Mix Bus Reverb

Discussion in 'Mixing and Mastering' started by Kundalini, Feb 12, 2021.

  1. Kundalini

    Kundalini Kapellmeister

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    Dear Community, have some multitracks and when listening to stems or individual instruments I have impression of softness, kind of a silky sound which is difficult to describe as I'm not native english speaker. I wonder what are your thougths on this subject. Mine are that this sounds like a short room/studio reverb put on mix bus. Would be grateful for your thoughts.

     
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  3. No Avenger

    No Avenger Moderator Staff Member

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    Why don't you upload one of the stems or instruments so we get an impression?
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2021
  4. Kundalini

    Kundalini Kapellmeister

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    Here are a short samples..
     

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  5. Arabian_jesus

    Arabian_jesus Audiosexual

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    In the past it was a pretty popular trick to have a reverb on the master bus and it's still used today by some. I remember seeing a video with Andrew Schepps explaining why he started using a reverb on the mixbus to get some glue back because he apparently doesn't use any buscomp!

    Edit: Found it
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2021
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  6. Kundalini

    Kundalini Kapellmeister

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    Thank you Arabian_jesus for this video, reverb used on a mix bus is on my mind since a while and it seems that when using properly it gives a litle sense of space and could help in getting rid of digital harshness but as I'm not experienced in mixing I appreciate ideas of these more experienced people here..
     
  7. Stevie Dude

    Stevie Dude Audiosexual

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    Reverb On Mixbus - It's cool, whatever works I guess. Used it several times to push some element to the back.

    I added all the tracks to DAW and then I stuck.. what was I suppose to do again ? these aren't the same length, so it's not stems from a project right ?

    lol. I think Im missing the point.
     

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  8. Kundalini

    Kundalini Kapellmeister

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    These samples were taken from one project and are from different parts of a song so they do not goes together. I uploaded them just as an example
     
  9. Stevie Dude

    Stevie Dude Audiosexual

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    Ah, i see. Listening to them (solo and together), in my opinion, there's plenty of reverb in each of them. A little too much for my liking, but Im not familiar with the music style.

    Are you going to add more (short) reverb in the mixbus for all of them ?
     
  10. Kundalini

    Kundalini Kapellmeister

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    This tracks are not mine but taken from a commercial project I had a chance to remix and you right they are wet and I have a feeling that on top of that there is a short softening reverb on each track but I could be wrong and this is why I'm asking people here if it is a common practise for you to use short reverb at the end of a chain regardless individual fx track treatment
     
  11. 5teezo

    5teezo Audiosexual

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    You can bring out Ambience by using Parallel Compression as well and blending it back in. Less cluttererd mix less mushy and cluttered low end.
     
  12. Pipotron3000

    Pipotron3000 Audiosexual

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    May be it is simply a "stem" export.
    And they put Insert reverb on ALL tracks.

    When you export stems, you are supposed to DISABLE master.
    But may be there was an error ...

    You can remove excessive reverb with Transient Shaper plugins (there are free ones).
     
  13. Stevie Dude

    Stevie Dude Audiosexual

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    I think it is pretty common nowadays, for creative purpose, you'll get more flavours too. With all the resources (processing power, plugins) we have now, I don't see why not to use them in individual channel. A return channel for reverb is more to "glueing" stuff together and create a sense of everything been played in the same space, IMO it's always has to be there in every mix.

    Me personally, i stopped just to "add reverb" long ago. I look at it as a tool to achieve thing. Space, sauce (ie. plate for some character), extend tails, push track back in the mix, glue, ambience etc. Doesn't matter it is a kick track, or even the 2bus.

    you can do that before adding your own flavour of reverb at the mixbus if you want to i guess.
     
  14. No Avenger

    No Avenger Moderator Staff Member

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    IMHO, these are all individual reverbs (and ofc delays), not a single one on the mixbus.

    This is absolute common practise to give the instruments some depth and ambience. I rarely use a mix bus reverb, only when I think it's exactly what is missing. But I know some people do this all the time. As one of my former signatures said, your noise, your choice.
     
