Pro Tools Mixing Engineer

Audio Mastering and Online Audio Engineering school

2011-02-21T00:11:00.000-08:00

Audio Mastering and other updates

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged but I’m back. I’ve been extremely busy (thankfully) mixing while I’ve been trying to expand my studio to offer a greater depth of services. I’ve also been working to complete by mix engineer handbook as well as get the finishing touches together for my online audio mixing school. There were a few but significant technical hurdles to conquer in an effort to ensure that the clients experience would operate as smoothly and as quickly as possible. Beta testing soon.

I’m in the early stages of offering audio mastering as well as mixing services to my clients. I’ve been asked too many times to ignore the question any longer. I spent time researching mastering software that I could incorporate into my recording studio so I could take advantage of my analog gear as well as all of my hardware and my expansive plug-in collection. I’m comfortable with the balance I’ve struck.

I’ve also updated my pro tools rig to a Mac Pro with a dual 8-core processor with 12gig of ram as well as Pro Tools 9. There is always too much time spent converting from the old to the new, but it’s crucial that it’s done correctly. I had to update quite a few plugins and I had to go through all of them to ensure they worked properly, if at all. There were also a few quirky parts of the playback engine that I had to figure out.

I’ve been working with a lot of interesting independent artists lately who are not afraid to take chances and are making some bold musical statements. It’s an enjoyable time for music and an exciting time for me as I venture into the unfamiliar world of mastering. I’ve been mastering a bunch of EP’s and singles for itunes and a very big full cd live album release, my confidence growing with each project. While I’m extremely comfortable mixing, I’m getting there with my mastering abilities. I've attended hundreds of mastering sessions with George Marino, Tom Coyne, Bob Ludwig etc but I've never been in the seat. I'll hope that I can get my mastering chops close to my mixing chops. Stayed tuned!

Pro tools recording sessions

2010-06-05T18:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I’m back from England having finished 5 weeks of recording. It’s fair to say that pro tools/ daw’s has changed the way in which records are made forever. It’s been like this for a while but this record has point a fine point on this sentiment. Tempo has always been an issue when making records. What works live doesn’t always work on record. Natural timing pushes and pulls give recorded music it’s human feel. While locking everything to a grid is appropriate sometimes, it occasionally takes the heart out of a song. This was the biggest challenge on this project.

The producer and the band liked some sections of some songs to be locked solid to a grid, but other sections felt too stiff. We tried recording the songs at several tempos and then edited the sections together, each having it’s own tempo. But some songs still didn’t “feel” right. The answer came in the form of elastic audio. We averaged out the tempos, recoded the song to a click at one tempo and had the flexibility to change tempos of different sections using elastic audio until the song worked as a whole. While certain sections felt good at a specific tempo, but when the song played through some of the sections still needed to be tweaked just a bit to get the whole song to feel right. I’ll state the obvious by saying that this was inconceivable before daws/pro tools came along.

Also, some of the arrangements are huge with many layers of vocals and guitars that would have taken tons of bouncing down and comping to make room for further overdubs. We had the luxury of experimenting with varying arrangements thanks to the massive track count in pro tools. Being that I wasn’t sure if I would be the mix engineer for the project, I made sure that the tracks were cut n a way that would allow for maximum flexibility during the mix. The quick example is that I made sure to take a dry di signal on all of the guitars and bass for the purpose of re-amping. Being that I am indeed mixing the record I’m glad that I thought of the mix engineer when recording.

Having spent much of my time over the past years mixing, I had a pretty clear picture in my minds ear of how I though the record would sound when finished. By getting better at mixing, my recording engineer skills have also improved as well. I have a pretty good sense of how different instruments blend together in a mix so I’m able to record them in a way that facilitates the mixing process. Keeping the final mix in mind as I’m recording helps me tremendously when it comes time to mixing as I hope that when other engineers mix tracks that I’ve cut find that there is less damage control going on and just having fun with the balances and imaging.

