Macro-Mixing for the Small Recording Studio

Produce better mixes, faster than ever, using
simple techniques that actually work

Copyright Information

Copyright 2014 – Amos Clarke and Macro-Mixing

Information in this product is the property of the author. No part of this book may be duplicated, resold, copied stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any other means, electronic, photocopy or otherwise or reproduced without prior written permission from the author. Unauthorised duplication of this material in any form is strictly prohibited. Violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

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The author assumes no responsibility for the use or misuse, damage and/or financial loss sustained to persons or property as a result of reading this book.

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Who is this book for?

This book is not intended for absolute beginners, but if you are one, you can avoid years of disappointment and time wasted effort by using these principles and techniques. (If you’re a beginner then there is a lot of free introductory and basic information available on the internet to get you started. See my recommended reading section at the end).

This book is intended for intermediate users who understand basic principles with some mixing experience. If you have spent years fiddling around and not getting the results you want then this book is for you because it shows you techniques to improve your work-flow and focus on doing the stuff that matters, while avoiding the time-wasting stuff that doesn’t. The main aim is to push you through the barriers of frustration that you’re probably (if you’re like I was) experiencing right now.

Read this book if you want to:

+ Find more time to mix

+ Create better mixes in less time

+ Learn simple, powerful mixing techniques

Contents

1. Rethink Your Approach

Key Points

2. Macro-Mixing

Key Points

3. Mix Faster and Better

Key Points

4. Macro-EQ

Key Points

5. Macro-Compression

Key Points

6. LCR Panning

Key Points

7. Get More Quality Mixing Time

Key Points

8. A Bit of Balance

Key Points

9. The Power of Reference Songs

Key Points

10. Ten Tips for Getting Great Mixes

11. Common Reasons Mixes Sound Bad

12. Final Words and Future Books

13. About the Author

14. Recommended Resources

Other Books by Amos Clarke

1. Rethink Your Approach

Relax, break your bad habits and refocus your precious time

When I first started out mixing, I didn’t really know what I was supposed to be doing – that was even after I’d achieved my audio engineering qualification. There was lots of theory out there, but I just couldn’t find anyone to show me how to mix effectively, let alone how to create a great sounding mix. Even now as I write this, there’s a bucket-load of ‘how-to’ information on the web, but I still found myself fumbling for years even with these apparently great resources. Fumbling for me essentially meant pumping huge amounts of time and effort into my mixing with results that I was continuously unhappy with. Sound familiar? So in an effort to get over this, I got into a really bad habit of pouring more time into this love affair, while still hanging on to the same poor habits.

So what I unfortunately did was this:

+ Spent inordinate amounts of time researching microphone preamps, microphones, plugins, and other gear in the hope it would improve my mixes.

+ Read countless (and often conflicting) gear reviews that created further confusion, making any gear purchase decisions almost impossible.

+ Trialled plugin after plugin after plugin and got sucked in by sexy interfaces, big discounts and glowing reviews by industry pros.

+ Searched and read countless ‘how-tos’ on every possible facet of mixing leaving me with an impossible number of ideas and principles to try out.

+ Lost hours of my life surfing on-line forums and believing the opinions of posters that couldn’t mix a cake, let alone a great song.

The big problem with my behaviour was that while research was useful, it was out of balance with the total time I had available. I lost hours of valuable mixing time and created a ton of unnecessary stress and anxiety. If you’re doing this kind of thing now, you need to stop immediately! You’re a busy person right? Maybe you’re holding down a normal job as well? So your mixing time is valuable.

“Research is vital but it must be
in balance with action”

It didn’t end there. When I was mixing, I drowned my tracks in EQ, compression and effects, in my effort to create a mix like the pros. The result was this:

+ I spent 4-5 times longer than I needed to on every mix, twiddling and tweaking and continuously trying stuff out

+ Every mix sounded weird because of the excessive EQ/compression/FX treatment

+ Most of my mixes sounded squashed and strangled like they’d been run over by a steamroller because I thought it was important to have my mixes sounding as loud as possible.

If someone had set me straight at the beginning I wouldn’t have wasted so much time being unhappy and unfulfilled with the quality of my mixing. The good news for you is that I’ve done lots of the hard work for you and hopefully, you can avoid the wasted hours and the frustration and get on with the business of crafting great mixes with minimum effort and time.

The irresistible lure of sexy plugins

Don’t they look great? Seriously! If some of the plugins worked as well as they looked, they would change your life. It’s very easy to be motivated into buying plugins based on the assumption that they function as well as they look, because they look so good. To cure yourself of this affliction, ask yourself what you actually need then go and look for it. Then test a demo before you buy. It’s easy to think that the next great plugin (or piece of hardware) will fix your mixes. You’re better to invest your time into educating yourself and getting experience. That’s not to say that good plugins don’t make a different – in the right hands they can.

Get creative by limiting your options

Have you ever been in a situation where you had to complete a task with a lack of resources? Maybe it was a time with your job where your boss told you to just get on and finish the job: “do the best with what you’ve got”. And you got it done! I’d like to introduce you to the idea of how limitation leads to innovation. As I’m writing this book, I’ve set myself a challenge (on my Macro-Mixing Facebook page) to record and mix a complete song using a simple (cheap) two-channel mixing desk and only three plugins that came standard with my mixing software. I’ve committed to one compressor, one parametric equaliser, and one reverb. Now that’s a challenge! I’ve creates significant limitations with my tools and I’m going to have to work VERY hard to find ways to maximise their use, while all the time, aiming for the best mix I can do. And if you’re wondering, yes, I’m uncomfortable with the idea, but also excited. I’ve got to think about workarounds and getting creative with the plugins and routing within the mix. What do I hope to achieve? An improvement in my skill level and proof that knowing how to use the tools is more important than the tools themselves. I also expect I’ll come up against challenges with the gear that limit what I can do, like the quality of AD conversion (analogue to digital). But I’m up for the challenge and I think I’ll come out of the end of this exercise a little better than I was before.

“Limitation leads to innovation”

Key Points

Re-allocate the time you spend on research
Don’t quit it, just focus it on absolute ‘need-to-know’ areas and limit it relative to the total time you have available. Remember, when your studio time is limited, the less time spent researching means more time mixing. If you have a maximum available time of 10 hours per week in the studio, then limit your research to say, 1 hour per week and spend 9 hours mixing.

Trash the mind-set that more gear and plugins will improve your mixing
It’s easy to get caught up in ‘plugin-prettiness’. There’s a good reason that developers spend significant time developing gorgeous GUIs (graphic user interfaces). It’s no surprise that packaging plays a major part in the saleability of any product. Boxes of chocolates, aromatherapy products and plugins: buyers get attracted to pretty packaging. Try and look past the packaging and focus on the functionality.

Don’t use equalisation, compression and FX on your tracks unless you know why you’re doing it
I know how compelling it is to do this. It makes you feel like one of the big boys when you’re strapping multiple compressors on every track. The fact is it's possible to create perfectly good mixes using minimal or no compression and the same goes for applying EQ. The first question to ask is, “does it need compression/EQ/FX”? And “What am I trying to achieve?”

Education and experience beats gear and plugins any day
You can’t buy experience but it’s the one thing that will get you closer to being a master at what you do. There’s a common notion that experts in their field have completed 10,000 hours before they got to being experts. When you’re chalking up your experience it then becomes vital that you spend time doing the right things and that’s where education comes in. If you’ve got cash to burn, then buy a book or enrol in a course and learn from an expert. Ultimately, that will be better value for money and get your to your goal quicker than buying gear.

2. Macro-Mixing

Address the ‘big picture’ before focusing on the detail

First up let’s look at what Macro-Mixing is. Micro is small and macro is big. So the Macro-Mixing method could also be known as a ‘big picture’ or ‘top down’ approach where we focus on the ‘macro’ first and the ‘micro’ later. In practical terms, the aim of Macro-Mixing is to treat groups of similar instruments with EQ, compression, and FX before we start working on the individual tracks. This doesn’t mean we ignore the individual track treatment – there are regularly tracks in the mix that require specific treatment, such as an EQ scoop to remove the boxy-ness from a kick drum or a high frequency boost to bring life to a snare drum track. If we apply this ‘group treatment’ approach you should find that:

+ Your mixes come together more quickly because you’re simply doing less

+ Your mixes sound more natural because you’re applying less EQ and compression treatment

For the first several years I mixed using a ‘micro’ approach. In other words, I started working on the smallest element and worked my way up to the final mix. I eventually had to rethink my entire approach because:

+ My mixing projects were taking far too long

+ I wasted a lot of time applying treatment (compression, EQ and FX) that wasn’t necessary and regularly had a negative impact on the final mix

+ My final mixes never sounded the way I wanted them to due to the over-processing

The benefits of Macro-Mixing became apparent very quickly for me. The first thing I noticed was that many of my mix projects were completed very quickly, often in half the time I would usually take. Immediately I was very curious. The final mixes were sounding closer to how I wanted and it didn’t take long to get there. The mixes were also sounding less ‘squeezed’ (too much compression) and tonally, more natural (less unnecessary compression and EQ). So how does doing less work and using a simpler approach create a better outcome?

