Today I want to address all of you late night mixers. You know who you are. You work or go to school all day. You have family and friends to take care of. And the only time you can carve out to actually mix your music is late at night. You crawl into your home studio dungeon and you try your best to make it work without waking up everyone else.
I think for all you late night mixers, there are just a handful of simple but practical things you can do to get great results in your not ideal situation. And truth be told, your “limitation” is actually a blessing in disguise.
Via Bernard DUPONT Flickr
Step 1 – Work In One Or Two Hour Chunks
If you have to wait until late at night to start mixing you’re already at a disadvantage: your ears and brain are tired. You’re not fresh, no matter how much coffee or Red Bull you drink. The solution, however is simple: cut yourself off each night after one or two hours.
That’s right, don’t mix any longer than that. The reasoning is simple: best case you won’t make much progress after two hours of late night mixing so you’re wasting your time. Worst case, you’ll actually do more harm than good on your mix and therefore cancel out your first couple of hours of work.
You’ll need a couple of tools to really maximize your time here: pen/paper and a timer. Cost effective and powerful. The pen and paper are there for you to take notes during your initial listen through. Your first impressions (good and bad) of a mix are a glaring treasure map to success. Write them down and refer to them often.
Secondly, you’ll want to time yourself for the entire process. Whether it’s your initial 10 minute mix, or simply a looming deadline for the night, timers help you do better work because they gently push you into focus mode, not mess around with plugins mode.
So when looking at your calendar this week, block off which nights you’ll be mixing and whether those will be one hour or two hour sessions. Write down which song(s) you’ll be working on while you’re at it. That way you’ll be prepared the moment you set foot into your studio.
Step 2 – Mix At Low Volumes
The biggest complaint I hear about having to mix late at night is that you can’t be loud. I find this fascinating because that shouldn’t be a problem. Mixing at loud volumes is a bad idea anyway.
The truth is, you late night mixers should be getting better mixes than the rest of us because you’re forced to mix at low volumes, which is one of my favorite mixing hacks of all times. By simply turning down the speakers you increase your chances of two things: hearing your mix without a hyped bottom or top end, and minimizing nasty room reflections. Both of which improve your ability to hear your mix for what it is and therefore make better decisions.
When you sit down to mix, open up your session and go to the “loudest” section of the song. Have your monitor speakers turned all the way down and then press play. Slowly raise the monitors volume until you feel like it might be getting too loud (i.e. it will wake your kids/wife/etc). Then back it down a bit and you’re set.
This will likely be a very quiet level, and that’s a good thing. The rest of us “day mixers” have to fight the temptation to mix loud, when you don’t have a choice. Seems statistically you’re gonna come out ahead of us every time.
Two Great Limitations
Honestly, you late night mixers are in a good spot. In fact I’m willing to get you can churn out better mixes than 80% of the home studio population who mix during the day because of these two simple limitations: time and volume.
By mixing in shorter blocks of time and having to mix at lower volumes, you are already setup to win. Funny how “limitations” are actually more liberating than anything, isn’t it?
So, two questions:
- Are YOU a late night mixer?
- If so, how are you going to change your workflow to better take advantage of your time?
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My name is Graham Cochrane and I'm the founder of The Recording Revolution, one of the world's most loved audio recording and mixing blogs with over 200,000 readers each month. 
Writing this at 11pm 🙂 The one thing I’ve learnt is that nothing good ever happens after the first two hours on a mix…especially not after midnight! So the time limitation is actually necessary. The good thing is that it frees you up from feeling obliged to spend any more time on it. I tried to limit myself to one hour per night, but I found myself craving more studio time 😉
It’s 9:30 on the east coast and I’m only beginning to start my latest mix! I always set midnight as the very latest I will mix. You are absolutely, my ears are just too tired. Better to come back tomorrow and finish up with a great rather than mediocre mix!
This article is great! Because I am one of those late night mixers. And I totally agree with what you address here, Graham. I actually started to incorporate a loudness meter into my mixing. And I have gotten amazing results. Forcing myself to mix to a certain loudness (LUFS) level, has created more open more focused and punchy mixes, for me. And it’s all been because I’m forcing myself to mix at low volumes!
