Welcome to my new blog.  I will be posting ideas and tips about mixing music in-the-box ( ITB ).
I am not an audio professional.  I am simply an audio technologies enthusiastic, an electronic music creator and a mixing nerd.  I won't be sharing a lot of news about new products and products up dates, there's already a ton of that out there. Instead, i'd like to put the emphasis on the psychology behind mixing and evolving as an "audio engineer".  Most of the time the most effective tips comes from the tools you already have inside your DAW ( digital audio workstation ) and it doesn't require you to buy any new products.  Audio software companies are like any other businesses, they are tring to sell you their products.  I'm not here to sell you anything.  I am simply doing this to share what i know and to put some of my thoughts in a structured format ( it helps my brain ).  One thing to take into consideration is that i am French Canadian ( Montréal ) and that English is not my first language but since most things audio related are in English ( manuals, tools, DAWs and etc ) i think it's only appropriate to make this blog accessible to most. ( like Fab Dupont does at PureMix )

So, as a first entry, i'd like to remind you of a super simple tool ( dare i say knob ) on your DAW's mixer and it's the mute button. ( Dhaaaa, right ? ) But one thing that keeps getting me good results is the muting of tracks while mixing. Let say you just dial in the perfect eq curve on a bass track. It cuts trough, it supports the kick and it is not overpowering everything else. Awesome ! Then i suggest you try this little tip to see if, indeed, it was the perfect eq curve : Mute it ! Mute the bass track for 5-10 minutes and keep on mixing. You ears, by focusing on something else, will more then likely forget what you just did or rather what your bass track sounds like  and will "reset" them self.  After a few minutes, when you feel you have nailed ( i.e. ) the pad track, un-mute the bass track and see if it still wows you.  If it does then great but if it doesn't adjust whats needed and mute it again. Repeat and repeat and repeat again. 

I found this tip most useful on instruments with a lot of lower frequencies ( low mids and down ). So go ahead and try it with the kick, the bass, the pads and etc... but it works for everything.

Thanks for reading :)