Don't get fooled again - Possibly the most important thing you need to know about mixing

Mark explains the three elements necessary for hearing your mixes as they really sound.
Mark Wingfield is a critically-acclaimed jazz mixing and mastering engineer. He has mixed or mastered three Downbeat Magazine Masterpiece Albums of the Year, two JazzWise Best Releases of the Year and three All About Jazz Best Albums of the Year. Jazz albums he has mixed or mastered have received more than 300 rave reviews worldwide. Mark mixes and masters at his UK based Heron Island Studio.
If you enjoy these videos or find them useful By Me a Coffee it will help me to keep creating these videos. Thanks!
www.buymeacoffee.com/HeronIsland
If you are interested in working with Mark on your next album you can contact him here:
heronislandstudio.co.uk

[@jakobole]

Plugins that say they are game-changers, when in reality they are merely gain-changers....

[@xenstein4298]

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@floatleafmusic]

It took me years of painful trial and error to learn things that you've summed in 30 minutes so perfectly! great video

[@christiandavidjr4241]

Years... Decades...

[@TheHouseofKushTV]

Agreed, although I'm possibly the odd-man-out in that my primary monitoring level is "very, very quiet." Like ~50dB, quiet enough that if someone talks in a normal speaking voice, you can't follow the music. I jump to 80dB fairly often, but only for a few minutes, generally just to see how things are hitting my body, or to help dial in things like sharpness vs. softness. But man, I LOVE dialing compression, distortions etc. at whisper volumes. You need a really, really tight room to hear transients and 50Hz at 50dB, but it's just so easy to hear what's actually cutting thru and what's playing background when the whole mix is barely reaching to begin with 🙂

[@sylvaind9086]

"Level matching" has been recommended since several decades. And no one argues the fact that it should be part of the workflow. But as you mention, it's been mostly ignored or underestimated. Even by seasoned mixers. I am also guilty of neglecting this element. Thanks for emphasizing once again its capital importance!

[@sylvaind9086]

Excellent analysis of audio perception challenges and how to mitigate them.

[@midikuper3557]

Outstandingly good advice. The difference in Mark's recommendations is that it is applicable to mixing material that has a very wide dynamic range. Even for those that are aware of these points, it is easy to level-set consistently when mixing rock with lots of distortion on the guitars, bass, even drums, and everything is just loud, but not at all easy when mixing a jazz group, classical music or other experimental music/alternative music. Thank you! Please give us more on how you mix difficult jazz sessions.

[@alexanderhobson5585]

Again incredibly useful information here. Game changing. Thanks so much.

[@akumusik3582]

Gratitude & Appreciation 💯

[@GingerDrums]

This is essential, fundamental and true advice that will save hundreds of hours and accelerate the learning curve exponentially. The real opportunity cost of falling for loudness over quality is the hours wasted rather than learning to actually balance music.

[@simondanielssonmusic]

Absolutely awesome video!

[@Brutuscomedy]

#2 is particularly important and something I ought to address. Thank you for your insights!

[@drfirenugz2641]

This was awesome, good work

[@conrow1157]

Superb! Thank you sir!

[@singularity7400]

You sir are correct an all counts.

[@pedroahets]

Sooo helpful! Thanks a lot!

[@mir9168]

Absolute gold mine of a video, i am one year into music production and didn't know any of this. I am so happy to have learnt this now rather than later.

[@drindy5166]

Definitely valuable information and discussion. Also something to go over down the road and revisit as a reminder when utilizing any kind of mixing skills.

[@fivebyfivesound]

Likewise, Mir. Once I learned the importance of 1) maintaining gain structure along a channel’s signal chain and across a mix and 2) maintaining a consistent monitoring level, these practices*greatly* improved my mixes. All the best to you in your journey.

[@drindy5166]

@@fivebyfivesound 💯% 👊🧡👍

[@keimaari]

This was great, thanks so much for the gems

[@AturaxAudio]

Great advice, so so important.

[@chillwalker]

Thanks for all the reminders!!

[@michaelscottpettis]

Fantastic video, thank you!

[@ostrol1590]

Missed your educational content! Great stuff

[@hodshonf]

excellent breakdown and presentation

[@joshd265]

So much gold in this 🔥

[@zdogg8]

Wow, best mixing advice EVER, so much here that's pure gold..Thank you Mark.

[@arthurph9744]

This channel will grow so much!! Amazing video. You are great at teaching!

