This terms assignment would further touch on establishing and rehearsing techniques for recording various instruments using a blend of analog and digital resources. I would again be performing on the guitar and shall utilize both analog and digital workflows, recording the guitar and programming drums through a mixture of hardware and software ranging from Native instruments Maschine to EZ Drums which contains recordings of real drum sets but can be performed digitally. I shall then produce a synchronous multitrack recording, planning and outlining the project according to a defined production process, including pre-production, rehearsal, demo recordings, brainstorming, planning and lastly mixing and mastering. The guitar is routed through an amazing analog preamp which has the ability to introduce 2 types of harmonic saturations. Audio will be summed into the analog domain and routed into the cranbourne 500R8 and 500ADAT which houses various EQs and compression units for processing. the signal flow is then heading into the SSL Sigma which is a remote-controllable 32 channel analog summing unit with a monitor controller section. It uses the exact same summing amplifiers and mix bus circuit and topology as the SSL Duality. It also includes the MDAC (Multiplying Digital to Analogue Converter) technology as SSL's Duality and AWS consoles. The final summed mix will then be captured in Pro Tools/Reaper.
Linear Production
I began by connecting my electric guitar into the Camden 500 preamp and would adjust the gain to set a good signal level. I would also introduce some saturation in the low end as i love a beefy guitar sound. I then routed the signal into FL Studio's mixer channel and checked the incoming audio levels. I would load Guitar Rig 7 and would set what i call a dreamy surf guitar sound. I would begin improvising a chord progression and would experiment with various styles of playing the chords. i usually start of with this approach as i have learnt not to be too critical in a creative stage as sometimes errors can also be great ideas!.. After practicing the chord progression i had in mind i would arm the mixer channel with my guitar and begin the process of recording my perfomance. i usually would set the project to have a countdown for recording and the metronome on when playing to aid in playing consistenly on time. Usually i would aim to record 5 takes just to capture various performances and after recording i would carry out composition work and would select the best sections of each take and would later consolidate into one single audio take. I would filter through each section to find which was played in time, which sounded expressive and which part compliments other chosen takes. after forming the final take i would check over to see the results of the new take in context with the other sounds.
my next task was to clean up my recording as there were some sections I had strummed the guitar early which would mask other sounds in my music piece. to fix this I would slice out or fade out any audio causing this issue. This in turn would cause the initial transient of my guitar piece to start very sharp which I needed to tame. I would duplicate the chord progression and have it repeat at a later stage in the the songs arrangement as my intention was to have this chord progression as the chorus. I would also record takes for my Hybrid production which would involve playing power chords on the guitar which are also palm muted for a stubby crunchy sound as I was aiming to make my hybrid production to be a mixture of a rock/hip-hop fusion.
I would begin creating drums to accompany my guitar composition and would firstly use Native instruments Maschine to create a percussive drum pattern by playing and capturing my performance on the expressive MIDI drum hardware controller. My sound selections for these percussive elements were punchy and consisted of an African drum, a clap, finger clicks, a shaker and tambourines. I would play them sparsely as i would be adding more elements to my drum performance later. I would create another layer on the Maschine hardware and load more drum sounds but this time the sound selection would be of the hip hop genre which consisted of a boom bap kick and hihats. Once i was happy with my performance I would record my performance and edit various notes played with quantisation which keeps notes played on time with the beat. My next idea was to add authentic sounding drums to the composition which is where EZ drums shine in this field. The sounds of the drum samples of EZ drummer reggae pack was recorded at Rub-a-Dub Studios in Stockholm Sweden and everything was recorded using vintage gear and microphones including the custom miking techniques of the genre. All this coupled with the studio’s dense, organic wood-lined walls helps capture the drum sounds I was looking for (Saturated, warm and rich drum tones).
I would begin performing on my drum MIDI hardware and would record MIDI information which I would later edit in the EZ drummer software. I wanted the drums to be slightly off timing and would offset the drums to give a sloppy feel to the groove. This was a technique I had learnt from pioneers such as J Dilla who was known for this technique. I also added extra variations to the hi-hats and filled additional areas that required more movement and energy as the song progressed. EZ drummer has a feature in which it can view your MIDI composition and give you ideas for sections in your song such as drum fills or if required a full song building feature but only for the drums. I would use 3 variations of snare and tom drum fills and would layer them into my timeline at points of transition in the song to give the sense of progress. Another feature of EZ Drummer 3 is its ability to route individual drum sounds into separate channels in my DAW and also features a bleed function replicating the natural bleed you’d get with multiple microphones in a drum recording room. With all the tracks routed into my DAW’s mixer I was able to fully utilize a mixing workflow with each sound as an individual source rather than sending the audio of EZ drummer as one single source with all sounds combined. Giving me further flexibility and deeper control on each sound in the mixing stage.
With my composition becoming more full I would begin to start arranging the whole piece into a song by having an intro which would begin with few melodic or musical elements and no drums which would then lead into a few drum elements playing which helped to create the progression of the song. My thought process and experience has helped me to understand the perspective of the listener or consumer of music and one thing I have learnt is long intros are not really liked n comparison to an intro which has progression. With this in mind I would ensure not to introduce every element of the song early but also not to bring these elements in very late. At certain sections prior to a big change I would completely delete audio and give space which creates a sense of a drop creating the sense of climax for the listener and energy to the composition. This is another thing learnt that most the time I should try a subtractive approach to sound design and composition instead of an additive mindset as less is more in many cases specifically when working with audio which can drastically change the whole feel and direction of a song/composition. With the composition fully arranged into a song I would consolidate all audio for organisation ready for mixing.
