I'm older than Rick and have been producing, writing and running a studio for over 40 years.I've built 3.5 studios and done about 500 cassette, vinyl and CD albums over the years. It took me many years to learn what Rick is sharing.I agree with all his teaching. He's fast tracking many young people with invaluable info that you won't always even get at these schools where you'll pay 40k. As an aside, I joined a band in 1976 that did Kid Charlemagne. I already had a good ear from piano. viola and choir boy experience. I had that solo nailed and love hearing Rick play it. I also learned some great Joni Mitchell tunings and Little Feat tunes. Best regards to Rick who is a true treasure. I'd love to meet for Coffee if you have time one of these days. I've been collecting vintage gear for 40 years.

Weak and Powerless is one of my favorite songs, and that example of how it’s a bass feature but a kick *heavy* song was a real game changer for how i think about low end. rick, your channel is literally one of the best channels of all time.

This is the first video I've ever seen on the nuts and bolts of recording, mixing and producing. It is an important video and one that should be highly appreciated by anyone trying to make it in the industry. I think it's great that you try to give people the knowledge and tools to be successful. Thank you Rick.

Rick please do How to get KILLER mastering episode, talking about the loudness wars,PEAK, RMS and LUFS !! I extremely appreciate this mixing episode.

This helped me alot to grasp what mixers do to many different genres of music . I just like how it's all about presence and clarity. Learning from Rick is Golden!

Thank you Professor Beato. Many times while watching I feel like I am attending a lecture in school. Take notes to get all the good stuff. My mixes are steadily improving. So much so that I have put off my album release multiple times, because I am still discovering better methods to record and mix. It is really challenging when you are the composer, play all the instruments, producer, mixer and do the mastering. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

Thanks Rick, I’ve learned so much from you over the last 12 months. This, like all your other videos are great! Thank you for being such a wealth of knowledge 🤟🏼🤟🏼

Loved this one! As a session player of 40 years this has tons of "secret" information everyone can benefit from.

Rick, you tell it like it is. Learned more in this video than watching stuff like Mixing with the Masters. Grabbed the Beato Book last week and chewing through it. Cheers!

What is so enigmatic about the process of mixing is that it is an individual art, however, there are guidelines that are the standard to creating clarity and placement of instruments. It is so interesting and eye opening to see the thoughts of other musicians about the process. I have some of my own recordings that I have done from my home, but I will say this, "There is nothing better than an excellent original signal." If you have an ear for quality and more importantly an ear for harsh tones, I think you might be on the same page with me in realizing what you can get out of an instrument live. This live "take" might "make or break" your recording. MAN... the more I watch Rick Beato's videos the more I have confidence in what he is saying. It is time well spent.

Wow Rick, mixing my first rock album and your eq, compression, and mixing videos are helping me immensely.

Thank you Rick!!! I have been prnting mixes through an L2 limiter and your comments here about riding faders is something I also heard Andy Wallace say. The advice you gave on leaving headroom for the mastering engineer and riding faders on tom fills, guitars, etc was the missing piece that took my game to the next level, GRATITUDE!!!

Rick, you are awesome dude. If the music industry were ran by guys like you, the standard of music would be held in such a high regard.

Wow! Thanks for filling in so many blanks for me. So dead-on ...answering the important mix questions here. Hats off!

Loved this video. I'd usually look for information with sonic examples. But this was super explanatory and I could relate what you explained to situations I've had to face lately. Thank you so much!

Awesome stream Rick! Thanks for sharing all this valuable information with us. Hope you have a great time in Germany.

Excellent info Rick. I learned a bunch and you reinforced some good habits that I already have. Thank you SO MUCH for sharing your incredible knowledge. Your book and merchandise are on my short list.😀

Great vid Rick. I’m following most of what you talked about. Thanks for bringing these videos.

Always a great experience and source of knowledge on how all this sound stuff works.

