Mixing Tricks that made my songs 10x BETTER

🌊 STREAM Aquawaves here:
soundcloud.com/aidenwilliams/aquawaves
open.spotify.com/track/4oIV1aIBHQcjRPfw1OwkfM?si=b8tbn0I_RLe-3J1hxql3vg&context=spotify%3Aalbum%3A3UQAqLVpIP1cdJuddyL45h
distrokid.com/hyperfollow/aidenwilliams/aquawaves
So I've been mixing this track recently… and to do that properly I've used a few mixing tricks that I wanna share with you today. In this video you will learn how to separate elements within the 3D space of a mix, how to make your instrument not clash in terms of frequencies, we'll go through tricks like mid/side EQing, dynamic EQing, I'll answer some questions and worries about mixing and show you some extra tricks like frequency sidechaining or volume ducking that changes depending on the context!
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Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
0:10 - Why not normalized?
0:27 - Mixing as you go?
0:49 - Why stems?
1:35 - Trick #1 Pro-Q Separation Trick
3:36 - Trick #2 Reducing resonances
6:04 - Dynamic EQ vs Static EQ
6:32 - How to target frequencies?
10:11 - Mind-blowing fact
10:39 - Trick #3 Automatic Separation
13:35 - 3D Aspect of the mix
14:50 - Trick #4 Mid/side Trick
16:09 - Try it out
16:43 - High end = quality
16:52 - How to find tonal balance?
17:20 - Trick #5 Sidechaining
18:11 - Mixing in solo???
19:00 - Different places = different EQ
19:25 - Should you master loud?
20:24 - Complex mastering chains?

[@Oversampled]

18:11 "mixing in SOLO", not mono, just noticed, I'm a dummy 🤦‍♂️ Here we go! Hope this answers some of your guys’ questions and shines a bit of the light at the whole mixing process 👌 also as a ProQ alternative I think a free TDR Nova will do the job 👍🏻

[@Bittamin]

What about stock logic channel EQ??

[@solo3660]

Mad respect for this bro ! Learned so much in 20min!! You are a great teacher👏🏽

[@Oversampled]

@@Bittamin haven't seen logic eq, but if it's just a standard eq then it's good too. I like proq more because of how easy it is to be precise in it

[@Bittamin]

@@Oversampled thank you!

[@arsonman5684]

Tbh tdr nova is a great eq i agree

[@Zorax2144]

I'm just gonna throw this in as someone who specializes in mixing rather than making tracks. Mixing doesn't have to be this complicated. Amazing mixes have been done with panning, 3 band EQ's, basic compression, preamp saturation, reverb, and delay. This crazy fancy stuff can sound great, yes, but it can also make things a little sterile. if you've got your 4 band EQ, a compressor, saturation, reverb, and delay, you'll go far. Keep clashing from happening, abuse the 3D space to aid in separation, use your compressor to control dynamics and groove, saturate to add flavor (honestly not even mandatory), and use your reverb and delay to add depth and space to elements. Doesn't have to be rocket science hunting for resonances and stuff. Andrew Scheps is actually really insightful on this. He once said that the last thing you want to do is look for problems, and instead, only tackle problems that you come across. Your DAW's stock plugins are miles ahead of anything they had 30 years ago anyway, so just keep it simple if you feel overwhelmed by any of this, and keeping it simple will likely give your mix more personality anyway. And again, not throwing shade at oversampled at all here, the super complicated hyper clean stuff can sound great. I'm just saying that it's not the only way to approach the task.

[@Bittamin]

This is strong advice. I just wanted to start making classic house and I immediately thought, I can and SHOULD only make these tracks with the types of tools that were originally used in the 90s

[@ricobonimusic]

I like this type of comment. I often feel overwhelmed, thinking that I will never do enough to keep up with this modern super techniccal approach on every little bit of an audio track. Sometimes it just kills the fun of doing music. I understand that there are high audio standard nowadays, but... please take me back in the 90s!😄

[@ericjohnston424]

Great advice, thanks for sharing.

[@Freeflowzeek]

Yeah you throwing shade bro.

