(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Drums are essential part of music production, likewise the vocals, but when not mixed properly they can cause distortion that damages the entire mix process. When I was coming up as a Mix Engineer that I intended to be, I had several challenges with the production process and one of those challenges includes instrumental mixdown, vocal treatment or processing, effects application and automation etc. I am grateful to God because I am not only perfect in doing those things now but also teaching others to be like me too. I guess your ultimate wish right now is to be like me, but the simple truth about this is that there is no perfect way of doing mixdown however I have a guide that will help you through. Your ear is one of the determinant factors here so it all depends on your musical listening ability.
Usually, as a novice producer sometimes instead of paying attention to the quality of the voice, you may just be loading effects which in the end damages your entire mix. Sometimes instead of applying so many effects on my mix I simply go with balancing, this means that instead of just applying effects which somehow may cause distortion I simply balance my instruments and ensure that all my instruments sit at their individual comfort zones. With EQs alone I will create a perfect instrumental mix.
Some of the effects you are busy loading or applying are not even meant for drums so you have to ensure that those effects you want to use are actually designed for the purpose you are trying to use them. For instance, you don’t have to use autotune on a kick or snare because the autotune plugin wasn’t designed to be used on drum kits. An important question that we ought to always ask ourselves is why are we doing this thing we want to do? Like in this case, ask yourself this question: what are the reasons why we must mix drums or instrumental?
As an audio mixing Engineer, the reasons why I always mix my instruments are as follows;
v To avoid distortion: Perfect mixdown gives you quality audio sound, so if these instruments are not mixed they will cause noisy production, hence the need to mix them.
v Create space for vocals: One of the good reasons why instrumental mix is necessary is because it creates space where vocals are going to sit. I am quite sure that you have encountered the situation where after rendering your mixdown, you preview and observed one of the most annoying thing which is “vocals are sounding in front of the beat” or “the beat sounding in front of the vocals”. But a good instrumental mix will always create a center space for the vocals, which is the vocals must sit in the middle of the instruments.
v Effects application:Another crucial thing that is importing for mixdown is to apply the necessary effects. Right application of effects is not only good but also help in defining the style of the music. For instance, it is through the mixing process that Techno music usually becomes techno, this is because techno music carries a lots of effects, panning and automations which can only be achieved through mixdown.
v Sharpens dull instruments: Mixdown helps to sharpen dull instruments like de-essed hats for those who are used to importing and laying premade samples in Cubase.
Its very important to be acquainted with the reasons why mixdown is mandatory in music production before diving into the mixing process. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); So please pay attention to the following steps which I always used to achieve a quality instruments or drum mix in Cubase 5.
Steps to achieving a quality drum mix
Just before starting your drums mix, you must bear in mind that mixdown does not have a perfect way of achieving it because it depends on the mixing engineer’s hearing. If a mix is not perfect even by hearing you should observe it right away, don’t wait for the playback signals to clip before you notice it.
Precaution: Always remember to save an unmixed or unprocessed version of your project that will serve as a backup so that if the project got damaged in the mixing process you will retrieve the unmixed one from your backup. You can watch my video tutorial on how to mix drums in Cubase here.
Below are the steps to achieving a quality drums or
Instruments mix in Cubase 5.
KICK
1. Solo your kick: You can solo your kick by selecting the channel that contains the kick, click on the “S” icon or simply press letter “S” on your keyboard.
2. Use EQ to cut down the HIs: Open up your effects rack and in the middle region of the rack click on the horizontal line towards the extreme right and bring down the line. You can adjust it as you feel it’s fitting for your mix or click under the fourth column and select from the presets.
3. Add compressor: You can add compressor or other dynamics effects to tighten the kick. Have you ever noticed that your mix doesn’t play well on mobile devices? You only hear the snare and hat without bass and other low instruments. This is because kick and bass are low instruments so without tightening them you can’t hear them well on mobile devices. Click in the search space of the compressor and select any preset that suites you.
4. I sometimes add de-esser to my kick to do away with any hi completely, but that’s optional though depending on the style of the music anyway.
SNARE
1. Un-mute the snare: Let the kick and snare play simultaneously.
2. Add EQ to the snare: snare is a mid-tone instrument so you can either kill both the low-end and the Hi-end of the EQ.
HI-HAT
1. Un-mute the hat: Let the hat, snare and kick play simultaneously.
2. Use EQ to kill the low-end of the hat and increase the hi-end just a little.
3. Add stereo enhancer: Instead of panning left or right I simply add stereo enhancer and choose the “Big overhead” preset to spread my hat over to the right and left.
PERCUSSIONS
Most of the times I pan some of the percussions and add a little reverb just to push them at the back or space them a little from the drums.
You can now play your drum-line and hear how it sounds and I just guess it’s pleasant. I am only talking about drums because this is the most neglected part of instrument mixing. Most people mix the synthesizers and forget the drums thinking the drums are untouchable.
I am sure you grab some useful tips in this article so keep visiting this site for more tutorials. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Please share and comment below.
