Grebz - Mixing in practice

MIXING IN PRACTICE

After seeing the theoretical notions here, let's put them in practice. How can we make our recorded instruments clearly distinct from one another, what frequencies should we boost or cut, where should we place the instruments, etc.

We are going to study the complete mixing of a song I wrote: Life.

Instrument after instrument, we will see what plugins and virtual instruments were used and how, and we will proceed until the ultimate mastering stage. Of course, this is my way of doing things, this is not a recipe that everyone should apply in all circumstances, but that's an example that can be used as a solid base, in order to know what amateurs can do when there's no outside help.

Concrete exemple with a song of mine: LIFE

I made this song entirely in my home studio. And my home studio is only vaguely related to professional recording studios. It's just a room in the appartment, it isn't soundproof and my neighbors don't appreciate tube amps played in the evening. So I plugged my guitars directly into my audio interface (through a preamp) and used amplifier simulations for the guitars and the bass, an acoustic drums software instead of a real drum set, as well as software synthesizers. The only thing that produced some noise during the recordings was my voice. But that's a rather quiet song, vocally speaking.

Of course, before mixing it, the song doesn't sound like much, as you can hear below.

We are going to go from here...

No effects whatsoever are used in this version. The takes are raw, superimposed one onto another, the sound is monophonic (everything's centered) and the guitars are thinner than a fashion model... As for the drums, they sound really flat. To sum up, it lacks everything that could make it sound good. It's even hard to imagine that it will sound good.

Here is the waveform of the song before mixing.

As we'll see in this tutorial, we are going to have to use some tools to make Life come to life (!).

...to there:

This is the finished song. As you can hear and see in the graphics, the difference is huge.

This is the waveform of the finished song

This song is called Life, I wrote it and recorded it in my home studio in October 2011, and made some modifications in the course of the year 2012.

MESSAGES

FromMe
le 13/10/2025 à 12h14

Hello.

So how can I contact LePou?
The latest X64 version of Legion has a bug where the Drive amount jumps when changing from green/red channels. The knob doesn't jump, but you can hear the drive amount jump when tweaking a little bit, so who knows what the default or chosen sound is being used whenever?
Also similar problems with the Engl as well. The old V 1.01 x86 32 bit version of Legion works perfectly however. (but the newer 64 bit version does sound a bit better, sadly).

Has you or anyone else noticed this?
I want to contact him for a way to fix these plugin bugs.

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Hello,
To my knowledge, Lepou has not been active for years in the simulation community. I think he has completely given up by lack of time and motivation. So I doubt he'll be willing to fix any bugs, and I have no idea how to contact him.

Grebz

musicien-bidouilleur
le 07/09/2025 à 17h58

Juste pour t'encourager et te féliciter pour ton travail. Bonne source d'informations.
J'ai écouté en partie ta musique : il y a un monde entre 2008 et 2020, non pas concernant les titres que j'aime bien mais concernant leur réalisation. 2020 >>> 2008 à mon humble avis.
Le travail et la persévérance paient !
Bravo.

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Merci beaucoup, ça me fait très plaisir !
Grebz

ace0fspades
le 25/08/2025 à 05h50

Thanks for the free impulses! Great stuff!

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Thanks for visiting!
Grebz

Jimmy
le 09/12/2021 à 15h16

Hello,
I would like to config my Schuffham S-Gear 2 but I don't know how to do.
I have Logic Pro X.6.2 with S-Gear plugin
I found your website and I ask myself what does it means in the folder Schuffham S-Gear 2.
I don't understand what you have writing like in this exemple : Guitar on the left:
1 impulse of baffle Marshall 1960A (loudspeaker: G12M) through a microphone Neumann U67 in Cap Edge position, at a distance of 2 inches (5 cm). Stereo panning: 100% left.
1 impulse of baffle Marshall 1960A (loudspeaker: G12M) through a microphone Neumann U87 in Cap Edge position, at a distance of 4 inches (10 cm). Stereo panning: 100% left.
How can I find the same sound as you ? How can I do to config my own S-Gear with these parameters ? What does it means ?
Sorry for my English ;) I’m French !
You can answer me directly on my email address.
Thanks in advance.
Jimmy

Labrava
le 29/10/2021 à 13h49

Hi Grebz,
I don't know if you read these... but I was wondering if your Lepou plugins are x32 or x64? Thanks for all the great stuff on here!

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Hello, thanks for visiting my website. They're x64.
Grebz