Thanks... i'll be soon in the mixing process of the first album of my band, so this is very helpful to know what to ask for how to make me understand.

Great show... bought the Beato Book too and love it. Thanks for what you do!

Great video as usual, thanks for the mixing tips Rick.

I love this idea drums come to centre concept and your arms waving in front.. I went to a talk where all 3 producers recommend co-axial pair overheads if you want glistening stereo for drums (at the time I was spreading them wide across my room at the time), its so much more together in the bass even if hard panned out to get a stereo treble in your headphones.

Such a boss man! Thank you for your brilliant insights to mixing!

Man, I’ve been watching loads of your videos. So interesting and inspiring. I’m exactly (almost) your age, a drummer/producer, and identify with many of your observations. Having that said, being a drummer/producer I work in a single room, no control. So I many times leave the phase checking for after the recording. Aspecialy today when you have relative phase plugins to fix phase cancelation issues I find it convenient and it helps my workflow. Would love to hear your take on this comment. Great stuff, both you’re channels. Cheers

Always amazes me how you read the comments while providing in depth technical information.

Thanks for this, Rick. I bought the 1.0 and fot 2.0 upgrade of your book ;). I rememeber there's a video where you go oever the different frequencies of instruments in a mix. I'm going to look for it. But you might want to make a series where you go over the mixing basics (panning, where instruments lives, tips and tricks to have each instrument not lose its soul, thanks !)

A lot of people think that it doesn't matter where the bass instruments are placed as I was once told by a lecturer that it is near impossible to locate where the bass is coming from, although when the class talked about this we realised he was kinda wrong as in a live setting, going with his logic, could be problematic. Great video not sure if anyone will read this as this video is 4 years old now. Just reminded me of that lecturer who was definitely the biggest know it all. Love your content Rick keep up the great work :)

A tonne of information here, so valuable. Thanks Rick!

I love getting whatever tips I can get from you, you're truly a talented musician and producer. I wish you would make some videos where you deconstruct the stems from different songs to show how they have been produced, that would be extremely informative

And this is a super helpful episode, as always. Thank you!

The low end shelving is a must. So many people do not understand the concept of subtractive EQ. I was taught by a great teacher Fred Catero. He would always ask why are you boosting the EQ .

Thanks Rick appreciate your help and your shared experience!

As always another great video Rick!

love from hamburg. watching one of your videos before almost every studio session

Thank you for sharing all of this information. It's immensely helpful. Cheers.

I've been mixing for a while now and Ricky is the man , learn from the great man.

I Love this song, heard it hundreds of time. I am amazed the bass is so sparse!! It's not thumping except in the Ah Mater section. The vocals are so interesting as an arrangement themselves. 💯

Between -12 and -9dBfs i think is a good peak level for mixdowns to aim for, providing enough headroom for mastering without being too quiet.

Man don’t you just fkn love Rick? I swear to hell, I would pay for a Rick channel with helpful stuff he gives us. I would consider myself to be a fairly expert musician and Rick is always finding some new things to teach us in various ways.

You’re a very good and concern teacher, love your lectures

Thank you very much for sharing your knowledge and experience.

Thank you Ricky, we definitely find some pearls here to implement in our work. Regards from Cornwall

Thank you Rick for your very informative content!!!!

I learned so much here, thank you Rick.

A lot of great advice, Rick! Thank you!

Currently composing/sequencing/producing a midi orchestral theme song for my friend's web series. This video's guidance is perfectly timed...even two and a half years later! Thank you so much...once again!

Very helpful video. Appreciate your insights.

Rick , you’re great. Thank you!

I'm learning metal guitar playing and recording and this video was helpful! I'll add a sub to my studio asap!

I watched this a few years ago. It still holds up today, Rick (07/07/24). The only thing some might still disagree on is sample rate/bit rate.

Fantastic video, lots of good stuff here!

