Mixing | Session Bass

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

A: It must be the recording of the funeral doom metal band "Skepticism's" latest full length album "Companion". We recorded it at Sonic Pump Studios and the band had booked it for a week, so we had plenty of time to get all the material nicely laid down in a top quality space and with state of the art gear. The band's sound had several pecularities, that made the project particularly interesting: no bass player, the drumset included a 26 inch bass drum, no rack toms but two floor toms with a third extra big tom on the side that resembled more of a kick drum (I forget the proper name for it). We did track a bass guitar track but mostly the bass line was played by a synth pedal, which was reamped through a bass amp stack with a grindy distortion. A truly unique project that challenged me as an engineer that I really enjoyed working with, not to mention they were fun guys to work with. The same record ended up being chosen by the Rolling Stone magazine among the top 10 metal albums of 2021.

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

A: Maybe Tom Arraya whom I mentioned elsewhere or Ed Sheeran, since Iheard he's a great guy too. The thing is I highly value the content of character of the people I work with and really appreciate working with respectful people.

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

A: The classics: "Can this be edited out?" "Can it be fixed in the mix?" My answer: I'll do my best, but next time try to nail it in the recording phase. Or if I happen to be recording engineer: No, it has to be played again until we get it right.

Q: What are you working on at the moment?

A: Doing live mixing for a local ukulele band's summer tour called "Leipomo".

Q: Is there anyone on SoundBetter you know and would recommend to your clients?

A: I don't know anyone on this platform personally, I'm new here.

Q: Analog or digital and why?

A: I have to say analog simply due to the feel of turning actual knobs and the inspiration it brings. Though with the analog equipments digital counterpart you can get 99.9% identical results. The "real" differences in the end are only noticable with a very special listening system and a hyper obsessed analog proponent. The vast majority of listeners will barely hear any difference or won't bother.

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

A: I work by two principals: 1. To get your unique sound out and polished to 150%. 2. Your wants and needs for your music always come first.

Q: What do you like most about your job?

A: Experimenting and playing with the drum and bass tracks.

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

A: Way too many times customers ask the mix engineer to edit certain pieces are tune the vocals. It might be doable, but it's not the mix engineers job. It only tends to slow things down unnecessarily and causes extra stress due to the extra work, especially with tight deadlines.

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: How many songs do you have? How many tracks per song? Is the vocal tuning and editing done?

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

A: I am a mixing engineer, so please make sure you do the editing and vocal tuning before sending your audio files to me. Mane sure you have DI tracks of the bass and electric guitars just in case.

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

A: Two speakers, computer, ilok and a power source. That's all I need to mix commercial music.

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: I started off with the basic free online tutorials in 2014 to record my own demos. The first pahed course I attained in 2015 and soon started to work on my first commercial releases after that with the band I was playing in after that. I got into a media college programme to specialise in music production in 2017 and started getting great work opportunities. I've worked as a live sound engineer at many of my countries biggest music festivals (provinssi, ruisrock, porin jazz etc.) and at one of the most prolific recording studios of the country, sonic pump studios between 2018 and 2020.

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: Slammy, aggressive and solid.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Proper drum gating is the basis for a great drum mix. I highly recommend Oxford Drum Gate for that.

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

A: All kinds of heavy music, be it hardrock, death metal, doom or hardcore. I also have plenty of experience with folk and can nail a soft sound as well (or I could make a folk band 'slam' if that's what the band wants).

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: Nailing the bass tone, due to my background as a bass player. The proper tone has a grindy midrange complimenting the guitars and a nice fat low end (duh) that doesn't disappear when moving to higher notes.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: I aim to bring out the bands unique sound, and I pay extra sharp detail to it. I don't want to make the guitarist sound like that guitar rig or the drummer like this drum sample. No. Guitar rigs, drum samples and every other piece of equipment and technology are there to serve the artists and not the other way round that some engineers tend to do. If you abuse that formula you end up choking the artists identity.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: I check and clean up any audio tracks from unwanted noise, gate the drums and start mixing. I first get the raw drum tracks sounding as good as possible and then add complimenting samples (if needed). The rest of the mixing process goes very smoothly after the drums are complete.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I have a pair of Yamaha HS7W and a pair of Genelec 8010A active speakers. On my iMac computer I have Logic Pro X with plenty of plugins for mixing, and Studio One 4 for mastering. For bass reamping or session bass recording I've got a Darkglass microtubes 900 amp head, Tech 21 Sansamp bass driver DI, Warwick WA 400 amp head, Darkglass microtubes B3K pedal, and a Bass EQ pedal from Boss.

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

A: I would say Tom Arraya from Slayer. I'm not that moved by extraordinary talent, but rather by the attitude of famous musicians. Tom is a great example of a musician who has made, yet still seems to be very down to earth and treats other human beings respectfully. That is what I wish to show in customer service.

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

A: I mostly do recording and mixing, but mixing is my absolute favorite part of the process and is what I specialise in. Remote mixing ensures peaceful focus and therefore the best results.