Hello to all !
We are in the process of making a 16 tracks album (Rock / Pop-Rock) of which here are some extracts.
I would be curious to have opinions on the sound of these tracks.
I'm working on headphones and then I listen on different speakers or in the car and on other headphones. It sounds pretty good to me but I don't have any reference speakers of good enough quality to be certain.
Thank you in advance for the time you will devote to it.

 

A little too much distortion, there is a fine line between just enough and too much. I am not a full on francophone but I am a polyglot with a reasonable grasp of french and usually have not problem at least making words out even if I don't understand them. On your tracks for the most part I can't even make out what is a word and what is just background noise.

If that's your style you are going for you got it, if not you might want to revisit the process.

 

Indeed, your point is valid, but this is caused mainly by targeting high LUFS (Loudness) without doing a proper mix job, results in similar problems.

I speak french and i couldn't make out most of the words, hope that's french in first place though

 

The songs sound cool but there is too much compression on the master bus.

 

i can't help but think the comments so far are based on listening to only the first track. the vocals are not distorted at all in any of the other tracks. and i do not speak french but i didn't really have that much trouble hearing the words in the first track. but, i was listening to the songs through headphones. and if they were mixed on headphones that may be why my experience did not match the first two comments

 

JMOUTTON, Yes, it is an assumed choice for the first song. The others are not treated in the same way.

KungPaoFist, Too much compression? Maybe... I need to do some tests.

MR. FUSION, I think you're right. I don't really understand the point of giving your opinion on something you haven't heard...

 

I thought the distortion might be a reference to the heavy compression. It seemed like the dynamics were squashed out at an attempt at loudness. I did enjoy all of them though

 

I made a test by comparing with the Youlean Meter 2 plugin my mixes and rock tracks from the 90's to today which I like the sound of.

I noticed that if the readings were relatively similar on the LUFS, I had a lower dynamic range on my mixes. (By the way, I also noticed that the dynamic range was much higher in the mixes from the early 90's than in the current mixes).

I have a compressor on the playback bus (all instruments) and a limiter on the master.

On the compressor, I let about 20% of the direct sound go through and I softened the effect of the limiter.

The result is quite convincing. The mixes lose almost nothing on the LUFS level and finds a dynamic range comparable to the tracks I had chosen as references. The mixes thus reworked seem to me more airy and have not lost anything in power.

I deduce that there was a useless excess of compression that I was used to but that was not at all necessary.

 

In my ears the vocal in each track is unintelligible, garbled perhaps due to too much distortion. Maybe try cutting some low mids to clear out the mud, Bud!

 

Save a few euros and take your songs to a professional mastering studio.
Your songs and the voice are pretty good, it would be a shame if you can't do it now because there is not enough money.

Peer "Online Mixing" Hahnefeld // Award Winning Engineer // Berlin, Germany
https://soundbetter.com/profiles/2425-peer-"online-mixing"-hahnefeld

 

2-3 seconds silence

 

I quite like it. I like the singer. There's a sort of Placebo sound going on. My only reservation is that all the tracks have a tonal and dynamic similarity. I'd be looking at mixing up your mix. But it's good.

 

I would like to buy the services of a mastering studio but I can't afford it at the moment. I hope to convince a label to invest in this direction.

I find it hard to take into account the remarks about the intelligibility of the voice because here in France, the people I have been able to make listen to have had no reflection on this point and have even found the lyrics interesting (which suggests that they have understood them).

The work path of giving air and dynamics back to the mixes seems more and more convincing to me. As I go along, I wonder how I missed it. Our ears quickly get used to a sound, a volume... and end up not analyzing correctly. In any case, for me who is not a sound engineer, I think that this is what happens. I also need quality speakers and this will most probably be my next investment.

Anyway, thank you for taking the time to listen and for your suggestions.

 

A couple of thoughts: I recommend listening to "reference songs". So I take some songs that I think are very good and listen to them and then I would try mixing and mastering. get there as far as possible. Even if you have the best boxes, if your room is bad, the result will be accordingly.

( Reference 1 / 2: Speech intelligibility and more bass. Every instrument should be clearly defined and perceived.

(Reference Song 1) Tanita Tikaram - Twist In My Sobriety

(Reference Song 2) Criminal World (2018 Remaster)

 

Last edited: Jul 12, 2021

good job man, the mixing is spot on, you have tons of experience i can tell. good songs too !! well done

 

Thank you for the suggested references but I don't find them particularly appropriate to our musical style.
The sound of the 80's is very typical (a lot of synths, guitars with rather clear sounds...) and I don't think that this is the kind of sound we should be close to.

 

Was just a suggestion - where were the videos I would take for reference? Do you work with "reference tracks"? Do we want to sound like this motto?

 

Yes, for example, I often use this Liam Gallagher track to check the overall balance, even if I'm not necessarily looking for the same sound.