Tracking Session

2010-05-03T04:07:00.000-07:00

For the past few weeks and for the next several I’m recording an Irish rock band of brothers in the English countryside in a barn converted into a studio, Angelic Studios, with Ali Shaheed Muhammed from A Tribe Called Quest producing. It’s a great combination of influences and it’s been quite fun with the usual long hours and a lot of laughs. The first challenge for me was to switch gears. The day before I hoped on a flight to this side of the pond I was mixing a Spanish artist that mashed up traditional flamenco with drum loops, samples and horn sections. It was a big gear shift to go from mix engineer, to recording engineer in a day, on a different continent, and vastly different styles. Having mixed and recorded both genres many times made the shift exponentially easier, but it’s a big change nonetheless. The focus of each is fairly different.

Recording and mixing are two half’s of the same brain. Mixing drains the creative side, and tracking the more technical side of my grey matter. My approach is to record with the final mix in mind. As the track takes shape, I try to hear the song finished while we’re overdubbing. I try to keep the final mix in my minds ear as each new layer s added. Microphone choice and placement are considerable when it comes to the overall sound of a record.

I started the tracking session out by creating a template in pro tools to use at the start of recording each new song, complete with input and output assignments as well as group assignments. The group assignments are crucial when doing multiple takes, which we were doing. I set up a group of all of the tracks that constituted the live tracks (drums, bass and guitar) and when it came time for a new take, I simply created a new playlist (with the group activated) on one instrument and all of the other tracks in the group added a new one as well. The file management can get a bit out of control when working with many takes, so careful attention is a necessity at all times. Sessions also get a bit messy as you start to overdub, so I make sure that I keep plenty of notes doth in the comments window and by scribbling on a pad as we go.

I’ll detail the sessions when I get back to NY. As always, it’s been yet another learning experience.

Update:Recording basic tracks w/the final mix in mind

2010-03-18T19:17:00.000-07:00

I recently had the pleasure of producing/recording/mixing a blues album for some very talented folks who happen to be friends of mine as well, The Tangiers Blues Band. The idea was simple, yet hardly original: Record an album in a day. We spoke about the technical aspects of recording, briefly. The idea was to set up and let them play. It is a blues records. And to me that meant not getting too precious about any of the technical details. I used 4 mics on the drums, one each on the guitars,lap/pedalsteel and bass with a pair on the B-3. Eleven mics were used on the whole record. It was tight to say the least but I think appropriate considering the genre. So tight that I had King, the singer/rhythm guitarist, set up in the hall.

: Tangiers Blues Band Tracking Session Set Up

I used no more than 14 tracks on any song. We recorded the entire album live in 4 hours. Some of the vocals were replaced and the harp had to be overdubbed (Harpist, Danny Clinch has a day gig in photography and he was busy shooting Eric Clapton the day we recorded). I knew in my minds ear exactly how I wanted the record to sound and I think I nailed it. I approached the recording with idea that a different mix engineer was going to mix it and I wanted to make it obvious what we were after. (I love getting tracks from great recording engineers because it makes mixing so much easier.) Whether or not others think it's a good recording is a matter of taste. But having a crystal clear picture in my minds ear before we started allowed me to set up quickly, get out of the way and let the boys make some noise. A similar approach should be used on every record you cut. It's unrealistic to cut a R&B record in a few hours, but a punk record? Hmmmmmm. A sample of what we accomplished is posted on my site, here.

