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hi this is Andrew chefs at studio la

Fabrique I just finished up my week-long

seminar here and we have a few more

questions to answer so here's here's the

first one I'm gonna get this name wrong

from Jose Bo's eh cause Bo's I'm sorry

I've just butchered your name but first

up thanks for all your great work well

thank you if you were to mix a song in

the box without a traditional console

would you still use some outboard as

inserts on channels and buses in

combination with plugins or would you go

only with plugins to skip all the hassle

once you are in the box that's a good

question because I do mix in the Box

sometimes still even though most of my

mixes around the console usually when

I'm in the box I just stay completely in

the box because either I'm finishing a

mix that has been started in the box

while the production was going on or I'm

doing it that way because I need to be

portable and I want to be able to work

with it on my laptop and so if I start

using outboard gear it's a problem and

now with all of the plug-in emulations

of the hardware that are around you can

usually get pretty close to what you're

used to with the console so obviously

the the concepts are really different

and the gain structure and all of that

but you can really set up sessions in a

way where it's familiar so yeah I just

stay completely in the box all right

next question from Jesse Miller a much

easier to pronounce name for me I thank

you for taking time to answer our

questions

you're welcome is mixing an LCR a hard

rule for you or are you flexible have

you always mixed LCR and if so why and

if not what specifically drew you

towards your use of LCR okay so I think

basically what Jesse's talking about is

the idea of all of the instruments in

the mix either being on the left the

right or in the center there isn't a

whole lot of placement in between left

and center and right and center

and the real answer to that is that I

mix on an old Neve console and it has a

button for the left speaker a button for

the right speaker and if you want a pan

in between you actually have to switch

in a pan circuit and it drops the level

and I don't like that so I almost always

hard pan but it's really just because of

the hardware I'm mixing on and now I'm

used to that sound but when I mix in the

box I'll sometimes pan in between and

sometimes when I'll set up a stereo

output of Pro Tools and pan inside Pro

Tools even though on the console it's

hard left and right so it's something I

got used to and now I kind of like it

alright question from AJ steel mixing

LCR so apparently the fact that I mix

LCR is big news

mixing LCR do you find the middle sounds

quieter than the left and right but when

you collapse the mix to mono the center

is the loudest which is good I get a

little worried that the left and right

are too loud but my mix seems to be okay

in mono to me we actually talked about

that this week quite a bit because there

was a question about checking your mixes

in mono and initially my response was

well I really don't care what it sounds

like in mono because most people will be

listening in stereo even if it's a low

quality mp3 or off you tube it's still

stereo but then it was pointed out to me

that a lot of people listen on their

iPhone speaker which is of course mono

so mono does matter but I would never

change a mix because of it I think if

you check a mix in mono you might think

okay now my balance is not right but you

should always go back to stereo before

trying to fix the balance I'm not one of

those people who does their panning and

their balances in mono and then goes

back to stereo so maybe checking in mono

could help you notice something that's

wrong that you're not noticing when you

listen in stereo but fix it for the way

it sounds in stereo because I think 90%

of the time that's how people hear it

and if you're tailoring your mixes for

how it sounds on an iPhone speaker then

that's just not where people are going

to listen and it's not what's important

to me anyway that's what I think

next question from Herman who tear as

Ross I tried it's probably wrong hi

Andrew chefs hope you had a good time in

la Fabrique such a great studio I

definitely had a great time it is a

fantastic studio

I admire your job thanks for answering

these questions do you think it makes

sense to spend a lot of money on a

digital clock instead of a converters

clock or a proto-tool sync clock even if

you do not have a lot of different

digital devices okay that's a good

question and I think my answer to it has

changed over the years back when Pro

Tools had the 888 their clock was really

not very good and I had an art sink as

an external clock and it definitely made

everything sound better now I think that

the clocks inside most professional

interfaces are very very good the clock

makes a huge difference so if you have

equipment with bad clock then using an

external clock is a really good idea but

I really think at that point you should

spend the money upgrading to a better

audio interface because you'll get

better analog electronics better

converters along with a better clock and

in general now my feeling is that most

equipment sounds the best when it's

clocked internally because as soon as

you're on an external clock you're

bringing in other circuits that help it

follow the clock and it just most gears

sounds best internally so when I'm