Thanks so much for the insight, graham!
Graham,
I am a late night mixer, so, yes, I’ve been forced to turn my HR624’s way down – I refuse to mix in my headphones, because they distort the sound too much, and usually if I started mixing a song at a certain volume on my monitors, I doesn’t make sense to change the monitoring situation.
One mistake I’ve been making is mixing way longer than 2 hours at a time, sometimes staying up until 3-4 AM!! Talk about being late to work because you overslept!! Bad excuse and I don’t recommend anyone to do this no matter how passionate you are about mixing. We are all still human after all, and getting proper or decent rest makes you a better mixer, too.
My wife snapped a photo of me once sleeping in front of my DAW with a chorus looping!! Not joking!
That is hilarious!
This is the best article you’ve ever written. It’s too easy, mixing my own band’s music from home, to say “I’m too tired tonight to get anything done, I’ll just relax tonight and work in it tomorrow.” I love your idea of actually putting it in my schedule, and will try that this week. I have ADHD so focus is not my strongest point, I think that putting limits on activities in general is something I need to actually put into action, not just read about. Thanks for your wise words.
Glad it’s helped!
Hi Mark, just about that ADHD thing > if that s what people keep telling you, did you ever notice that e.g. you re working on a mix you are totally absorbed in it, that you are “in the zone”? I actually believe that focus and determination probably IS your strongest point! The problem might be to get “into the zone” on a predicatable timing which can be coordinated with the rest of everyday life… 😉
I really should do this. Like many I work all day and mix in the evening. I find that I never feel that I have done enough so I carry on until silly o’clock and then feel even more tired the next day. As the week progresses my mixing becomes less productive because I’m getting increasingly tired. A few times I have found that when not taking a break I end up making unnecessary changes in the mix and screwing it up. Now if I feel I’m about to do this, I stop and come back to it the next day and very often don’t make the changes that I thought I needed to. The two hour time frame is a good idea….I now need to be disciplined and make myself stick to it!
How about early morning mixing? Same rules apply. Always been a morning person….hot coffee and off I go.
Yep! Same plan applies.
This article speaks directly to me! I’ve just recently joined Dueling Mixes (loving every minute of it too) and as a father of 3 that works two jobs – I literally don’t get any time to mix or record unless I make time by seeing it scheduled or carved out at night. Since I’m posting this before I go to work I’ll keep it short, but excellent post Graham!
I’m so with you, Daniel. I can totally relate, as I’m a father of 3, too. It’s hard to find the time, I know, but keep up keeping up, buddy! I’ve had to start over mixes because I ruined them by getting 3-4 hours of sleep per night.
This post is awesome, Graham, if you’re reading this, I love the fact you can relate to the “rest of us” who are amateur home mixers.
Thanks for joining DM! Glad this article helped.
Thank you for the hints! Sometimes I switch to headphones and I use the VRM box from Focusrite to hear the final result simulating some environnments. Do you think it is a good practice?
Yep, it’s a great little box. I have one myself.
Ditto on mixing at a low volume. I typically mix at a level where I can carry on a normal conversation with someone in the studio while the mix is playing. Then, when I feel like the mix is getting where I want it to be, I will turn the volume down as low as possible to where I can barely hear it… and I listen to see if if I can pick out all my elements… lead and BGVs, drums, kick, bass, guitars, piano, organ, etc. I believe if I can hear all these things at an extremely low level, then they will blend well at higher levels. Thank you, Graham, for a great and timely article!
Honestly I do most of this stuff but never really thought about it. I only mix for an hour just because I start so late that if I do go over 2 hours it’s already 3am and I gotta be up at 630 for my kids. I usually listen outside my studio while I’m running errands or on my wY into work. Great article for guys trying to find a way to fit in time.
Family, a dayjob, never enough time, always tired and burned out when I get to mix? … sounds so familiar!
Thank you Graham for your very inspiring post! Here s a strategy that works for me to “deep-freeze” my inspiration until I get to the studio at night: I always listen to my mixes on the way to work, and write down what has be worked on. In the morning I m fresh and inspired, so when I sit down in the evening all I have to do is to follow my instructions and in addition to that have a clear idea about what I want to achieve until midnight 🙂
I know it seems like it s taking away the fun, but actually I found it adds to the fun to see if what you planned works out the way you expected it to. Also I find it easier to “mix without staring at the screen”, and this is as close as it gets to that!
