Dj Caut!on - This Is Spartaaa!

[djcaution]

http://caution.frih.net/sparta-b.jpg

My latest hard trance mix. Enjoy!

-------------------DOWNLOAD HERE------------------- (http://caution.getproxied.com/CAUT!ON-THIS_IS_SPARTAAA.mp3)

Tracklist
1- Andrea Montorsi - Don't leave me
2- Amber D - Kirei
3- Jason Cortez - In My Dreams
4- Masif DJ's - Everyday [Steve Hill vs Technikal mix]
5- The Prodigy remix by Unknown - Voodoo People
6- Brookman & COE - Panzan [Edison Factor mix]
7- Dark Monks - Insane [Steve Murano mix]
8- Greg Brookman - Tweakin
9- Edison Factor - Engage
10- Unknown - Boogie2nite trance remix
11- Mark Gray - Why Am I?

[Berbs]

Wickedly good!

[freaky_alien]

not really my type of music, pretty banging hard house. aside from that, the levels seemed to be pretty off from track to track. one was clipping and maxed out, then the next was quiet and empty sounding. i always used to hard limit my mixes for a long time to get the levels sounding even, but that can sometimes kill a set. the best way to do it its to watch your levels all the time.

[djcaution]

yea, I went for a new style of normalizing that someone suggested to me when I first released it and it made it sound like shit, so wanting to just quickly get the upload fixed I just converted the raw wav to mp3 so it's not normalized. Except for a bit of clipping I find the volume increasing kinda builds with the set nicely for the most part..

[freaky_alien]

the first and last track seem to have the same level, a few seem weaker and a few are clipping.

it also could be the quality of the vinyl as well. people can talk about how vinyl sounds better than cd with the whole digital vs analogue debate but throw a bad pressing into the mix and your sound quality suffers huge.

reminds me of my hard german trance in a way...

[Berbs]

I use a free program called Audacity

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

when I record it allows me to monitor my volumes very nicely during a mix, but this program is pretty good for something free and I've never tweeked a mix after recording it, is that good or bad, I'm not sure :p and I think for now it will serve it's perspose till I get a bigger HD. Its a fairly small program, so with the tiny size of my PC I needed something like that.

[crono_]

I actually had this problem in "Impulse". Everything was EQ'd equally according to the mixer but after listening to finished product some of the tracks do sound quieter then others, more specifically their bass. Not knowing how to Normalize or Master properly I did my best to fix it but am not sure it made much of a difference. Hopefully the set is still enjoyable to listen to.

Regarding the sound quality of CD's vs Vinyl, I really don't think it has much (if anything) to do with what format the track is on but rather how the track itself is mastered. It's tough to compensate for a track that was mastered poorly, especially when mixing on the fly.

On a side note - I've got "Everyday" stuck in my head. The original of that track was one of my favorite Trance tunes from when I first started partying =)

[LSDave]

I actually had this problem in "Impulse". Everything was EQ'd equally according to the mixer but after listening to finished product some of the tracks do sound quieter then others, more specifically their bass. Not knowing how to Normalize or Master properly I did my best to fix it but am not sure it made much of a difference. Hopefully the set is still enjoyable to listen to.

Regarding the sound quality of CD's vs Vinyl, I really don't think it has much (if anything) to do with what format the track is on but rather how the track itself is mastered. It's tough to compensate for a track that was mastered poorly, especially when mixing on the fly.

On a side note - I've got "Everyday" stuck in my head. The original of that track was one of my favorite Trance tunes from when I first started partying =)


alot of these problems could be fixed with good monitors while recording.
I have a fairly decent set of speakers and no sub, and when i record i found tooo much bass. added a sub, and now when i record things seem fine.

A good generic normalize in soundforge is to use the -16db rms(music) preset

also the djm 600s level indicators dont offer alot for fine accuracy.. your best bet is your ears. good headphones and toggling between cues is the best way to tell before you bring in a mix.

as for caut!on, if you record something clipped. your screwed. you cant fix that. you should always record a mix a little quieter, then boost the levels or use a maximizer after normalizing the mix.

