SAMPLE SOURCE

Mixing Guide
Comprehensive guide to mixing

Table Of Contents
This guide will cover how to mix your beats effectively. It will explain how to incorporate
compression, equalization, panning, automation, and modulation effects to create a cohesive
mix for your beats. The DAW I use is FL studio, but you can apply these techniques to any
workstation.

Sections

● Gain Staging/Leveling
● Clipping
● Sound Selection
● Panning
● Compressors
● Equalizers
● Modulation
● Automation
● Stereo Separation
● Master Channel
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Gain Staging/Leveling
Before I explain all the different elements of mixing, I need to explain what gain staging is.
Simply, it is “Setting the gain for each volume stage (gain stage) in your DAW to get an optimal
mix volume that minimizes distortion and clipping.”
This is important because it makes sure when you add
all the mix tracks together that your mix isn’t clipping
or distorted.

You should make sure nothing is clipping (above 0db)

before you add it in the mixer track. You should also
make sure your master channel is not clipping when
you add all your mix tracks together. Your mix might
sound perfect and be under 0db until you add the 808
or kick into the mix. I’ll give you my guide for how loud
each element in your mix should be. This will help you
to keep everything from distorting, but the volume
levels depend on what genre you're producing or which
artist you’re producing for:
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Leveling Template for Gain Staging:

Main melodies (-9db)

Other melodies (-15db)

808 (-3db)

Sub bass (-9db)

Kick (0db)

Snare/Claps (-6db)

Percs (-12db)

Hihats (-15db)

Open hats (-18db)

Risers/FX’s (-12db)

Voices (-15db)

Master Channel (0db to +2db)

The template I just gave you is for leveling your beats. 90% of mixing is leveling, panning, sound
selection, and eq. Leveling your beats correctly is the easiest way to distance your mixes from
amateur beatmakers and start sounding more professional. My mixes even a year ago sounded
horrible because I failed to level my beats properly. I wanted to jump into Eq and compression
and adding effects to my beats before they even sounded decent. The biggest tip I can give you
is to take a break from listening to your beat for a few minutes before mixing. Then come back
to you and listen to it again before you mix it. My process personally is mixing as I make the beat
on the monitors, switching to mixing on headphones, then taking a break and listening to it again
on monitors. Then I make adjustments as needed. Ear fatigue can deceive you into thinking
your beat is leveled correctly, so make sure you’re aware of this when leveling your beats.
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Clipping
If you talk to mix engineers for bands, the thing they probably fear most is clipping. It has been
undesirable in mixes for most of music history, but in trap music and the hip hop scene, clipping
can be a desirable sound in beats. You can accomplish this sound 2 ways: (a) Just increasing
the overall volume of the beat, or (b) by adding a soft clipper to your master track. If you’re
making a beat for Lil Baby or 42 Dugg, you’ll probably want the beat to sound distorted. But if
you’re making a beat for Chris Brown or Drake, you’ll probably be aiming for clarity and keep the
beat from clipping too much. In the trap genre, turning the 808 up and making it clip is a popular
choice for a lot of beatmakers. This can hurt your mix if it’s too drastic, so reference your beat to
a song you want it to sound like and make adjustments from there.

Sound Selection
I mentioned the components that make up 90% of mixing. One of those elements was sound
selection. While this may seem obvious to you, a lot of beatmakers struggle to make their mixes
sound how they want because they have poor sound selection. Most drumkits are “pre-mixed,”
meaning their sounds are already leveled, compressed, and EQ’d. This means that if you choose
good sounds, you should have very little work to do when you go to your mixer channel to finish
mixing the beat. If you want to use sounds from other drumkits, make sure you're shaping that
sound to the other sounds so that your mix sounds cohesive. Most mix engineers who are
recording bands in studios will sit and adjust a snare drum for hours. I’m not telling you to spend
hours selecting your sounds, but you should painstakingly choose your sounds because it can
be critical to having a great sounding mix. Also, make sure you’re updating your drumkits
regularly to avoid having your beats sound dated. No one is making beats that sound like 2014
Zaytoven beats anymore, and artists will disregard your beats if they don’t sound modern
enough.