working in Pro Tools with multiple

interfaces I usually have either the

first interface as the clock or the

interface that my mix is printing into

as the master clock and then I use loop

sync I'll only use the sync i/o if I

have to sync up with external timecode

or I want a very speed while I'm

recording or something but then I switch

back to internal clock and that sounds

the best to me so I would say unless you

can really spend a bunch of money just

get the best audio interface you can and

that will usually have a pretty good

clock alright another one I won't even

say your name again because if I got it

wrong the first time it's only going to

be worse hi

Andrew hello again I have many questions

as you can see I've understood you

engineered and mix the Chili Peppers

last record greg fellerman did the basic

recording I recorded a lot of the

overdubs along with Greg and then I did

mix most of that record I've noticed a

lot of distortion on that record and it

rules did you record on to tape those

distortions are from tape the limit your

Neve desk or maybe because of the

mastering they initially did some

recording onto tape but we ended up

using most of the tracks straight into

Pro Tools so the tape didn't win in in a

battle of tape versus straight Pro Tools

my Neve definitely adds Distortion the

way I mix with parallel compression and

all of the level adds some distortion

and sometimes I would just add

distortion so the distortion comes from

all over the place and I like the sound

of it just a little bit of harmonic

distortion as part of the way my console

sounds so it comes from everywhere I

don't know that we really added any in

mastering on that particular record I

mean I think the mastering was pretty

close to the mixes so yeah so the

distortion came from everywhere and

thank you very much all right from Brett

Skoda's Lima how do you feel about the

final output of projects you have mixed

clipping mastering and such okay so

that's a very subtle question about some

very specific records that I've been

involved in basically I won't talk about

the clipping what I'll talk about is the

first of all from the previous question

I enjoy distortion I'm fine with that

that doesn't mean that I enjoy all the

distortion that's on all the records

I've ever worked on but it's not my

record it's the artists record and on

some of those records there's a separate

producer so if they're happy with the

final product then I'm happy with the

final product it's not up to me always

at the very end of the decision making

process so it's just important for me to

try and make it sound as good as I can

and sometimes distortion makes it sound

good

yeah I just make it sound great and then

sometimes it's not my decision and we'll

leave it at that

from daryl's Stuart

oh I'm sorry Darryl smart hi Andrew love

your work thank you

very inspiring what is your opinion on

using analog summing when mixing in the

box what are the reasons for your answer

I would say if you're mixing in the box

in general I don't think that analog

summing is something you absolutely have

to do especially with the newer summing

boxes they're very very clean and I

don't know that it's really that much of

a different sound than the summing

inside of Pro Tools digital mixer or any

of the other DAWs digital mixers because

they're very clean and especially with

floating-point you have infinite

Headroom up until the very end the

biggest thing about it is when you split

up to go into analog summing you're

using the D to a converters to get into

each channel of that and so you're going

to sort of a final gain stage before

you've put everything together so that

really changes how you have to work with

the Headroom inside the mixer so you

could be much hotter in the mixer

because you're gonna split it out and

you're not going to be hitting the

converters as hard as if you sum it all

in the box but in terms of just the

sound of it if you're not going to have

an e or an API or some it mean doesn't

have to be an old thing it could be a

new thing but if it isn't something that

actually has harmonic distortion and a

lot of wire and metal and transformers

and things that really has a sound then

I don't know what you're gaining other

than having to use more converters and

it takes more time and it's harder to

recall so in general unless you're

really going for a specific sound of the

summing box I don't think it's really

worth it and another from Jessie Miller

oh this is an interesting question with

your background in drum programming and

source creation how do you mentally turn

off the source creation section of your

brain and get on with mixing what you

have available from the artist as in do

you hear parts in your head that are not

there and how do you work around that

that's a really interesting question

because it's not owned

about programming and being a musician

or things like that I think it also ties

into producing versus engineering and

all the time while I'm working on a mix

let's say I'll have ideas about how to

finish the song and that's what makes it

finish so I always if I'm just employed

as a mixer I'll always try and work just

with the source material I've got and

sometimes I might add an effect that

wasn't there and that can be just a

subtle way to add something sometimes I

will create what might look like drum

programming but I'll create it with

