Anyone want their beat mixed?

[Iron Keys]

Old sage @Iron Keys Can you recommend any specific VSTs that make that help make that crisp sound at the most optimal volume. Thanks in advance. I'll also see what I can dig up and send.

What do you mean exactly ??

 

[hosie]

What's the chances @Iron Keys is fixing everyone's mixes, writing in-depth step-by-step analysis and breakdowns in between making a winner for his 100th beat battle?

I will need to give this another listen but sounds like the first mix you've did that I prefer something on the original. I think you lose the boom bap'ness of @Fade's drums? Interesting you say you initially added a little more high end and then decided against it. Wonder if the thump you added late on messed with snap of the snare too, if you adjusted it on the drum bus opposed to the individual mixer channel. Be interesting to have heard the difference between your initial drum mix and your final readjusted mix.

No doubt the sample sounds nicer as its just brought up for the nuances to be heard. That vocal chop is perfect. Just feel like the drums are a little muted in comparison to the original - loses that large, open sound. Again, I'll have a listen later and revert back!

And I think the whole finding your own tracks the hardest to mix is the same for everyone. It's like critiquing. You can find anomalies with someone else's work but sometimes can't detect an obvious issue within your own.

But yea, loving your in depth analysis and breakdowns and look forward to hearing more.

 

[Fade]

@Iron Keys nice breakdown, much appreciated.

I could have given you some other beat with more samples in it, but I thought this one was simple enough since you were going to mix it straight from a Studio One file. That's also one of the reasons you didn't have to do much, compared to some beats where you were going off an MP3.

But that's always a good point about picking the right sounds, like you said. They have to sound good but also fit together, especially when you're trying to match up samples.

The only thing I didn't do on this one was a bassline because if I were to mix it I would have copied the music to another track and use a low pass filter on it and bumped it up a bit, then of course thin out the main sample so there's no muddiness.

Overall I like your mix although what @hosie said about the drums, I found them to be non-boombappie, if you will. But like you mentioned about trying to keep the raw feel to it, this is why I like to use Decimort on my drums because it's a dope amount of drum machine presets that sound really good for that style. It compresses them enough but keeps them raw. But if you're doing something with the drums without a plug-in like that, I like how the drums blended in with your mix, it's just for me I always try to make my drum buss stand out so it carries the beat.

Also, I changed the output to zero on my MPC!

 

[Fury Beats]

What do you mean exactly ??

I was wondering if you are aware of any VST plugins that help with getting that crisp clear sound. For example, if I am starting with a slightly muddy sounding sound or is that more of an EQ technique?

 

[Iron Keys]

I was wondering if you are aware of any VST plugins that help with getting that crisp clear sound. For example, if I am starting with a slightly muddy sounding sound or is that more of an EQ technique?

Stock EQ is fine...

Just boost with a medium Q and sweep until you hear sound that don't feel important but it's just kinda there, usually around thay 300-900 range. If you're hearing a bunch of mess there that isn't contributing to the main sound cut it a little.

Also subtle boosts higher up can make things sound crisp whether that's around the 3k range or 8k and higher

 

[Iron Keys]

I think you lose the boom bap'ness of @Fade's drums?

Overall I like your mix although what @hosie said about the drums, I found them to be non-boombappie, if you will. But like you mentioned about trying to keep the raw feel to it, this is why I like to use Decimort on my drums because it's a dope amount of drum machine presets that sound really good for that style. It compresses them enough but keeps them raw.

Appreciate you both.

Maybe I'll re investigate and see what was going on there.

How would you both describe the drums in my mix if not boombappy?

Curious if too weak too this too that etc

Maybe making the kick too low had this effect

 

[Fury Beats]

Stock EQ is fine...

Just boost with a medium Q and sweep until you hear sound that don't feel important but it's just kinda there, usually around thay 300-900 range. If you're hearing a bunch of mess there that isn't contributing to the main sound cut it a little.

Also subtle boosts higher up can make things sound crisp whether that's around the 3k range or 8k and higher

Thanks man. That helps.

 

[2GooD Productions]

Thanks man. That helps.

Been watching some videos on youtube about EQ, they all pretty much do the exact same thing, regardless of what the manufacturers tell you. They have been scientifically tested by nulling one eq with another, on all the EQ's.

 

[Fury Beats]

Been watching some videos on youtube about EQ, they all pretty much do the exact same thing, regardless of what the manufacturers tell you. They have been scientifically tested by nulling one eq with another, on all the EQ's.

