How difficult is mixing really?

[The Pezman]

So I've been around here for over a year, trying to pick up the basic of remixing. I've been very busy, so the time I've spent has not been a huge amount. I hear tales of remixers who spend months and months fine tuning their mixes and getting things just right. So I naturally assumed that remixing involved dedicating a lot of time.

But then I found out a guy I know here at school has actually been using FL Studio for a couple of years and had made a good number of songs. But when I sat him down to grill him on everything he knew, it seemed his knowledge was pretty limited. "I just load up the default samples and play around until it sounds good." He didn't know what an LFO was. I asked him how long it usually took him to make a song. "Well, most of them are pretty short, like two minutes, so between one and two hours." What really confused me about all this is that his songs sound good, much better than I'd been led to believe they'd sound when spending the amount of time he indicated on them.

Before anyone insinuates otherwise, I'm pretty sure he does actually do all this himself. His girlfriend mentioned how often he's on his computer using the program. And his personality isn't the type that would lead me to believe he'd be interested in pulling such a massive scam.

[zircon]

I don't think it's possible to generalize about it. It really is completely different for every person. It has a lot to do with how inspired you are, how fluent you are with your software, how fast your computer is, how good you are at production, what source tune you're doine, what genre you're working in... it's as easy or hard as you make it. It's not any harder or easier than making music in general.

[The Pezman]

True, but just think about the sheer logistics of it. This guy isn't stupid, but he doesn't seem like an FL Studio supergenius either. I guess I'm trying to understand what usually is and should be involved with making a mix. Would you, who's been doing this for years and years, feel confident saying you could make something like what he did in two hours?

[Moseph]

So I've been around here for over a year, trying to pick up the basic of remixing. I've been very busy, so the time I've spent has not been a huge amount. I hear tales of remixers who spend months and months fine tuning their mixes and getting things just right. So I naturally assumed that remixing involved dedicating a lot of time.

But then I found out a guy I know here at school has actually been using FL Studio for a couple of years and had made a good number of songs. But when I sat him down to grill him on everything he knew, it seemed his knowledge was pretty limited. "I just load up the default samples and play around until it sounds good." He didn't know what an LFO was. I asked him how long it usually took him to make a song. "Well, most of them are pretty short, like two minutes, so between one and two hours." What really confused me about all this is that his songs sound good, much better than I'd been led to believe they'd sound when spending the amount of time he indicated on them.

Before anyone insinuates otherwise, I'm pretty sure he does actually do all this himself. His girlfriend mentioned how often he's on his computer using the program. And his personality isn't the type that would lead me to believe he'd be interested in pulling such a massive scam.

A couple tricks, if you want to call them that, are in use here which I think are what allow him to compose so fast:

--- He loops a lot of material. This cuts down drastically on the amount of music that needs to be written. A lot of his musical variation comes from automating parameters on the synths rather than composing new material.

--- There tend to be fairly few instrumental layers, which also cuts down on the work needed.

--- He's using only synths -- he doesn't have to struggle to record something just right, or figure out how to make the best use of mediocre samples, or figure out how the heck to write for a French horn.

--- I assume that he views his music making as basically a fun hobby rather than anything really serious, and I would expect that this would make him less hung up on the labor-intensive OMG DOES THIS SOUND ABSOLUTELY PERFECT? aspect and more inclined to just make stuff and show it to others without worrying so much about it.

[The Pezman]

Thanx. That's good info. I think he and I will be working together on a music project so hopefully I'll learn enough to do what he does.

[DDRKirby(ISQ)]

What really confused me about all this is that his songs sound good

Am I the only one who noticed that the first 3 songs are instantly recognizable as built-in FL demo songs? o_o;;;

[Smenelian]

Edit: damn you DDRKirby, beat me to it.

And I think it's perfectly reasonable for a person who knows their way around the program and knows a little about arrangement to be able to crank out tracks like that in a couple hours.

