#117: Essential Mixing Tips to Make Your Synths Sound More Interesting

Are you stuck trying to figure out where your pads sit in the mix? Maybe you're scratching your head thinking what can you do with a synth or even how can I make my pads sound better? Then check out EP 117 of the Inside The Mix podcast.

Want to level up your synth mixing skills? Then prepare to be inspired. This episode of Inside the Mix sees me, your host, sharing some of my go-to synth EQ techniques that will revolutionize how you mix instruments. Listen as I unravel the layers of two synth pads in an outro section of a song from my upcoming EP. With the aid of a virtual mix rack, I'll reveal how to create a distinct effect, and how to position your synths for maximum impact. It's about time your synth started standing out from the crowd.

As we dive deeper into the world of synth mixing, discover the power of kilohertz Trance Gate and Neutron 4 EQ in adding subtle movement and variation to your tracks. Uncover the secrets of identifying clashing frequencies with Neutron’s masking feature, and learn how to use the Decapitator and Waves Brauer Motion plugins for added saturation and synth pad movement. Don't just listen, immerse yourself in the world of music production and take your skills to the next level.

Submit a music production or mixing question and feature on the podcast: https://www.speakpipe.com/InsideTheMixPodcast

Listen to Let You Go on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/4ARvlY0FXZEwnAQTvj6N6B?si=rW65U0oET9OePPZiXmDTTA

Watch the Let You Go music video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/sabjnmW0Rts

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

You're listening to the Inside the Mix podcast with your host, Mark Matthews.

Speaker 2: 0:06

Hello and welcome to the Inside the Mix podcast. I'm Mark Matthews, your host, musician, producer and mix and mastering engineer. You've come to the right place if you want to know more about your favourite synth music artists, music engineering and production, songwriting and the music industry. I've been writing, producing, mixing and mastering music for over 15 years and I want to share what I've learnt with you. Hello, folks, and welcome back to the Inside the Mix podcast. If you are a new listener, make sure you hit that follow button on your podcast player of choice and if you're watching this on YouTube, make sure you hit subscribe and that notification bell so you know anytime that we go live or a new episode drops. So, for those of you who regularly listen to the podcast and follow me on Instagram, you will know that I drop the single on Monday and also you'll know this from the podcast episodes as well. So let you go has now been out at the time of me recording this for approximately four, five days, and it's been a fantastic response, I must say so thank you to everybody who has streamed, listened, shared, commented, posted and added to playlists. Let you go featuring Indigo and if you haven't listened to it yet, shame on you. But seriously, I will put a link to it on Spotify. So a Spotify link that is in the episode description. So the episode went live on Friday and, coincidentally, I went to my first Metal gig in a very long time on Friday and this was in Bristol, and I went with my friend Matt, who played bass on Let you Go and a few other tracks on my EP. It was a great gig. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was great being at live music again. I don't know why it's taken me so long to get out and get to a gig, but hey ho, there you go. But it's on my list of things to do for 2024 and that is go to more gigs and shout out to Neon Highway. That guy is the archetypal giggoer. He's been to more gigs in one year than I've ever been in my life and hats off to him. And he's been to some amazing shows as well and he's a regular on the podcast. A big shout out to Carl.

Speaker 2: 2:03

But yeah, we stayed at a Filtern travel lodge and it took us an hour to go five miles on a bus and I was chomping at the bits. I have some food at the local weather spoons in Bristol I won't say which one, there is more than one and also have a drink as well. And what it made me realise is, because it was quite a late night, had a few beers as well, mixing cider and beer cider being from the West Grunge, you love it. It made me realise that I am not as adept as recovering as I once was. The next day I felt pretty rough. It was pretty much a write off. I wasn't even out late. It was like mid night no, not mid night, but probably about half 12, 1am. But for the remainder of the weekend, and now rolling into this week as well, I'm still feeling it a bit, and it's not going to affect the podcast today, but I'm certainly feeling tired today, but it was worth it. It was a fantastic gig.

