Just tried this and it worked. Found it is easier to hear EQ fx in mono. Got greater clarity and was able to decide that one part of the track actually didn't need more bass. Belated thanks.
Not sure if you know Graham from the channel The Recording Revolution, but he also goes into great detail on this subject (not with metal or hardcore though), so glad to hear your take on it from a metalhead perspective!
I've been using mono for mixing, and the point you made about focusing on the eq moves in mono rather than volume adjustments, I was totally overlooking that. Thank you for the info.
Thanks Jordan! I've been mixing in mono (at least switching between stereo and mono 70% of the time mixing a song) for several years now and it was one of the best techniques I've learned! Wheather it's a grand piano or a drumset or a whole mix: if it doesn't sounds good in mono it will not (or even hardly) translate to different sound environments. Especially with the advent of (single stand alone) streaming boxes mono is becomming more important than ever.
Sorry for the "beginner question" but, when you talk about mixing in mono you mean selecting the plugin you are going to use in its mono version instead of the stereo one and inserting it on the track you want to EQ?
@@rmv2333 no reason to say sorry - I'm convinced that all kinds of questions will help everyone! Mixing in mono simply means that you take your signal on the master buss and collaps it to mono. As a result you're going to listen to your mix in mono. Some DAWs can handle that natively (I'm using Reaper, which does): you just need to press the MONO button on the master buss. In other DAWs you'll need to engage a plugin like A1StereoControl on the master buss. Simple as that! One crucial thing though: you could also listen in mono by simply muting the left or right channel of a stereo signal. BUT that won't work here! The mono signal must result from the summation of both channels, therefore the MONO button or the plugin! This ensures that the volume of all tracks is included in the mono signal. Beyond that, phase related problems (e.g. partial cancellation of signals) become audible only like this. Cheers, Bernd!
@@boldbearStudios thanks so much! I'm using Cubase but I don't know if it has that button to switch from mono to stereo but I'll check it out. Anyway, is there any waves plugin that can do the trick as well? I'd like to try this approach. Thanks again, dude! ;)
@@rmv2333 As far as I know in Cubase on your stereo out buss you can switch from Stereo Balance Panner to Stereo Combined Panner. Set to zero it will make your mix mono. Concerning Waves, there is this plugin called S1 Stereo Enhance Plugin (a counterpart to the free A1StereoControl). You can also use it to make your tracks mono. www.waves.com/plugins/s1-stereo-imager Have fun mixing in mono, mate! :-)
This works PERFECTLY! You the man! EQ Sweeping in Mono to see where the instruments that gets lost "POPS" out is the easiest way I got my guitars back. unreal.
I produce electronic music and never used Mono untill last year i bought a monitor controller (Drawmer CMC2) with a Mono button. I started checking my mixes on it and i recognised everything you just explained but i never understood why these volume differences occured. Sometimes its really bad, sometimes there is hardly any difference. Thanks for this very clear explaination 🤘
Great advice. Another reason to periodically switch to mono is to check the phase of virtual synths, for example, a lot of stereo synth patches fall apart when summed to mono due to the synth using haas type chorusing to achieve stereo spread (which has terrible mono compatibility). And for those finding that the sides of their mix become to loud once they switch back to stereo after mixing in mono, try tweaking the stereo pan law in your daw.
What about doubling guitar tracks and they collapse in mono? Is that just really dialing in eq as well or can not much be done? It always just sounds flat.
excellent explanation. I've been pushing the "mono check" soapbox for quite awhile...most mock it touting the stereo earbud world we live in, but as for me, checking in mono has only pushed my mixes to a better place in every way...including panning and effect decisions :-) thanks for waving the mono compatibility flag high!
great tips again. i watched loads of your videos now. i also heard mix in mono and didnt know how or why. now i do. EQ in mono so it reveals all the overlaps
Man my problem right now is the bass guitar. When I bring it up in stereo to where it cuts through, it’s absolutely overwhelming in mono, buries everything, but when I level it in mono, it’s gone in stereo. Obviously I need to get better at eq..
If you can afford it, I highly highly recommend URM Enhanced. It’s an online mixing school, which caters to metal. They have an entire course dedicated to controlling low end, game changing.
