http://soundcloud.com/vvv-4/blood-to-the-bone-vvv-mix
Again, apologies for the delay.
There's something very odd about the timing at the outset of this mix -- the guitar line sounds like it's slipped out of line. If this was intentional, then I'd be interested in knowing the thinking behind it. It does make it a bit trippier, I suppose, but it doesn't really work for me as it stands. Your dramatic reinvention of the bass sound makes for a nice swirly atmosphere in the verses, and also makes the contrast with the aggression of the chorus great. The downside, of course, is that it does also inevitably lose most of the rhythmic momentum of the verse part, and there are also phase mismatch issues at the low end on account of the deep stereo chorusing.
Before being able to judge anything else in the mix, I first had to adjust for the overall mix tonality, which is unfortunately very boxy, with a low-midrange emphasis and recessed frequency extremes -- a long way away from the references. Turning the playback volume up makes much more sense of the balance, though, which makes me think that you're monitoring too loud. Once I'd adjusted this frequency imbalance with some broad-brush master EQ, the mix was a lot easier to deal with.
The kick sound and general drum tone suits the verses pretty well, especially given the softer bass timbre. However, when the chorus hits, the overall drum sound feels very muffled. Although you do have to compromise some drum brilliance if you want to deliver clear-sounding guitars without harshness in a mix like this, it's gone a bit too far here, I think, and you could afford to be more sparing with your high cuts. The dull-sounding kick tone of the verse also gets mostly lost on smaller speakers during the choruses. Despite these things, I think there's actually a really good drum sound waiting to get out here, because if I mentally try to compensate for the drums' spectral tilt, the balance seems very respectable, and the snare's got exactly the kind of density, weight, and width that I'd hope for in this arrangement. The toms feel like they're maybe a bit too wide and not well enough blended, and the cymbals may be over-present in the outro particularly, but those are pretty small niggles, to be honest. (Did you trigger a snare sample in there, by the way?)
The overall balance is also pretty well-judged once the mix tonality is taken out of the equation. I think you could balance the main guitar during the verses a little lower compared with the vocal, because it feels like it's stealing a shade too much of the limelight. I like the sound of the guitar, though, because it's a nice contrast to the bass and drums, ringing out nice and clearly. The overall stereo width of the mix is also rather well-judged, although it's difficult to ascertain how the mono-compatibility holds up given the mix tonality issues.
You've introduced some interesting production touches here as well, although I think they could probably still do with some polishing as far as execution is concerned. I liked the delay overlap into the second chorus, for instance, especially because the chorus vocal melody doesn't start until the middle of the first bar of the chorus. However, the delay's timing feels a bit out of sync with the chorus, subjectively speaking, and that bugs me a bit. The alternating panning was also cool in the first mid-section, but the editing needs to be cleaner for this to really work properly, I think -- especially bar six, which rather stumbles over itself as a result. The reverb features on the drums in the second verse are also nice, but I reckon there's a danger of dating the whole production unless you differentiate these a bit more from the overall drum/production sound. Finally, is the lump in the final cymbal tail meant to be a production feature, or is it a dodgy edit?
On the whole I think you've explored lots of interesting new angles here, and you've clearly got a good ear for balance and blend already, so just paying a little more attention to your monitoring/referencing technique should hopefully improve things no end.
