God I hate that piece. Not seriously, but omg I hate that piece.
Hmm! i see. thanks for your comments. i guess having a thin texture is a recurrent problem in my songs, tbh. I always find it tricky to remake and remaster songs and i guess i may have an easier time composing my own. i have no idea why.
I'm listening to the evening star remix again to try find out what was bugging me about it. I'll tell you what I thought in certain places.
First, there's this weird dissonance in one of the lines panned left in the bass.
The first 2 chord are what struck me immediately upon first listen, and after having listened to it again I think I know why. By 'meatless', it's because you literally have this 2 octave range gap between the only two instruments that are playing at that time (which wouldn't be a problem if not for something in the next next sentence). So you have the crust but no filling. Also, because their sounds/timbres are so distinctive, they feel like independent melodic lines. Which means instead of having the lower instrument supporting the higher one, you have 2 melodic lines that have no lower harmonic support, which only adds to this 'air-y', meatless feeling.
At 0:03 when you start that 3 note descending line, it still feels too distinct for various reasons (probably same as above), still in the middle-y registers, and it's also panned slightly to the left which doesn't help if you want it to support the higher register melodic lines that are panned to the right. And I think that's another thing that's giving this a meatless feeling, there's a sonic-spatial gap in the middle because everything seems to be panned either to the left or to the right. The art of panning in digital mixing is apparently this high art that I don't really understand at all, but from an outsider's perspective, it seems to me that the main focus, the main melodic line and the bass are anchored right in the center while the decorative elements are panned off to the side. So until that flute-sounding instrument comes in at 0:23 there's nothing in the middle for me to focus on, so my ears wander. When the flute-thing does come in, there's finally this anchor that everything else is tied to, and we finally have this nice long support in the lower register bass (strings?), but it's still panned slightly to the left, making it seem like its own little thing.
I don't think having too many or too little instruments is something you're having trouble with. Instead, we seem to have dips but no chips. Salsa and sour cream but no beans. Or deciding on one of them to fill that role (ie: panned center). Then try getting the instruments to sound good together. They're probably all good independently, but they sound too distinctive when put together, fighting against each other to come into focus. What makes the 2nd one better than the 1st is that there's stuff panned center, I can focus on something, they support each other. But that pad is a bit too loud, drowning out everything else.
That's all I have to say for now, hope it helps.