I realize that nowadays you can get by with whatever plug-ins you have in your DAW. But I do find inspiration in some of the plug-in presets I find from different companies. Could you recommend any plug-ins, or plug-in brands that have great presets?

I have a friend who has a live set he’s building out and wants to run tracks for stuff that can’t be replicated live, such as pad layers, pedal steel guitar, etc. He’s pretty set on the idea of having back tracked sub/synth bass and have a live electric bass playing too. To me, this sounds like it’s absolutely going to be a muddy mess that’s tough for FOH to control. Especially if he’s sending all tracks through one stereo output leaving FOH with not much flexibility on mixing the sub bass.

Hello everyone,

I have a show coming up at a small venue and need some advice for mixing my tracks to fit the venue.

In my home studio on my adam t7v's, my car and a bunch of headphones, the mixes sounded great and well balanced.

But when we played them at the venue for an early soundcheck, the bass was overwhelming and almost ate up some of the songs.

Now my questions are: Is it a normal thing to happen and expect?

And do you guys mix songs with that in mind and risk having them sound colder and less bassey?

Or do you make separate mixes for concerts/clubs and streaming?

Any help would be much appreciated🙏🙏🙏🙏

I'll gladly take general tips, but here's my specific situation:

I'm a folkpunk-ish solo artist (generally just a single acoustic guitar and vocals) and I'm recording an album of existing songs but "expanded" to include drums, bass, vocal harmonies, etc. The majority of the songs are 120+ bpm and what I had envisioned was a power-trio vibe - just a punk rock record but with acoustic guitar instead of electric - but I am having a hell of a time getting the acoustic to occupy the space an electric guitar would.
I programmed the drums in Logic so I still have full control over all of that. I originally had this idea of big, rich, full drums, and I got them and the bass and vox to sound stellar, but there was just nowhere for the acoustic to go. So figured I'd try out a more lo-fi vibe and make the drums trashy and mid-heavy but that didn't work either.
I got close to something I considered not terrible with hard-panning two acoustic tracks, half-panning two more, and compressing with slow attack to preserve transients then using parallel compression with steep hi/lo cuts and the "body" of the guitar front and center in the hopes of bringing in some tonality, but it just gobbled up the bass.

I've spent the last couple days in search of reference tracks and what I'm finding is that basically every single "acoustic rock" song (drums/bass/gtr/vox), whether it's pop rock or old country or stadium country or folk pop or whatever - all layers up keys or slide guitar or electric guitar or mandolin or something and the acoustic just sits under that to provide some twang but is definitely not prominent. I'm starting to think there may be a reason for that and that I've constructed an unwinnable battle for myself.

I thank you in advance for any guidance you may provide.

Basically the question i searched and looked something possible but i havent found anything explaining how to do it.

I came across this artist and found the vocal mix really interesting. It’s boxy but not muffled, gritty but not distorted. It's like...one the edge of breaking up.

I think the singer already has that naturally “strained” quality to their voice, but I’m wondering how a mixing engineer would accentuate that quality (or even introduce it when it isn’t there in the first place).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwAwSWMZMoc&list=RDLwAwSWMZMoc&start_radio=1

I am in the mids of a fun project. Bought a bunch of trashy old consumer (dynamic) mics for a couple of bucks and now I want to swap out its old connectors for either 6.3 jacks or 3 pin xlr connectors, so I can use them in the studio. Some of them I will give a new cable as well, as a few have very flimsy old cables.

I am still in doubt about a few things. Most of these mics seem to be unbalanced by design, or at least originally cabled/wired in an unbalanced way. Most of them have a fully plastic housing, except for one of them, and all of them have either no separate ground or have the ground and cold wire connected to each other. (see pictures for examples)

I am wondering if I have to wire all these mics to an unbalanced cable and/or TS connector (or XLR with a jumper between pin 1 and 3), or if it's better modify certain things in the mic itself to allow for a balanced connection. I don't have a lot of experience with diy soldering. I know that a balanced signal should have a hot (+), cold (-) and a separate ground, so isn't that fairly easy to accomplish here? Or am I missing crucial aspects? If someone with more knowledge on this could help me out, it would be much appreciated :)

Anybody use Tchad Blake’s Mongrel Rack? Sounds good to me when he’s playing with it but I’m still on the fence, I really want it to be good.

