Matt Huber: Slashing Your Mix Times, Why You Need to Specialize, and The Psychology of Mixing

Speaker 1 (00:00):

Welcome to the URM Podcast. Our guest today is Matt Huber. And Joel, I'm curious about something. When we started talking about his method for mixing fast, did you think that he was a student of speed mixing? Because I certainly did.

Speaker 2 (00:16):

Totally. I felt like I was kind of talking to myself because very rarely do I meet somebody that's dialed in with their workflow and the way they approach their workflow on that level. And to see him talk about it, I just got so excited because I mean, he's really, I would say necessity creates your reality. And when you have a very high demand like Matt does, or I have had at certain points in my mixing, you have to create systems to be able to handle that or else you got to start turning on work. There's just no other way to deal with it. So it's pretty inspiring to see his approach.

Speaker 1 (00:48):

It's inspiring because we wrote a course about it and he basically created it for himself without ever taking the course. Love it. Almost one-to-one. It's crazy. It's crazy. Anyhow, this is a great episode. I hope you all enjoy it. Here goes Matt Huber, welcome to the URM Podcast.

Speaker 3 (01:10):

Thanks so much. Glad to be with you guys.

Speaker 1 (01:12):

Glad to have you here. So you guys just hung out in Nashville, right?

Speaker 2 (01:18):

We did. We had some smash burgers and complained about

Speaker 1 (01:21):

At why did you hang out in Nashville? Why of all places. Why on earth would you possibly hang out in Nashville?

Speaker 2 (01:29):

I mean, why not?

Speaker 1 (01:30):

What's going on in Nashville?

Speaker 2 (01:32):

I actually met Matt through Jeff Braun, who's a buddy of mine, and Jeff is obviously one of the top country mixers on the planet right now. And we just hung out and he's like, oh, you should meet my buddy Matt and Doug. I'm like, oh, I've heard of those guys, and they kill it. So we went and got some food and complained about Atmos and talked nerd stuff for quite a while. It was a good time.

Speaker 3 (01:54):

It's the classic mixer. Pastime.

Speaker 2 (01:57):

Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:58):

So are you from Nashville? I am originally an Ohioan, mid-westerner over here, but moved to Nashville a number of years ago. We were here for three and a half years, and then we had a short stint in la, not for super long, 13 months or so, and then just some extenuating circumstances brought us back to Nashville, but we're very happy to be back in Nashville. We actually love it here.

Speaker 1 (02:22):

Did you go to Nashville for the reason that a lot of people go, which is music industry?

Speaker 3 (02:29):

Yes. I thought there was a joke coming. I was like,

Speaker 1 (02:32):

Here

Speaker 3 (02:32):

We go. No. Yeah, it was absolutely a move for us, for me just to take the next step in the music industry. I'd already had some decent success working outside of a music city, but there was nothing tying me down and it was just the logical step to take.

Speaker 1 (02:54):

So there's this idea out there that you can do everything from anywhere, which is not entirely untrue, but I think that at the same time, it's just much more difficult if you're not, I guess somewhere where music and production is in the culture and is why people go there.

Speaker 4 (03:27):

Without a doubt,

Speaker 1 (03:28):

You can have a career outside of LA or Nashville, but it's much more likely if you actually do go to those places. I think.

Speaker 3 (03:36):

Absolutely. I mean that's definitely been my experience. It's, I kind of think of it as our careers as mixed engineers are built almost entirely on luck in a lot of times, being prepared, having preparation for the eventual hopeful luck, but there's a lot of luck and the music city thing just increases your chances. It's like buying multiple lottery tickets instead of buying one. And so I feel like I can think of a hundred different situations, and I'm sure you guys can too, where you're just in the right place at the right time. You have a conversation with someone. Just the most random situation that opens up a relationship, that becomes a fruitful work relationship down the line. And so that's what a music city has done for me for sure, is just increased those chances so many times.

Speaker 2 (04:27):

So at what point in your career did you transition into being a mixer? Because I get asked all the time. They're like, oh, I want to be a mixer. I'm like, okay, well, how long have you been music? Well, I've been doing this about a year. I just got into it. I'm like, well, hold on, that's a jump. Most people come in and they produce, they build up a clientele, and I feel like that's something you more transition into it. So what was your path?

Speaker 3 (04:46):

My path was I played music. I grew up playing music, playing music a lot, playing live music. I was a guitarist. I was a guitarist. It's the classic mix engineer thing. It's like I don't play my guitar anymore. So I feel like I have to say I was a guitarist that I'm afraid my calluses are gone and I'm afraid what'll happen when I pick up the guitar. A guitarist.

(05:08):

Yeah, exactly. But yes, so I am still a guitarist, but I came up playing guitar, playing music, and obviously an avid consumer of music growing up. I mean, so many records were just the soundtrack to my life. You hear a certain record and you're immediately transported back into that 1993 Toyota Tercel driving to high school. And it's like I remember all those records, but point being is music was a very important part of my life growing up, and at some point I was playing live music and it would be, there was a problem back at the soundboard, and so I'd run back and fix things and I just kind of had some level of intuition for it and was in my spare time, I'd find myself on gear space then gear sluts for hours and hours researching, mixing or really anything microphones. I was just fascinated by it even though I didn't have a job or career in it.