To begin my mixing session in the box I would route all audio into mixer tracks and would set the levels to an optimal point whilst also following the judgement of my ears more than visual judgement and meters. whilst the song was playing I would often critically listen to parts of the song and solo instruments to further refine the audio with processing such as EQ, dynamics or effects. I have also learnt that not every sound needs processing as some sounds already have had processing work done whilst others sound great and only would need minor adjustments. In my case the drums were very clean and sounded great meaning I only would need to set the levels and other adjustments such as setting low end instruments in mono for better control and less phase issues. Also panning some sounds to give each their respective space for clarity and less masking issues. I had also the recordings of the room the drums were played in which I would ensure to sit well in the mix as this would have bleed of every instrument and would have great characteristics when blended in parallel with the other drum sounds specifically the snare as when the volume is just right with the dry drums the room snare sound can give the infamous reggae dub "hall snare" sound. Once I was happy with my drums I would move onto the other sounds starting with the guitar power chords. I would insert an optical compressor (LA2A) to fatten up the power chords and would set the levels so it would sit alongside the drum mix. I would also route the vocal sounds to an aux track in which I would insert a reverb to help it to sit well in the mix amongst the heavy drums and also I would spread the dreamy vocals into the stereo field more. I would also load the guitar chorus recording into an aux track with a reverb plugin but this would be a plate reverb which made the guitar sound lush and dreamy. after revisiting and checking my levels on later listens I would save this and render it into a stereo file ready for the mastering stage.
Prior to starting my mastering stage I would ensure I have no phase issues in my stereo mix and that my session is organised and ready. On my mastering track I would have a loudness meter plugin loaded which would help me to understand the songs true perceived loudness and other factors such as the dynamic range of the song. It also helps me to achieve the target loudness for streaming services, TV or film services such as Spotify, Apple, Netflix Amazon and HBO to name a few. I would also insert a tonal balance plugin on the master track which helps me to fine tune my master using EQ target curves from different genres of great mastered tracks. this serves as a reference and a way for me to analyse my master amongst other masters of similar genre. I would begin by listening through the whole song and checking the average loudness of the whole song and the dynamic range of the whole song. My mastering loudness target was to be for the online streaming service Spotify which was -14 LUFS. I would firstly insert a clipper to push the loudness of my stereo track while still maintaining a clean and dynamic sound by removing unwanted distortion and the peaks of my volume at a certain threshold. I adjust the levels to a point the audio was loud but also only just the peaks of the low end was clipped as the kicks would be the dominant sound that would be pushing into the red. Once I was happy with the loudness I would do an on and off test (A/B) to check the difference and my meters to see how much headroom was present. I would next insert a mastering suite software in which I would load an EQ first in the chain. I would cut off all frequencies below 36hz and above 15khz as I felt these areas contained either frequencies humans couldn't hear and harsh frequencies in the high end of frequency range. I have learnt over the time not always to cut the low end or insert low cut filters as some genres depend on the low ends haptic feedback as its more felt then heard. Especially when the environment is that of a club or concert which can make songs hit harder due to the heavy low-end. I would also solo frequencies to audit the audio at the specific EQ points. One example can be seen where I was searching for the kicks thump to boost the transient punch of the kick. I would raise the EQ point to hear better the starting point of the kick and would then lower the EQ point so that the kicks thump is more present but subtly adjusted to sit well in the context of the mix of other sounds. Overall the EQ curve shape on my master follows the infamous Mid scoop or "smiley face" EQ curve which is a practice which helps music listened at lower volumes and helps emphasize the low end and high end giving the song more energy. At times this can be a disadvantage as it means boosting the low and high ends which is my reason in cutting or controlling some of the ends of the frequency spectrum when applying a smiley face EQ. I would have my EQ set to Mid side mode and I would edit the sides by adding a low cut filter which isn't as steep as the Mids but cuts a lot of low end frequency. I would also dip the Mids slightly as most of the audio in the Mids was not clear. I would listen to the overall progress and check the levels and other information such as loudness, tonal balance and dynamic range of the song. I would finish off my mastering chain with 2 limiters to push the song to my target loudness and also to bring the whole song to that final polish. My reason of using 2 limiters is that it helps reduce the load on one limiter which can be handy when using one limiter to catch the peaks and harsh transients while the other limiter focuses on increasing the overall loudness. I would have my 1st limiter catching the peaks of the audio and would have the "character" or attack/release to be slightly slow. My 2nd limiter would push the loudness to the levels i was targeting being Spotify's -14 LUFs. Although this is the standard for streaming services I have learnt to make my masters slightly "hot" meaning to push it a bit further than the loudness target as most streaming services have the option to disable loudness which then would leave your mastered track sounding weak amongst other Hot masters in a listeners playlist of songs.
With the mastering complete for a first revision I would print out or save the data in regards to the average loudness and dynamic range of the master for either a client or for later revisions.
Summary
In this assignment I encountered many challenges which would further test my ability in critical listening and decision making in particular the mixing and mastering stage. I had felt I had improved in making programmed drums feel more human and less digital by creating and performing more expressively on the drum MIDI controller. One of the major difficulties in which I feel I failed in was setting up my analogue summing mixer as I'm still developing a solid workflow and routing with my hybrid setup which has slowed my progress and would occasionally find myself less productive. This lead me to ultimately mix and master entirely in the box and spend more time at a later point to gain knowledge and experience with my summing mixer. My performance on the guitar was not great as my timing was not consistent which I would resolve using Melodyne for natural timing correction.
In my mixing stage I found it difficult to balance some sounds and also would struggle in controlling the guitar tone as the transients and my playing performance wasn't the best. I would also struggle to find the right time to stop as I would reach a point in where I would be looking for problems when there was none. This happen a lot when listening to my master playback on various speaker formats and i would keep revisiting to make changes. I would overcome this by learning to step back from the work and revisiting with a fresh mind and ears.