  15. Arabian_jesus

    Arabian_jesus Audiosexual

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    Yes! I feel that it works especially well when the recording of different instruments differ quite a lot in quality, for example if the guitars are recorded with amp sims and the drums are from SD3. Because the drums in SD3 are recorded with very expensive analog equipment in some of the best studios in the world and the guitars are just recorded directly into a interface with an amp sim they can sometimes sound so far from eachother in quality that they don't really sound very convincing together. A master reverb can really help to put the instruments in the same "space" in that case. Most of the magic is ofc done on the individual tracks but sometimes a reverb on the master bus can be the missing ingredient!
     
  16. danfuerth

    danfuerth Kapellmeister

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    Best Answer
    The old school mixing is very different due to the analog way of doing things.

    Passing a vocal a through a small mono reverb with 10% wet only then send that mix to a Stereo reverb at 30% wet
    This is full wet process so the original dry signal is not sent to the master bus as we want the vocal to sit just
    a tiny bit outside the reverb.

    These days the vocals are so upfront it sounds ridiculous

    The reason is people forgot how to mix.
    Due to how you work in a daw they make a send from that vocal to a reverb fx channel or bus but the original dry processed signal is still hitting the master bus thus that sent signal will always be behind the dry signal which is completely displeasing to the ears.

    In reaper for vocals I add reaverberate as the last fx on the track. I adjust the wet / dry percentage first to 10-15 wet and bring up the dry to full level. Now I set the pan to zero width so the track is 100% Mono and then on the routing I uncheck "Master/Parent Send" so this signal only goes to the send. Now I make a send from this track to another track which has an Reaq, Reacomp and finally Reaverb set to about 20 % and 80% dry in order to keep the dry vocal signal still going but now sounds like it is just sitting just a tiny bit outside the reverb to you think the vocal is inside the Reverb and not in your face.

    For setting this up in the Reaper Master track on the mixer make sure you are using the OOPS mode by right clicking the mono/stereo button and choosing L-R. Yes this sounds weird as you are listening to a sound without the middle center but this is the key to setting up the stereo reverbs!! ( In any Daw for that matter).

    In the OOPS ( Out of Phase Stereo) mode you can hear how your vocal sits inside or outside the reverb, by setting up the Stereo reverb in this mode you can hear the vocal going in and out of the reverb properly as the center channel is gone thus giving you control of the sides of the stereo field and how much they go to the side varies with the Wet/ Dry mix settings on the Stereo reverb.

    Why is this mixing / track setup necessary?
    Because most of us do not have expensive hardware reverbs which give the sound a more centered location vs a fully digital reverb running in a Daw. Since I have a Digitech 2112 SGS ( for acoustic and electric guitars) any sound coming out of that processor in stereo is centered and only a small section is on the sides. When these stereo out tracks are recorded and examined with the OOPS mode in Reaper we finally see how much of the side signals there is and we can then ear match them to a Stereo reverb inside our Daw.

    Take any Multitrack and listen to the vocals, if a hardware reverb was used use the OOPS mode (L-R) and turn up the volume a bit to hear where the wet portion is ( deep inside or outside). The reverb almost disappears in the OOPS listening mode because they are using a hardware reverb which does not go to extremely to the sides like reverbs inside Daw's.


    You can test multiple reverbs like this or multiple tracks like this to see what reverb they used on those tracks, it will not tell you what Reverb unit they used but their setup will be there in OOPS mode.

    I hate vocals that sit in your face and vocals that too far back inside the reverb. The vocal should sit just a small hair outside the reverb signal so we think the singer is in a room not inside a Can.

    In the 80's many singers sang in actual rooms so the signal was very unique as there was no need for additional reverb for the vocal track, but this recording process took more time instead of the isolated vocal booth approach. The sound from a vocal room is completely different than an isolated booth signal then sent to a reverb unit-analog out back into the mixer.
    The response from the singer hearing themselves in a large room requires more takes as the earphones are hard to use as you are hearing mostly yourself.
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2021
  17. Smoove Grooves

    Smoove Grooves Audiosexual

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    I knew this was a thing back in the day, but I was recently helping a young lad and he has Garageband on his 'phone.
    I said "wow, that's a lot of verb on your master", and he was like "yeah, that's how the template is set-up"!
    I found it strange that Apple would choose to do this.
     
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