Mixing a Live Recording

moogmusic · Post by **moogmusic** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 10:46 am

I've been mixing a live recording of our band made in December and the first pass is in: http://soundcloud.com/smnwail4u/alive-i ... le/s-VThfA

Any thoughts, comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. The recordings were made from the channels on the desk and then I've mixed it using Ardour (http://ardour.org)

Thanks

Sloan · Post by **Sloan** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 2:59 pm

The only thing that really sticks out for me right now is that is sounds pretty mono. I would try to find a way to make the guitar spread a bit and get out of the way of the critical bass/drum/vox center elements. Maybe spreading the vocal out would help make it feel 'wider' too.

avj · Post by **avj** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 4:29 pm

I've got your recording open in a tab ready to have a listen during lunch.

Regarding Ardour, how do you like it? I've used it casually for mixing and post-production stuff for a few years in both OS X and Linux and I've found it to be very capable.

avj · Post by **avj** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 6:07 pm

I think the bass could come up a bit in the mix. If you're just a three-piece (like it sounds, if I'm hearing correctly), you could also maybe just pan the guitar left a bit and the bass right a bit to separate them and give them a bit of distinct space.

It sounds like there's some decent stereo field stuff going on with the drums already by virtue of how they were mic'd.

duosonic · Post by **duosonic** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 6:20 am

How many tracks did you record to? I would get a little more separation between the guitar and the drums (compression and eq). Panning the guitar off to the side will give you more space for the rest of what's going on. Best tip I've heard is to get the vocal where you want it and then build up the rest around it.

moogmusic · Post by **moogmusic** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 6:41 am

Thanks for the ideas, I'll post another mix when I've had a fiddle. We are a three-piece and I've got about a ten tracks I think - vox, guitar, bass, individual drums and a couple of room mics. I've panned the drums around but left the guitar dead centre, I'll move it off to one side a bit. I'm not so hot on EQing drums so any suggestions on where to begin would be very helpful.

I find Ardour a great program. I'm just beta-testing version 3 and it seems pretty good - they've multi-threaded it so you can use multiple processors for FX plugins now which is a great improvement. I've been using version 2 for years and it's always been rock solid and it does everything I need from a DAW.

Sloan · Post by **Sloan** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 6:25 pm

don't be afraid of the room mics if they sound good. if you can get them wide enough, you can pan your other instruments to fit and it will sound pretty natural.

moogmusic · Post by **moogmusic** » Sun Jan 29, 2012 1:22 pm

I've tweaked the levels and stereo field a little. Next up: EQing which is an area I have no skill in what so ever...

http://soundcloud.com/steven-j-tonge/al ... le/s-haRSR

markleton · Post by **markleton** » Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:42 am

The dude that recorded my last band in Glasgow has put up some videos about mixing a live recording, might be some help?

[youtube][/youtube]