Fix Your Quiet Mixes

[@ringforthrev]

What drives me even more crazy is listening to old mixes that are louder, but I don't remember what I did different to get there...I just know it wasn't this technique. Thanks Joe!

[@beachforestmountain4269]

There's another really important element to this... If, for example, you find that it's the snare which is responsible for the high peaks in the mix, which is stopping it from being turned up, what you can do is put a SATURATOR on the snare track. It will add more harmonic content to the snare track which will make it sound louder. This means you can actually turn the snare down, which means the snare will no longer peak as high, so that means you can turn the whole mix up. The SATURATOR is more useful for short sounds (like drums), but it can be used on longer sounds (vocals, instruments, etc) as long as it's not pushed too far. The SATURATOR is often used in conjunction with a limiter - that way you can get an even louder mix than what you can get by just using a limiter by itself. You guys should try it out for yourselves - put the SATURATOR on a snare track, turn up the gain on the SATURATOR and you'll see that you can turn the snare track volume down, which gives you a tighter/louder mix without having to squash/compress it too much with a limiter - even more so if you add a limiter on the snare track after the SATURATOR. You'll see that the overall mix has more headroom, which means it can be turned up louder.

[@beachforestmountain4269]

Exactly. It's the unsung hero of loudness and harmonic-rich audio. You're right - most home studio guys don't get to hear how important saturation is. Some EQs, compressors etc have saturation built-in. For example: -The "Waves SSL G channel" channel strip. -The "Kramer PIE" compressor. -The "Waves API 2500" compressor. -The "Waves CLA-76" compressor. -The "Waves MetaFilter" filter. -The "Waves H-EQ" equalizer.

[@beachforestmountain4269]

@Qincent Rusca No worries man.

[@Intergalacticjack]

helpful stuff. Thanks!

[@christianstainazfischer]

Holy shit.... fuck I love KZbin comments

[@hydro5378]

ok that’s mad useful. much obliged

[@slim1275]

So often, these channels talk about not being able to compete with the "professional" mixes; but what they fail to tell us is how to over come it. You have done a fine job of explaining the role of the limiter, and how not to abuse it. I know there is more to "mastering" than just limiting, but limiting certainly takes a mix from sounding amateur to being in the same ballpark as the pros. Thanks so much for helping those of us trying to learn this art in our homes, often times without clients.

[@darrenhirst9900]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/apemdK2XjN56rLM

[@prodchubs]

I’ll forever reference this video to anyone who has this problem. Watched plenty of videos on this today and this one made it make the most sense to me. Appreciate the sauce!

[@zachalderson5608]

this has to be the most useful video I have ever watched on this. I've been struggling with the volume issue for probably 4 years. I dont know why but the way you explained it made perfect sense. thank you very much my guy.

[@ThomasMurray7]

I've been making music with the same daw for like 15 years now and this is still a big problem for me. Hearing about it from someone I trust has given me a little more confidence. Thanks, Joe

[@evanwilliams8908]

Really useful tip. Can't wait to try it on my pathetically quiet mixes.

[@sorrychangedmyusername3594]

With my 4 Levelers at 12 db, donna why it's quiet. I used earbuds.

[@knutagon]

Holy jesus. I have Fabfilter Pro L, and I thought that since I had -3 dB headroom, I could only add +3 dB in the Limiter to hit 0 dB 😳😳😳 Seeing you push your limiter to +12 dB makes so much more sense. I have struggled with quiet mixes for 10 years. I produced 6000 songs, but never released any, since my mixes never got loud 🤯🤯🤯 Joe Gilder, you're a game changer! I subscribed, and will binge the rest of your videos!

[@gabehinman6917]

You are amazing and this video is insanely appreciated. I wish every beginner could see this like myself 💙 thank you for this video three years later

[@Alex_Florin_Prod]

Man...this was my problem for the last couple days...and this video is a life saver! Thank you so much Joe!

[@raymondshue8045]

This reason is why when I’m listening to Spotify or KZbin I generally keep the volume knob on my interface at roughly the same spot 24/7 so when I mix songs I know I’m getting close when it’s within the same loudness

[@VivianDohlen]

So helpful, I just got started with production and am about to finish my first song and the volume problem was driving me crazy!

