Tag: Nail The Mix

Mixing MESHUGGAH lead guitars w/ Daniel Bergstrand

Dissecting one of the most iconic solos of all time

Heavy music can essentially be divided into two categories: before Meshuggah and after Meshuggah. They completely changed the game with not only their songwriting, but also the groundbreaking and unique production on “Destroy Erase Improve” courtesy of the one and only Daniel Bergstrand.

Mixing “Future Breed Machine” lead guitars w/ Daniel Bergstrand + Meshuggah

Watch Daniel Bergstrand mix the lead guitars in the iconic Meshuggah song “Future Breed Machine”! He uses Pro Tools, Brainwork Shredspread and Soundtoys Echoboy.

We consider ourselves insanely fortunate to have Daniel on Nail The Mix to take us through one of Meshuggah’s most well-known songs “Future Breed Machine,” and for those who may have missed it, here’s a little peek at the pure awesomeness of this session – check it out as Daniel mixes the iconic solo from the bridge!

Nail The MixNail The Mix is our online mixing school that gives you REAL multi-tracks from REAL bands, plus a mixing class from the producer who recorded it. Past guests include Periphery, Gojira, Monuments, Machine Head, A Day To Remember and State Champs. Join now for instant access!

Dial in punchy and powerful clean vocals

It’s a bit counterituitive…

As we’ve said a million times, vocals are the most important part of almost every song – even in guitar-driven genres like progressive metal. It’s just a fact of human psychology that we’re drawn to the human voice, and therefore it’s always going to be the central element in a mix.

Which makes it kind of ironic that many mixers don’t spend nearly as much time on vocals as they do drums or guitar. Big no-no!!

Clean vocals are even more attention-grabbing than screams or growls because they’re easier to understand, and this actually makes them even more challenging to mix than harsh vocals. It’s a bit counter-intuitive, because you’d think that harsh vocals would be harder to mix because they’re more dense, but it’s actually the opposite: with cleans – especially when it’s a really strong singer – there’s nothing to hide behind, and every mix move counts.

Dial in powerful + punchy clean vocals w/ John Browne of Monuments

Watch John Browne mix the vocals for “I, The Creator” by Monuments using the raw multi-tracks from the album. He uses Cubase, Waves CLA-76 compressor plugin, Waves H Delay, Waves Manny Marroquin plugin, Waves Desser, and Soundtoys Echoboy.

As an example, check out this clip of John Browne mixing the lead vocals of Monuments’ “I, The Creator” from his Nail The Mix session featuring their incredible vocalist Chris Baretto.

Obviously Chris absolutely nailed the performance, which is awesome – but working with really great tracks like this presents its own set of challenges as well, especially in a dense, complex arrangement like this one. Namely, that as the mixer it’s your job to highlight all the details of the performance with a subtle touch– to bring out the greatness and bring the vocal front and center without smashing it or overwhelming the rest of the song.

Nail The MixNail The Mix is our online mixing school that gives you REAL multi-tracks from REAL bands, plus a mixing class from the producer who recorded it. Past guests include Periphery, Gojira, Meshuggah, Machine Head, A Day To Remember and State Champs. Join now for instant access!

Break the rules of drum programming

If it sounds good, it IS good – period.

You know what drives me nuts? The idea that there are rules to music (or art of any kind, for that matter). It’s kind of ridiculous, especially when the self-appointed authorities making and enforcing the rules are a bunch of random people on Facebook. The fact of the matter is that there are NO rules to music – the only that matters is whether you and the audience like the sound coming out of the speakers!

One of the best examples is drum programming: we all assume that the “right” way to program drums is to mimic as closely as possible the way in which a human plays drums. Nobody questions this – and I’ll admit that I’ve always thought of this as an unbreakable rule. You never program parts a human couldn’t play (for example, hitting two cymbals and the snare at the same time), you don’t use 127 velocity for every hit, and so forth.

