A clear mind creates stronger music. Also, take time away. A mix
made after ten hours of tracking rarely sounds good to worn out ears.
Tired ears = bad mix. So, make sure you take a break, then return to
your mix with fresh ears.
Today's technology makes it very
tempting to add layer upon layer. The side effect is your song or
production gets rather dense and cluttered. Sometimes you must step
back, reevaluate, and strip it down. Heed the advice of award-winning
recording and mixing engineer Ed Cherney (Stones, Clapton, and Raitt):
"Listen to what's there, see where the song is, [and] eliminate things
to find the heart of the song. Ultimately, mixing is about heart, not
equipment. Nobody dances to what kind of gear you used."
Check
your mix in mono (use TV speakers). If you use small speakers, check
your bass content on full-range systems. Don't rush. Take frequent
breaks.
Don't forget about dynamics. I get lots of tapes and
the one common thread is dynamics . . . or a lack of any. Get soft. Get
loud. Swell. Fade. Mix it up. Subtract some instruments from the mix.
Add in everything including the kitchen sink sample. If you don't know
what I mean, listen to orchestral music, specifically try Mahler's
Adagio to his Tenth symphony. You'll learn what dynamics really are.
Try using a little compression when tracking. Set the
compressor to the point where you see just a little bit of flicker in
the gain reduction LED's (1 or 2 dB) with a 2:1 or 4:1 ratio. Leave the
attack and release times in the middle of their adjustment ranges
(20ms-80ms attack, 350ms-650ms release). Besides the small amount of
compression and the appropriate distortion, record it dry, and add
effects at mixdown.
Patch your signal into wave lab for a
Visual representation of the Source you are applying EQ to.
If
you can't use stereo mics or try stereo mic imaging for any one of a
number of reasons, don't worry. You can make your stereo mix sound a
lot bigger through the use of creative panning, stereo effects
processors, digital delays, and creative reverb usage. You can even
send a mono signal via headphone output to a speaker in a room and mic
the room. Use your imagination but watch out for "widening" devices that
rob the bottom end of solidity. Try to picture what a wider sound would
be like. If you were two microphones, what audio "image" would you
"see?"
If you find that at the end of your project (meaning
it's too late for a remix) the levels of some of the instruments or
vocals aren't as even as you would like them to be, mastering can help a
bit in this area. At mix time, keep a CDR of all your mixes close at
hand, and A-B them on a level-matched system while you mix each
subsequent song. Then, when you go into the mastering studio, take an
audio CDR of your mixes just in case you want to reference what you had
before with the enhanced version.
Another thing you can do is pick some commercial CDs as consistent
references during each mix, you'll be establishing a "sonic imprint" of
that particular balance and referring back to it when you're on a
different tune. Don't worry if your reference CDs are different styles
of music. Focus on the Sonics and the tonal impact of the artist.
Sometimes a reference CD can show you what you don't want in your mix
too.
Less work doesn't always mean better results. Take the case of "flying"
backup vocals. Record one pass of vocal tracks and clone them into the
rest of the song. That's less, isn't it? Well, it's less work than
singing every single note of the song, but what could be lost in that
process? Did you lose some spontaneity at the end of the last 8 bars of
vamping? Singing tighter as a group by the time the 3rd chorus is
recorded? Getting a tighter groove because someone gives it a little
something extra? Don't skimp, as you and your project are the ones
being shorted.
Commercial CDs sound the way they do for good reasons. There's a lot of
stuff that happens to make a great sounding record, and a lot of talent
making it so. Often, a great sounding record starts with great players,
arrangers, and singers who know what to do and what not to do. 'Less is
more' is said and it's true, except that many people think that 'less"'
means 'less effort.' Some digital recording techniques can tempt us from
putting that something extra into a performance. Yes, we can get
addicted to plug-ins and editing and CPUs and spend countless hours
perfecting each bit and byte, but are we keeping an eye toward the soul
and spirit of the music? Is Auto-tune going to help us be better
musicians (and better live performers)? Sometimes the answer is simply
"Do what works." Other times, the answer is "look a little further."
Many an engineer has spent extra time searching for their path of
excellence, and that can only be accomplished over time. While you are
going through that "time", keep in mind that our attitudes about the
process are just as important as the process itself.
Here is 'sin' #1 of the first release home recorded CD. Buried Vocals.
Probably the single most important instrument on your CD is the lead
vocals. The lead vocals intimately tell the story of your song and carry
the main melody, the one that people will be humming days after they
hear your masterpiece. It's a shame then that the most important
instrument in the mix is usually the most sonically neglected when bands
mix their CDs.
Ideas don't always evolve into songs, but they help you be creative. The
important thing is that since they are ideas, you shouldn't come to a
conclusion till you have tried it. In other words, if you have an idea
that running a drum set through a Marshall stack would sound cool in a
love song, and when you try it, you may tell yourself... "Not so much
but that sound is cool."