I know this isn't what this section is here for, but I hardly make a habit of asking for general feedback on my music, or anything else for that matter. Let this slide just this once, please

Negative feedback is the most useful thing for me at this point. I know I'm not all that great at this, if I ever want to be I need to know exactly what I'm doing wrong, and try to iron out those problems.

I've been pretty good about that, I think, I've noticed each mix I make seems better than the last. I'm starting to lose focus, though, I don't get a lot of feedback whenever I share my music so I just haven't been doing it lately. I really don't want to stop improving because of it.



Soundcloud, in case you insist on using it, but Tindeck's encoding is a lot less noticeable. I'd prefer you use that instead.

So, feel free to rip this track to shreds. Unless you're a complete douchebag about it, you're not going to hit a nerve, I want to know exactly what's wrong with this mix so I can figure out where to go from here. Go crazy. And hey, if you think I did anything well, it'd be nice to hear that too.


Thanks in advance, guys. Hopefully this isn't too unfair of a request.

Last edited by Kysora on Mar-03-2012 at 19:49

Okey, ill give it to you straight.

The intro is alright.

That high pitched cymbal that comes with the clap could be replaced.

The minibreakbeat in the break has little rhyhtm to it.

None of these are dealbreakers really, but the bass is a bit rumbling and undefined in the mix, the melody at 3:16 sounds like something from a Mega Man game, and the bass-changes are hardly noticable.

That being said, the 2 first minutes of the track are ok. But overall i find most of the sounds to be very undefined and blurry. The kick could use some more snap in the top end, although its not a bad kick.

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High end is toooooo washy. The kick seems immersed in water.
For the style you're after this might be ok to a certain degree, but you went too far with those hats.

I suppose you opted for a Nickey/Kandi type kick?

You got it right from the mid to high end, but you should cut more from the bottom end and slightly reduce its volume. It booms too much hence the bassline is unlocalizable.
A simple comparison you could make to notice clearly this fault is by taking your refence track and listen the kick at high and low volume.
Usually, at low volume you should barely hear kicks bottom end. In your track even at low volume the low end still breaks through quite clearly...and this should suggest at high volume things would get worst when adding all the other elements.

Also, did you even compress that kick? (confused)

And the bassline appears badly equalized.

Another thing I noticed is you place hats quite high in the space.
Usually that area should be reserved for the lead/reverb to breath.
And if you choose a saw type lead what happens? You basically add noise over noise.
This placement works for pop songs, but rarely for overflooded trance tracks.


At the end, these are opinions. You choose where to place what and how to eq it, but you should be aware of the pros and cons of any choise. If you have a clear picture in mind, then go for it...otherwise step back and think a bit.


Taking in consideration how many elements are there I say this is quite a bad mix.

go to 127

your kick, your bass and your percussion that form the foundation of your track don't work. In EDM, you don't have this, you don't have a track.

from the start

Why all the hihats ? They are not doing anything for you. You give them about as much importance as the kick. If someone is listening to the hihat, you've done something wrong. I don't get the point of the first minute. You don't do anything. There is no sense of anticipation of something cool or presentation of some motive, just random trance sounds that are really not salient in any way.

The sounds themselves are not working. You should be able to have a mix with no fx and have it still work to some degree.

Now talking about form, i won't bother saying this whole 32 bar intro bullshit is over but you are doing it so i will roll with it. Your intro goes into a small breakdown and then builds up to what ? nothing. That had to be the most disappointing introduction of the main bass and percussion i've ever heard. The dj will be mixing this, the last song is over and people know it, they are now hearing the random shit you have at the beginning of yours and the end of the other, and then as that break comes in and the dj flips the bass respectively, i mean i would give you the finger ( the dj for picking such a shitty track )

Honestly, i don't really know what to say. The mix is so so muddy with this ridiculous low end that isn't helping your bass. In fact your bass has no definition what so ever. Your ideas are so conflated there is nothing there but a big mess. There is nothing i can say you did right. You need to start over. With a kick, a bass and a snare/clap.

Sorry man, I want to help but i don't even know where to start.

When you learn to compose , you leaern to compose for one instrument and you learn to compose for each. Then you do say duets, then trios and so on . I don't think you are past the point of being able to get a kick and bass happening. You really are at point A, I

But I don't even see the point in talking about mixing, There is nothing there to mix. This sounds like Robby Rox in that it sounds like the kinda track some artists keep making over and over and over.

the rolling bassline is done. Stop doing it. You missed it, and that is just how life works.
Start listneing to more music. I get a sense that you really don't listen to any EDM other than the rolling bassline shit that tries to be trance from 2001. And if you must do it, do it right. It isn't a license to add 8 layers of bass. The more layers of music you have, the smaller your track sounds. This is true in every style of music. So stope with the 10 hihats. Stop with 9 bass layers. It isn't going to work.

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That was actually really helpful, thanks to both of you.

The kick is compressed but you're right, it sound sound like it's under water, what the hell. How did I not notice that? I think it sounded better than however I mixed it prior to that version, but after tweaking with the tail end and EQing it to give it more punch, it sounds so much better. It opened up a lot more space for the bassline too, after I adjusted the EQ/volume like you suggested.



If anyone wants to A/B those and let me know if I'm right in thinking it's a lot better, that'd be cool, but either way I've already benefited more with 2 posts than I expected to. Thanks again guys.

edit: thanks L4C, I'm taking a break for now but I'll see what I can about the issues you brought up. do you by any chance have an example of a well-put together intro? I've never been great at those.