[@matshbocks]

All I can say is thank you thank you thank you thank you so much! I don't know how long I've been dealing with this, but I never had the idea that it was a problem. I'll make good use of this now! Thank you!!!!!

[@ArtificialJetleg]

OMG, this is the best video for the same problem!! And I spent a few years in searching and found yours until now…I don’t know why youtube kept giving me crappy results! Love your explanation. To the point and easy to understand! But how to avoid having such low mixes in the first place, that you don’t have to depend highly on the limiter?

[@grovestreetbarz9938]

You’re a Godsend thank you sir

[@devingademan]

A great question asked by George Glass! A great video by Joe! Love the community helping each other out! Greetings from the Netherlands!

[@ALKrecords]

This is the video I’ve been needing to find

[@scottslater7704]

Love the way you explain stuff. I've been recording and mixing my own songs for 25yrs and still learning. Definitely getting some good tips from your channel...Thanks Joe!

[@CraveDiamonds]

wow ive been trying to figure this our for months thank you so much! Update : litterally crying because of how much time ive wasted trying to figure this out on my own. i dont know what i would have done without you man

[@ChuckSeayII]

Great video! Just wish I would have found it long ago! Thanks

[@fegenakki]

thank you so much for this video

[@GuitarLone]

Gotten my answer , yay! Thanks Joe!!

[@yomoney2871]

Finally the right answer, Thank you💪

[@jessejafrnd]

This video helped loads. I had fun listening to my halfway done instrumental song loudly in the car today.

[@CLaw-tb5gg]

Another big problem is too much bass. It took me a while to figure out that if, for instance, you feed a limiter too much bass it'll be completely smashing the audio yet still be pretty quiet, and it's because any audio gear/plugins/etc. sees bass as being really, really loud. You can make your mixes a lot louder by just turning the bass down, which will make your limiter "see" it as quieter, allowing you to turn the limiter up without losing dynamic range. I know, it's not fun turning down the bass, but it's kind of necessary.

[@raymondlooi]

Joe = Patience 😄👏 Everyone of us having the same doubt at the beginning point! When we started (learning stage) to mix something, certainly we were just speed up the process with no patience and can't wait to check out or enjoy the final result as what we heard from John Mayer's CD (Joe's favourite example 😂). We couldn't get things right in Mastering stage if the Mix is awful (without well balance in all instruments' tracks, volume and frequencies, good control of compression etc). Joe has pointed out, although Limiter plays its role to bring up more volume, but it still might distorted if over do! Or, we'll loose a lot of dynamic from that mix / song. Limiter, it's just a simple plug-in for over all volume at the very last step before export/bounce the track to fit the reference we used. In fact, skill & knowledge & experience to using plug-ins like EQ, Mid-Side, Multiband Compressor etc for the balance of the whole song, that's even important than limiter! 💪

[@briankingart]

Very, very, very, very, very helpful Joe. Thx!

[@HomeStudioCorner]

I’m glad!

[@gkswift1999]

Joe- you're AWESOME. Everything you review and everything you teach everyone, are incredibly important aspects and you're very easy to listen to when we get frustrated. One note- its silly, but even Audacity now has a (brand hosted) Mastering Limiter that does an awful lot of different versions, including soft clipping, soft limiting, etc- and its pretty damned incredible. I've taken a few mixes and bumped them to 2 track and run them thru the Audacity Limiter, and was blown away. It seriously rivals my Izotope setup.

[@johbowfor]

Thank you!

[@StratsRUs]

Such a great video.

[@justinwaynesmith3477]

Justin Wayne Smith here, just want to say great job

[@shrekmate4383]

This not onky fixed my problem but gave me a sick idea for a sound for a dnb track

[@Ammarfyo]

omgg this is what I've been looking for ,thank you so muchh u helped me and ur explanation is on point

[@SaulDeAnda]

Great explanation! One thing that I'm wondering about this though - Since you use it at the end of the chain after each mix just to raise the volume a bit, what should you do when you have the very final mix done and you're ready to master? Do you export a version without the limiter so that you limit properly when mastering, or do you leave it and just limit still quieter than a mastered file each time you export a mix?

[@williampalenikjr8433]

Yep that is what a limiter is for to limit the peaks without going overboard and distortion and clipping.

