Production · · 7 min
10 Mixing Mistakes Every New Producer Makes
Loud master bus, no reference tracks, soloing forever. Fix these ten and your mixes jump a level.
Every producer has a folder full of mixes they never released. The cause is almost always the same ten mistakes — committed in a slightly different order each time.
1. Crushing the master bus before the mix is done. The loudness war ends at mastering. If your mix only sounds good with a limiter clamping 8dB of gain reduction, the mix isn't done. Bypass the bus compressor and work the balance until it holds without help.
2. No reference tracks. Your ears adapt. After forty minutes in a session, your brain starts calling 'normal' whatever you've been listening to. Load three commercial releases in the same key as your track and A/B constantly. Your low end and stereo width will thank you.
3. Soloing instruments to mix them. A kick that sounds huge in solo can disappear in context. Everything in music exists in relationship. Mix in context, always.
4. Over-EQing. The instinct when something sounds wrong is to add. Cut first. Find the frequency that's causing the problem and notch it out. You'll use far less processing and get a more open sound.
5. Panning without intention. A centred mix sounds narrow. A thoughtlessly panned mix sounds random. Think about the physical space of the arrangement — where would each instrument stand on a stage?
6. Ignoring phase relationships. When kick and bass fight, it's often a phase issue, not a frequency one. Flip the phase on one, compare, pick whichever has more low energy.
7. Mixing in mono. Stereo is a trick. The mono mix is the truth. If your mix falls apart in mono, your stereo enhancement is masking arrangement problems.
8. No gain staging. Levels matter before the DAW channel strip. If your inputs are hitting -6dBFS on average and you're pushing channels hard to compensate, you're adding distortion at every stage.
9. Reverb on everything. One or two well-placed reverbs tied to sends will always sound cleaner than individual reverb plugins on every track. Use parallel sends, roll off the low end on every reverb, and keep the mix tight.
10. Finishing nothing. The best mix skill is completing tracks. An imperfect mix you ship teaches you more than a perfect mix you abandon. Finish. Release. Repeat.