[@JamesHarcourt]

Gold. Thank you!

[@photicsonar]

Wow! You made my day! What a fantastic explanation and advices❤

[@MrSymontech]

Very important topic, thank you for this video!

[@maxdishaw]

DROPPING GEMS! Thank you

[@GingerDrums]

Tools from Tokyo Dawn Labs are free and employ LUFS based level matching as standard. Highly reccomend integrating such tools into mixing workflows

[@taylorstudios135]

Awesome advice.. Love this

[@robertm708]

An excellent video. Thank you for taking the time to explain everything from an experienced point of view.

[@makemusictoday3130]

Thank you so much Sir!

[@ansmfella]

Inestimably valuable advise! That you so much for your time and sharing this wisdom accumulated through your great work. Saving us a great amount of time in trial and error

[@EdwinDekker71]

Great video, thanks

[@Aleksandr_Igorevich]

Very serious topic right here. Thank you, sir.

[@gilgillis]

Great video~ Thanks!

[@LexXxusTVLive]

This video made me re-think my approach to what I was doing wrong in my mixes. I could tell this was happening but did not know it was this. Now I know, I know how to correct the misalignments in my mix. This applies to level, saturation, and all mark advises here. This Is Golden Advice!!

[@freeyourmind790]

Your definitely spot on about your brain turning certain EQs down. I have noticed this but I didn't realise what it really was until watching this.

[@davidcamarda8301]

Huge. I kind of knew all of this, but it is valuable to hear it all spoken as a single subject. I can't tell what Ive done without level matching.

[@luluschnabel9243]

Thank you Mark this soooo helpful! Thanks a lot!

[@RenanBEreanSound]

Thank you so much. This video is pure gold, your tip number 3 is a life changer.

[@jacquelamontharenberg]

Excellent advice. I am going to listen to this several more times to burn it in my brain. Thank you. Great video.

[@DrMarlowski]

Wow, what a fantastic video

[@darrynsantanamusic]

Thanks for the info, very useful. :)

[@MonkeyBars1]

Great information, very underdiscussed basic principles. thanks so much

[@adamkiefel79]

Excellent advice 😊

[@steveluk473]

Extremely wise words …. Wish we all had the ears and means to be able to judge all this on a day to day basis

[@elpmettsol]

Very good info! I liked, and subscribed!😊

[@abash4683]

wow what a gem from all the engineers who didn't have mentors to teach them this. thank you

[@yiannismanopoulos]

I love this video! Intelligent and usuful advices for things all of us can daily get wrong !

[@vinayakaiyer4408]

Very Valuable Advice👏

[@michailluuko3909]

Thank you for the useful advices. The implication of the new knowledge is that a mixer engineer should work as fast as possible before getting tired with his/her auditory system.)

[@heronislandstudio8054]

Or just take breaks.

[@DUSKOsound]

Nice sound logo! 🔥

[@fortissimoX]

Thank you!

[@CaptainProton1]

Thank you so much for this, I think this is a huge part of any mistake I am making.

[@slackdog71]

Very well done. I have heard all of this advice many times from many people over the years. What they usually fail to do is explain "why" you should follow these principles. I know that for myself (and perhaps for Mark) there was a lot of trial and error, and many mistakes made along the way. So thank you for explaining in such a clear and concise way.

[@MusiclyricsByECDaleyC]

Really great advice, very clear and so very important! also love your delivery on this topic. It's so easy to end up chasing your mix endlessly, with days crap as the result....

[@heronislandstudio8054]

Cheers!

[@psybursonic]

Great video ❤

[@brentbrownmusic]

Awesome video! Thanks Mark. Just ordered a sound meter as I’ll be recording a new album this winter. Sooo many future frustrating days will be avoided.

[@oliverpinelli3334]

Thank you very much.

[@the_other_dude]

Thank you algorithm gods. Great stumbling on this! *ez subscribed*

[@obecojb]

Thank you so much! I learned to stop mixing after 2 hours and take a 30 minutes break. You are so right!