There’s another important consideration with this approach: the quality of the recorded material has a significant bearing on the quality of the final mix. I’ve found that well recorded instruments with good performances often result in tonally pleasing recordings with good level dynamics. When you get great tracks like this to mix, it’s a dream, seriously, because it’s like getting a jigsaw puzzle where all the pieces actually fit. In other words, the engineer/producer doing the recording succeeds in capturing the tones they want rather than recording any old thing with a plan to ‘fix it in the mix’. An example of this would be with recording electric guitars where the selection of the guitar, pickup, strings, pick type, microphone choice and placement, and amplifier choice are carefully selected to produce a tone that sits comfortably in the mix, in sympathy with all the other instruments. Take this careful selection and add a great guitarist and an outstanding performance and you have an example of a carefully crafted recording that may need little EQ and minimal compression treatment.

Step-by-step process explained

Next I’ll explain the step-by-step method I use. It applies to any DAW software and same goes if you’re working on a portable recorder or OTB (out of the box) on a mixing desk with outboard gear. Sometimes I’ll vary the steps depending on the genre or quality of the recorded material. I suggest you use the following steps as basis to develop your own workflow. And here’s the key point: what happens in the steps is important, but what’s also important is that you follow a set process or workflow and stick to it until you find something better.

See my extensive mix checklist in the next chapter.

Step 1: Set up your DAW session

Load up all your audio tracks into your mixing session, including the reference song. Assign each track output (not aux sends) to a designated group as listed below:

1. Drum group ‘G.RHYTH’: all drum tracks and bass tracks
This group contains the fundamental elements of the song

2. Instrument group ‘G.INST’: rhythm guitar/keyboards
This group contains all rhythm elements that are not drums and lead instruments.

3. Backing vocal group ‘G.BV: backing vocals
This group contains all backing vocals.

4. Lead group ‘G.LEAD’: all lead elements (main vocals, lead guitar)
This group contains all lead elements and is used to conveniently solo the lead elements while mixing. I sometimes leave this one out and have these tracks going directly to the master buss.

5. Ambient group ‘G.AMB’: all ambient elements like keyboards and guitars
This group contains elements that are used to create layered ambience within a song. Generally these are not prominent in the mix and therefore mixed at low levels. They include elements with minimal transient peaks and contain ambient FX treatment.

A note about the groups: the groups’ main purpose is to provide a quick and convenient way to apply compression and EQ processing globally. The processing done on groups needs to be subtle in the first instance. For example, a big adjustment to the EQ or compression on any group affects all the elements in that group and this is most evident with groups containing lots of different elements with prominent transients, like the Drum group G.RHYTH. Go with care!

Step 2: Gain staging

Keeping all your faders at zero, adjust the gain/trim of each track so it reads approximately -18 dB RMS on a level meter. You can do this by either adjusting the volume of the clip (some DAWs let you do this) or adding a gain or trim plugin as the first in your chain.

Stage 3: Rough balance

Do a rough mix balance of the track in mono. Don’t pan, don’t add any FX, compression or EQ. Simply adjust the fader levels to get the best balance you can. Simply try and get a feel for the song in terms of the different sections and overall dynamics. It helps to refer to your reference song at this point and try to get a feel for the treatment you’ll need to apply to get your mix sounding like the reference. It’s also important to detach your thinking from your technical operations (knob twiddling) and try to capture the essence of the song.
I ask myself these questions at this point:

+ Does it vibe?

+ Are there good dynamics, builds and transitions throughout the song?

+ What am I liking and not liking about it?

+ Is there frequency masking? What instruments are affected?

+ Are mix elements clashing rhythmically?

+ If the mix is sounding good at this point, it’s an indication that the final mix could sound very good without too much work. Make some notes of any issues arising from the above questions – there is work to do to fix these.

Stage 4: Gating

I always gate early on because this makes a massive difference to the clarity of the mix by non-destructively removing unwanted noise and ambient content. This is most noticeable with drums where gating can clean up your kick, snare and tom tracks giving cleaner, tighter sounding drums. You’ll need a gating plugin for this and there are many good free/cheap plugins available like GVST’s Ggate (www.gvst.co.uk).

Some considerations:

Do the tracks need gating? Perhaps the performances or the genre of music suggest a more open and lively vibe (such as with jazz).

Be careful when tuning the gate that you don’t remove material you want to keep. For example, incorrectly tuned gates can remove snare ghosting, kick drum ghosting and vocal breaths that you may want to retain.

Note about mixing into a compressor: This is a process where you insert a compressor into your master buss early on the mix process. Mixing into a compressor changes the way the levels of all instruments interact and can give quite a different flavour to your mix as it progresses (compared to not using a compressor). It does require some care in the settings used, which I won’t go in to detail, other than to suggest around 3-5 dB of gain reduction with a slow attack and fast release as a start. You need to keep monitoring and adjusting it as the gain reduction can increase as the mix progresses and overall levels increase.

Stage 5: Panning

Once your mix is sounding the best you can (without compression, EQ and FX) set up your pan positions. I use the LCR system mostly because I’ve found that this consistently gives me big open mixes more easily than other approaches and it’s quicker.
You might spend a bit of time on this depending on the tracks you’ve got because you’re essentially giving yourself three options on where you can locate the pan position of each track – Left, Right, or Centre (more about this in a later chapter).
At this point you need to recheck your mix by listening at low levels, in mono and referring to your reference song. You may need to rebalance the levels.

Stage 6: EQ your groups

This is the point where we add equalisation (EQ). Difference here is that we’re adding it to the group busses first. We’ll only be using three to four EQs for the whole mix at this stage. Add these plugins now. At this point we’re saving ourselves a ton of time because for some genres and mixes, you’ll find that these EQs are the bulk of the equalisation you need in your entire mix! This is in comparison to a ‘micro’ mixing approach that would have us strapping on an EQ plugin to every single track and endlessly tweaking it. There are some important points to note about this EQing step:

+ Do the group EQing first before touching track EQ.

+ You will need to apply EQ to some tracks, but we’re saving a lot of time by not simply applying EQ to every track.

+ Take your time to get the overall mix sounding as good as possible

+ EQing of tracks will mainly comprise rolling off the low end (high pass filtering) and high end (low pass filtering) I usually employ a parametric for this as it enables me to use the same plugin to carry out further fine-tuning later. I generally avoid EQ boosts during this operation.

+ Compare your mix to your reference song regularly so that you can see if you’re heading in the right direction with your sonic treatment.

Stage 7: Add FX

Apply delay based FX to tracks and/or groups (reverb, delay, chorus, phasing etc). It’s important to understand the difference between FX used for tracks and those used for groups. My approach to treating groups is either no FX or a subtle ambient affect, like adding a short low level reverb to add some space to a drum kit. Delay-based FX applied to individual tracks is generally more specialised, such as a slap-back delay on a lead vocal or a longer plate reverb applied to a snare drum. The best approach initially, is to refer to your reference song and try and emulate the FX used on individual and group elements (e.g. lead vocal or entire drum kit). Decide on the FX you’re looking for and set up FX busses, then create auxiliary sends from each track. Avoid adding lots of FX directly to your tracks unless you have a very good reason to do so. It’s hard on your computer CPU and it simply takes more time to add and tweak many FX, than it is to add and adjust several FX busses.

