There are two ways to make something louder in the mix
The first way is obvious: turn the thing up.
The second way is perhaps less obvious: turn something it’s competing with down!
I’m a big proponent of the “everything louder than everything else” theory of mixing, so I tend to instinctively look to option 1 by default. But sometimes that can lead to a situation where sounds are fighting more than is appropriate for the thing I’m working on.
For example: over the last couple of days I’ve been working on the end of the last “80s kids” song for the new album. This particular song has a repeated “oh-oh-oh” background vocal motif that repeats for the last minute of the song, with a lead vocal vamp riding the song out into the fade (because of course it ends in a fade. It was the 80s!).
The relationship between the vamp and the backing vocal bed has proved to be a key and nuanced aspect of this part of the song. When the vamp is too quiet in relation to the backing vocals, it doesn’t carry the section in an adequately triumphant way … but when the vamp is too loud in relation to the backing vocals, it detaches from the mix and feels less gritty and emotional.
For most of the vamp, if the lead vocal felt slightly recessive, i could simply automate it up a skosh and it worked out fine. But for this one particular phrase, it was not working — pushing the vamp upward at all by any amount made it feel too aggressive. Not emotionally correct.
What I finally figured out (because, like I said, turning things down isn’t my first instinct) is that I could duck the backing vocal cluster -0.5 dB for one repeat under that particular vamp phrase. And all of a sudden the vamp popped forward, and the emotional intensity was there, but with none of the aggression that I was trying to avoid. That whole moment just clicked into place. Riveting.
I should note that these are always small changes in this sort of situation. These are +/- 0.5 dB changes max that I’m talking about! Just tiny chiropractic adjustments.
Nudge nudge — jamie