(06:09):

And so at some point ended up running front of house a good bit, and then the classic just started making music with my friends and found out that they wanted to pay me for it and that my time was worth money and kind of grew it from there. And so I started out as a producer, which was a big part of my journey coming up and I think is a big part of the way I approach mixing now. And so yeah, I started producing, always said, I'm never going to be the guy that mixes. I don't want to be a mix engineer. I don't want to mix my own productions. I want to be a producer. And that was kind of my path and kind of a couple things happened that sort of, I forced didn't really force that transition, but first thing was I started getting mixes back and weren't what I expected them to be, not what the client expected them to be.

(07:02):

And they would always be like, can you just mix it? We love your rough mix. And so I got in to mixing because my clients loved the rough mixes and started mixing, realized I really, really enjoyed it. And it kind of got to a point where producing and mixing were growing in tandem. But there were two things that I noticed. First thing is I would wake up if it was a bad song, I would wake up in the morning with that song on my schedule as a producer and dread it. If it was a bad song as a mix engineer, I'd wake up and I'd still be pumped about something about it, something about the process, something about learning and creating in that realm. And so I knew that mixing was a thing that I could wake up every day and do, and it was sustainable for me.

(07:51):

And then at the time, I was also reading a book Good to Great, it's a classic business book. And one of the principles in that book was what is the one thing that you think that you could do better than anybody else or be kind of world-class level on that? And kind of the idea of these companies who identified that thing, even if it wasn't their main business, they found that thing that they could be the best in the world at. And just totally focused on that, just a single-minded focus. And I knew for me, I, I didn't see the path to become a great producer for myself, just knowing my skillset and the way I think. But I looked at mixing and I thought I, I see the path of how to get there, what that would look like, and I feel like I'm ready and willing to put in the thousands of mixes to get there. And so I made the pivot, hard pivot, stopped producing and started mixing. Actually not too long ago. It was 2019, February of 2019 is when I went full-time as a mix engineer. And then since then

Speaker 1 (08:56):

She's been great talk about seeing the path because I've said that quite often about decisions that I've made in life that have turned out to be good decisions. That's how I've described it too, is that I've been able to see the path forward

Speaker 4 (09:14):

Very

Speaker 1 (09:14):

Logically. So while other people might consider it this huge risk and not take it, when I decided to quit producing to start URM, I quit completely and I freaked. I freaked out my family, of course, yeah, they were like, you've got a career, what are you doing? What are you doing? But I could see the path forward and it was very logical. It didn't seem like this risk because I definitely could see how it would get to the next level. And then there's been other things that I've tried where I just don't see the path forward and those are things that I've failed at. I've never failed at anything where I've seen the path forward. So what I'm wondering is what you just described is being able to see the path forward. How did that work in your head? Was it a series of logical steps that you could take or how did that translate for you?

Speaker 3 (10:17):

Well, I think pretty simply a lot of times I'm not a super, I'm a bottom line type of guy, and so I think what it was was I just intuitively so I didn't sit down and plan things out and graph things out or whatever, but it is like I just looked at the journey from a beginner intermediate mix engineer and then thought, here's where I'm at. And then I look at my heroes in the mix world and to me it just seemed like a very simple path of I knew that my technical understanding was adequate to be able to get there, and I enjoy learning, so I knew that I could learn my way there and I enjoy doing the same thing every single day. I'm a very process oriented person generally, so I enjoy that kind of repetition

(11:11):

Of song after song, after song after song, sharpening my skills 0.1% at a time. And so it just seemed like a simple path to me that I was equipped for that my skills and my giftings corresponded well with that, and I could see that it was just a matter of building great relationships and waking up and doing another mix every single workday for the next eight, 10 years or whatever, to have a shot at being, to be able to mix alongside my heroes. And obviously there's so much I'm not there yet and there's so much luck and chance involved in that, but to kind of boil it down, I saw it very simply as my skills align, I find a lot of joy in mixing and it's sustainable, and I can see I generally had a good sense of what the work looked like to get from me to where my heroes are

Speaker 1 (12:19):

And

Speaker 3 (12:19):

Was willing to do that.

Speaker 1 (12:20):

It's very logical. That makes a lot of sense. And at the time that you made that decision, you were already getting work as a producer and a mixer. You just decided at that point to go exclusively mixing and just go all in on the thing. That's cool. How long did it take once you'd made that decision until you were full-time in terms of income with the mixing

Speaker 3 (12:53):

At that time? It coincided when I moved to Nashville in 2019, late latter 2019, late 2019. And so at that time I was already kind of mixing and producing. We were at a point where I was getting enough business in both of them that they were starting to compete in terms of just, I started having to say no to things. And so thankfully I was in a good place, and honestly, I feel very fortunate when I made the jump, I think back to then I made the jump and I can think of maybe a couple, two, three, maybe four weeks, a total of time since then that have been unbooked. And so it's been pretty much solidly booked since then. And so I don't really know how that happened. I guess it was just having a lot of great relationships and timing, having a good relationship and timing. Yep.