Interesting, indeed

 

[Dusty B]

So, out of all the beats I've received so far, Fade's was by far the easiest to mix.
This is down to 3 main reasons...
1: the sounds were all pretty clean and straight up; I didn't have to do any rescue work, free to process them as I want.
2: sound selection; I probably could have just turned up the main sample, slapped an EQ, Compressor and Limiter on the Master and called it a wrap. Everything just fit together.
3: It's Mister Motherfuckin' Fade

Okay, so first things first, noticed this was quite clearly a 'boom-bap' style, gritty 90s type Hip-Hop feel - so that was going to guide my approach; I'm not about to mix this like I would mix a pretty girl pop record.
That being said, one decision I made straight away (that I only just realised after pulling up the project), was to slap an SSL 9000 J channel strip on every channel (lot of Hip-Hop was probably mixed on 4000 E or G consoles, but I'm more of a 2000s guy so 9000, and would still keep the hip-hop feel.)
I didn't really do anything with the strips other than drive them a little for the console tone.
View attachment 7061

Okay, if I'm totally honest, first thing I did was say to myself "this is so well fitting, what I even meant to do to this?"; which is an interesting point, a lot of time you don't actually need to do much in a mix, (i first learnt this when I went completely legit and started with only stock and focussed on just getting levels right - if you have to do too much in a mix, recording/production process might be flawed)

I approached this mix with the idea that I want to 'bring it up to date' a *little* in and make it sound big and hard hitting, but, I did not want to turn this into a glossy pop-bap affair, I wanted to keep that grittiness --- in practise this means not making things overly bright or sparkly (example, don't high boost the snare, or keep in mind to keep it a little darker)

Clean Sounds
Clean in the sense they aren't drenched in verb, or buried in a drum mix or sample.
View attachment 7062
This gave me ultimate flexibility over processing them. And as you can see, the drum hits are very untainted - not compressed/saturated/clipped - I was free to fuck 'em up as much or as little as I want. (compared to some others where I may have to fight to claw back punch for example)

Sound Selection
As mentioned in previous sections - the sounds all just fit, I did not have to really do anything in terms of getting them to 'fit together', all EQ decisions were based on tone and whether I wanted more/less of something.

Drums
As I previously mentioned, I did'nt want to make these too hi-fi, but I initially brightened the snare a little, gave it more crack and sparkle, however, when I revisited this the other day after Fade said he was ready for me, I decided the snare felt too harsh and I ended up removing my eq boosts to it.
In the following is what my EQ moves were before my revision (the high mid was higher, I moved it down to where shown in photo, then removed it altogether. The low boost was also only added on my revision, I decided the kick needed more thump.
View attachment 7063
(drum bus)

The Sample
Fade was curious about what I did to the sample, and honestly, I don't think I did much other than turning it up...
View attachment 7066 --- my gain pots (LOL @ + 17.8dB)
The following is going to look crazy, but is mostly just some dynamic EQ ducking for the drums to cut through (probably not necessary, but I wanted to feel like I was doing something --- jokes aside, it likely did serve a small function)
View attachment 7064
Just a subtle bit of rebalancing the mids.

At the end of the mix, I added this to the 'music' bus just to bring it a bit more to life and a bit more upfront...
View attachment 7065


This was quite a half-happy-accident type occurence... I wanted to add a bit of movement to it so did some auto-panning, and also threw a delay on... and I think when I scrolled onto like a '1/4d' or one of those odd timings on the pan, it split it perfectly time wise. So I chopped the end part onto another track and made the delay come from that side. Something like that, but I 'heard it'(in my head) and then chased it.

It's Mister Motherfuckin' Fade
He told me I can only say nice things about his beat or he'll ban me jokes aside, Fade is an experienced beatmaker/kidnapper/musicmaking guy, and this is probably a big reason why; his sound selection was so on point, delivered well. That experience plays a massive part in naturally picking and playing sounds rhythms and melodies that just naturally are going to 'work' without too much conflict; I imagine it would be similar mixing a 2Good beat - the challenge here would be he uses a lot more instrumentation, so would naturally require more work to make everything 'fit'.

As for my master bus, I did not do too much, I added Tape saturation, to add to that 90s feel, and some mid-saturation just to add a bit more weight and presence. Then just typical limiting etc.

As I said, Fade's beat didn't feel like it needed too much, so a lot of it was just about 'enhancing' typically by adding 'tone' of vintage hardware emulations.

One of the most important things in mixing, is realising that (and when) you often don't really need to do anything.

great write up - you could likely grow an audience blogging like this.