Here Today... Gone To Hell!

I'm sorry to start a new thread, but I dont want to read through 100000guess of what each one is supposed to do.  If anyone knows for sure, please share.

great stuff on wikipedia for this:

mixing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_mixing
"to balance the relative volume, frequency and dynamical content of a number of sound sources"

mastering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastering
"process of preparing and transferring recorded audio to a medium that will be used in the production of copies"

Mixing has already started. It has been confirmed. Its not like they are starting next week.

My take on it is
That there are already songs
In final-mix form.

Frank's and Bumble's parts
Are simply one more detail
Added to some songs.

Adding to a mix
Is really very easy...
Put it on a track

Beneath the first mix
Set its placement and level
Then mix down again.

Taking something out
Is a little more involved
But not a big chore.

I think they're working
On the ultimate mixes
For just a few songs.

(That's speculation,
But it's the feel I get
Based on history.)

Splash

/Mike

Mixing is what it is. You get the right mix of everything and have things stand out that you want standing out.

Mastering: This is where overall levels are tweaked so that they fit the feel of the record. This keeps sounds from popping, mid levels from being burried and it creates one common level so that the volume and feel flows.

If you hear just a mix, you'll hear things separated.
When Mastered, it feels like everything is together.

For example, the latest Better is definitely a rough mix, because the sound jumps too much and the overall sound is mushy.
Mixes have that demo-like sound where it's a bit flat and not crisp.
Masters sound like the real deal.

THanks for starting this thread, and for the info, as I, too, am somewhat in the dark about this stuff.  Now I need to find someone who doesn't know this, and make them feel stupid!  : ok:

The process should take anywhere from 1 to 3 weeks depending on how many layers etc and depending on if the band and record label are happy with the final mix.

If not it will be re-mixed and the process will start over.

Once they get the mix they like, it would be mastered, the final mastered version will be listened to and if it is accepted, we will be ready to roll.


The fact the album is finished though is ENORMOUS NEWS!

here here!

so we can prolly guess about 5 weeks for this album :hihi: :peace:

I think its fair to say that adding Frank and Ron to the tracks would mean the adjustments to previous laid recording is required. ?This said, that is great news not only do the fans get to hear BBF and Frank but it cements their status as band members. ?FWIW the album I think will get a release date within a month - so looking at a middle of May drop in my book.

that made me giggle :hihi: and yeah thank for this i've asked this myself in already existing threads but people have ignored it.

and yeah the mixing has already started and who knows they might have mixed the record for 2 weeks already (or one day)

Mastering rarely takes more than a day.

Mixing, depending how far along they already are, could take weeks, months or years. The Use Your Illusions took many months or maybe even a year to mix. If I remember correctly the first release date was May '91 and it didn't come out until September of that year.

I'm assuming most of the mixing was done last year and they are just finalizing Ron and Frank's parts.

Hopefully they're just finalizing the parts that were just recorded, but even then, I still don't see the whole '8 week turnaround' period starting until at least April or May.

If they're truly just starting formal mixing right now, which I doubt, but if they are...'07 isn't happening.

That's a big assumption, though I truly hope you're correct.



I see two possibilities:

#1: Mixing started five minutes before the message was put up.  This would be in line with the GNR world worst case scenario, that always seems to occur.

#2: Mixing has been taking place for a considerable amount of time.  This would be in line with the idea that every time the fans "need to know" something, we get told a couple of months down the road.

For the first time, I'm actually rooting for #2! 

the mixing phase is as long as the recording phase ...

i hope it started a long time ago.

I think thats pretty cynical to rule out 2007 already.

It all includes excuses as to why the album STILL ISN'T OUT YET! Sorry, I had to say it.

This isn't the 1st time the album was finished.

sure is....tell me the last time they said the album was finished......they never did

I enjoyed this thread last autumn fall... just read through it it tells you a lot:

http://www.heretodaygonetohell.com/board/index.php?topic=38291.0

I do realize who we're talking about here, but all your estimations are way too long. Mixing, even for professional albums is usually one month max: even on complex albums. Mastering is usually a very short process (usually a week): once again even on complex albums. 