Typical FX buss assignments:

1. Long reverb

2. Short reverb

3. Delay

4. Chorus/phaser

5. Haas delays (very short 20ms – see the chapter on LCR Panning)

Stage 8: Compress your groups

Add a stereo compressor to each of the group busses. These should go after the EQ plugin generally, however, I sometimes find it useful to have EQ – compressor-EQ in that order. This chain enables you to filter out the low frequencies before the signal hits the compressor as these ‘lows’ can cause the compressor to act unexpectedly. Similarly, raising particular frequencies with the EQ can activate the compressor, leading to compression action on the overall signal that may not be required. Fun times! The second EQ then enables you to adjust the EQ without affect from the compressor. An example would be to add a slight lift to the high frequency region. Once your compressors are set up, do a quick rebalance of the song. The aim here is to create some gentle levelling of the group – not to slam it with compression. When I do this my aim is to keep the compression transparent sounding (around 3-5 dB gain reduction) meaning that the affect created is that levelling is achieved without any noticeable problems like pumping or loss of punch. Your aim is to level your group and create a more solid and fuller sound so you can consider this to be ‘corrective’ rather than ‘character’ compression (more about this distinction later). Drums have a lot of attack transients, which you want to retain and control in your mix, so your compressor should not reduce these too much or else it will take out the punch and snap from your mix (simply ensure you have a slow attack to let the drum transients through). Conversely, distorted rhythm guitars don’t generally have or need a lot of attack (the inherent guitar distortion usually creates significant compression of the signal already). So we are not always so concerned with retaining transient information for guitars and therefore take this into consideration when setting compressors.

Stage 9: Compress your master

This is where you add a stereo compression plugin to your master buss. See my note earlier about mixing into a compressor – if you’ve done this earlier then there’s no need to add this step. The reason for compression on the master buss is provide ‘glue’ or a method of making the mix sound more solid and cohesive. The trick here is to use it sparingly as over compressing your mix will give it a choked and strangled sound and reduce the dynamic range (we want to avoid this). Keep an eye on your compressor settings. I check it regularly and aim for a maximum of around 3dB gain reduction with a slow attack (to let transients through) and a reasonably fast release. As you fine tune your mix the overall mix level can change which drives the compressor into higher gain reduction, so keep an eye on this regularly and adjust it to keep it at 3dB-ish. At the same time, if you’re looking for a more aggressive sounding mix, then it can work well to push the mix harder to achieve a higher level of gain reduction. I really love using PSP’s Vintage Warmer plugin for this. It provides a nice levelling compression with saturation (mild distortion) that can give any mix a tough sounding edge. One important thing to keep in mind is your overall level. You need to avoid overdriving your master buss levels into clipping. If you’re passing your final mix to a mastering engineer it’s even more important to provide a dynamic mix with plenty of headroom. A good mastering engineer will usually do a better job than you at making your mix loud and punchy. I aim for no peaks higher than -3dBFS peak on the meter.

There’s another trick I’d like to share that always works a treat for me. I like to use two compressors on the master buss in series. I love the big fat, solid vibe I get. The first compressor is performing parallel compression, while the second provides levelling. The first compressor is set to a fairly aggressive gain reduction of anything from 7-15 dB and blended back in to the overall mix at a low level, to taste (for me that’s anything from 10%- 30%). By itself, this sounds downright awful, but in the context of the mix it’s like adding corn flour to soup and it gives my mix a lovely solid and juicy vibe. The second compressor is more gentle and is just pulling down the peaks with 3-4 dB of gain reduction. This approach yields a very dynamic sounding mix, in comparison to simply inserting one compressor and applying heavy gain reduction.

“Keep it simple: do less, to achieve more, in a shorter time”

STOP

At this point you can have a pretty good sounding mix. By this I mean your mix should:

+ Have an even spread of frequency content across the full frequency spectrum

+ Have a solid and cohesive character to all elements

+ Have a balanced overall sound from appropriate level setting

+ Achieve clear definition between the different elements

If you’re working on a demo mix, then your work could be done. If this is a final mix for a release, your work could also be done. What’s important at this stage is to know when to stop.

The ‘Macro-Mixing’ process can have huge advantages over the micro-mixing/endless twiddling approach because you save so much time and you don’t strangle the life out of your mix from too much compression, EQing and FX.

Step 10: Render/Output your mix

If you’re happy with your mix you can output your mix to an audio format that you or your client needs. Most often these will be:

Mp3 – 256kbps – for internet upload/streaming

44.1kHz/16 bit  .wav – for adding to a cd

44.1kHz/24 bit .wav – for sending to a mastering engineer

Note: I’m not necessarily advocating you record or mix at 44.1 kHz – it’s simply a preference of mine.

Key Points

Look at the big picture and work from the top down

Focus your attention on applying EQ and compression treatment to groups before you move to tracks. Using the Macro-Mixing approach is the same as the ‘less-is-more’ approach. We’re keeping it simple by doing less to achieve more in a shorter time. It also means less tweaking. Less unnecessary tweaking usually improves results because simply doing less means the likelihood of doing something wrong is reduced.

Decide early on, the sound you’re aiming for

Use a reference song that you want your mix to sound like. Ensure you regularly refer to your reference song throughout the mix process and make every mix decision count.

3. Mix Faster and Better

Focus your time, avoid distractions and mix to deadlines

Process checklists

Committing to a process was a second game-changer for me because it meant that I could focus on fine-tuning my skills and techniques instead of worrying if I’d done everything I was supposed to.

I spent years messing around trying various work-flows during mixing sessions. Almost every time I started a mix session I’d do it differently, so effectively I was in new territory, trying new things and generally working slowly and ineffectively. The best thing I did to resolve this was to create a checklist and follow it religiously.

Look forward a few pages to see the checklist I use for every mix session. I recommend you print it out and use it for every mixing session. Or, tweak it to suit yourself BUT use it every time you mix.

Under pressure

There’s no doubt that putting yourself under pressure improves your focus and your motivation to get stuff done. Ever heard of ‘Parkinson’s Law’? It states that work will increase relative to the amount of time available. In other words, if you give yourself two months to mix a song, that’s at least how long it will take you. There’s also no doubt that the more time you spend doing something well, the better you get and the faster you’ll become an expert. So combining this idea with Parkinson’s Law means that if you limit the time you spend on your mixing projects, you’ll mix more projects, get more experience and become a better mixing engineer.

Here’s what I suggest to get started:

+ Give yourself a tight time limit to complete a mixing project

+ Find more mixing projects to do

Let’s put this into perspective a little more. If you normally take three months to mix a project, then progressively reduce this to one month, then to three weeks, to two weeks and then to one week. They key thing here is that you need to put yourself under pressure because this provides significant motivation to focus your attention and dispense with unproductive activity. Another suggestion is simply to go ‘cold-turkey’ from three months to one week. See how you go. How were the results? Did your mix sound any better or worse? I found that I really started focusing on the stuff that I know works and stopped with the endless knob twiddling.

To sustain your hungry mixing appetite you need lots of mixing projects. I recommend you join online mixing groups like www.mix.org and www.indabamusic.com for an infinite source of mixing projects. I got a lot out of Indaba because every mix was a competition with a deadline. Once I’d committed to the deadline it was game-on. Another useful feature is that there are lots of enthusiastic contributors who are only too happy to provide feedback on your mix.

“Set short deadlines and complete more mixing projects”

Mixing Checklist

Pre mix

Check for the following errors in all recorded tracks:

Clipping,

Low frequency

Rumble

Tuning errors

Distortion

Phase rotation

Hiss

Noise

Resonances and tonal problems

For audio restoration you will need to use an editing package that can visually show the audio frequency spectrum as well as the wave. I strongly suggest that you keep a backup of the original files before applying any hard edits.

Plugin/Applications: identification/removal of low frequency rumble, clicks, noises
Adobe Audition, Izotope RZ, Spectro Spectral Editor (Stillwellaudio.com)

Plugin/Applications: tuning
Melodyne, Waves Tune, Antares Autotune (there are other cheap and free options)

During mix – technical

Complete each activity in the following order

1. Set up groups and add reference song.

2. Gain-staging – aim for -18dBFS RMS (average level) for all tracks and check with a spectrum analyser. - best done with a gain plugin or using the trim knob in your DAW.

3. Timing – Set DAW session to song BPM. Check and edit timing as necessary – drums first

4. Tuning – Yes, check it again. Listen for disharmonies between tonal instruments.

5. Gating – Do this for every track to remove noise. This REALLY cleans up your mix.

6. Rough balance – Do this without pan adjustments

7. LCR panning – Pan all elements hard left, centre or hard right. See my exceptions list.

8. Group EQ – Use a parametric equaliser on your group buss for each group.

9. Track EQ – Only do this on tracks that need extra attention AFTER group EQing for correction and character.

10. FX (group & track) – Do this to taste, I usually do special FX on some tracks and add subtle ambience to groups – depends on the song, genre and production goals.

11. Group compression – aim for ‘corrective’ transparent sounding compression.

12. Track compression – Only do this for some tracks for corrective or character e.g. Hard peak compression on a poorly sung vocal (corrective) or heavy compression on a snare (character).

