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Sneakin' Up On The Blues


Barry Seymour

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EDIT: Final mix is in this post!

Hey everyone! Sorry, I've been out of circulation for a while. A little matter of quadruple bypass heart surgery. 😳  But I'm doing great and am back with a new song.

This is a rough mix; still missing a harmonica part. But I'm soliciting advice on how to mix this. So many of the parts are busy, or dirty - I even applied a little distortion to the voice. (Black Keys FTW.).  But does the mix need more clarity? Or is it good to sound swampy?

Let me know your thoughts, thanks.

https://soundcloud.com/barry-seymour/sneakin-up-on-the-blues

Edited by Barry Seymour
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It's a good raw sounding rockin' blues tune I like it. Dig your guitar tones and playing. I do think the bass kind of gets lost, not sure if panning the guitar to one side a little would help maybe.  I think the vocals might sound good thru some tube distortion, to give it that old harmonica mic sound. Or leave it alone it's a cool song.

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1 hour ago, KurtS said:

do think the bass kind of gets lost

I'm hearing it ok.

5 hours ago, Barry Seymour said:

soliciting advice on how to mix this

I do think I'd high pass the guitar pretty hard Barry; there's a lot of low mids there.
For some reason the snare is "hotter" in the left can here, (could be my ears though...).

Like that move to the IV chord, brakes the 12 bar up nicely!
As always well crafted, you always deliver.

t

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2 hours ago, KurtS said:

It's a good raw sounding rockin' blues tune I like it. Dig your guitar tones and playing. I do think the bass kind of gets lost, not sure if panning the guitar to one side a little would help maybe.  I think the vocals might sound good thru some tube distortion, to give it that old harmonica mic sound. Or leave it alone it's a cool song.

I actually did that, but it's subtle. I may crank it a bit more.

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1 hour ago, DeeringAmps said:

I'm hearing it ok.

I do think I'd high pass the guitar pretty hard Barry; there's a lot of low mids there.
For some reason the snare is "hotter" in the left can here, (could be my ears though...).

Like that move to the IV chord, brakes the 12 bar up nicely!
As always well crafted, you always deliver.

t

Your ears are true; I went into the drum mixer and panned stuff out from the center, including the snare. Toms were added manually to a separate track.

"High pass" as in reduce the treble, or increase it? And to which guitar, the backing guitar or the solo?

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“High Pass” or “low cut”, basically we want to “filter” out the low end energy. In the Pro Channel EQ engage the “high pass”, roll it up to about 90hz (I suspect I would be much more aggressive, maybe even 200hz), leave the slope at “default” (12db per octave, I’m on my phone so I can’t look) this will “block” all that “low mud” in the rhythm guitar.  I’d do the same on the solo, whatever amp you’re using has a lot of “low end” energy. Sounds great soloed, but tends to “dominate” the mix. Some “high pass” every track; YMMV. 
HTH

t

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Barry here's a screen shot of the Pro Channel EQ

720812178_pceqhp189.jpg.a203b2ab4aa88069978d1f9bd80ac9e1.jpg

Notice that the High Pass [HP there at the lower left] is set at Freq 189 Slope 12db.
On this one I was tuned to an open G chord, eight notes on the 4th and 5th strings; a "chugging" rhythm figure, if that makes sense.
There's piano and of course bass , and I had to get the rhythm guitar "out of the way" yet still be in the center of the mix.
Without those eight notes up the middle, moving the song along, everything just seemed to drag...
The lead guitar (for want of a better term) was not so "aggressively" High Passed [freq 113 slope 12db], but pretty much the 5th and 6th strings
were untouched, and it was panned opposite the piano during the vocal so it wasn't "in the way".

Hope this makes sense and helps a bit...

t

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10 hours ago, DeeringAmps said:

Barry here's a screen shot of the Pro Channel EQ

720812178_pceqhp189.jpg.a203b2ab4aa88069978d1f9bd80ac9e1.jpg

Notice that the High Pass [HP there at the lower left] is set at Freq 189 Slope 12db.
On this one I was tuned to an open G chord, eight notes on the 4th and 5th strings; a "chugging" rhythm figure, if that makes sense.
There's piano and of course bass , and I had to get the rhythm guitar "out of the way" yet still be in the center of the mix.
Without those eight notes up the middle, moving the song along, everything just seemed to drag...
The lead guitar (for want of a better term) was not so "aggressively" High Passed [freq 113 slope 12db], but pretty much the 5th and 6th strings
were untouched, and it was panned opposite the piano during the vocal so it wasn't "in the way".

Hope this makes sense and helps a bit...

t

It does, thanks. I'll give it a shot.

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Barry . . . I'm relieved to hear it was the "quadruple" bypass surgery . . . those are very thorough . . . means you'll be cranking out these great tunes for many years to come !

You lyrics in this one are a lot of fun to listen to, and cudos to your recording and pronunciation techniques, I can interpret ever word.  The mix is pretty balanced sounding . . . though, I'd like to hear a bit more low kick / bass myself to round things out. I like how you just got back on your horse and kept riding . . .

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EDIT: This is now the final mix!

Okay, here's a new mix for 28 May. I did some low pass filtering on the guitars, adjusted some volumes (bass!) and balances, and added a little more distortion to the lead vocals. What do you think?

https://soundcloud.com/barry-seymour/sneakin-up-on-the-blues

Edited by Barry Seymour
Re-Linked to final mix
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More conventional panning has "cleaned" things up quite a bit I think.
I'd go after the HP a little more (lot?) aggressively, but that's a "taste" thing,
and with the instrumentation at this point certainly not a deal breaker.
More instruments, you'd need more "space"; me thinks.

I didn't mention the first go how much I enjoyed your slide work! NICE!

Great tune, but I think I mentioned that already...

t

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17 hours ago, mark skinner said:

 Barry , Your playing skills and especially the vocals and lyrics "really" shined thru on this one. I hope you recover quickly. It sure hasn't effected your musical talent.   Enjoyed it ..  mark

Very kind, thanks Mark. I recorded the drums and rhythm guitar prior to the surgery; the vocals are the first thing I did after I came home from the hospital. The slide work I did on an acoustic guitar - it was the only thing light enough that I could pick up at first! (Doctor's orders.) It was only a few days ago I was allowed to pick up my Telecaster again, so I could play lead. I'm still waiting on a buddy to provide a harp solo near the end.

 

 

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6 hours ago, DeeringAmps said:

More conventional panning has "cleaned" things up quite a bit I think.
I'd go after the HP a little more (lot?) aggressively, but that's a "taste" thing,
and with the instrumentation at this point certainly not a deal breaker.
More instruments, you'd need more "space"; me thinks.

I didn't mention the first go how much I enjoyed your slide work! NICE!

Great tune, but I think I mentioned that already...

t

Thanks, TD. I think I'm going to stick with the EQ on the guitars for now, although I may boost the volume of the rhythm guitar a bit. It's all minor tweaking at this point, at least until the harp solo gets here.

How about the amount of distortion on the vocal? Too much?

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