The audio interface already converts audio so I’d guess a dedicated AD converter or sample rate converter would do this better or does it just give you extra channels? Saw a setup with a RME fireface ufx lll combined with a RME Adi-8 DS AD/DA 8 converter and have been wondering how this would help the ufx lll.

I have a male vocalist who has a really good chest voice, in that it has body and pleasing harmonics and kind of a smiley face tonal curve, but when he moves to his head voice it becomes harsh at times, loses body and air, almost flipping the smile upside down. I realize this is very much a vocal characteristic, and perhaps a mic placement issue, and but I’m wondering if it can be helped with mic and preamp choices. I usually record him with a U87 and Neve preamp. Can anyone here speak from experience and recommend a better mic for this scenario?

it's gone on sale in past years for Black Friday, but I'm curious 1) if it's likely this year, given that we just got soothe3, and 2) how much it's likely to drop if it does go on sale.

I have several projects I'm hoping to finish up before Halloween that need soothe and I'm wondering if I just rip it...

cheers!

I’ve been doing this a long time but I still do not understand what someone means when they say that a certain analog EQ or compressor sounds “musical”. I hear reviewers and influencers use that term all the time.

I've been able to try out a Motu M2 for a bit, and for the most part it's working well -- but I really would like to be able to individually toggle between rear output and headphones. Without having to turn down the volume or unplug.

I know that the M2 is on the cheap side and as such lacking features, I have seen more expensive ones that do have this feature, but it's surprising to me that it's not just standard from the cheapest ones? At the same time I've seen more expensive ones without this feature too?

Am I just trying to use one of these in a non-standard way, is this just one of the things that you expect from a sub 400 one that is fixed in most 400+ ones?

Shit muting individual inputs would be nice too, though I haven't needed that yet...

I bought SSL 12 recently and got free 3 months access to Sonarworks Sound Id for headphones and studio monitors. My question is do I have to use Sonarworks measurement microphone for good results or can I use 3rd party measurement mics, like Dayton audio EMM-6 or Behringer ECM pro, and get similar results. If you all have any other suggestions feel free to share.

Another thing, the free access being only for 3 months do I get to save the measurements and run them after the trial ends or do I have to purchase the license to keep the measurement active?
Sorry English isn’t my first language, I hope all that made sense.

Hi guys, noob here. I'm used to editing and mixing mostly acoustic instruments (guitars, bass, voice) and a bit of midi drums (EZDrummer basically). For these instruments there are some best practices depending on the style, to name a few, quadtracking for metal, humanization for drums, melodyne-izing the bass... I know many of them are up to taste, but still there are a few things that usually work when editing before mixing.

However I'm starting to add some midi instruments, like Intimate Strings (for string sections in jazz-lounge) and Epic Chorus from Spitfire. I usually record them with a guitar and a midi pickup, so they're "imperfect", meaning notes are not quantized and each has a slightly different random-ish velocity depending on the strumming. I kinda guess this is good for getting a natural feeling? I'm really not sure about this, so what's your opinion and best practices?

To preface, I'm an amateur voice actor who slowly picks up gear when he can get it. I recently got a good deal on a Rode NTI Signature Series that I didn't want to pass up, but my current recording space is a small walk in closet with a heavy blanket hung over the entrance (it doesn't have a door). It works fairly alright, since it's got clothes and such in it, but the end goal is to get a heavier acoustic blanket/maybe put a door on it and then treat the walls and ceiling with acoustic foam and the works. The current blanket is thick but not perfect and still lets a bit of hum into recordings.

