This project strays a bit from my usual stuff. It is my take at rap or hip hop or as I like to call it after going through renoise “tech-hop.” Thanks for listening, and please let me know what you think. All necessary props to Shellz, who provided the youtube acapella rap here:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZABK_Jn6eaw
Here is my final product:
http://soundcloud.com/antithesisof-myvibe/shellz-youtube-acappella-aomv
I am a bit disappointed after listening to this track on my wife’s factory car stereo. The bass (although intended to be prominent) was way too loud in the mix and muddy. However, the mix sounded fine on my cerwin vegas ls-10’s and my factory car stereo (compact Toyota). I usually use at least one pair of headphones, my cerwin vegas, and my car stereo to reference my projects before posting. I thought that this would give me a good system of cross checking my mixes. But obviously, I have been missing something.
The mix is probably not without other faults, but does anyone else detect that the bass is overkill?
On that note, I have flirted with the idea of buying some entry level reference monitors to prevent these sorts of surprises in the future. Does anyone feel that a decent pair of monitors would help in this regard? (I will check for other threads on monitor recommendations)
Thanks for any input!
Hi!!!
OMG, I listened to this on my cellphone the other day, and I said to myself, “I really have to listen on my monitors when I get home,” but it slipped my mind, and I am so glad you bumped the thread!!
This is really awesome as a track. Combining her vocal, and your beats worked out well. If she is interested, you might consider a long term collab with her, cause your music fits with her.
As for what you are asking!! Yes! This mix is totally bass heavy. As you know, I never would have noticed on my cell phone, as those speakers do not tell you anything. The bass is overtaking the entire track, its not mixed well. If you tell me how you mixed this bass… ( Is there compression, is there eq, is there a little delay ) I could have more input.
I think the bass in this mix should be brought way down… and compressed, or compressed differently, and I think you need to send everything through eq… like a lp filter, with the cutoff @ 500 htz er something like that standard…
After that, I actually think you should bring the vocals up a bit… but I can’t say for sure, cause I do not know what the mix would sound like, if the bass was a little better.
Finally… “entry monitors.”
I am using Alesis MK 2… But I think they have been taken off the market, and replaced by a new product. Alesis is very good, imho!! But Adams has a new entry level too!! I believe they are called the F5. I would shy away from anything Event, or Mackie!!
Now… These ( equators ) have a 30 day Money back guarantee! ( Read the website, last time I read the site, I saw the guarantee, but I hope you confirm if you get interested in these. )
http://www.equatoraudio.com/D5_Studio_Monitors_with_DSP_p/d5.htm
I have heard ZERO feedback about these equator audios, but I keep telling myself, “next time I am in the market, I am going to try em.”
What I can tell you about the equator’s is you are purchasing factory direct!! Sometimes, when you buy factory direct, you really score. If you are a sport, and you purchase the equators, could you please post your experience in the General Forums Recent Monitor Thread…
Thanks
Hey 2 daze j,
Thanks so much for your feedback, analysis, and recommendations for the track and the monitors. It is such a let down for something to sound tight on one set up and so muddled on another, so I am determined to minimize these experiences in the future. 
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As I recall the sub-bass line as well as the bass kick have virtually no processing to them. The overall mix goes through the renoise maximizer.
I think I will bring the bass down and repost the track on soundcloud and in this thread. I will proably try a combination of eq-ing and mixer levels to achieve a better balance, but I am always open to suggestions.
I will also play with compression on bass since you suggest it, but compression is always a bit of guess work for me still. For tracks like this I rarely compress anything but the snares and/or claps and maybe the vocals.
I was reading about the equators monitors and I am definitly intrigued. As an alternative to active speaker monitors, I am considering buying a pair of nice beyerdynamic headphones for monitoring. But I know the headphones/monitors for mixing is a controversioal topic. With that said, I am always interested in more commentary on the matter. 
/> I will be reading up on the thread you mentioned.
Thanks again!
Oh, and by the way, I did send shellz a youtube message with a link to the track on soundcloud. No response yet. But I am not too hung up on it. I rarely do hip hop stuff, and bouncing around on different styles keeps me entertained.
This is a very nice track, but as 2 daze j points out, the bass is very heavy and it is unfortunate as the vocals fall in the background.
The vocals sound highpitched in some way, so I’m not sure how it will sound if you just use the gainer, but you definitely have to make it more prominent(without overdoing it of course 
)
Else I think the drums are all good, so keep up the good work!
I have gone back and replaced the soundcloud file with my updated mix, which hopefully has the bass a little more under control.
Thanks for the feedback Gotthelf and 2 daze j.
Oh and by the way, I used renoise cabinet sim on subbass and kick as well as slight Tal Reverb on the sub.
Mainly just brought the levels down on the basses and applied a high-pass to the whole thing with a really low cutoff.
Drums are cool. Missing a change up.
Thanks Alien 7. What do you mean by “missing a change up”? Do you mean like a breakdown or variation?