Yes! Sometimes it is better to listen to someone's opinion rather than looking at a tutorial, you know that sometimes, things can be deceiving and when you go and try it for yourself, it doesn't work, its better to analyze the logic behind mixing moves rather than cutting the low end on each and every one of your tracks just cuz someone said it works XD
So when I turn my mix into mono, and stuff disappeared that I panned in stereo etc, reverb, doubler , chorus etc, do I turn it up more to make it heard in mono? Or what do u do when stuff disappears when switched to mono
The issue I have with this concept is, that I have never seen someone demonstrate this in heavy music. Everyone is just talking about this. Whenever I try this concept myself, all leads and synth parts poke out like crazy and my rhythm guitars get buried. In all videos about mixing heavy guitars (including this channel) the only applied eq to main rhythm guitars is just hi- and lo-pass filtering with some additional dips for annoying frequencies. So that leads me to the conclusion that all other tracks in the mix must have some sort of eq carving related to the mono mixing, is that correct? Jordan, could you maybe create a short demonstration video of your workflow regarding mixing in mono? I would really love to see the actual execution of this concept.
Will this fix mix translation issues? Issue i currently face is mix sounds good on my cans. Suddently flip to Sonarworks APods and theres really harsh top end freqencies
there are a lot of videos online about the importance of mixing in mono, and they're all valid. but they typically neglect to talk about the fact that you absolutely cannot complete an entire mix start to finish in mono. if you did that, you'd be completely bypassing seeing how your panning sounds, and you wouldn't be able to hear any stereo image from any of your stereo tracks or processing. mixing in stereo is enormously vital. it just shouldn't make up the entire mixing process, for all the reasons you've mentioned. for me, i typically check my mixes in mono while mixing, but i keep things in stereo most of the time and don't seem to have any problems. i guess it's just because i'm ultra conscious of the problems you're talking about and have been since i started doing this work. however i find mixing in mono almost intolerable if it's being done for long periods of time. especially with the experimental electronic music i often work on. people generally know that stuff is MADE for headphones or a good wide image. of course you're gonna be outta luck with a bluetooth speaker or a super market but that kind of music isn't made for those environments most of the time.
When you're noticing these masking issues, do you usually reach for an EQ boost on the 'masked track' or do you try cutting the other instruments (or a combination)? I'm noticing this a lot with drums under heavy guitars atm.
I tried doing it before, but whenever I colapse my mixes to mono, the rhythm guitars and vocal doubles that are panned hard completely disappear. How can I prevent that from happening?
You're experiencing phase cancellation. Are you taking the same track, duplicating it, then hard panning left and right? If you track separate takes for each side, I'd think they shouldn't cancel.
@@KeepTheGates They are different takes, that's why I'm finding it weird. They souldn't cancel unless they were the same performance. Anyway, thanks a lot for answering.
I know this comment is a bit old, but I was worrying about that stuff a lot lately, until I saw an advice on a forum to listen to some of my favorite professional mixes in mono. I checked a lot of pop punk bands like Mayday Parade, You Me At Six, bands like that, and tried listening in mono. I found out that the guitars collapse, in every single case. Of course they don't disappear, but they do sound weak. The way I see it - I think there's not much you can do about it, rock music with hard panned double tracked guitars is just best enjoyed in stereo.
it could be a bad sign or it could be a good sign. i think it depends on the style of music, how many instruments and layers are there, and what youre going for. it's always best to have a nice wide final product though. so if you're listening in mono and the width of the stereo image doesn't seem to collapse, then it's possible your mix sounds mono because you've panned everything to the center. do you have anything panned out? do you have any elements with a wide stereo image, like a stereo synth, or any stereo reverbs or delays? if not, you may need to incorporate some of that to give your mix a more epic sound, with some depth and width to it.
mixing in mono is great, and jordan is right, but you can't do an entire mix in mono and call it a day. you're ignoring an entire dimension that absolutely needs to be addressed and refined. mixing in mono is to help you get the general framework completed. but when it's time to work with panning and stereo processing, you can't do that in mono. you simply just absolutely cannot. you HAVE to mix in stereo before you're done your mix, hands down, no questions asked.
I have this weird issue that my mix sound very simular and comparable to proffecional mixes on headphones, but completely loses against proffecional mixes when I want to let people here it on my laptop speakers. Do you know what tge issue can be?
sounds like the exact issue I'm talking about. Your headphones give you lots of low and high end, and so it might sound as exciting as pro mixes on headphones. But then on your laptop speakers you've only got midrange.
Mmm, certainly mixing in Mono is good for EQ but not for toher stuff, I made the mistake in the past of doing everything in Mono, and after going to Stereo the sides had too much volume.
when doing double tracks is it best to use 2 different sounds (different amp, cab and/or guitar) for better separation or is it purely just playing the part as tight as possible?
