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To me there are three kinds of mixes: First, there is the mix that has no hope at all. Even if the mix was sent to a top-of-the-line, major league mastering engineer, it still doesn’t matter because the mix is lacking. You could think of it as an unfinished mix being passed off as finished. Second, there is the mix that is great! It’s a C to A when it comes to mixing. This mix is when mastering engineers can take a song and really do something with it and make it shine (turn a C to a B or an A to an A+). Third, there is the mix that needs nothing else done to it (The A+). It doesn’t need any further processing because to do so would only take away from that song. A real mastering engineer knows when not to touch a song. It’s still great to have a mastering engineer listen to your mix even if it’s an A+ just so you can have an expert reaffirm that you actually have an A+ mix on your hands.

You might have heard people say, “The ‘independent’ sound today is trendy and people like it, so my mix is good enough and certainly doesn’t need a mastering engineer”. If you have found yourself thinking that, please consider the following. First off, mix engineers who get that raunchy or raw sound don’t get that sound from lack of talent. It’s because that’s the sound they’re going for and it’s a well balanced mix- just a different kind of sound or tone that’s different from your average pop song. Secondly, I, like many other fellow concert goers, have found myself at certain shows so captivated by the music of the band or M.C. that I decided to purchase a CD after the show only to be very disappointed when I get in my car and listen to the CD. All the songs that moved me at the show only disappoint now. As a result, I don’t listen to the whole disk and I end up misplacing it because I don’t really care about it at all.

I’m sure from talking to some artists that the mix really wasn’t important to them because, according to them, “Nobody actually notices the quality of the mix.” This is only half true.

People never notice when you have a good quality mix (except maybe fellow mix engineers) but people DO notice a bad mix. They may not say it was a bad mix or even think it, but they won’t dig the music like they would have if it had been mixed right.

I know selling CD’s is half the battle but if we are honest with ourselves we don’t want our music that we poured our heart and soul into to end up broken on the bottom of someone’s car floor and forgotten about. We want our CD’s to be the one that is in the disk player being worn out until the listener moves on to something else but at the same time can’t wait until your next album comes out!

Well, what exactly is the missing link between the sound of your show that you performed and your CD’s sound? It’s all in the mix! Sure I know you need a good DAW such as  Propellerhead Reason  and a quality audio interface such as the  Focusrite Pro Series interfaces , and so on, but trust me, what good are those things without a well balanced mix? Here’s my point. When your listener attended your show there was most likely a sound guy at the show making sure everything sounded fine while you were playing on stage. You also made sure everything sounded good as well. It was you on the stage and for the most part if you performed well then it was a good show. But as we all know it’s very hard to fit your band’s song or performance into a set of car stereo speakers.

So how do you get that performance to come through?

1. Get back to the basics

There are tons of great songs and records made back in the 50′s, 60′s and early 70′s that were “so, so” in the mixing and recording aspect but are still considered classics. What these recordings mainly had going for them were soul. So remember the most important thing is capturing a great performance and not letting anyone in your recording space that will kill the “vibe” when you are doing so. Get into the moment!

2. Try using cut filters

As we all know the high end in our mixes can be hard to deal with. If you are having problems with your guitar try cutting out a little bit of the high end. Maybe cut it off at 10khz. Try this with vocals cutting off at 13khz, 15khz, or 17khz. With cutting the low end you should be a little bit more conservative. If you need to cut some of the low end out of a lead synth, for example, just make sure you’re not taking too much away- just enough so it sits better in the mix. Make sure to A/B it a few times before moving on as well.

3. Use some compression

Vocals are usually one the toughest things for people to get to sit right in the mix. Gentle, or maybe even heavy, compression is usually in order to help cure this or at least a limiter to control the peaks if you’re going for a fuller more open dynamic mix.

Here is how I usually set my vocals when compressing them:

• Set the attack to about 10ms or if there’s just a fast/slow setting set it to slow.
• Set the release time to about 1500ms and set the ratio to 6:1.
• Solo the track and play it. While the track is playing mess around with the threshold until the vocal sounds about right.
• Start to set the release gradually backwards until you hit the spot you like.
• Then set the ratio backwards or forwards, depending on your taste.
• If your compressor has an input section, gradually increase that to see if you like it. You don’t need to increase the input but it can help sometimes to push the compressor a little harder.
• Last, if the compressor has an output stage make sure the vocal track is no longer muted and adjust accordingly or just use your fader on the mixer.

If you’re an indie artist, try taking some of these basics to heart and give them a shot. Maybe you’ll move up a letter grade or two in your recordings and your next album will get the respect it deserves.

I re-recorded "Shoot Her Memory Down". I believe it to be much better. Please give it a listen if you get a chance.

Please see here

We read so much doom and gloom about the music business every day that it’s easy to think that pretty soon the whole thing will come crashing down. Cheer up. It’s not as bad as you think.

