“Record like there’s no mix. Mix like there’s no master.”

Happy 2024. I’ve been recording and mixing music for over 10 years, and writing and producing much longer. The last 4-5 I’ve done it professionally. To me, that’s surreal. What did you start in 2014 that you’re still doing now?

Mixing boils down to making things sound good and then picking the best version of what sounds good.

#mixing #musicproducer

If a frequency is ringing out it doesn’t mean you HAVE to cut it. Sometimes it actually makes your mix too sterile. Sometimes the imperfection/imbalance gives a mix character. Listen to your fave songs - is the frequency spectrum cleaned out? Or is it full of life and movement?

If at any point ever when the vocal is playing and something else in the instrumentation comes and distracts you from the vocal, you’ve lost.

When you demand everything be perfect the first time you do it you rob yourself of actually learning. Ex: You learn more by practicing a sport than you do planning and studying it. In the time you spend procrastinating due to your perfectionist mentality, you could have just

Making mix decisions in a poor monitoring environment is like shooting a basketball in the dark. You might get lucky and occasionally get it in, but most of the time your mix will miss. You can improve your technique more by practicing in the light too.

"Rush may not be your favorite band, but they are probably your favorite band's favorite band."

Controversial take on fade-outs: For me personally, looping the last chorus while it fades out feels like a lazy way to end a song these days. Agree? Disagree?

An artist's job is to create something that wasn't there yesterday

"How do you get a better snare sound? Write a better song." - The idea here is that *obviously we want great snare sounds* BUT the snare shouldn't be where you spend your energy before getting the song right.

Music production YouTubers (myself one of them) trying to pronounce plugin names we don’t know how to say is one of the funniest things to me 😂

One cool thing about getting good at mixing is re-listening to songs I used to listen to years ago (pre-mixing ability), and being able to appreciate the mix and hear them in a new way. So oddly satisfying.

Rest in Peace, Quincy Jones. A true legend.

An unknown band called The Killers play their new song "Mr. Brightside" in 2002

Get ready #LdnOnt for the 14th annual Share the Land concert. Celebrate London’s music scene while giving back to the community. Proceeds go to HopeSpring Cancer Support Centre. Join us Feb. 11 at 7 p.m., London Music Hall. Buy your tickets now: @miafanshawe

What’s up Gary Vaynerchuk 😅🤘🪗 #accordionplayer #accordion #musicproducer #audiobook #garyvee #daytradingattention #audioengineer #musician