'Worlds beyond the vail' Production

Electra_In_Hades · **Posted:** Tue Apr 13, 2004 9:47 pm

This will proberbly start a great mass-debate, which is good;

I was just listening to 'Worlds beyond the vail' album, and i'm not disputing that its a good album or a bad production because clearly its not; far from it, its a fantastic album on the contrary; but when i stuck it on my hi-fi i noticed that the sound or production was sloppy, i couldn't work out weather it was because Leon Macey's instruments are so down tuned that it created a kind of fuzzed up even muffed up sound, or weather the production was just poor. i turned the treble up and it sounded perfect, the guitars where clear and more defined, rayners vocals sounded better, actually the whole album sounded better.

Was that deliberately done? the muffed sound? was that how it was intended? or was it because of poor production...

...please do try it on your stereo before you critise me... What are everyones views on this? Your invited to speak...

i think that i might re-record it just like i tuned it on my stereo

Weasel · **Posted:** Tue Apr 13, 2004 10:32 pm

Electra - You Came and They Were Silent. :lol:

Weasel · **Posted:** Tue Apr 13, 2004 11:39 pm

I think it's all a matter of personal preference with production. Take for example '...and justice for all' ; some people hate the production and say it's overproduced with 'clicky' drums whereas others love the production. I suppose sometimes it pays to have a decent graphic equaliser but then you're not listening to the music as the artist intended it to sound. I use mine for listening to either really old recordings or badly produced/mixed/recorded music....it still doesn't get rid of Lars Ulrich's trashcan snare on St Anger though!! (not that I listen to St. Anger much)

Weasel · **Posted:** Tue Apr 13, 2004 11:50 pm

Hmmm.......all those supposedly 'true' fans that said they'd thump someone in the chops if they 'dissed' Mithras!! B@LL5H!T! Where are all your posts then or are you all just a bunch of idle buggers (see Board Problems section). I thought there would be at least one other person with an opinion...maybe not. :lol:

Toozey · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 12:54 am

I'm a sucker for treble, in proudction and gutair tones. This album doesn't have an awful lot of Treble in it, the gutairs have alot of mids. Even though this isn't my personal preference for guitar sounds it works. The gutiars mesh together and blend and its all very spacey at points. I think it suits the style and soundscape the album is trying to acheive perfectly.

Electra_In_Hades · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 12:26 pm

Yes but the spaciness sound and atmosphere; in my opinion is emphasised a great more when treble is added, its more emphatic than the mid tones and bass tones that mithras use, so therefore your apotheosis or rather theory has been devalued by my opinion (too Toozey) the lack of treble stifles the music, like you said it blends all the instuments together, yet as a result this demeans what macey is actually playing because you can't hear (for example) maceys guitar in its entirety, you get an overall muffed sound rather than clear notes, its not very nice to listen too, it sounds like one big noise. This is ment as no insult to mithras of course because i love their music; i just think that the lack of treble demeans what mithras are trying to achieve, quite the reverse.

O and Weasel, i take it that wasn't wit that came to you naturally huh? how long did i take you to think up of something so remotely funny? Two weeks? longer?

Toozey · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 2:48 pm

I can see what your trying to say with your opinion and I can understand the reasoning behind it but lets wait for Leon to tell us what they were trying to acheive sonically, "i just think that the lack of treble demeans what mithras are trying to achieve"

No point in arguing over something neither of us can really prove and hey its all down to personal preferences in guitar tones.

Weasel · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 4:34 pm

Electra_In_Hades · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:15 pm

No Toozey your not getting it, i posted it to generate some kind of reaction in the members yeh, (aside from me actually believing it of course). You were so quick to defend Metallica when that idiot Weasel slagged them off, you argued with intense force and vigour that it went on for a few pages. Here i stand "Dissing" Mithras, disputing weather their production is good, and you give me a lame answer, "Wait until leon tells us" then that will be the end of it, excuse me. No wonder why no one wants to post anything...i quit with this, its like i keep hitting a brick wall...

Weasal it was lamely funny, i wasn't praising you. Everything comes to you naturally...Like your ballshit? :lol:

now that was funny!

Electra_In_Hades · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:19 pm

i agree with you both Toozey and Weasel that it is down to personal preference, However its not what i was getting at, i asked a question on weather the production was deliberate or poor.

Toozey · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:24 pm

Ah I see

Matty_T · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:24 pm

i think it was deliberately meant to sound like that. Also imo it does sound really good.

Leon · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:14 pm

Hi

;

regarding the "muffled" production, if you make a cursory comparison to albums considered to have an "amazing" production in this genre by popular concencus of fans and producers (i.e Morbid Angel's 'Covenant' or 'Domination', or lets say Nile 'In their Darkened Shrines') you will find that both Mithras albums have a similar amount of (if not more) high frequencies or "top end".

When albums are mixed in a studio, it's commonplace to compare your mixes with other bands to asses the equalization and then to test your own master on many different systems to make sure it's clearly audible which is what I always do when mixing and mastering a band.

If you think it hasn't got enough top end, i'd say the problem lies with your stereo or maybe you are listening to music before or after putting 'Worlds...' on with a totally different sound (like some real top endy black metal). Like i said before, for the genre the production is similar sounding.

The beauty of it is, if you want it to have more top end because that's what your ears want to hear, then use the eq on your hi-fi, thats what it's for. A good way of getting your hi-fi to sound good, is to use a cd which has universally acknowledged production and play with the eq until it sounds good to your ears, then you'll be set for all your other cds.

On my studio monitors the album sounds great, on my crappy hifi it sounds great, on my discman it sounds great too, and on the pa system at rehearsal it sounds fucking amazing compared to nile which is just a blurred boomy mess when turned up extremely loud (i'm talking 120dB here though, not levels you could have in a house without a 2000watt pa system and being arrested within 30 minutes).

Regarding what we wanted to hear, with 'Worlds...' we decided to go with a real sounding guitar with some midrange, not a fizzy sound that is unusable live. I've done sound for many metal bands and sound engineers always have to boost the mid range on guitars in bands when the guitarist has decided to use a sound that sounds "HEEEVEEY" in his bedroom but sounds inaudible at a gig and blends in with everything else (im talking about a sound with no middle which is all boom, fart and fizz btw). We also went for clearer vocals growled bass and defined drums that weren't just a click for a bass drum and a quiet indistinct "duum....." for the toms.

btw i think you are referring to 'Worlds beyond the veil' as opposed to 'Worlds beyond the vail' :wink:

cheers

Guest · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:57 pm

ok mithras so i've been told; and put in my place... You say it sounds great on your shitty hifi, well on my shitty high fi it sounds crap (not the music the sound)! i know nothing about black metal music, or other death metal bands i dont listen to that stuff i listen to classical music; so i have nothing to compare worlds beyond with in that same genre. My ears don't crave a "Top end" sound or tone, i don't know what this means; all i know is what i hear, so your answer to my question was that it was deliberate? ok thats fine good.

Guest · **Posted:** Wed Apr 14, 2004 8:15 pm

I'll come back to this when i've listened to this album on a better stereo this weekend. But as far as i'm concerned on my stereo which apparently is not shit, worlds beyond...as it is sounds messy, with treble mithras i can hear the drums properly and the guitars all are intelligable.

Electra_In_Hades

'Worlds beyond the vail' Production

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