As all the various research and trade organizations begin releasing their sales figures, a number of them have jumped out to perfectly define the state of the music industry today. Check this out:

• US album sales were up 1.3% last year, the first year since 2005 that’s happened. 66% of these sales were CDs.

• There were 249 million albums sold in the US last year. People will tell you that the music industry is dying, but 249 million of anything is still a huge number.

• 75% of all CD sales were made offline. That means that people physically purchased the CD at a brick and mortar store or an event.

• 40% of all CD buyers are over the age of 45, which means that the demo that mostly grew up with CDs are the ones still buying them. But it also means that 60% of all buyers were under 45 too.

• Vinyl sales increased 37 percent in 2011, but only accounted for 1.2 percent of all physical sales. That doesn’t mean that people who buy vinyl actually listen to it though. Just like the old days, many still buy it for the cover, the artwork, the liner notes, and the trendiness (which is new).

• Rock is the most popular genre of music, with 32 percent album share, while pop music represents 40 percent of all current digital tracks sold. Ninety-three of the 100 best selling vinyl albums in 2011 fall within the Rock or Alternative genres. I guess that means that the hip-hop and rap trend has run it’s course.

• People who live in New York or LA buy more country records than those who live in Nashville by almost 2 to 1. Having just come from a speaking tour in Nashville, I can tell you first-hand that it’s a very cosmopolitan music town, with country no longer the major part of the industry as it once was. That said, country music represents 13% of the total album sales.

• Digital country music sales are up 31% over last year. While it might have been true at one time that country music lovers were slow to get into digital music, that’s obviously no longer the case.

• Acts that perform at halftime during the Superbowl get an average sales bump of 555%. Critics may pan them and you might hate them, but you still buy them.

All these numbers (which mostly come from Nielsen Soundscan and the IFPI) show that the music business is still huge, is still extremely diverse, and is still as quirky as ever. It is changing, morphing, shifting, and evolving, but it is definitely not dying.

I'm proposing a "Suggestion Box" blog to address questions and concerns about the site.

My first suggestion is as follows: I think it would be a real good idea to provide more formal notification when a radio show is being cancelled.  I know sometimes the cancellation is due to some kind of last minute technical problem, but in most instances, it's known relatively early on that a radio show won't take place.  Some of the DJ's are real good about providing advance notice while others don't and you're left to find out the show has been canceled when you logon and discover you're the only person in chat. 

Some of the easiest ways to improve your recordings are also the cheapest. In fact, the most effective techniques require no money at all.

Here’s a collection of tips you might find helpful the next time a pricey piece of gear stands between you and great recordings.

HELP FROM OTHERS

Have a friend perform:  Home recording, especially for singer/songwriters and electronic musicians, often involves a single musician writing and recording all the music. But artists in this situation can find themselves too close to the song, at mix time, to make decisions critically.

Working with other musicians might initially complicate recording and mixing. However, creating a great mix depends, in part, on your ability to remove unnecessary details, and most of us are more comfortable objectively critiquing someone  else’s  work. So asking a friend (or  some professionals ) to perform a track or two will ultimately make mixing easier,  and  more effective.

Get more ears on the mix:  With any task requiring attention to detail, it’s easy to lose the forest for the trees. And so it goes with mixing. A second or third opinion can draw your attention back to details you’ve glossed over.

And outside opinions needn’t come from other musicians and engineers. (Although the  homerecording.com MP3 mixing clinic  is a great source for free advice.) Often, regular listeners give the best feedback because they don’t think in technical terms about the production, and instead form their thoughts on how the song makes them feel. And some of the best mix feedback I’ve gotten has come from children, who are unconditioned by musical convention.

Listen on multiple systems:  Hearing a mix through different speakers is a little like getting a second opinion. And professional mixing engineers rely on this technique. Chris Lord Alge, for example, keeps a portable radio near his console  for checking mixes :

Avoid dogma:  Our hobby (or profession, if you’re lucky) is plagued with religious arguments, like “tube gear sounds better,” and “analog sounds warmer than digital.” Regardless of each argument’s merit, these dogmatic issues over-complicate the recording process, and distract us from the importance of technique – which, of course, costs nothing!

Cut. Ruthlessly:  As musicians, our egos push us to put everything we’ve got into every part we record. But virtuoso performances and great recordings don’t necessarily go together. The whole, as they say, is often greater than the sum of the parts.

In most song arrangements, over-instrumentation usually just leads to clutter. And along with being more difficult to mix, clutter rarely sounds good.

Make every part do work:  Ensure that every part competing for the listener’s attention is  supposed  to compete for the listener’s attention.

PRACTICE

Practice your performance before hitting record:  The benefits of practice should be obvious to all musicians, but home recording fosters a “write as you record” approach to song creation.