Speaker 2: 2:50

Anyway, I'm wittering on now, but let's dive into this episode. So in this episode we are returning to well, it's not really a new format anymore, because we've done a few of these, but it's where you, the listener, submit a music production question. Okay, and your question will be answered in an episode of the podcast. Because I want you to be involved in the planning and production of the podcast, it makes sense to answer questions that you want answered. There are challenges that are pain points that you're experiencing right now.

Speaker 2: 3:22

Plus, you can give yourself a little shout out on the podcast as well. All you have to do to do this is submit an audio message via speak pipe, totally free. You can do it using your mobile phone. You don't need to download an app or create an account, and you can use the link in the episode description. Alternatively, if audio isn't your thing, you can send me a DM on Instagram at Inside the Mix podcast, or you can email me at insidethemixpodcast at gmailcom, but remember to include a link to where our audience can find you online. So for today's episode, our question was submitted by Oddsprite and here it is.

Speaker 1: 3:58

Hello, this is Oddsprite. I produced original cinematic space wave and sci-fi synth pop. My music has a lot of orchestral and electronic instruments. All together, they often have different dynamics and frequency spaces. I've been working on my mixing and was wondering if you had any tips about this. You can find me on Instagram threads, YouTube and all the musical places. Thanks, Oddsprite out.

Speaker 2: 4:25

So immediately, two synth EQ techniques spring to mind, and I'm going to demonstrate these two now, and they're two that I always use. So what I'm looking at here is juggling frequencies when I've got multiple synths and where I'm positioning those synths in the left and right. So let's have a look at the first one. Okay, so I'm in this song here and this song is called Alive and it's going to feature on my EP, and what I have are these two synth pads in this outro section, and I've got pad left and I've got pad right and I'm using Anna 2. And then this Anna 2, I've got the same patch on both sides 80s love scene. Now, usually my advice would be to use a different patch on either side, but in this instance I've used the same on both sides and, for all intents and purposes, the patches are the same. However, I have done something slightly different. Right at the end of each of the channel strips, you'll see, I've got the virtual mix rack. And then, after the virtual mix rack, I've got the U add LA to a emulation plugin, which I absolutely love, and I got it for free in October. Thanks to our nine for pointing me in the direction of this freebie. I had no idea it was going for free, but I grabbed it with both hands when I knew it was. And I've got that on both of these pad channels and they are panned almost hard left and right. So I've got a pad left, I've got pad right almost hard pan left and right, both and a two with the same patch. Pretty much the same processing. I've also got the TDR number EQ as well, just before my virtual mix rack, and the LA to a and I've got a six DB first order slope with a high pass filter at 200 Hertz and a low pass filter at 20 Hertz as well. And the reason I've done that is I've just got rid of any unwanted low frequency energy from these pads. As I've got other synths, I've got guitars, I've got bass guitar and I've got my kit as well and I don't need it there. So what is the tip? I might hear you cry. Well, it is this if you have two synth pads and you're going to pan them left and you're going to pan one right, ideally you want some sort of fluctuation, some sort of differentiation in terms of frequency, content and sound. Usually what I would do is I would do that with the Q, so I might have a high shelf filter on one pad and then another high shelf filter on the other pad as well, but I might boost one where I cut another or something along those lines. I mean, that's a really really simple explanation. But in this instance what I've done here is on my pad left I've actually got the free waves magma lights tube saturation plug in little tube, it's called, and I've got that on my pad left and it sounds like this, okay, and I've driven it, just so it's going into the red. And then I've made sure I've ducked it. I've had to duck it by about four DB on the output of this magma little tube, just so I can say consistent when I'm hitting I'm going into the next plug in in the chain.

Speaker 2: 7:27

There isn't an X plug in in the chain. Well, there is. Technically it's going out to a pads bus, so technically there is. But that's where gain staging comes in. You want to set it so it's at the optimum level, going into the next plug in in the chain.

