Mixing Guideline

[bgrotto]

Doesn't always go this way, but often it's:

1. throw up the faders, get a musical rough balance going as fast as possible
2. add mix buss compression
3. solo snare, process to taste, check against full balance
4. add kick, process to taste, check against full balance
5. add OHs, remove mud, balance to taste, check against full balance
6. start frenetically tweaking sounds and playing with fx, generally against full mix balance, double-check 2-mix compression
7. add drum submix compression, double-check 2-mix compression
8. tweak more, double-check 2-mix compression
9. get psyched, print mix
10. tweak more, fuck up mix, hate self
11. print mix, compare to mix from step 9, hate self for over-working mix
12. go home, listen, take notes, hate self, wonder how in the hell I keep finding suckers to hire me, sleep
13. tweak a bit, print mix, move on to other song(s)

With any luck, I stop hating my shit at this point. Sadly, this rarely happens, so I dump the turd onto my preferred mastering engineer for a coat of polish, and try not to read the reviews when the record comes out for fear of criticism.

 

[jackbraglia]

5. Listen to it 500 times and start to think I am completely worthless

aaaahahaha.....yea...

 

[jackbraglia]

I never normalise as it brings the noise floor up

normalizing does not bring the noise floor up in relation to the signal peak. COMPRESSION reduces the signal-to-noise ratio. normalizing, as Mr. Waltz said earlier, is simply a digital gain increase.

there's nothing wrong with normalizing your tracks first, just don't normalize to 0db or else you'll be peaking with the first move you make. -9db works well for me

oh and regarding your mix order, I tend to EQ after compression since the loss of those transients usually comes with a loss of HF. It can also undo some of your EQ moves. But this is completely preference and I know lots of you out there will disagree with me. really its just whatever the mix requires.