PLEASE tell me why cant i get my mixes to "gel" together?

Without hearing it everyone's answer will just be a guess. But, the generic answer is, a good arrangement where the parts are working together, appropriate amounts of ambience to tie it together, and getting everything at the rigth place front to back to create the desired sense of space. And I guess, though it's just a guess until we hear it, you may be obsessing too much about separation and destroying the cohesion of the mix?

The best thing is a good front end and proper recording.

Next is arrangement - proper soundscape.

During mixing, sub buses help - guitars going through the same bus, etc.

Another thing that sometimes works is to throw the SSL bus comp onto the master bus.  Sometimes that will smooth out the sonic differences and hold everything but the loudest part down and let the loud thing poke through.

A little serial compression (going in, mixing, mastering [or mix bus] is usually better than slamming every sound once.


@

You'll need to post examples to get any meanIngful answers. Bu I would start by checking for:

- sloppy playing
- poor tuning
- weak arrangement
- inappropriate sounds used /chosen

Thanks for all answers, which all have points im going to test when i get back. Droddey's point about ambience is probably what i overlooked the most, some things have too much and others too little, so they sound too much like theyre recorded from different places. everybody swears by the SSL but i just dont have the money for it right now, can anybody vouche for the plugin instead? Sub busses are another good idea idea ive been suggested but havent tried yet. High pass filters are something i started doing just recently because i liked the idea theoretically. Sometimes i notice more clarity sometimes i dont. Im going to try out you guys's advice and then post some examples sometime this week.

you should post a link to the project so we can hear it..... it's easier to give advice after hearing what you're doing first.

Consider taking your tracks to a professional mixer, or even an advanced hobbyist, and having him mix your song. An engineer will typically charge the same hourly fee to explain what he's doing as he does to mix a record. It might end up costing you a couple hundred bucks, but at the end of the day you'll have a professionally-mixed song that you can then analyze and reverse-engineer. 

The reason I suggest this is because there is no single technique for making a mix "gel" (or "shine" or "pop" or any other perfunctory verb). There just is no big secret. It is the culmination of many small decisions, each the product of experience.

Reading Mike Seniors excellent "Mixing secrets for the home studio", he puts forward the idea of using a specially set up reverb called a "Blend verb" which is used in very small amounts to tie tracks together.

If you haven't got it, I thoroughly recommend it as it addresses the very issues you're struggling with.

ASG


     Someone PLEASE help me to understand what it is that makes a good mix "cohesive", and what it is that im not doing. I start off with a good gain stage, I HPF everything but my kick and bass from the start so its clear and ive got more headroom, I've learned to EQ any instrument the way i like it, and nothing over laps in my frequency spectrum, ive even tried compressing my mix buss ( which has done nothing for me at this point), but for the life of me i cant get the tracks in my mix to "hold hands." listening to this mix im working on is like looking at a family portrait where all the family members(tracks) are standing a couple feet away from each other instead of shoulder to shoulder lol. Im by no means any proffesional, but ive come too far from where i started to believe that i have bad ears. I know what sound im trying to get, i hear it all day when im in the studio but its like i just cant get my monitors to spit it out and its driving me mad. And for the record i refuse to believe that gelling things together is the mastering engineers job. If I can get any track in the project to sound the way i want it to on it's own, why cant i get them to sound like its all one piece of music when theyre together?

ASG: You soo sound like me before I got some really good monitors and ARC monitor correction software. I began to question my ears as well as my skills. I was ready to hang it up. Without telling you my long, drawn out story, if you can't hear the right stuff, you will never make the right calls. I was at this for years and still struggling. I had a feeling in the back of my mind that my ears were fine...but what was it that stopped me from getting things to sound right?! My monitors and how they were NOT corrected.
 
How can you tell how much bass to add if they are misrepresenting low end? How can you tell how much mid to put in if they already sound like you're getting enough mids? Bass and mids are what causes us to have "gel" issues. If you have too much lows going on in all the wrong areas, you're not going to have a good mix. If you have too much mid range congestion going on, you're going to get mud.
 
You also need to know how to pan and compress correctly. Each instrument needs its place in the stereo field as well as its place in the frequency realm. If you're not panning anything, you're right down the middle and walking on top of yourself. The same with effects you use. Every stereo effect you bring in is equal to hard left/hard right. If you pan all your tracks wide and then add stereo effects, you get an entire mix of hard left/hard right and it will not gel and will not sound right. So there are lots of things to really keep in mind here.
 
As the others have mentioned, it would be a good idea for you to post up a mix so we can hear what you mean. It's hard for us to take a guess without hearing anything. Don't be shy...no one will bite your head off. Well, maybe one guy will because...that's just his nature...but if he does, don't pay him any mind. He can't mix to save his own life. LOL!! But seriously...post something up and let us check out what you have going on.
 
One great thing you have in your corner...ever person that has replied to you in this thread are all really good engineers that have had awesome results. So if they read you posted a song, you'd not get a bad comment out of any of them. All top dudes that know their stuff and have achieved great results themselves. So you're in great hands here, honest. :)
 
Philip: Thank you so much for the most kind words and the plug. Much love to you my brother! :)
 
-Danny

i dont intend to try to revive this thread after 10 days of not posting but i just wanted to say thanks for all the answers cause its comforting enough just to know that you guys have been where im at beore. I really have been questioning my ears but you guys all made excellent points and are helping me to realize things i have to improve on. So if i want to post a mix to have it critiqued i guess ill post it in the songs forum then.