[crono_]

Ya my speakers suck. They're loud but the quality of sound isn't that fantastic. That's what you get for buying them in a Future Shop parking lot out of the back of someones van lol But hey they've lasted for around 5 or 6 years so at least I got my moneys worth ;)

[Berbs]

your best bet is your ears. good headphones and toggling between cues is the best way to tell before you bring in a mix.


Doesn't everyone do this, this is the way I mix, as well as listening to the mix as I'm doing it, home setups lend themselves to allow for this very well, for this reason, you can really hear what the mix sounds like.

Sometimes it's important to get out of your headphones while your mixing just to learn your volumes, this was a hard lesson for me but figuring it out made all the differnce, though I will never claim to be 100% proficiant at it yet.

I also think having good recording volume set on the mixer is a great way to make sure you don't go over, I love to crank it so I have a pretty low volume set for my booth/line out/line in to the PC and I know I can go up as much as I want on the mixer and I will never get into the red in the first place.

[loprogression]

as for caut!on, if you record something clipped. your screwed. you cant fix that. you should always record a mix a little quieter, then boost the levels or use a maximizer after normalizing the mix.

If you clip only a couple times during the mix you can fix it with a de-clicker such as Waves X-Click. If its clips a bunch of times, toss the mix and have a re-do.

Record quiet like Dave said, or record with a limiter set to just below zero. You can record with a compressor too, but I've never tried that so can't comment on that one.

That's what you get for buying them in a Future Shop parking lot out of the back of someones van lol But hey they've lasted for around 5 or 6 years so at least I got my moneys worth ;)

haha. nice!

[LSDave]

If you clip only a couple times during the mix you can fix it with a de-clicker such as Waves X-Click. If its clips a bunch of times, toss the mix and have a re-do.

Record quiet like Dave said, or record with a limiter set to just below zero. You can record with a compressor too, but I've never tried that so can't comment on that one.



haha. nice!

being that he IS a dj:DJsmile:, i doubt its just clipped a few times, usually one track at minimum.

[djcaution]

I just looked at the wav in soundforge and I don't actually see any clipping anywhere.. it comes damn close especially during the 'engage' track but it comes just under maxing out every time. Am I wrong here?

[loprogression]

I just looked at the wav in soundforge and I don't actually see any clipping anywhere.. it comes damn close especially during the 'engage' track but it comes just under maxing out every time. Am I wrong here?

I'd have to actually see the waveform myself but my guess is it was recorded at to high a level, and of course your built in soundcard would just normalize whatever it records, in other words your stuff could be pushing +10 db or whatever when its recorded but the output would be right at 0.0 db.

[f/64]

You could also be running red on the mixer, and if the output volume is down then the line into the pc would not be overloaded. But Clipping could happen

[mahalliner]

BTW best image ever to accompany the mix.

[freaky_alien]

BTW best image ever to accompany the mix.

i agree. i saw a wet floor sign today and thought of the caut!on cover. nice. did you make that yourself??

[Bluejay]

Yea, this was one of the first things I noticed when I started recording my sets. I've started using the level meter on the mixer now, but it still seems to be inconsistent in some regards. Like, I'll have tracks that say they're putting out the same dB, but some sound really loud and bright, and others kind of faded and dull.

I figured it might be something with the records, but wasn't too sure of the specifics. Were they just produced/pressed differently? or is it from a lot of wear and tear? And how bout the difference between 30 and 45 RPM? You've got more data and power on a 45, right? (it's spinning faster, so more power, and there's more surface area devoted to each sound, so more data).

So how much mastering/tweaking do people do to their sets once they're recorded?

When I was just starting, I had to fix mine quite a bit to get the levels right, but now I'm starting to get the hang of keeping the levels balanced while I'm recording, so aside from the odd mistake I don't really touch them much.

Do you guys know how popular it is for people to master their recordings?