Career Choices

2010-03-03T20:31:00.000-08:00

I’d like to start this post by having the readers ask themselves a question. How long of a career do you want as a mix engineer? It takes quite some time to become a good mixer and to build a resume. But to do so built on a single genre in my estimation will shorten your career. An engineers life cycle is “Who’s Tim Latham...Get me Tim Latham!!...Get me someone just like Tim Latham!!!…Who’s Tim Latham?” No matter how successful you become, there will be someone new who wants your gig. I highly recommend that you, the aspiring mix engineer, try to work on as many genres as possible.
This is a difficult task because as you become proficient and successful in a particular style, you’ll get more work in that style. This is not a bad thing, but a good situation. Success breeds success. Try to think a few years ahead and set goals. What might be popular today might not be popular a few years from now and your name will be connected with a fad that’s passed. It is a challenge to diversify, especially when considering the city in which you work. If it means taking a few low/no paying gigs on the side, take them. Take them and build your discography. Your mixes are your business cards. There have been very successful engineers that have had great, long lasting careers working in a single genre, but you can increase your odds by expanding your resume. The sad truth is that often your work as an engineer is often overshadowed by sales or lack of sales. There are mixers who get a lot of work based off the hits that they’ve been involved with, sometimes with less than stellar work. You might be a great engineer, but you might be overlooked (for a while) due to lack of sales.
I think that it’s even more important now to be diverse and competent in a wide range genres due to declining overall sales and even more importantly, because genres are being mashed together with great ease thanks to pro tools and daw’s in general.
You should strive to be a great mix engineer, not a great”___” engineer.

Recording basic tracks with the final mix in mind

2010-02-09T10:04:00.000-08:00

Notes On Recording

I recorded an album over this past weekend. Not just a single. Not only the basics. I recorded an entire album in a single day. I was contacted by some very talented friends about recording their newest blues record. I said great, let’s do it Saturday. The response was a bit doubtful but everyone was encouraged by the challenge. How can you record an album in a day, when some take months to complete? You have to prepare. The band knew the songs cold and I was somewhat familiar with the recording studio. The night before, we did a quick prep of the room, and showed the next day to make the final adjustments of the amp placements. I chose the proper mics for each instrument and placed them in a manner to get the best sound with the greatest amount of isolation. This is where my skills as a mix engineer came into play. Having spent years recording before I started spending the bulk of my time mixing records, I knew how to place everything in the room (it was a very small room) to achieve enough isolation. Having knowledge how the final record should sound before the first note was recorded I knew I would get a great recording under less than ideal conditions. Having this image in my minds ear was crucial to getting the results we did. That picture developed over years of mixing records. There’s unfortunately no substitute for time served, which holds true for every craft (mixing and songwriting are crafts, delivering a performance is an art). After an hour or so of setting up pro tools for the session and checking all of the mics and headphones, we were ready to go. We cut a dozen songs in a day, the old school way. My thoughts were that we were cutting a blues record, not a polished work of art to hang in a museum. Raw rough and rugged is what we went for and achieved, but it’s still a good recording. With a minimal mic set up, I achieved a really full sound. The key was having the picture in my mind before we recorded, which will make mixing a breeze. This is a perfect illustration of my theory that says in order to become a great recording engineer, you first need to learn how to mix. Most of us learn both at the same time, so I suggest to practice mixing as often as possible. Like a great athlete, it all comes down to training, and we train our ears.

Mixing Drums

2010-01-20T18:25:00.000-08:00

Drums. Every engineer’s favorite topic. And for some reason the snare drum in particular has always been the gold standard by which mixes are judged. And this is a phenomenon I will never for the life of me understand. I’ve tried to, but as a mix engineer who spends many hour of every day mixing records and balancing often 70 plus tracks only to have such a delicate juggling act reduced to, “wow, great snare sound” escapes my capacity of understanding. Mixing is hours upon hours of hundreds of subtle changes, shaping and molding an amazing amount of moving parts into a single form whose sum is exponentially greater than the whole of its parts. This is not meant to downplay the importance of any one instrument, but if mix engineers were to focus on a single instrument, it without question should be the vocal. Back to drums. I love drums and I love mixing drums. I think of drums as the motor of a mix. And for a motor to function at its peak, all of the parts must fit together precisely and be well lubed. What good is a shit-hot frame, body and paint job if it’s sitting in a showroom? I try to mix drums as a kit, not as individual sounds. This was learned the very hard way. I spent years getting the “perfect” kick sound and the “perfect” snare sound only to put them together and have one big mess on my hands. I like to treat the all of the parts as one to avoid these sloppy, disjointed motors. When assembling the motor, I go one step further and add the bass to it. It turns a small block 350 into a big block 427. I do this because I consider the kick and the bass to be a single instrument. Once the parts are fit together, it time to lube ‘em up. Compression is one way to keep it running smooth. I tend to (not always) use a touch of individual compression on the separate drums as well as a slight overall compression on the whole kit, which has been bussed to it’ owns auxiliary. A touch of verb, be it a room preset on the whole kit or some plate on the snare for ambience also “smooth’s” out a kit. So in conclusion, build your motor solidly, keep it well oiled and never again reduce someone’s hard worked mix to “wow, great snare sound,” appreciate the whole record.

