Ableton Forum

here is a track from a side project i have. it is a mix of music from mali and electronica.
there's a singer and a traditional instrument from mali called "donso n'goni" (a kind of 6 stringed bass harp, that you can hear solo at the very beginning of the song) that i loop in real time and process, and on which i've added drums, percs and keys.

the mix is not very good, but it is meant as a demo.
hope you'll enjoy it, let me know your impressions!

listen here

I found it quite hypnotic. A bit like a dubby transglobal underground/ david sylvian kind of vibe.

I've also got a stonkin hangover and found it quite soothing. I've got it on my desktop so will have another listen in a bit.

Nice track! I'm a big fan of Malian music. I like the fact that your electronic additions complement the traditional sound without overwhelming it, unlike a lot of electronic/traditional fusion attempts I've heard. I'd gladly buy a full album of tracks as good as this!

I'm noticing that the extreme low kicks on every other bar tend to overpower the rest of the mix, at least on my monitors. You might want to cut that back just a bit to make it more compatible with different speakers. I have the same problem with my mixes all the time.

Nice track, mixed on headphones? My 20/20's are generating a lot of basss right now. Like it tho'

I really enjoy the track. I can report, too, that the bass is slaying my poor speakers. Would like to hear the mix further down the road, with the bass pulled back a bit. Please repost if you feel like it. Tasty stuff.

thanks guys for the feedback!
i know the bass is too loud, gonna work on it.
though, the donso n'goni makes things really difficult for me: it's a low-range instrument, so i need to have the bass frequencies at high level for it. but i also want the bass and kick to be heard, so i'm constantly pushing the volume for those 2. but then the n'goni is not loud enough... it's full circle...
i guess i need a real sound-engineer to do the mix, my skills are not enough. but this track (as well as the other we're working on) are just meant as a demo to (hopefully) find a record deal and have recording sessions paid.

anyway, i'm gonna work on this and improve the song structure too. i'll let you know when things have improved...

thanks again, cheers.
by the way, this is also supposed to be a live project... soon in a theater near you...

I'll probably get slayed for this

Compression

If you want to bring up the bass without overwhelming the rest of the mix, eq out some of the low freqs, eq in some of the low mids and higher freqs that you can hear and then compress the bastard to get it up in the mix...what I would do (I am a professional sound engineer, though for film/tv not music)