Hi Devin,

I was wondering... what do you think of Death Magnetic by Metallica.

The other question... Someone told me that you used the Mesa setting of a Pod for recording Ziltoid instead of using a real Mesa Dual Recto... is this true?

I know you're a busy man so it's cool if you don't have time to answer questions

Devin said himself here on this forum that he used the pod for ziltoid. He posted some rough settings, you should check his post history

[The Dev]

last song on dm is pretty cool.

Sounds quality killed it dead for me though, listened to it twice.

3 days.

3 days.

is....? 72 hours?

last song on dm is pretty cool.

Sounds quality killed it dead for me though, listened to it twice.

3 days.

Whoa, my heart skipped a few beats. :O

last song on dm is pretty cool.

Sounds quality killed it dead for me though, listened to it twice.

3 days.

The Unforgiven III has to be one of the best songs on it...along with All Nightmare Long!

3 days? A surprise for us or what?!

If I remember correctly, Devin said that Ki would be completed around Feb 20th. It's the 20th in 3 days.

3 days suddenly seems so far away.

...Sounds quality....

speaking of which, and if I may ask: I found your last records, especially synchestra (ziltoid not so much), "overcompressed". Like the sum compression at the end of it all was so much that everything sounded really packed, and as if every intrument had to "bite its way through" (especially the drums), if you know what I mean.
Have you heard more criticism about that, or maybe thought about it yourself afterwards?
I personally prefer it if a mix can breathe a bit more, and contains some dynamics.

If I were in the position to wish anything from you, I'd like to hear a bit more Infinity or OM and a bit less synchestra, compression-wise.
Don't get me wrong, this is just about mastering. No doubt that the music itself will rock my socks off!

Well then, that's all. Keep it up, u da man ;D

There definitely is a lot going on in Synchestra that not all speakers can handle but on a pair of decent headphones its amazing and is one of my favorites.

[The Dev]

speaking of which, and if I may ask: I found your last records, especially synchestra (ziltoid not so much), "overcompressed".

I totally, completely agree.

speaking of which, and if I may ask: I found your last records, especially synchestra (ziltoid not so much), "overcompressed".

I totally, completely agree.

You know, surround mixing can help quite a bit with that.... Particularly all of the work outside of SYL.

I'm never gonna stop... I'm sorry... Your tonal output just screams for it with the delays and choruses and such... Sabbath's Paranoid is finally being released in Quadrophonic if that has any bearing...

Is overcompression that bad? It was a very smooth sounding album, i really like it.

Dev, was it the sound you wanted?

Or was it at the time but then your tastes changed?

[The Dev]

Yeah, I did it in my bedroom on a digi 002, which sounded better with Ziltoid, but is still a pretty cheap-o unit.

I broke down a while back and got this HD thing, and to me it sounds worlds better, and the room I mix in is pretty special.

Synchestra was my first mix, and I was getting advice from everyone around me in the production world, and it was like 'compress to tape, compress on the bus, compress everything under it, compress the master then make it louder...gold!' I understand the motivation (if youre good at compression)...new Nickelback is a good example.

With Ki, I just left everything flat, just some highs and lows, and no real compression. Some ssl on the master that just caught the peaks.

I'm mastering it myself at a studio with a Neve board. I've never done it before, but how hard can it be? Make it sound better and make all the tracks the same relative level, right? I'm not going to compress it in mastering though, maybe limit it a BIT, but I want it to be quiet when it's quiet and loud when it's loud.

It won't be the best sounding record in the world, but I think it'll sound good...pleasureable to listen to ...not as many sonic tricks kind of distracting.

You'll be the best judge I suppose...enjoy!

d

I personally didn't find anything to be wrong with Synchestra- it's one of my favorite albums, along with Terria and OM. Ziltoid was a little too streamlined for my taste, but it kind of worked with the slick sci-fi theme. Nothing can top Terria for me though in terms of rich sound.