Music and mixing

“The music unfolds itself with perfect freedom; but it is so heart-searching because we know all the time it
runs along the quickest nerves of our life, our struggles & aspirations & sufferings & exaltations.”

1 We can easily identify with these ideas when we come to think about modern music – there is no doubt
that music can have a huge impact on us. Following Beethoven, music became an affair between two
individuals, the artist and the listener, fueled by what is today an inseparable part of music – emotions.

2 At present, music rarely comes without a dose of emotions – all but a few pieces of music have some sort
of mental or physical function on us. Killing in the Name by Rage Against the Machine can trigger a sense of
rage or rebellious anger. Many find it hard to remain stationary when hearing Hey Ya! by OutKast, and for
some this tune can turn a bad morning into a good one. Music can also trigger sad or happy memories, and
so the same good morning can turn into an awful afternoon if at midday one hears Albinoni’s Adagio for
Strings and Organ in G Major (which goes to show that even purely instrumental music moves us). In many
cases, our response to music is subconscious, but sometimes we deliberately listen to music in order to incite
a certain mood – some listen to ABBA as a warm up for a night out, others to Sepultura. Motion-picture
music directors know well how profound our response to music is – they use music to help induce the
desired emotional response from viewers. We all know what kind of music to expect when a couple falls in
love or when the shark is about to attack. It would take an awfully good reason to have YMCA playing along
at a funeral scene.

3 As for mixing engineers, one of the greatest abilities, which is in fact their responsibility, is to help deliver
the emotional context of a musical piece. From the general mix plan to the smallest reverb nuances, the
tools they use – and the way they use them – can all sharpen or even create power, aggression, softness,
melancholia, psychedelia and many other emotions or moods that the original music entails. It would make
little sense to distort the drums on a mellow love song, just like it would not be right to soften the beat of a
hip-hop production. When approaching a new mix, we should ask ourselves a few questions:

● What is this song about? ● [How can I support and enhance its
● What emotions are involved? vibe? ]
● What message is the artist trying to ● How should the listener respond to this
convey? piece of music?

4As trivial this idea might seem, it is imperative to comprehend – the mix is dependent on the music, and
mixing is not just a set of technical challenges. What is more, the questions above lay the foundation for an
ever so important quality of the mixing engineer – a mixing vision.

A mix can, and should enhance the music, its mood, the emotions it entails, and the
response it should incite.

The role and importance of the mix

5 Trying to explain to the layman what mixing is, the following definition can be given: a process in which
multitrack material – whether recorded, sampled or synthesized – is balanced, treated and combined into a
multichannel format, most commonly two-channel Stereo. But a less technical definition – one that does
justice to music – is that a mix is a sonic presentation of emotions, creative ideas and performance.
Even for the layman, sonic quality does matter. Taking the cell phone, for example, people often get
annoyed, sometimes even angry, when background noise masks the other party. Intelligibility is the most
elementary requirement of sonic quality, but it goes far beyond that. Some new cell phone models with
integrated speaker phones are by no means better than playback systems people had in the 1950s. There is
no wonder why people prefer listening to music via their kitchen’s mini-system, and – if there is one –
through the separate Hi-Fi system in their living room. What point would it be in spending a small fortune on
a Hi-Fi system if all the mixes in the world would exhibit the same quality of a cell phone’s speakerphone?
Sonic quality is also a powerful selling point. It was a major contributor to the rise of the CD and the fall of
compact cassettes. Less literate classical music listeners buy new recordings rather than the older,
monophonic, subordinate ones, no matter how acclaimed the performance on these early recordings is.
Many record companies issue digitally remastered versions of classic albums, which are alleged to sound
better than their older counterparts. The popular iPod owes much of its existence to the MP3 format – no
other lossy compression format managed to produce audio files as small, yet provide an acceptable sonic
quality.

The majority of people appreciate sonic quality more than they will ever care to imagine.

6 So it is the mixing engineers` responsibility to craft the sonic aspects of the final mix. Then, they also
control the quality of the individual instruments that constitute the mix. Let us consider for a moment the
differences between studio and live recordings: During a live concert, there is no second chance to rectify
problems such as bad performance or a buzz from a faulty DI box. Both the recording equipment and the
environment are inferior compared to the ones found in most studios – it would be unreasonable to place
Madonna in front of a U87 and a pop shield during a live gig. When a live recording is mixed on location,
there is also a smaller and cheaper arsenal of mixing equipment. All of these result in different instruments
suffering from masking, poor definition, slovenly dynamics, deficient frequency response, to name a mere
few of possible problems. Audio terms aside, these can translate into a barely audible bass guitar, honky lead
vocals that come and go, a kick that lacks power and cymbals that lack spark. The combination of all these
makes a live recording less appealing. A studio recording is not immune to these problems, but in most cases
it provides much better raw material to work with, and in turn better mixes. With all this in mind, the true
art of mixing is far reaching than just making things sound right …