Super duper oober helpful! Eloquent advice for the bourgeoisie and pr0 mixers alike!
I still struggle with the low end, though. My monitors are clunky house speakers with 10″ subs. At low volumes, the bass doesn’t translate too well. The subs produce a wavelength so large that my wife in the next room actually hears more bass than I do up close. Anyone else in this boat?
Is this the excuse I’ve been waiting for to invest in more appropriate sized monitors? I sure hope so 🙂
Low end is always hard for me to get right.
Great post as usual Graham! I am a late night mixer. I’ve had to keep it to only a couple of hours for sure. Going too long when you’re brain and ears are tired and you think it sounds great… until the following day when you listen again and you wonder who the heck mixed your track! Definitely takes discipline to call it quits but it’s worth it if it gets too late into the night.
Men you psychic or what? I actually was thinking to email you about this subject. Iam a person that luvs do music but between my fam and work …kinda hard 4 me to concentrate or take time to build a nice mix. This is a great article and u just answer my question. Thanks
Hi graham/all
i use headphones at first, then those baby monitors you get with two inch speakers,[quarter inch jacks you plug into the side of yous P.C] then last of all i progress to the powered monitors. At least with the headphones you can mix at any time.
John
Sorry i ment one eight`th jacks.
Just got done mixing a 5 song acoustic EP almost exclusively late night! I also live in apartments so that’s an added hurdle when it comes to listening to music at “true volume” aka the volume other people are going to listen to my music at. I’ve found that one of the best things is to burn my mixes to a cd every night and listen to them in my car while I go for a drive! Real world application/learning what is shining through and what’s incoherent
You should at LEAST credit the picture sources, if not ask permission for their use.
This a pic stolen from my Facebook page. A picture of me at work, as it were.
I’ve been mixing like crazy for the past few weeks. I’m currently working with two bands, and have been working in mixing around my full-time job and additional recording sessions for these bands. It’s a lot of work to take on at one time, and it often means burning the candle at both ends. I’m basically putting in about 4 hours at a time with very minimal breaks in between, which isn’t good late at night. Needless to say, I can’t wait to wrap these bands up so I can have a break before my next set of sessions.
I’m in agree with this point of view, in fact, it gives me force to continue mixing this way.
So, I got a question: ¿Is there any late mixer who, at 11pm, hasn’t his/her ears tired? ¿How can somebody achieve that :)?
Maybe where ear plugs for the entire day before mixing? 🙂
I just have to say, Graham, that the featured image you used is greatness…been there a ton…
Here’s another late night mixer ! Think I should show these posts to my wife – just in case she wonders if am REALLY busy mixing so late at night / early in the morning. I find that I am more creative at these very late hours. Another big advantage is that there are no interruptions, and to me this a huge plus ! Thank Graham. (Shall we start a Late Night Mixers Anonymous support group? 😉
Seems like there are a lot of us!
hi John, Actually im having some problems in mixing my songs which took me a month or so. the accurate problem is that my mix is going too “trebly” and when i adjust the high,low ends i end up with a mix out of a cup of tea. Do you have any suggests ? and yes im a late mixer who starts at 12 am and lasts till 3 or 4 am. Thank bro
Hi chuck,
without hearing the mix i cant really advise,but sometimes depending on how many tracks you mixing with the same effects/plugins, i find mixing through a group channel helps. Rout all the tracks using the same effect/s through a group track, which helps with a mix which is consistent less muddy and less busy. It might help!
j
Great Post Graham
Jason T in my opinion is suffering from low end and in order to keep the wife happy try invest in good monitors like KRK rockits rich low end u can even feel it @ low volume.great mixing guys..its 9pm bout to mix until 11pm wake up 5:30 tomoro hopefully one day we make it big wit this music thing never give up even if the mix is going bad.
thank you Kelvin, actually this reply answers Jason T and mine as well, but as a matter of face i use American Audio HP550 for mixing, is that a good way for mixing music ?
