What's the secret to getting guitars up front?

Have you tried the Boost plug in?

Pro channel should get the volume up then perhaps Channel tools to place them where you like in the stereo field.

Have you any sound sample available?
It would be easier to give advice.

-Panu

 with no dissrespect.. there is a art to eqing and placing
sounds.. so in the end it all sounds good 35yrs at..as i said
there is also outboar processing doubbling ur peadels wont
cut it.. and the sound is only as good as wht your putting in

I find that tone and technique have as much to do with placing guitars in the mix as eq and panning. The most common mistake I hear is a bit too much distortion and sustain, or using a distortion that kills the dynamics of the track. Also the high frequency build up of some "fizzy" distortion can kill vocal and percussion tracks as well. Distortion can act as a limiter of sorts. It can kill the attack of the guitar strum, and make it difficult to hear either the tonal contribution (what chord is it?) or the rhythmic contribution of the track. If the guitar is a constant presence with no attack and no space between the attacks (so the ears can recover), the ears quickly learn to tune it out as background noise and search for something more interesting in the track to listen to. Certainly doubling guitars (perhaps with a bit of difference between the tracks) and panning can help as well. But if there is no "attack" content in the widely panned tracks, your two ears don't pick up the timing differences between the tracks and the spatial illusion is defeated.

Thanks Larry! No, I don't have any compression on that project.  I've been messing with it a bit in ProChannel recently though.  I'll keep messing with it.  Compression is possibly the only effect I suck more at than EQ lol.

And thanks everyone else as well.  Lot's of cool stuff to try.  Much appreciated!

For what it's worth... each of the guitars parts is heavily compressed.

So while you may not have compressed the mix... you sure as heck compressed the guitar parts... and since you are asking about the guitar parts it is going to be helpful to think about how compressed they are.

I don't know if your guitar patch has a compressor in it or if you are just hitting the distortion enough to shove the tone against the ceiling... either way the end result is the same.

best regards,
mike

OK im listening to your song/mp3 not badd but the EQ im
hearing is a issue..as a producer with many years under
mt belt.. the eq'son drums and guitars are a issue,, I never
take files and dont work for free. but if you tell me the bun
file size, i might consider, a free demo mix.. for you..jon..

BTW your song is not badd and you play quite well..vg

outboard processing is yamaha rev 1000's in pich shift
mode de tuned a little on left and right channel.. delay
is a korg sdd3000...leveling is La-2's... there is other
processors il bring in if you have the $$$..

I'm not one to claim to be a great mixer,  but one really quick trick on sonar I've found...Throw the "Vintage Channel" plug-in on your guitar (or what ever you want to "pop").  There is a combination of eq, compression and expansion in that plug in that just works.  Run thru the presets and you will fing a setting that you'll like.  Then start messing with settings--or not.  You will NOT be dissappointed. 

I listened your song. Nice song & playing...

Main problem of the mix is not in guitars:
- Drums are not punchy enough. More kick and snare, less hat and crashes. Reverb off.
- Own reverb for snare.
- Tambourine(s) are way too loud and they eat all the space in upper frequencies. I would mute them and rely on drums.
- More bass.
- 1/4 open hihat is not grooving. Mechanical.

Lead guitar sounds good. It could have more hidden delay and reverb behind it.
Rhythm guitar sound is too close to the lead guitar's sound. Try something different. Try basic doubling L & R, no or little verb.

Wider than life guitar from mono guitar: add Channel Tools and set  ~10 ms delay for L or R channel. (Check that track interleave is set to stereo.)

Listen the mix at ultra low volume to check balance.

-Panu

i feel your pain,i too am having this very problem right now..i went a buddys house last saturday night and hes got this pumping,jump right out at ya guitar sound..its killing me cause mine are thin and weak..i layer 3 tracks for rythm and three for lead..but sounds nothing compared to his 3 just centered in the mix...dont have an answer,just thought you might wanna know,your not alone

The closest thing I can compare this track to is probably Eric Johnson in guitar style. With perhaps a little less delay. Go listen to this track http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUsjURfdQ4g

You have the main guitar up front and center, like this mix, but yours is carrying a lot more low end weight. You could do a high pass around 150 on that instrument and you would provide room for the bass a little more.