Percussion and bass should be able to drive the track alone. Since most of your lead elements don't contribute to a sense of drive, it makes the bass and percussion that much more important.

When you drop the bass in for the first time, have only the percs and bass going.

The track is only 4 minutes long...it doesn't feel complete.

Another basic arrangement idea is to play the lead in the breakdown so its anticipated in the big drop.

I can't think of any big song that just surprises you with the lead in the big drop without it being played in the breakdown. Maybe someone can?(pop structures being the exception)

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quote:

Originally posted by dj_alfi change your avatar for fucks sake.

quote:

Originally posted by Beatflux The track is only 4 minutes long...it doesn't feel complete.

It's not.

FWIW I usually spend a lot more time on the actual arrangement of my tracks, typically any less than 6 hours and I'd consider it rushed. I wrote the parts as I needed them for this, I very rarely do that, so I'm not really surprised the arrangement suffered for it.

guess I was happier with the overall mix than I was the arrangement, but looking back on the first version, I'm already wondering what I thought was so good about it. can't imagine what you guys must think. Hopefully the revised version was cleaned up a little bit but yeah, I still wouldn't call it a good example of songwriting.

i've noticed with a few of your mixes this awful low end boom. You have monitoring issues.

I also think you need to stop and think about why you are adding something. The average brain can focus on one item, some people 2. Of course there are people like me that can hear it all in one pass but we can't all be awesome.

Now when i listen to your stuff. It is just so convoluted. There is no purpose to anything, Just a big mess of sounds. Honestly, right your track out in writing. So many problems can be solved at the arrangement part.

i mean if you just did this

kick bass and snare right, that is about 80 % of the work done. So get that right. DOn't waste your time on stupid shit until you can do the simple stuff right. Until you can manage a 6 track mix, don't aim higher.

___________________
"This is why Superman works alone." GC
old stuff from days gone by (2001-2004)
Mad For Brad's gay little contest

Last edited by Looney4Clooney on Mar-03-2012 at 23:05

quote:

Originally posted by Kysora That was actually really helpful, thanks to both of you. The kick is compressed but you're right, it sound sound like it's under water, what the hell. How did I not notice that? I think it sounded better than however I mixed it prior to that version, but after tweaking with the tail end and EQing it to give it more punch, it sounds so much better. It opened up a lot more space for the bassline too, after I adjusted the EQ/volume like you suggested. If anyone wants to A/B those and let me know if I'm right in thinking it's a lot better, that'd be cool, but either way I've already benefited more with 2 posts than I expected to. Thanks again guys. edit: thanks L4C, I'm taking a break for now but I'll see what I can about the issues you brought up. do you by any chance have an example of a well-put together intro? I've never been great at those.

The kick definitely better now. You got rid of that very low.


Still a lot of things to improve anyway.


Don't know if you realize it but the rest of the elements sounds minimalistic in comparison with the kick.

Locate the slider at medium volume and try to visualize the tridimensional space. Don't you feel like the kick is taking too much space on the horizontal axis?

I have the impression you emulated well the kick, but you didn't put it in context. Those tracks you're aiming, yes, do have a big prominent kick, but so are the basslineS, the pads, the lead. There is BALANCE.
Something I don't see in this track.

For example, you got hats jumping everywhere in the field, but you miss one BIG open hat that actually takes this track to somewhere/drives it. Yes, there is an open hat, but is too minimalistic...is barely notable.
Almost every set of hats in a track have 1 or 2 big ones that lead the other smaller hats, which are low in volume.
You got all of them small, and at the same volume...thus creating a sense of linearity even if they're moving left/right.

Same for the synth starting at 0:30. Is minimal (in the context of course), fluctuating...gets easily lost later on...

Seems you have some structural gaps, because these are basic things.
Rendering elements compact and present in a busy mix like that is a must.
A revisal on the topic of compression wouldn't be bad.

I understand that mixes are not the pinnacle of uplifting, but I'm talking about solidity here.
Take your favorite producer of the genre. You'll see that even in that congestion still there is some logic.

Check "Niveus" from Onova (But don't listen on youtube cause quality is crap).

He is my fav producer of uplift.


Anyway, to balance things there are to exits.

One is to change the kick, re-layer. Or if you like its color and wanna keep it, then you have to adapt the rest to it.

Yeah, I guess I need to rethink my approach quite a bit, I tend to not think of the elements relative to each other. I've been focused so much with getting everything to sound good on its own that I forget to make sure each part actually agrees with each other, especially with the percussion and bass and how it plays off everything else..

I wouldn't call this track a good example of songwriting but I'm sure my other tracks suffer from the same problems. Probably not as blatantly but still, it's the next area I should focus on improving. Wouldn't have even considered that without this thread, thanks again for the wake-up call.

quote:

Originally posted by Kysora Yeah, I guess I need to rethink my approach quite a bit, I tend to not think of the elements relative to each other.

I would say this is THE most important thing when making music. You can have say 5-10 elements sounding shit on its own, but when played together they complement together and it sounds good.
The ability to know which sounds to discard is crucial in the making of a good track.

One hit wonders are often born because the artist/producer has been extremely lucky and gotten sounds fitting perfectly together. Overdoing their skill and talent level thus is never able to create a track of such high standard again.

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http://soundcloud.com/subtara

Maybe the original sound clip has been updated but i dont think it sounds too bad that mix
Not listening on my monitors but on some "bass-heavy" sony in-ears and the kick is fairly strong alright but ok i think

The one thing i dont like is the lead that comes in near the end coupled with the key change in the bass - not necessary and kinda spoils it for me

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