delays or different effects to start

creating parts that aren't there but

they're all made from the parts that are

there sometimes I'll create harmony

vocals because it feels as though that

will make it sound better and sometimes

I'll just go ahead and record myself

playing an instrument because I really

feel that it'll help the song and then

you have to read the situation as to do

you just bury it in there and hope

nobody notices or do you say your song

is amazing but it really needed this one

thing so I hope that's okay and maybe

you'll replace it with something better

than what I did but usually when you do

something like that if you frame the way

you present it to the artist in the

right way they're really happy that

you've done something or it'll give them

an idea as to what they could do that's

better and they'll go and finish it in a

different way but I'm always hearing

things and it's just a matter of do I

create it from what I was given or do I

really have to go ahead and just put new

instruments on it but that side of my

brain I don't think it ever gets

switched off because otherwise you've

never you would just put up the faders

and you'd be done because it's all the

same thing

all right and a question from Rodney

Melvin what are your views on this whole

Pandora and other online music streaming

service is it great for music because it

allows more people to tune in at a

moment's notice do you think it will

eventually only be beneficial for the

major labels okay that's a big big

question I could talk for hours and

hours and hours about this but I'll try

and give the short version

two questions in there and those two

questions really go to the core of what

I think about the services so in terms

of music discovery I think it's really

important and I think YouTube is as big

a part of that as the actual music

streaming services so people being able

to listen to music is amazing and

obviously it only works for people like

me who make records if that makes people

buy the records and then that money gets

back to the artists and then the artists

use that money to hire people who make

records because for the artists they

have other ways they can make money but

for people who just make records if

people don't buy records we're out of

work so I think it's important for music

discovery I think some of the services

are really cool and the way you can find

things and I think they need to do a

much better job of driving people to

actually buy the records because the

payments that they make are tiny so that

goes to the second part of the question

which is do you think it will eventually

only be beneficial for the major labels

I think already it's only beneficial for

the major labels because the payments

for each stream are so small that unless

you own five million songs it's not

enough money there are major artists who

don't get a lot of money even though

they have millions of streams so with my

independent label there's money that

comes in from YouTube and Pandora and

Spotify and all the other streaming

services and that's great but it's not

enough money for us to make records with

so I think really the key is that the

people who listen to the streaming

services need to understand that they

need to give their money to the artists

if they really like the music if they

kind of like it they got a chance to

listen to it for free on their end and

for very cheap on the services and so

that can be great but eventually it

needs to turn into real money for the

artists and that's the part that is

missing and now a question from Stephen

M Gordon and we will never know what

that M stands for unless he responds to

this video so check the comments

how would you define your approach in

terms of EQ and compression or other

ideas to obtain clarity between the bass

guitar and kick drum in a rock

arrangement thanks Andrea I'm a big fan

of your mixes thanks Stephen I'm a big

fan of your middle initial and I want to

know what it stands for this is

something that a lot of mixers talk

about and they have really specific

ideas about how they treat the bass in

the kick drum

I've seen people talk about one wraps

around the other or one is above the

other one is below the other I have no

idea what I do I think that usually what

happens is that the kick drum has a much

more rhythmic element than the bass and

so that's where I try and get the

distinction that the kick drum is really

pounding and is a big part of the rhythm

of the track and obviously it has some

low-end and the bass is much more the

foundation of the instruments so the

low-end from the bass is more of a

constant thing and the low-end from the

kick drum is more of a rhythmic thing

and then using the top end of the kick

drum is where you can get more of the

rhythm and the way it interacts with the

snare and guitars and things like that

so in terms of frequencies and

compression in EQ I have absolutely no

idea and every mix I use the same tools

but I do them slightly differently but I

think that that's the key is to let them

do different things in the low-end and

the other key is to make sure other

instruments don't have extra low

frequencies that are down there messing

around with them really let the bass in

the kick if it's a straight-ahead rock

thing be the only two things down there

and that way they can fight for space

but they don't have to fight with the

guitars and stuff like that

and that's it