Hello, and thanks for the nice words! I have created just some three tracks with vocals (a band project excluded, I didn’t mix it), so I have no deeper understanding on my vocal mixing habits. But I know I try to follow a few simple guidelines.

Firstly, the style and the mood of the music should fit the vocals, both the style and the story. Naturally, the composition and timing should be ok as well, but here the composition was a bit tricky, as the vocal melody was something else than plain western pop I am more used to. Starting with nothing and trying to come up with something new to me that fits. Of course there is not just one correct solution, and that’s what sometimes holds me back, because I’d like to plan a bit ahead, but here I just needed to do it. So it was good excercise for me :)

Secondly, respect the vocals! They were the starting point of this work after all. If the vocal track is good, it would be shame to push it down. We’ve surely heard examples from the pop industry, where the not-so-great vocalist is mixed down, and that’s just awkward.

But here, the vocals are in front for two simpler reasons: 1) technical sloppiness in the mixing process (adding gain for the limiter, but not monitoring the output well enough, and not at all with loudspeakers) and 2) the original work was a vocal-only track that was ok alone, so I felt it natural to keep the vocal on top.

I surely hope I can produce more now than the last year. I’m interested in creating something like 80’s italo disco and EBM. Acid house with vocals could be cool as well. My roots are in the mid-80’s dance music, house/acid, and perhaps the biggest influence was the underground/warehouse techno in the early 90’s. I also like some melodic heavy metal and classical music, also some pop/rock. The key seems to be the melody and the harmonies: if they’re ok, the genre and style are secondary.

Okay, if I cannot produce much, I can surely write too much :D Thanks again!

Thanks for the feedback! Nice if I could give something unexpectable for you :)

Thank you for your opinion and recommendation!