reaMIXed: The Reaper Mixing Contest - December 2022 - I Guess That's How it Is

[darjama]

REAPER CONTEST - December 2022
(ONLY REAPER PLUGINS ALLOWED)



LAST CHANCE to support reaMIXed by buying a t-shirt at https://reamixed.myshopify.com/, I'll close the shop in the new year.




OFFICIAL WEBSITE: reaMIXed.com


MIXING: 1-16 December
VOTING: 20-26 December
RESULTS: 28 December
FEEDBACK: 28-31 December

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Last month's winner Zhwau declined to pick a song, so I chose this month's song, "Tourism" by Our Good Wolf, courtesy of the Cambridge Music Technology site. It's a fun piece of indie chamber pop.

Please remember:

-NO GLUING OF FILES / RENDERING OF EFFECTS
-ONLY NATIVE REAPER FX -or- non-Native JSFX files that you include with your submission.

Also, I'd recommend taking advantage of the new normalization settings in the reaper rendering dialog to meet the LUFS and dbFS requirements. My suggested workflow would be:

1. Normalize to -14 LUFS.
2. If your mix peaks at or under -1 dbFS, you're done!
3. If your mix peaks over -1 dbFS, rerender it normalizing to -1 dbFS.

MixCheck (https://reamixed.com/mixcheck/) is still beta, it can help you by analyzing your .rpp files before you upload to:
- Make sure your they don't contain disqualifying audio files
- Make sure your they don't contain disqualifying VST/AU plugins
- See what non-native JSFX files you need to include in your zip file
- See what impulse files you need to include in your zip file

NOTE that Mix Check DOES NOT upload your mix, only checks your project file on your local machine.

Once Mix Check has been tested I may not require you to send in the mixed flacs, just the project files, jsfx and impulses. I'd like to hear your thoughts on that.

You can download the multitrack from the website or clicking on this link.

Happy mixing!
-Daryl

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IMPORTANT

• Please use the reaMIXed.com website as the main resource for the contest.

[JohnMiears]

Very nice, looking forward to breaking my Remixed "fast" on this one. I think winning this month is going to come down to rock solid fundamentals and tasteful reverb/ delay. While the song's tracks are recorded well, the production is lacking ear candy and it's going to take a lot to stand out (in a positive way this month. Good luck everyone!

[MisterGTR]

Just noticed the song we download is called Tourism but the website says "I guess that's how it is". No biggie. It's a cool song. Just thought i'd mention it.

[darjama]

Originally Posted by MisterGTR

Just noticed the song we download is called Tourism but the website says "I guess that's how it is". No biggie. It's a cool song. Just thought i'd mention it.

Oops, you're right, the song is Tourism. The EP is 'I Guess That's How It Is.' my bad. Can't correct the thread title should be able to correct elsewhere.

[Osse]

Spent a few hours with the track this evening. Nice song!

[ColinJ]

Man, these drums are brutal to mix.

[beingmf]

Dear bass player: why?











Dear recording engineer: why? What am I supposed to use from the "Snare2Up" mic? Why only 1 overhead, but 4 room mics? Overhead in this case refers to the head of a giraffe, I suppose. The kick is recorded really really well, but did you run out of time miking the "HiHat" and "Ride" (the latter though carries some useful information, but not for the ride )? Vocals are fantastic, but why did the singer have a click track in the headphones?

@darjama: Do you know what year this was recorded? I hear a lot of really annoying digital fizzle in the tracks, sounds like an outdated AD converter to me. It's really hard to add some top end without having to de-ess at the same time.

[Osse]

Originally Posted by ColinJ

Man, these drums are brutal to mix.

Indeed, they require a creative mindset

[beingmf]

Originally Posted by ColinJ

Man, these drums are brutal to mix.

Originally Posted by Osse

Indeed, they require a creative mindset

Really? I thought they're quite nice, if I don't use every track that was recorded.

[Osse]

Originally Posted by beingmf

Really? I thought they're quite nice, if I don't use every track that was recorded.

You pointed out a few good questionmarks which i agree on in your previous post. Nevertheless they offer good opportunities for the vigilant mind.

[beingmf]

Originally Posted by Osse

Nevertheless they offer good opportunities for the vigilant mind.

Haha, definitely!

EDIT: I think less is more when it comes to drum miking and recording. A drum kit is ONE instrument, not separate shells and cymbals ‒ so ideally a pair of room mics should be enough. In theory. I never understood the benefit of a thousand spot mics, phasing like hell and capturing everything but the drum it is supposed to capture.

[darjama]

Originally Posted by beingmf

@darjama: Do you know what year this was recorded? I hear a lot of really annoying digital fizzle in the tracks, sounds like an outdated AD converter to me. It's really hard to add some top end without having to de-ess at the same time.

It was released 2018, so presumably not long before that.

[beingmf]

Originally Posted by darjama

It was released 2018, so presumably not long before that.

Interesting, thank you!

[ColinJ]

Originally Posted by Osse

Indeed, they require a creative mindset

I guess I'm just used to mixing rock drums, which have a certain clarity and attack they you can work with (or replace). But these flubby, washy lounge music drums just do my head in.