Listening to your favorite mixes

2010-01-12T09:07:00.000-08:00

As a beginning mix engineer, I found a few records that I loved the way they sounded. Some of them being Earth Wind and Fire’s “All n All”, Donald Fagens “The Nightfly” and Peter Gabriels “So”. You should try to find a record that you really love and use it as a reference when mixing. Don’t attempt to copy it, because that is an impossible task. There are literally thousands of decisions that go into the sound of a mix, including all of the thousands of decisions that went into the recording process. Choice of mic, mic placement, mic pre, compression, eq, room, etc… on often 40-70 instruments adds up to a lot of decisions during the recording process. And an equal amount of decisions go into mixing records. So to try to replicate what a mixing engineer has done to arrive at a mix is difficult if not impossible. I am suggesting using a song or a record as a reference of the overall balance, sound or mood. Also, it’s important to develop your own style. Pick your record and close your eyes and listen. Listen to a lot of records. Your ears are your instrument so you really have to practice a lot. You've been listening to music your entire life, but now you have to listen as a mix engineer. You'll get to the point (trust me, you will) where you find yourself enjoying music less and less. But don't despair! This is a good position to be in. Getting over this hurdle is tough, but it will happen. You'll enjoy music like you used to as a younger person. I highly recommend "mixing" up your listen habits a bit ( sorry for the obvious pun, but my teachers always told me I had problems with self control). Do some casual listening while cooking (or ordering) dinner, doing laundry etc... But critical listening is crucial to becoming a better mixing engineer. Listen to the relationship between the rhythm track and the vocals. Figure out which of the harmonic instruments (keys, guitars etc…) are more “up front” and which are tucked in/back. These relationships are important because they create dimension. Borrow different sounds or uses or reverb that create these dimensions in your mixes. And don’t be too concerned about genre. It’s actually incredibly useful to be able to cross reference instruments across genre lines. I can’t stress the importance of listening to as many records as you can from as many genres as you can handle. (There are some genres I can’t listen to, but they’re very few). Happy listening.

End of a decade as a mix engineer

2010-01-01T06:23:00.000-08:00

As this decade comes to its inevitable conclusion, I ask myself, well, how did I get hear?. It started out with me living in TriBeCa, actually purchasing my first cell phone and using pro tools only casually, to finishing it with my own blog, a couple of cell phones, a website to run, and a full blown pro tools mixing studio in a house out in the burbs of NYC. As the next decade begins I find myself mid-way through my 3rd decade of life inside a recording studio. With nearly 24 years years of studio time, I realize that I’m starting to become a competent mix engineer. I said it. I, Tim Latham has finally become a competent mix engineer. I resisted the switch to exclusively using a daw until I was sure that I could get similar results from one that I could with tape. When pro tools hd was released and de-bugged, I was sold. Some have called it the home studio revolution but I think it was more evolution. With budgets sinking faster than Jay Lenos ratings and real estate prices skyrocketing combined with the cost of daw’s coming down to about 1/10th their digital reel to reel counterparts, it was nearly impossible for the big recording studios to keep their doors open. Home studios began to fill the void of the closed rooms. A few great tracking and mixing studios have survived to this day (thankfully) and a few new, smaller rooms have opened up as well. In a rare moment of foresight, I saw the end of big room studios coming to an end and devoted myself to the industry standard pro tools, and built a mix room in my house in an effort to survive. Some of my colleagues weren’t too happy with my decision, claiming that I was becoming part of the problem (mixing in the box is still taboo to many mixing engineers) but I have bills to pay and I wasn’t going to throw away at that point close to 20 years of experience as well as a few years in college on principal. And more importantly, I was wholly qualified to do absolutely nothing else. So I dedicated a lot of time money and effort to get my studio up to speed as I re-learned how to mix. So as a new decade dawns upon us I am remiss to hazard a guess about what the future holds after seeing the tumultuous decade of the zeroes. But I will guess that the studio business won’t change all that much from what it is now, with a few big rooms managing to stay open and smaller rooms like mine will continue to offer great quality mixes. The monetizing of recorded music hopefully will figure itself out. And I can only hope that there is a cultural sea-change amongst consumers who feel that free music is their right. While I really want a Ford GT, if I took one off the lot of my local dealership because I felt that it was my right to have one I’d wind up in prison doing 1-5 for felony grand theft. I am hopeful. A bit nervous (nothing like a hint of fear for motivation!). And I am also very grateful that I’m still invited into artist’s dreams for a living.

