Entourage Paul Tucci
EntourageForum Replies Created
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JLew, During my time in the live audio world an important lesson was learned that I believe is applicable to your question. The lesson Bob McCarthy, a world class system tuner taught was the concept of the ART / SCIENCE line. The band mixer’s responsibility was to create the best sounding presentation in terms of balance and especially, tonality. That is on the ART side of the ART / SCIENCE line. In this example, that line is an electrical signal handed to a PA system engineer. His responsibility is to accurately deliver that to the audience members. This arrangement put the onus on the mixer to get it right. There’s a very symbiotic relationship in play between the two. If the band mixer delivers a bright sounding (electrical) mix is it the responsibility of the PA system guy to tone it down to make it correct for the listening audience?? What if the opening act’s mixer has a different sensibility, and both his mind and preferred tonality leans dark? Mr. McCarthy say that Ii the speaker system is linear, neutral sounding, and accurate, a good and appropriate mix from the console should translate to the audience members. I’m in the weeds here, but the analogy I’m aiming for is this. The mixer is the artist that should make the ART as best he or she can. If master bus compression, tonal shaping, or intentional distortion of the electrical signal is part of the artist’s intent, it should be implemented before the mastering process. All that said, a professional mastering engineer who specializes in eeking out the last bit of level and super polish can make a huge difference and get your art noticed. FYI, I’ve been tinkering with the iZotope Ozone mastering product.
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Nice twist your own self with the technical critique question. As expected they cowered upon hearing it, never thought of retaliation, and will remember me forever.
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Hey Pete, I think you waited too long to put this one up. Perhaps you’ve had this stewing in your head and have got no objectivity left It’s closer to right than you may think. Two listens in and I’ll comment. There’s that choral flavor That happens early on in the intro. That’s a good flavor to utilize fully. That grabbed my ear as an engaging sound but I had to work to hear through to it. I think listeners would like more of that later in the song too. It happens to be buried by the bass synth. I felt like that bass synth was too dominant in both its bandwidth and duration. When the vocals arrived there was no room left for a warm vocal without going too loud on the vocal. I carved out a bit of 145 Hz and that seemed to tame the bass synth a good bit. If you’re feeling that the vocal tone left is too sibilant may I suggest the first verse be a single voice and save the vocal stack for the second verse and beyond. Between the territorially-dominant bass synth and the vocal stack with all the sibilance, intelligibility suffered and whats there sounds almost lispy. Consider low passing all but one of the vocal takes (probably panned center) and see if that gets you happier. When the drums come in later …they sound great, especially the snare. I was wanting the high hat played at that point to sit in with the rest of the kit, not way in the background. That trick worked in the intro, but when carried into the groovier section later, makes the hat sound distant and not as powerful as the rest of the kit. Take what you will. I’m just an old man that still says groovier 🙂 -PT
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Hi Kevin, I was agreeing with the Mix Master D in the first few bars regarding the guitars being a touch forward, especially with the drummer mixing it. I coaxed a bit more drum out of your interesting and strong guitar piece to demonstrate what Dana was possibly hearing. -PT
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Jesse, I, for one, am digging the “Down by the river series’ you seemed to be riding recently. This next step of additional layers grafted onto your acoustic performance is logical and encouraged from my point of view. I bought completely into the invisibility of the added acoustic guitar until the other layers (non guitar sounding) came in. I would suggest patience before those new layers come into play and I would suggest gentleness when they do. I’m feeling the au natural guitar getting buried by the bass texture and it takes my attention away from your performance space. At the end of the music I really wanted the flowing water and wind sounds to ground me back to your original location but it just wasn’t happening. As I’m writing this I realize that’s exactly what I did when I reworked your flugelhorn piece with bird calls and a bigger stream with a bigger stereo spread. I got stuck on how to place the original guitar so that is just sitting on my drive unfinished. As far as the nature of lo-fi sounds goes, that question is long since settled. Lo-fi and/or distortion has worked quite well for Beck, Link Wray, and Hendrix. There’s a whole lotta songs in the US Govt archives that are bandwidth limited. Chase your instincts and make your art. PT
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I’m doing everything on in the box and on headphones. What are your studio big speakers?
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David, Thanks. You recognize my early musical influences precisely. Intelligibility and clarity that I fought to achieve for so long in hostile acoustic environments (live audio) carried over into my approach in the recording world where we have complete control, including firing any player that doesn’t play for the team and insists on overplaying. Appreciate the word.
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Christopher, I implemented one of Dana’s ideas and dropped the vocal level en mass about 1.6 dB, high passed the vocals to 110Hz or so, high shelved the vocals .3 dB from 1200Hz, and the high shelved the entire mix .2 dB from 1200 Hz or so and gave it all a little squish to boost the overall level 1dB. I’m hoping it’s helpful to the readers/listeners to compare two versions. -PT
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Jeremy, That’s greasy good mon! I think it sounds consistent and crystal clear throughout other than that chorus vocal. If you stripped away all the music and listened to only vocals I’ll bet that the chorus vocal has a definite different tonality compared to all the Rastas. Because it is tonally darker and not wide open in the mid-range like the Rastas are, you might think it to be woofy. I’m hearing that chorus vocal (you?) as midrange deficient. Like Dana said, that could be a choice. If it is a tonal choice I have to think a dB or two level boost will make it sit closer to the other vocal parts. The best $79 I’ve spent in audio was the Sonarworks headphone correction software. Highly recommended. Are you hip to it? https://www.sonarworks.com/soundid-reference?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&gad_source=1
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Your new version is much stronger and focused on the vocal delivery. YEA!!
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I was hopeful that the mixer’s opinion was in play. It only makes sense to me that if the band chooses the producer who hires the mixer, the producer ought to “let the mixer cook” as the kids say. Each level of mgt finding the right people who in turn, find the right peep for that intended flavor of presentation. If everyone is aligned, the magic might could happen more easily. I’ve only experienced that on the live audio side of the world and it’s a pleasure to work with those that ask for you (me), provide the tools, and clear the path for you (me) to do your thing. Cool, I crossed three generation in wordplay. PT (me/he/him)
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So I’m curious. In your experience, what’s the politics of who chooses the mastering engineer? Logically, that task should fall in the producer’s realm. But if the producer is much more musical than technical, who’s opinion matters most?
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Jesse, from my non-professional mixer perspective, I would ask the mastering guy what he or she would prefer in terms of peak and perceived loudness levels (True Peak and LUFS) and give said mastering engineer headroom to work with compared to my finalized version.
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Jesse, I appreciate the word! Positive feedback always feels good and helps further one’s determination to progress and get even better. Progress on the path is so dependent on having the vocabulary to discuss the topic, be it music production related or anything else. Little steps of understanding lead to bigger steps, and sooner than you think, you realize how little you know of the topic at hand. I’m thinking it’s a lifetime journey. -PT
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The bass ,as is, has a difficult time vying for attention because its tone is dark. No matter how loud you make it, it will not cut through the density of a distorto guitar and rapid fire drums. What sounds awful in solo mode may just be the thing to get the bass guitar to compete with rest of the trio. And that solo’ed sound may be very upper mid and pick-on-strings heavy. Like Lemmy on his Rickenbacker
PT