13. Master buss compression – done to ‘glue’ the mix. Aim for approx. 3dB average gain reduction.

14. Automation – use for corrective and creative purposes e.g. automate to fix a vocal with crazy levels (corrective).

15. Overall level not clipping – aim for average levels around -18 dBFS, no peaks higher than -3dBFS.

During mix – creative

All elements are distinctive

Rhythm section is punchy

Vocal lead is clear and intelligible

Low frequency range is balanced

Mid frequency range is balanced

High frequency range is balanced

It’s important to ‘change hats’ at this stage. Get away from your mixing session, burn your mixes to a cd and play them in your car, home stereo, Ipod. Listen on ear buds and headphones. Burn your mix along with your reference songs. The key thing is to leave the studio and focus on the listening and away from the knob twiddling. Keep a notebook handy and make notes, then go back to your mix session and make necessary adjustments.

Key Points

Work more effectively by using a checklist

Working effectively means getting the best output from the best use of your time. A checklist makes it easy because when you’re working on a mix, you stop thinking about the process and start focusing energy and attention on the actual mixing. You simply follow a step-by-step procedure and check it off as you go. The fact is, even when you’re at the top of your game you can make mistakes and forget to do important steps. So the checklist ensures a measure of quality assurance in what you do.

Work to deadlines and complete more projects
I’ve spent countless hours messing around in the studio working on projects that I believe did very little to improve my skills. One of the best things I ever did to improve my skills was to join online mixing groups and mix a lot of stuff to deadlines. The pressure that I put myself under by giving myself unrealistic deadlines was exhilarating and revealing. The only way I could mix quickly and effectively under pressure was to follow a set routine (checklist), do what I know worked (stop fiddling endlessly) and remain focused (remove all distractions).

4. Macro-EQ

Focus on equalisation (EQ) to groups before tracks

Nearly every book, online post or instructional video I ever watched focused on EQ at a micro level, in other words, track-by-track. Learning how to apply EQ to individual tracks is critical but the potential problem with this approach can be that if you start your mix by EQing individual tracks you can end up with an un-natural sounding overall mix if you overdo it. This is because you can find yourself applying EQ treatment in isolation and without full consideration of the overall mix. I found working on the detail to be slow, frustrating, and unyielding  because it seemed to take forever to get the sonic flavour I was looking for, sometimes resulting in an almost unbearable back-tracking exercise to readjust many settings.

The Macro-EQ approach was more of an evolutionary than an overnight realisation. It eventually occurred to me that it was far more useful to think about the consideration and application of EQ with a holistic approach (rather than track-by-track). So I experimented and found I could quickly achieve a reasonably good sounding mix by applying EQ to groups within my mix. Only after that would I apply EQ treatment to some individual tracks that needed it (such as drum overheads, electric bass, vocals and snare drum). To make this work, I would need to assign every track to one of 4-5 mix groups. Then I would apply EQ to each of the groups so that they occupied a defined area of the available EQ spectrum in the song (re-read chapter 2 if you need to).

Applying EQ to several groups is far quicker and easier and can produce more natural sounding results, than applying to 30-40+ individual tracks. It also consumes considerable less CPU power from your computer.

It’s important to note the following:

This is a guide, not a prescription. I use these mix groups on almost every song, but sometimes I’ll deviate by adding an additional group for say, a brass/horn section, FX sample tracks, or ambient keyboards.

I’ll almost always have to apply single track EQ to elements like bass guitar, drum OH’s, toms, kick and snare, lead vocals BUT the key point is to start with group treatment BEFORE you move on to individual track treatment because it saves so much time and your mix can be sounding great with less time and effort.

These groups set you up nicely to apply Macro-Compression i.e. to four groups initially, instead of dozens of tracks (more on this later).

The Macro-EQ approach is in the first instance, a ‘corrective’ application and comprises mainly rolling off low and high frequency content of each group using an appropriate EQ. This will generally result in a transparent adjustment that cleans up the overall mix considerably without affecting the overall tonality.

What I really like about the Macro-EQ approach is that I can quickly and easily make broad and effective adjustments to groups that resulted in a pleasing separation between the musical elements. See figure 1 for a visual reference on how to approach this technique across all the groups.

Here are starting EQ settings I use for groups to start with:

Drum group ‘G.RHYTH’: low roll-off @ 50Hz, high roll-off @ none

Instrument group ‘G.INST’: low roll-off @ 125Hz, high roll-off @ 5 kHz

Backing vocal group ‘G.BV’: low roll-off @ 125Hz, high roll-off @ 10 kHz

Lead group ‘G.LEAD’: low roll-off @ 125Hz, high roll-off @ 10-15 kHz

A note about EQing groups: while you will initially focus on EQ treatment to your groups, you will almost always need to apply EQ to individual tracks. The key here is to stay focused on your group EQ before digging in to track-by-track treatment.

Equalisation for Correction and Character

This section discusses the two different types of EQing you’ll do. Just understanding this concept can make all the difference for you because you’ll have a definite purpose to what you want to achieve when applying EQ to your tracks and groups. This is not a discussion about compressor settings.

Corrective Equalisation

Corrective EQ could best be described as the minimum amount of equalisation required to reduce unwanted frequencies and a sympathetic approach to fit the track or group into the overall mix. Corrective EQ almost always means reducing frequencies using high pass and low pass filtering (HPF and LPF). The high pass filtering (or rolling off the lows as it’s also known) aims at removing unwanted low frequency content usually found in most tracks, that if not removed can cause a bassy and muddy sound to your mix. The aim of low pass filtering removes unnecessary high frequencies from the mix in an attempt to provide clarity and distinction by not having a lot of mix elements competing for the high end. For example, in a typical rock mix, I would filter out the high frequency content of electric distorted guitars so that the high end of the spectrum is occupied by the vocals and the drum overheads.

Let’s consider these two points:

1. Unwanted frequencies: too much bass, mud, unpleasant resonances

2. Sympathetic: the element sounds fine in isolation but requires EQ treatment if it is to maintain definition in the mix when combined with other elements.

Referring to the ‘sympathetic’ definition, I consistently find that the more tracks I have in my mix project, the more I have to reduce the overall frequency range of each group/track. This is because more tracks equate to more elements fighting for the same limited frequency real estate, causing frequency masking. Frequency masking is where one element masks or obscures another because both operate in similar frequency ranges (example: distorted electric guitars often mask lead vocals).

A very common technique is to roll off the low end frequency of a track or group because too many instrument elements playing simultaneously can lead to a build-up of low frequency information that can make your overall mix sound muddy. If we consider the Macro-EQ approach then the first thing we do is consider the overall frequency range that we want each one of our groups to occupy. The goal of EQing this way is to carve out space for each group element in an effort to avoid frequency masking.

“As the track count increases, the volume and frequency extent must decrease”

Figure 1
Approximate Frequency Range for Groups (Typical Rock Song)

Note:
This diagram shows suggested frequency ranges for each of three groups. Filtering out the low end of the Instruments group reduces masking between the bass and kick drum and low frequency content from the guitars. This results in a defined low end for your mix. Similarly, we can achieve clarity in the high end by filtering out the high frequencies of one group, once again creating less likelihood of frequency masking because fewer elements are competing for the same frequency region. The roll-off notes shown are approximate and can vary based on the tracks you have to work with. You know you’ve solved all your frequency masking problems when each element has distinct clarity in the overall mix – easier said than done!

Individual track Equalisation

Depending on the mix you’re after you’ll need to perform some individual track EQ, but that completely depends on a number of factors such as the quality of the original recorded tracks and the style of mix you’re after. The primary goal is creating overall mix clarity and distinction between elements. One way to do this is to listen for combinations of elements that commonly create masking, then apply both corrective and character EQ to minimise the frequency masking between these different elements e.g. electric guitars and main vocals often mask each other in a similar way to bass guitar and kick drum. Additionally, electric guitars with too much low end can mask the electric bass. This might start to sound complicated but the key thing here is to attain clarity and distinction for each instrument in the mix.

Here are some individual track treatments I almost always do. I’ve included sample frequencies I use but these can vary:

+ Roll off the low end of drum overheads around 150-200 Hz

+ Roll off the low end of the snare around 125 Hz

+ Reduce the 400-500 Hz region on kick drums

+ Roll off the high end of the bass guitar around 3 – 5 kHz

+ Roll off the low end of toms depending on the fundamental of each tom

+ Pay careful attention to the 200-350 Hz and 400-500 Hz regions on all instruments and groups and reduce if necessary using a bell curve with a parametric EQ.