The deal is that it's not 1965 anymore and basically everyone has 2 airpods or 2 car speakers and mono is basically bullshit- Just my opinion. Does it "help you judge the sound"? Yes- until you turn it off and hear your stereo panned elements absolutely blasting too hard because in mono they sounded to quiet
Okay understood, yet sadly (my opinion ), the dumbing down of audio/music started when a/d conversion began has compromised the purity of real music created by real musicians that play real instruments. Data compression, Mp3, smart phones, and now the tiny mono speaker has become the ‘given’ for our music pleasure, not to forget the advent of pushing a button to activate the loop/sample/beat another dude created, yet you call it yours because you bought the license to use. People call them selves artists yet they are nothing more than digital jukebox sample operators with man-buns. Hope I wasn’t respectful.
This guy is the only one on RUclips that is an expert. Solid technical explanations with no baloney.
And @streaky
Dan worral
No one usually explains these type of things and I thank you for that!
Just tried this and it worked. Found it is easier to hear EQ fx in mono. Got greater clarity and was able to decide that one part of the track actually didn't need more bass. Belated thanks.
Not sure if you know Graham from the channel The Recording Revolution, but he also goes into great detail on this subject (not with metal or hardcore though), so glad to hear your take on it from a metalhead perspective!
Of course, Graham is a friend!
I found out about Jordan's channel from Graham, both are the best ever
I've been using mono for mixing, and the point you made about focusing on the eq moves in mono rather than volume adjustments, I was totally overlooking that. Thank you for the info.
Thanks Jordan!
I've been mixing in mono (at least switching between stereo and mono 70% of the time mixing a song) for several years now and it was one of the best techniques I've learned!
Wheather it's a grand piano or a drumset or a whole mix: if it doesn't sounds good in mono it will not (or even hardly) translate to different sound environments. Especially with the advent of (single stand alone) streaming boxes mono is becomming more important than ever.
Sorry for the "beginner question" but, when you talk about mixing in mono you mean selecting the plugin you are going to use in its mono version instead of the stereo one and inserting it on the track you want to EQ?
@@rmv2333 no reason to say sorry - I'm convinced that all kinds of questions will help everyone!
Mixing in mono simply means that you take your signal on the master buss and collaps it to mono. As a result you're going to listen to your mix in mono. Some DAWs can handle that natively (I'm using Reaper, which does): you just need to press the MONO button on the master buss. In other DAWs you'll need to engage a plugin like A1StereoControl on the master buss. Simple as that!
One crucial thing though: you could also listen in mono by simply muting the left or right channel of a stereo signal. BUT that won't work here! The mono signal must result from the summation of both channels, therefore the MONO button or the plugin! This ensures that the volume of all tracks is included in the mono signal. Beyond that, phase related problems (e.g. partial cancellation of signals) become audible only like this.
Cheers, Bernd!
@@boldbearStudios thanks so much! I'm using Cubase but I don't know if it has that button to switch from mono to stereo but I'll check it out. Anyway, is there any waves plugin that can do the trick as well? I'd like to try this approach. Thanks again, dude! ;)
@@rmv2333 As far as I know in Cubase on your stereo out buss you can switch from Stereo Balance Panner to Stereo Combined Panner. Set to zero it will make your mix mono.
Concerning Waves, there is this plugin called S1 Stereo Enhance Plugin (a counterpart to the free A1StereoControl). You can also use it to make your tracks mono. www.waves.com/plugins/s1-stereo-imager
Have fun mixing in mono, mate! :-)
@@boldbearStudios ohh, I have that one! Thanks! I'm gonna try this tonight!
Very informative vid! I didn't have a clue why people mixed in mono before watching this. Thanks!
Jman. Any chance you can do a full vid of an actual mix in mono and a breakdown of your moves to get it to sound epic?
This works PERFECTLY! You the man! EQ Sweeping in Mono to see where the instruments that gets lost "POPS" out is the easiest way I got my guitars back. unreal.
I followed this approach on a mix I've been working on and things got so much clearer and cleaner. Awesome video!
I produce electronic music and never used Mono untill last year i bought a monitor controller (Drawmer CMC2) with a Mono button.
I started checking my mixes on it and i recognised everything you just explained but i never understood why these volume differences occured.
Sometimes its really bad, sometimes there is hardly any difference.
Thanks for this very clear explaination 🤘
Great advice. Another reason to periodically switch to mono is to check the phase of virtual synths, for example, a lot of stereo synth patches fall apart when summed to mono due to the synth using haas type chorusing to achieve stereo spread (which has terrible mono compatibility). And for those finding that the sides of their mix become to loud once they switch back to stereo after mixing in mono, try tweaking the stereo pan law in your daw.
I like the idea of having two versions of the song in one. Obviously won’t really work, but cookie cutter art for the mall.