[@bartr2888]

Thanks for the great explanation! I wonder if you use a limiter only on the master track? Sometimes I use it on a vocal track if there is a lot of volume difference between several bits. Somehow I feel like that's a 'dirty solution' to my problem..

[@dallincory7287]

Is it common to use sufficient amounts of compression and then to raise the entire mix with the limiter? Im new to this and trying to figure it out, so this has been very helpful. Thank you!

[@TheKaOwe]

Do you have a video going thru how to do mastering?

[@myronsamuels8798]

Hello Joe not sure if you check comments from videos posted years ago. but this is fantastic in multiple ways. for one i had send out a copy of a song me and some bandmates wrote to listen to but like others it was very quiet. i didn't notice it until I had done a mixdown and listened to it on Spotify, which is a whole other thing because Spotify is significantly more quiet than say apple music. anyways that aside I'm going to try out the limiter on it to see how it works out on my song. on another note i also play live music at a church and my IEM's meter is usually in the red likely due to the drums being too loud but I cant actually hear the kick or snare without getting distorted. so my levels usually are clipping even though i may only hear it on the drum channels and not the overall mix. well anyways it has a limiter function on the mixer and i'm going to try it out. everything from front of house sounds fine and even though i don't normally run the set through the house none of its levels are close to clipping so i couldn't figure out why the IEM mix was clipping so much. this is the first set I've ever mic'd so it could be wrong although it sounds pretty good listening back to the recording through the house so i think its more of something to do with the sound going to the personal mixers. hopefully the limiter will work like it did in this video.

[@VocalEdgeTV]

Your voice is incredible

[@AudioReplica2023]

I heard that a trick to get it loud but no squashed is that after you set your mixes compressor set limiter (-1 db ceiling )after the compressor and drive the compressor output into the limiter instead of using the threshold fader on the limiter itself. Of course this will only work if you take care of all the crazy peaks from drums, acoustic gtrs..and all that before the final "pre mastering stage" .

[@beachforestmountain4269]

The 'secret' trick the top mixing/mastering engineers use is SATURATION (using a SATURATOR). I just made a comment about it on this page if you're interesting in reading more.

[@AudioReplica2023]

@ryanshreevedrums Im not saying use the compressor to do the limiter's job. The compressor will do its job as usual but its output(not make up) will be pushed against the already set threshold of the limiter. Bobby Owsinski could explain this technique in detail and why its better than just using the threshold to bring the audio to the ceiling point. Now like I mentioned before...this only will work if nasty peaks are been taken care of earlier in the mix instead of trying to kill all those peaks with the final limiter which its the big mistake a lot of ppl do.

[@ConstantineM]

Wow, nice. Thank you. I had problem with my mixes and this is helped :)

[@kris_lx]

I always aim for around -12 LUFS. Fabfilter Pro L2 is a great tool to achieve this.

[@jasonwright4144]

DUDE thank you! I was loosing my mind. I'm recording a song with high gain guitar in reaper and was like "THERES no way this should be this quiet". Thanks again :)

[@StoneLuckBandWindsor]

Joe! Your video's are awesome....keep them coming brother. This once helped me ....

[@leahhidalgomusic]

Thank you for this video! This really helped me

[@hanashe4599]

Awesome. Thanks.

[@shirleyhe4215]

soooo helpful. Thank you so much!

[@cualfuneri2510]

Great video!!! Thanks!

[@KogaNobuyoshi]

This was incredibly helpful. Thanks a lot.

[@MikeHeebz]

Thanks for sharing Joe, great question & demonstration. =)

[@BillGraper]

I've had this problem fore a while. I already know my songs are quiet compared to others before I render it, because I have to turn my computer speakers up. Then when I listen to a KZbin video or play Facebook UNO, the sound is super loud & I have to hurry up & turn the speakers down to save my eardrums. Now I know how to fix this!!!

[@joshuabrits6737]

I only heard 15 seconds of that song, but I'm already edified. Absolutely beautiful and immediately inspiring, sonically and spiritually. That's a like and subscribe from me. And I guess a comment too? haha.

