Dead Sounding Mix?

At the studio we often get sent in tracks that have been recorded in a home studio set up and the most common issue is that it just doesn't have any vibe or ambience. Everything has usually been close mic'd and tracked separately and the "glue" and energy just isn't there.

At this point most people would instantly reach for a selection of reverb plugins to bring some depth to the picture but there is a better more realistic way to bring some atmosphere to a dead sounding track.

Re-amp your room.

Take the mix and send it to a seperate monitor set up in a live space and re record the ambience sound of that room and mix it back into the track. The concept is simple but often has great and realistic results. Here in the studio I usually stereo mic the room with some nice tube mic's, send it to the 1176 to compress the peaks and you get a great sounding room recording for the whole band. The tracking room sounds great and so I use it as often as possible and will just leave the mic's up to rerecord at will when its needed. I find it far better than opting for the digital way out especially for rock/punk or any other "live" music art form. For pop or EDM digital reverbs have there place but when you want your band to sound real, this is the way to go.

I will however either completely leave the bass and kick out of the send feed or lower them considerably as thing get to get to muddy down low and don't need that in the room sound.

If you don't have a nice tracking room you can try any larger room in your house that might do the job.

Give it ago. It might works wonders....