If you’ve had experience in tracking and mixing screaming, can you either make a video or give me advice on how to mix screamed/growled metal vocals? Thank you.

Just commenting to push this video forward. Love this Rick thank you.

Hi Rick, awesome video as usual. I would like if you could maybe do one specific about vocals?, it seems for me it is the hardest part of the mix, maybe because it's my own voice I mix so it makes me be too self-conscious, but also maybe talk about doubling vocals to make them thicker, is it always necessary or should it just come from good tracking? I've tried the typical "thickening trick" doubling tracks and varying pitch and delay, but I think I prefer mixing different takes. When there are lyrics it should all be mixed in support of the voice, so... Cheers bro.

Hey Rick! It'd be great if you could make a video about what kinds of music I should listen to, and what I should listen for when I'm listening. A lot of the time I just like to try and hear intervals, but I think that maybe there's a better way to improve my ears while listening? Perhaps just focusing in and listening for certain modes? Share your secrets please!!

Great video, great info! Loved it!

Dude your videos are in alignment with my life. I am trying to master the tracks im recording.

-18db is where you want your tracks at if your converters are aligned at -18dbfs. You need to know what your converters are aligned at to know what RMS level you should be shooting to record your tracks at. If your converters are aligned at -18dbfs that equals 0dbvu in analog. You do this so that if you use outboard gear it lines up good and that’s the sweetspot of your converters. Or lower!!! That way you don’t have to pull down all your tracks in the mix… Also, everything just works out if your tracks are right around where your converters are aligned at RMS.

Props on the LOW frequencies in the center. Try listening to a track with low frequencies off center with headphones and you feel like one side of your head is heavy and you don't walk straight anymore :) For heavy metal I record two identical takes of the rhythm guitar and put each take 100% in opposite ears, I also double any distorted chord phrases with a bright acoustic if I need some extra fullness. The problems I have with this is sometimes I can crowd out the vocals, so its a balance. But it makes the guitars sound MASSIVE

About the dynamics in the performances, AC/DC is all about that. One of my favourite examples are the Malcolm Young isolated guitar tracks, especially Let There Be Rock in the last solo. Night Prowler is my favourite whole song example.

Using the pcm 92 lexicon reverb and pcm 42 delay a lot lately, have you used those in any techniques? Loving your channel! Great work

Regarding listening in mono, I always put a multi-meter on the stereo output and check the correlation. Also, not many people listen to AM radio anymore :)

Hi Rick! Big fan here, love your videos... I have a question about always place low frequency instruments centered: What do you think of Mac Demarco? In many songs of his albums "Mac Demarco 2", "Another One" and "Salad Days" you can perfectly hear the drums and bass hard panned to different sides, something very rare... Said this, keep doing amazing stuff, and again, thank you for share all this amazing and valuable knowledge!

Regarding HP filter to remove uneccessary low end - If you have a spectrum analyser built into your EQ, like the Fabfilter Pro-EQ, then it's easy to set the high pass filter. Just find the frequency of the fundamental (where the lowest frequency energy peak is), and set a 12dB/oct HP filter at one octave below that point. This will minimize the change to the sound of the instrument.

Great tips and entertaining info, thanks! :)

YOU MAKE GREAT WORK FOR PEOPLE WHO WANT TO KNOWS HOW THEY FIND BAND'S WHAT LISTEN TO YOUNG PEOPLE

Great Album Mer de Noms as well. Lots of love. three Libras wow! Paslin Lenchantin fantastic.

A lot of mixes pre 1970 panned drums, including kick drum, to one side. But it's true, you rarely hear bass off-center. And bass drums used to be recorded with less bass. Now it's common for kick to sit below the bass in the mix

Extreme's album Waiting for the Punchline is a good example of an open mix, sounds like there is lots of room in that mix, but doesn't lose its dynamic (don't know who the producer was on that album)

Great video Rick!

Thanx for letting us know what a magic a/b platform mixer is. Apart from the fact that you always do sick posts.