Yes most def.550’s are great for reference purposes I’ve used them in big studios and @ home I just use ma beats by dre,but wut I’ve found is that headfones can be misleading cos everything sounds great on them,However my 5″ KRK’s sound fantastic And they really rich in low end,allowing u to have the joy of using highpass filter sumwere betweem 125k n to 250k.However u can have the best monitors but don’t 4get thos acoustic panels if u don’t have the Luxury just a few of them of the 1st reflections will help.
Imagine spending sleepless nights mixing being late for work then when u drop ur track it sounds totally different else were dissapointing isn’t it?So its better to identify the problem @ home b4 sum1 does it for u.
Keep using em 550’s man I’m not a pro or anything m also learning and a freelance Engineer but instead of going out to have a couple of shots @ a club and spending money on women… Please sacrifice dat $250. For KRK’s not that m saying u do cos I know I used to but get the picture rite?Cheers Happy mixing
Exactly,saying that when spending sleepless nights mixing late and then you get disappointed suddenly in the comparing between your hearing of the mix with a headphones and in the car for example or hearing it on your mp3 player. I just compare my mixes with other bands, and i go through thinking “lets do this quality of a band”, and then in a sudden your wrong man,you get a slap on the face and tells you get your ass up back to mixing again.Reference is really good but sometimes it is pain. Im too in the process of learning how to mix, only 2 years of experience. Cheers man
Yep! I’m a late night mixer too. Come to think of it, I’m a late night everything… Recording at modest volumes is something I’ve learned through the years. My home studio is actually not inside the house: I am located in a seperate building in my backyard (thank goodsness for that!) and I did pretty good job soundproofing it so I can go just a little higher on levels…
But you are absolutly right Graham: after two hours (or so) of intense concentration on what I am mixing my ears get tired and that’s when I call it quits. I might go to another song I am working on and do some editing or cleaning up of recorded tracks before I close down for the night.
Thanks Graham, I’ll try it out as I really have beeing frustrated lately, because of lack of time for mixing.
What’s ur DAW of choice chuck
Mine is Steinberg Cubase 7, I’m used to it. I inherited Cubase 4 LE it with the purchase of my PreSonus FP10 from an enthusiast co-worker 2 years ago, so it just stuck with me and I love it. I’m more than sure that ANY one major DAW out there is equally as good (ProTools, Logic Pro, StudioOne, etc.) – CU just happens to be the one I’m used to.
Whatever the time of day, I find myself mixing at about 75dB. Never thought I’d land on such a low level, but it’s comfortable.
I’ve always done my best work 11pm-2am because there are fewer outside distractions – the house is quiet, and no one’s going to come walking in mid-chorus asking questions. This is only Part 1, I’m sure you’ll get to that 🙂
In the week I do music in the night but on weekends whenever.
I am new to the home studio but a fast leaner. Thanks for the tips.
I hope pretty soon I well put out music that I can listen to from
the Radio or so. Keep up the good work.
I don’t feel that bad for being a late night mixer now after reading this blog! I feel like I’m doing pretty good, giving myself breaks and low level monitoring. I usually switch between monitors and headphones, but sometimes tend to favor my headphones just out of fear of waking people up. Something to work on I guess =)
I’m not going to be a late night mixer, but I once mixed my song at normal volume, but not low. I want your opinion in my music that I mixed for my video project last year:
What do you think?
I don’t have studio monitors but consumer speakers and Sennheiser HD 280 Pro headphone, which I mainly mix using it. Music can be made and mixed using just an ordinary consumer sound card which is even connected to my home theater receiver’s multi-channel analog inputs (3 analog outputs from my sound card to 6 RCA analog inputs in my home theater receiver). Recently, I’ve started to connect my CD’s input to my sound card’s output, which allows me to use Audyssey and Dolby Pro Logic II for movies, music, and games. I do listen to music in stereo, though, but sometimes I switch over to Dolby Pro Logic just to hear music enveloping around me.
Here’s a Dolby Pro Logic II demo:
http://graysonpeddie.com/dolby-pro-logic-ii-demo/
I’m having problems whit some unwanted ssssss noise
I don’t know if is my cable from the piano to the interface or the piano is not sending clean signal
What does it sound like when you are listening to something known, like an iTunes track of your favorite song? Did you switch cables on your piano? How are you plugging the piano into your interface? Are you using a microphone or left/right outs on your keyboard?