Budget for a mix engineer

2009-12-16T09:57:00.000-08:00

A topic that I’ve been dealing with for my entire career as mix engineer is the issue of proper budgeting. I implore every band and every recording engineer working with a band to encourage them to budget enough time and money for mixing and mastering. Even with the guidance of a producer, time and money has a habit of disappearing quickly. This might seem to be self-serving, and I guess that it is. But being a mix engineer, I constantly hear from bands wanting me to mix their records (not demos) for free because they spent their entire budget recording their record. Every step in the process of making records and none of them should be given any more or less importance. While there have been occasions that I actually have mixed for free, I submit that it would be a bit nuts to go out and buy all the materials needed to build a house but didn’t allow for the actual construction or the painting of it. I’ve never met a contractor who would build/paint for free. Hiring a proper mix engineer is crucial to making a great record. One that possess’ real talent can take a decent recording and turn it into a masterpiece. The likelihood of finding one to do it for little money or for free greatly diminishes your choices. There are plenty of really talented mixers who can take your project from OK to amazing, for a price. I always ask clients how good do they want their project to be? I’ve never heard I want it to be as mediocre as possible as the response. Inquire in advance the fees of a few mix engineers that you would like to work with and budget accordingly. Don’t get sloppy and cut corners while recording, just record smart. If the proper amount of time and consideration is spent in pre-production an awesome record can be made on a tight budget.

Rough mixes and Demo mixes

2009-12-06T11:56:00.000-08:00

When mixing a demo, treat it like you’re trying to beat Sgt. Peppers or Pet Sounds or any of your favorite recordings. Any mix engineer worth their weight in patch cables should never put anything less than 100% into their demo mixes or rough mixes. There are numerous instances in my career as a mix engineer where the rough mix was as good as if not better than the final mix. As mixers, we tend to get in our own way when attempting to make a mix perfect. I find that it’s often the imperfections in demo mix or rough mix that give a record its charm. There certainly are instances where the arrangements are far too complex nail a mix when doing a rough. Mixing records that are complicated require much more time to realize than an hour or so. But there are plenty of occasions when putting together a rough mix that the mix kind of falls into place. Sometimes its unconscious and there is something to be said for that. It’s a good tool to have as an audio engineer, that tool being the ability to “get out of your own way”. Remain conscious of the fact that there is always a chance that the rough or the demo might become the actual record. Never underestimate your own abilities as a mix engineer when mixing demos. Mix every song, be it a demo, a rough mix or a final mix as if it’s going to be the one that get’s you the Grammy award.