[DDRKirby(ISQ)]

Yea, to actually contribute something more helpful:

-amount of time spent usually has a direct correlation with quality of a mix. this doesn't mean that it's horrible to churn out some quick mixes (they're fun!!!) but it means that people's best works are usually the ones they spend the most time on. (...which is logical, no?)

more importantly,

-ease with which musical ideas come to me varies, a LOT. sometimes I sit down and work with some little ditty and nothing comes out of it, =ever=, so it goes in the eternal bin of unfinished projects. On the other hand, once I get something good going, usually things start to fall into place really quickly and it's almost like I can't stop finding more stuff to do with it.

Of course, most important of all is the fact that every individual mixer has his or her own workflow and style. Up to you to determine what works best. Are you the kind of person who likes to have a general outline of a mix in mind already before ever opening up your sequencer? Or do you start with tweaking synths and figure out what kind of cool sounds you want to use? Or maybe you have a particular chord progression in mind?

Also, making "decent stuff" gets a lot easier once you've got experience under your belt. The first few mixes can take what seems like ages because not only are you figuring out how to actually make the music, but you're also confused at which knobs do what and which window is supposed to represent which section of the audio flow. Later on as you get comfortable with the sequencer itself you discover neat little timesaving tricks and shortcuts that make the process easier. And of course, you find how to "make stuff sound good".

gluck (b^^)b

[OverCoat]

How difficult is mixing really?

It's actually really easy when all you've got is synths and samples, but once you incorporate live instruments and other recorded things it just gets URGH

and that's why I make minimal techno

[Escariot]

Ahahah!

lol @ Boltz

lol @ Laser Tap

[Palpable]

Not knowing a lot of techniques can make your songs a lot quicker to complete, at least in my experience. When I first started out on FL Studio, my first few songs actually sounded pretty good and usually took only a few hours each. What I did was use the best quality samples FL came with, combined with default presets, in the best ways I could. You can make some very good sounding stuff just with that. But the thing is it almost certainly doesn't sound like you want it to.

As time went on, I figured out a million different things you can do in FL Studio, added on lots of new plug-ins, and now it takes me a month or two to complete a track. What do I have to show for it? My songs sound a lot closer to what I want them to... though still not perfect.

Yeah, sometimes I wonder if I shouldn't have just stuck with the first method of making songs.

[Harmony]

Not knowing a lot of techniques can make your songs a lot quicker to complete, at least in my experience. When I first started out on FL Studio, my first few songs actually sounded pretty good and usually took only a few hours each. What I did was use the best quality samples FL came with, combined with default presets, in the best ways I could. You can make some very good sounding stuff just with that. But the thing is it almost certainly doesn't sound like you want it to.

Exactly. Sounding good isn't really that difficult these days, but getting an idea from your head, into the computer, and out the speakers is where the trouble and skill is at.

So generally when I say something like "this mix took me 3 months," after the first couple of weeks or so most people would probably say that the WIP sounds "good." Why the additional time? The last 10 weeks are spent fine-tuning details (big and small) that make the mix sound as close to what I imagine as possible.

[statas]

another thing to consider is that sometimes ppl won't tell you the whole truth about making music. some ppl are very possessive about their tips and techniques.(see twin,aphex)

[Palpable]

The last 10 weeks are spent fine-tuning details (big and small) that make the mix sound as close to what I imagine as possible.

Hah, this is so true. And not only that, but your returns become less and less as you spend more time, like a logarithmic function. Sometimes I'll spend hours trying to get something sounding marginally better. But I suppose that's the only way anyone can ever improve.

[Yoozer]

The words "mixing" and "remixing" are not completely interchangeable.

[Hausdog]

Often I'll forget how I wanted a piece of music to sound. That REALLY sucks.

Also, I'd rather have the computer be able to read my mind perfectly than put all the notes in and come up with a "decent" approximation of what I wanted, even if the approximation is better. It's SO much more artistically fulfilling getting what you ENVISION down rather than something close that sounds better.

[Escariot]

Often I'll forget how I wanted a piece of music to sound. That REALLY sucks.