Ty for sharing these!
What about doubling guitar tracks and they collapse in mono? Is that just really dialing in eq as well or can not much be done? It always just sounds flat.
Helped my mix so much Thankyou
excellent explanation. I've been pushing the "mono check" soapbox for quite awhile...most mock it touting the stereo earbud world we live in, but as for me, checking in mono has only pushed my mixes to a better place in every way...including panning and effect decisions :-) thanks for waving the mono compatibility flag high!
great tips again. i watched loads of your videos now. i also heard mix in mono and didnt know how or why. now i do. EQ in mono so it reveals all the overlaps
Yes!! Thank you Jordan!
Thank you for this useful video. It is amazing
Awesome video
Finally someone explain it!!!! Thanks a lot man!!! Is clear now for me👍👍👍
Thank you so much 🙂!
Watching your vids for a few weeks now and I learned so much! Thank you 🙏🏼
Thank you
You just taught me something new.
Thank you bro
You just made it make sense.
cool wisdom. appreciated!
Great explanation
Man my problem right now is the bass guitar.
When I bring it up in stereo to where it cuts through, it’s absolutely overwhelming in mono, buries everything, but when I level it in mono, it’s gone in stereo.
Obviously I need to get better at eq..
Any advise on how to solve that problem ?
If you can afford it, I highly highly recommend URM Enhanced.
It’s an online mixing school, which caters to metal.
They have an entire course dedicated to controlling low end, game changing.
Very insightful. The mistake that I think I was making is I was leveling in mono.
Yes! Sometimes it is better to listen to someone's opinion rather than looking at a tutorial, you know that sometimes, things can be deceiving and when you go and try it for yourself, it doesn't work, its better to analyze the logic behind mixing moves rather than cutting the low end on each and every one of your tracks just cuz someone said it works XD
So when I turn my mix into mono, and stuff disappeared that I panned in stereo etc, reverb, doubler , chorus etc, do I turn it up more to make it heard in mono? Or what do u do when stuff disappears when switched to mono
Enjoying
Such an awesome piece of advice though, as usual.
Sup oz!
@@sambec27 haha hey dude! You watch Jordan as well??
Yup, a friend just recommended me his channel
He is awesome dude, you will get great advice from him.
The issue I have with this concept is, that I have never seen someone demonstrate this in heavy music. Everyone is just talking about this. Whenever I try this concept myself, all leads and synth parts poke out like crazy and my rhythm guitars get buried. In all videos about mixing heavy guitars (including this channel) the only applied eq to main rhythm guitars is just hi- and lo-pass filtering with some additional dips for annoying frequencies. So that leads me to the conclusion that all other tracks in the mix must have some sort of eq carving related to the mono mixing, is that correct? Jordan, could you maybe create a short demonstration video of your workflow regarding mixing in mono? I would really love to see the actual execution of this concept.
Great video. Once again just proves how important listening.
Funny how we forget that.
Will this fix mix translation issues? Issue i currently face is mix sounds good on my cans. Suddently flip to Sonarworks APods and theres really harsh top end freqencies
there are a lot of videos online about the importance of mixing in mono, and they're all valid. but they typically neglect to talk about the fact that you absolutely cannot complete an entire mix start to finish in mono. if you did that, you'd be completely bypassing seeing how your panning sounds, and you wouldn't be able to hear any stereo image from any of your stereo tracks or processing. mixing in stereo is enormously vital. it just shouldn't make up the entire mixing process, for all the reasons you've mentioned. for me, i typically check my mixes in mono while mixing, but i keep things in stereo most of the time and don't seem to have any problems. i guess it's just because i'm ultra conscious of the problems you're talking about and have been since i started doing this work. however i find mixing in mono almost intolerable if it's being done for long periods of time. especially with the experimental electronic music i often work on. people generally know that stuff is MADE for headphones or a good wide image. of course you're gonna be outta luck with a bluetooth speaker or a super market but that kind of music isn't made for those environments most of the time.
So I want to keep everything in mono straight up the middle for the whole process and then pan all the mono tracks at the very end?
This is what im wondering also
When you're noticing these masking issues, do you usually reach for an EQ boost on the 'masked track' or do you try cutting the other instruments (or a combination)? I'm noticing this a lot with drums under heavy guitars atm.
hey Jordan, do you continue to mix in mono after putting fx stereo sends?
I'll check it, but mostly no, I'm just doing the initial EQ work before adding my FX
many thanks for your reply
Hey man thanks for the tip
Got me thinking. Good vid.