Speaker 2: 7:40

Then on the other one I've made it different. I've used this is my right hand side now I've used the bit crusher in logic pro and I've got a 16 bit downshift and I've got about 24% in terms of mix and I've got a 16 bit resolution and a four times down sampling and it sounds like this. So this is the right hand side. Now. Okay, and now I'm going to put the two together. And what I've done here is I've made the left and the right different in terms of their timbre and how they sound, their subtle differences there and the idea being I didn't want this just giant big mono left. Well, it's not mono technically, because it's left and right, but if you've got the same sounds in the left and right, it could almost sound like a giant mono. It sounds a bit weird with the way I described that, but that's the way I would hear it. And here's what it sounds like You've got the left and the right together with the bit crusher and with the soft tube magma lights.

Speaker 2: 8:45

Now I'm going to turn off both of those plugins. Now I'm going to turn the back on. Now I'm going to turn them off again. So, hopefully, what you can hear there is when I bring those plugins in it, almost it helps spread it out. It's a psychoacoustic effect, but it helps spread those pads out to the left and right, rather than just have this really boring sound down the centre. Now I will say this with a caveat. I'll just hit my pop shield there. I will say this with a caveat Now, when I'm playing this right hand pad on its own with that bit crusher, I mean it's not the nicest sound.

Speaker 2: 9:38

I did this in the context of the mix. It sounds good, but I think it sounds better in the mix. So let's have a play with it all in the mix. So this is with the bit crusher on, so I'm going to turn it on and the magma light soft tube as well. I think it's called soft tube. I keep calling it that. It's not soft tube, it's little tube. Apologies to waves there, it's little tube, not soft tube. So here we go. I'm going to play it all in the mix. Now this is with everything or instrumentation, so hopefully you can hear what I've done there is.

Speaker 2: 10:19

I wanted them to be nice and separate, nice and wide, because I wanted space down that middle for that electric guitar that's slightly pan to the right to really come through and kick through in that mix. Albeit, now I'm listening to on headphones that guitar, that solo guitar, might need to come up a touch. But that's my first tip there. Folks, if you've got a left and a right synth and you're panning them left and right, they don't have to be hard panned left and right, by the way, okay, but make them different in terms of their texture, their timbre. Do some subtle changes. Use saturation, use bit a bit crusher, use something like that, just to make them different and it will just help enhance that stereo spread sound. So my second tip is really a combination of multiple tips, to be honest, but it centers around the summing stack. So the channel, the pad channel that I have here, I've got my left and right pads going out to this pads summing stack or instrument group bus I guess you could call it as well and I got to play the same section.

Speaker 2: 11:14

But I just got to describe what I've got on here for those of you not watching on YouTube. So the first plugin I have on here is a Transgate and the reason I love using this it's a kilohertz Transgate and if you're familiar with the podcast, you know that I've used this a lot in productions and it's set at 29% and it's got a one 30 second red resolution on this and I'm just going to play it and I'm going to gradually bring it up to make it more audible for you. You can hear it there. It's just adding subtle movement and variation, once again adding more interest. This goes back to the episode before, episode 116, where we're adding interest to our music, the ear candy.

Speaker 2: 11:59

And then this is an important tip that I have here I've got neutron four here and you can do this with any EQ. And what I've done is I've got some notches here that I've picked out that are competing with the vocal, for example, 300 hertz, three kilohertz. I've ducted it by 2db with a 2.5 q there, just to allow that vocal to come through more, and then what I've got here is now. This is a quite sweeping statement, but if your synths ever sound muddy, look at between 250 to 300 hertz to begin with, and you may well find the culprit. The great thing about neutron is it has this masking feature and you can set it to an instrument group. Obviously, you will need neutron on that group or that track, and I've got it set to my bass instrument group and what it would do is it will show me where there's potential masking frequencies using this orange hue. So I'm going to play it and I'll describe it for those of you listening on your podcast player of choice.

Speaker 2: 12:57

Okay, so what we can see is an orange sort of hue dancing around 250 to 300 hertz, saying that the synths are in the same. Well, they're competing. Let's say they're masking the bass. So what I've done here is I've just ducked it at 300 hertz by 2 dB with a 2 Q and I've also got a low shelf going on here as well, and then I've got it. It's actually, I say, a low shelf. It's not, it's a well, it is a low shelf. I tell you the lie. It is a low shelf and that is then rolling off 110 hertz and below. It's probably quite steep. Actually, I may want to revisit that just looking at it here, but we'll listen to it in context.