Nice tune, though.

[JohnMiears]

Finishing my static mix, ready for automation in the next day or two. This track isn't Thriller 2.0 in production or recording. That said I'm just trying to make the most "listenable" version of this song I can.

[WaveTrans]

Well, thanks for the hint, not using all the drum mics does help a lot.

[MisterGTR]

Very rushed last minute entry (i'm doing a 16 week Front End Web Dev course which is taxing my old brain!)..........which means i'll be on for my best result of the year!!

Really nice song. Enjoyed mixing it. No doubt i'll wake up tomorrow morning and cringe!

But for a change I:
Started from a blank canvas (no 200 track production template this month!)
Started with faders and panning only.
Minimal plugins (i was going to go all stock buy used 2 Tukans for speed)
No automation.
And lastly and probably most significantly I used headphones as it's late here!

Good luck everyone

[darjama]

Originally Posted by MisterGTR

Very rushed last minute entry (i'm doing a 16 week Front End Web Dev course which is taxing my old brain!)

Hey, that's how I got started with reaMIXed, good luck!

[Wallaby]

Originally Posted by ColinJ

Man, these drums are brutal to mix.

Only 1 overhead and too much rooms lots to delete

[JohnMiears]

My mix is not done but it is uploaded, looking forward to listening to how other people sifted through this.

[cool]

This time I gave up. I took some time to make the sound what it sounded like in my head. But I couldn't handle the original tracks. I was disappointed with the result of my work and just deleted the project.

Now I think that if only the bass had been recorded well, it would have given me more freedom to work.

I can be too emotional, but "being creative in the technical points of recording" is not the best solution and it doesn't work for the good result (especially speaking of the drums!). Although, maybe it's not creativity, but trivial mistakes. Otherwise, I can't explain why the D.I. bass track sounds more distorted than the amplified one...

Good luck in this contest, everyone!

[JerZee]

Yesterday night i also uploaded my mix last minute. Not totally happy with it. In fact, i was listening to it in my car Yesterday afternoon car and realized there was still lots of work to be done to complete the mix. I was really struggling to glue it all together. I liked the sound of all the tracks but it lacked the professional shine. So i'm hoping that at least some of the Reamixed participants got it right than i learn how to solve that.

[JohnMiears]

I'm expecting some critiques on this one... Until we get to download the sessions and see though, and now that mixes are submitted. What are some standout things people did this month that will either win it for them or get them borderline cyber-bullied? For me I can think of a couple things

1. a "Vox Candy" track that has a 1/8, 1/4, and 1/2 note delay fed into a pitch shifter to make it stereo into a reverb that ended up being the "reverb" that my whole drum set went through, the snare and shaker got double sent to it, guitars, piano, lead vox, and bg Vox. I didn't make the time to automate it either so it's just static sends the whole song.

2. Bass Amp: -4.6dB @ 311Hz, +12dB @3634Hz
Bass DI: +12dB @ 4367dB
Bass Bus: 6dB GR with the JS1175 4:1 ratio, 50us attack 50ms release

[MisterGTR]

Originally Posted by darjama

Hey, that's how I got started with reaMIXed, good luck!

Thanks, it's funny how I've started noticing bootstrap buttons everywhere and the navbars!

JavaScript I'm finding easy but getting the layout with CSS to look good I'm rubbish. It's not even difficult but I just seem to always edit something and break something and not realise until I'm 10 commits down the line!

[Jopame]

Originally Posted by cool

This time I gave up. I took some time to make the sound what it sounded like in my head. But I couldn't handle the original tracks. I was disappointed with the result of my work and just deleted the project.

Now I think that if only the bass had been recorded well, it would have given me more freedom to work.

I can be too emotional, but "being creative in the technical points of recording" is not the best solution and it doesn't work for the good result (especially speaking of the drums!). Although, maybe it's not creativity, but trivial mistakes. Otherwise, I can't explain why the D.I. bass track sounds more distorted than the amplified one...

Good luck in this contest, everyone!

I almost gave up, but anyhow in the end I uploaded a mix - with which I'm not really satisfied. Also very little time (but dont we all have only very little time??). The snare was ringing like hell and I couldn't get rid off. Then I noticed that most of the ringing did'nt came from the snare mic ... Yes, omitting the one or other track really helped.
I think this is a real life recording, with which you have to work on in order to get really usable tracks. I did a lot of trimming to avoid background noise during breaks. And this loud cymbal during the last 20s annoyed me really but was not able to reduce it without changing the overall sound.
Good luck for everyone.

[ColinJ]

Originally Posted by cool

This time I gave up. I took some time to make the sound what it sounded like in my head. But I couldn't handle the original tracks. I was disappointed with the result of my work and just deleted the project.

Now I think that if only the bass had been recorded well, it would have given me more freedom to work.

I can be too emotional, but "being creative in the technical points of recording" is not the best solution and it doesn't work for the good result (especially speaking of the drums!). Although, maybe it's not creativity, but trivial mistakes. Otherwise, I can't explain why the D.I. bass track sounds more distorted than the amplified one...

