature to mix, as I use them a lot, and in this style. Basically, I find where I want them to sit from L-R... usually I pan; panning makes them very audible, quite an aggressive sound, so i was able to turn them down a bit as the width keeps em loud and big, I also wanted to keep them bright enough to not sound like smushy nonsense.
So... my approach, I find the listening/playback that will highlight the most harshness... I then boost their high/air frequencies until it sounds broken or painful, I then back it off until it sounds fine. --- I then find that, with the panning etc, they usually just sit right. they usually have a few db range to play with at this point to either have them slightly louder or quieter to taste without losing their impact. Maybe adjust to meet the tone of the record. Could even very very high cut just to round it off if you've got enough brightness but want a bit of darker quality.
thanks bro. I've started taking a similar approach with the drum layers recently as I use drum breaks often and often run into the same challenge of trying to mix the break/bus vs. the individual sound. I think this one was before I knew to do that! appreciate the info on how you approached the transient shaper + mixing the crash!
 
Top