I do a bit a both, curious to know what others do tho.

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Juan Paulino - Quantum Break (Original Mix) [Progressive Breaks]

I prefer to mix while I go. I find that having a substandard mix while I'm writing something can be a bit distracting and I struggle to envision the final track.

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imo for dance music you have to mix as you go

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i used to mix as i went along but find it easy to mix when the track is done.

Why commit and print to wav if you don't have to?

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Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear

A bit of both for me as well, but it depends on the song, how much of it is ITB vs OTB, etc. If I'm using my outboard synths, bass, guitar, and vocals a lot, then I tend to do all my tracking/comping, etc. first, make any final changes to the arrangement/structure, then mix down at the end.

quote:

Originally posted by evo8 imo for dance music you have to mix as you go

Yeah, I definitely tend to mix as I go with dance music. Mixing, arrangement, and sound design are pretty much intertwined in EDM, so it's hard not to mix as you go.

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quote:

Originally posted by evo8 imo for dance music you have to mix as you go

Agreed.

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If I'm using any hardware or mics the I treat is as a proper studio session and do it all in stages. Track, engineer, edit/arrange, mix.

If it's ITB, I tend to mix as I go and if it's something I really want to spend the time on, I'll print the rough mix, save it as a copy of the project, then zero out all automation, all the faders, all the pans/sends etc, and do a new mixdown.

The only thing I have to be careful about doing this is to be really strict about getting it to the final rough mix before treating it as a separate mixdown session, otherwise it devolves in to a backwards way of composing and I start messing with the arrangement and sounds etc.

In some ways, I try to treat it like someone gave me their project to just mix (where you're not allowed to do any editing or arranging etc).

The issue that got me started thinking about all this was a few songs ago. A friend of mine who produces came in and did a rough mix on a track of mine that had great potential on the arrangement side but was horrid on the production side. Mind you, I am just getting to a point where I am starting to understand the production side (which to me,now..seems almost 95% of the workload in electronic music producing)
After he realized how terrible the mix sounded he went in and did a rough -06db mix. I watched and observed everything he did but after a certain point, it just went over my head.
After he was finished, to me...it sounded like crap. Everything that he did was completely different to how I wanted patterns to sit in the mix. I never let him touch my settings again..lol
However, enlightenment. What I realized 4 songs later when I was "attempting" to mix as I go for the first time is that he didn't do anything wrong at all. It was when I began making small adjustments to each track by using comp*Eq*limit*etc. that it completely dawned on me. I then realized that HE didnt know how I wanted things to sit, it was up to ME to arrange as I see fit and because I had not been using any of the above fx, it was impossible for me to understand..or hear for that matter.
Needless to say, I also found ozone....and omg! FTW!
Now...I do not think I will ever be able to mix electronic music at the end of a arrangement again. Nor do I think I'd even want to...ouch, way to tough for my skill level.

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Phil

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I do both.

One issue is that I'm realising more and more that mixing ITB as you go tends to promote the idea that more is better.

Rather than carefully choosing sounds based on intuition and experience, you just keep piling stuff on simply because you can.

One day soon I plan to make an entire track from start to finish, limiting myself to 24 channels (including FX) using hardware only. Sadly, it'll still need to be mixed in teh boxez.

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Do any of you think that artists who have developed a consistent sound (I'm thinking here of artists such as PVD or Sean Tyas) undergo a full "mixdown" process for each song? The vast majority of the mix will already be mixed before they start a song - they're going to have a number of mix templates they've developed, which already has their kick in place, their basses in place, their drum sounds, their pads, their leads. These elements are already mixed to sound fantastic.

Then they run their latest composition through the template, and work out what they're going to change - they'll probably try a few different lead sounds, probably some different pads, and then fit just the changed elements into the mix.

Just listen to a PVD album, or the albums of a number of artists. A lot of artists don't change their main kick and bass sound over the course of an album. Some artists do, and that's fine too - every artist makes their own choice.

For myself, I've spent a heap of time developing a large number of templates, covering a wide range of trance styles. When I create a new song or remix, the first thing I do is work out which direction I want to take the song, then I run the composition through the template I've chosen as a starting point, and take it from there.

When it's time to get a song done, I want to know that I can work quickly, that I can get a quality track done in a short amount of time. I don't want to be worrying that my bass is clashing with my kick or whatever other mix concerns may arise.

My recommendation is, spend a good 6 months, 12 months getting some mix templates set up. I do this every now and then, last time I set up 60 separate mixes. You'll be amazed at the perspective you'll have of your mixes when you're working on 60 at once. If a mix isn't working, scrap it. Much easier to scrap a whole mix in this situation than when you're trying to get a song done.

In the end I had 12 very decent mix templates out of the original 60, which I can use for future songs.

I completely separate all my processes. Composition is completely detached from sound design, is completely detached from mixing is completely detached from working out a given song's overall structure.

Apologies for any spelling mistakes, I'm typing this on my phone and it seems to be playing up big time.