[@darrenhirst9900]

I read that audio manufactures used what you call a disco smile/curve when making audio equipment. That was to cut out certain frequencies so the music sounded good. So if that's true then that could be part of the problem of your audio not sounding good on your car stereo. I know music sounded different on various settings like pop rock classical etc. but which one do you mix for? Your videos are really helpful and appreciated. Thanks.

[@musicproductioncentral4540]

Try using a clipper followed by a limiter. Clippers can make things very loud, with very little artifacts.

[@kiddynamite3931]

A question from" Gorge Glass". That's the made-up bf of Jan Brady. Great name 👍

[@donlavalley2400]

Hi Joe, My name is Don and I recently purchased the Personus Studiolive 32S from Sweetwater where I purchase 95% of my gear. Your videos of how to are great. I have a Alesis HD24 I am using at the moment, love this unit, how do I channel the playback to my Desk so I don't hear it going out to the next track on the HD24 I am trying to record. My hook-up was channels 1 thru 16 top XLR inputs to record out like drum track 1&2, bass out on 3 etc. my playback came in on the 1/4 inputs 17 thru 32. How do I assign the playback inputs to be heard only and not be sent out with the next track I am trying to record? I record the drum track and play it back on 17&18, but when I record my bass track from Channel 3 the drum track goes with it. What was I thinking! I'm using my Tascam Model 24 for the playbacks and of course the headphone jack so I can hear what I'm doing. The only have to keep changing my 2 out line to the HD24. It works this way, would like to keep it so I don't have to keep changing line outs. Help!

[@tatertotter25]

Hey Joe, killer video man. this and the how to make your mix louder one, from 2018, both awesome. I ran into this issue recently, where i was tracking bass over a synthetic drum track that i imported into my session as a wav file from another software (can't afford to buy a drummer at the moment). i got three tracks recorded, one mic to my amp cabinet, one coming in from the DI with ampire live-printed on the insert (shoutout to your record through plugins video) and one stereo signal mixing the two of them. i just live to have options to pick and choose and combine from when finding the tone i want. anyway, the bass was clipping like crazy. i guess i had my input signal pretty high when tracking, i know you recommend keeping the meter somewhere above the halfway point but not TOO close to the top when tracking, and mine was pretty hot coming in. but it sounded quiet, so i wanted to push it for volume. then, lo and behold, i listen back to it and it's clip after clip. but the wav file of my drum track was just overpowering it. i had to trim 7 db off the bass bus just to get it to stop clipping, and then could barely hear it. so my question is: is bass a particularly clippy instrument to record? i mean do those low frequencies really eat up your headroom? when it comes to the final stages of the mix i'll throw that limiter on there and see if it can work its magic but for right now is there any way i could bridge the gap just a little? i don't think i've had a bass track come through this quiet before. would it be because i have three different copies of the track? i would think if i muted one or two and then turned one up to the about the same output as the three of them together, it would still clip. should i re-record with less gain coming into the interface? just wondering what your suggestion(s) would be in this situation. thanks man, rock n roll

[@justinwaynesmith3477]

Justin Wayne Smith on Facebook i released that song ,just me playing my acoustic Just explaining the story behind it kinda it's on Facebook

[@prodbydjuna]

Bro I love you so much

[@liammurray3011]

This is great thanks

[@MuzeInspiration]

Hi sir, some part of my vocals are quiet than some, I mean some part are louder and a few parts are quiet .what do I do?

[@TheKaOwe]

I’m noticing reverb on your guitar part on the track. Do you have any tutorials on using reverb and delay on instruments?

[@toddtab3048]

Thanks Joe, another great Vid. Can I make a suggestion? How about a semi in depth look into the standard tri-comp in S1? Cheers from Australia.

[@b1j]

Joe, I'm paying close attention. I see you have placed the limiter on Main Out, Post Fader (very much in the MIX, not the Master). Between watching this video and the one from 2018 that you referenced here, I put the limiter in Main pre-fader. After watching this video I moved it to past-fader. OK: big difference! The mix which used to be very quiet is now louder at a kind of typical gain setting on the Main Out of my interface. I can't wait to mix it down for the car (tomorrow). BUT, here's my question: I can't hear the difference between the pre- and post-fader position for the limiter. What is the difference? (I'm two years late with this questions, so I think I'll bring it over to the VIPer forum and see what turns up. Thanks again.