Speaker 1 (13:53):

I want to point out two things about everything you just said that I've coincide with messages that I've put out over this podcast for years, which is number one, if you're going to go to a place like LA or Nashville, your chances of success of it being worth it to where you don't just leave a few months later are going to be way higher. If you've already got momentum

Speaker 3 (14:23):

100%,

Speaker 1 (14:24):

If you go in with zero momentum, there's a way higher chance you're going to get chewed up and spat back out and then think that everything's crooked and leave. If you go in with momentum, people will actually probably give you a shot if you've got some relationships. And then number two, we meet through URM. A lot of students who say they want to mix exclusively, that's their thing, but before they've had any clients ever, they've made the decision. And my advice to them always has been to don't make a decision like that until you're ready to make a decision like that. It has to be a choice based on reality in my opinion.

Speaker 3 (15:16):

Hundred percent.

Speaker 1 (15:18):

Yeah. You were at a point where you could do that and where you had to decide, like when people ask, when should I quit my day job? It's like, well, when you've got enough momentum from the producing or the mixing to where it's not just jumping into the abyss, it's like you can replace your income or you're very close to being able to completely replace it. You don't just quit your job.

Speaker 3 (15:47):

Right, exactly. And I think the whole deciding your path sort of thing, I'm thankful that my gut instinct of I want to be a producer, that I had flexibility to pivot away from that because if I would've just committed to that to be miserable, a lot of times we don't actually know the best paths for ourselves, especially when it's something that's untested. You can have this idea of what it can be like and then you start doing it and you realize that the job is very different than you thought it would be. Just like I thought I never wanted to mix, and then it's because I didn't really know what mixing was and I thought I wanted to produce because I didn't really know what the realities of being a producer was. And so I feel like there's a time to specialize and drill down to one thing, but I think that is after you've tried out a number of things, you probably don't know yourself as well as you think you do, especially on the work side of things

Speaker 1 (16:50):

And developed a broad range of skills. I think mixing the best mixers generally, not always, you got some exceptions, but the best mixers generally were producers or engineers at some point, just like the best movie directors generally were editors at some point, not always the truth, but it's very, very common

Speaker 4 (17:15):

That

Speaker 1 (17:16):

Someone starts as a producer engineer and then they transition to only mixing every once in a while you'll get someone that just mixed the whole time.

Speaker 2 (17:28):

But

Speaker 1 (17:28):

That is a lot more rare, I think, for sure.

Speaker 2 (17:32):

I'm curious how you pace out your day because this is something I struggle with a lot, but I also have other irons in the fire, meaning I have this and I have, this is my first and foremost responsibility in my life no matter what else is going on. So I have a tendency what I'm mixing to. I like to say yes to everything and sometimes so much will come in at a certain time where I'm like, I need to do three full length albums in three weeks just happened to me in June and I got through it, but that sucks. It's really brutal. And then I talked to guys like Jeff Braun and Jeff's like, I can only do one song a day and maybe four or five songs a week and that's all I'll take. And I'm like, if I don't do four or five songs in two days, I feel like I'm not doing anything and I'm failing. So what does that look like for you?

Speaker 3 (18:24):

I think the time management side of things, I try to, well first of all, I try to build in margin into my schedule, and so I know what I'm capable of in terms of if I had to turn on grind mode, I know what I can do. I know what my upper limit is and kind of songs per week or songs per day even, and I just don't schedule myself up to that point. I just schedule myself. I try to think of it as I'll schedule myself at like 70% at all times. And so that just kind of affords me a few different things that affords me the flexibility to say yes to a last minute, something that I really want to do, but it also affords me the headspace needed to take longer on something that is fighting me, you know what I mean?

(19:24):

Or something comes up in life and you just step away for half a day. And so that's worked really well for me. Another thing is my workflow is so, so important to me and dialing my workflow in and improving my workflow has made a world of difference for me. I mean, I think back, I remember I had a friend mentor, really generous guy here in Nashville. He's a mastering engineer, Sam Moses, awesome dude, very generous. And when I first moved here, he kind of just showed me the ropes, you know what I mean? There's so much I had to learn about the industry in particular and operating on a higher level. And I remember him one day I was talking to him and he was like, yeah, I mixed two songs a day. And I was like, what? My mind almost exploded because at that time I was taking eight to 12 hours on a mix and it blew my mind and it was kind of like, you see these Olympic world records or whatever, and it's like those world records or just those high performers, once you see it, you can't unsee it and I can do this, it's possible somebody else has done it and it gives you permission to kind of do that.

(20:41):

And so that sort of unlocked this journey for me of just finding ways to spend less time on non-creative things so that I can people talk about flow state or whatever, and basically finding any way possible to spend as much time in the most productive ways and mixing and automate sometimes hire out certain things that are just repetitive tasks or whatever. And that has made a massive difference for me in terms of managing my time. Going from eight to 12 hours on a mix to kind of two to three hours is sort of where I'm landing now. And I feel like my mixes are better than they've ever been. And so it's not speed for the sake of speed, it's just working smarter so you don't wear yourself into the ground. I mean being able to get the same amount of work done in four or five hours that used to take me two days is a massive benefit.

