Producing...Different Strategy?

[edwards1257]

I'm new to music production, EDM specifically, and I feel like I'm going upon it in a totally wrong way. Right now I'm currently writing the music WHILE EQing and mixing. My tracks just aren't sounding professional this way whatsoever.

I'm curious to how those who've been producing for a while go upon producing a track? Do you write the track first? Without any EQ, compression, etc. etc. and then mix? Because my current approach does not seem to be showing any quality results.

I would really appreciate some feed and tips, thanks.

[Linear Phase]

I don't think there are any rules really. You have pro's and cons no matter which way you do it. Anyways, a lot of eq, and compression, can actually be part of sound design, or yah, you can mix as you go along.

I suppose since we are talking, "edm," than the mix as you go along thing is really not so odd.


My guess is why your tracks aren't sounding is professional is, "you are new to music production." It takes about ten years to learn this stuff. That's assuming you practice your ass off.

I'm sure your favorite producers have been producing for like twenty years

[timothyallan]

Yup, practice for 5-10!

Also, mixing as you go along is fine

[edwards1257]

Thanks, I appreciate your guys' inputs!

[memes_33]

my strategy is different- i really need to separate the creation/arrangement process and the mixing process or i have a really hard time finishing anything. i will do some rough mixing during creation/arrangement, but i usually turn whatever i've done off before mixing.

i even go to the extreme of mixing in reaper instead of live. when i feel the arrangement is 'done', i will turn off any eq/compression i've put on the tracks, turn each track up individually so that they don't clip, then bounce every track. i'll import into reaper and start mixing. of course, if i need to fix anything in the arrangement, i have to re-bounce, but that motivates me just finish the thing unless the arrangement change is absolutely necessary.

i have found this process helps me finish mixes faster.

[trevox]

Agree that experience is the key.

I find that while I may add eq or dynamics to channels as I go along, you generally don't know exactly where something is going to sit in the mix until you are at the mixing stage. For instance, you are not going to know what frequencies you may need to cut from a channel because they are clashing with some other channel causing muddiness etc. So for me, it's a combination of both - make things sound nicer as you go along and use that as a starting point when you are truly ready to mix you track. Oh, and whatever about mixing as you go along, I would certainly advise not having any EQ/dynamics on your master channel until you are happy with the mix itself. Even then (unless you are mastering yourself), you should leave that stuff up to a mastering engineer.

[Psychoactive_Music]

something ive discovered lately which has hugely helped me might help work flow and ease cpu usage.

Basically I used to just add midi tracks and freeze them once I was happy. some tracks I side chained others i didnt want or need to but eventually I would always reach a point where nothing is left acceptable to freeze but the side chained tracks trip out the cpu.

Now I dont freeze anything. once I'm happy with a track I create a fresh audio track , then record the midi into the audio track and deactivate the midi clips which are now in audio. This way almost everything is audio from start to finish. instead of saving my patch and creating new parts on new midi tracks by reloading patches and then trying to remember how i had the fx set up , the midi tracks are still in tact because the clips unused are deactivated. This way I can also re activate clips, edit them, then re record to another new audio track.

I hope this makes sense and might help someone who was working the way I used to

[invol]

I agree with memes_33. Though, I will add EQ, Compression, Reverb, and other effects as I write and arrange, but only for sound design or composition purposes, not "Mixing." I focus on making sure the sounds are good in the first place and that the instrumentation is well designed. When the arrangement is done, then I go back through the track to do a real mix - which is thinking about the whole as much, if not more, than the parts.