+ Check each instrument for unnatural sounding resonances or overly prominent frequencies and reduce these carefully. Typical examples are distorted electric guitars and vocals in the 200-500 Hz range and the 2 kHz – 3 kHz range.

Once you have completed your EQ corrections you should have a very natural sounding mix. These EQ corrections should add clarity to the mix and minimise frequency masking. You should also find that after you complete the initial group EQing that your mix already sounds a lot better and this may negate the need to then perform further track EQing. You’ll have noticed that by and large, corrective EQing is mostly rolling off (removing) the low end and/or the high end and there’s rarely any frequency boosting going on here.

Character Equalisation

The goal of character equalisation is to provide further clarity and uniqueness to individual elements in the mix. So now it’s time for a bit of fun. The snag here is that it’s also the point where you can screw up your mix by over-emphasising certain frequency ranges: I suggest you go easy with your EQ boosts and use the subtle approach. Importantly, character EQing works best on tracks rather than groups. My approach is to select tracks that I feel need a bit more mojo or simply need more definition in the mix.

Try This:
Add clarity to a snare drum by a small boost around 3-5 kHz with a big cut at 400 Hz.

+ Make the bass guitar growl a bit by boosting somewhere between 700Hz to 1.2 kHz and start to roll it off at 5 kHz.

+ Add clarity to the main vocal by a big boost around 10 – 15 kHz while using a de-esser to reduce sibilance.

+ Add a bit more of a brassy sound to the overheads by gentle boosts around 1 kHz.

+ Add emphasis to electric guitars by using complimentary EQ to left and right panned elements. E.g. Add a dB or two of 1 kHz to the left panned guitar and a similar level cut at the same frequency to the right panned guitar. This can be done successfully at 2-3 different frequencies on the same two L/R tracks to add separation to the guitars.

+ For a cool effect on backing vocals roll off the low frequencies at around 500 - 700 Hz and add a healthy boost at 1 kHz to give them a telephone/AM radio sound – really makes them cut through the mix.

You rarely want to add more than a few dB bell curve with a parametric EQ as big boosts lead to gain increases that can start to clip and can alter the tonality in a negative way. EQ boosts are more noticeable with vocals because our ears are familiar with how a vocal should sound, so keep your adjustments subtle. As usual, always keep listening to your reference song to keep your listening ‘grounded’.

Key Points

Focus EQ treatment on groups before you focus on tracks
Be clear on the frequency range that each group should occupy in your mix and focus on the group adjustments before moving to your tracks

Only ‘treat’ the elements that need it, rather than EQing everything
Listen carefully and compare your instrument group with your reference song – it may sound fine without any EQ adjustment. Don’t assume that every group or track requires EQ treatment.

Be clear on the difference between ‘corrective’ and ‘character’ EQ applications
Corrective EQ is used for correcting individual tracks and groups and is done by removing unwanted frequencies, starting with a gentle EQ roll-off at the low and/or high end. Character EQ is used more for individual tracks and requires both cuts and boosts to enhance the natural tonal characteristics of a recorded sound.

5. Macro-Compression

Apply compression on groups before applying to individual tracks

This book somehow wouldn’t be complete without a section on compression. Similarly to Macro-EQ, Macro-Compression is a top down technique where you apply compression to your groups before applying to your tracks. Depending on the genre of your song and the tracks you have, you’ll sometimes find that compressing your groups is all you need to get the sound you’re after. Or perhaps compressing your master buss and your groups does the job. The benefit here is that you can get your mixes sounding better more quickly by focussing on group compression before looking at applying compression to your tracks. On my mixes, I commonly find myself applying levelling compression to all groups, with a few individual tracks of compression on bass, lead vocals, kick and snare, with a little buss compression thrown in for good measure. However, the amount of compression required on tracks is once again significantly related to the quality of the recorded tracks. Good musicians can obtain a certain natural levelling in their performance and by the gear they use. A recording engineer may apply levelling compression during recording as well. Use compression judiciously to avoid a less squashed and more open sound.

I would categorise compression treatment similarly to EQ treatment by saying that compression can be used for character or correction. Thinking about compression application this way is helpful because it helps you determine what you actually want to achieve before you start twiddling knobs.

Corrective compression

Corrective compression is all about applying suitable compression to achieve the sound of a solid performance and correct signal overloads and can be used on tracks and groups. Done well, corrective compression should be transparent, in other words, doesn’t create unwanted artefacts such as ‘pumping’ or loss of punch (unless that’s what you’re aiming for). In terms of compressor settings I would focus on a maximum of 3-5 dB of gain reduction to start and set the attack fast to clamp down on transients OR use a slow attack to let these transients pass through, depending on the material. It’s not uncommon to use two compressors in series with both set at gentler settings if you’re looking for a gentler transparent treatment.

Here are some key things to note

+ Electric distorted guitars often require little to no track compression individually because they are by nature, compressed; however compression on the group can be worthwhile to ‘glue’ them together.

+ Mix elements like drums usually benefit from settings that preserve the transient information (the peak at the front of the waveform) and these are vital to creating a punchy mix. Set your compressor attack times to allow the transient information through but avoid clipping by limiting further down the plugin chain.

+ Lead elements like vocals and lead guitars/keyboards need careful compression application to provide a solid performance. I like use two compressors in series. The first one has a fast attack to grab the peaks and the second one is set to provide some average level reduction.

Character compression

Character compression is used when you want to create a tone or flavour to an element. I wanted a longer, bigger snare sound for a ballad, so I duplicated the original snare track and heavily compressed/limited the duplicate track to create a slightly distorted snare tone with more sustain, which was mixed back in with the original snare track. Result: big, sustained, fat sounding snare that worked beautifully with the slower paced song.

When carrying out either corrective or character compression, the compressor settings are critical here. I don’t intend to go into an in-depth analysis on compressor settings. There is, as mentioned, a ton of good and free content on the web about this topic.

Key Points

Character or correction?
Be clear in your mind about whether you’re aiming for corrective or character compression and dial in your compression accordingly.

Use your ears when setting compressors
Listen carefully to ensure that you’re not overdoing the compression Remember that you don’t need to compress an element unless you have a good reason, such as reducing the peaks of a vocal track or creating a more solid feel to a bass line or levelling a group of backing vocals. Always have a reason and make sure whatever you do actually makes it sound better.

Refer to your reference song regularly
Listen to the way the elements are compressed in the reference song. Are the elements ‘in your face’ or do they retain lots of dynamics? Remember, you’re trying to emulate this with your own mix. Compare, compare, compare.

Be ready to accept that your song may need little or no compression
The amount of compression on group busses and tracks depends just as much on the musical genre as it does on the quality of the recorded tracks. Well recorded tracks with good performances may be sufficiently levelled and not require any corrective compression

6. LCR Panning

Create width, clarity, and separation in your mix by limiting panning options

LCR (Left/Right/Centre) panning is a principle I’ve found to be very valuable in mixing. The concept is that there are essentially three places to pan any track – left, middle or right (however, I break the rules in a couple instances – I’ll elaborate later).

What I like about this technique is:

1. It makes panning decisions easy because you only have three options
I used to fuss around with panning all over the place, wasting time then coming back and changing them again. Committing to L, C or R is quick and effective.

2. My mixes actually sound bigger and more open
It’s a little difficult to actually describe ‘big and open’ without hearing a mix that sounds ‘big and open’. However, when your mix contains elements that are panned to the extremes there’s no doubt that a state of separation is created and by making careful choices about what you pan and where, it can improve the apparent separation of the elements in your song.

There are mixed viewpoints about this technique but I’ve messed around with many panning options and LCR makes my life easier and my mixes better.

Things to consider:

Tracks that are panned hard left or hard right tend to sound unnatural, particularly on headphones because in real life, even a sound that is located hard left gets heard with your right ear. Our brains localise sounds by the short delays created. (I’ve got a hack for this – see my comment about Haas delays a bit later).

LCR panning seems to accentuate frequency masking (one element obscuring another in the frequency spectrum) because there are only three locations to pan your track (see the exception to this rule a bit later) so careful work with EQ is needed to ensure every element is clear in the mix (there are other techniques available to create clarity – see my comments about muting and the ‘bucket concept’).

Mixing in mono at low listening levels is a really useful way to check your clarity in terms of frequency separation. If you can get your mix sounding clear and defined in mono at low levels, it usually sounds great in stereo at higher mix volumes. It can be hard work but absolutely worth the effort.

Exceptions to the LCR rule:

1. Pan your drum overheads 50% L and 50% R

This assumes that you have a mic placement where the mics are placed left and right over the kit. You can break these rules. On one mix I only used one of the overhead mics in mono (muted the other) and it sounded great.