[@nerdexproject]

Fair but in the end it comes down to the style you're going for. You can't compare a mixing approach that suits genres from the 80s with a mixing approach suited for modern trap. What you call "sterile" is part of the art in modern EDM. But sure, there is more than one way to mix. You need to know what your goal is and what your song / style / genre calls for.

[@rishabhbose29]

The best Mixing advice that I follow personally is that you should never spend too much time EQing and treating something in Solo. Always play it in the context of the Mix and then take a call how much of what has to be done. In isolation everything can sound bad or great. But at the end of the day you will hear it with everything else. So this one thing that I try not do much and from a personal experience, this saves time.

[@modeswitching]

“There are no hard rules, just use your ears, if it sounds good it’s good.” The problem with this kind of advice is that, aside from being obvious and true about nearly everything, until you get really good you are still developing your ability to discriminate what sounds good and what doesn’t. I have mixes from years ago that I thought sounded great at the time, that now sound muddy and horrible. When you are still developing your ears, it is very useful to have guidelines and heuristics to help you focus on what to listen for. Anyway sorry to pick on this one thing from an otherwise great video that does offer useful guidelines - I just wish people would stop pretending that this is useful advice!

[@mikekennethdevine]

If you don't sound good, you'll sound good with or without the “rules”. Without them you have a better chance to sound interesting and develop your own style over time though.

[@loganpierce6041]

Agreed. It should really be like “do it this way until your comfortable experimenting on your own to find your own personal way”

[@deadmassesmusic]

Agreed. When I was making hot garbage on GarageBand in 2011, I thought I was hot shit. Listening to those mixes now is embarrassing.

[@deadmassesmusic]

​@loganpierce6041 highly underrated and ignored advice.

[@jordangressman5164]

“fattening” changed the game for me, it was first explained to me in the art of mixing by david gibson. i read the book then watched the full 2 hour video, but the video describes the technique very well. book just has more room for you to internalize everything. i would HIGHLY recommend anyone wanting to get deeper into mixing read that book for all the fundamentals and roots you need to connect it to what mixing AND mastering has become nowadays

[@itsVincent_]

well done! I was shocked to see how similar these tips were to my workflow, and some new things to try next time

[@AlbertSirup]

for fixing resonances with Pro-Q you can also hover your mouse over the spectrogram for a few seconds and it will create a static graph which usually reveals the resonant frequencies visually - then you can just select them directly in the graph and pull them down :)

[@dantepatel]

You are correct and this is what I often do. However, Soothe is also a very popular plugin designed for this purpose. It makes things sound more natural where as Pro Q is surgical and moreso preserves the original sound.

[@AutPen38]

Yeah, that magenta blob that appears is very good for giving you an overall look at the frequency curve and it's great that you can then grab any peaks or troughs that might need tweaking.

[@unequipped7318]

you're rlly sharing the sauce in this one thank you sm

[@daanthijssen1748]

The real sauce is a website that offers all these plugins for free

[@unequipped7318]

@@daanthijssen1748 then consider me ketchup i got the whole fabfilter kit cracked lol

[@negvey]

trcik #3 blew me away, nice video!

[@guydixon8205]

hey man we really appreciate these videos, all the best

[@knewjhq]

I recently started honing in on resonant frequencies and it makes a huge difference. The clashing frequencies I’ve just learned from this video and cannot wait to try it 👌🏼

[@godo-techno]

"there's no frequency that is like 'Oh! fuck that frequency' ", you're hilarious dude! I watch all your videos even tho I make Techno because you are such a great brain to pick

[@josephalsks4913]

THIS PRO Q THING HAS BLOWN MY MIND.

[@vipulvishwas4960]

Thanks So so much I requested this in last video And u made one🔥🔥❤️🙏

[@nickhappy1110]

yes!! thanks my bro!!! respect from taiwan

[@2MADmusic]

really thank you for those eq tips.. already thought that pro-q 3 was super powerful but didn't know about those features too, this video is a gem fr

[@TraxtasyMedia]

I like your videos and this one is pretty genuine, this time you focus on the topic and the questions that came up by your community, I followed your channel, because of the Serum Tutorials and the other funny crazy stuff you do, but you are also able to do "adult" content, which is pretty cool to see., wanna see more of this. Cheers.