7 Many people are familiar with Kurt Cobain, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic as the band members of
Nirvana, who back in 1991 changed the face of alternative rock with the release of Nevermind. The name
Butch Vig might ring a bell for some, but the general public knows nothing about Andy Wallace. Seldom a
front album- cover credits the producer, let alone the mixing engineer. Arguably, the production of Dr Dre
can be just as important as the artists he produces, and perhaps Nevermind would have never gained such
an enormous success had it not been Andy Wallace mixing it. Nevertheless, record labels see very little
marketing potential in production figures. The irony is that many times major record companies do write fat
checks to have a specific engineer mixing an album – a certificate to what every record company knows:

A mix can play a huge role in an album's success.

8 To understand why, one should listen to the four versions of Smells Like Teen Spirit. The link between the
sonic quality of a sound recording and its ability to excite us makes it fair to assume that the listed order
would also make the appealing listening order – having the rehearsal demo as the least appealing listening,
and the album version as the most appealing one. As per our recent discussion, it should be clear why most
people find both the rehearsal demo and the live recording less satisfactory listening when compared to the
studio versions. But comparing Vig’s and Wallace’s mixes gives us a great insight into what mixing is truly
about, and what a huge difference a mix can make.

9 Both Vig and Wallace used the same raw tracks; yet, their mixes are distinctively different. Vig’s mix suffers
from an unbalanced frequency spectrum that involves some masking and the absence of spark; a few mixing
elements, like the snare reverb, are highly discernible. Wallace’s mix is polished and balanced; it exhibits high
definition and perfect separation between instruments; the ambiance is present, but like many other mixing
elements it is fairly transparent. Perhaps the most important difference between the two mixes is that Vig’s
mix sounds more natural (more like a live performance), while Wallace’s mix sounds more artificial. It is not
equipment, time spent or magic tricks that made these two mixes so dissimilar – it is simply the different
sonic vision of Vig and Wallace. Wallace, in nearly an alchemist fashion, managed to paint every aspect of
this powerful song into an extremely appealing portrait of sounds. Like many other listeners, Gary Gersh –
Geffen Records, A&R – liked it better.

10 Straight after recording Nevermind, it was Vig that started mixing the album. Tight schedule and some
artistic disagreements he had with Cobain left everyone feeling (including Vig) that it would be wise to bring
fresh ears to mix the album. From the bottom of prospective engineers list, Cobain chose Wallace, much for
his Slayer mixing credits. Despite the fact that Nirvana approved the mixes, following Nevermind’s
extraordinary success, Cobain complained that the overall sound of Nevermind was too slick – perhaps
suggesting that Wallace’s mixes were too listener-friendly for his artistic, somewhat punk-driven, taste.
Artistic disagreements are something engineers come across often, especially if they ignore the musical
concept the artist wants to put forth. Yet some suggested that Cobain’s retroactive complaint was only a
mis-targeted reaction to the massive success and glittering fame the album brought. Not only that
Nevermind left its mark on music history, but it also left a mark on mixing history – its sonic legacy, a part of
what is regarded as the Wallace Sound, is still a subject to imitations today. Remarkably, there is nothing
timeworn about the mixes in Nevermind, they aged well despite enormous advances in mixing technology.

11 The example above teaches us how a good mix can sharpen the emotional message of a musical piece,
make it more appealing to the listener and result in more commercial success. The opposite is true all the
same – a bad mix can easily turn a great piece of music unattractive. This is not only relevant for commercial
releases. The price and quality of today’s DAW enable unsigned artists and home producers to craft at-home
mixes that do not fall short from commercial mixes. A&R departments are slowly getting used to very
respectable demo standards, and a big part of it has to do with the mix. Just like a studio owner might filter a
pile of 40 CVs based on their presentation, an A&R might dismiss a demo based on its poor mix.

12 Mixing engineers know what dramatic effect mixing can have on the final product. With the right amount
of effort, even the poorest recording can be made appealing. Yet, there are a few things we cannot do, for
example, correct a truly bad performance, compensate for very poor production or alter the original concept
the music entails. If the musical piece is not an appealing one, it will fail to impress the listener, no matter
how noteworthy the mix is.

A mix is as good as the song.

Refer to these questions:
1. Why do you think Music has such a profound impact on people?
2. What would be the Mixing Engineer´s main task and responsibility? 3-6
3. Refer to “It would make little sense to distort the drums of a love song”
4. What emotions are involved in a song like Smells like teen spirit?
5. Definition of MIX (your own words)
6. Why do you think Nirvana's Nevermind changed Music and Mixing history?
7. Explain your approach to music and mixing.