But the truth is that (like most “rules” in music), that isn’t a rule at all – it’s just a guideline. Sometimes your music sounds better when you break the rules, so why not go for it? If you think it sounds better with everything at 127, then do it!

Break the rules of MIDI drum programming w/ WZRD BLD, Jeff Dunne & Emmure

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For a real world example, check out WZRD BLD and Jeff Dunne programming drums on the latest EMMURE album in this clip from their Nail The Mix session. As they point out, some of these parts are physically impossible to play, but they just went with it because it sounded better that way.

Remember: the goal isn’t to please a bunch of nerds on Facebook by slavishly following their made-up “rules,” the goal is to make great music 🙂

Nail The MixNail The Mix is our online mixing school that gives you REAL multi-tracks from REAL bands, plus a mixing class from the producer who recorded it. Past guests include Periphery, Gojira, Meshuggah, Machine Head, A Day To Remember and State Champs. Join now for instant access!

 

Essential snare-mixing technique w/ Beau Burchell of Saosin

Guaranteed you’ve effed yourself many times because of this.

You’ve heard people tell you countless times to watch out for phase issues, but if you’re like most people it went in one ear and out the other because phase issues can be hard to spot, hard to fix, and definitely aren’t a sexy or fun part of the mixing process (“blah blah blah i can’t hear you!!!!!!!” *spends 100 more hours on guitar tone*).

But you know what? I’m 1000% sure that you’ve spent hours beating your head against the wall fighting a phase issue that you didn’t even know was a phase issue! If you’ve stacked EQ after EQ and compressor after compressor with no luck… I’ll bet you lunch that you were fighting phase, and could have saved yourself a whole lot of time (and come out of it with a much better mix) if you’d fixed the real problem instead of throwing plugins at it.

How to mix a snare drum: finding and fixing phase problems

Sooooo many snare drum mixes get effed up by snare phase problems most people aren’t even aware of – don’t mix another snare until you watch this! Beau Burchell of Saosin shows a few common ones + how to fix them in your mixes using Pro Tools and Fab Filter Pro Q.

In this clip from his Nail The Mix session, our friend Beau Burchell of Saosin shows exactly how these phase issues might be destroying your mixes without your knowledge – don’t mix another snare until you’ve watched this! (Also – you can get access to this session + Beau’s mixing class right here)

Nail The MixNail The Mix is our online mixing school that gives you REAL multi-tracks from REAL bands, plus a mixing class from the producer who recorded it. Past guests include Periphery, Meshuggah, Machine Head and State Champs. Join now for instant access!

 

How to dial in a PUNISHING bass tone w/ WZRD BLD and Jeff Dunne

The secret to amazing guitar tone? A great bass tone!

You’ve heard us say a million times that the key to great guitar tone is dialing in the right bass tone – and you know why we keep saying it? Because it’s effing TRUE – and yet you still see people spending a fraction of the time on bass that they do on guitar. I get it: nobody gets excited about bass. But the cold truth is that you better LEARN to get excited about it because you simply aren’t gonna get good guitar tone without it.

The real secret to metal guitar tone [w/ WZRD BLD + Jeff Dunne]

The key to great metal guitar tone in a mix? The bass guitar tone! Watch + learn as WZRD BLD and Jeff Dunne dial in an absolutely crushing and ridiculous bass tone on the latest EMMURE album. Want this session and the full mixing class?

In this clip from July’s Nail The Mix session, WZRD BLD and Jeff Dunne dial in an absolutely CRUSHING bass tone using the session from EMMURE’s “Flag Of The Beast.” They use the familiar 3-track splitting technique you’ve probably seen before (one track each sub, clean and distorted tones) but with a couple cool details you  probably haven’t, such as editing the distorted track to kick in only during key parts of the arrangement and getting great tones out of a few rarely-used Pod Farm amps.

Nail The MixNail The Mix is our online mixing school that gives you REAL multi-tracks from REAL bands, plus a mixing class from the producer who recorded it. Past guests include Periphery, Meshuggah, Machine Head and State Champs. Join now for instant access!