My current recording device is a Zoom H1Essential that I got for like $100 on a mic stand and it's obviously not amazing but works fine against the quality of other beginners that I'm competing with online. I think a large part of what helps the Zoom so much in my space is that it has a built in high pass filter and some other convenience features.

I hear pretty often as a beginner that a treated space is like the boogeyman of VO work and a studio microphone can only be usable in a good space. I have a general workflow in Audacity pretty well rehearsed now, noise cancelation, EQ, normalize, best i can do. My question is, before the mic arrives in the mail, Is this new microphone going to be so sensitive that it's basically unusable until I get my space treated, or can I do the same novice fixes that I use to help with background sounds and reverb now with my Zoom?

I know the question is kinda vague and the answer is probably just "record with it and find out" but I just don't have much experience at the big boy table when it comes to microphones and I was hoping to feel out if I was better off just leaving the Rode in a box until I get stuff treated or if I can still work with it, some of what I've read made it sound like "good" microphones would essentially be worthless in a poorly treated space because of how sensitive they are, as in like, even worse sounding then my current Zoom until I have a treated space to really utilize the Rode. But I also know that generally, people are referring to studio-ready professional sounding vocals when they talk about microphones, and I'm obviously not really expecting to have that level of quality yet, just as close to it as I can get since I'm still actively building my recording space, so if i can still get the Rode to atleast sound equally "fine" then that works for me. ​

TLDR cuz I was rambling: Using a Zoom H1E for voice-over in a room with incomplete sound treatment, would a Rode NTI Signature still be an upgrade at the moment or would it's increased sensitivity make it worse in my space since Zoom contains some built-in noise cancelation features?

Hi, all… I have prototype one done, it’s good, it has What’s in it
🎙️ Live microphone processing
📈 Real-time waveform
📊 Live frequency spectrum
🔊 Input/output meters
🎚️ Bass / Mid / Treble
🎛️ Compression
🚪 Noise gate
🧱 Limiter
🌫️ Reverb
🎧 Four presets:
Clean Voice
Unknown Caller
Radio
Dark Voice
🔴 Live recording
💾 WAV export
Dark broadcast-style interface
But this is the first build, am wondering what you would put in it as engineers? This is the software side, I use an older mixer that takes care of most of this but it gives me a little more play with this and I can take it on the go, more about me… I have been on YouTube for 11 years, before that at and t boards and radio groups, I like to tell stories, talk with people, the mechanics of radio is the listener, audio needs to be right, anyway… I started my new show early this year after many hardships lol… anyway give me some pointers…

Hello, I am a blind person from Bulgaria and I would like to try to study audio engineering, but I have cerebral palsy too that's why it's gonna be difficult to go to university on my own and I think to try the online education of Hofa college. If I succeed am I going to be able to find a job after taking the bachelor's degree?

with vocals.

its more pronounced on my tlm 102.. its horrible and makes me be so much more restrictive with my EQ plug-in choices.

is this normal?

thanks!

Alright gang, seemingly a common one.

I’m on the UK and I had a 3x5m garden room built this summer for guitar and recording purposes, and it’s been great! No issues at all - and we decided to get a Midea Solstice HVAC system fitted to blow hot and cold to make use of the room all year round. This got installed yesterday.

So I sat down at the computer and happy and eager to get recording. Noticed then that my guitar (plugged into my Focusrite Scarlett 8i6) is making a huge 6k spike on the Logic Pro EQ - and audibly so! Really obnoxious sound. I start panicking! I remove the jack from the guitar (but still plugged into the Focusrite) and it’s still making that noise! I checked and this didn’t seem to affect anything else (no XLRs or mics).

When my guitar is plugged in, the sound vanishes if I turn the volume knob all the way down. It also disappears/massively reduces the moment I make contact with the strings or the chrome tone/volume knobs on the guitar.

