I wear glasses and my AKG K-240s are pretty comfortable, I think. The pads are soft and big and don't feel like they're pressing your glasses' temples into your skull. I'm not crazy about the AKG's sound, but that's a personal matter.

I have some Grados whose sound I like better, but those are uncomfortable after 30-40 minutes even if I'm not wearing glasses.

twelvepoint wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 12:25 pm I wear glasses and my AKG K-240s are pretty comfortable, I think. The pads are soft and big and don't feel like they're pressing your glasses' temples into your skull. I'm not crazy about the AKG's sound, but that's a personal matter.

I have some Grados whose sound I like better, but those are uncomfortable after 30-40 minutes even if I'm not wearing glasses.

Thanks, I do have a pair of 240df but I've never successfully trained my ears to them, plus they need driving like crazy. Maybe I'll try them again; I'm only a recent glasses wearer...

Adam_I_III wrote: Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:13 am

twelvepoint wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 12:25 pm I wear glasses and my AKG K-240s are pretty comfortable, I think. The pads are soft and big and don't feel like they're pressing your glasses' temples into your skull. I'm not crazy about the AKG's sound, but that's a personal matter.

I have some Grados whose sound I like better, but those are uncomfortable after 30-40 minutes even if I'm not wearing glasses.

Thanks, I do have a pair of 240df but I've never successfully trained my ears to them, plus they need driving like crazy. Maybe I'll try them again; I'm only a recent glasses wearer...

I use Sennheisers with glasses and they're pretty much the only headphone that doesn't feel like it is crushing my temples.

Adam_I_III wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 1:05 am Over-ear headphones while wearing glasses.

Beyer Dynamic DT770 Pro. Extremely comfortable full ear closed back headphones. I've never noticed them making glasses uncomfortable, which is to say you don't notice your glasses when you are wearing them.

They have become my favorites.

Kniferide wrote: Wed Aug 04, 2021 3:21 pm

Adam_I_III wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 1:05 am Over-ear headphones while wearing glasses.

Beyer Dynamic DT770 Pro. Extremely comfortable full ear closed back headphones. I've never noticed them making glasses uncomfortable, which is to say you don't notice your glasses when you are wearing them.

They have become my favorites.

32 OHM?
I'm sorry I'm nearsighted, my heart goes out to you.

Mickey242 wrote: Fri Aug 06, 2021 10:57 pm

Kniferide wrote: Wed Aug 04, 2021 3:21 pm

Adam_I_III wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 1:05 am Over-ear headphones while wearing glasses.

Beyer Dynamic DT770 Pro. Extremely comfortable full ear closed back headphones. I've never noticed them making glasses uncomfortable, which is to say you don't notice your glasses when you are wearing them.

They have become my favorites.

32 OHM?
I'm sorry I'm nearsighted, my heart goes out to you.

They come in 32, 80, and 250 ohm. I have the 80s which seem fine for general all around use.

I have started recording more, I got a decent computer, a few ok-good mics, and am using Reaper.

I am up to 7 songs, but this 7th song is killing me. I am at the point where I am mixing it and mixing it and maybe I am ear fatigued or something, but it just sounds like noisy soup. Almost like a fuzzy gauze is over the whole thing. I have been recording in the same space with the same amps, drums, bass, mics, and have not run into the entire song sounding so cluttered? Sorry, for all the technical terms. It's not like a ton of extras tracks sitting on top of each other.

I got all the drum tracks and they are all clean and actually sound solid. Trying to keep all of them sort of central.

I have a clean bass track and a fuzz bass track. Fuzz is hard panned to the right and clean bass is hard panned to the left.

I have two mid gain guitar tracks each slightly panned L & R.

I have two vocal tracks with reverb on them, nothing special and I am keeping them in the center.

I also have a track of just feedback that I recorded for a small section that I laid over.

I thought I would sleep on it and give it fresh ears, but I almost hate it more this morning, so I guess I am just going to start again and mix it again. What do you do when you are stuck like this? Do you get to the pint where you re-record again even though the performance is good and is recorded decent? Maybe just walk away and give it a couple days?

Owen wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 5:53 pm I thought I would sleep on it and give it fresh ears, but I almost hate it more this morning, so I guess I am just going to start again and mix it again. What do you do when you are stuck like this? Do you get to the pint where you re-record again even though the performance is good and is recorded decent? Maybe just walk away and give it a couple days?