A.K.A. Late April or Early May

I also want to add that there are reports of Andy Wallace doing mixes way before which leads me to believe that they are just mixing down Frank and Bumble's parts. Andy said that everyone was "delighted with the mixes" sometime last year. Think about it.

Admittedly, I know nothing about this stuff.  But IF the album was believed to be able to be finished by March 6th (when it was announced in December), then mixing can't be TOO long of a process.  With an eight week turnaround, Axl clearly thought the album could be mixed/mastered in about 6 weeks. 

By the way, for my mental timetable, is mixing/mastering done by the band and producers etc. that they work with, or is it done by the label's people, once all recordings are submitted?

I think thats pretty cynical to rule out 2007 already.

Well, I did say that I doubt that is the case.

As I said, they took nearly a year to mix Use Your Illusion, and yeah it was a double album, but recording took a year and mixing took almost a year. Recording CD took years and years and mixing will take...a while I'm assuming.

Which is why I optimistically guessed that the mixing has been going on for a while (which it obviously has since that Better leak sounds 90% final).

My actual realistic guess is that it will come out sometime between May and July, but if mixing doesn't go smoothly, it could still be a long way away.

I'm actually glad there's no release date anymore. I'm pretty sure hindsight being 20/20 Axl would have gone with the version of the open letter that didn't include the tentative date if he could do it over again.

del said the band is currently mixing the record.....     so it`s not the record company. in general, it`s never the record company, as the mixing plays a very important role in the final sound of the album.

mixing: Getting your voice to sound as badass on tape as you think it sounds in your head.

Well, it isn't ALWAYS that, but photographs and film need often need to be color corrected because the camera or the film isn't able to reproduce the actual color and light at the scene... though it still records adequate data.

Similarly, microphones, tape, and ADCs do not perfectly replicate the sound that one hears in the recording environment. So often, EQ, ADSR and compression are adjusted to make what ended up on the recording sound more like it did when it was performed live.

To give some persepective, Nine Inch Nails started mixing their new album in January, the album is due in April.  Linkin Park started mixing their new album in February and their album is due in May.  If GNR are mixing now...we should be looking at a May/June release.

It's hard to tell how much mixing needs to be done.
Lots of the album could have been mixed already.
If they needed to add a new guitar solo or drum track in, that's not that big of a deal if everything else was already in place.

Can you imagine how many different takes and tracks they must have to choose from?

If Axl is mixing alone, look for a 2010 Release. 

I bet it will be out sometime in the summer. 

this is great info, and i would tend to think their goal is to have EVERYTHING done before they hit the road again in April.  After that its probably just finding the best tuesday along the way to release it coupled with a single/Video ETC

I was listening to a DVD today.  They were saying that it took 6 months of mixing for the 2 Illusions cd.

So basically, it took 3 months to mix each.

I hope that it won't be that long for Chinese Democracy! ???

Bumblefoot said this:

Usually after that, the process would follow with mastering the mixes, cd design, a lot of promotion and preparations for the release.  Hopefully all the business stuff won't take too long, and the album will be available...  (here comes the magic word......)   *SOON*   :)

When Axl is ready, he'll be ready

I have a random question

Why do albums usually get mixed at more than one location? Surely it makes sense to mix songs together to get the right feel?

another 5 years

it's funny..almost everyone here thinks that it's bullshit just cause of the past.What happened in the past happened in the past.It's done over,never gunna happen again.so Give them a chance before you go doubting it..bumblefoot says we're in the mixing stage,Del says we're in the mixin stage..so it probably is..have some patience and just wait.

  This is good news and every ones being so negative..it almost makes me sick

Mixing & Mastering =  another 90 -120 days before the album's release.

 :yes:



/bringbackadler

But this was also two albums worth of material to mix...that's the reason it took twice as long.  But recording for UYI took roughly 3 years...while CD took 10 years of recording.  So I guess anything is possible.

one other thing you have to think about, back then they didn't have as many fancy computers and what not, so it would have taken longer to mix.  now it is a lot easier...

at my friend's home studio, we were able to get pretty professional results in just a few days.

General rule of thumb is 1-2 hours for every minute of music. I'm sorry but when I hear Axl Rose and mixing , I just think of years and years. If he wanted the recording to be perfect , the mixing is like the perfection of perfection. Mastering is just getting the mix to the right level basically , Mixing is what takes the longest.

