Checking your mix in mono: Demonstrate and teach please!

[Erkan]

Heeeeeeeey there folks!

I have read a few posts about checking your mixes in mono and all that but I've never really understood what that means. "Check your mix in mono" .. alright, so today I did check my mix in mono and it sounded crap to my ears. What exactly am I checking and what is the desired result?

Below is a little snippet from a scratch track, excuse the horrible mix... it IS after all just a scratch track and no, Addictive Drums will not be used on the finished product No bass guitar either.. that would probably make the mono mix even worse! I don't know... anyway, let's look at these two snippets.

Stereo

Mono

So, you heard the stereo and you heard the mono. Is the mono version what you would expect from a mix such as this one? If not, what is the desired result, what am I looking for?

I'm suspecting more people are wondering about this so I think this will be a really rewarding thread! I thank you all ahead of time =) And now, over to you gurus!

 

[Erkan]

Oh, before anyone asks: Guitars are double tracked.. so one is 100% Left and one is 100% Right. Sounds phasey and just shit in mono... is this common and "expected"?

 

[Morgan C]

I think thats about right.. its never going to sound 'good' in mono, you just wanna check that the guitars aren't going to completely disappear, and that the frequency balance is about right I think.

If you're concerned, import some reference mixes into your DAW and make them mono (Sonar has a button to switch between mono/stereo), and see what happens to them. But I wouldn't worry about it too much, even YouTube is stereo now.

 

[LeSedna]

Basically I would say it is to check the phase issues. If there is a phase pb, then some frequencies could disappear or add in the mono version while you wouldn't have noticed it too much in stereo. So every doubling or chorus VSt, if used with strong effect on an important part of the mix, could sound strange in mono.

Also, it's to check if the music is good enough in mono, because it will end up being in mono in many internet players, or youtube videos, etc. It's just a check.

 

[AudioPhile777]

I check my mixes in mono for frequency issues/balance... if you can hear everything clearly in mono, chances are it'll sound much better in stereo...

 

[DestroyTheColossus]

I check my mixes in mono for frequency issues/balance...

+1

The idea is that when your listening to something in stereo, where an instrument is panned in the stereo spectrum can emphasize its separation. For an extreme example, if one instrument was panned hard left, and another panned hard right, they would appear to have great separation. The problem is that the panning can mask your perception of general frequency separation, and so you would check it in mono in order to take that out of the equation. This way, if you can get the instruments to cut through and sound balanced in mono (frequency), when you switch it back to stereo you should have a very clean and clear sound.

 

[ahjteam]

The thing with checking mono-compatibility is that you have roughly the same instrument balance and you don't want any of the elements to dissappear when monoed. Especially the guitars and low end are very prone to it if mixed incorrectly. And mono is still widely used, for example in many cheaper laptops and in the low quality video on youtube.

Good example: Children of Bodom - Sixpounder (nothing dissappears, only gets narrower)
Bad example: In Flames - Trigger (guitars dissappear)

 

[Erkan]

Aaaaah, thanks for the explanations guys! This is awesome and certainly something I will be incorporating into my workflow. Really, the first project I recorded which can be found down in my sig wasn't mono checked at all. I didn't really know about the importance of checking stuff in mono.

Thumbs up!

 

[::XeS::]

For example, checking your mono mix, I noticed a loud snare, no bass and low guitars

 

[Erkan]

For example, checking your mono mix, I noticed a loud snare, no bass and low guitars

Now, this is good too because we have a concrete example right here in the thread!

By no bass I assume you don't mean a bass guitar because there isn't one in there. But yeah, the overall bass frequency drops down and whatever bass frequencies that are in that "mix" are coming from the 2 guitars and the kick drum, maybe a little bit from the snare too.

So, if this is a problem in the mix, how do I fix it? I don't see any way I can fix this problem since there really isn't a "problem" in the way things have been done. Programmed drums (can't really go wrong there), double tracked guitars panned to opposite sides, and 1-2 synths. That's it.

I'm VERY eager to learn though. If you guys could point out the errors in my mix/mono mix and give a hint about how to solve the errors, it would be totally awesome.

 

[::XeS::]

For example, if you barely notice guitars in your mono mix, probably you have to raise them untill you can hear pretty clearly them in the mono mix. The same with the other parts...snare too loud? Turn down it a little bit, etc...
You can notice some wrong balances in the various levels

 

[Erkan]

Oh I thought there was some sort of phase issues or something that made the guitars low. I suppose mixing in stereo can fool you a lot since for example you can have a loud snare and low guitars but still hear the guitars loud enough because they are panned and the snare is not. So if I mix the fundamentals (drums, bass guitar and guitars) in mono, it will "automatically" be good in stereo? Man I can't believe I haven't picked up on this earlier... feels like I've missed out on something HUGE!

 

[Trevoire520]

As has been said, checking in mono is great for checking frequency and phasing issues between instruments.

It's also handy when recording as well as when mixing. e.g. if you're using a spaced pair for your overheads check them in mono, if the mic's are very wide then you might have a nasty mono overhead sound, whereas a coincident setup will hold together very very well in mono, at the detriment of the width of the stereo image.

 

[Dexter_prog]

For example, if you barely notice guitars in your mono mix, probably you have to raise them untill you can hear pretty clearly them in the mono mix. The same with the other parts...snare too loud? Turn down it a little bit, etc...
You can notice some wrong balances in the various levels

Couldn't it happen that after doing that (turning up guitars and down the snare) guitars become too loud and snare too low when going back to stereo?

 

[Erkan]

Yeah as Dexter wrote, this is what's confusing me right now about checking and adjusting the mix in mono. What if a mix sounds good in stereo but bad in mono and when you remix it so it sounds good in mono, does it automatically mean it WILL sound good and balanced in stereo or is there always a risk it won't? In that case, I guess one has to simply decide which media to aim for and most of us would choose to aim for a good stereo mix since the majority of people probably listen to music in stereo.

And as in my case posted in the first post, the guitars sound kinda phasey and stuff but I assume that's normal when you double/quad track the same riff and I don't see how you would go about to NOT get a phasey sound since that's exactly the purpose of multi tracking instruments.

 

[::XeS::]

Of course you have to double check the balance in mono and stereo. You check the balance of various intruments. If in mono you can barely notice the guitar, 90% they are too much low in the mix...so raise a little and double check. It's not a perfect rule but often it helps to find something wrong in the mix