Speaker 1 (21:50):

We have this course called speed mixing that we put out in 2017 that we're actually getting ready to put out a brand new version of it. Updated

Speaker 4 (22:02):

Speed mixing two.

Speaker 1 (22:03):

Yeah, speed mixing two, but speed mixing when we put it out. I don't know if you're familiar with it or not, but it sounds like I'm guessing No, because you didn't say yes, but what you're

Speaker 3 (22:15):

Talking about. No, I actually, I'm aware of it, but I haven't seen it.

Speaker 1 (22:19):

Okay. What you're talking about is basically exactly what it's about. And it's interesting when it came out, lots of people who didn't take it thought that we were telling people to cut corners, and so we got a lot of hate for putting out speed mixing. So they thought that we were part of

(22:37):

Encouraging people to have bad habits, but no, that's not what it was about. What it was about was exactly what you just said, figuring out a way to spend as little time as possible on the boring, repetitive stuff that can be automated and systematized so that you can spend the maximum amount of time in the flow state and then having workflows designed so that even within the flow state, you're not getting in your own way and you're moving hundred percent as effortlessly as possible. So lots of people who did take it ended up seeing just night and day difference in their ability to mix because the amount of time people spend on dumb stuff, it's not dumb because it's necessary, but the amount of time they spend on dumb stuff because it is dumb because they spend too long on it,

Speaker 3 (23:29):

100%

Speaker 1 (23:29):

Just impedes their progress so much. So I find it fascinating that basically you figured out speed mixing for yourself. So I'm just wondering,

Speaker 3 (23:42):

I'm excited to watch speed mixing too. Sure. There are things that I can pick up from it.

Speaker 1 (23:47):

It's pretty intense. What are some of the, just out of curiosity, have you had to pick out a few of the anchors for how you, a few of the non-negotiables or just the most effective things that you added or changed in your workflow that just there was before you did this thing and then there's after you did this thing?

Speaker 3 (24:11):

Well, I think the first thing is just kind of a mentality shift of shifting away from a mentality of insecurity to a mentality of like, I trust my skillset, I trust my ear, I trust my judgment. I can look back over the years of work that I've done and the clientele that I've built and see even from external affirmation that they keep hiring me. I can see that my gut, there's something to it that is resonating with the people I'm working with. And so that's kind of the first thing of just switching that mentality of second guessing every decision to being like, no, I can think about this intuitively and I can just feel and I can just move through things really quickly and trust the moves that I'm making. I remember this kind of a long answer to the question, but I kind of discovered the idea of speed mixing because one day I was just so sick of getting in my head on this mix and I was just like, you know what?

(25:07):

Screw it. I'm going to mix this as fast as I can. I'm not going to second guess any decision. I'm going to try to get this thing done in under an hour and if it sucks, I'll start from scratch and that's fine. What I found was when I just sprinted through it that I just was in a creative mindset but also in a confident mindset of I know how to get to the finish line on this thing and I can trust my gut on things. And I got to the end, I was like, I love this mix. I'm so happy with this mix. And so it's just first thing is just trusting your gut and trusting your decisions, and that kind of comes with experience too. I couldn't have done that at the beginning of my career, but in terms of more specific techniques or whatever, real

Speaker 1 (25:58):

Quick about the gut training, we actually have entire sections on that because if you don't have that feedback from the real world telling you that they like your work, it's very hard to have false confidence in yourself so you can't be confident about something that doesn't exist. So we have these gut trainers that help people make decisions faster and learn how to technically understand what they're hearing and then react to it quickly. That's incredible. So that they train themselves, they train themselves to trust their gut because they don't have that thing of people enjoying their work yet

Speaker 2 (26:46):

Just doing them gives you anxiety. I filmed some of these last week and it was like you're sitting there with a timer and just drilling yourself and it's like you have these ridiculous constraints to adhere to, and when you do that, you don't have time to think. Just like in the real world, if somebody calls you at three o'clock in the afternoon and said, Hey, this needs to go to distro at LA five o'clock today, get it in before then, and you're like, I got

Speaker 4 (27:10):

Four

Speaker 2 (27:10):

Hours to mix this and then see if the mastering person is available, let's go. You get it done.

Speaker 1 (27:16):

The same thing applies with songwriting. I really think that people spend way too long on songwriting. I mean, some songs take a long time, but I think that people think that it has to take a lot longer than it really does. So last year I tried this experiment called the two hour song and we presented it to some riff hard students, but actually I used the two hour song experiment for real songs that ended up being singles and it was just sit down and there's going to be a song done in two hours and maybe not the finished finished version,

Speaker 4 (27:55):

But

Speaker 1 (27:55):

Let's just say 85% of the way there. And what I noticed is you don't have time to second guess and you don't have time to get lost in production decisions or anything that takes away from songwriting. You don't have time to sit there and mess with a reverb or whatever. It's just a

Speaker 3 (28:14):

Freaking arrow through kick drums.

Speaker 1 (28:18):

Exactly, exactly. None of that matters. The only thing that matters is, is this a good idea? Does it sound cool, does it flow? Is it working? Yes or no? Binary, yay or nay. And it's amazing how much, it's amazing how much you can get done when you get out of your own way. But alright, so what was the next thing you were about to say?