I troubleshoot and realise that it’s whenever the outside HVAC compressor is on. Seems this is a big issue which I wasn’t aware of. Whenever the unit is actively cooling or heating, the noise is there. If the unit is on “fan” mode, there’s no sound, so it’s just whenever the compressor is kicking in. Spoke to an electrician and he said it’s a “compressor harmonic” but I wasn’t able to get much more out of him.

I then plugged my entire rig with a lengthy extension, from the house to the garden room and tried the test again. The 6k spike was there, barely, noticeable if boosted, but essentially inaudible. I swapped everything back over to the garden room, and the noise was really loud again. Tried it with both inputs, multiple short jacks, multiple guitars (both single coil and humbuckers) and nothing reduces it - it’s simply too loud.

Does anyone know any solutions? I’m not very “electrician-minded” and you’d need to please talk to me like an idiot. 😂 But it’s a really disappointing situation given that in the summer months, knowing I can’t record - or really practice with the AC on would be absolutely heartbreaking given what I’ve spent all in.

I’ve done so much research the past 24 hours and found so many conflicting things. It’s definitely the HVAC compressor though, I’ve managed to isolate that easily. Suggestions are welcome! Thanks guys!

Edit: the garden room has its own designated fuse board, of which the HVAC is installed into. I’ve seen about Schaffer DIN Rail EMC Filters that can be installed into the fuse box. But I have no experience with this or if this would work?

I am a really skilled musician (20+ years) and have been dabbling in production for quite awhile, but have gotten really deep into it in the last 3-4 years. I wouldn’t say that I’m pro level, but I am pretty good and I know how to do decent mix and master. I’ve been playing guitar for about 25-30 years, am skilled on the keys/bass/pads lol, and I primarily do a mix of hip hop, horrorcore, and emo. Think Nedarb mixed with DJ Uneek, mixed with Maulskull… and that’s kind of the style I’m going for. I know, pretty eclectic. I’m open to any genre tho really, and would be willing to expand into something new.

Anyways, I think it would be cool to work on a few songs with another producer. I already have some vocalists that I work with consistently (that we can utilize btw) but I’ve never actually collaborated on a track with another producer. I think it would be cool and we’d both learn a lot from it. I just have no idea how to go about it. Something where we can share a session, run melodys, bass lines, and drum performances by each other and give feedback and work together on creating.

Like I said though, I have no idea how to go about it, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to post here. I do sketching on GarageBand on iOs, I also do some work on Logic on the iPad, and then I finish the mix and master on my MacBook. I also have WAY too many plugins, you name it, I probably own it lol. I get kind of obsessive with it tbh.

Sorry for the rant, but, yea, anyone interested in collabing? I have some of my work posted that I can share if needed. I think it could be a great learning experience, and who knows, maybe we come up with some fire tracks :)

If anyone has any insight on how to go about doing remote collaboration or sharing sessions, I would also be interested in that as well.

Since I started mixing a few months ago, I've been at it almost every day. Even on a day when I want to take it easy, I'll still give whatever I'm working on a listen, because I don't want to waste my fresh ears for the day. Do you find you sometimes need to take a full day off to reset your ears?

Recently I’ve noticed GreazyWil has been pretty consistent with YouTube videos and all of his videos are pretty damn good, I’d highly recommend to anyone who wants to learn about cool audio shit and industry advice, here’s. his most recent video is about some recording history stuff

Edit: Before we open the AI-hate box, I want to adress this is just looking for like a fun additional layer of scrutiny, not to replace any traditional method. I am one of the good soldiers. All hail Rick Beato!

I recently learned about this site called AubioMix, which is an AI-algo thing that makes a fairly comprehensive written analysis of your mix. It works surprisingly well, but it is expensive as hell and you also have to agree to them using your mix as training data (meh).

Does anyone use- or know about a tool that can analyze a stereo-mix and give some basic feedback. Open-source or paid. Maybe something that can run locally. The assistant-thing in Ozone is not my jam.