Do you balance the levels at least a little bit at first? Like how do you know its an EQ problem and not an overall volume problem?
You go back and forth and adjust as necessary.
I tried doing it before, but whenever I colapse my mixes to mono, the rhythm guitars and vocal doubles that are panned hard completely disappear. How can I prevent that from happening?
You're experiencing phase cancellation. Are you taking the same track, duplicating it, then hard panning left and right? If you track separate takes for each side, I'd think they shouldn't cancel.
@@KeepTheGates They are different takes, that's why I'm finding it weird. They souldn't cancel unless they were the same performance. Anyway, thanks a lot for answering.
Does it still happen if you turn them way up?
@@KeepTheGates Not sure, gonna give it a try.
I know this comment is a bit old, but I was worrying about that stuff a lot lately, until I saw an advice on a forum to listen to some of my favorite professional mixes in mono. I checked a lot of pop punk bands like Mayday Parade, You Me At Six, bands like that, and tried listening in mono. I found out that the guitars collapse, in every single case. Of course they don't disappear, but they do sound weak.
The way I see it - I think there's not much you can do about it, rock music with hard panned double tracked guitars is just best enjoyed in stereo.
My question is, after mixing my tracks for my newer album, my mono and stereo isn't very different at all in sound.. is that good or not so good?
it could be a bad sign or it could be a good sign. i think it depends on the style of music, how many instruments and layers are there, and what youre going for. it's always best to have a nice wide final product though. so if you're listening in mono and the width of the stereo image doesn't seem to collapse, then it's possible your mix sounds mono because you've panned everything to the center. do you have anything panned out? do you have any elements with a wide stereo image, like a stereo synth, or any stereo reverbs or delays? if not, you may need to incorporate some of that to give your mix a more epic sound, with some depth and width to it.
mixing in mono is great, and jordan is right, but you can't do an entire mix in mono and call it a day. you're ignoring an entire dimension that absolutely needs to be addressed and refined. mixing in mono is to help you get the general framework completed. but when it's time to work with panning and stereo processing, you can't do that in mono. you simply just absolutely cannot. you HAVE to mix in stereo before you're done your mix, hands down, no questions asked.
To make the whole mix in mono can you just throw a mono plugin switch on the master fader?
yeah you can
absolutely!
That’s the way I do it, bypass it when I need stereo
Would you create a master mix bus for like parallel compression when you switch to mono? Does compression effect any EQ moves you're going for?
I say this, because it splits it in logic, and hides and deactivates your stereo out plugins
I have this weird issue that my mix sound very simular and comparable to proffecional mixes on headphones, but completely loses against proffecional mixes when I want to let people here it on my laptop speakers. Do you know what tge issue can be?
lmao laptop speakers are trash, that's why it sounds bad.
sounds like the exact issue I'm talking about. Your headphones give you lots of low and high end, and so it might sound as exciting as pro mixes on headphones. But then on your laptop speakers you've only got midrange.
Mmm, certainly mixing in Mono is good for EQ but not for toher stuff, I made the mistake in the past of doing everything in Mono, and after going to Stereo the sides had too much volume.
exactly! I believe you should still do your balancing & other moves in stereo, but work on the EQ and frequency separation in mono
Great Vid :)
when doing double tracks is it best to use 2 different sounds (different amp, cab and/or guitar) for better separation or is it purely just playing the part as tight as possible?
I use the same chain for my main left and right guitars, no changes. Yes, tight as possible
wow bro
I like mono it sounds cool but stereo is kewler haha :)
and when i switch after from mono to stereo, wouaahhh !
The deal is that it's not 1965 anymore and basically everyone has 2 airpods or 2 car speakers and mono is basically bullshit- Just my opinion. Does it "help you judge the sound"? Yes- until you turn it off and hear your stereo panned elements absolutely blasting too hard because in mono they sounded to quiet
Is it Gigachad himself??!?!!?!!?!?
I swear by mono mixing.
Okay understood, yet sadly (my opinion ), the dumbing down of audio/music started when a/d conversion began has compromised the purity of real music created by real musicians that play real instruments. Data compression, Mp3, smart phones, and now the tiny mono speaker has become the ‘given’ for our music pleasure, not to forget the advent of pushing a button to activate the loop/sample/beat another dude created, yet you call it yours because you bought the license to use. People call them selves artists yet they are nothing more than digital jukebox sample operators with man-buns. Hope I wasn’t respectful.
That’s all ya got
Yeah that was lame. Go practice some guitar scales bud
@@danielwetzel7777 yeah most definitely. Y’all go practice pressing that button thing. Try some inversions too, or tempo thangs while you’re at it.