Balanced mixes are boring (do this instead)

“Produce music as if mixing does not exist”. As casual as you mentioned that, that hit so deeply. I take pride in my production skills, but I find myself saying a lot “it’ll sound better when I get to mixing”. When in reality, if I didn’t get it exactly right at the source, all of my mental RAM goes right into mixing that. Needed to hear that, thanks man! I try to make similar content to you, very inspired by the philosophy of making music. Love the perspective you bring.

So in Graphic Design I’d call that contrast. Contrast is the difference between things. If there’s no contrast it’s boring and over ‘balanced’ as you say. Everything is the same. Totally agree. So what we need is contrast. Contrast of loud and quiet, contrast of texture and washes, etc.

Creating “A hierarchy of sound” that’s a helpful phrase to consider when approaching mixing.

I add OTT and supercharger then a limiter to my already finished masters 🙊 sounds great

So spot on ! Its intersting that presently as I'm working on a track and the points made here are answering questions I'm stuck on

Really thorough explanation, Nathan. Excellent teaching.

Love this. I love to think of mixing as "focus". You can't focus on everything, so choose and place everything else in the background

Fantastic advice

A little while ago I went back and listened to one of the old songs I produced. It was VERY balanced.... it sounded awful, lol.

I love how I just got done participating in a mixing competition in Nashville and this video drops a day after 😂. Awesome content as usual keep up the great work

thank you so much,,❤ please upload more videos about arrange

Wise words, as usual! Until (very recently) bringing in a mixing engineer on one of my songs, I didn’t know how much the mix was an integral part of the composition/arrangement process. I had been avoiding studying mixing bc I didn't know how much of the comp/arr process it is. This means I am now (mostly) going to do the mixing myself from now on. Unless I can stand over the shoulder of the engineer at the mixing console, it’s really hard to communicate every element of the vision of the song (like you said “what to focus on at this moment”). As an example: the difference between having two different electric guitar parts play a duet, vs. one supporting the other. Nathan, is there a line (porous, of course) between mixing-as-comp/arr and whatever the next stage is (the one right before mastering)?

Oh man, how I would love to spend a day with you in your studio!

man i have so much to learn

The Christmas tree of sounds!

I wonder if there're sidechains in these productions.

Hey Nathan! I have been watching your videos for a long time, its been really beneficial for me regarding my music journey and I cant thank you enough for guiding me through your videos making me to focus on things I should rather than waste my time. The question I have is , is it possible for two artists, A music producer and a singer, to work together despite them being far away from each other?( Through online ) and if so , will they get the results they truly seek with their project?

Awesome

thanks for this advice! im gunna go bump my bass up for a section of my song!

Сool vocal ^^