The Loudness War

2009-11-30T23:25:00.000-08:00

There is an ongoing debate/discussion in the mix engineer world. There has been a race to who can mix records the loudest. Audio engineers have been complaining about this topic for a few years now. Mastering engineers are none too happy when they receive mixes that have been limited and compressed to a point where they have no room to work. But the toothpaste is out of the tube. As a mix engineer, it’s a difficult position to be in. We need to satisfy our client’s needs but we don’t want to leave mastering engineers with nowhere to go. Often when mixing records with a limiter on the mix buss it’s problematic to turn it off, as a mix tends to fall apart. Delivering a mix to mastering houses with the limiting on and a version with it off could be helpful, but as I’ve mentioned, a mix can fall completely apart when the hard limiting is turned off, leaving the mastering engineer with a mess on their hands. As a mix engineer, I try to find a middle ground. I do use some compression and soft limiting on mixes, ensuring that they appear loud enough but leaving enough dynamics to keep a musicality to them. This also leaves some room for mastering engineers to work with. Until clients are saavy enough to understand that loud doesn’t always equal good, we as mix engineers have a fine line to walk.

Mix engineer Audio Training

2009-11-26T07:47:00.000-08:00

I am still working on an audio education program designed to help you as a mix engineer. The paperwork is quite a bit more involved than expected. I also want to make sure the material is complete before launching. The outline will be posted here and the details will be posted on Tim Latham website. It will be a mix engineer program that will be an aide for audio engineers working on any platform, including pro tools, logic etc... and any operating system. Please feel free to contact Tim Latham for inquiries.

The Role Of A Mix Engineer

2009-11-23T21:36:00.000-08:00

The role of a mix engineer is evolving. When I was starting out in recording studios, the role of the mix engineer was fairly well defined. A few weeks of lock-outs (24hr. sessions) were booked at a studio of choice, the tapes arrived a day before starting, the multitrack machines were aligned, and all of the extra outboard gear was hooked up and tested. On day one the mixer would arrive, set up their effect sends and returns and the mixing would begin. Typically, a day to a day and a half were required to complete a mix. At the end of a mix, the assistant would document everything in the room. Everything. Every setting on every piece of outboard gear was written down. It was very tedious and extremely important to get all of it 100% correct because this documentation was used to recall a mix at a later date to make some very minor changes. There would be a recall or two and the mixes were then sent off to a mastering studio. The mix engineer mixed. There was an occasional overdub, but the mix engineer was just that. The role has now evolved to a combination of a few disciplines. The mixer now is an editor, a vocal tuner, arranger along with the role as mixer. I have embraced these extra responsibilities with gusto. The speed in which I am now able to work in pro tools is exponentially faster than the analog days. It is by no means cutting corners, but hours a day are saved alone by not having to sit idle as 2 24track machines rewound and locked back up. That time is now used for the editing and tuning which I feel gives me a bit more insight into each song. Digging into the structure of the song bridges the left brain to the right brain. For me, mixing is a battle between the two halves and having that occasional bridge to cross is beneficial in giving each half a break every once in a while.

Online Audio School

2009-11-12T13:18:00.000-08:00

I've been receiving a lot of correspondence regarding audio engineering education. There is desire amongst home studio mix engineers to learn more about their craft. There appears to be a limited amount of options available. The two most common sources for such an education are the big name music schools and instructional dvd's. There doesn't seem to be any other alternatives. After years of fielding the same questions, I've developed an online audio program that fills the gap between the two. It is designed to increase your skill set as a mix engineer and to increase your audio engineering salary. I've drawn from my 23 years of experience in recording studios to assemble what I think can be of tremendous value to home recording enthusiasts and established mix engineers who want to advance their careers in the music industry. The technical details are being finalized and within the next week or two the program will be detailed on my website. Please check back and feel free to contact me as your input will help me shape the program.

