Uptill now it worked fine but this one just wont be contained.
Mostly the drums spoil the fun, and now I ended up with two compressors and a brick wall on the endbus.
Together they constantly push the mix down with an average of 10 dB.
The drums bus before the endbus has also two compressors. One fast one eating up 7 dB and a slow one, constantly pushing it 8 dB down.
In my opinion this is just severe shredding and crushing. But it’s the only way to get the track in line with the rest.
How do you do this? Is it normal in electronic/dance/pop music to feed compressors that much. I am on a learning curve here.
Hiya Dylan. Wow, this has a Tangerine Dream vibe to begin with. Good work
The actual English term is “More Than This”, minor detail I know but better get it right in case some English dude tells you about it Oddly enough, you sing “More than this” so no need to redo the vocal. Hurrah
Overall, I think you’ve done a great job on this, well done
Cheers
Phil
Okay, so you don’t think this piece is squashed to pieces?! Great! Because that was what I was afraid for.
I used really so many compressors and limiters to contain it all.
Well, you’re supposed to have a lot of compression in this style, right? It does seem your vocal is pushed down in the second half. Anyway, I still like it.
But why exactly do you want just 9 dB of dynamic range (I assume you mean crest factor here)? Because although this doesn’t sound bad, you HAVE squashed the impact of the drums out of it.
My suggestion is, since you’re preparing a release, just get your individual mixes so they rawk… then work with an experienced mastering engineer to achieve some dynamic consistency over the entire album
If I listen my own music on a Mp3 player it’s way to soft, -9 dB is when it starts to get good.
All other commercial music is way louder, and I want my music to line up with that.
But somehow it’s impossible to achieve that, but I want to learn it, and maybe invest in proper gear to achieve that.
A lot of compression also results in a ‘signature sound’. Not a lot of dynamics is what I am after.
It makes it ‘round’ and ‘solid’.
When I mix/record singer songwriter stuff I mostly end up with a -12 mix.
Okay as I said to Jet
crest factor? Ehm, looked it up, very mathy
I mean the avarage levels of the RMS value. Is that the same?
When my music would be commercially released I would definately get a real mastering engineer.
This is all playground for me, trying to make it myself.
The rest of the songs were rather easy to get to -9 dB, I mean electronic stuff or samples and synths don’t have such dynamics as a real piano or a violin or whatever. (they can have but the sounds I create are not that dynamic)
Just this song gave me troubles with it, and because the rest of the songs are -9 dB I really hate it to alter that because of one song.
Oddly enough, you sing “More than this” so no need to redo the vocal. Hurrah 