Good luck in this contest, everyone!

I gave up, too. I just couldn't lick those drums.

[JohnMiears]

Seems like a lot of people aren’t turning in mixes this month….I’ll take those odds! We’ll see

[darjama]

FYI, I'm traveling in a place without a great internet connection, so while I was able to get the individual FLACs uploaded on time, the ZIP file with all the FLACs won't be completely updated for a few hours until after voting starts. I'll post here once it's available.

[Dex]

Originally Posted by JohnMiears

Seems like a lot of people aren’t turning in mixes this month….I’ll take those odds! We’ll see

I wanted to! Just didn't have time this month.

[JerZee]

Lots of very good mixes and creative use of reverb and delay. Also lots people managed to get the drums right.

[JohnMiears]

Something I'm noticing on a lot of the mixes this month is bad or lacking reverb. If anyone is new or doesn't know about this yet the reverbs in Tukan bundle are actually pretty good (much better than the reaper stock verbs). These are free and can be used for Reamixed (if you copy the plugin into your zip folder).Installation is a little different but this video will help. I normally hate blaming the arrow over the Indian but there is a clear line this month between people with access to decent reverbs and not. Is anyone else noticing this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBqaV_jTmws

[Broken Glass Audio]

Originally Posted by JohnMiears

Something I'm noticing on a lot of the mixes this month is bad or lacking reverb. If anyone is new or doesn't know about this yet the reverbs in Tukan bundle are actually pretty good (much better than the reaper stock verbs). These are free and can be used for Reamixed (if you copy the plugin into your zip folder).Installation is a little different but this video will help. I normally hate blaming the arrow over the Indian but there is a clear line this month between people with access to decent reverbs and not. Is anyone else noticing this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBqaV_jTmws

Haven’t listened through yet, but for anyone who used the actual release as a reference, it was very dry. I went the opposite direction and tried to create a more spacey version. I’ll either get blasted or praised for creativity. We’ll see.

[darjama]

The FLACs zip file finally finished uploading, let me know if you have any problems.

[Wallaby]

Originally Posted by JohnMiears

Seems like a lot of people aren’t turning in mixes this month….I’ll take those odds! We’ll see

25 participants ! Isn't that record ?

That's great ! The contest is growing !

[JerZee]

Originally Posted by JohnMiears

Something I'm noticing on a lot of the mixes this month is bad or lacking reverb. If anyone is new or doesn't know about this yet the reverbs in Tukan bundle are actually pretty good (much better than the reaper stock verbs). These are free and can be used for Reamixed (if you copy the plugin into your zip folder).Installation is a little different but this video will help. I normally hate blaming the arrow over the Indian but there is a clear line this month between people with access to decent reverbs and not. Is anyone else noticing this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBqaV_jTmws

There are some decent free impuls respons packages to find on the internet. For example: https://bedroomproducersblog.com/201...lse-responses/ also other models are available if you search for it. Hope this helps...

[TomekSmilok]

Originally Posted by cool

This time I gave up. I took some time to make the sound what it sounded like in my head. But I couldn't handle the original tracks. I was disappointed with the result of my work and just deleted the project.

Now I think that if only the bass had been recorded well, it would have given me more freedom to work.

I can be too emotional, but "being creative in the technical points of recording" is not the best solution and it doesn't work for the good result (especially speaking of the drums!). Although, maybe it's not creativity, but trivial mistakes. Otherwise, I can't explain why the D.I. bass track sounds more distorted than the amplified one...

Good luck in this contest, everyone!

The distortion you're talking about is probably the delay that is applied on bass, overtimes it changes note, the delay echoes the previous note and it makes a completely messy low end.
I personally chose to make bass secondary in terms of support because of that, and rely on the kick.


I have so much work I'm not sure I will be able to dip into all that listening ...

I found this song by itself raw flat in reaper already very good ! ^^
Bit of a problem with monoish of drums, but these drums sounds awesome with all those rooms, let's say this song is to be enjoyed somewhere out of the speaker center spot, drinking and smoking while wandering about your dream life.

[JerZee]

Voted today. It was fun listening to all the different mixes. There where some very good ones and lots of creativity.

Merry christmas everybody!

[MisterGTR]

Nice song this month. Enjoyed listening to the different directions people went in. And some of you really threw down in terms of automation!

My mix sounds like i had a blanket thrown over it. But i'm happy with the balances - if i'm going to take anything away. But still not good enough for top half.

Lesson for this month. Take breaks. Listen to reference tracks. And give myself time for at least one getting up the next day and listening to it with fresh ears session before submitting.

Merry Christmas Everybody!

[JohnMiears]

Trying to finish voting up now, there are so many great mixes it's hard to pick a favorite. Even the "not great" mixes aren't awful good job everyone. Looking forward to the results and stealing secrets on this one.

[JohnMiears]

Just submitted, super hard to pick a winner this month so I tied 3 for "first" place and 4 more for "2nd" good job again everyone.