So let's discuss RevRad's mixing/mastering issues

[Met Fan]

6 hours ago, dudley dawson said:

I've listened to both digital and vinyl versions of the album.  Both have the same mixing/mastering issues (I'm not sure if mixing, mastering, or both gets the blame here).  The most apparent gaffe I think is on Youngblood where on the last verse, you actually hear BJ's vocals getting louder mid-verse. 

 

5 hours ago, Kyle Serlington said:

I just kinda hate how the mix isn't consistent. In some songs the vocals seem buried, in some songs they're loud enough. and what's up with the trumpet? apparently it's in there but you can't hear it. The drum tones are great, guitar tones are decent, but the bass gets lost in the mix, it's a little muddy and needs more grit to it to cut through the mix. as far as the low-fi intros, I think the band did that intentionally in the studio, which is fine for a song or two but they over did it, the one in Too Dumb To Die is totally uncalled for and doesn't seem to really have anything to do with the rest of the song. The mastering isn't very good either. I understand wanting someone new to mix, but they should have still used the same mastering studio and engineer.

 

4 hours ago, Hero_Of_The_Hour said:

It's not just audiophiles that care. It's annoying even on car stereo equipment. I feel in order to hear the vocals properly I have to turn songs up and down halfway through. It's crazy.

 

2 hours ago, Kyle Serlington said:

eh I dunno, green day didn't tell the label about the album until it was pretty much done, I get the impression that they didn't have much input on this

 

4 hours ago, strangestat said:

Could this be because the boys produced it themselves? I've been a little bothered by this mixing too

 

I agree with all of the above quotes, I made a post about it when the leak came out but it was deleted because it detailed the leak, back then I thought these problems were just in the leaked version.

There's bad clipping in the mid section of Bang Bang around 2:10, but that's loudness war related IMO.

The volume varying and the vocals drifting in and out is a production problem and I definitely think it's Green Day's fault in production, I'd say 99% of it were conscience decisions by them cause they thought it was cool or whatever but it is not cool, when I keep having to turn up the music to hear a section then get blasted when it goes loud again; not cool, you have no idea how not cool that shit is, to quote Negan from The Walking Dead heh

The vocals drifting especially bothered me in Say Goodbye.

However:

 

4 hours ago, dudley dawson said:

That being said, the songs themselves are good enough to where I'm not going to let this drag down the experience too much for me.

 

[Eric]

Don't see the issues at all. CD sounds perfect for me, the quiet parts sound like they are meant to be that way. 

[Leni.]

I completelly understand everyone of you talking about those quiet intros of certain songs. But honestly and personally, turning the volume down and up happens to me only if I'm on the bus for example but if I'm at a place where is no other noise around me it's just ok. The same issues I always have with songs like No One Knows, Letterbomb or Homecoming too. So it's nothing new really to me. 

[BUBBA7012]

The mixing is kind of a mixed bag on this album but the only times I find it genuinely distracting when casually listening is in Outlaws and Bang Bang. Even when it came out I thought it was kind of obnoxious that the intro is so much softer than the rest of the song. Every time I instinctively turn up my headphones and then when the intro's over I'm deaf. xD 

Outlaws has a similar problem when it switches to the chorus. It's so much louder than the rest of the song. Still dig the album overall but those are just my minor qualms.  

[Christian's Inferno!]

Well I've listened to this album on two different devices. On my computer and on my iPad. It sounds fine when I listen to it on my computer, the volume doesn't change that much but when I listen on my iPad, some parts are extremely low, followed by extremely loud. It can be very annoying if you have to change your volume up and down. Interestingly, there are a couple of parts when I listen on my iPad where the vocals have the same volumes and the instruments are lowered or vice versa, which doesn't happen on my computer. Idk if anybody else has noticed this or if it's just me. I was surprised when I first listened to the album on my iPad because certain parts sounded so much different due to the volume change.

The main problems to me are the intros of Somewhere Now, Bang Bang and Too Dumb to Die, although problems are also apparent in Youngblood and Bouncing off the Wall too.