If your kicks and 808’s are clashing, one tip to fix this is by reversing the polarity of the 808 or
kick. This goes into the actual waveform and flips it upside down. The reason for this is if your
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808 and kick have a similar waveform, they will clash and cancel each other out because
both waveforms have the same peaks and troughs.

The second way to fix a clashing 808 and kick drum is by moving the 808 forward so that the
kick hits first, and the 808 is delayed by a few milliseconds. There’s 2 ways to accomplish this.
The hard way is to go into the beats timeline and manually move the 808 a few milliseconds
forward in the beat. The easier way to do this, however, is to go and click on the 808 sample and
click the tool setting and move the shift knob under the time section. (in fl studio) See the
image below.
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Panning/Stereo Separation
I don’t want to spend too much time on panning, when you’re mixing just make sure that
whatever you’re mixing sounds good where it sits in the beat. A lot of producers have asked me
if they should pan their 808’s, hi hats, or kicks, so I’ll show you a general rule of thumb for mixing
each element. You shouldn’t pan your 808’s or kicks ever. This is because they’re so loud in the
mix and it will offset everything in the mix. (you can use stereo separation on them, but I’ll cover
that later) Snares and claps should be in the center as well, but if you’re using multiple claps,
snares, or percs, you can start panning all those elements other than the main one because it
will help balance the mix and avoid all those similar sounds lumping together and muddying
your mix. You can pan everything else however you want to, probably other than closed hi hats,
but I would try to avoid panning hard right or hard left unless you absolutely have to. I like to
make sure half the elements are panned to the right and the other half to the left because I think
your mix should sound perfectly balanced when you’re finished. If 2 sounds are clashing when
they’re panned the same direction, try panning one of the sounds a little more than the other.

Stereo separation is very similar to panning. Basically, instead of moving a sound left or right,
you’re expanding that sound in all directions. This can make something sound “wide” and have
a lot of “depth.” If you want to experiment with stereo separation, the best things to add it to are
melodies and percs. This is really effective when the sound has reverb or delay on it already, you
can precisely control how much space that sound takes up in your mix. So if your mix has a
sound that seems like it’s bleeding into all the other elements in your mix, or it sounds dry and
you need it to sound wider, then you can adjust the stereo separation of that sound and
“separate” it or “merge” it together to sound more mono. In FL Studio there’s a button at the
bottom of your mixing rack that you can move left to “separate” the sound, or move right to
“merge” that sound.
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Compressors
Compression is the most loved and hated tool when it comes to production. If you listen to a
poorly mixed song, the vocals probably have either way too much compression, or not nearly
enough. I went to a community college to learn how to become a mix engineer, and it really
helped me to formulate a better approach to mixing my beats. But the problem with traditional
education is that it’s always years behind the industry. They want you to add compression on
everything, but it’s unnecessary because so many sounds have already been compressed by the
sound designer or producer already. What a compressor does is make the softer sounds louder
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and the loudest parts sound quieter. It’s best used on live instruments, bass and kick
sounds, and vocals. One gem for recording artists is to add the compression onto the input, so
when you record the vocals, the compression has already balanced out the vocal signal and
makes everything sound even. I rarely use compression on my beats! If I do decide I need
compression, I apply it as lightly as possible. I will sometimes put very mild compression on my
master channel if the beat sounds flat or too quiet. I use compression to enhance a sound, not
to fix a sound. The threshold knob controls how much volume you’re taking away from the
sound, the ratio is how much compression you want to add to the sound, the attack knob
controls how fast the compressor is going to engage, the release knob controls how long the
compressor is engaged for, and the makeup gain amplifies the overall compressed signal. The
attack knob is a little confusing because the more you turn it up, the less attack it will have. The
less you turn it up, the faster the compressor will engage. Now that I’ve explained its basic
functions, I’ll show you a picture of the Slate compressor I use all the time, and it includes
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definitions for all the knobs on the compressor.

