Mixing advice needed

[Lars_uk]

Hi all,

New here!
Have been doing electro music for some time but have not put any track together fro some time. Is this the right place to request advice/guidance on making my mix sound better?

Thanks

Lars

[MusicMan11712]

First of all, welcome. Just my opinions, but here is my advice:

(1) Use your own ear as a guide; there is no one better that knows what you are intending to do and how well you achieve that--even all along the creation --> final product process.

(2) Search Youtube and other sources for tutorials; in my experience there are many that are so-so, some that are painful to watch or listen to, and a few that are really really good, relevant, and insightful. Bookmark and re-watch the ones that are personally relevant to your needs and interests, which relate most to your learning style, and have the right balance among what you already know, what you tend to forget, what you didn't realize before consciously, "aha!" moments, and useful content v. extraneous stuff [which is different for each of us].

In my experience, (a) some people here will like whatever you share and will tell you so, (b) some people might tell you what they like about it, (c) some people might tell you what they noticed and bounce that back to see if that was your intent, (d) some people might share ideas for your possible consideration, and (e) some people will tacitly negate others who do (c) and (d). I suppose there could also be (f) some people might use your post to vent, go off in directions other than what you are looking for, etc. but I don't seem to recall much of the (f) ers.

The bottom like: "Be your own best judge!"

Finally, if you really want to elicit feedback, (just a suggestion)--you might want to focus responses, for example by explaining what you were trying to accomplish, by addressing specific aspects you have been debating with yourself, etc.

On the the other hand, if you just want people to listen and tell you they like it, how nice, wonderful, or another superlative it is, what they like about it, etc. don't be afraid to ask for that kind of feedback.

Caveats: All of the above is just the idiosyncratic personal beliefs of one person (me). If any of it is helpful, great--take what is useful and ignore everything else. And finally: No one needs to agree or disagree.

Steve

[YYY]

try to find some reference tracks and compare with yours, different elements level, space, pan...and don't forget to focus on composition, how many elements you have in your tracks compare to the ref track, what is the most important to you(what the listeners will retain) and listen your mix in different environnment, with different mood....don't over use Eq/comp, sometimes, a good ballance level between track make all the difference

[Alfonso Del Rikardo]

And try to keep it simple. You don't need 15 diferent cymbals. If you record something on an live instrument (guitar, bass, trumpet...) or vocals first have it practeced to perfection, and record it 10000000 times untill is played and recorded good. You don't need to rush it and have bad recording or performance.
Of course, key to any song is the melody. Focus more on good melody than a good mix. When you do that mixing will be easy

[Airlock]

Hey, good replies to this!

I would add try to keep instruments in their own range of the frequency spectrum so they're not stepping on each other, and high pass everything that isn't a bass or bass drum over (at least) 200HZ.