[@BodyOfPlayMusic]

The EQ for low and high was such a great tip, thank you for the sick videos!!

[@rayid2003]

For those who do not own PRO-Q3 or any EQ plug-in with dynamic bands, there are tutorials that show how to use a DAWS stock EQ alongside a peak/side chain controller to make it dynamic. Try that out alongside these tips.

[@Juanitooooo]

TDR nova

[@Freeflowzeek]

What videos. Please share I want to watch them. I use logic stock plugins cause I don’t wanna spend money and I’m not a “professional” sine wave shaper

[@gooneybird808]

Yes dude so straight forward! Thank you!

[@marcoviscarra1922]

To add to your thoughts on mid/side/stereo processing, you can change Ableton's utility effect to fade between the mid and side channel (opposed to changing the stereo width) by right clicking on the stereo width knob and switching the default setting to mid/side mode, this comes in handy if you want to exclusively affect the mid or side channel (obviously be sure to do this in parallel). You can also change the panning setting on any track to split stereo mode by right clicking on the pan pot and switching to the split stereo mode.

[@dianabushleryashaev2443]

OMG!!! This is huge! I'm not a producer. I want to be one. But I have a very good ear. And this sounds, the usage of space - oh my god. Seriously, it puts the composition on a completely different level. Now I understand how judgmental I am because when I try things they sound artificial and mechanical because it's lacking all that pro mixing knowledge. Well there's much more then that of course when it comes to being a beginner...but you know. You know when you know. Thanks Oversampled!!!

[@awlledmusic]

finally its here. Thanks for these mixing tips, it really helps!!!

[@dekoto9817]

Full of gems, with a good amount of honesty. Very very useful, thanks !

[@gooneybird808]

This was the best shit I’ve heard in a long long time! Straight forward. Thank you

[@katalitik_sounds]

Great video thank you, gonna check out the track now!

[@AbhiBass96]

An absolute treasure!

[@UnKnown1631]

Hello Peter, for the 3D space, there is a plugin called DearVR Pro, it works really well, you can place mono signals around a dummy head and do crazy automations with it if you wish, like some risers coming from back to front and bottom to top for exemple, it's kinda impressive

[@iknoweverythinginthisworld]

yes, nice.. for schoolboy

[@UnKnown1631]

@@iknoweverythinginthisworld what do you mean by that ?

[@Theshabadaman]

@@UnKnown1631 That would be a brilliant plugin for mixing film sound.

[@UnKnown1631]

@@Theshabadaman for a stereo render yes, otherwise it's useless

[@Theshabadaman]

@@UnKnown1631 Oh, it's not compatible with 5.1? Shame.

[@nig786]

These tricks actually work 🤙

[@Sinner487]

I wish these videos got more views they are easily the best things on the internet.

[@FINXainarskrastins]

Try vintage tape (in ozone) in master and how it bass boosts the low end (obviously tame it with an eq or a multiband comp. after for balance) but be careful, as I can describe it, it's like making it resonate more and so making it fuller/louder/powerful/punchy, but at the same time it rings out when you overdo it. So find a balance. ALSO, it's fun to automate it slightly for the drop and stuff... "When to use it?" - if the master doesn't feel like it's boomy enough, for instance. Even if your sub is turned to the max and the kick is giving a lot of umph but it feels like it's still not even there, then, of course, check if it's mono, and try some saturation. If that doesn't work, then this is all you'll probably need, cuz tape saturation is already giving some bite, and the boost will get it at its max. "how does it affect my lufs/loudness?" - it's simple, lufs are based on an eq curve that mimics the human hearing range, a boost in the 1k-4k range will affect the loudness of your track more than subs will. BASSically saying it depends on your frequency balance, if you want a clear master with no clipping artifacts after the limiter, or getting it all squashed when there is a loud sub frequency, either way, try not to handicap your end product with too much sub, cuz most of your loudness is in the mids/higher mids/lower highs, and there needs to be a lot of sub sometimes too to compete with the loudness of the track. It's a balance to learn. "Why sub isn't perfect as just a sin wave?" - simple, a lot of people don't listen on fancy headphones or speakers, they listen on earbuds, phone/pc speakers, in the car, radio exists too. By that logic, it's rare that someone will have a sub that will make them feel the sub (cuz it's more feelable than hearable). To make sure, try listening to the mix or master with a highpass not any lower than 100hz, then add some saturation to the sub (preferably in the mix if you're not lazy) for overtones, once you get the "illusion" that there is a sub frequency (even tho you can't hear it with the highpass on) - by then it's at a good enough level, but maybe after clean it up with eq so that it's not clashing with the kick or bass or other low sounds that you have... In the end, everyone masters their tracks differently, this might work for some, and for others, it won't, either because of style, sound, genre, and so on. But in the end, I must say, getting the sub right might be the hardest part of mixing and mastering. It takes a more fine tune and back and four adjustments, unless you're lucky with your buss and master setup and if you have a really good mix. Also_also, there are no rules to music, if it sounds great and you're sure of it, then don't fix it.