Hi Jack
I found out last night when I record the piano I give less volume to the piano and more volume to the interface,that’s y it sound like that with the noise ssssssss.
There anything I can do to save the track and fixed with som EQ and eliminate the unwanted sound.
Thanks for your advice.
Well here I am in the late night crowd. Thought I was one of only a few to mix quietly in the night. 🙂 Funny how you mention dungeon in your email because that’s exactly what my wife calls my studio when I head up here for the night. “Oh I guess I’ll see you tomorrow since your heading to that dungeon of yours…” funny thing though is I might actually use that as part of my new studio name and marketing campaign I’m working on. LOL. Great article! I’m really going to focus on getting notes taken during the initial mix of a session to better help with starting on a solid foundation of where I and the client want the mix to go. This will help drastically to stay on track with the end goal in mind from the beginning rather than changing course so many unexpected times (keep in mind the mix change as you go through it but I’m looking to cut down on the number of times I change the course). Thanks again team!
Thank you Graham!
I’ll try this next!!
Really helpful article.
Graham – Great post, I have 3 kids and a day job and definately fall in to the category. I usuallly do the mixing on headphones and check it on monitors when I have some time I can make some noise. Any thoughts about that?
Great thanks. I would like to know just how loud vocals need to be when recording, you know, without startling the neighbours! Most vocalists love to shout! can we record really low?
Your vocals need to be as loud as required to record all the passion and emotion of the song. If you hold back for whatever reason, you will give an entirely different color and emotion to the song and it will be apparent — human voice is the most expressive “instrument” among all others. If you don’t want to startle the neighbors, record your vocals during the day or off site, heck, you can even record them on your iPad or iPhone and transfer to your DAW when you get home (done that before), just make sure you use a metronome or something to keep the rhythm. You can compromise individual instruments, but NEVER compromise your vocals, you will regret that later.
Thanks a lot. This is great mate. right on point and i can feel it as i’m trying it out right now
I used to be pretty much a “full time” musician, but recently had to get a day job again. Reading this article really got me excited that I have a day job – that way it’s not wasted trying to work on music for too long and ultimately waste time.
I’m going to start scheduling out my evenings, that is a great idea. Thanks for the awesome article!
-CJ
Where’s Part 2, Graham? We’re anxious!!
How are you Graham.
Mi name is Angel how are you.
It is possible to send you a solo piano instrumental track,there some noise the I will like to get advise from you and how to get rid of this unwanted noise.
The reason of that noise is the a increase the interface volume more then the piano volume and the result of that the unwanted ssssssssss noise.
Cubase 7 nice heard itS also cool,but hey the debate for DAW is of another day Live suite n Avid r cool for me,Any suggestions on a Preamp to use wit a Rode NT1A Price range from 250 to 300,was thinking of Presonas studio channel,reason being? U get to control amount of tube u want on vocals in. I know the best is prolly a Neve bt out of my range .Thanx guys
I fall in to this category for sure. because I’m kind of a “night animal”. So I’d say that 90% of my mixing gets done during late hours and then I come back and check them at a slightly louder volume the day after!
Late night-working is great. The night has a great vibe. Lots of pro musicians only start working late in the afternoon or 10 o’clock p.m.
But playing your music at low levels is nice for your ears, but doesn’t solve your frequency stuff. I have so many mixes that I ruined by putting TOO MANY FREQUENCIES in them cos I played them too low. When playing loud [not too loud but a ‘nice loud’] you hear what actually is going on. The frequencies really pop out, so you know you have to trim them.
I always use the loud playing when tucking vocals into the mix. When I play loud, I FEEL THE BEAT. while feeling the beat I try to get my vocals just above that, without loosing that beat-feeling. That works like a charm. When I am satisfied I play softly to check if the vocals still come out at a low level. If that is the case, I am fine.
When I play loud, I always do it in time-peaks. So I do not play loud for too long. That is too tiring.
The F/M curve is one thing, but you still want the eq-curve to be great when playing at low AND at high levels.
That’s just a reference back to this post, which we’ve all just read and commenting on.