Tips for learning to mix and master my own music! Help please!!

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Hi guys, I'm starting to get into electronic production. I fiddle around with Ableton and create my tracks and stuff (nothing good yet obviously) but in the end I can tell they just sound physically weak. Like it feels like theres a lot of empty space if that makes sense. I like music like Flume and Purity Ring, and their music sounds so rich and big, no matter the physical content in the song.

So what do I start doing to learn how to make my songs sound better in the mixing and mastering phase?

Any plugins that are suggested? I heard stuff like Izotope or something like that...

As for now all I do is just try and lower levels or raise levels to try and have everything sounding even, but then by doing that, once the different tracks come together, some of the tracks further decrease in volume and stuff like that. For example like when i have a couple of kicks successively the first one is always louder than the others.

SOS TIPS HELP ME !

Thanks! :)

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Hi,
I am not a specialist for electronic music production, but I can tell you that it is the arrangement first that decides whether a song sounds big and rich. Effects and such are important of course, but you won't find anything that does "big and fat" automagically.
Listen to your favorite songs, try to see what arrangement tricks they use. If a song sounds "empty" as you said, you could for example put a dark pad sound in the background that is barely audible but if you switch it off, you miss it.

For mixing (forget about mastering, really), there is so much information on the web nowadays it'll keep you busy for the next years. Search YouTube. There a a lot of good and excellent tutorials out there, not all especially targeted at the electronic music (like e.g. therecordingrevolution.com) but nevertheless useful for learning the basics.
Then practice a lot :wink:

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Thanks a lot man, and yeah I know effects and such play a role in it, but I was just curious if the richness of the sound came from the mix itself. Thank you for the info!

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WillNeighbor wrote:SOS TIPS HELP ME !

Thanks! :)
As you said SOS, the articles and tutorials at SoundOnSound (SOS) are a great resource!

Furthermore, there are tons of great books about mixing & mastering out there, for example by Bobby Owinski, Bob Katz and Mike Senior...

...but the most comprehensive and detailed book about mixing, IMO, is still "Mixing Audio" by Roey Izhaki! :love:

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WillNeighbor wrote:Hi guys, I'm starting to get into electronic production.
...
So what do I start doing to learn how to make my songs sound better in the mixing and mastering phase?
Forget about mastering for a while. Learn the basics first.
WillNeighbor wrote:Any plugins that are suggested? I heard stuff like Izotope or something like that...
Forget about that, too. No plugin will give you the fix for these problems. A cool synth and a sampler, an EQ and a compressor, a delay and a reverb is all you will need to make great mixes right now. You would do yourself a favour if you would reduce your setup like this for starters.
WillNeighbor wrote:As for now all I do is just try and lower levels or raise levels to try and have everything sounding even, but then by doing that, once the different tracks come together, some of the tracks further decrease in volume and stuff like that. For example like when i have a couple of kicks successively the first one is always louder than the others.

SOS TIPS HELP ME !

Thanks!
Don't be afraid, show us some of your audios! Then we could give you specific tips how to make things better. And a link please to one tune of one of your heroes that is a milestone for you.
One very important thing: Don't quit! Everybody started with the first steps. So don't think it's uncool to show your beginnings. It's cool. :wink: :D 8)

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Fritze wrote:
WillNeighbor wrote:Hi guys, I'm starting to get into electronic production.
...
So what do I start doing to learn how to make my songs sound better in the mixing and mastering phase?
Forget about mastering for a while. Learn the basics first.
WillNeighbor wrote:Any plugins that are suggested? I heard stuff like Izotope or something like that...
Forget about that, too. No plugin will give you the fix for these problems. A cool synth and a sampler, an EQ and a compressor, a delay and a reverb is all you will need to make great mixes right now. You would do yourself a favour if you would reduce your setup like this for starters.
WillNeighbor wrote:As for now all I do is just try and lower levels or raise levels to try and have everything sounding even, but then by doing that, once the different tracks come together, some of the tracks further decrease in volume and stuff like that. For example like when i have a couple of kicks successively the first one is always louder than the others.

SOS TIPS HELP ME !

Thanks!
Don't be afraid, show us some of your audios! Then we could give you specific tips how to make things better. And a link please to one tune of one of your heroes that is a milestone for you.
One very important thing: Don't quit! Everybody started with the first steps. So don't think it's uncool to show your beginnings. It's cool. :wink: :D 8)

Okay cool! I'm not afraid at all lol, no matter what anyone says I'm still gonna try to progress!! As for my favorite tunes I'll give you two since I can't decide!

This is something I love, stuff that you can just constantly vibe to! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l15evegaKo

And then there's the more serious technically mindblowing stuff that I seek!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zx6odbKMCw

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and here's a link to my first song! I'm proud of it but I know it's no where near good!

https://soundcloud.com/william-naber/my-first-song

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Absolutely not bad Will! Perhaps this song need a forwarded (or more fat) kick and especially VOCALS!