[@taromuzikpie]

if you want to get a louder mixing，you must control your low end，thats my experience

[@drindy5166]

💯% generally speaking... the love of bass tends to have more people dialing it in to heavy pre gain staging... finding that perfect minimal level really does let the higher frequencies set it off. Totall agree with you.

[@Freeflowzeek]

No you don’t lol. You just make a very thing forken loud. Just up everything and en happy with it and you can Rest In Peace and stop worrying about sounds lol.

[@r.a.7898]

@@Freeflowzeek ??? does not work like lol

[@alborzmousapour3446]

MID frequency and transients both important in your Loudness....just try to kill confligs transients

[@or3n_]

@@Freeflowzeek nooooope. you get your loudness from eq what u said is what a 14yo beat maker would do

[@Trem.official]

You can do the same thing with soothe 2 for eq masking. Just select the input to the track you want to sidechain to and adjust the depth node aaand viola!

[@Ultimate_Destruction]

Ye ye Mahn is back 🔥🔥❤️❤️

[@kisstherajn]

Thoughts: if you are EQing the 2 'important' sounds, dont use trick 1 (EQ 1 of the 2) but use trick 3 instead (sidechain 1 with the 2). For reducing resonances, sometimes don't worry about it too much until master, because you should do it again when you master.

[@rebirth4119]

One thing to note about Soothe2. There's a way to keep background sounds out of the way when the main sounds play. Group your backround sounds into a bus and sidechain it the sound or bus of the main sounds. Additionally if needed you can dip around 3k to build space.

[@roderiechrivas607]

These videos are awesome. Is It available for downloading the Space effect rack you used in the Vaporwave video? THE ONE rack really Is a game-changer btw.

[@Oversampled]

Yeah! It's here: oversampled.us/products/mixingsauce Glad THE ONE helps!

[@candoraudio3159]

Love that pluck

[@stiptreezy8481]

These are all good tips, I don’t know who is saying not to mix in mono though practicing mixing in mono definitely improved my ear.

[@Oversampled]

Fuck, I meant in "solo" 🤦‍♂️

[@wrxnglove]

Really insightful video. Especially the analyzer trick is a gem. Is the A/B in ProQ processing the signal parallel or in sequence?

[@Oversampled]

A/B is either A setting or B. It's used to switch between 2 different settings to see which one sounds better or to see if you're making a good change

[@arooshsingh]

Serioualy good video ,gonnanuse all of these ideas

[@sakatagintoki1323]

Holy Sh*t, I just discovered a whole new world. Thanks man

[@johnmcnally322]

Taming the resonance seems like it would be especially important if you are going to play your tracks on big speakers in large rooms. When elements of a track are super resonate and high pitch in a big room it can sound really shrill and piercing.

[@dansylas]

most comments are questions or criticism, because giving props and saying 'thanks for the great advice' is not of value for the viewer. that being said, I have a question :) when you talked about the 3D space you mentioned that the "front" and the "back" of the mix are determined by how much reverb there is on a sound. From what I have gathered it is about loudness - the louder parts of the mix are in the "front" and the quieter ones sit in the "back" - isn't that the correct way of portraying it?

