What are the main things you down to "mixdown" after working on your DT?

Elektron Gear Digitakt
#1

Hopefully I’ve worded that title such that it makes some sort of sense.

Basically, I work entirely on my DT. In an ideal world, I would make pieces of music on there, export from it and that would be that. The thing I’m ignorant of is what people do to “mixdown” the piece (that’s a new term to me) on their DAW.

So in short, after making music on your DT (or OT, DN, whatever), what more still needs to be done before you’d be happy to release it?

If anyone is aware of a good introductory guide to this “post-composition” stage, I’ll happily go off and do some reading.

Many thanks in advance!

#2

For me, it depends on how I intend to record my output. When I was working just on the DT or with one thing through the inputs, I’d do all the mixing and compression on the DT itself and record it out to a Zoom R8. Easy.

Now I have a larger setup and I work in Ableton, and I use Overbridge to take the separate tracks from my DT and Analog Keys over USB as well as the inputs. This takes the audio before the effects, panning and the compressor. It also substantially reduces the volume and bypasses the internal mixer.

For the FX and panning, I do that on the fly now, because I monitor through Ableton at all times, and I use a Novation Launch Control XL to control my sends in Ableton in the same way I would use them on the DT itself.

For the ‘mixdown’ proper, I come back to the song after I’ve recorded everything and check all my levels, set up compression, do any adjustments to FX and panning that I feel are required, do some EQ if I feel like there is any sort of frequency issues. At this point I’ll listen critically at reasonable volume through my monitors and my headphones to check for anything that doesn’t feel right, and make adjustments if necessary.

I’m a novice at this, so hopefully some more experienced people comment. I keep it quite simple.

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#3

Doesn’t sound it! Thanks for that, really appreciate it. This is a world I know nothing about so you’ve opened my eyes to a few bits there.

What I find interesting is that, if I understood you correctly, you used to do all this on just the DT, and the only reason you don’t now is because you’ve harnessed other gear/Ableton etc. Which suggests I can indeed make full, finished tracks on the DT and not necessarily have to export to a DAW and do all sorts of post tweaks. If so, this is pleasing.

Out of interest, how did you learn this post-composition process (adding compression, EQ tweaks etc.) - just bit by bit or is there a good course/book you’d recommend?

Many thanks!

#4

You can absolutely make great sounding stuff on just the Digitakt, and if you want to keep it that way, don’t feel any pressure to change it! If you get in to good habits of checking your mix as you add new elements, learning how to use the compressor, even as just a limiter, feeling your way around setting up your effects without drowning anything out, etc, you can get great sounding mixes.

As for learning sound production stuff, I just picked it up from searching out information whenever I had a question, and playing around with things. Like I said, there is a lot I still don’t know, and I only got Ableton and a number of other bits of gear this year, and I’m still working on getting everything working together flawlessly. Unfortunately I can’t recommend any books or courses, but this site is a goldmine of information if you have the patience to dig. The difficult part, in my experience, is finding the right question. Once you can sensibly formulate a question about why something works the way it does, or why you might need to do something differently, I’ve found it usually quite simple to get an answer.

Like today, for example. I’m trying to incorporate a new piece of gear into my setup. I knew that there were potential problems, but I didn’t know exactly what they would be until I got stuck in and saw what went wrong. When I could see what was going wrong, I knew the question I needed to ask, and I found the answer on here in a minute haha.

So I’d recommend making a bunch of music and recording it as you go, then come back to it a week later and listen to it critically. Find out what the weaknesses are in your tracks, and then ask questions about them.

#5

I’m also a complete novice at this stuff, so other folks please correct me on any of this. But after I record from any sampler, there’s some things that tend to crop up for me as I listen back, which I use post-processing to take care of…

Note: Most of these issues would be better taken care of by mixing more carefully “in the box,” but I’m impulsive.

Note, 2: I record everything “digital analog,” i.e. to a digital multitrack mixer with lots of physical routing, because I find remixing fun. But what I consider fun is not remotely the most efficient way to do this. I use a mix of Reaper’s free VSTs and outboard gear like pedals, but you could surely do it all with VSTs and save yourself a ton of time and disk space.

ISSUE 1. When I listen back to what I record from the DT, sometimes the EQ curve will have “humps” or “dips” that I didn’t notice as I was recording—bits of the spectrum that my monitors didn’t portray accurately, or got cancelled out by my study’s low ceiling, or ear fatigue, or whatever.

This is especially the case with too much low-frequency rumble or hats that are too prominent, which I often seem to catch after the fact.

So I often EQ the whole mix against a reference track (ideally multiple reference tracks) by loading the track onto one of the spare channels in my mixer and using Mute to go back and forth between them.

Then I mix this EQ’ed recording back in with the original recording to find a happy medium between them (aka “parallel processing”). That’s Mixdown 1.

ISSUE 2. The DT often sounds “livelier” when I record than when I listen back.

So, I’ve been experimenting with “cheap” compressors like the RNC and RNLA to bring a little of this “bounce” back into the mix, or to “tame” some bits that stand out too much in the mix.

I’ll usually run this signal through an EQ before it hits the compressor, to accentuate the parts of the signal that I want to the compressor to react to (like if there’s a HH that’s too loud, or there’s a hiss in one of the samples that I didn’t notice). And I use a cheap EQ pedal on the comp’s sidechain to do the HPF trick you can read about here.

Then, same as with EQ, I’ll usually mix the compressed signal, at a fairly low level, with the original signal (“parallel compression”) to a new mixdown track. That’s Mixdown 2

Then I listen back to all these, and mix together some combination of them, in parallel or in sequence, to find a sound that “feels right” against the reference track. It’s an iterative process with lots of iterating. But I find all the listening back helps me think through the composition, decide which takes are my favorites, etc.

Finally, all this doubling and tripling up of tracks tends to cause unwanted bass frequencies (“muck”) to pile up, so I EQ it one last time to make sure the mix isn’t too rumbly or muffled.

If needed I process the whole mix one final time through a “mastering chain” I’ve honed over time, which is based on this video by Kenny Gioia. Again, he’s using REAPER plugins, but you can apply the lessons from the video to any free VSTs you have available.

Issue 3: My mix is too quiet!
I tend to record my DT pretty quiet, so this whole process is also a way for me to bring up the levels on everything in a (hopefully!) careful and non-destructive way.

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#6

I’m by no means a professional.

But the number one thing is making sure your levels are good across all the tracks. Making important decisions about which elements you want to stand out and which elements are going to be lower or “further back” in the mix to add support.

From there it’s often about adding automation to the levels to make the track more dynamic. This sound is louder in this section but in the next section I lower the volume because a new sound is now the more important aspect.

And then of course using things like an EQ to cut and boost aspects of any individual sound. Maybe your lead sound is too bassy and is competing with the actual bass sound, so cutting those frequencies out of the lead so that the bass can sit more comfortably. And then adding dynamic eq changes where you use automation to only cut the low end of the lead sound when the Bass is playing but then have it come back when it’s just the lead.

But really the most important step is making sure the volume for all your tracks is right. From there it’s learning how to use EQs and Compressors.

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#7

Thanks so much, guys - there’s some tremendously useful information there and I’m grateful for you taking the time to explain it. Really helpful :pray: