101 Mixing Checklist PDF

EVERYTIME  1. LEVELS AND BALANCE 1 Have you used the 1 dB rule to get the most balanced level across the multi-tracks? Move each track up or down 1 dB. If the mix sounds better try another dB until it starts sounding worse. When you can’t move a track one dB up...

EVERYTIME  1. LEVELS AND BALANCE 1 Have you used the 1 dB rule to get the most balanced level across the multi-tracks? Move each track up or down 1 dB. If the mix sounds better try another dB until it starts sounding worse. When you can’t move a track one dB up or down without making it worse you’re as close to the sweet spot you can get with only levels. 2 Is the kick drum balanced with the snare so that they are equally loud and important in the mix? 3 Is the drum sound mixed from the close mics or do the overheads make up most of the drum sound? 4 Do the tom tracks contribute positively or negatively to the overall drum sound? Do they need gating to get rid of bleed? 5 Does the bass fit well with the kick drum or are they obviously clashing when you solo them together? Do minor level changes help or hurt the situation? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 1  1. LEVELS AND BALANCE 6 Can you clean things up with selective muting to make things interesting? 7 Have you panned your instruments around the stereo spectrum? 8 Do your pans create an even stereo mix where there’s about equal “stuff” going on on each side of the mix? 9 Have you panned your instruments in mono to separate them better? 10 Have you grouped or routed your tracks together for easier level handling and balance later in the mix? 11 Have you made sure your master isn’t overloading from the start of the mix? If so, lower your track volume until it’s more manageable. 12 Have you listened to each instrument group critically and taken mental notes on what you need to do to them to make them sound better? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 2  2. DRUMS 13 Have you high-pass filtered all the drums to an appropriate frequency? 14 Have you added thickness to the kick drum by finding its sweet spot in the 50 - 100 Hz range? 15 Do you need to boost the 2-4 kHz range of the kick to bring out the beater? 16 Have you reduced all the boxiness you don’t like by cutting the frequency range of the drums around 300 - 400 Hz? 17 Does the snare cut through the mix or does it need extra high-mids around 2 - 4 kHz? 18 Or does the snare sizzle just a bit too much and need a cut in that area instead? 19 If EQ doesn’t work to add weight to the snare, can you add a bit of saturation or distortion instead? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 3  2. DRUMS 20 Have you found the best sounding compressor for each drum by testing each type you have available? 21 Have you doubled your kick drum, filtered out the lows and aggressively boosted the high- mids to bring out the beater? 22 Did you use a fast attack compressor on a drum that has transients that need to be tamed? 23 Did you time the release of the compressor in time with the song by watching the gain reduction meter? 24 Did you play with the attack and release to control the overall shape of the drum compression? 25 Did you boost the highs and lows while cutting the boxiness of the toms to get a punchier tom sound? 26 Have you used parallel compression on the drums with a hard-hitting compressor that has a 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 4  2. DRUMS fast attack, slow release, high ratio and a LOT of gain reduction to add punch to your overall drum sound? 27 Have you added a separate reverb to your snare to add some extra depth to your snare sound? 28 Have you EQ’d the drum reverb to make it sit better in the mix? 29 Have you chosen the right reverb sound for your particular song and style or did you just slap something on at random? 30 Do you need to enhance your kick to make it sound better? 31 Have you panned the drums to make them wider? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 5  3. BASS 32 Can your DI’d bass track benefit from some amp modeling to give it more depth? 33 If you’re working with both DI and mic tracks, have you made sure both tracks are in phase? 34 Have you found both the sweet spot of the bass and kick drum in the lows? 35 Have you added an EQ cut in the sweet spot of the kick in the bass and vice versa for the kick so they don’t clash in the lows? 36 Have you used a spectrum analyzer to help you find where the best frequencies are for both the kick and bass? 37 Can a high ratio on your compressor help the overly dynamic playing style of the bass player? 38 Have you decided whether the bass or the kick will be the king of the low-end? EQ according to your decision 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 6  3. BASS 39 If you can’t get the snap of the beater through because the bass is so thick, have you tried side-chain compression on the bass so that it ducks out of the way of the kick? 40 Instead of EQ’ing all your bass weight in the 250 Hz range, have you tried adding presence to the 600 - 800 Hz range instead to bring the bass out in the mix? 41 Have you used parallel distortion/saturation to add some subtle grit to your bass sound to make it cut through the mix? 42 Have you used a sub-bass plug-in to add extra artificial low-end in case your bass recording lacks actual low-end? 43 Have you used automation to bring out all the small fills and lines that the bass player does in a song? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 7  3. BASS 44 Have you brought out the brilliance of your acoustic guitar by enhancing the 5 - 10 Khz region? 45 Have you reduced the shrill cheap acoustic guitar sound by reducing the mids around 800 Hz? 46 Do your guitars sound small because you’re overdoing the compression? 47 Have you used complementary EQ on multiple guitar tracks to separate them in the mix? 48 Have you tweaked/slowed the attack time so that the acoustic guitar strum isn’t being held down by the compressor? 49 Are you using the “right” compressor on your guitar bus? 50 Do other compressor types sound better? 51. Have you checked the phase/polarity 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 8  3. BASS relationship of all multi-miked guitar tracks? 51 Have you separated all the guitar tracks in the stereo spectrum with panning? 52 Have you tried a short 100 ms stereo delay with one repeat to create space around your guitar solo? 53 Do your guitar tracks sound good in the reverb space you’ve chosen? 54 Have you EQ’d your Guitar reverbs? 55 Are all guitar tracks high-pass filtered to about 100 Hz (or more depending on your needs)? 56 Can you add a “double-tracked” sound with modulation or delay to create a bigger guitar sound? 