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This is a great, comprehensive article I found:
How do I mix so it sounds good? Practice is the short answer, but not one that'll help you I reckon. It's really been a combination of a few things for me:
1. Get decent studio monitors and learn how they sound. Take your favorite CDs and listen to them over and over again on the monitors. Pay attention to the low end especially, as I find it's the hardest part to get right. Many times it's too bassy or too light, getting a proper balance is not easy until you know how what you hear on the monitors will translate to other listening environments. For instance, I do 95% of my listening in the car going to and from work. So when I first started mixing, I would be running down to my car all the time to check my mixes, as that was my main listening environment. It wasn't uncommon for me to burn 10-15 CDR while perfecting a mix. Luckily for my wallet (CDR's get expensive at that rate), I've learned through that practice what the differences are between my studio monitors and my car speakers, so I can compensate appropriately without having to burn tons of CD! R'! s. BTW, the monitors I use (Alesis M1 Actives, MKII's) are now selling for $399, I can't recommen
d them enough, especially at that price. If you can spend more, look into Mackie HR824's, as those would be my ultimate choice if money wasn't an object (well, maybe some Quested's  ).
2. More is not better! Any time you think that you need more EQ, more efx, more volume, take a pause and reconsider. It's easy to over do something and really kill your sound without realizing it. Many times you want to add so much effect that it becomes too obvious. Same with EQ, instead of boosting the frequencies you want to emphasize, try cutting the frequencies you don't.
3. If it's not bass drums or basslines, kill the low end! Got guitar, synth, pianos or strings in your arrangement? Cut the low end, as many times samples of these instruments (or the real thing) contain a lot of low frequency content that isn't important to the sound of those instruments in the mix. Keeping the low end in can add clutter, not to mention it all adds up and you lose headroom too. Of course this isn't always true, you just learn when to do it and when not to through practice.
4. Tracking right lets you mix right. If you're recording a new song, right from the get go there are things you need to be doing to make your life easier later:
- Always record your signals as hot as possible, just shy of clipping. This helps to lower the noise floor and brings the actual signal into the upper end of your bit depth, where the detail is recorded more accurately. This includes bouncing audio files too on the computer, always maximize (not normalize) your levels before you bounce!
- Use the highest bit depth you can comfortably on your PC/Mac. I swear by 24bit, it's made worlds of difference to the clarity of my mixes. But, that's not to say you can't get good results with 16bit, so don't worry if your PC is struggling with higher bit depths. The downside of using a high bit depth, is that you must use GOOD dithering and noiseshaping. I use the Apogee's UV22 plug in, it's awesome.
5. Give each track in the song it's own place in the frequency spectrum and sound field. By using EQ and panning to isolate your tracks, you give them all more room to breath, and they don't conflict with each other. Panning properly helps to open up the stereo imaging, and keeps everything from sounding like it's in mono. BTW, I never mix with mono in mind anymore, even though many people say you should check that. It's the 21st century, if people don't have a stereo set up by now, too bad! The flipside, is that you still don't want bass sounds panned wildly to any side of the field, especially if you're mixing with vinyl in mind as this will cause the needle to jump out of the groove on the record.
6. Don't ever say to yourself, "I'm not happy with this, but I can fix it in the mix". Crap in = crap out. The final mix should be about applying subtle effects, gentle EQing, and panning appropriately. You shouldn't be doctoring your tracks at this point, stuff that isn't right should be fixed back in the tracking phase.
7. Read and learn, then read some more. Everything I've learned about mixing has come from two places, online articles, and interviews with mixers I respect. By far the best place to go, is (surprise, surprise) Mix online. (http://www.industryclick.com/magazi...d=141&SiteID=15). There you can find all sorts of interviews and tips. Don't be put off if you read articles where they talk about gear you don't have and could never dream of affording. You don't need a rack of Pultec's, Distressors, or 1176's to get a good mix. The general principles are what you should focus on, not the specifics.
8. Listen carefully to CDs that are mixed by people who are well respected in this aspect of the industry. MY favorite mixer is Bob Clearmountain, and his work on Dada's "Puzzle" still leaves me floored. Every instrument is warm and punchy, and the whole thing speaks of quality mixing and clarity (damn good CD too). Chris Lord Algae is another mixer I respect....
9. Never mix or master right after finishing the writing phase. Give your ears a break, and give yourself some time to gain your objectivity back. Mixing right after writing tends to make people emphasize parts that may not nead it.
10. Mastering. This is the last step, and like everything else in the process, don't wait til this stage to "fix things". Mastering should ideally only be some subtle use of compression and EQ to finalize your tune. I completely disagree with magazines like Computer Music and Remix when it comes to their mastering tips, as by and large they make it sound like you have to squash the shit out of your track with compression to make it sound good. Anyway, here's some quick rEalm mastering tips:
-Export your final mix as 24 bits, dither down to 16 bits and add noiseshaping as a VERY LAST STEP. Never dither more than once, the Waves Mastering plug ins being the exception (if you don't know what I'm talking about with the new Waves stuff, don't worry about it).
- Use a good spectrum analyzer to see what your song is doing sonically. If you see lots of low end hitting the meters but you can hear it, chances are you've got subsonics eating into your head room. I use a good EQ to kill just about everything below 20Hz, and roll it off less and less up til about 50Hz. Typically I use Steinberg's Freefilter, although lately I've been using the Waves Linear Mastering Eq (the LinLowBand is perfect) for this, it's way more transparent. Of course, balance this out with how it actually SOUNDS. No use doing this step if you don't need to.
- Sometimes you can pump up parts of your mix slightly with a multi-band compressor. This is best used when you need to tighten up just the low end for instance, and want to leave the rest of the track unaffected.
- Next up is the one part I hate to recommend, but it's necessary. Limiting. Everyone knows that you can use a Waves L1, L2 or Loudness Maximizer (or T-Racks) to beef up a track, but it's also one of the most over-abused plug ins out today IMO. Used subtly, it can really make you hard work shine, while still keeping the dynamic range at sensible (ie musical) level. In the wrong hands it's nothing more than square wave generator Seriously though, you should be using this to limit no more than a few dB's, any more than that and you've got issues that should be fixed in your mixing phase I wager. If you use these tools, just remember not to take part in the "louder is better" mentality. And keep in mind that all radios, CD players, and DJ mixers have volume or gain controls, so there's no need to make your tune hot as hell and squashed to death just for the sake of volume. Otherwise ! al! l that hard work you spent getting a nice open mix will be ruined quicker than you can click on Render.
- As you master, listen to a CD of the same genre as your tune that you really to make sure your EQing correctly, and that they sound similiar
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