Also, I'd rather have the computer be able to read my mind perfectly than put all the notes in and come up with a "decent" approximation of what I wanted, even if the approximation is better. It's SO much more artistically fulfilling getting what you ENVISION down rather than something close that sounds better.

That's why you make it sound like what you want it to sound like. Otherwise, find a live performing group that you can explain it to.

[Flexstyle]

For me, I started out looping stuff in ACID, and while the songs certainly had some "cool" factor to them (and I was a decent looper so they sounded ok too), they certainly weren't very close to what I really wanted. I was more arranging stuff than anything else. Each song only took me a little while (1-3 hours), because all I was doing was pasting loops all over the place. No effects even.

Then I discovered FL, and it kinda just "clicked" for me as far as the basic workflow went, but I was still clueless as to how to use most of the effects. I just found something that sounded good and then tried to find a neat preset. I went that direction for a while but I was starting to learn about VSTs and VSTi-s, and that broadened my sound choices.

Next I started learning some basic synth programming and also how the various compressors, flangers, distortions, etc actually WORKED so I knew what it was I was doing when I was turning the knobs.

I now consider myself a fairly decent producer, but at the same time I'm continually getting better at what I do. Also now I have more opportunities to branch out and explore new techniques, since I know what I'm doing.

This is all in the span of about two years, but I have had some fairly extensive musical and technical training even before I started on the computer. Hence I've got more of an "ear for things" than many people might.

If you're just getting started on (re)mixing, I'd recommend just trying out presets, see which ones you like, maybe see what happens when you turn a knob or a slider. That's a lot of how I learned too..."what does this button do?"

Also a big part is look at other demo projects 'n stuff and see how other people did their thing. I learned a lot from the crew at Silexz-Studios.com forums since there's a ton of FL Zip files floating around there. Tutorials on various techniques, as well as just songs people have made available in the FL format. There's many places on the web where stuff like this is available.

Mixing is not difficult once you know how. However, learning how to get it right can take a while or not, depending on how much of and "ear for things" you've got. I'd say stick at it, it's a heck of a lot of fun!

[Argle]

The better you get at mixing the longer it actually takes because you get obsessive-compulsive.

[dannthr]

I guess "GOOD" is a subjective term.

His music SOUNDS like half hour to an hour jobs.

I've been in and out of the electronica world, I've spent an hour on an 8 minute track and I've spent 6 hours on half a minute.

When I'm specific and detailed, it takes longer.

Arranging for a full orchestra takes that much longer, programming realistic performances also takes longer.

What this guy does SHOULDN'T take long.

[Zephyr]

Edit: damn you DDRKirby, beat me to it.

And I think it's perfectly reasonable for a person who knows their way around the program and knows a little about arrangement to be able to crank out tracks like that in a couple hours.

Definitely reasonable since all he would need to do is his the "export to mp3" button after loading up the appropriate demo song.

[tweed]

That's one of the biggest mistakes you could make. Most people love the more simple tunes with a clear and steady beat. Anything additional is for audiophiles like ourselves who take notice. A truly simple melody and bottom line will carry further and have a tendency to become stuck in people's heads. One thing I like to do is hum the song for a while, or play it back in my head and see how catchy it is. So the key is: Don't over think! =)

[The Pezman]

Thanx guys. I understand this whole workflow thing a hell of a lot better now.

Course, I still need to get even as far as presets and loops...

[DDRKirby(ISQ)]

Course, I still need to get even as far as presets and loops...

or you could always bypass those completely =PPP

[V___]

And not only that, but your returns become less and less as you spend more time, like a logarithmic function

You have become my favorite person on this forum for that line

I've found that I'l usually work on 6-7 songs at once: I'l write down the meat of all the songs in around 2-3 weeks, and then keep working on it occasionally for the next while to get it to where I want. Sometimes it backfires and I get sick of hearing the same songs over and over and never quite getting there, and so I scrap all of em out of frustration, but usually I enjoy hearing the halflife of the imperfections in my songs.

I guess its just what you want to take from the music your writing, wether its for show or sale, pride or popularity, expression or entertainment, cliche or cliche, etc or etc....