[@purabkulkarni2678]

Thank u very much fr this vedio

[@deshonosgar1]

New to this and your videos really help thanks so much this solved a serious problem I've been having .will definitely make sure to go back to the start of your videos and watch all the way through.thanks again.subscribed and thumbs up :)

[@djmusique8963]

The Answer is parallel compression/processing

[@jaredhelms4768]

How much difference does the “brand” or model of limiter make? Because I have tried all kinds of things with a limiter and slammed it as far as I can while still maintaining some dynamics and I’m still a few dB quieter than professionally mixed songs. This is the most frustrating area of my mixing right now. If I limit any harder, it kills ALL the dynamics, bringing up the volume on portions that I don’t want to be pushed up.

[@flapjack413]

As another famous George of the silver screen, I am also familiar with one "George Glass". He must be quite old now, as he was Jan Brady's imaginary boyfriend back during the original Brady Bunch television series. It amuses me to listen to you call him George, as it does when Mr. Pete Thorn has referred to me as George during his live Q&A videos.

[@davehannah9894]

I noticed he put the limiter on the master channel post fader does that make a difference if so is there a video explaining pre and post

[@helgefaccini1488]

Well, that's kind of funny, cause I don't think that my master (mix with limiter) sounds too quite, on the contrary, I think it's sound way too loud. What I mean is that when I listen to great songs of the seventies for instance (Bob Marley, Cat Stevens...) it sounds so smooth and yes, I have to crank it up a bit if I want it louder, BUT...it still sounds smooth and beautiful. That limiter use in DAW makes my smooth mix way too loud and it changes the vibes. Is that what they call the loudness war? I don't know, but I wish someone could explain it to me for dummies how to keep that smoothness in my mix but still be able to play it on Spotify etc in their 14 lufs rule. How am I supposed to save the rock and the roll if nobody is going to help me out here?

[@shanehagan]

you rock joe !!!!

[@project1265ffo]

nice and clean :) love it

[@MeAndTheBoys_]

If and when you need compression, add it in stages. That means that from the beginning of the mix, right to the end, you have managed the dynamics in a musical way, not just for getting things louder. Then in mastering stage, you or someone else, can easily do the final loudness level, without destroying your now dynamic mix. There is a way to make a mix dynamic, even if the waveform looks like a brick of shit. The key is building the dynamics into the mix. You need to do it from the inside out.

[@jonathanmurphy8147]

Does it make sense to add a limiter to each individual track, not just the Master ?

[@moltasstopyra9406]

What´s your opinion on adding a soft clipper, like StandardCLIP, before the limiter?

[@beachforestmountain4269]

The SATURATOR is the "secret" thing which the top mixing/mastering engineers use to reduce the peaks without squashing the mix too much. I made a comment about it on this page if you want to read more.

[@izvarzone]

Makes it sound too soft. I only do on some sounds, not on entire mix.

[@etwagama]

Thanks George for the question. Thanks Joe for the answer. Fabfilter works great. But unfortunately after render it becomes very quite as usual. I've noticed that mp3 is twice quite, mp4a and wav are close to what I hear in Studio One, but still it's not the same. And i've noticed that in S1 everything sounds more bright and lowder comparing to winamp or VLC or any... Is there an option that I don't know? I hope. Cause before (without) FabFilter I did render and got same results - it's almost twice quiter. And after render with Fabfilter it is like four times lower in volume :). Can you help with this? Thanks!

[@prajayj7463]

MY HERO!!

[@applecrazy1]

Hi joe! Whats your opinion on the t.bone SC 600?? COuld you please give some feedback :)

[@phoenixxbeatz22]

Why does my audio randomly go silent when I listen to my project in fl studio ? Sometimes its just in random spots.

[@josephn3496]

So I recorded 3 guitars, it sounds beautifully in tune at a louder volume and totally out of tune with 2 to 3 clicks down on my output level on my Apollo. So frustrating! What gives!? I even ran it thru Melodyne and did individual note edits. Please help, much thanks.

[@BCC288]

i can barely raise the fabfilter limited because a keyboard in my song is peaking high already. no matter what i do to it nothing changes its peaking.