2. Pan short (20ms) Haas delays 50% L and 50% R (more about this later)

This gives a sense of real space to an element in the mix. Try the following with a single guitar (no other instruments) to get the full effect:

Try this:

Acoustic guitar track panned hard left

Aux send the guitar to a delay effect with a 20 ms delay and pan this 50% right and at a lower volume. You should get a sense of real space around the original left guitar. This is a great trick that’s very effective in sparser recordings that don’t have so many instruments.

If you haven’t tried LCR panning before then try it on your next mix. Here are some common pan placements for different elements:

C (centre)

Kick drum

Snare drum

Bass guitar

Lead vocal

Vocal doubling

FX

Ambient layers

L (left) and R (right)

Guitars

Keyboards

Backing vocals

Percussion

FX (with minimal bass)

Ambient layers

Figure 2
Frequency Extent and Panning with LCR – Typical Rock Song

Note: Figure 2 has similar characteristics to Figure 1, but with the addition of panning information. Panning and frequency sculpting shown in this diagram can assist in creating mixes with very good separation and clear definition between instruments. I like to pan my reverbs and delays either 50% left or 50% right.

The Bucket Concept

In my view, a critical component of making LCR panning effective is a holistic consideration of how all the mix elements relate to each other in terms of the frequency range that each occupies. Frequency masking will occur in any mix (where two similar sounding elements mask each other e.g. lead vocals and electric rhythm guitars), but tends to be exaggerated with LCR panning and in mixes with a big track count. The excellent news is that if you can apply effective EQing in your mixes in combination with LCR panning, it can really improve the definition and clarity of your mixes.

Imagine all the tracks in your mix filling an imaginary bucket. The bucket represents the total EQ spectrum available for your song and it’s limited, so when the bucket is full you can’t add anything more. If you only have a few elements in your mix, they fill the bucket and in effect each element can occupy a much fuller part of the frequency spectrum. Conversely, if you have 50 tracks in the bucket, each element has to be significantly reduced in terms of frequency range if they are all to fit in the bucket. To achieve this fit, you would need to aggressively roll off more low and high frequencies from each of the tracks to get them to fit in the bucket. What this means is that your mixes with less tracks can potentially have a fuller, richer character due to less masking. There’s no doubt that when a mix has less elements playing simultaneously, it can have more clarity because our brains can differentiate more easily between fewer elements. Add some careful equalisation and you can create beautifully clear and translucent mixes. So consider this idea when you’re busy filling up your mix with more and more tracks.

Figure 3
The Bucket Concept

Compare this to the 50 track example which requires each of the tracks to have their frequency range significantly sculpted so that all the total frequency content ‘fits in the bucket’. This commonly applies to heavy rock or pop mixes where there are many tracks playing simultaneously. Using many of the same type of track can accentuate the build-up of unwanted frequencies, such as muddy frequencies (200 – 400Hz) and harshness (2 kHz – 3 kHz). This depends on how tracks are recorded where room resonances in poorly tuned tracking rooms can become more obvious.

Why is the bucket concept important?

When you ‘get‘ the ‘bucket concept’, then you’re on your way to crafting mixes with much more clarity because you understand that the more tracks you have, the more you have to sculpt the frequency content of each track or groups of tracks to avoid frequency masking.

Key Points

Get more separation in your mix by having less pan positions
I have my go-to pan positions which I’ve mentioned earlier. I might change them, but it makes setting up my mix fast because I don’t have to waste time considering an infinite range of pan positions.

Save time by making faster panning decisions
Left, right and centre for most elements, with 50% left and right for drum overheads and ambient tracks.

Remember the ‘Bucket Concept’ and reduce frequency masking
Pay attention to equalisation and frequency masking of individual tracks and groups. Be aware that the more tracks you have, the more masking you will need to deal with by applying more EQ.

7. Get More Quality Mixing Time

Get a routine, avoid distractions and focus your time

There are thousands and thousands of home studios in the world today. That’s probably inaccurate – I think there are more. Many of these are run by nice folks like you and me who have a real job and maybe even children (also like me). So how do you find time to perfect your craft with all the other life pressures continually competing for your time? Do you squeeze in an hour here and a half hour there?

Let’s consider these principles:

More time mixing = more experience = being better at mixing

A routine = guaranteed hours mixing = more mixing time

Avoiding distractions = more focus = quality mixing time

It took a few years for the lights to finally come on for me, but once I understood these principles, some magic happened:

1. My mild but ongoing frustration about wondering when I could next get into the studio eased and I became more satisfied and a nicer person to be around.

2. Setting a weekly routine in place enabled me to increase my weekly hours spent mixing.

3. Ensuring I had ‘distraction free’ mixing time meant I stayed focused and got more done in the limited time I had.

Implementing these three principles into my daily life was a game-changer for me. Here’s what I did and still do:

Daily:
Rise at 6am every morning and go straight up to my studio where I work until 7.30am. 7 days x 1.5 hours/day = 10.5 hours/week
My studio like many of you is in another room in my house. If you don’t have this, then do your best to get your studio set up in a place where you can work early or late without annoying people. I struggled initially with the early mornings, but I was unproductive late at night.

One night per week and one afternoon on the weekends where I could work on specific projects or have clients over.
One night: 1 x 3 hours = 3 hours/week
time on the weekend: = 1 x 3 hours = 3 hours/week

That’s 16.5 hours/week of wonderful, focused mixing time.

Limited my research to lunch times at work: 1-2 hours/week
Research is all the stuff I mentioned earlier: reading books, forums, product reviews

Avoid all distractions while mixing
Turned off my phone, no internet connection on my studio computer, coffee machine nearby. Research indicates that it can take up to 45 minutes to re-focus your thinking if you become distracted. Being distracted means less productivity.

Seriously, implement these or similar strategies into a regular mixing routine and enjoy guaranteed mixing time and focused mixing sessions. This was one of the most valuable things I’ve done to improve my experience.

“To become a better mix engineer, spend more time mixing”

Key Points

Set up a weekly routine to ensure guaranteed mixing time and stick to it
You may have to agree set times with other family members. My wife had no problems with me getting up early to work in the studio. I had to negotiate a little on the one evening and weekends but once it was agreed, I stuck to it and everyone was happy. I have to add that prior to this arrangement, I annoyed the crap out of her by regularly doing a disappearing act then emerging hours later. Scheduling time like this means more time for you and more time for your family because there’s no more uncertainty about when you’ll be around.

Avoid distractions and stay focused for more productivity
Separate ‘research’ time from mixing time, turn off your phone and internet. Less distraction means more focus, which results in greater productivity.

8. A Bit of Balance

Get an even balance of levels for your entire mix by utilising a variety of monitoring methods

Getting a good balance is critical to getting a great sounding mix. What’s important is knowing what you’re aiming for first up and having a process in place to achieve it.

For example, if I’m working on a mix for a folk song, the style of mix is quite different to that for pop, rock or metal. Once again, using a reference song helps us emulate the different compression, EQ, and delay based treatment we need to achieve that particular mix style. In terms of process, I strongly recommend that you have a variety of monitoring that simulates how your listeners will consume the music. This means going beyond monitoring on your main monitor speakers. It means using a sub, listening on earbuds and headphones, listening at higher and lower levels, listening in mono, listening on a TV and in the car. When your mixes translate well to all of these mediums, then you know you’re on the right track. When I’m close to a final mix, I always burn a couple of versions of the mix (vocal level up and vocal level down and other variations) in addition to my reference song(s). Within a day or so, I always know what I want to change. A really key part of making this successful is getting out of the studio environment and listening without the distractions of plugins and gear. Listen a lot, take notes, tweak and do it over again.

One last thing: keep your overall mixing volumes consistent because as you raise and lower the monitor level, your ears’ sensitivity to different frequencies changes. This can lead to a tail-chasing exercise where you find yourself endlessly tweaking low and high frequency ranges. Just for fun, do some research on the Fletcher Munson equal loudness contour curves.

Key Points

Aim for getting a good balance first up
Once your tracks are loaded, pull up those faders before doing anything else. Get familiar with the track and how it sounds without processing. Start deciding now what you will treat and what you won’t treat.

Check your nearly finished mix on a variety of mediums
I check on a combination of my main studio monitors, home stereo, earphones, earbuds, computer speaker, mono small speaker, car stereo, mp3 player.

Utilise set mixing levels
I won’t go into setting up the optimum listening level – there’s lots of free resources available on line that show this procedure. But avoid the habit of listening at a variety of levels as the Fletcher-Munson (equal loudness contour) curves show clearly that your ears’ sensitivity to frequencies varies relative to volume, so if you’re continually varying your listening volume, your mix balance decisions will be inconsistent and unreliable.