[Spike]

9 hours ago, MysticManiac said:

Well I've listened to this album on two different devices. On my computer and on my iPad. It sounds fine when I listen to it on my computer, the volume doesn't change that much but when I listen on my iPad, some parts are extremely low, followed by extremely loud. It can be very annoying if you have to change your volume up and down. Interestingly, there are a couple of parts when I listen on my iPad where the vocals have the same volumes and the instruments are lowered or vice versa, which doesn't happen on my computer. Idk if anybody else has noticed this or if it's just me. I was surprised when I first listened to the album on my iPad because certain parts sounded so much different due to the volume change.

The main problems to me are the intros of Somewhere Now, Bang Bang and Too Dumb to Die, although problems are also apparent in Youngblood and Bouncing off the Wall too.

I had a similar issue when listening on my phone as opposed to my laptop. It's still not great on the laptop, but the phone is worse. That's entirely down to the bitrate being lower from the phone though. If the record was mastered better it would be able to handle being converted to lower quality, but it's just not happening with this.

[Red]

I never expected the mixing to be perfect with this being the band's first self produced album, but to me it sure as hell sounds better than anything in the trilogy and the only song that sounds considerably muddier to me is Say Goodbye although it seems pretty obvious to me that the song sounds that way on purpose.

Overall, I cant really complain, I consider myself to be pretty fussy when it comes to audio, but nothing in this record really bothers me.. The mixing in The Offspring's "Coming For You" and the entire "Days Go By" album's mixing on the other hand... Yuck. Every song feels muddy as fuck and is really hard for me to listen to at a loud volume due to this.

I guess what I am trying to say is, yes it could have been better, but it sure as hell could have been a lot worse too. I'm just stoked that the band sounds much closer to how they did before the trilogy now and I am totally cool with the mixing being a little off in exchange for that

[Hero_Of_The_Hour]

This review by ABC news actually mentions the production 

 

"On the plus side, production-wise, the album sounds less compressed when compared to the band’s other recent work. After the excess of the trilogy, Green Day obviously wanted a back-to-basics approach. They overstepped that."

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/green-day-norah-jones-phantogram-music-reviews/story?id=42742388

[chrisdiaz94]

I REALLY like the dynamic contrast on this album. I really do think the mix sounds fresh and new, BUT the constant clipping/peaking just kills me. The volume differences within songs is a creative choice and I think it's really awesome that they made the variance so big. Artists are afraid to do that these days because most people get annoyed by it and want quiet things louder and loud things quieter, not to mention radio requirements. But historically, dynamics have always been a big part of injecting more movement and emotion into music. Jazz and classical music still have huge dynamics today, even on radio. I would never touch my volume dial while listening to a song to get rid of the dynamics the artist meant to put into the song. That would be like skipping a verse or a bridge because I decided I didn't want to hear the lyrics Billie wrote.

What's definitely not acceptable is the insane clipping that is prevalent in every song. When Tre hits his toms and kick at the same time, creating a lot of low end rumble, the audio clicks and pops and crackles like crazy (One of the biggest/easiest to hear examples of this is the very beginning of Bouncing Off the Wall). It's such a bummer because there are so many things I like about these songs and the way they sound. 

Good thing Green Day still sounds incredible live. I always love their mix when I see them. It always sounds huge and tight and I'm so stoked to see them again in a few days. 

[Grinch]

Top is the vinyl version of Somewhere Now and the bottom is the CD version. You can see it's a lot more dynamic. If it looks like it's clipping, it might be because of the rip I was sent was a little high on the gain or something (I don't konw, I never ripped a vinyl). It's definitely better

[Ric503]

After earing the CD a lot of times, when I started to ear the vinyl one it definitely sounded even better

[Collingordon96]

the mastering is def funky, I feel like they were trying to really achieve the modern pop mastering standards. Because it is def louder than 10 lufs. I've kept my volume the same when I tested the mastering for each  album. RevRadio is clipping while the others are perfectly fine.

[Wretched & Divine]

I don't really know what all you audio geeks are talking about, but the changes of volume on some tracks is really annoying. But they're so apparent that I feel they must be intentional, which just baffles me.