Join 4,000+ music creators receiving weekly actionable tips and tricks, in-depth music career and business advice, and high-quality resources from across the web, directly to your inbox!
Share
60+ hours of FREE mixing & mastering courses
Published about 1 year agoย โขย 5 min read
by plv music
Insights Of An Artist's Journey
Hi Reader ๐๐ป
Welcome to another issue of Insights Of An Artist's Journey!
Here are today's topics:
๐ง Best ways to learn mixing & mastering
๐ถ 2 new music discoveries
๐ 400 FREE plugins (no, it's not clickbait!)
โ Is it a good Spotify playlist website to vet playlists
Let's jump in!
This newsletter is brought to you by:
โ Looking for a DAW that lets you be in your creative flow?
โ
Try SoundBridge - a new DAW that combines the best of all previous DAWs to create a new one that will enhance your workflow and unleash your creativity.
No unnecessary menus, no right clicks, only the things you need, a clean UI and a simple workflow for maximum efficiency when producing or just starting out.
They even have a free version so you can try it out and see if it's for you!
๐ "PLV, what are the best ways to learn mixing & mastering?"
This is one of the questions I receive the most - so let's answer!
During the last 4 years of my journey learning music production on my own, I experimented with different ways.
Here are the best 5 ways to learn mixing & mastering (in my opinion):
โ
1 | Reference tracks
Let's start by the basics.
If you want to achieve a professional sound and mix, it starts by analyzing professional sounding tracks.
Take note of everything you hear:
Which are the loudest elements?
What instruments are panned?
How much reverb can you hear?
How are the transitions made?
How loud is the master?
Analyzing tracks in such details will push your ear to get better and understand what makes a professional and clean track.
I know it's time consuming but doing just a few sessions of analysis will have great impact on your next tracks! It did for me!
P.S: I recommend to buy a few reference tracks on Beatport to get the highest quality file and support fellow artists.
โ
2 | Remakes
In the same idea of learning by analyzing reference tracks, you can take this one step further.
Produce a remake of that reference track!
In addition to actually putting in practice what you learn from analyzing reference tracks, it will push your ear to analyze even more in details everything that makes up a great track.
By constantly comparing your version and the original, you'll be able to teach your mixing ear on what to do to achieve a professional mix and master.
Pro tip: Use a stem splitter platform like Kits.ai or LALAL.ai in order to split each instrument (bass, chords, drums, vocals) so it can be easier to recreate the original version.
โ
3 | Feedback
Another great way to improve is to send your track to other producer friends to get their feedback.
I personally always send my new tracks to 3-4 producer friends and ask what they think about the mix and master.
We spend a lot of time working on our tracks that sometimes, we lose track of it. It's like we can't hear anything about it anymore.
This is where fresh pairs of ears can come into play!
They'll probably spot something you stopped paying attention to.
Pro tip: If you don't have any producer friends, I recommend to connect with some on social media by commenting under music creator's posts that already have a community of producer or to join their Discord servers.
You probably already heard me talking about this platform but, there is a reason why.
A couple years ago, I challenged myself to use their platform for 30 days straight, and the difference since then has been noticeable.
I felt a before/after in my mixes where they finally started to sound decent and quite professional.
SoundGym is a platform that uses mini-games to make you practice your mixing ear.
It has games such as recognizing volume levels difference, identifying which sounds has the most amount of reverb, which frequencies has been cut or pushed etc.
It's a great way to practice while having fun - and it only takes 5 minutes per day!
It is a website/online school I discovered recently which does a BUNCH of free courses and livestreams.
I'm talking hours and hours (60+) of uncut footage from professionals mixing and mastering tracks! ๐คฏ
Just sit down, watch, take notes and apply the tips you learn on your next tracks.
Learning from professionals in such an environment (aka uncut footage) is THE best way to learn and progress.
โ
โ
๐ถ | Music Discoveries Of The Week
One Night - Wiki.P โThis week, I want to start by sharing a new release from one of my coaching student, Wiki.P. At only 16yo, she has an AMAZING voice, (think like Ava Max and Dua Lipa), and the clean dance pop production will get you instantly! She has a great story too, she sings and her dad produces the music - what a wonderful duo!
Is this real life - Zerotonine, UNIMIโ This one has quite a different style - Melodic Techno. I usually don't listen to that much but I love how he blends some elements of Progressive House and soundscapes in his tracks. It's perfect for a gym workout or motivation to get to work and sometimes, I need it!
We know that Spotify playlists are one of the best ways to grow our audience on Spotify.
But a lot of them aren't that good and we have to be careful who we pitch our song too.
This is where this new tool comes into play!
By copy/pasting the link to a playlist, you can see ALL the details about it. The listeners, the streams, the tracks quality, the discovered on artists etc... which is great to decide if it's a good playlist to pitch or not.
โ
๐ฌ | My Last YouTube Video
How YouTube changed my life & music career (in less than 3 years)
If you ever wanted to see me outside of the studio, it's that video! As I go on a walk, I reflect on my last 3 year journey and how YouTube actually changed my life and how it can change yours. If you need a dose of inspiration, watch it ๐
Join 4,000+ music creators receiving weekly actionable tips and tricks, in-depth music career and business advice, and high-quality resources from across the web, directly to your inbox!
Hey Reader, A few months ago, I could barely run for 1 minute straight. But after a few months of training, I finally ran a 5K! And weirdly, it taught me a lot about building a music business too. Before starting to run, I read tips. Watched videos. Saved running plans. Asked my running friends for advice. But the real lessons came when I actually started running. I kept cramping mid-run until I realized I was drinking too much water during the runs. Something no blog post warned me about....
Hey Reader, When I first started this music business, I was wondering: ๐ญ โHow can I make sales while I sleep?โ ๐ญ โHow can I find the right customers or clients for my music services and products?โ ๐ญ โHow can I get email subscribers?โ But after 2 years of trial and error, I discovered that the real magic wasn't in any single tactic - it was in building systems that worked together - for you, even while you sleep. Systems that made growth inevitable, not accidental. Today: โ My email list grew...
Hi Reader ๐ค In this week's newsletter, I cover topics including: How I got my first music clients online The DAW I use 10+ hour course on "How to use compression" (free) SPONSORED BY SoundBridge - DAW (available on Mac & PC) SoundBridge combines the best of all previous DAWs to create a new one that will enhance your workflow and unleash your creativity. This is why I personally switched to SoundBridge over a year ago! No unnecessary menus No right clicks A clean intuitive UI for all levels...
