About Mixing. Some tips & tricks about EQ, Compressor, Delay, Reverb, etc

The Lounge General Discussion
#1

Found this blog about some tips about Mixing the Instruments /Elements in a song. They cover some tips & tricks, for EQ, Compressor, Delay, Reverb, etc…

It sounds useful to me so i share it with you

How To Mix Music - 1. Fundamentals

How To Mix Music - 2. Signal Flow and Plugins

How To Mix Music - 3. Stereo Image and Mixing Tips

How To Mix Music - 4. Mixing Drums, Percussion and Mixing Bass

How To Mix Music - 5. Mixing Instruments and Synths

How To Mix Music - 6. Mixing Vocals and Sound Effects

How To Mix Music - 7. Finalizing your mix (Side-Chaining, Leveling, Delay and Reverb)

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#2

can we keep this thread live?! I wanted to start a thread “Mixing Help”, but found this.

I’m asking cuz, everything I do is muted and shit. and you guys all have such great sounding stuff, and was wondering if you guys wouldn’t mind lending knowledge to help those less capable.

mixing, recording, routing, plugs, hardware…I try and try and read and try…with not a whole lotta luck. any info would be greatly appreciated.

thanks

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#3

Mainly -sound selection and - use your ears to decide.
Every mix is different, but the advantage of percussion-based music is, just like a regular rock band in a real studio, the drums are set up first and, as a template, everything else around them.
Perhaps the proliferation of electronic music nowadays, and the plethora of sounds and options distract from the basic “western music” approach and how things are placed in the sonic field.
If you lay out a drum track and raise the mixer fader level to the maximum- 0db, you have then found the "ceiling’.
If you add a bass, obviously, something has to give- either by turning level down or EQing/cutting something. This is the precarious balance.
Sometimes, instead of building, starting from top down and cutting/adjusting is another way. It is easy to lose perspective, and for the most part, we will have only a few tracks that will be “dominant” and the rest “supportive” or decorative. Think of it as a Beef Roast dinner. Get the meat right. Often good songs have a few powerful elements that carry the rest.
For a start, everything should occupy a unique space in the overall spectrum, but there is also the tricks of accentuating harmonics and upper registers of a bassy sound and vice-versa, which increase the presence of a particular sound without adding very much level.
On a usual finished mix, each tracks level readouts will vary, sometimes widely, yet all the tracks will sound the same volume. This tells you to basically not pay very much attention to the actual relative positions or numbers associated with controls. Some faders or effect controls will be very extreme while others at minimum, yet be fully present in mix.
Therefore, if it sounds right, it is.
The only other caveat to that is capturing the mix as transparently as possible, so, when final level and mastering is applied, translates across both a smartphone as well as a hifi.
I would not rely very much on compression in the beginning and only leave it for light touches. Focus on EQ, sound selection and level/placement.
So, I would suggest, (although I did not begin this way) to separate mixing and mastering.
Although several years of trying to capture live mixes to a stereo track may give insight into the entire process from start to finish; that you are not getting bogged down too much in the technicals. It may depend on your approach- for me, I am more interested in capturing a “vibe” or musical moments over precise, technically accurate mixes.
Lastly, experiment! See how far your equipment will go. Push things. Mix at a quiet level. Listen loud a bit. Mix in mono, through monitors and headphones. Use reference tracks of like material. Have fun with it.
Sometimes it can be frustrating, excruciating work if you get way bogged down and lose focus on making music. It needs not to be perfect to be a great piece of music.

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#4

I guess I don’t know what sounds right :frowning: or how to pick sounds that fit together.

I mean great recordings sound amazing to me and I’m very particular with the ones I like.
But when it comes to making sounds…clueless. Stuff sounds decent while I’m doing it. But if I step away and come back it sounds like shit. Then I don’t know where to go from there…turn it off and walk away.

I’m a sucker for bass. I try to add more higher tones, they wrong…then get sucked back into the mud.

Lost.

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#5

What I learnt since I make music for hobby is if you don’t know how to mastering, dont do it at all. It sound way better with vanilla sound (just mixed the right volume) than the mastered track with too high EQ, too compressed, etc… The amateur will always use too much. I’m like this, now I don’t do mastering and it sound better.
If you have time or you are pro, so you definitively want to learn to master. (and buy good monitor and good plugins)

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#6

What is your monitor situation? And Room? And does your mixes just sound “bad” on all the places you listen to them?