Practice takes time. But it needn’t hamper the creative process; and in most cases it will ultimately save time. Though the tracks may take longer to record, it’s far easier – and quicker – to mix a set of well-performed, polished performances.

Not only do the performances themselves benefit from practice, but the final mix will sound more professional.

Use reference CDs:  No single technique will do more to improve the quality of your mixes. Working with a  reference mix  is, in some ways, like getting a free lesson on mixing from a professional engineer.

Practice mixing when you’re not in the studio:  Every mixing engineer should spend time listening critically to professional mixes. Set aside some time every day, say 10 minutes, to immerse yourself in a mix someone else has done. Consider the panning, which instruments take your focus, and how the focus changes as the song evolves. Try to determine the effects in use, and why they were chosen. In modern pop and rock mixes, the interplay between the lead vocal and the snare drum is particularly important, as is the bass guitar/kick drum relationship, so spend some time analyzing these parts in detail.

With the help of David Coonrod's bass and Piyali's vocal I have produced a song called "Just Breathe". We would love for you folks to give the song a listen.

  http://www.mixposure.com/david-c-deal/audio/16802/just-breathe-feat-d-coonrod-piyali

Thanks, David c Deal

Chabane's Records' new release:



HEADSHOT - Frozen Lips

9 Trip Hop / Electro / Dark Pop Tracks

CD and FREE download : https :// archive . org / download / HEADSHOTFrozenLips / HEADSHOT - Frozen _ Lips . zip
Torrent : https :// archive . org / download / HEADSHOTFrozenLips / HEADSHOTFrozenLips _ archive . torrent

Chabane's Records:
http :// www . chabanesrecords . c . la
http :// www . facebook . com / Chabanesrecords
https :// twitter . com /#!/ chabanesrecords
http :// www . youtube . com / user / ChabanesRecs

Headshot:
http :// www . ht - th . com

Hey Everyone! Just a quick mention that we added in a new forum. This is kind of in line with the ones we have had in the past and we were able to retain all of the original posts. When you log in to Mixposure, you should automatically be logged in to the forum. If you are not, please just reset your Mixposure password to the same password to reset your forum password. 

So what this means in login to mixposure.com > from the menu links click your Name and then Account Settings. Enter your existing password and submit. Logout and back in. Then click the forum link. You should then be logged in. To get to the new Forum, just click the Forum Link in the menu. 

Thanks!

No one knows where the first song came from. Did Neolithic men sing around the first campfire? Did Adam croon a tune to Eve in the Garden of Eden? We may never know. Many believe that rhythmic chanting with percussive accompaniment from weapons may have been the first form of song. Prehistoric Rap? Well, sort of….

At some point, ancient people discovered that blowing across a hollow tube, like an animal bone or reed, produced a pleasing tone and that a string under tension (like a hunting bow) sounded pretty cool. An archeological dig in the Ukraine has uncovered 20,000-year-old flutes made of wooly mammoth bones — you won't find those at your local music store!

The First Song, the First Songwriter

Most songs and songwriters of the pre-Renaissance world have been forever obscured by time. Even after the development of musical notation, songs were mostly passed down through the generations by rote and modified to suit the changing times without reference or regard to the original songwriter.

We have no idea where the first song originated, who wrote it, what instrument was used, if there were lyrics, or what culture fostered its conception. What we  can  be sure of is that whoever wrote the first song probably had no idea of the importance of what was occurring, only that something wonderful was happening. That feeling is common to all songwriters, whether they are professionals or amateurs, rock stars, classical composers, Music Row hit-makers, or any other lucky soul who writes songs for fun or profit.

Tribal Music

Some of the first music happened in a tribal setting. Early tribes used drums and horns to communicate across long distances. Setting music in the context of a language and encouraging the development of a musical vocabulary probably hastened music development. Ancient people also used music for religious rites, festivals, and as a form of oral history.

Work Songs, Chanties, Marching Songs

One of the earliest song forms, worksongs, were sung to relieve the boredom of repetitive labor and provided a rhythm to keep a work crew in synch. One of the basic forms of the work song is the field holler, sung by farmers, serfs, and slaves while tending crops.

Another work song variant, the “chanty” was a favorite of sailors. To prepare a large vessel to sail, steer, drop anchor for the night, or make the ship safe from an oncoming storm requires large crews of people to work together in precise coordination. The sea chanty provided a rhythm to keep things running smoothly at times when a mistake could mean disaster for the whole crew.

You could say that marching songs are a subset of work songs. By establishing a beat, marching songs helped people walk as an organized group, thus moving more quickly and at a uniform speed. By setting a pace, marching songs allowed for precise timing in processions and parades. One of the most famous marching songs is undoubtedly  "Yankee Doodle" , sung by American soldiers during the Revolutionary War. In many cultures, work songs are still a part of everyday life.

Have I been blocked from adding to the forum??