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Hey guys, sorry if this is a little noobish. I'm pretty new to mixing/mastering LSDJ tracks, so I was wondering what you guys' approaches were. Do you do a lot of post-LSDJ work in FL Studio/Logic/Reason etc, or do you try to keep it all contained to LSDJ? What are some of your typical steps when getting the mix to sound just right?
Last edited by Soleviio (Jul 8, 2012 5:24 pm)
I think I have a very noobish approach. I import it into audacity, boost the bass a little, add a tiny bit of reverb, and that's it. I'm happy with the way it sounds most of the time, I don't really need to drop $500 on ableton or something.
For my album I did a little eq-ing. Barely any, just a little high and low end in flstudio. I also put a tiny bit of reverb that's not too noticeable unless a track stopped. But the main thing I did was take one gameboy and slightly pan it to the left less than a second, and the same thing with the other gameboy but to the right. Then had the original tracks play at the correct timing. It opened the soundscape some.
But besides that it's all lsdj contained.
Other tracks (the only one available to public is Impact from the pxl-bot comp) have no reverb and different panning percentages.
Last edited by Auxcide (Jul 8, 2012 5:58 am)
That panning idea is really cool. I might steal that idea if I ever run 2 gameboys together, right now I'm just using an emulator on my computer. On a side note, I really dig your new album, auxcide.
But yeah. It's pretty much contained for me. It'll probably stay that way unless I sync it with another music software, which is unlikely.
Is the variability of LSDJ's tempo too great to possibly record each track by itself in Live mode mix them in another DAW? Or would that be cheating? 
Last edited by Soleviio (Jul 8, 2012 6:11 am)
I'm dreading doing the mixing for my next release, because it's going to not just be 2xlsdj. Which means I'm going to have to actually work to fit things into the mix just right. Ugh. Lazy. . .
When/if I start making real stuff with a gameboy instead of emulator, I'll probably start mastering it in Audacity or LMMS (I like LMMS because, like FL Studio, you can do it live rather than having to press "Preview" all the time.)
As for now, though, I try to get it sounding as good and balanced as possible within LSDJ.
Is the variability of LSDJ's tempo too great to possibly record each track by itself in Live mode mix them in another DAW? Or would that be cheating?
Good idea, I hadn't thought of that. Doing that in audacity would be somewhat of a challenge. I need new software.
Is the variability of LSDJ's tempo too great to possibly record each track by itself in Live mode mix them in another DAW? Or would that be cheating?
my gameboy is pretty good at keeping time, I think you could do that yeah! Also, I'd assume that if you mute channels then it has less stuff to process and can keep better time... can anyone confirm this?
I record the whole gameboy at once, though. Bit of EQ to roll off the dumb frequencies (steep HPF @ 40Hz, gentle LPF @ 16K and a notch at 9.25K) and a mastering compressor called endorphin to add flavour, applied in FL Studio.
If you mute channels, it still has to process the same things it has to process with these unmuted.
Only live mode helps there.
But if you work with lots of groove or tempo changes, you should probably get your effects on any channel.
+ yes, it is totally possible to record each track by itself. This way you have so much more possibilites. I was wondering all the time why noone mentioned this before.
So anyway, if you mute the channels you don't want to record, you sometimes get disturbing noises in parts where nothing is played. Especially kit-instruments cause these disturbing noises, but other channels or instruments do, too.
EQ-Protip: You get most of the DMG bassdrums at about 100 Hz.
Edit: I recommend recording single channels with the three other channels muted. The distortion sounds usually don't bother, + if they do, you can cut them out or mute them (in postprocessing). This way it is sure that your DMG will keep the tempo. Even if there are slight variations, they will be on every single channel, so every single channel will be synchron. Variations may occur, but you wouldn't be able to hear them in a full mix, because they would be too slight.
Last edited by Stern Fucking Zeit (Jul 8, 2012 7:33 am)
^ solid tips, + cheers for clarifying how channel muting relates to processing speed!
I mix all within LSDJ and really only just record the stereo out. If I were to add in other instrumentation other than the gameboy, I'd consider multi-tracking and even separating the clips by instrument (but with the way my tracks have tons of instruments...fuuuuck that for now).
Mastering I really don't do too much other than evening out some peaks with a multiband compressor. I have however been really into using Mid-Side EQ to get your bass all very mono and tight as hell. Definitely an improvement over my previous recordings.
also - This is just me but when I DID multitrack once, I had to delete all the data from the other channels that weren't being recorded. Even on mute, the DMG still processed the data and made some hiccups on my DMG. Recording one lone channel at a time made a far smoother multitracking process, at least for me.
Last edited by an0va (Jul 8, 2012 11:09 pm)
Also helps if you got the AGS's processing power. I can multitrack fine by using the solo and mute features. No hiccups.
[there's no evil teeth bared emoticon]
Is the variability of LSDJ's tempo too great to possibly record each track by itself in Live mode mix them in another DAW? Or would that be cheating?
I wouldn't trust it, personally. You can actually sync it with MIDI Clock/ARDUINO or whatever too, but I just Warp the tracks to the click in Ableton Live. 
Mastering I really don't do too much other than evening out some peaks with a multiband. I have however been really into using Mid-Side EQ to get your bass all very mono and tight as hell. Definitely an improvement over my previous recordings.
More of a general mastering question here (to which I am also a relative noob), when you're evening out your peaks, are you basically looking at the track through a spectrum analyzer as it plays and lowering peaking frequencies accordingly? If it's a global EQ, how do you get that to not affect other parts of the song where that frequency might not be peaking?
And wat.jpg on "Mid-Side EQ", please explain this magic.