Hi Tchad!
I’ve been borrowing a lot of your tricks, with the help of MWTM. Copying example your drum template often works for me, but I have a hard time being as experimentative as you. How did you develop this freedom? It seems you don’t have a clear end goal in mind, but still arrive at a glorious deep and quite distorted mix. Whereas if I let go of direction, I end up in an unglorious, distorted mess…
Secondly, I was hoping you could speak to the creation and mix of Peter Gabriel’s Down To Earth off the Wall-E soundtrack. This has become my main reference, both for checking speakers as well as mixing. The arrangement is so full from top to bottom and has many layers of depth. Were you involved with production too, or just mix?
Sorry this slipped through the cracks Angelo. 2023! Sorry!
I make choices getting rid of stuff. Just because there’s a great chord or cool riff doesn’t mean it has to be in the song. It needs to collaborate with the whole. Experiment with mutes! Choose a couple of things to use strong character effects on to support the rest.
Down To Earth was the same as most of what I do.
I play when mixing. Moving all over the shop, often with very little working, until I hear something that perks my earbrain. Then I do it again, and again until it starts to take shape. Sometimes I think it sounds like a mess so I take a break. Many times when I come back to it, I find it’s pretty good and seems almost finished. Sometimes it’s really not so good, then I just start over. Perseverance will usually get you everything.