This is a neat little technique for drawing the ear's attention to things in the mix that you're having trouble finding the right level for - hardly mind blowing, but interesting nonetheless:
 

The phenomena the guy describes happens every time you have a slow attack and a high compression ratio on a regular old compressor.
 
The guitar track he is trying to make stand out is too fuzzy and thick... it doesn't have the character to make it in the mix. It would have been easier if the guitarist just played a part that actually cut into the mix... it'd be especially easy if the guitar player came in with some emphasis and simply played the "attack" on principal.
 
The vocal track could have earned it's own place too... but it was performed to sound like a back ground vocal so what are you gonna do?
 
I like the idea that the video presenter speaks about listening to the mix. That gets over looked sometimes.
 
 
best regards,
mike

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I quite like the idea and I can see how it could be used to also increase the dynamics within a mix but one can still get a great mix without it too. Tone shaping is going to get you a long way there. I agree with Mike in that the sound of that guitar part would have attracted my attention long before getting it's level right within a mix. I find the better I get the tone of a given part sounding great within itself and working with other parts but also being different in some way, the less I actually have to have in its level for it to be easily heard. I find I am turning that part down. That concept is called maximum illusion, minimum voltage.
 
Also even more important is what I have mentioned before and that is what other things are going on. Look at all the other stuff that is layering on behind. Once you start reducing the overlap and creating actual space behind so the black backdrop is more clearly seen, then you can turn these parts down even further!
 
But I could also see it as being useful when there are a lot of parts present and you cannot create that space and you need another way to make a part stand out.
 
ProTools makes it easy to do what he is doing because smaller clips can be easily created and they have their clip gains and their individual clip envelopes which are very easy to shape. Studio One has the cut into smaller clips and clip gain idea too but without the more complex clip envelopes yet. Being able to change clip gain visually is great and fast too. What this guy is also suggesting is going to take longer to do as well. Some software is going to be able to do what he is suggesting easier and faster than others.
 
But thanks Sharke because I am about to go into mix mode again and might give it a shot and see what happens.
 
 

Yes, it is a curious phenomenon of audio perception. We've all had this experience: a part isn't standing out enough, so we give it a little boost and then we're happy. Sometimes the boost only needs to be 1db to make us happy. But ask yourself if a casual listener would ever notice a 1db difference. The answer is no. So why did it satisfy our own ears? Because we were actively listening for the difference, and focused on the part. To achieve the same effect for the casual listener, you have to dramatically force their focus onto it.
 
Another example. I had a minor tambourine part in a song. A friend listened to the track and commented the tambourine was too loud. As soon as he said that, I was aware that it was indeed to loud and too piercing. From then on I could not listen to the song without being annoyed by that damn tambourine. But previously, I'd listened to the song a hundred times and had actually forgotten that it had a tambourine in it at all! 
 
It's just how our auditory sense works. It's how we can hold a conversation in a noisy room. Or how, when hunting for supper, our distant ancestors could pick out the footsteps of their prey among the other sounds of the forest.
 
It's also the same mechanism that keeps us from going insane from the constant barrage of extraneous sounds in our environment. I live a mile from the freeway, but I usually don't hear it. At least, not until I think about it - then suddenly it's very loud and very annoying. So I try not to think about it. Oh, dang it, too late - now I'll be hearing it all day!

It's a similar phenomenon to tinnitus - ordinarily I don't notice it, as soon as anyone says "how's your tinnitus" it manifests out of nowhere.
 
Dang! I just said the 'T' word

Buzz buzz buzz ...
 
I've said this before but people need to have their blood pressure checked too.  Tinnitus (oops, said it!) can be aggravated by that condition.  Not hearing is bad enough - no heart beat is a bit more immediate of a problem.
 
@

And the phenomenon that Bit mentions is also all too often at work in the opposite direction, i.e. we get obsessive about small things in the mix that the casual listener will never hear or care about, but we'll sometimes happy whack the good stuff about a mix to get rid of those little, non-important things, particularly in the early days of learning how it all works.
 

Cool method, I can see where this would be useful at times.  Thanks for sharing.

I have realised that I have been doing it in a fashion. I think it can be useful and could add some excitement to the music. In a section there may be a few parts that enter all at once and settle to a level. It can work to bring some of the initial hits up a tad in level and even 1 or 2 dB works well. Once something is established we hear it from then on but the levels of those parts can drop after a while. I have been doing by hand too. I send buses out or those stems to a digital mixer and can make changes to bus levels nicely by moving faders. You can play those controls like an instrument.
 
This is what I like about working with a K system approach through tracking, the buses and the final master. If you are at K-14 then you have got 14 dB of headroom to move and it allows level changes in anything actually to be done easily without a hint of distortion present. And with 14 dB of headroom up your sleeve they can be significant changes if you want them to be. That premastered mix is going to end up with nicer dynamics at the end of the day.
 
This approach works when you are doing things like maybe have an accordion part under a vocal track along with other instruments. The vocals stop for 8 bars and some instrument takes the lead. The accordion can jump up 3 dB now and sit louder especially at the start of a phrase. It can also ease back so the next few phrases might be 2 dB down but another instrument might just step into the lead position by coming up another 2 dB. A good mix has always got some well positioned commanding lead sound with everything else supporting at the right volume and maybe jumping around in dynamics a little to add some excitement.
 
While some things get their attack portion turned up a little, other things can benefit from their initial attack portion being softer and making its way up to the correct or nominal level. Creates room and a little space for something else to exist or appear louder without changing its level at all. What is very important too is the shape of the envelope of the attack portion returning to normal after it has boosted or ducked. How smooth that is. Bad changes are easily heard and do not sound good. Smoothness here so you cannot hear the sound returning to normal in any way, it has just happened.
 
This is where it is important in your software as to how easy it is to create that new clip or attack portion of a full clip the see its automation, clip gain, adjust accordingly, tweak envelope on return to adjacent clip level. How fast was all that. Pro Tools has a separate clip automation independent of the track automation. Studio One gets away with it by adding in the fades into the ends of the clips. There is a lot of control over the shape of those fades. They can form the return envelope easily. Being able to do all that visually and often very well by eye makes it easier and a little faster too.