Good Luck! ;-)

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How do these artists get their vocals by the way? Are the lyrics recorded for their respective songs? Or do they find vocals and just chop them up and alter and insert into their songs!? This is a question I've always wondered

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Buying an audio inteface and a condenser mic and start to sing and rec into your DAW! I'm make Rock, can't help you on that but the web is full of imformations\resources to start and learn...

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Hi Will,
really not bad, your first song and I kinda like what you call "empty space", the sparse arrangement which lets the final part shine much more. Of course there's room for improvement, but that is also valid for that Flume example (in my personal opinion it is too full and too loud and aggressive).

But let's see how "What you need" achieves the sound you strive after:
- Panning. Most of your sound are very much in in the center, only the pads offer some width. Can be used on purpose, of course, and you did that a bit with the second part which is wider. As contrast, that is fine. Flume uses the whole stereo stage: Drums and bass in the center, Vocals sometimes here, sometimes there (maybe automated), sound effects on the sides, with delay and reverb creating even more width.
- Effects, as i already said. Reverb and delay can create depth. Reverb though in my opinion is really hard to use and often separates the pro from the amateur mix. Cannot help you there much as I am struggeling with it myself.
- Arrangement and choice of sounds. That deep bass (or is it a cleverly layered bass drum, cannot decide) carries the song, organ-like sounds for the lower mids, synth pads for a higher register and then mostly effect sounds or shorter plucked ones. Contrast.

Let's have a look at your mix:
- Some of the snare hits are much louder than the rest. On purpose? Also your main synth line has some notes that seem much quieter than the rest, as if they are ducked by the bass drum.
- As Turello said, the kick could be fatter. Either layer it with a second one or use a bass sound for the low end. Perhaps a bit of parallel processing (compression, distortion/saturation) could help. Read up on parallel compression.
- Try panning your sound effects to left or right. If you are uncertain about panning, start with LCR-panning: hard left, center, hard right. These are your only pan positions, make them work. If it sounds good with this, maybe refine with 50% positions. Keep it simple.
- Maybe a nice delay on your main hook to create some depth?
- The hihats are too much up front and too harsh in my opinion, some EQ at 8-10 KHz could help. Small thing, though.
- Try that dark pad trick i described in my first answer to give more fullness.
- Overall your arrangement and choice of sounds are good, it's mostly finetuning.

None of what i said here is a must or a strict rule. Find out for yourself.

OK, last thing. Quick-and-dirty-mixing-Howto:
1. Decide which elements are important and which not so. Mixing and arrangement is all about balance and contrast. Make a plan.
2. Start your mix using only the volume faders and panning. Try to get a good balance with it.
3. Simple rule: anything under 100Hz is reserved for kick and bass. If other tracks have energy down there, use a simple HiPass-Filter (=LowCut) to remove anything under 100 or even 200 Hz (listen!). Use LowPass/HiCut-Filters on sounds that are too prominent and should be more in the background.
4. Use EQ and Compression on anything that needs it (yes, that is the hard part :wink: )
5. When everything sounds already good, only the start adding Reverb.
6. Use automation (volume, panning, effect level) for spicing things up.
7. only then are you allowed to use a Limiter on the stereo sum, but please do yourself a favor and let it only catch the peaks, that is not more than 2 or 3dB of gain reduction.
8. Start from the beginning until you are satisfied. This of course results in an endless loop :D. Just kidding, don't work too much on it, nobody ever reaches perfection anyway and a finished song is always better than an unfinished one.

Also, a very common advice, compare your mix to reference mixes, songs by pros that are similar to what you want to achieve. If only I did that more often :)
And as Fritze said, forget about buying third party plugins for now. Ableton has lots of hi quality effects and there are loads of excellent freeware tools out there if something is missing (see http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic ... 6&t=390110 or http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9780).

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Wow amazing answer! Super informative and helpful! Thanks a lot that's spectacular lol

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Cool post fese! :tu:
Will, this should keep you going for quite some. I like your first tune. You got taste. Keep going! :-D

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fese wrote:
5. When everything sounds already good, only the start adding Reverb.
Okay so, are you saying as I create my sounds and synths don't use reverb until I get to the mixing stage. For example if I wanted to make a reverb-heavy synth, skip the reverb effect in the actual synth and put it in later during the mixdown. I know everyone works differently and I'd much prefer adding the reverb as I create my sound, and then I guess fine tune it to fit the mix later. That's an alternative, right?

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Hey Will,

The top 2 things I would recommend would be:

1) Get as accurate an audio representation as possible.

If you must use headphones research well before purchasing and just take the time to learn them. If you go the monitor route, you'll likely need to get room treatment as well as reflections and room reactions will change what you're hearing.

2) Learn your tools well, less is more.

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