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To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 7:23 am
by Phen
Hi All,
I wonder if I can get some help with a question I have about this listing:

ORIGINAL, VINTAGE HARD ROCK SONGS Recorded in the 1990s are needed by an A-List Music Publisher for Film and TV sync licensing. If you’ve got old recordings that sound like they could be on a playlist with the references they gave us, or anything that would have been a playlist with those acts, you might have exactly what this awesome publisher needs:

“Seether” by Veruca Salt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jC9AUR-iTo0

“Cannonball” by The Breeders: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpoqzt2EHaA

“Real Love” by Slaughter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkrb6spsN1w

You can submit old masters or demos for this pitch. The recording quality is not expected to be on par with today’s broadcast quality! Many TAXI members have been signed by this publisher with nothing more than good demo recordings! They’re much more interested finding music that sounds authentic to the time period!

My band recorded a few songs in the late 80s-mid 90s on 1-inch reel. We never really mixed or mastered any of the songs at that time, I just ended up with a cassette "demo" (rough mix) which actually had spots where the music cut out! After having a song forwarded to this publisher from that cassette, I decided to see if I could track down the masters, which (unbelievably) were in my engineer's attic!
So, having reclaimed the master reels, I found a guy with a 1-inch deck, and had all the tracks (each individual track from kick on up to vox) transferred to digital. I did this so if the publisher was ready to pull the trigger on a deal, I could offer him either the original reels or the digital tracks instead of the lousy cassette copy.

Now I'd like to submit a song for the above listing. Having all the tracks in digital format, should I have them mixed and mastered? I can't see sending an Mp3 from the rough mix from the cassette when I have nice clean tracks ready to be finally mixed down.

Any thoughts certainly welcome and appreciated.

Thanks
Phen

add: I did do a quick mix through Audacity just so I could have something for the time being, I posted them to reverbnation. I might jump to peer-to-peer and get some feedback as to their fit with the listing.

Re: To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 8:00 am
by Paulie
Since they are looking for older sounding tracks I would do a mix using the master tracks just to get the levels right. Maintain the original recorded sound.

Re: To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 8:18 am
by Phen
Thanks, Paulie,
Ideally, I would use the reel, but the guy who transferred the tracks to mP3 wasn't set up for mixdown (and he was 70 miles away!) I t)hought I might have my guy mix the mp3s just as is, adding nothing, just to get good levels, like you said. The mP3s sound awesome, as the tape was still in great shape (I was worried about sticky tape).

Re: To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 8:31 am
by Phen
Paulie,
I think I missed your point. Do you mean listen to the demo right there while mixing so as to replicate the levels? I gotcha! Absolutely will.
Thanks!

Re: To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 10:01 am
by waveheavy
Why not 3 Mixes then? The original tape mix, a digital mimic mix of the original, and then a modern mix and master by a pro. I'd give them that choice out of all three.

Re: To Mix or Not

Posted: Tue Apr 04, 2017 12:19 pm
by Phen
Sounds good, Wave. Of course it's all moot until I hear back from him! Hopefully that will happen.
Thanks again,
Phen