Speaker 3 (28:42):

The next thing, I mean I can just kind of rattle off a few very simple things. I really rewrote all of my plugin defaults to basically be a snapshot of exactly what I love that plugin doing. There are certain plugins that are just like, it's the single sound for me. This plugin does this one thing. Great. I just overwrite the factory preset so that when it instantiates, I'm not having to flip the same three knobs or switches every single time to get it to the place where I like to start. So that's one thing is I rewrote all my plugin defaults. I really limited, not intentionally, but I've really narrowed the amount of plugins that I use in terms of variety. Obviously I've got a million plugins, but just so I can have 'em when I get sessions in. I don't have to bug the producer, but I use a pretty limited number of plugins that I know very well and know the plugins that are the quickest path between my thought and what I'm hearing out of the speaker is what I use and I enjoy using them.

(29:49):

Another thing has been, I basically use sound flow a lot for a lot of macros and a lot of shortcuts within pro tools. And so I've kind of got things set up to where all of my shortcuts are done in a way where my right hand never leaves the mouse and my left hand never leaves the left side of the keyboard, and so it's all just right at my fingertips. And so I kind of did the thing where every week I would learn, I'd have a post-it note of five different or shortcuts I wanted to learn and utilize, and over time I just learn as many as possible so I'm not never really menu diving and sound flow helps me do a bunch of things in a single keystroke that used to take five minutes and I can just, boom.

Speaker 2 (30:43):

Have you started tracking mouse movement distance? Anytime you have to move the mouse across the screen, you're like, if I can eliminate that, that just has to stay in. It's like a video game where you're in a quadrant, it adds up.

Speaker 3 (30:56):

I did this thing and I still do it, is whenever I notice that I'm doing anything multiple times in a mix or in my workflow, I write it down, I just write it down really quickly and come back to it and find a way to automate that thing as much as possible. So any repetitive motions are reduced as much as possible. And then really great tools like Bounce Factory has been amazing for me. I mean especially in the world of Atmos now where 70% of projects I do are requiring stems of some to some degree and oftentimes more basically a multi-track bounce through the mix Bus is the most common thing now I'm printing 70 stems per song. Well, they're not even stems at this point, single tracks through the Mix Bus, but things like Bounce Factory, that takes me 15 minutes to set up an EP worth of stems and I can print 300 stems while I'm sleeping.

Speaker 1 (32:01):

What is this bounce factor you speak of? I have never heard of it.

Speaker 3 (32:04):

Oh, so it

Speaker 2 (32:05):

Works.

Speaker 3 (32:06):

Do

Speaker 1 (32:06):

You know about it, Jill?

Speaker 2 (32:08):

I've heard of it, but I've never used it. But Cubase has automated batch exporting and all kinds of things like that.

Speaker 3 (32:14):

Does it do it through solo? Bouncing through the mix bus?

Speaker 2 (32:17):

I never actually export like that because well, I mean there's a myriad of reasons, but I usually argue with people that want me to do that because I feel like it's a pointless endeavor whether you're going to Atmos or you're going live, well then

Speaker 3 (32:31):

Argue with me right now. Let's go.

Speaker 2 (32:34):

We can argue,

Speaker 1 (32:35):

But hold on, hold that argument. I want to hear about this program first.

Speaker 2 (32:38):

Yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 3 (32:39):

So Bounce Factory, it's kind of an extension to sound flow. Ander Shep's made it and it's incredible. So it basically allows you to do extremely sophisticated automated offline or online bouncing within Pro tools. And so it can be as simple as you select any number of tracks in a session or VCAs or anything like that and with just a couple clicks, you can just tell it to, I want you to do a batch bounce where you solo print, solo print, solo, print all of these one at a time and it'll take care of track naming based on the track

Speaker 1 (33:25):

Header. Oh man, I want that.

Speaker 3 (33:27):

And so you can go as simple as that where you're doing just solo bounce all these, or you can do mute passes where do a pass where these tracks are muted or do a pass where this group of tracks are soloed or do a pass where this playlist is loaded on this track so you could do your clean version. So I mean, there have been nights where I've queued up 450, 500 prints just gone to bed and woke up and it's like it's all done. I mean, this saved me a literal full workday and it's relatively expensive, but it's one of

Speaker 1 (34:06):

Those,

Speaker 3 (34:07):

It's one things where

Speaker 1 (34:08):

It's like,

Speaker 3 (34:10):

Check

Speaker 1 (34:10):

This out.

Speaker 3 (34:11):

Once you use it one time, you're like, wow, that literally saved me a full workday. And you're like, that was worth, I would pay 10 times

Speaker 1 (34:18):

The amount if you hear me typing right now, pro Tools only. Correct.

Speaker 3 (34:23):

I think they may have announced it for Logic as well, but I'm not positive

Speaker 2 (34:30):

Because Cubase has export queuing where you can basically program up pretty much anything you wanted to export. And I'm sure Reaper, you could script it or something like that, but I'm not a Reaper user, so Interesting. But yeah, that makes sense because

Speaker 1 (34:44):

Cubase, I just emailed myself. You do that too, otherwise forget

Speaker 3 (34:51):

Email is my to-do list.