[@weenermusic]

Thank you for the tips 🤟🏻 any chances you sharing your ableton skin? Just love it :)

[@Oversampled]

Https://www.livethemes.co/themes/yello-by-live-themes-remixed/28636

[@moresnqp]

cutting resonances is an easy trick to prevent drum layers from clashing at least ive seen, especially with electronic sounds with often very loud and prominent tones

[@BodyOfPlayMusic]

Didn't know about the pro q clashing frequency technique

[@nycyabber7103]

Is there an advantage to comparing resonant frequencies within the routing you did vs just adding an eq to an instrument bus and identifying resonant frequencies through one EQ?

[@purplbeats3360]

Damn man, ur r best, thx for video

[@kanchanbajaj4773]

GAME CHANGER BRUHHHHHHH😱

[@Darksagan]

Excellent video.

[@Quant-Beat]

Arranging the sounds to not clash is the best starting point for a great mix. The mix shall then be not very hard…

[@0Human1]

Excellent tutorial as always! Did you have a mentor? Did you really learn all this yourself via tutorials online and trial/error? When are you going to start a discord or patreon?

[@Oversampled]

Ye bro, all by myself, learn and practice, that's it. And here's the discord: discord.gg/Xk8aydeRdc

[@rola8597]

i like to use distortion + parallel compression on drums, makes it louder and hit harder without actually being higher in volume.

[@fibbledrip437]

What did you try to show during the 'mind-blowing fact'???

[@Sfn2.0]

"You can 'see' improvements in sounds" Oversampled 2022

[@musikausdemosten]

Thank you

[@frankinocuda]

hi great tutorial, i wanted to ask you if you can do a tutorial on mixing videos in ableton i heard that you can thank you

[@ResonanceRebel]

How do you best stem the tracks? Resampling any track solo from the master output?

[@Oversampled]

For this song I exported individual tracks, so outputs of tracks that don't go through the master. Recently I'm freezing and flattening, I find this less of a hustle.

[@CGLialgo]

What program are you using?

[@Libero_g]

ty parker

[@Kristoff-Kun]

Do one with stock/free plugins please!

[@amirmussekenov9128]

5:19 that whistle

[@Retro-zn2jt]

4.53 - You don’t have to « find » the frequency, use the ears and only if you find (by just hearing) an annoying resonance then turn it down (if you add like 6 or more DB when searching for « resonance » on a EQ of course you will find a lot of res’ and it’s the best way to loose the character of the sound when doing that, and you don’t want that), also Baphometrix talked about sooth2 so you have to be careful when you use it. Cool video however, there is some nice tricks (Google translate)

[@DJayFreeDoo]

So much this! I used to make this mistake myself for a time. mixing with my eyes to find resonances and pull them down. not only did i take the life out of the sound, those resonances also stayed in my hearing until i took a break from mixing. When isolating resonances it really has to be an audible problem before even reaching for an eq. and dealing with them quickly before the ears adapt. And usually its just one or two resonances that may be causing a problem. for vocals there is that one resonance in the high mids that every voice has that makes the voice sound harsh, but it also contributes to the vocals prescense a lot. So gotta be careful with these things.

[@adamsmith7058]

Exactly. Using the boost and cut method turns everything into an annoying resonance. It's best to try and listen for these without doing this and if that fails use Soothe s/.

[@Identityinchrist_]

Are the stems exported already mixed and you're just fixing it?

[@jayklly]

🤣 never noticed im in the recommended at 16:48

[@Hkhk1725]

Dope!

[@iWhy_Music]

Sad that you don't know about the most transparent sidechain trick, Trackspacer from wavesfactory for mixing and mastering, there's nothing alike)

[@kiko8u]

Hard clipping transients

[@daanthijssen1748]

How to find tonal balance? Maybe with Tonal Balance VST? Just an idea..

[@pleasenomoreJane]

Is there an easy way to just stem out your project while keeping it in the same organizational layers in abelton?

[@Oversampled]

I'm not sure what you mean exactly. But exporting to stems will export every track from top to bottom in that order. So then you can drag all of them holding Ctrl and they will stack under each other. Then you can group them as they were grouped initially

[@pleasenomoreJane]

@@Oversampled ahhh it's the holding ctrl I'm missing!!! Thank you so much that's gonna help me out a ton haha 😊

[@mewforest]

What do you do, if you want to change some instrument? Because all in project is a ton of WAVs, not instruments.

