Michael on SoundBetter

I run audioMAP mixing, a professional mixing service. We make your records sound amazing so you can focus on the fun stuff: making music, building your career, gigging, and growing your fan base. Leave the mix to us.

I've mixed hundreds of songs in many genres. I've spent years developing my skills and mix philosophies, and have built an extremely solid and dependable workflow. I'd love to use my years of experience and musical knowledge to help make your songs as good as they possibly can be!

Tell me about your project and how I can help, through the 'Contact' button above.

Credits

1 Reviews

Endorse Michael

by Esorabla
Michael is an extremely talented mixing engineer. I have used his services for many projects and had consistently fantastic, radio-ready results. I’ve even had projects where I was only able to give him the mp3 versions of the songs with my vocals and he was able to make what should have sounded mediocre into a high quality song. I could go on with the praises, but to keep this short I will say, if you are looking for a mixing engineer who is passionate about their work and making your tracks sound amazing, let me be your confirmation that Michael is the mixing engineer you should invest in.

Interview with Michael

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?
A: All kinds. If it's music, I can mix it. Send me a reference track if you have a particular goal in mind, but if you don't, I'm resourceful, I'll figure out what it should be like, if I don't know right off the bat.
Q: What's your strongest skill?
A: I never stop learning, improving my craft. There's always more to learn. At the same time, I've developed a very strong mix process and workflow, with plenty of built-in quality control. I produce consistently great mixes as a result.
Q: What do you bring to a song?
A: Passion and countless hours of doing this stuff. I've lived and breathed music for my whole life, and production for years. I didn't have resources, so when I wanted to record my music, I had to teach myself how to do so. When I wanted to mix it, I had to figure that out as well. Hundreds of songs later, I do it for other people too now.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: Monthly singles in 2020 for bluecurlyhairrecords' artists Esorabla, Autoimmune, and City of Shepherds.
Q: Analog or digital and why?
A: Digital. Nothing wrong with analog, but I have all the advantages of digital, with all the analog emulation I could possibly need. Best of both worlds this deep in the digital age.
Q: What's your 'promise' to your clients?
A: That I will deliver on your song's potential. Your music is your baby, and I will treat it with the respect it deserves.
Q: What do you like most about your job?
A: Making music sound good. It's never not fun.
Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?
A: That we should be paid for the amount of time we spend on a song, or the complexity of the song. I charge the same amount for the vast majority of the songs I mix because you're paying for a high quality mix. This is a craft, an art, not a science, not a factory line. If you want your song to reach its potential, send it to me and I'll help you get it there. I'm not competing with people who charge less than me, I'm providing you with a quality product, and that has an implicit value.
Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?
A: Do you have any reference tracks? I want to know what you want it to sound like. Give me 2 or 3 reference tracks, tell me what you like about them. If you don't give me reference tracks, I'll choose some that I find appropriate, but it's better if you choose the sonic direction you desire.
Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?
A: Listen to examples of their work. If you like the mix quality, not necessarily the songs, but the mix quality, then go forth. If you don't, that's not the engineer for you.
Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?
A: Well, assuming there's electricity and any of this stuff works, a MacBook Pro with Logic Pro X, FabFilter Pro-Q3, FabFilter Pro-C2, Goodhertz CanOpener Studio 3, and my Sennheiser HD 650s.
Q: How would you describe your style?
A: Mix with an attitude. Not just one attitude, either. Whatever attitude the song calls for. Mixing isn't for the faint of heart.
Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?
A: I'd love to work with Layla! Alas, she appears to have abandoned Layla for Oh Wonder. If she ever does another Layla project, I'd love to help produce it, and also mix it.
Q: Can you share one music production tip?
A: Be bold, decisive. Decide what you want your song to sound like, then make those decisions on recording day. While I can certainly do a lot with whatever you send me to mix, never leave problems you know about to fix in the mix, or leave important aesthetic decisions for later. Produce with funk and spirit.
Q: What's your typical work process?
A: Obsess over the sound until it's right. Break only for food and sleep.
Q: Tell us about your studio setup.
A: I was born and raised in the box. I have extremely high quality plugins that can do everything analog can do and more. I don't judge a tool by its age but by how well it does its job, and all the tools in my toolbox are of unparalleled sound and workflow quality. When it comes to monitoring, I do 80% of my mixes on a single Avantone mixcube in mono. I have a pair of JBL monitors, a pair of Sennheiser HD 650 cans, and a pair of AKG K240 cans that make up the other 20%, primarily to refine the stereo mix and dial in my fx, as well as perform sanity checks on my nearly-finished mixes. In my opinion, the stereo mix lives and dies by the quality of the mono mix, so that's where I focus the bulk of my attention.
Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?
A: I'm inspired by lots of musicians. Glass Animals, Keene, Athlete, Michael Jackson, and many more. I'm also inspired by Graham Cochrane, a music educator on youtube. He puts lots of great information out for free that empowers everyday musicians to improve their craft and start producing professional music. Never let anything get in the way of the music. It must be made.
Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.
A: I mix music. Send me the files that make up your song, and I'll mix them together for you and give you back a song that chiseled, smooth, and radio-ready.