Hip Hop Mixing and Production

Q: Tell us about a project you worked on you are especially proud of and why. What was your role?

A: I recently mixed/mastered a beat and I just enjoyed how it came out. I switched my entire setup, template and all, and tried a different approach that I had researched that worked very well for me. It was nice to learn about something, research it, apply it, and have it work well. Unfortunately as good as the mix/master is, I wasn't too fond of the beat itself, so unsure if I will ever release it.

Q: What are you working on at the moment?

A: Currently off and on with my own instrumentals as I have time. My two close clients I work with are both in the midst of an ep/album each. Both projects are on slight hiatus as one recently moved across state and both are working on their home setups so the can spend more time on their projects before seeing me about them. We tend to find many song writing and production issues when they come in to record with me, so we are trying to alleviate it.

Q: Analog or digital and why?

A: I hate to be a fencesitter but both are great. The short version is: Mastering: Analog Mixing: Mostly Digital I could write an essay on why I think so, but I'll summarie my thoughts. For mastering when you're working with a single sound file, and pushing the boundaries of physics and electrical quantities, analog gear lets you push those boundaries with much more pleasing results than you can with mixing. Mixing with how many different tracks you work with, having a digital setup give you many more tools and flavors you can add at the track level. It would be impossible to have enough physical gear to match what you can have digitally. There are also digital tools that don't have an analogue counterpart and have features unavailable in the analog domain.

Q: What's your 'promise' to your clients?

A: The promise is to give you my best version of your song and to work with you what you want out of it. I want you to have a product you can be proud of and work with you on it. You WILL have something better than what you started with when you work with me.

Q: What do you like most about your job?

A: I love the "aha moments" when things work or come together. When you make a change and something just sounds so right, or when every part of the song comes together at a certain moment. I love being constantly challenged and switching up my workflow and learning. If I get through a song and didn't learn anything new I get disappointed. Music is always changing and evolving and getting stagnant is the worst thing I can do.

Q: What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A: How do you know how to do this/why did you do that/etc.? I spent a lot of time working with different tools on different sounds in different contexts until I learned how and when to do the things I do. When/how did you start mixing? I started in 2016 after a friend and I jokingly recorded some diss tracks on our friends (they were terrible and no you can't hear them, they're long gone haha) and they sounded terrible, and not just the rapping. The sound quality was abysmal. I did research to understand why and learned what the concepts mixing and mastering were and found a local studio to learn from and just worked from there. So is this your job? No this is my side passion that I spend my time on when I'm not working. I'm a full time electrical engineer at a utility, so I don't do this for a living.

Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?

A: Many people think certain things are easy to do or that mix decisions have no consequences. There are no rules to mixing/mastering, but we do work with limited space in terms of frequency and headroom. We can't often just turn things up without having to sacrifice something else. It is a constant game of give and take and so things that may be simple in theory ("Can you make the bass louder?") are not as easy in practice.

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: How long have you been working on the song? (Very important so we can address 'demoitis' "Demo-itis is a slang term used in music production. Generally, it is the problem of falling in love with a flawed demo version of a song. The more you listen to it, the more you like it.") Have you ever hired someone to do mixing/mastering work for you and how well did it go? What are your plans for this song (i.e. a single, an album, an ep, etc.)? Where and how was it recorded?

Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A: Provide references, but don't set your expectations too high if you'r just starting out. Your reference songs were worked by teams of professionals with decades of combined experience and limitless resources. This doesn't mean your songs can't sound like that, but maybe they can't just yet. Understand that everyone has their own taste and you are likely listening in different environments. You each have your own wealth of inspiration and ideas for how things should sound. Neither of you will be right or wrong about production/mixing decisions, but sometimes adjustments or refinements will need to be made. Most likely this isn't the skill of the engineer being poor, just pre conceived notions of how things should sound. Work with them and they can address your wants and needs.

Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?

A: Avantone mixcube, lavry or burl ADCs, CL-1b compressor, SSL channel strip, and some sort of transformer saturation (kazrog true iron plug in but a physical piece of gear if I could)

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: I love snares to be loud and proud and to be tasteful with effects. Many songs have reverb and delays everywhere they can be, which starts to take from each individual one. I like those effects to be noticeable when they're used and to really enhance the song.

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: Although not technically an artist in the traditional sense, I would love to sit on mixes with Derek Ali. His process seems very in line with how I like to mix, and he could teach me so much about getting clarity depth and good stereo imaging using simple tools.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Simpler is often better, make sure to listen for the song at the end of the road (i.e. can you envision what the vocals would sound like on this beat). Many producers fill their songs with many sounds and make them too wild for an artist to actually use. Many of my beats that turned out the best were simpler ones that left space for the artist to impart their own vision to. A more concrete tip is to turn your bass down and take breaks. Ear fatigue will lead to poor decisions. Sometimes a good break can be a few days long. I have had beats live and die by coming back a few days later to hear they were either way better than I originally thought or were not nearly as good as I first imagined.

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: I work exclusively with Hip Hop/Rap

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: My strongest skill is my objectivity when it comes to a song and the artistic choices made. I will never look on my own work with rose tinted glasses and deliver a less than desirable project because I chased my own vision and not the artists'. My takes on the song need to objectively improve the song and coincide with the vision of the artist.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: I will bring clarity and edge to a song, and interesting takes on the stereo field. With hip hop being a very monocentric genre with its drums and bass, a little goes a long away in the stereo field which allows for delays and reverbs to create interesting songs. I find the right balance between elements that need to be edgy and in your face as it pertains to each song as *every* song is unique.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: I start with importing the multi tracks into pro tools and adjusting the levels as needed (typically if the producer has levels set a certain way, I will try to maintain this balance in the mix) going between my main monitors and mixcube. Since I master my own mixes, I get much better results mixing into a lot of master bus processing (transformer saturation, compressor, clipper, and limiter) so I after balancing the individual tracks I will set the gain and paramaters of the master bus processing to get a good over all feel. Then... I start the mix! I will listen to the song and see what the important elements are and being mixing in mono on my mixcube where I will do most fo my work, with referencing on the headphones and studio monitors. I Start with drums bass and vocals and everything else falls into place after those are right. I spend much of the time mixing bouncing between mono and stereo on my different sources to verify my changes are helping the song and I'm not adjusting for deficiencies in any one monitoring source.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I have an acoustically treated room using custom GIK acoustic panels. I mix using a single avantone mix cube, two Sceptre S8 studio monitors, and DT 990 Pro headphones. My monitors and mix cube sit on isoacoustic stands for isolation from my desk. For recording I use a Lauten Atlantis Microphone into a 500 series neve pre amo with a DBX eq and compressor following, all into pro tools. I then do my work in the box. All cables re mogami gold.

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: Derek Ali and Dr. Dre are my favorite mix engineers when it comes to hip hop. They have simple refined work flows with incredibly strong fundamentals. They bring power to every song they work on and have incredible taste for how a song should sound.

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: I spend much of my time recording and working to get them the takes they want for their song. I then primarily do mixing and mastering for their songs as well as my own.