These kind of mix problems are hard enough on a technical level, before you get into all of the psychology of wanting to hear your own music sound good. I've always thought a complete re-record would be an interesting experiment, but it could be an exhausting effort.

As for the mix problem, I often find that problems arrive when elements that sound good separately have unexpected buildup when put together. The most common (but certainly not the only) place for this to happen is in the low mids.

A few things you may consider trying, if you haven't already:

- Pan both of your bass tracks up the middle. There certainly isn't a rule against a panned stereo bass, but it's definitely way harder to get away with.
- Sometimes bass casts a fog on the mix in those low mids 200-400hz region. I'd try cutting some of that out of either/both of your tracks and see if it opens up the overall mix a little.
- High pass the vocal reverb. Get rid of anything below like 500hz. You can low pass it too. It's amazing how much info you can cut out of a reverb, save space in the mix, and still have a sense of a spatial effect.

Another thing I've done when I'm losing my way on a tricky mix is pretend I'm a mastering engineer. I'll mess with eq on the stereo 2 track. For some reason I prefer twiddling knobs on a parametric EQ on the boad, but it could just as easily be done with a plugin. Make a move to cut something in an area that sounds bloated, or less helpful to me, boost something that seems undefined. If you picked the wrong frequency move it a little, or go back to zero and try to set your spot again. Don't go sweeping around like crazy, it's really confusing. If cutting an area a little opens something up, does boosting it bring out more of what was bothering you? Are some instruments more affected by these moves than others?

This can of course be a total snipe hunt and can send you obsessing over, or overcorrecting frequencies, but in the right frame of mind, taken with a grain of salt, it can give you a broad side "there's a little too much shit happening at this frequency" kind of focus, that can then inform individual cuts, or boosts on instruments individually. And as you, and others have stated, if any of this gets weird, or you feel like you lose the thread, you just turn shit off and walk away for an hour, or a day.

My goal with mixes like these is to pretend I'm an outsider with a good ear and a critical attitude. Throw the mix on, stand way back and go "sounds a little harsh on that snare", or "pretty cool, but something in there is boomy, kinda sounds like it's in the guitars or bass" etc. Just some seasoned asshole with a cup of coffee hearing it for the first time. That's who I'm trying to be.

Owen wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 5:53 pm Maybe just walk away and give it a couple days?

Yep. That's the best thing you can do. Know when to walk away before you erase tracks that you might wish you had kept or end up reworking it to the point that your original intention is buried. Before you think "oh, I'll just fix the vocal" and end up recording 30 takes of it when the first one was the keeper even though there was that one tiny problem...and then all the fun is gone. I have to go through this with everything I record. Sometimes you go back and realize it was just fine, sometimes the culprit is all of a sudden sticking out like a sore thumb, but you were too deep into it to see before. Leaving a recording alone to let your head reset is my favorite mixing "trick" and it's never one you'll regret. It's one of the luxuries of home recording. Sometimes it's hard for me to switch from the 'making music' frame of mind to the 'listening to music (mixing)' frame of mind. A little time and distance is the remedy. Also, you've probably already done this, but when you're building the mix back up, start with the core of it and don't try to throw all your tracks in at once just because you've got them. Maybe start with drums, one bass track, one vocal track, one guitar track and see what's working, what's communicating the core of the song that was in your head. Maybe you'll also find where it's going wrong. Sometimes it feels great to leave something out, even though you were pumped to play and record it, if it's not serving the song overall.

I'm also a total amateur with a home studio, so no pro level advice here, but I've been working through the same things for a long time.

Owen wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 5:53 pm I thought I would sleep on it and give it fresh ears, but I almost hate it more this morning, so I guess I am just going to start again and mix it again. What do you do when you are stuck like this?

I have a clean bass track and a fuzz bass track. Fuzz is hard panned to the right and clean bass is hard panned to the left.

I have two mid gain guitar tracks each slightly panned L & R.

I have two vocal tracks with reverb on them, nothing special and I am keeping them in the center.

I also have a track of just feedback that I recorded for a small section that I laid over.

From what you described I can picture it coming across as overkill. Yeah, take a day or two off, then come back and re-approach it with half the bass and guitar tracks you recorded. Try a more mono approach overall. Either double the vocals or use reverb, but not both.

If that works, maybe sneak some of the other tracks back in and see what that's like. [/spitballing]