So in this example, I was using the compressor for my vocal track. This is an example of heavy
compression, sometimes called “squashing” the signal. You can do this for sounds that are very
low in the mix, so that they cut through better and don’t get lost in the mix. I’ll show another
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example of compression that I sometimes use on my master channel.

You can see in this example that the ratio, threshold, and attack are much less aggressive than
the other example used for vocals. This is because you don’t want to make the quieter sounds
too loud in your beat, and you don’t want to squash your 808 and kick. (both will ruin your mix)
So mild compression basically adds a little volume and sharpness to the mix, and brings your
mix together or “glues” it together.

Equalizers
An equalizer is an amazing tool that is often applied too aggressively, and can actually take
away much more than it gives if you’re not careful. I personally use the FabFilter ProQ3 filter, it’s
a great compressor but learning how to use the stock Eq on your DAW will work almost just as
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good if you learn how to use Eq effectively. An equalizer basically adds or takes away
volume from a particular frequency. So when you add high-end a sound, the Eq is adding
volume to all the high frequencies in that particular sound. In mixing school, the basic rule of
thumb is that you shouldn’t add more than 6db of Eq to a sound or take away more than 6db
from a sound. If you add or subtract much more than that, you can hurt the integrity of the
sample your Eq’ing. If you take away too many frequencies out of a piano, it starts to sound fake,
or low quality. So if the piano you’re using in the beat sounds too thin or too bassy, you should
probably try a different piano before you start adding a lot of Eq to the piano. (see section on
Sound Selection) I’ll show you 3 different Eq curves, the first is used on a guitar, the second is
used on a sub bass, and the last is used on a kick.
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You can see from these examples that I didn’t have to dissect these samples too much to get
them Eq’d effectively. In most cases, you shouldn’t have to use aggressive Eq unless the sample
has a lot of issues. With the guitar, I added some high end, took away a little of the midrange,
and cut out a lot of the low end to make room for the sub bass. Since the guitar barely has any
low end, it’s ok to cut out a lot of the low end. With the sub bass, the main objective was to cut
out very low frequencies that were interfering with the kick drum and adding unwanted
distortion and noise in my mix. The human ear can’t hear frequencies under 20 Hertz, so in
beats those frequencies are unneeded for the most part. For this reason, I usually cut these
frequencies out of the 808, bass, or sub, so it makes it easier to get the kick and bass to work
together. In the last example, more aggressive Eq is used. I probably could have gone back and
looked for a different kick sample that was closer to the sound I was looking for, but I decided to
use aggressive Eq because it was close enough to where I wanted. The kick wasn’t cutting
through the mix, so I raised the upper frequencies of the kick to make it punch a little bit more. I
also subtracted some of the low end on it. The best way to find frequencies you want to take
out is to raise up a band of Eq and make it very sharp. Move it from left to right until you find the
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harsh frequency you want to take out and then bring the band of Eq downwards. (see
example below.)
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A lot of producers are relying on presets for mixing, but every beat is different and you should
rely on your ears instead of your eyes. Make sure you aren’t mixing your beats lazily, put some
effort into listening to the beat or sound and making adjustments based on what sounds better.