Next in the EJ mix, notice how the supporting guitars are panned a little left for the brighter one and another softer rounder one on the right. Each has a corresponding and opposite delay of a few milliseconds. Just a suggestion to move the supporting guitars in a similar fashion, delay is optional but they might use some hi pass as well at least at 100hz maybe higher depending on the result compared to the rest of the mix. Once you move the guitar your snare is going to have some more room down the middle and will pop a little more as suggested above.

These subtle changes will open your mix up and give it a little width.

+1 Matt

I've not read every post on this thread, but one thing to be extremely cautious about is how much distortion you use.

Whatver you think sounds "good", back it off a little.

Too much distortion = fizzy highs = thin sound.

I/O: That song has a real nice feel to it - and the playing is quite good. Nice piece!

I tend to agree with most of the advice on this thread. Some separation of the instruments either by EQ, Compression, panning - etc.... is required. All the instruments seem to be fighting for the same space - and that is why the guitars are not "popping". First you need to separate the instruments, and there are plenty of tips in this thread for that. 

After you've created the space, one trick I use - and works especially well on a tune like yours is ducking the rhythm guitar(s) with the lead guitar. This is done with compressors and side-chaining. If you are not really familiar with the use of comps side chaining may seem foreign to you, but it's worth learning.

I'll set the attack fairly high, so when the lead guitar comes in, the rhythm drops in volume to create more space. For a song like this I would set the release fairly slow - so when the lead guitar hangs on a note, the rhythm guitar swells back into place. I'm not talking about a drastic effect here, the untrained ear should not even be aware this is happening. When done right, the rhythm part(s) will breath in behind the lead part, and always open up space, allowing the lead to "pop" out of the mix (providing you already have separation in all the instruments).

Earlier in this thread John said "Often a solo will start with the other players backing off their volume." That is essentially what this trick is doing with the other guitar(s).

Good luck in your mixing endevours. It's a never ending learning curve.

I didn't read all the posts.... but there are a number of factors in getting a guitar to pop out in the mix without being too loud.

IMHO most have to do with the following things:

EQ.... make room in the spectral landscape for the guitar. Other instruments in the same frequency range should have different eq settings from the guitars. If not the freqs will blend and you get muddy non distinct noise.

Panning, don't crowd them together. they will melt into one noise.  Watch this video, it will explain this better than I can here.    Video  Feel free to watch it all later, but initially, jump to 13 minutes into the video and stick with it. It might seem dumb to start, but it becomes clear as he goes on and will make perfect sense in the end.  Michael talks about the sonic landscape and uses pictures to illustrate his points in how this relates to mixing sound. Michael was a recording engineer on some big time sessions before he started TAXI. You have heard his work on the radio.

Enveloping, don't let everything play all the time. If a guitar is playing and a piano is playing...decide which one is more important and envelope the other one out totally or at the very least down considerably in the mix.  If you want to feature the guitar, all you need to do is lower the other instrument(s) and the guitar is suddenly clearly audible. When a guitar isn't needed , keep it enveloped down.... when a piano isn't needed, keep it enveloped down. Doing this might seem hard at first...after all,  you spent the time to record it and you want to hear it. But having everything play at the same level all the way through a mix is a recipe for crap. The only things in my mixes that tend to stay at the same level is the drums and the bass. They are the foundation. The lead vocal also tends to stay constant in level. Everything else gets enveloped and plays only at the level it's needed at, and nothing is guaranteed to be present all the way through. Listen to music on the radio, and you will hear this in action. All genre's use it to one extent or another, but country is the best to illustrate it in action.

There's really  no secret to it. Brightening and compressing will also make it louder and brighter, which translates to being able to hear it better. In addition to getting the guitar sounding right to my ears, I use the methods I listed above in my mixing regardless of what the instrumentation of the mix is.

If necessary, pull everything down and start again from square one.

Hope this helps you.