Check your mix against your reference song regularly
This can be painful if you feel like your mix is not even close to your reference, but stick at it. Remember: no pain, no gain.

9. The Power of Reference Songs

Have a clear target for overall mix character by emulating modern song productions

I’ve mentioned reference songs regularly so far and I can’t stress enough how important it is to use one as a vital component of every mix project you work on. Choosing and using a reference song has got to be one of the easiest, no-brainer things you can do, to get your mixes sounding better. In the same way that you can’t play darts without a dart board, if you don’t have a reference song, you have nothing to aim for in terms of achieving specific mix characteristics. Sometimes a band gives me more than one reference song. They might like how the drums and guitars sound in one song, yet like the overall mix balance of another. Other times they might like the overall clarity or the loudness.

Rest and reset your ears

A reference song is also a great way to reset your ears during mixing. Our ears get accustomed very quickly to what we’re listening to, whether it sounds good or bad. This can mean getting comfortable with heavy bass, over-bright guitars and poor sounding drums, for example. Switching regularly back to your reference song while mixing helps to refresh your ears and keep perspective.

Compare regularly

It’s really important to refer to your reference song regularly during your mixing to help shape your mix and guide your mixing decisions. In addition to the sound of individual instruments and groups, the reference song is a great tool for assessing the overall tonality of your mix. I request a reference song from every band or artist I work with. Sometimes I have to help them choose it and if they don’t care, then I select one secretly and get on with the job.

Lastly, remember that reference songs are generally going to be professionally mastered, so you’ll be comparing your un-mastered final mix to a mastered version. I strongly suggest you don’t apply heavy limiting to your mix simply to emulate the master. By all means, put a limiter on periodically to get a comparison to the master but don’t ‘smash’ your mixes and make them look like a brick. Punchy, dynamic mixes generally translate well into loud mastered mixes while heavily compressed and limited mixes simply don’t. Once you’ve sucked the life, punch, and vibe out of your mix with over-compression it’s near impossible to recover that during mastering. I really suggest letting a professional mastering engineer, with his/her mastering ears, great room, equipment and experience, master your final mixes.

A word about mastering

Some time ago, I had a client happily screw up their album by getting a cheap and inexperienced ‘mastering engineer’ do the mastering. We spent a year recording and mixing it. Disappointing! Check out your mastering engineer before you engage him or her and listen to their masters. Believe me, a substandard mastering engineer can easily trash all your hard work. The proliferation of mastering software has led to a flood of mastering engineers who don’t know what they’re doing and Industry marketing of sexy looking plugins can easily mislead people into thinking that they can master songs just because they have some software that tells them they can. In saying the above, I master songs as well, but I tell my clients that I’m not a mastering engineer and they’ll likely get a better job by a professional.

Sometimes there’s simply no budget for mastering. If the band or artist is simply looking for a demo quality recording then I’ll almost always apply mastering treatment. However, for international level releases, my advice is to open their wallets and find a Grammy mastering engineer they can find who masters in their genre.

Seven things to listen for when selecting a reference song

1. Overall mix balance of instruments and vocals

2. Overall EQ character of the mix (is it bright/bassy/middy?)

3. Overall loudness of the mix (is it heavily compressed and or highly dynamic?)

4. Clarity of primary elements (bass, kick and snare drum, vocals)

5. Width and depth of the mix

6. Punchiness of the rhythm section (drums & bass)

7. Wetness/dryness of mix (is it swamped in FX or is it a very dry mix)

“Use a reference song as a vital component of every mix project you work on”

Key Points

Here are some suggestions for choosing and using a reference song:

Check out the Grammies
Do a bit of research on who is at the top of their game. Looking for Grammy winners or Grammy nominated mastering engineers is a good place to start, and then see if you can afford them.

Reference songs are usually mastered mixes
Keep in mind that yours won’t be, however, if you can get your mixes sounding close to a professional master then you’re on the road to awesome-ness.

Choose your reference songs carefully
Get familiar with how they sound in different listening environments so that you can compare the characteristics with your own mixes. Decide on the characteristics you like about the song. Ensure that the reference song you choose has as many features that you want to emulate – punchy drums, wet or dry ambience, vocal character, guitar tones, and overall mix loudness and so on.

You’ll likely need more than one reference song
Depending on the genres you mix in (pop, rock, metal, jazz, country, grunge, punk, dance, and many, many more) you’ll need more than one reference song. Start looking for these now so they’re ready to use immediately for your next mix session.

10. Ten Tips for Getting Great Mixes

Here is a list of what I believe are the most important factors in getting a great sounding mix. Some of these have already been discussed earlier in the book

1. Everything in tune
Songs with instruments and vocals that are out of tune AND contain disharmonies sound amateurish
Make a point to check all tonal instruments (not drums) for tuning errors and fix them using a high quality tuning plugin (I use Melodyne). Don’t make the mistake of over-editing and making every single sung or played note pitch-perfect. This will make the song sound mechanised and unhuman. Also check the harmonic relationship while the full mix is playing by listening if anything simply sounds wrong. It’s helpful to solo combinations such as bass and guitars, guitars and vocals, lead guitar and rhythm guitars, lead vocals and backing vocals, and so on when checking.

2. Everything in time
Create rock-solid time for a professional sound
Songs with timing errors sound plain bad. Typical timing errors with drums are most noticeable when significant beat elements like the kick and snare are not in time. Poorly played drum fills are another show-stopper that you’ll want to fix. Similarly, when a drummer’s tempo (or BPM) varies throughout the song it can lead to an extremely uncomfortable sounding mix. Lock everything into time at the beginning of your mix by having drums played to a click. When starting your mix, edit your drums first and foremost. Once again, don’t suck the life out of your drums by locking every beat into time.

3. Reference religiously
Duplicate the sound of a pro mixer to sound like a pro
As discussed many times in this book, having a reference song provides a target to aim for. The reference makes it easier to get tonality, punch, dynamics and more in your own song because you have a polished professional mix to try and duplicate. Think about it like you’re copying a painting. You need to pay attention to many areas of your mix, such as punch, spread, time-based delay effects (reverb , delays, chorus etc), loudness, compression, tonality, saturation – really, this list goes on.

4. Creating focus
Create a dynamic mix with ongoing interest for the listener by using automation
A great mix has lots of ‘micro-leads’. I’m not talking about the major lead components like lead vocal and lead guitar. Modern mixes often have many elements playing simultaneously. The way to create focus in the mix is to temporarily raise the level of different elements to bring them subtly to the listener’s attention. Use automation to raise that bass fill a few dB at the end of that verse, bring up that interesting guitar chug-a-chug for a half bar, or emphasise the organ riff as it transitions from a verse to a chorus. An easy technique is to listen for the gaps between the lead vocal line or solo and raise the level of another element in that gap. Another technique is to raise the level of an element at the transition points of your song. Typically these are at the end of a verse leading into a chorus, or chorus into a lead break, or the turnaround in the middle of a verse. Remember to keep it subtle unless your creative decision is to make it smack-in-the-face obvious. My preference is to make the end result ‘transparent’ In other words, you barely notice it in the final mix.

5. Various monitoring
Monitor at different levels on different systems to get a better understanding of how your mix will sound to the world
My main mix level in the studio is around 80 dB SPL on my main midfield monitors. I know this because I’ve measured and I use this level regularly. I also monitor in mono at very, very low levels, on small computer speakers, with earbuds, on headphones, in the car, on the TV (via USB). Do this, make notes and revise your mix.

6. Short delays
Use very short delays to enhance the uniqueness of mix elements
Short delays in the region of 0 – 10ms can be mixed subtly back into almost any instrument sound to enhance it and give it a unique place in the mix. I use this trick on every mix to some degree. For example, if an electric guitar is getting lost in the mix, then applying a small amount of delay adds a mild comb-filtering effect that can give the element character and clarity in the mix. I also regularly use Haas delays of 20ms panned away from the original element to add a real ambience. For example, panning an acoustic guitar hard left and then panning a low level 20ms Haas delay 50% right can create a real and pleasing dry ambience that gives the guitar its own space.

7. LCR panning
Pan elements hard left, centre, or hard right to help achieve maximum separation and speed up your mixing workflow
I like this technique because it saves me time by having only three options. As previously mentioned this includes an extra two panning positions (50%L and 50%R for ambience delays). So that's five positions all up. Nice and easy and also extremely effective in producing a mix panorama with maximum separation, and therefore clarity and distinction between the different mix elements. LCR panning is most effective when careful attention is paid to EQ treatment of each of the panned elements. Our key goals are to limit frequency masking and to provide a consistent level (compression and balancing). It’s helpful to have ‘pre-decided’ where your mix elements are panned before you start a mix.

