Applied Aesthetics In A Mixing Context
Over this last month I have worked on a 3-track project with an artist which has been aesthetically focussed to fit an outsider, somewhat low-fidelity and down beat sound. Using inspirations of the audio qualities of released records by artists such as Daniel Johnston and Jeffery Lewis, we aimed for a dark and moody style with the tracks to bring together the melancholic lyrics / vocals with the disenent guitar falling in and out of melody, calamity / rhythm in a overall disassociating atmosphere, which I emphasised in the mixing stage to enhance the audio quality from its original recording files.
With tracks by artists such as those previously mentioned also utilizing low quality recording techniques, we were keen towards a sound which similarly encapsulated this aesthetic. A track with similar themes regarding the haunting vocals, rhythmic dissent and somewhat intoxicated style which we kept in mind by Daniel Johnston [1] made for a good reference anchor of the types of audio effect we wanted going into the production based on the content of the lyrics of the three tracks and the artists insight aiming towards similar effect with regard to the overall compositions.
As with the artist’s own limitations the tracks we produced did have a low-quality recording setup, using only a phone’s microphone, however this decision was made alongside the limitations as we agreed that this was the way to record such a set of tracks to achieve the characteristic which we were after, and in retrospect even if clean studio recording was possible for this I still believe the setup lended greatly to the raw, exposed and dark tone we aimed for, with the outsider aesthetic fitting the use of a rudimentary microphone adding character to its signal response, slight warp of clarity and the odd physical knock and bump creating completely unexpected tone shifts which I felt then made for interesting changes and effects to the final audio which massively added to the aesthetic we had aimed for. Along with this stylistic choice however came
a need for significant mixing and processing to bring the files to a level of quality which was still highlighting the bright tones that came through and the smooth glints of harmony to polish and shine as with the dark and moody undertones and style being the heavy focus I felt it important to still subtly push through those contrasting elements which would help keep the melancholia moving in the listeners senses between dark and bright.
With the process of recording done with the lonely mobile recording, these files for mixing were imported into Logic Pro X where the mixing process began. Each of the three tracks had slightly differing overall drive and feel behind them, however all were to fit the outsider aesthetic and came at a relatively similar overall dry tone to begin with, therefore they got similar EQ applied, cutting out low-end below ~60Hz to remove sub rumble, boosting the high-mids significantly for balance and ~165 Hz cut and the surrounding lower / higher from this point boosted to reduce the boxy tone and drive the warmth through. In the signal flow chain of each track the EQ actually came after two processing units, firstly tape delay with no delay-time and tweaks to the wet/dry balance as well as feedback amounts, timbre characterizing frequency range tweaks and stereo imaging processing to bring the audio from a dry recording to an immersive and expansive signal which maintained the element of space and in-your-head style movement within the mix which I thought nicely lent to the aesthetic aspects of internal conflict portrayed through the lyrical context. Between the tape-delay and EQ on each track was the compressor, this was set to glue the recordings and ring out the higher string transients whilst simultaneously dipping the guitar behind the vocals as is found in Bob Dylan’s “It’s Alright Ma” [2] to highlight what is vocally conveyed as it cuts above the gloomy guitar and pushes it down in the mix adding to the movements I aimed to draw out from the mix.
Each track then passed through reverb units to place the compressed and EQ’d signal back in a space which fit the aesthetic of being an outsider, course aiming here to re-introduce the distance somewhat lost dynamically through the compressor and building it back up now with the emphasized transients and special qualities produced by the tape-delay signal in there. These all then lastly passed through an adaptive limiter to boost the final signal through before going to the stereo mix and aux channels. Each track along with the insert effects present also got sent at some stage through their playback to at least one of two aux channels, these aux’s each in turn added more modulating effects to the signals primarily including chorus on one and a rotary emulator on the other. These were used with automation changing the send level of each aux throughout the playback, with all three tracks fluctuating with the chorus aux route and the rotor used mostly on the third track.
The aspect of melancholia and error was a recurring element of the aesthetic, implementing this through the mixing stage I utilized the pre-existing errors in the recordings of knocks to the microphone in the third track to emphasize a different approach to this representation through the mix by working this into something still hopefully listenable. As the knock and subsequent drastic tone shift to a muffle coincided with a lyric referring to blindness we ran with the error and decided to fill that now warped sonic space into something dissociative with the rotary spinning effect I designed on the aux.
Below attached are two bounces of the project, the initial recordings before the mixing stage and then also the final mix. All three songs are in each file, with a runtime totalling 8:30.
Dry Recordings - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1r54c55T4VLACrIW_obSDhhPPBIJGIZtK/view?usp=sharing
Mixed - https://drive.google.com/file/d/19-FzoqmM-Zk7_6T1-EoXWq8HSeRRZZnC/view?usp=s haring
[1] The Last Time I Did Acid I went Insane - Jeffrey Lewis Band - 03.09.2001 -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4suOoKtqMs
[2] It’s Alright Ma’ - Bob Dylan - 1965 -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CJHbfkROow
