rimshot
thanks for the kind words....
you know, your ears do not decieve..
i used room mics, and just a tiny bit of room reverb (via sends to a separate bus) to push the guitars back a bit.
when i first mixed it, it was bone dry, and just didn't work for me.
i went from direct, back to mics,and pullled them back a bit, then added some room mic and even added verb, in very small increments, until the guitars set back.
 
 
makeshift
you know, i guess i went and saw KISS as a headliner back in the mid 70's, whenever it was that styx was first breaking, before shaw, and they opened for kiss, and so i saw them when they were really rocking, before they leaned into the more top 40 stuff..
they were really tight, and had a great live sound.
and yes, NOT punching in is harder....
but after you've done 10 full takes, it really makes you focus to nail a part.
heheh

beagle
thanks for listening!
yes, slammed mix, this is fully mastered, and sits at 8 on the dynamic range scale, which is pretty hot.
not as hot as a lot of 2014 hard rock mixes, and at 8, this is as hot as i will ever go.
maybe, i'll back it down some.
DR of 12, to me, is perfect, for almost any genre.
so, tieing into rimshot's previous comment, he says the guitars are 'more back' than usual...
and you are saying kinda the opposite, that they are too far foward,
and i'm guessing this means i just didn't nail the vocal mix, more than what the guitars are really doing......
it's tricky, but i typically move all the guitars out away from center, and leave that for ONLY the kick, snare, bass and lead vocal.
i do like the vox sitting more INTO the mix, instead of on top of it.
thanks for the comments, i'm listening......

HD 380 Pro
Everything goes through very well - but I really want to hear the lead singing better - up with the volume there;-)
Otherwise a very nice song.

eko
thanks for listening, and letting me know about your listening setup...
 
interesting thoughts about the vocal levels......
can you ever NOT hear the lyric enough to understand the words....?
my perspective of it must be slightly off...

I listened using AKG K240DF cans, and the experience was uplifting.  It also sounded good through my KRK Rokit 8's.  All in all, it sounds well balanced to me.  Regardless of your goal, I think you're getting better and better every time, in all phases.

I am the same way Bat, I like my vocals to sit a little more into the mix. Or another way to look at it, I like the instrumentation to wrap around the vocals more, than having the vocal sit on top.

I remember back in those days of old, frequently pulling out those album jackets to read the lyrics, because you couldn't always understand exactly what was being sung. I don't think that any of our modern mixes are to that extreme, but I learn more towards being wrapped by the music, as opposed to sitting way out on top.

lynn
thanks for that, lynn...
both systems, that's good to get a feel for what translates out of the bigger krk's vs the headphones....
actually, the more i mix, the more i learn and experiment, but it's still no where near where i want to be yet.


makeshift
yes, i think we are similar that way, about how we hear things....that method of mixing is just a feel thing....

and i much prefer to be drawn into a mix, than have it slap me in the face...

a song like this one (following light) has SO much going on in it....
yet, it all is supposed to flow together, so you are not so aware of all the elements at once...
 

plus, i intentionally play a bit loose, so that the parts are more obvious..
rather than nail parts to the Nth degree, which i can do, but don't like the feel of it.
i'm like somewhere between the stones and Rush..... LOL.... as far as my feel for things,
and i guess my mix style follows that to some degree.
 

HD 380 pro. Sounds just great, nothing I could add to make this sound better. I get where you are coming from in regards making the vocals part of the overall performance, even though one of my bugbears is not being able to hear a great vocal line, but there is nothing wrong with the way the vocals are mixed here.
Everything seems clear and where it's supposed to be. Stereo separation is, for lack of a better word, perfect. I particularly like the clarity of the acoustic guitar, but the whole song seems really well recorded. If you haven't already guessed, I'm impressed. I wish I could get my songs to sound this good.

REBEL
thanks for listening, i appreciate it.
 
hd380's, nice cans. er, headphones.
LOL
 
not trying to sexist here....
 
even tho i wrap my lyric/vox back a bit compared to pop mixes, i still try to get the eq such that everything is clear.
 
sometimes i think it is just the level of quality of playback systems that makes or breaks certain mixes.
i do a bit of hard LCR mixing, and that seems to not only help with clarity, but also with any phase issues.
seems the more i play with inbetween panning positions, the more it falls apart when summed to mono.
 
i used to like to play with stereo widening and phase tricks, copied and moved tracks, etc, but after several years of trying all those tricks, i've decided it mostly phooks with phase, and is not worth it.
 
 

Listened to it again,but this time through the speakers and had no trouble hearing the vocal at all. The stereo separation of the speakers opened a hole in the middle and the vocal was coming thru loud and clear as opposed to when I listened with the headphones. Thought you might want to know..