Speaker 1 (34:53):

Yeah. I also text myself, I have two identities. I made an identity,

Speaker 3 (35:00):

This sounds healthy.

Speaker 1 (35:02):

Well, one's my dog's name, but I text my dog stuff to do just so that I can

Speaker 3 (35:11):

So funny

Speaker 1 (35:12):

Because that's somewhere that I'm checking stuff constantly getting, that's where I communicate with people a lot. And so having an always updated list right there where I'm always looking is a lot easier for me than a to-do somewhere that I'm not always looking. I guess similar type of concept. Love it to what we're talking about that bounce factory man, just thinking because a pro tools user dude, even if you're not doing stuff, you're talking about Atmos mixes. Even if you're using Pro tools for songwriting and you're working with your own band and you have to send your own band stems or DI's or whatever. Just doing that over the course of writing an entire album and just sending people individualized parts and all that, that is a huge time suck that something like Bounce Factory could really, really help with.

Speaker 3 (36:19):

Well, and it's one of those things where it's extremely powerful but can also be used in a very basic way.

Speaker 1 (36:24):

Yeah, it sounds like

Speaker 3 (36:25):

You kind of look at it and you're like, oh my gosh, there's so many options, but hit me up and I can give you the five minute tutorial

Speaker 1 (36:32):

That'll

Speaker 3 (36:33):

Distill it all very easily.

Speaker 1 (36:35):

I will. That sounds awesome.

Speaker 3 (36:38):

Yeah, so Bounce Factory has been huge for me. Yeah, it's just a bunch of things like that, but also just maintaining an awareness of you're never too far into this thing to cut fat. And so I've done a lot of work on my workflow and I think to myself, man, I'm sure there's so much more I can do and so much I can learn. So just always having that thought going of how can I optimize more? It honestly makes working more fun. I enjoy my job so much more now that I'm not bogged down by those sorts of things. I mean, I think, man, if I'm spending four hours at the end of a day solo printing a bunch of stems or whatever, that's a huge wear and tear on my mind, and I wake up the next day less creative. And so yeah, it's just saving your most productive times and you're saving your brain for the things that matter most. It's

Speaker 2 (37:38):

Amazing how necessity,

Speaker 3 (37:39):

Sorry, go ahead, Jill.

Speaker 2 (37:40):

It's amazing how necessity of when you get busy, right?

Speaker 4 (37:44):

You don't

Speaker 2 (37:44):

Really think about your workflow. I guess what I'm saying is when you're coming up and you only have a few things to mix, you can sit there and you can spend 12 hours when you're actually mixing in the real world and you're slammed all the time and it's intense and you have everybody and their mom wants something from you. Now that necessity forces you to get really creative about the ways that you're approaching things. So for me, it started when Joey, I started mixing stuff with Sturgis and Joey had 40 to 50 songs a month he was sending to me to mix, and it was like I had a full-time assistant, then I was sitting there and then he was working on it kind of almost on an executive mixer level. And we created an entire system around it from the way we communicated with clients to actually mixing, to prepping, to have everything be so systematized.

(38:32):

And had we not had that demand, there was no reason for us to create that system. But that demand forced us to sit down and be like, how do I move my mouse less? How do I make a key commander a macro that can do literally anything that I do more than once in a session? How can I get less mixed notes in my communication with the band upfront via email versus what we're doing now? So we don't run into problems where people don't. So we just started asking fundamental questions in drilling and drilling and drilling and drilling and drilling.

Speaker 3 (39:01):

And I think a really big part of speeding up your workflow too is becoming more aware of what your clients actually want and need out of you. What do you mean? Well, I find, okay, you get a mix in and you're like, holy cow, this sounds incredible already. You pull it up, you're like, oh my gosh, when you're used to spending taking a mix from a 50 to a 95 and this thing is already at 95, it's like that can be like, oh, how do I add value to this? And I remember times,

Speaker 1 (39:44):

How do I go from a to a plus? Yeah,

Speaker 3 (39:46):

Exactly. And feeling like I had to do the same kind of lift on that as I did on other songs. And what I'm saying is learning. There are some clients that want you to totally redefine the song, but the majority of clients want a better version of what they sent you

Speaker 2 (40:05):

And

Speaker 3 (40:05):

Some of 'em and very experienced producers, oftentimes a win to them is it comes back one or 2% better or it doesn't come back worse. And because a lot of people on that level who if they wanted to be, they could be in incredible mix engineers, those people, they just want it a little bit better, and that's a massive win for them. So knowing what your client expects from you out of the mix is huge. I mean, when I made a big pivot a number of years ago where I was like, I think what most of my clients want just noticing from notes I would get back and everything. I think most of them, what they send me in the rough is sometimes a blurry, but a picture, sometimes a blurry picture, but it is a picture of where they're aiming. And most of the questions that I could ask in terms of direction on a song could be answered by just spending time with the rough mix and delivering to them a version of what they sent me that just takes all of their goals and their aims and sharpens them and clarifies them and brings them to life.

(41:17):

And so yeah, that pivot from being like, I have to be a hero as a mix

Speaker 1 (41:22):

Engineer, I'm the artist.