[@mikaleppaaho]

Thank you for your valuable information! In youtube there's lots of a material about quick and "cheap" tricks and tips and also overwhelmingly detailed stuff for the beginner as myself. Not many are reminding to get your fundamentals and workflow right at first. Nice to see though that I have somewhat intuitively gone to the right direction but this explained a lot of things I kinda had been starting to notice. The way I'm trying to stay on the map while mixing is I've measured the "standard" mixing volume by listening at the same pleasant and probably quite average volume some stuff that I like and consider nicely mixed and mastered (and that also have lots of details and is somewhat in the same field with the stuff I create). Time to time I check my creations with different type of devices and volumes. I've put other people listen to my work in progress to get at least some feedback even though not that professional. I also like to working on couple of songs and changing from time to time to another. That is also because of it works better for my creativity and maybe helps not to overcomplicate things and also not to get bored. Still have noticed a day after some too long session that I've done stupid stuff and wasted a lot of time for less quality. Btw, lots of people also say to just trust your ears but actually you can't really trust too much :D Well, more of a musical and artistic aspects that's maybe more true.

[@__prtcl]

Great advice on level matching plugins. I noticed that Pro C2 does this, so I made my own default preset that turns off autogain and starts at a more neutral setting of just compressing a couple DB. Changed my life

[@drindy5166]

How many times I have noticed the db trick a lot of plug ins use. Always questioned it myself and now I am glad someone else recognizes this practice. I generally stay away from plug ins short of a few dedicated to sidechaining and dealing with kickdrums and low end signals such as bass. Great video brother! 👊🧡👍

[@petecoyne]

Many thanks for this - really well explained process for getting consistent levels and a workflow through mixing and mastering. A tiny increase in volume level from plugins - some as you say at zero settings - can really fool your ears as to 'improvement' in sound!

[@toffchunks]

Really interesting & heplfull thks

[@nigeltdavies]

Excellent and thought-provoking! I have subscribed.

[@jaklair]

[@thelifeofalii333]

Wow this is going to change my life, I have literally probably re mixed thousands of ideas not knowing this. Thank you

[@fatalitydnb]

Great video. I have gradually learnt most of these points through time. Very well explained sir 🎯👍🏼 Although I generally don’t put any limiter on my stereo channel / 2 bus (mixing), at any stage. That is a whole next conversation… ‘gain staging’ and ‘headroom’ etc 😃👍🏼

[@cottoo1]

good video, thanks

[@steppabanton9753]

I don't know how I got here but you got yourself a new subscriber

[@catalystdrums123]

I love this because I've never heard anyone talk about this before in this way

[@GaunCochran]

Really good video! Tdr slickeq M is something that’s useful for fixing mixes after working at too loud or quiet. It has an EL curve EQ that can be useful on the master bus to nudge something back in the right direction

[@m.i.stapes]

cheers to a future where all plugins have autogain level matching!

[@4brvhvm]

Very valuable information and advice. Hit the sub, bell and like button within seconds. We appreciate you Mark! Keep dropping them gems 💎

[@nebstaism]

This is very good .... he’s right.... my master is always hitting at minus 6db ... and always mix not too loud and always try to mix at the same volume most of the time.... the sooner I started doing all this.... my mixes improved a lot

[@y-man8925]

Great advice ! All of them make a lot of sense and thanks for doing it in a very understandable way … 👍 !

[@BOODA575]

This is the best advice on youtube about mixing “ getting used to the one level workflow really allowed me to hear what plugins do and how to hit the sweetspot alot better

[@adelekeadeleke9284]

THIS IS NICE ADVICE

[@davidasher22]

This s a very informative video. It’s definitely information I know and techniques I practice but it’s dead on accurate! I even had a hunch what number 3 was before we got there. Lol but that’s the great part! It’s obviously coming from genuine experience from a person who knows what they are talking about. Plus it reminded me of some bad practices I’ve gotten lazy with. Like the level matching. I used to do it more but lately kinda not so much. I do feel like I can hear those minute volume Changes and can differentiate from actual saturation. But it’s probably also hindering my work at times. So. That’s a good reminder to stay on track. I also thought you were gonna mention possibly using reference material when you got into the brain EQ thing only number 3. Sometimes recalibrating with a song you know and love will keep you on track with tonal balance. But there is that point when there’s no helping the ear fatigue and you start to feel like you going on n a circle. That’s my que to shut it down! Looking forward to more video like this! Thanks!

[@bengineer_the]

Thank you. :)

[@artg7909]

Best advise.

