How to maintain consistent mix

[EmilDelaRosa]

Finally, I'm almost done recording and editing my band's first full length. This is going to be my very first release. Question is, how do you guys maintain a consistent mix throughout the album? Templates? Mixing into one session? Thanks!

 

[slaytah]

I save presets on the inserts I use, and generally use the same inserts for all songs. And I always use the same reverb on everything.

 

[DanLights]

some people do it different ways, either all in one session or one by one. I'm doing my band's album and I'm doing separate sessions for the first time, a lot of songs have some "unique" tracks or parts that others don't, and half of the songs were recorded on a different drumset than the other half, so it makes sense to go one by one. I mixed the first song and when we decided that mix is done, I just started transferring track settings to the other songs and tweaking from there, for example guitars, bass and vocals are all the same, they were all recorded together and therefore sound the same throughout the album, but many keyboards, drums and other additional parts vary throughout the record.

Before this album I always used to the "all in one session" thing, it works for certain types of records, like death metal and other stuff that tends to have the same settings throughout, and with not too many tracks, not a lot of computers would know how to handle such huge sessions, I've only done that on 5 song Eps tops, no more.

 

[Sloan]

I am doing this right now. I am using REAPER, the SWS Extensions help immensely with the snapshot feature. The very first song on this project took me FOREVER to get to where I was halfway satisfied with it, but once I got everything dialed in, I made a snapshot and just pasted that on the next song and went from there. It's pretty effective.

There are a fucking shit ton of tempo changes in each song so it was way easier for me to track in a separate project for each one. I much prefer keeping everything in one project if possible, especially when it comes to cleaning your project directory...


One thing to keep in mind is to mix everything, render the mixes with nothing on the master/stereo buss, then import all of those stereo mixes into one big session to adjust levels between each song, the sequence, and all master buss processing.

 

[Fox Mulder]

I like mixing into one session but depends entirely on the genre and of course, the songs. For example, I'm mixing this Death/Thrash album right now. Tempos range from 145 to 240. The songs have extremely identical tracking. I created a draft mix, switching back and forth between the songs, then automated everything that came to mind - Release times, panning, volume, minor EQ changes for certain passages, etc etc. Not a problem. Not that I ran into any, to say the least

 

[DanLights]

I am doing this right now. I am using REAPER, the SWS Extensions help immensely with the snapshot feature. The very first song on this project took me FOREVER to get to where I was halfway satisfied with it, but once I got everything dialed in, I made a snapshot and just pasted that on the next song and went from there. It's pretty effective.

There are a fucking shit ton of tempo changes in each song so it was way easier for me to track in a separate project for each one. I much prefer keeping everything in one project if possible, especially when it comes to cleaning your project directory...


One thing to keep in mind is to mix everything, render the mixes with nothing on the master/stereo buss, then import all of those stereo mixes into one big session to adjust levels between each song, the sequence, and all master buss processing.

Dude, I'm doing the same thing but I don't know about the SWS extensions you mention, please elaborate! I just made a template after finishing the first mix and then started putting the audio files in their places, but maybe your method is easier?

 

[Sloan]

Dude, I'm doing the same thing but I don't know about the SWS extensions you mention, please elaborate! I just made a template after finishing the first mix and then started putting the audio files in their places, but maybe your method is easier?

DUDE.
http://www.standingwaterstudios.com/

 

[DanLights]

DUDE.
http://www.standingwaterstudios.com/

I owe you a blow job Thanks!

 

[mharwood]

In addition to the other suggestions so far, I'll throw in maintaining consistent monitor SPL levels. Not mixing the whole album at the same SPL, but keeping the master output at some consistent level across all mixes (I usually aim for -18 dBFS RMS during mixing) and putting markings on your monitor gain so that you can consistently return to the same monitor levels while mixing. I have the max level on my monitor controller calibrated to about 77 dB SPL, and the monitor gain is marked from 0 dB (max) down to -20 dB in 1 dB increments, so I can consistently return to the same levels day after day. Helps a ton.

 

[006]

I mix all songs in one project to keep consistency. Used to do separate session for every song, using mixer/project templates and so on. All-in-one has been a lot easier to work with. If I make a change on the guitar processing it's applied to all songs at once instead of having to do it per-song project at a time, I can quickly switch between songs in the project to check things, etc. YMMV.

 

[ArthurD]

I save the channels on Cubase, then mix all songs on each project.

 

[matt youwin]

I do tracking/editing/pre-mix in individual sessions, then consolidate files and import into one big mix session. Makes it a lot easier to deal with song transitions and keeps everything consistent.

 

[Sloan]

In addition to the other suggestions so far, I'll throw in maintaining consistent monitor SPL levels. Not mixing the whole album at the same SPL, but keeping the master output at some consistent level across all mixes (I usually aim for -18 dBFS RMS during mixing) and putting markings on your monitor gain so that you can consistently return to the same monitor levels while mixing. I have the max level on my monitor controller calibrated to about 77 dB SPL, and the monitor gain is marked from 0 dB (max) down to -20 dB in 1 dB increments, so I can consistently return to the same levels day after day. Helps a ton.

I'm quoting this so everyone has to read it again.