#7

Yamaha HS-80M
room, kinda reflection city, no money for foam
have to use headphones a lot, neighbors: use grado rs-1

I dont try to ‘master’, so much as just mix.
try to get sounds working in the boxes cuz I generally and going out through the stereo out into my I/O

mixes will sound good initially on whatever I use, but then shit everywhere else. and THEN when I go back to where I mixed them at another date…sounds like shit.

its like I get sucked into. the current sound and think it sounds good. but when I come back to it…it isn’t. its like my ears smarten up

#8

Ahh, you want to open that ol can of worms, hmm?

The topic is super-broad as well as very deep so we need to set some boundaries for the scope of discussion, don’t you think?

I can tell you this much. About 15-18 years ago I first worked in a “professional” recording studio as an intern (mostly recording dialogue and radio commercials tho) and the main room in that place had decent acoustics and big 3-way active monitors, and now looking back I think that was the biggest difference of that place compared to most project studios. Its that simple.

If your listening environment is subpar, you will most likely find yourself in a position where no amount of “mixing” is giving you a great sound off the bat… You find yourself listening to the mixes in different places with different systems and little by little make corrections that make stuff sound more balanced across them…a soul destroying, if not sobering experience.

So the no 1 priorii IME is, if you’re not happy with your mixes, check your listening environment. Is there something you can do to improve your acoustics? Are your monitors placed optimally? That sort of thing. This doesn’t need to be expensive or fancy, carpets, sofas and thick, heavy curtains (but no egg cartons ffs!), speaker stands, that sort of things can do a lot already.

This is the most vital piece of the puzzle. Without this in place, nothing will ever make sense.

In a good listening environment for audio work, you find yourself doing the right things instinctively, just by following your ears.

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#9

well my enviro sucks. apartment life.
I just figured if I could shoot for a ref track as a goal, in the room…shouldnt it kinda come out the same…ish? id be happy with same-ish vs shite

the disheartening part is…ive been at this for 20+ years. [I think I started messing around in 99]. and just haven’t improved. in fact probably went backwards

#10

Reference tracks are always a good idea!

Again, if you feel like you have almost gone backwards in your output sonics in that time, ask yourself have you moved/changed apartments in that time? If you have, chances are that some of those places had better listening environment.

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#11

I think what id like mostly is to just get out of the mud zone, and get thumping kicks. if I could get that…I think id start feeling happy with the sounds.

#12

Have you considered a Subpac S2? If you mix on headphones a lot this can help dial in your low end freq. You can balance the kick and basslines better when tracking. Maybe that will help to make room for some more of the mid and hi freq to strike a better balance. I’ll say that it is hard to get great mixes from a home studio that’s not setup well. I’ve had mixes where it sounds great on 3 systems (home, car, phone) but then I listen on some other system and I cant hear a certain element. I would consider that 75% success rate, so it’s a win, but it’s hard to Perfect it.

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#13

Ahh, kicks huh? There’s a vert easy solution for this… using already processed, “club ready” samples. I dont do it myself but I’m sure someone in the interwebz has some kind of “best kickdrum samples for” listings/threads/info?

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#14

note: hobbyist here.
just hoping to make myself happy with my tunes. no aspirations other than that at all.

even tho im looking for help. I was hoping this would turn into a place where people can dump ideas…tips and tricks.

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#15

Sometimes a lot of mud can come from a kick having too much decay. The decay freq can sometimes be hard to spot it’s full energy on headphones alone. I love me some “boom boom boom” 808 kicks, but it leaves no room for much else down below.

Also if you have chord pads, I like to shave off some of the low end to give room for other low freq elements.

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#16

I use meat beat for ref for stuff like that. MAD kicks/subs. everything is CLEAN tho!


you gotta hear the non youtube compressed tracks…oh man!

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#17

oh and their levels are lower than mine…but their music plays louder. which means im getting freqs ALL mixed up :face_with_symbols_over_mouth:

#18

If their peak levels are less than yours, but their RMS level is still hidhger or equal than yours, that should tell you they use more compression/limiting than you. Having excessive lowend can also bring your RMS levels down fast.

Problem in that case is, using compression/limiting in a isubpar listening environment can be a risky endevour. But that’s where you need to start if you want more RMS level for the same peak level.

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#19

What kind of monitors or cans you got, @phaelam?

#20

Yamaha HS-80m
Grado RS-1 and PS-1000

1 Like