I'm sure alot of the people hear have recorded a project once in their life, I was just wondering what everybody thinks a good mix is. And don't forget to mention your style of music too.

For me I would say a good mix is a nice clear sound, close to the real thing as possible.
Good separation of instruments
no clipping
and I think a recording should be just ONE great take. Not a bunch of punch ins.

Sorry to break your heart but NOBODY does "one great take." Like seriously, to think otherwise would not only be naive but foolish. And the things you mentioned are basically what the purpose of quality recording, mixing and mastering attempts to achieve.

Btw i write and record Melodic Death Metal day in and day out.

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Hes right, the days of the "one great take" ended long ago.

As far as mixes go, I like the instruments, particularly the guitar and the bass to sort of mesh together to create a single texture. Ive never been a fan of squeaky clean production. I like a big thick wall of sound. Think Opeth's "My Arms, Your Hearse" or Mudvaynes first album (technically) "L.D. 50".

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When it comes to layering guitars, 'one great take' per track is virtually impossible, you need to go riff by riff, bit by bit. Solos can be another story.

A good recording process results in a good mix for me. The order usually goes like this:

1. Make sure you have the best tone for recording possible when you start, for whatever instrument.
2. Record all the tracks [in mono or stereo if you had a mix idea in mind].
3. Make sure there are no timing errors/edit all unwanted noise out.
4. Pan everything as you see fit.
5. Begin to compress and add external effects.
6. MASTER IT.

Mastering can do so much for a recording it's not even funny, but nothing will fix a shitty inital recording.

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Actually believe it or not alot of the "pros" Do bit by bit on solos too. But obviously sometimes thats over kill, but sometimes its needed to do things like.. playing like.. #1 guitars solos.. then like ending with a long held out bend while #2 Guitar solo comes in and does its thing.

But you basically summed it up quite nicely.

Now here is a good question for you that i was thinking on the long drive back to my college.

When would you add reverb into your mixing. I mean Do you add a little bit of reverb to each instrument (that needs it, i.e. guitar, vocals, and drums) and then come back later on the finished part and add reverb over the whole thing? Or do you completely create dry tracks then do it at the end?

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It's better to record everything as dry as possible, so you can adjust everything in relation to everything else later.

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Well thats not exactly what i've heard before. Not to mention what would be the point of having onboard effects on every recording mixer? Sure its possible to run everything out into it, run it through the processessor and then back out to your recording software/hardware.

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Or you could use software effects.

But my philosophy would be record dry with little to no gain, but use an amp for monitoring, layer the dry signal trough different amplification methods (could be software, could be analogue), and when the layers sound nice, run them though some live effects, and adjust as nessecary. Record the wet signal.

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Running in and out of the PC definately doesn't sound like a good idea. Definately not a good idea to turn analoge data to digital data and back a shit ton of times. I could imagine alot of... quality being lost along the way. Although its possible it could be only noticed by extremely keen ears, or not even at all.

I can understand the recording dry, cause thats what i kind of have been doing until recently. But the little to no gain.. eh... thats proably where i would imagine my most disagreement would be. But i just got a new mixer so i still got alot of toying to do.

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Just thought about something else i'd add in that i remembered.

The good thing obviously about doing dry recordings is the ability to change and ad over different effects. But the problem with t hat is the type effects that would be added such as delay and reverb i would imagine are best created through real time changes. Granted. You could do like you said run it out to a piece of hardware then back in (individual pieces not the entire thing) and do it that way.. but eh.. seems a lil shifty. I still need to try it though> i seem to never have enough time for experimentation anymore. Sucks doing it by youself, cause i'd like somebody else to play while i work on mike placement and shit like that.

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well, recording with little gain but a lot of layering is what Opeth does. You may or may not like their music, but one has to agree they have great production, that "brutal but clear enough to hear all individual notes" tone

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Intresting. I have found that alot of layering sometimes for me has produced almost chorus sounding like effects on my music. Especially during some of the parts that say i'm doing lots of triplets on say on open e string (tuned to c duh. ) but anyways, it often sounds muddy as hell. Its possible that i should concentrate on the timing of the multiple guitars better.

Also when you say layering.. do you mean... multiple guitars playing the EXACT same thing or just harmonizes and leads and so on?

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what works for me is just recording the clean signal, and running that through different amps and different eq's. I use software amp simulations, so it's not that awkward in my case

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As for me, I like printing effects straight onto the recording, because to my ears when I add guitar effects to a part it IS PART of the guitar riff, not an enhancement.

Layering can mean doubling parts to make them thicker [usually done on rhythms] or harmonizing. Layering I found is best done with less gain than you'd normally use playing live, but not TOO little. Also, to eliminate that 'chorusy' crap that occurs, your parts have to be DEAD ON. Sometimes I've had to edit parts in milliseconds to get them to match up and layer correctly, but I find it's best to just play the damn thing correctly in the first place, it's quicker.
It also helps enhance the sound of the guitar layering by using a slightly different guitar tone on every layer, i.e. in your case, roll off the bass alot on the second layer. Remember mids are what makes guitars sound full and heavy. Recording tones most certaintly must be different than the ones you use live, especially if you're going direct in. Experimentation and practice is a must.
How you pan the layers depends on two things - what you want the mix to sound like and how many layers you recorded.

EDIT : About reverb. I find it better NOT to put reverb on every instrument when you're recording them unless you're going for a specific effect in mind. Drums will naturally have some kinda reverb on them, especially if you're doing it from a module. Keep everything as dry as you can before you start adding effects unless, like I said earlier, you have a certain goal in mind, or the effect is a part of the part [i.e. chorus on a clean part or a delay during a solo.]

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I think i kinda know where you are going with this. I.E. like how death usually has some pretty heavy delay/reverb going on their guitars.

But I can see what you mean with different eq and tones with multiplte layers. I didn't even really think about that. If anything that would definately allow for more access to the entire spectrum of the EQ for the different instruments. I find that also good bass eqing and recording also really helps with thickining up an entire song. duhhh but yeah.

This conversation definately gives me some food for thought next time I start some recordings.

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