"Big Mono" - That's a really good way of putting it! I've heard beginner bedroom producers just doubling up on the same synth patch and asking why it doesn't sound big and fat like they want it. And I'm there telling them "you're just layering up the exact same thing on top of itself, all that does is make it twice as loud"! You need to vary the phase and the tone, modulate parameters, get smart with your panning and EQ, to sculpt and carve out space for each sound in the "nix" lol. Nice one Rick, thanks for all the deadly advice!

Rick you're the best! I think the "hostility" comment came from your responses to seemingly basic questions about audio engineering. This type of video assumes the viewer has a root knowledge or recording and mixing. If they don't have that, these tips will likely be lost on them anyway..

Any plans on writing a book on basic mixing? PLEASE

Great stuff as always! Never hostile. - Faithfull follower watching from the north of Norway.

would have liked to hear about bus compression settings!

I'd be interested to see how you structured your session notes. I've read the book where George Martin collaborated with the Beatles to produce a detailed record of every track. Who sang what. What gear they used. What effect. pre-fader, post fader, settings. Tea leaves to read in case you had to go back to any point in any track and redo them or change them. What was your system?

Hey respect for the tremendous content.., i'm kind of a rhythm nut and see it as being the key that unlocks a song. In Don't Dream It's Over i was surprised to hear a flam throughout. Perhaps an exception to the rule.

Awesome video again RB. Do you have a song or songs you can recommend as a fantastic Rock - Pop/Rock mix reference track? Something new or old that holds up no matter what speakers you listen to it on? With real drums would be great!

Very useful info. Thanks

You sound fine Rick mate. Love your teaching .

if it translates on a phone its good, i use a mix bus compressor, and a pulltech eq, very slight use, it brings the mix alive, learned from a warren huart video , but it can be over done easily , so only slight eq and compression

I understand that sidechaining the bass can sound like a pumping sound but I found in a work around to that. You double the track and only use it on one of them and blend them together. It's really bailed me out on some tracks to help them play nice together. I keep hearing side-chaining is not necessary but in my experience it's really bailed me out on some mixes after trying everything else and trying to carve bass out with EQ. Carving too much means you are lowering volume of the bass throughout the entire song, which is bad because then you are losing some stuff that you can keep most of the time that only dips when the kick does a kick - and I don't even notice the dip at all. Sounds good to me. I will say that you have to properly compress the bass first, and use exactly, and I mean exactly the right compressor for each job, using multiple types, for what they are best at like opto for some of it, VCA for some of it, etc., and I put tons of work into that - I mean tons. So I'll bet without the prep work, the sidechaining might make more of a noticeable effect. I'm just saying it's worked for me really well if you do it carefully. If you raise something like 1db too high it's all off. It's one of those things you have to be very precise with.

Loved this one!!!

Very helpful tips.

Great info. Thank you!

Your videos are Gold 🥇

Such a good video. So much great advice from a seasoned pro. Thanks! And to the guy who got so offended about mixers taking phones in to account: Music is a business, and if you deliberately don't take your biggest listening demographic in to account you're just being stubborn and foolish.

Awesome video mate :)