Mixing In The Box

2009-11-05T20:08:00.000-08:00

An ongoing debate amongst mix engineers of varying skill that “you can’t mix in the box or shouldn’t”. And my response it that I can “mix in the box” only because I’ve retrained myself to do so. It’s an ongoing debate with valid points made on both sides. Mixing in pro tools is certainly not the same as mixing on a big console. Having spent almost 2 decades in the analog world, I have a different point of view then those who’ve started their careers using pro tools. In the early versions, doing anything in the box sounded pretty lousy. When Digidesign got the HD together, I was sold. Not just on recording in it. It was a great digital recorder that replaced reel to reel machines forever. But it also was a great editor. It changed the way in which records were made forever.
But it was a few years before “mixing in the box” became an issue. Technically, you should be able to do a much better job mixing pro tools files through an SSL or a NEVE in a big name recording studio. And at fist that’s exactly what I thought. And then the budgets started shrinking, fast. I saw the budget tsunami on the horizon and built my own HD mixing studio with a ton of plugins as well as my analog gear. I spent a lot of time tuning my room and it’s pretty damn flat. Then I had to re-learn how to mix. This was a challenge, but I had my analog experience to draw from. One of the first projects completed in my new room won Best New Artist on the MTV awards, The Gym Class Heroes. There have been many since, including a Grammy Award for the Broadway cast album for “In The Heights”. So yes, it can be done without compromising quality. I would never work in a manner that would give my clients anything but the best that I could possibly give them. It would be professional suicide. I think I have successfully made the change to mixing in the box. When considering your options, try not to be discouraged by the confusion surrounding this passionate debate. Let the results speak for themselves.

Vocal Mic Technique

2009-11-02T08:35:00.000-08:00

The most important elements of recorded music are the vocals, with the obvious exception being instrumental music. The drums are the engine to a mix and the vocals are the navigator. One of the biggest challenges as a recording engineer is the get a great vocal sound.
To start, the most appropriate microphone should be chosen, not the best. Often the most expensive tube microphone will not sound as good on a particular voice as an inexpensive condenser mic. If given the luxury, set up 3 mic’s next to each other and have the singer run through the song acapella. Switch between the three mic in the control room (make sure the singer doesn’t have headphones on, this will drive them crazy) and one of them should jump out as the obvious choice. One chosen, have the singer run through a verse or chorus with their headphones on and listen to how the sound of the vocal “sits” in the track. No that you’ve picked the appropriate microphone, it’s time to place it. First, raise the mic to the height of the singer’s mouth. Then flatten your hand and hold it parallel to the ground and place in between the capsule and the singer’s mouth. This is usually a good distance to start from. Finally, place a pop filter in between the mic and mouth and you’re ready to record.
What does this have to do with mixing records? Well, we don’t spend all of our time as audio engineers mixing. A well recorded vocal will make your life exponentially easier when it comes time to mix.

What makes a good mix good and a great mix great.

2009-10-26T21:47:00.000-07:00

What makes a good mix good and a great mix great.
When I’m asked what I do for a living, there is a now familiar look of confusion when I say that I’m a mix engineer. Or a recording engineer.
Mixing records is a very difficult concept to describe to someone who has no idea what a recoding studio is, never mind what an audio engineer does. Once that difficult task is overcome, the next challenge is describing what makes a great mix.

Most people will know a poorly mixed record when they hear it, but will not be able to describe why. But I’ve never met a non-engineer that understood what a great mix is and why. In my opinion, formed over two decades in recording studios, a great mix is one that is transparent to the song. The listener should never “hear” a mix, they should “hear” the song. A bad mix is easier to identify than a good mix. They sound “cheap” or like a demo. A good mix sounds “nice”. A great mix should create an image, a visual to put the listener in the setting of the story of the song. And it should do this without being obvious. A great mix engineer is able to pull the listener into the story. A great mix should have the same effect that a great movie does: it should pull you into a space where you forget where you are. My favorite example of a great mix is that of “The Boxer” by Simon and Garfunkel (engineered by Roy Halee). It’s a visual masterpiece. Pro Tools has given me the ability to create unique spaces easier than when I was working solely with analog gear. "My Own Zero" by Zap Mama is a mix that I feel that I created a stage for the lyrics.

Professional recording studio speakers

2009-10-25T18:17:00.000-07:00

Monitors: The ears of your studio.
A question that’s often asked when someone is putting together a recording studio or mixing studio is what monitors they should use. I think your monitors are the most crucial piece of gear in your studio. They need to be comfortable to listen to, but more importantly, they need to be accurate. I use Genelc 1031a’s because they “fit my ears”. That is to say that I find when I take mixes out of my studio they sound as good as they did in the studio. You can have all of the best plugins in the world and the best analog compressors built, but if your speakers aren’t telling you the truth, the results of all of the time you spend mixing records might be misleading. While most speakers in every price range are pretty accurate in the higher frequencies, the achilles heel of all monitors are the bass frequencies. Some have too little and you’ll end up adding too much bass to your mixes and some are the opposite giving you a false sense of low end.

