I remember when I first started producing about two years ago, I was obsessed with getting a good, clean mix. I would watch tutorials and try to learn every "technique" and "hack" that would put me closer to that goal: low cut everything, parallel compression on the drums, etc. While these are good techniques, no formula, no step by step procedure is going to give you a good mix.
There's a reason why mixing, in itself, is an art. The best mix engineers have a specific sound. Their mixes sound different than other engineers'. Why is that? It's because they have a different mental model of the mix. I used to think that a mix was one of two types: good or bad. The truth is that there are so many types of mixes. Listen to the bass in a modern hip-hop track like XO Tour Llif3 and compare it to the bass in a pop song like Maroon 5's Payphone. There is a massive, massive difference between the sonic profile of these two tracks. Being able to identify these mix differences, and knowing how to recreate them in your own tracks, is what will make you a good mix engineer.
Let me explain what I mean. When you listen to a song, can you visualize where everything is on the track? If so, how do you visualize it? Do you have a clear understanding of where each element is, in physical space, in the sonic landscape of the mix? Can you visualize the frequency content of each instrument in this physical space? Do you know which frequencies to cut / boost to move the instruments around and place them in your mental model?
The more I produce, the more I realize that this is the whole game: 1) knowing, concretely, in your mind, what a "good" mix sounds like (note that there is not one answer) and 2) knowing what steps you need to take with your arrangement to get there. That's it. You can learn all the techniques you want, but if you're just tweaking knobs in the dark for hours you're never going to get anywhere.
With that in mind, here is some stuff that has worked for me with learning how to do the above: 1) Listen to a lot of good music. But don't just listen like an average person would. You need to focus in on each part of the spectrum. I do a lot of meditation, and honestly, this really is like a meditation on mixing. Focus on where each instrument is in the mix, in physical space, top to bottom, front to back. The more you can start listening to music objectively like this, the more quickly you can start to move your mixes in the direction you want. Listening more carefully, in many cases, can be more helpful than just mixing more music yourself. 2) When you're mixing, stop and think about your mental model of the mix. It's really easy to just tweak knobs. I get carried away with this all the time. Whenever this happens, try to reset and gain a high-level view of the mix again. Where do all my instruments sit in physical space? What's muddy and how does that relate to where I've placed my instruments? Try to always keep in mind your mental model and move towards it instead of randomly turning levels up and down until something sounds good.
TL;DR - You have to know what you're actually aiming for to hit the target.
PS - This video would be a good starting point if you have no idea what I'm talking about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEjOdqZFvhY . It won't instantly give you your own mental model of the mix, and I don't really see my mixes exactly like the visualizations in the video, but at least you get the idea.
Submitted November 26, 2017 at 02:26PM by SwaggMuffin https://www.reddit.com/r/edmproduction/comments/7fo9ys/an_important_mix_concept_that_doesnt_get_talked/?utm_source=ifttt