8. Transient manipulation
Create fuller and punchier mixes by manipulating transients
Controlling the initial transient of a waveform enables a sense of clarity in a mix that simply can’t be obtained by other means because it enables you to accentuate elements of the mix that might otherwise remain buried. Particularly useful in dense rock mixes where it’s difficult to get drums to cut through the mix. Most useful on drums (but just as useful on other instruments when required), the process involves increasing or reducing the first ‘spike’ at the front of the waveform to help and element cut through the mix. You can do this with any compressor that has attack and threshold settings. You can also do it with more easily with transient design plugins. The SPL Transient Designer is famous for this and Izotope’s Alloy plugin has a transient section included. Reducing transients is also a great trick to de-focus or soften an element in the mix. You can take this concept further by altering the sustain portion of the waveform in terms of increasing or reducing it to get more length, or to shorten (a bit like a gate) a sound. This is a topic I’d like to cover in another book – look out for this because it’s one of my favourite topics.

9. Leave the studio
Switch your brain from technician to producer and hear the difference
One key part of finishing a mix that I always do without fail, is to listen to my mix anywhere except in the studio. By removing myself from the studio I stop thinking technically and start listening like a producer or simply like an average person. When there are no knobs and sliders and compressor settings to mess with, you free your mind just to focus on your mix and hear the mixing choices you’ve made. Put your mix on a cd/USB along with your reference song and a few other songs of similar genre, grab a notebook and listen. I love listening in the car because a simple half-hour drive to somewhere and back means one hour of listening.

10. Don’t mix and master
Mixing and mastering are different tasks requiring different skills, equipment, and thinking – avoid doing them simultaneously
Firstly, it’s about focus and secondly it’s about understanding. In the same way that you can’t expect good results if you’re trying to write an essay and talk on the phone, don’t expect to create a great mix and master. It works if you’re happy with marginal results. But if you really want your mixes to shine, you’re best to give your final mixes to a professional mastering engineer with great experience, great ears, great gear, a great room, and who has achieved great results. They are generally great value and you’ll find you can get a Grammy nominated/awarded mastering engineer for not a whole lot of money.

11. Common Reasons Mixes Sound Bad

Trying too hard
In your earnest attempts to get your mixes sounding like the pros, you overdo just about everything: too much and incorrect compression, too much and incorrect EQ, too much and incorrect FX. Just too much. And you do all this because you think more is better. It’s not. What’s better is knowing what to do, what not, and how much of either.

Trying to be loud
Almost everybody wants their mixes loud. Loud is great until your song loses punch and starts distorting. The trouble is that many don’t know when they’ve reached the optimum loudness for their mix. But here’s the news-flash as a mixer your aim is to get a punchy, dynamic and beautifully balanced final mix. Leave loudness to real mastering engineers who know how to get mixes loud and still retain punchy dynamics and balance. If your motivation is to get loud mixes at the expense great mixes, then I recommend rethinking your mixing goals.

Endless twiddling
Endless knob twiddling, tweaking and ‘trying stuff out’ is unproductive and damaging during the mix process. It wastes time and often creates extra work because you need to go back and revise. If you’re desperate for a ‘trying stuff out’ session, then I suggest you do this in ‘research’ time and allow time to mess around on stuff that doesn’t damage a real mix project. Take the good stuff you learned, only when you know it works, and incorporate this into your mixing checklist or technique skillset.

Poorly recorded material
The best mixes I’ve worked on have included well recorded tracks, great performances, great songs and great arrangements. I can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever done a bad mix when all of these ingredients were present. The opposite is also true, where poor material; performances and songs have resulted in mixes that were average at best. Reading between the lines, I’m saying that the outcome of your final mix production is significantly affected by song and recording quality before you even start mixing. To put this in perspective, if you get poor material to work with, accept the likelihood upfront that your final production is unlikely to be great, and similarly, get excited when you get access to great material to work with – this is your chance to shine.

12. Final Words and Future Books

What you’ve read so far is an explanation and methods for the quickest and most effective way to get great sounding mixes from your studio. It doesn’t matter too much what plugins or DAW system you use. It’s all about using solid principles and sticking to processes. I’ll admit that good sounding plugins used correctly can add something special to a mix. But you’re more likely to get a better end result by knowing exactly how to use the tools you have got, even if they’re not the latest and greatest.

Here are some other books I plan to write very soon. If you like this book, then please look out for these in the near future. I believe the information in this book will really help take your mixes to the next:

Mix focus
In this topic I’ll explain how to create dynamic and interesting mixes by creating focus on different elements in the mix using automation and other techniques. This technique alone can really inject life into your mix productions.

Vibrant and punchy mixes
The manipulation of transient and sustain elements in your tracks is an incredibly effective way to inject punch and vibrancy into your mixes. This was one of the most challenging and rewarding things I ever discovered. Overnight, it took my mixes from flat and unexciting to fat and punchy.  This technique can be used on all elements in your mix. What’s more it’s an easy technique to master.

Production and arrangement
This book will focus more on song crafting and arrangement and less on the technical aspects of mixing. A great song is way more than a great mix. So once you feel comfortable in the techniques for achieving the mix you want, the next piece to the puzzle is a careful consideration of overall dynamics, transitions, builds, climaxes. In other words, how all the different elements in the song combine to create the whole. I’ll also look at how to inspire and capture the best performances from your artists.

13. About the Author

Amos Clarke has been working as a recording and mix engineer, songwriter and producer for well over 10 years. He’s worked extensively in live sound and as a bass player and vocalist in working bands that have gigged around the world. He’s also a lecturer at Unitec Institute of Technology in Auckland, New Zealand where he’s being lecturing at a tertiary level for over 15 years. He holds a diploma in audio engineering from SAE and currently runs sHOWpONY, a boutique recording and production studio in Auckland, New Zealand.

Get in touch with Amos Clarke

Email - macromixing@outlook.com

Facebook – www.facebook.com/macromixing

My Facebook page is dedicated to discussing and demonstrating the techniques used in this book.

Thanks

Well, you got this far – well done! I want to offer you a very big thanks for reading this book. I sincerely hope you found value in it and that you can find more time, stay more focused and create better mixes faster than you ever did in the past. Most importantly, I hope these ideas can improve the quality and your enjoyment of the art and skill of crafting great mixes.

Lastly, I would really appreciate it if you would leave me an honest review on Amazon. Honest reviews are important to me because it helps me write better books. This book is about my own personal technique and processes that I have developed over the years of recording, mixing, and producing in a recording studio environment. I really feel that the techniques and workflow outlined in this book can help mixing engineers enjoy their mixing more and produce more satisfying results. So let me know what you loved and what you didn’t. I’m happy for suggestions on improving the book and I will take all reviews into consideration and update the book at some time in the future as necessary.

Please leave a review on Amazon

click here to go directly to your review page

Thanks again for reading and I wish you the very best with your mixing.

Sincerely

Amos Clarke

14. Recommended Resources

Books
The Mixing Engineer’s Handbook                            Bobby Owsinski

The Recording Engineer’s Handbook              Bobby Owsinski

Mixing Secrets for the Small Studio               Mike Senior

Mixing With Your Mind              Michael Stavrou

Mastering Audio - the Art and the Science              Bob Katz

Online
www.moultonlabs.com

www.recordingrevolution.com

www.pensadosplace.tv

www.bobbyowsinski.com

Other Books by Amos Clarke

56 Mix Tips for the Small Recording Studio

Practical techniques to take your mixes to the next level

This first edition comes with a free drum processing video

Amos shows you how to get fat, smackin’ and punchy drums. The video is packed with audio examples and explanations on the principles behind the processing. A must-watch! Get the link inside the book.

56 Down-And-Dirty Practical Mixing Techniques To Take Your Recordings To The Next Level

Flip to any page, read the technique, and apply it. It’s really that simple. This is not a book that trawls relentlessly through the world history of mixing before providing any useful advice. It simply gets straight into the business of giving you real tried and proven mixing tips that actually work. And there’s plenty to keep you busy. The book covers processing such as compression, equalization, panning, parallel compression, transient manipulation, harmonic distortion, delay based effects and much more. The real value is how combinations of processing work to create magic in your mixes.

Click here to get it on Amazon 56 Mix Tips for the Small Recording Studio