Speaker 3 (41:23):

Yeah,

Speaker 2 (41:23):

Exactly. This is actually a huge topic to talk about, and I think this is so important because this is something that happened to me in the last two years as I jumped back into Fing benoff for we'll call it two years,

(41:34):

And then decided to come back and start mixing again because I just need it in my life. And it's something I just love. My initial instinct coming from metal was because you know how metal is, metal is like, here's the eyes, here's Midi, I don't know what to do. I can't produce anything. Just make this sound like this band meets this band with the drums of this band, with this band and figure out what we're thinking. That's a lot of what you get unless you're working with massive producers. But in metal, everybody that's a producer is like a mixer because there's no real dedicated metal mixers who only mix and not produce. You know what I mean? Aren't other genres where there are people that are just a mixer, they don't do anything else other than mix. Whereas metal, it's kind of like the biggest mixers are also some of the biggest producers.

(42:19):

So you get people that are not at that level and they're nowhere near the level of organization as the people that are on that level. Whereas when you come from that background, I did you find that, oh, every time somebody sends you something, you just want to destroy the reference and just show 'em how good you are. And I learned working on much bigger artists and with much bigger producers that these people can already mix and they know exactly what they want and what sounds you don't need to replace their drum. If they give you a sample, you use it. If this is what the reference is, give them the reference back, but 10% better or even 1% better and they'll be stoked. And when you go off of that, you get destroyed and you get tons of notes, yeah, this doesn't feel right. I'm like, are you sure you want it to sound like that? And they're like, yes. And you're like, oh, okay. Well what they actually want is this with this, but I can improve it here, give them what they want. And learning to make that distinction was a huge thing for me. And it felt so foreign just coming from metal where it's like you're expected to take a 50 and turn it to a 95 to a hundred, where in the bigger league stuff, in other genres, you're given a 95 or higher and you want to just turn it up a little bit.

Speaker 1 (43:30):

I figured they would tell you if they didn't like,

Speaker 2 (43:33):

But they don't know half the time. And that's the problem. I mean, again, Jeff Braun and I talk about this a lot. It's like sometimes they're like, we want it to sound just like this. And you give it to them, you're like, well, I'm mad you didn't take it far enough off the reference. And then there's other times where you take it too far and no one knows what they want sometimes until they hear it. And no matter how much diligently conversation you have with somebody you don't know until you've worked with them. And even the same producers can be inconsistent with that, where sometimes they'll want one thing and then on the next mix they'll want the opposite. And you're like, I know this person so well and I know what they want. But then you misread them or they tell you the opposite of what they want until they hear it. So sometimes it's like a coin flip even, which is kind of unnerving as a mixer because you obviously want to nail it every time.

Speaker 1 (44:20):

It's interesting because I'm trying to think of it from the artist's perspective, the artist's perspective, because I quit mixing or producing 10 years ago now, but I was always an artist first. And my most recent experiences have definitely been as an artist going to a mixer where there's already a rough version of the album or the song completely done. And in general, it's this interesting thing where there's certain aspects of it that you have to make sure that the mixer knows not to fuck with it at all.

(45:04):

And then there's other aspects where you want the mixer to totally do their thing. And I find that the more as an artist that can communicate that to the mixer, the better because there's still something in the rough that is, it captures some sort of an essence, some sort of a vibe, some sort of an intent that expecting a mixer to just get that if they weren't there. I think that's what it is. They weren't there for the recording, they weren't there for the writing, they weren't there for the arrangement, they weren't in on all the conversations that led to certain decisions. They're just coming in. And that's both an awesome thing to get that totally fresh perspective. But also there's some things that are already great that you don't want them, you don't want a fresh perspective on that. You just want them to maybe smooth out the edges or something or get rid of something annoying or just get it to sit better. So I feel like as an artist, you got to do make sure that the mixer knows. And I think the mixer should try to find out

Speaker 4 (46:27):

For sure.

Speaker 1 (46:27):

I think it's a two-way street. I think artists should do their best to make sure that whoever is mixing their work knows exactly what from the rough is, should be kind of just a better version as is. And one of it is like, we just want you to do your thing on

Speaker 4 (46:49):

This

Speaker 1 (46:50):

Part of it. Yeah, guitar tone, go for it, do your thing, but don't touch this synth balance or something. Right, exactly.

Speaker 2 (46:57):

I think one of the best things that a producer and artist can do in that case is print. So I'll give you an example. I just mixed a song last week where I mixed it and there was maybe 30 tracks of post-production in this rock song. And then they're like, well, I've got another producer that did some programming. They got just a couple of tracks and the dude drops me like a hundred tracks and no reference. And I'm like, oh my God, I've already mixed this song. Now I got to fit all this crap. Half of it's unnecessary. So I send 'em the mix and they're like, yeah, it's off. I'm like, here's what I want you to do. I'm going to stop mixing. I want you to sit down and take all the production tracks, and I want you guys to pre balance these all out, like a rough mix, and then send me stems no more than 15 stereo files of everything there and commit and make all the decisions for me exactly how you want it. And then I'm going to mix that. And then I did that and I had one revision on that entire next pass. So it was just being able to sit down and commit and figure out and be like, oh, this is unnecessary. We don't like this. Why did he put this in there mute? Instead of me figuring that out, who is not the artist or the producer,

Speaker 1 (47:57):

It's

Speaker 2 (47:57):

Not my job to read their minds. So that's the kind of place where

Speaker 1 (48:01):

Again, if they want you to interpret it then your way, then that should be understood upfront. I think. How much of this am I supposed to interpret as an individual and how much of this is purely just like a technical mix, I guess it's all you as an individual, but I just think it's important to know, I guess where the boundaries are

Speaker 3 (48:34):

For sure.