[@TracyZellars]

I’m brand new to the world of music making, and by listening to you and reading through the comments, I’m glad I’ve stumbled upon your videos sir!!!🤔👌🏾✅

[@chillwalker]

5:31: The origin of The good old suggestion Trick. When I work with clients from advertising, I use it almost every session. My Version is (its always about "more bass") to not only grab a dead grab a knob, but slowly drawing clockwise, looking the Client deep in the eyes till he says "Excellent". Funny thing: Its always the same point when its "Excellent")

[@punchilux5783]

Being a little facetious of course-- great video! Def gonna pay attention to my maximum mixing level because I am for sure guilty of mixing with the volume up high. My rule of thumb is if it sounds good at a reasonable level, it will sound good at a loud level.

[@user-cd8ze7eo6e]

perfect.

[@eddieleonard6925]

Great discussion. I truly appreciate your thoughts on saturation and how many plug-ins claim to better a signal simply by running through it. I've often wondered whether or not this was 100% true. Saturation has become a bit of a buzz word in our world, and can be misused, as you stated. Everyone wants a "warm" and "punchy" mix, no matter the genre, but few have the vocabulary to explain exactly what this means. My world changed when I switched from saturation plug-ins to using Rupert Neve Designs 542 tape emulators. They do exactly what you describe, subtly bring everything to life, without raising volume. I've also had nice results with very small touches of plug-ins like Radiator and Decapitator. Softtube has also some great saturation plug-ins that work well in very light moves. Love the video. Thanks for sharing. Cheers,

[@oinkooink]

The new buzz word is "spectral"

[@mm100latests5]

solid advice! I would add that when you are calibrating DAW to SPL int he room, also consider RMS in the the DAW along with peak as you mentioned.

[@heronislandstudio8054]

Yes great advice, thanks.

[@quipsta]

Greetings from York Mark !

[@heronislandstudio8054]

Hey, is that Ben?

[@thefoxfamily341]

The first Minutes trigger me very well..u are a good teacher..and u help me little bit better to understand loudness better..thanks and big Respekt..best wishes from Vienna ✌️ 🇦🇹

[@Bittamin]

The only plug-ins I have are stock through logic, but I noticed a lot of the stock plugins also have auto gain on a lot of them, thankfully for things like the compressor you can turn it off and then opt into makeup gain after setting ratio/threshold/ect

[@Nullllus]

17:00 you can set a recall level in RME software and have your reference level at the touch of a button.

[@thefeelcompany]

Subbed!

[@CharlesK441]

This is so useful. Thank you KZbin for the suggestion! Just last night I noticed a plugin at it'd default state was adding additional make up gain and I felt it sounded better. When I made the adjustment I couldn't tell the difference with it on or off. Also I did a backing track for a vocalist who wanted to take it to a studio to put her vocals on. I sat with the engineer while she was in the booth. Once she was done and came out to us, the engineer switched from the monitoring speakers, which sounded amazing, to the larger speakers with separate subwoofers. Yes it sounded impressive but I thought that just what he was trying to do. And yes she was very impressed. "Naughty"

[@2ndMOUSEofficial]

Great advice Mark. Point 3 was a biggie for me. I remember being so in the zone about what I was doing that i'd regularly do all-nighters and worked on things for 12 hours straight. When I listened back the next day, it was like listening to somebody elses track, because the brain had EQ'd it and I'd become acclimatized to the resonaces. Even now I still sometimes have to just reset all the faders to zero again and introduce them one at a time until I achieve something more balanced.

[@jasabasenara8124]

I know that feeling. Time goes so quick. That's the problem. 12 hours doesn't feel like 12 hours. 👍

[@ReelX1]

I like the earfocussed aproach of things here, still the most overseen by mixers all over the world ,thanks for the reminder (ps: still no consensus that everyone can hear a 1dB difference but that will be around the hearable level )

[@twocanmusic4159]

Hey! Really great video, if you could dedicate a video about how to setup your projects to have a safe level of volume to produce longterm that would be great! Definately something that is overlooked!

[@miquelmarti6537]

Calibrate your refference point (0dB rms) to 80dB with the help of a pressure meter. Then try to mix not into the red. Search for K-system

[@3DManShadowland]

I don't use sound level meters to measure what my speakers are putting out. I simply set a level which I will work at that is comfortable to my ears and keep it there as the system volume, then I measure the audio using an analyzer and set the sound to whatever volume I am wanting going for such as -14 LUFS, all the way to -9 LUFS and a maximum pea value of -.6 to -1 for head room. Of course genre have a lot to do with what level you want to be at, or what they insist on. But, I want to put it at a competitive level. Which any more is actually fairly loud. Also always aware at transferring from formats of audio because often more than not the peak level will change.