[LSDave]

Yea, this was one of the first things I noticed when I started recording my sets. I've started using the level meter on the mixer now, but it still seems to be inconsistent in some regards. Like, I'll have tracks that say they're putting out the same dB, but some sound really loud and bright, and others kind of faded and dull.

I figured it might be something with the records, but wasn't too sure of the specifics. Were they just produced/pressed differently? or is it from a lot of wear and tear? And how bout the difference between 30 and 45 RPM? You've got more data and power on a 45, right? (it's spinning faster, so more power, and there's more surface area devoted to each sound, so more data).

So how much mastering/tweaking do people do to their sets once they're recorded?

When I was just starting, I had to fix mine quite a bit to get the levels right, but now I'm starting to get the hang of keeping the levels balanced while I'm recording, so aside from the odd mistake I don't really touch them much.

Do you guys know how popular it is for people to master their recordings?

45 gives you better frequency response, mainly in the low frequencies, because the grooves can be wider. im not sure what you mean by power tho. also, 45's have less recording time on them. as for levels, thats up to the person who recorded the main "master" record that duplication gets made from.

your level indicators may not be totally accurate, depending on the mixer. What kind of mixer is it? but from my experience, level indicators get you real close and your ears gotta do the rest.

[Bluejay]

By power I mean, it's louder and got more Umph. Like, even with the speakers off, you can hear the difference with just the needle on the record, it's got a lot more power to it. With the mixer on, I find the signal comes through stronger, and I need to trim it more to compensate for the difference (compared to a 30 RPM record).

My mixer's an old Vestax PMC-170A. Old, but good. I'm quite pleased. (think I paid $250 for it last January). I especially like how the up-faders are nice and solid, with good tension too. It was nice to learn on. Now I'm using a Behringer VMX-300 that's set up at the house, which is a nice mixer to move to cause the up-faders are nice and light and quick, plus there's wicked kill switches and more level meters, etc. Haven't tried recording with it yet, though (need to get a computer set up to record, still moving in). I'll see how it records when I'm all set up.

[djcaution]

i agree. i saw a wet floor sign today and thought of the caut!on cover. nice. did you make that yourself??


hehe thanks! yessir I did :biggrin: you can see the actual wet floor writing through the reverse side of the sign if you look carefully

[freaky_alien]

hehe thanks! yessir I did :biggrin: you can see the actual wet floor writing through the reverse side of the sign if you look carefully

yeah i noticed the other side was normal. good job on the diy!

[Berbs]

So how much mastering/tweaking do people do to their sets once they're recorded?

When I was just starting, I had to fix mine quite a bit to get the levels right, but now I'm starting to get the hang of keeping the levels balanced while I'm recording, so aside from the odd mistake I don't really touch them much.

Do you guys know how popular it is for people to master their recordings?

I've never tweeked/fix/mastered a mix, I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing. I know alot of DJ's do master their mixes though.

[LSDave]

I've never tweeked/fix/mastered a mix, I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing. I know alot of DJ's do master their mixes though.

just some simple mastering can improve the sound quality of a mix dramatically

[loprogression]

Yea, this was one of the first things I noticed when I started recording my sets. I've started using the level meter on the mixer now, but it still seems to be inconsistent in some regards. Like, I'll have tracks that say they're putting out the same dB, but some sound really loud and bright, and others kind of faded and dull.

That would be an issue of compression and limiting, where certain tracks are not mastered as well as they should be. Or maybe you are using old records where the quality has decreased. A good example is with my tracks, its level will be visually the same as another commercially produced track, but will be quieter, because i don't have a professional mastering my tracks so i have to compensate on the volume. As I get more experience mastering its becoming less of an issue though.

I figured it might be something with the records, but wasn't too sure of the specifics. Were they just produced/pressed differently? or is it from a lot of wear and tear? And how bout the difference between 30 and 45 RPM? You've got more data and power on a 45, right? (it's spinning faster, so more power, and there's more surface area devoted to each sound, so more data).

Ya, that has something to do with it.