Speaker 1 (48:36):

But this is the same with an engineer versus a producer, right? Because there's certain artists who will go to a producer who want the producer to basically write the songs with them, even if they didn't hire them as a songwriter.

Speaker 4 (48:48):

They

Speaker 1 (48:48):

Want the producer to basically help write the songs and just really mold them into something else. And then there's other bands who all they want is the producer to get the best takes out of them. And then everything in between. And a producer's job is to know exactly who they're working with and how much, where's the boundary, what's the boundary on what kind of input?

Speaker 3 (49:17):

Absolutely. And a lot of times I'll even, yeah, if that direction's not given explicitly, a lot of times if I'm listening to a song and I think, okay, some songs, the direction isn't necessarily super clear where it's like, oh, I know exactly where they're trying to go with this. You sometimes you'll listen, you'll be like, oh, there are multiple ways we go with this. And in those circumstances I'll always just ask the producer or the artist like, Hey, with this song, what is a win for you as far as mix goes? What's the target you're aiming at? And just asking that simple question a lot of times will clarify things for me, number one, but also relieve a lot of pressure because I'm not having to guess my way and be insecure when I send it off being like, I hope this is what they were going for.

Speaker 1 (50:05):

Yeah. Want to do a rapid fire to close this one out?

Speaker 3 (50:09):

Do

Speaker 2 (50:09):

It. Alright. I'm going to drill you with questions, so just give me a short dare.

Speaker 3 (50:13):

I dare you to

Speaker 2 (50:15):

None of them about printing stems through the two bus or not, but alright, so just give me a short answer and why. First question, what's a trend in mixing right now that you think people are doing too much of

Speaker 3 (50:27):

Multi-band compression on the mix bus and why? I think it's too much. Well, I like it when it's subtle and artful and intentional, but I feel like people do it to try to pull energy out of things that are maybe not as interesting as they could be in the source material.

Speaker 2 (50:49):

Love that answer. Okay. If you could give one mixing tip to a beginner, what would it be?

Speaker 3 (50:55):

One mixing tip to a beginner. My tip for a beginner is don't get ahead of yourself. Trust the journey in becoming a mix engineer. The difference between you and your heroes is a few thousand mixes and you got to be fine with going down that path and learning slowly and intentionally.

Speaker 2 (51:18):

Now, if you could give a different mixing tip to an intermediate, what would that be?

Speaker 3 (51:26):

That would be learn how to structure your work and your mixing your workflow in a way that makes you a healthy person. If you have a killer mixed career but you're holding onto divorce papers or you have no social life or no hobbies outside of your work, I wouldn't call that a success story personally, but that's up to everyone to decide. But don't neglect your life outside of your work.

Speaker 2 (51:58):

Okay. Vocal chain, if you had to pick one, what's the goat?

Speaker 3 (52:03):

Every single time for me, ProQ for cleanup headed into some very gentle compression, one to three DB of either R vx or CLA 76 in blue mode. And then I've got a parallel chain of purified vu compressor on a mode spanking that thing negative 20. And it's got this saturation knob on it that right at a certain point it kind of works as a clipper or limiter. So it's a really fantastic add. Some color doesn't get spiky like other 1170 sixes would. So that on parallel purified vu comp, sneak it up under and then bring those together on a bus. And I do a little bit of flavor EQ with ProQ. Again, little cleanup with Soothe and resin frequencies. 2K to 4K, call it a day.

Speaker 2 (52:54):

And then what mix inspires you right now?

Speaker 3 (53:01):

Oh, I don't know how. I wasn't ready for that question. It's a hard

Speaker 2 (53:05):

Question to answer honestly. There's so many.

Speaker 3 (53:07):

I couldn't answer it. It really is. Okay, hold on. I actually have a playlist that I've got to just pop and look at right now. There have been two that I've been liking. I really listen to a lot of, I love pop mixes, I love mixes that sound like they cost a million dollars sometimes. They did to make, and there are two songs that I love for different reasons. Kissing Strangers by Usher was a really great mix by Manny Quinn and the vocal placement and the groove on that song are phenomenal. Really cool mid-range on that song. And then haven't really listened to full album, but Katy Perry's Single Woman's World. I just think the way the kick in the snare and the vocal are placed in that song is absolute pop. Perfection. Yeah, those have been inspiring me just because I've been learning from 'em and where they've been teaching me where energy and loudness come from in a mix. And it's not from your limiter, it's from your instrument placement.

Speaker 1 (54:09):

Great answers. Well Matt, thank you very much for taking the time to hang out with us. It's been a pleasure. Honored.

Speaker 3 (54:16):

It's been an honor for me, man. So great hanging with you guys. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 (54:21):

For sure. Thank you.