Spend time at your local music store listening to your favorite mixes on different speakers. Remember, expensive doesn’t always mean better. There are some very affordable self powered monitors that sound really good. A lot of this is a matter of taste. Find a pair to use in your recording studio that translate to the real world. Next installment: your studios' acoustics and how they relate to your choice of speakers

Pro tools tricks to save troblesome tracks

2009-10-19T07:41:00.000-07:00

Occasionally I’ll receive tracks that were not recorded very well.
In the analog recording world this used to present more of a problem. Now that we’re all in the pro tools mixing world, there are more tools at mix engineers disposal.

Studio time tends to be expensive so there are times when the recording engineer can’t spend too much time getting the perfect drum sound. “We’ll fix it in the mix” has been the battle cry for decades. And it used to mean quite a bit of extra work during the mixing process. It meant collecting your own bunch of drum samples and having some primitive ways of triggering them. A favorite secret weapon used in pro tools to enhance drums sounds is a plugin called Drumagog. An engineer can insert the plugin on any given track and instantly start to audition drum sounds. These newly triggered sounds can be used alone or as I like to do, blend them with the original sound to “fill in the holes”.

Digital equalizers are another pro tools mixing weapon which can be more aggressive than their analog eq counterparts. This means that a mix engineer can get more surgical when sculpting sounds. A poor vocal sound can be rescued by eliminating the problem frequencies with a sharp, very specific eq that has been traditionally more difficult to do in the analog world. There are many more benefits to mixing in pro tools and I will spell them out as I blog away.

Protools goodies at AES convention

2009-10-14T11:12:00.000-07:00

I spent the last few days at the AES convention in NYC, gawking at gear (not listening to it). There was plenty of I wanted for my mixing studio, but only some of it practical. I ran into some colleagues from Battery Studios and my friends from Electric Lady studios as well. It was encouraging to see that the recording studio business is still alive. There were plenty of veteran engineers attending as well as some future mixing stars. There were a few Digidesign pro tools plugins that piqued my interest. I’m going to download the demo versions to see how they sound in my mixing studio. This week I’ll be doing all of the file management that I’ve put off for too long. I’m looking forward to mixing a few new projects with Bill Sherman ( producer from In The Heights).

Welcome To My Blog

2009-10-08T15:12:00.000-07:00

Hello peoples. Welcome to my blog about record mixing. I first stepped into a recording studio in 1986 and have been working in the record business ever since. I’m a Grammy award winning audio engineer who has also received multiple gold and platinum awards. I have recorded and mixed records for a wide range of artists from The Black Eyed Peas Britney Spears and Gym Class Heroes to Lou Reed Fun Lovin’ Criminals and the Broadway cast album for In The Heights. My career started in the analog world and has advanced into the world of digital recording and mixing. I currently have a Digidesign Pro Tools mixing studio in New York where I do most of my work. In the following weeks I’ll be discussing recording and mixing techniques, technology trends, and the state of the music industry. Thanks for stopping by.

Testing 1-2-3

2009-10-06T17:13:00.000-07:00

Test post. Tim Latham is learning how to blog. Actual posts to follow regarding mixing records in protools, along with some fun anecdotal stories from behind the mixing board. Stayed tuned.

Protools Mixing

2009-10-06T13:55:00.000-07:00

This is a fansite for Grammy Award winning mixer Tim Latham. Tim engineered and mixed some of my favorite hip hop and R&B records from the late 80s and early 90s including records by Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Pharcyde, Erykah Badu and D'Angelo and has gone on to work with Grammy award winning Latin artists as well as pop Icons like Lou Reed and Brittney Spears. You can follow Tim's real website which is all about being a Protool Mixing Engineer.

That's all for now- more information about Tim, and Mixing your record in protools soon.