You mentioned Led Zep, and it's interesting that Zep II was mastered by the famous Bob Ludwig at Sterling mastering labs, and they would center the bass tones on those Lp's IN THE BASS FREQUENCIES, even if the mids were panned or off center for that particular instrument... but the original master used for Zep II was not allowed to exist but for maybe a week or two before they were recalled. I was kicked off of a record selling site for telling the truth on this, as I interviewed Bob Ludwig some years back for the straight scoop. It seems that Page and Eddie Kramer both were fans of Bob's work and asked him if he could literally make those grooves smoke with signal and full bass, as they were mastering kick and bass tones down to 40hz, something that a lot of groups shied away from in 1969... Bob aimed to please... and the record was a huge hit, immediately, and people bought it in droves, one of which was Ahmet Erdegan's daughter, who was playing it in her room on literally a "mickey mouse" turntable... you know, the little plasticky kids turntables, with no tracking and a glorified NAIL for a stylus... and noticed the needle jumping off the record on parts of "whole Lotta love"! He checked for returns and found that in some markets, there were high rates of returns for skipping... this was likely due to the fact that they express mailed out the press plates to certain plants and each plate at the time, was hand made according to notes taken by the mastering engineer... so each plate made for the plants was hand made, one at a time, each progressively hotter and hotter until they ran out of space on the disc, so each master plate is slightly different, but all very nice and SUPER HOT in sound... so... in a few markets, there may have been a really HOT one, depending on which plant was closest... but Ahmet did a complete recall of all the pressings out at that time (which were arguably the best pressings ever made in Rock up to that moment) instead of asking Bob for a milder master, which would have been no problem, and they were the kings of mastering at that tome... but instead used his own in-house mastering and a copy of the cassette/8 track tape master that sterling had made them with extremely compressed dynamics and limited high end and bass!!! Bob was incensed! And so was the band, but couldn't do much about it at that time. But if you find a "real copy" you'll notice that there's literally less than a 1/4" of dead wax on either side, and some mighty deep grooves! Also you'll see R Ludwig or RL on one or more sides, and the Sterling stamp, which means they made the plates (there were a few made by his partner Lee Hulko, from his notes, and the argument I had with these 'collectors' was that those are still the hot master, which they are. They were made on the same machine to the same specs, and though RL made all of the original plates, Hulko supplied a few replacements when the pressing plants blew out one occasionally.) Now those original mastered versions fetch as much as $500... but be sure to play them before you sell. Check for groove wear and skipping, because the punchy pressing was indeed a few years ahead of its time, but only because the average youngster that bought them wasn't quite up to date or even in at the mid-fi level of playback equipment... and in many instances, were even what one could only call "mickey mouse"... lol

I make orchestral metal a lot, and I typically keep the double bass, contrabassoon, tuba, and timpani near the center. 20% or less

"Magic AB" really is a game changer ...also "Auto Align" for getting perfect phase alignment when multi-mic-ing instruments

Old video so I dunno if Rick will respond but hrre goes anyway: what are your tips for mixing a dense but lush genre like Shoegaze? How do you pan the effects? Do you add effects via plug ins to a dry guitar? How do you layer sounds? Mic placements? Etc

Someone below probably already wrote it below, but as an orchestral bassist, the celli and basses are usually stage left. (One conductor in Brazil put us stage right, and I've been lined center behind everyone while under another conductor.) If stage left, the mix would put us a bit right as if watching from the audience.

Great insight, thank you...

Rick,you are the one!

Hi Rick, you mentioned that you should choose between a bass driven track or kick drum driven track, but I like a lot guys like Umek or Boris Brejcha and they have a heavy kick drum with a lot of bass, songs like Purple Noise by Boris Brejcha or Hard Times by Umek would be some examples, thank you for all the info by the way!

It would be interesting to hear your comments regarding the way The Beatles and Rolling Stones records were mixed. I am especially interested in the solo era of John Lennon . For example , the mix of John Lennon’s album “ Imagine “ and “ Double Fantasy “. John seemed to like a lot of panning on the Imagine album . The mix of Double Fantasy was much different. It’s more modern with a fascinating mix of multiple vocal tracks of John’s voice and the background vocals . Thank you for your consideration , I’ve been enjoying your show on You Tube.

Oh and another classic LP that had off center bass on first pressings was TIME OUT by Brubeck... but only the early 6 eye pressings. They skipped like crazy, since they were full frequency and very hi-fi... on Take Five, the little drum solo in the middle, all in the right channel... with the fill punctuated with a ff kick drum, sent even the best turntables a couple grooves back in time... so it truly was "time out"! Lol