Reverb/Modulation
I use a lot of reverb and modulation on my beats. I use the stock reverb, but I have 3rd party
plugins for Chorus, Delay, Pitch-shifting, Vinyl, and Resampling. Learn about the plugins you have
and study what they do, this help you when you go to put them into your beats and apply them to
create specific sounds. With that being said, my absolute favorite plugins to put on my beats are
FL stock reverb, RC-20 (wow/flutter and noise), Cymatics Origin (resampler), and the Kickstart
sidechain plugin. If you listen to Drake, his producer 40 uses resampling all the time in his
production. You might think it’s a lowpass filter, but what it does is actually change the sample
rate of the signal. This means it takes frequencies completely out of the sample, which gives it a
distinct sound compared to using lowpass filters. Cymatics Origin plugin is free too, so definitely
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get it and see if you like it. I use RC-20 on every beat I make, and sometimes add it on my
master track for aesthetic purposes. It really helps you sculpt a vintage or nostalgic sound
quickly and easily. And Kickstart is another one of my favorites, it allows you to sidechain
sounds in 1 click. I also use Phasers, Flangers, and other modulation too but not very often.
Understanding how to apply Reverb is important if you want to create great sounding samples or
beats. Understanding what the different parts of the reverb do is critical to getting it to sound
exactly how you want. The main knobs you want to focus on are Damping, Size, Decay, Wet,
and Dry.

The Damping controls how bright or dark the reverb sounds, the size controls how big or small
the reverb is, the decay is how long or short the reverb lasts for, the wet is how much reverb is in
the signal, and the dry is how much of the original sample is contained in the signal.
Understanding these elements allows you to turn a regular synth or drum sample into something
that sounds like a spacey, Travis Scott sounding beat. If you have an idea in your head of what
you want it to sound like, learn your reverb plugin and then apply what you’ve learned to shape it
into the desired sound. One trick you can do for making something sound “underwater” is to
raise the “wet” knob higher than the “dry” knob. What this does is it makes the reverb signal
louder than the original signal, making it sound like it's in a large cave or underwater.

The other trick I’ll show you is how to make a vocal, live instrument, or any other sound more
realistic. This technique is called “putting a sound in a room.” All you need is a stock delay plugin
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to do this. What you’ll do is add a slight delay to the sound, and then turn up the feedback of
the delay and turn down the volume of the delay, which will make it sound like it’s bouncing off
the walls of a room. In the top left side of FL Studio, (different in other workstations) you’ll see
how much time you’re setting the delay for. I usually do anywhere from 0.15 to 0.30. I left my
usual settings below if you want to try it on your mixes.

Automation
Automation is dope because you can literally automate anything. The most common
automations are for fading out the master volume, automating reverb, and automating lowpass
or high pass filters to change up the beat in different sections. But if you’re really creative, you
can experiment and use automation to change the pitch, tempo, modulation, halftime, panning,
etc. In FL studio, you can right click on a fader or knob in the plugin or mixer rack, then go to your
Playlist and start adjusting where you want the automation to start and stop in the beat.
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I won’t go into detail in this section, but automating elements of your beat can make a boring
hook section sound more lively, and give the artist ear candy that keeps them listening and
interested in your beats.

Master Channel
This is the secret sauce that most producers obsess over and Dm bigger producers about,
asking what they add on their master to make their beats sound amazing. I used to put 5,6, or
more plugins on my master, making the beat sound entirely different than it did without the
plugins. While adding your favorite plugins on your master channel is enjoyable, and while it
changes the entire landscape of the beat to sound different than before, most of the plugins
you’re adding on your master are unnecessary and are probably the reason your mixes are
sounding thin and lacking clarity. I asked a producer who is making a quarter million dollars a
year off beats what he adds on his master channel. His response was 3 words, which shocked
me:
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“A soft clipper.”

I had been doing the most, when all I had to do was add light compression, or simply add a
stock soft clipper to my master and export the beat. Some of you might ask, but don’t mixing
and mastering engineers add lots of plugins to their master? The answer is that it simply
depends. Mixing and mastering engineers spend thousands of hours reading about plugins and
applying them to mixes, so they have a vast amount of knowledge more than the average
producer. Also, they’re dealing with vocals and making the song radio-ready. This process is
much more intensive than making a beat that slaps and putting it on Beatstars, YouTube, or
Instagram. For the most part, keeping it simple makes it easier to make the beat sound good
than adding tons of plugins. So my advice is to add a limiter, compressor, or soft clipper on
your master, or incredibly subtle Eq if needed. If you have to do anything drastic on your master,
the mix is probably already bad anyway and you should start over.