57 Have you tried parallel routing on the electric guitar with an amp simulator panned to the opposite side to get a wider sound? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 9  3. BASS 58 Have you used both a short and long reverb on your guitar mixes to blend both the electric and acoustic guitars together to give them separation? 59 Have you automated all the guitar licks so that they stand out without clashing with other instruments? 60 Can your guitar sound benefit from re-amping? 61 Do you need to add a cut in the 900 Hz - 3 kHz area in the guitar group to make room for the vocal? 62 Can you add a really short slap-delay to add an extra dimension of rhythm to a fast rhythm guitar track? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 10  4. PIANO & KEYBOARDS 63 If you’re struggling to push the keyboards out in the mix, have you looked at boosting somewhere in the 500 - 1000 Hz range to bring them out? 64 Have you found the best high-pass filter frequency that gives the piano enough low-end weight without sounding thin on the lower keys? 65 Have you used EQ automation to make sure your piano sound is thick by itself but EQ’d around the other instruments and vocals when needed? 66 Have you cut the low-mids at 200ish Hz and again at 3 kHz to make room for the other instruments and the vocals? 67 Is your keyboard track unnecessarily stereo? 68 Can you add subtle chorusing or modulation to add depth without adding too much unneeded reverb? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 11  4. PIANO & KEYBOARDS 69 Have you compressed the keyboards heavily with a transparent compressor that smooths out all the dynamic changes in the performance? 70 Does your piano need to be back in the mix with heavy reverb and a low volume on the source track to push it back? 71 In a piano/vocal arrangement, does the piano and vocal sound like they belong together or do you need to work on blending them better together with reverb? 72 If you’re using soft synths can you add an extra layer of the same midi lines to add an extra dimension to your keyboard sound? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 12  5. VOCALS 73 Does the vocal need weight (low-mids), presence(5 kHz) or air(10 kHz and above)? 74 Does the vocal sound honky because of too much mid-frequency buildup? 75 Are you struggling with a nasal sounding vocal? Fix it by cutting slightly in the 1 kHz area. 76 Can you hear each phrase of the vocal or does it need automation or compression to make every sentence intelligible? 77 If you have a doubled vocal, does it help or hurt the overall vocal sound? 78 Does the doubled vocal introduce phase issues when you play both tracks together? 79 Have you high-pass filtered the vocal as far as you can in the context of the mix? 80 Need to add many compression to keep steady? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 13  5. VOCALS 81 Are you using right type of compressor for this? 82 Have you tried using multiple compressors in serial with a couple dBs of gain reduction each time to make it steady while not sounding squashed? 83 Can you make the vocal tracks more interesting by adding different spaces to the verse and chorus? 84 Does your vocal reverb fit the song? 85. Would a delay or a slap-echo fit the vocal sound better? 85 Have you used parallel compression on the vocal with a thick compressor and a low-mid boost to add extra warmth to your vocal sound? 86 Have you added about 20 ms pre-delay to your reverb to separate the vocal source from the space? 87 Can you automate effects on certain phrases to 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 14  5. VOCALS make the vocal more interesting throughout the song? 88 Can you pan the doubled vocal tracks to opposite sides for an interesting stereo image? 89 Alternatively, can you use an artificial stereo spread to make the vocal sound wider? 90 Do you need to manually ride the vocal or can you use compression to make it steady? 91 Have you tried multiple different parallel processing to add diverse background layers to your vocal sound? For example, two busses with one heavily compressed underneath and the other one also saturated? 92 Have you filtered out the lows of the backup vocals to make them stand out without cluttering up the low-mids? 93 Alternatively, have you cut the highs on background vocals to make them blend in better? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 15  5. VOCALS 94 Have you separated the background vocals with a different reverb than the lead vocal? 95 Have you tried out all your fun plug-ins on your vocal tracks to see if anything creative comes out of it? 96 Can you use crazy effects on small part of the song to completely change the vocal sound to better suit the song,? 97 Have you cut the most prominent lead vocal frequency range (about 900 Hz - 3 kHz) out of the backup vocals to keep them from clashing? 98 Again, have you EQ’d your reverbs? 99 Have you taken care of sibilance with your de- esser? 100 Does your vocal have something interesting in between? 101 Can you use delays instead of extra Reverbs? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 16 BONUS  MASTERING CHEACKLIST 1 Are you happy with how every single detail in your mix sounds? 2 Are you mastering for a single track release or a full album? 3 If single track, can you do a quick mastering job on the master fader incase you need to tweak your mix? 4 If album, do you have all the bounces of your mixes and the line-up of the songs? 5 Have you taken care of all the intro and outro fades? 6 Does the mix have enough headroom to master or do you need to turn the gain down? 7 Do you have references ready to compare your master to a commercial release? 8 Do you hear pumping in your master because of 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 18  BONUS too much compression? 9 Does the signal flow from each plug-in to the next have good gain structure? 10 Have you taken care not to over-EQ your master? 11 Are you accidentally squashing your mix with compression? 12 Are you using metering tools to check your peak, RMS and LUFS levels? 13 Is your master sounding better than the mix or just louder? 14 Have you referenced your master on multiple speaker systems, including a system with a subwoofer? 15 Does your master have a smooth frequency response with a gentle roll off from the high- mids? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 19  BONUS 16 Are there any specific bumps or under- represented frequency areas that need taken care of? 17 Have you added a limiter with a -0.03 output level? 18 Have you added dither? 101 Mixing Checklist by midisic 20