Speaker 2: 13:38

But my top tip there is this guys, if your synths are sounding money, muddy money, if they're sounding money, then you're onto a winner. If they're sounding muddy, look at that 250 to 300 hertz. Look how they're competing with any bass frequencies there. If you've got something like Neutron, use that to your advantage. Just because you're using your eyes, it is not a bad thing. Obviously, we need to use our ears, but use the tools that have been developed to help you. Okay, and then also that 300 hertz there as well, I know that is the presence frequency for my vocal or, let's say, a lead instrument, so I've also ducted there too. You can use the same masking technique.

Speaker 2: 14:18

Then after that, on this channel, I've got the decapitator plugin. I love this plugin and I've got it really subtle here, and this is just adding a bit of saturation to these synths again, or be it. You might say well, mark, you've already got it on the magma light here. Why are you using it again? Because I just want to, and it sounds good. And then after that I've got the waves Browr motion. I love this plugin, I've had it for years and I love the synth pad movement. So you've got to be really subtle with this. If you're using the trance gate and the Browr motion at the same time, you don't want it to be like this crazy blah, blah, blah, blah, blah stuff going on, cause it could almost sound like it's audibly pumping. But I've got. I like the synth pad movement patch, cause it's really subtle.

Speaker 2: 15:02

But with the Browr motion you need to be careful with regards to gain staging, because it will add extra level to your audio. So you need to make sure. If you're then running it into another plugin or it's going out to your Mixbus, just make sure that it's going out at the optimum level that it should be. Really, what I tried to aim for is it should be coming out at the same level that it went in at. Okay, now that once again, is a sweeping statement. You may not want it to go that way, but you want it to be working in a way that when it hits the next plugin, it's going to hit it at the optimum level. For example, when it goes up to my Mixbus, I want to make sure that my tracks are hitting this virtual tape emulation I got here at the optimal level. And this SSL comp solid state logic plugin I've got going on here. I stick that. I'm going off on a tangent here, but I love that plugin. I love the solid state bus compressor on a Mixbus. I think it sounds fantastic. So let's play it all in the mix with the Browr motion. I've got that movement going on, I've got the decapitator and I've also got my EQ there just ducking out any potential masking frequencies. There you go sounding pretty good, I think. Admittedly, that is Mix 1 of that track and it does need a tiny bit of work, but it is sounding good. If you like the sound of it, keep an eye out for that release on December the 8th. So there we go, folks.

Speaker 2: 16:46

Two top tips for your synth mixing. So the first one, panning left and right. If you're gonna use the same pads, make sure there is a subtle differentiation in terms of their sonic texture. Then the second tip was this On your synth pad bus, use EQ. Look for those frequencies that might be masking other instruments and also add movement as well. Use things like a trance gate, use things I mean that is killer hurts. There are other ones available. Use things like the brow emotion to add that left and right, that movement in the stereo width. You want it sounding interesting. Okay, that's what we're aiming for here. We wanna get that listener interest going. Just to correct myself, I think it's actually kilo hearts or killer hearts, and I keep saying killer hurts. So if I've got that wrong, my apologies. I will get it right. I'll do a bit of research and make sure I pronounce it right the next time.

Speaker 2: 17:41

A few episodes to go and check off the back of this one of the Inside the Mix podcast, episode 78, home Studio Acoustics and Fixing Muddy Mixes. That is a producer kickstart episode. Episode 75, how to Mix Pace Frequencies Another producer kickstart episode. And then episode 93, leveling Up your Mix Mastering Techniques and Songwriting Tips. Although it's mastering and songwriting tips, there are other bits and pieces in there with regards to mixing sort of 101. So do go check out those three episodes. So if, like my friend Odd Sprite, have a burning music production question or mixing question or music industry question, submit an audio message via speak pipe using the link in the episode description. Or if, like I say, if audio isn't your thing, send me a DM on Instagram at insidethemixpodcast, or email insidethemixpodcastatgmailcom and remember to include a link to where our audience can find you in your message. I cannot wait to have more of your questions on the podcast. Happy mixing folks.