[@Oversampled]

When I go into mixing I commit to the instruments that I have, but you can reimport an instrument as a midi track, then change it and if you want convert it to audio

[@paulstraszewski736]

dziękuję

[@kucaeth]

Share your ableton theme please!

[@Oversampled]

Https://www.livethemes.co/themes/yello-by-live-themes-remixed/28636

[@adziak]

Mixing is fixing so the higher quality of the sounds you use in your production the less problematic it gets to mix everything. Often times producers create additional problem instead of keeping it simple. The more complicated tracks like today's modern genres like dubstep there is a lot of going on and it might get confusing to mix and balance everything properly together.

[@FursAndMasksMusic]

No colour coding??

[@lordberly]

#OneColour2RuleThemAll

[@shvsagar]

😍

[@mareikemacinnes7764]

Instead of trying to correct all components with EQs or other VSTs before rendering the mix, you should choose sounds that are in symbiosis with each other when producing them. Mixes that only need a limiter in the end are best. That should be the goal of every producer. ;) Greetings from Germany

[@skellman42]

What I'm learning is I need to buy ProQ3 lol

[@projectepsilon9851]

Soothe reduces resonances

[@Андрюша-ч1ч]

About loudness: Usually this is not about loudness war as is, but a stylistic restraint. Different genres have different dynamic range (also known as crest factor - the difference between peak and RMS levels). For example, EDM music has a much lower DR than some 70s rock, simply because there is nowhere to get it from. While 70s rock has a lot of micro dynamics, wildly dynamic drums, flowing basses and chunking guitars, in EDM you expect more in your face drums and basses with some earpiercing leads. Also there is nothing wrong with mastering at -6 LUFS for Spotify. First of all the point is not to force people to make dynamic music, but to make listeners free from constantly adjusting the volume while listening to different tracks n genres. A lot of different music released nowadays primarily for streaming (if not only for it) still have the same -9/-6 lufs

[@georgejobe9402]

Yh valid point man! Spotify has loudness normalization at -14LUFS (integrated) tho so your track shouldn't be perceivably louder or quieter than others. It merely means that if your track is say -10LUFS the peak volume of the signal will be 4db too loud, hence it turns the track down by 4db to make it -14LUFS, allowing all tracks to be consistent volume for the listener. Note you can turn this feature off in settings. So for Spotify, (not for SoundCloud as much because its loudness normalization is next to none) listeners will never notice any major volume changes between tracks. The only noticeable differences for a high LUFS mix are the lack of transients, and ear fatigue after a shorter period of time. Otherwise, the listening experience should be completely effortless. Here's a useful article to conceptualize this: www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/mixing-and-mastering-using-lufs Have a good day!

[@y2kona]

3:07 i genuinly cant tell the difference

[@OnlyUseMyWii]

#AllFrequenciesMatter

[@baxuvis275]

[@vipulvishwas4960]

Can You Next do Future Bass and Future trap like Marshmallow 🔥❤️❤️

[@yn5608]

How to Gain stage Properly

[@aboliguu1168]

For mastering, I still think a little bit of compression and saturation can ”glue” all the elements together. Just a db of compression with a colorful compressor instantly makes the track better in a way that can’t be done in the mix.

[@unduloid]

Hyperbole!. I'd say they made your songs 9.34 times better, at best.

[@synthsyndicate]

F_ck im late. Im always late.

[@Vitae_]

Okay? It doesn’t matter lol

[@faustaocomseumegazord215]

I just don't make stems from my projects because of my HD space 🤡

[@fabclippers2632]

POV: you don’t have pro eq

[@evanfor9]

First

[@wesley8082]

I got this email from a company called U..... -_-

[@horbanstemelglermojdrum505]

1,14823 x better

[@nadeemamir1289]

but had absolutely no problems to follow Nice tutorials words. You don't have to understand all of tNice tutorials in 10 seconds, just take one step, stop the

[@zian3694]

Not useful, Not new tips, the average same techniques everyone is using