[@grantsharding]

HI Joe, why not use Presonus' Limiter for this?

[@jackjohannessen5995]

Could somebody please help me? I’ve mastered my podcast in PT and I have a limiter on my master fader (compression and such on the other tracks) but no matter what I do when I bounce the audio the wav file takes a sound and quality dive. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Please help!

[@Zurbagan001]

Thanks for the video! BTW do you use “normalize” function of DAW? Is it the same thing as limiting? Seems like it could save some time.

[@jonwymore460]

Normalizing is not the same thing no. Normalize only gets your peaks to O db, but doesn't compress (turn them down) any.

[@divaudofficial]

Can you not use this pluggin for mastering though? Because this is my same problem. I always use a reference track. On my speakers and headphones, I manage to get my mixes to a similar ball park as the reference. However, when I get to my car, my record is not as forward. It might be like 2 db quieter than the professional reference track.

[@David-officialchannel2970]

How to get more reverb and wider mix ?

[@vxllzbeatz]

I have fab filter pro q3 is the limiter on there

[@izvarzone]

I noticed if I unlink stereo on limiter, peaks sounds louder. But may also add unwanted movement.

[@sidetrackbeatz5431]

hey even with the limiter my song is still hitting the red -0.1 or -1.0 it still hitting red when I push it up ... but I don't know why

[@bubinga_basher]

This is another hurdle on my way to learning S1. I’m recording drums to a drumless version of a Police tune. Anyway, I can’t really hear my kit at all when I play back, just the tune I’m recording with. Is this what’s going to fix it?

[@ckowalski1029]

thank you, Joe. When bouncing your final mix for separate mastering, would adding a gain plugin on your stereo out, do the same job in increasing volume?

[@ampstudios]

-6 to -12 would be a nice area to keep your song before you send it off to mastering.

[@ckowalski1029]

@@ampstudios Thanks. So adding a gain at the end of the final mix chain would do that trick as well?

[@ampstudios]

@@ckowalski1029 using a limit will help you push your audio a bit more yes. I guess I was in the frame of mind for allowing headroom to prepare for mastering.

[@ckowalski1029]

@@ampstudios Thanks. I did mean before sending for mastering. Since I usually don't like adding any limiting before then

[@kippb]

Joe, how do you fix a mix that is very very quiet at the beginning....just piano and vocals....and then gets loud in the second chorus to the end? I use the limiter but I would like to not have to urn it up in the beginning and down in the middle to the end. Is that possible? The the loudest parts of the mix are fine I just need the beginning louder but not sure how to do that and have it natural. I messed with automation and had the beginning louder but no way to do it smoothly without abrupt volume change :-(

[@keyboardmatrix4328]

If you have the original stems, divide it into parts like 1st verse 2nd verse etc. Send each of these verses to a bus and apply limiter in the bus. Have 2 things in mind: Try to reach up-to clipping point as Joe showed in the video. And also reference the volume of the 1st verse with respect to the next verses. You should land up with a uniform perfect volume mix

[@bobbymarco274]

Do you mix tracks ?

[@FollowerOfChrist7777]

This does not get to the meat and potatoes that is the real problem. Our tracks crest factor is what the bigger issue is as most of us know the basics of what a limiter is and how to apply it. The problem is after using the limiter the volume still seems to be lower atleast -6db then pro mastered tracks?? This is frustrating. It would be nice to pin point the problem and be able to address it if we knew exactly what in our mix is taking up so much head room.

[@tonylopez1162]

When is it best to use a limiter, during mix or mastering ?

[@impolitikful]

So just add a limiter and turn up gain?

[@brianburch120]

What if the problem is that it's so quite in reaper that your having a hard time even mixing and recording?

[@natanunorthodox]

I can't figure out for the life of me why when I upload to youtube, my videos are ending up at around -19 db? It's supposed to be -14 db, and I can here the difference big time from other people's channel's? My db on my field recorder is hitting at around -12 db, sometimes a bit lower, sometimes a bit higher. I just don't understand why youtube keeps making them -19db? Does anybody maybe know why this is happening? Do you normalize everything? I try not to normalize. I go for the loudest volume without normalization, because I want the original level and tone? Any help would be appreciated...SBN RESONATE