Bill Price said it took so long because Slash and Axl were arguing over every single mix of every single song. If Axl liked it, Slash hated it, and vice versa. So most of that time was trying to appease both of them.

And as someone mentioned before, mixing does not take long.

which band's album do you think will hit the shops first, Gn'Rs or VR's?

Both albums are at the mixers. VR's album has been mixed 12 times so far (rumour has it), so I guess they are almost done. How many mixes will Gn'Rs CD go through before it's in the can? 1 months, 2 months, or whole years worth. Is it possible that an album can go to the mixers without good results, thus the band has to do some re-recording?

Relax People, be happy that the recording is finished, mixing will take about 1-2 months don't worry, release date will be in June, July 2007 I think.

everything is possible in GNR world.

Album was 95 % done in 99...
the other 5 % took 8 years to complete...
:D

we dont know that..for all any of us know the 99 version coulda been scrapped

not july, that's for sure. big albums are NOT released during mid-summer.

here's a link to an interview with Bill Price - the guy who ended up mixing UYI's.

http://www.chopaway.com/2001billprice.htm

interesting stuff that offers some insight into not only the mixing process, but also how that relates to Axl/Guns and what we might have on our hands presently ....

Pardon me ol' bean, would you mind if we turn that bass line up a bit? hahahaha! gentlemen? priceless!

I was watching a dvd, where they explained that it took 6 months to mix bothIllusions cds.  So basically it took 3 months each...

I hope it will take less....

I'm sure it will :beer:

my left nut tells me that the mixing process was already nearly done by the end of 2006. What happens now is just adding Frank And Ron to the mix.
mastering will only take 1 or 2 weeks. Album in may or ebven late april.

But otherwise : waht does my left nut know?  :hihi:

absolutely nothing ;D :hihi:

technolgoy is a whole lot better in 2007 verses 1992 , pro tools didnt exist in 1992

but wasn't there a bunch of songs that didn't end up on UYI's too like most of the spaghetti incident and other songs?

are you talkin about Crash Diet and Bring it back home,etc..?

it would be really cool, if we knew who was mixing CD, then we could have some sort of update thing happening.

im pretty sure bob rock, and kevin shirley used to do something like that (update on their work, what they re up to at the moment, what songs they are mixing etc etc)


or do we know who is mixing?? ???

The thing with that Bill Price interview is that he says they werent finsihed recording when they starting mixing. Mixing was being done in one studio, Axl's vocals in a 2nd, and Slash's guitar in a third. So obviously it would take a lot longer. If everything was done and decided on, and then mixed it would have been done a lot quicker.

So with Chinese, everythiing is done being recorded. Plus, the fact that Andy Wallace was mixing it late last year. Probably between September and October. Then Axl decided to put Frank and Bumble on the record, and now they are mixing again. So I think that it should take like a month tops for the record to be done being mixed. This is a totally different situation than the Illusions.

hope you're right dude!

I had a crazy thought...I know some members of this board happed to have BBF email address.  Does anyone who has this feel comfortable asking him these two questions?
1) Can you tell me who is doing the Mixing?
2) Do you believe the mixing will take about a month?

Why not wait and find out?

I think most of the album was already mixed in 2006, I don't think "minor additions" means mixing a complete album starting from the beginning.

so thats like 2 more years right?

good point.

if someone feels comfortable asking Ron who is mixing the albums or if it'll take around 1 month we thank you in advance :D
Hmm and we might ask as well if the mixing started only when album was totally done or if each finished part of the CD was instantly mixed

For whats its worth George Marino has Guns N' Roses under his current projects, its been there since 2005. So I'm assuming that he's gonna master it.
This guy has mastered all Guns' albums except for Appetite and Greatest Hits.

 :-\

is it that hard to forget that it's against the rules with smiley only posts ::) ???

i dont think it did either, but i think "additions" meant just that. actual musical additions. i.e. frank and bbf. i dont think he meant mixing at all. a little or a lot. coz they hadnt got that far in all probability. note that axl didnt actually say recording was finished.

Why the smiley. This guy is considered to be one of the best there is. Lies, Illusions, Spagetti Incident, ect. have all sounded awesome. I cant see Chinese being any different. :drool: