Yesterday I got the news that MixRoom was released and I decided to try it out. Those of you who know me know that I'm an advocate of plugins that make your life simple. I don't think you have to sweat for hours to prove to yourself you're a pro to nail the EQ curve of a mix. If a plugin gets me there in a few clicks, so be it. Mixing is more fun that way. We live in great times to mix music.

Anyhow, I downloaded the demo, and it was kind of annoying to have to download all of their plugins. It was also a bit discomforting not being able to know what the demo limitations are. Aside those two things, the plugin was a breeze to install without any glitches. I tried it on everything: drum buss, guitars, bass, synth, vocal busses, mix bus, and it sounds great. No hassle. The next thing I loved about it is that it changes your mindset about how to approach EQing. Regularly, using and EQ is a matter of looking at curves and/or thinking about knobs and numeric values. It's very much a left-brain process. For me at least, MixRoom made it easier for me to let go of measuring and I was more into listening. Don't get me wrong. This plugin has every measurement at your hands, but I didn't have to get into that. It was as simple as double-clicking to activate a band, soloing it to check which frequencies were affected, and then just moving a block around, like placing a 3D object in a space, and wherever you move it, it sounds good. I didn't have to worry about odd frequencies or resonances. The machine does it for you. You just play around like in some kind of video game until you like the sound.

Maybe this approach is not your cup of tea, but it cut my EQing time in half, and it was fun to use. On the other hand, the issue I've found with AI plugins is that they impart a sound of their own, and abusing them will color the sound in a way you might not need. However, combining MixRoom with any other of your favorite EQs will give you great results. For example, I used it in combination with Pro Tools stock EQ for things like shelving or a quick bell at a given frequency, especially when MixRoom was before another plugin and I just wanted a quick touch.

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Here you can see how I used MixRoom on the final stage of this mix. Everything was already consolidated and levels were initially set. Here's the mix I did:



I bought it.

 

Last edited: May 15, 2020

Nice mix
Saw the video for this software and was immediately interested.
Can't wait to try it out.
Anything that allows me more time for sound creation and music composition is extremely valuable.
And this does not look or sound like some of the shabby preceding attempts by other developers.

 

Spot on, agree with you. I like the fact that it doesn't try to do everything automatically; it starts you in a ballpark but is then easy to tweak by ear. A couple functions aren't quite intuitive out of the gate (I still don't know how to delete a band) but when you get used to it it's very nice to use..

 

Really great plugin i recently started using. It made me rethink mixing decisions bigtime, a great learning tool. I use own reference tracks, and it works like a charm!

 

Hi, just wondering, what reference tracks do you use? Do you have specific songs and what format? Need to improve and learn mixing better and am keen to know how others work with reference tracks.
Thanks

 

I know you want Retrolize77 to answer, but reference tracks should be of the genre or type of sound you are trying for. That's it.
You would want to import the best format for that!

 

Thanks @Smoove Grooves

I was more meaning do you have any "go to" tracks? Obviously I wouldnt use a Metallica track to mix a soul song, but at the same time, if I had an Oasis sounding track, I would necessarily want to use that for a mix reference due to the loudness issues / too much white powder taken in the control room!

I appreciate it is just a comparison thing rather than trying to "match" the reference track, but I just wondered if there were some specific songs in each genre that a lot of people generally use, or is it literally just personal taste? I did read somewhere you should pick songs that are well mixed, but again, isnt that a personal taste thing?

In terms of "best format", would you use a 320 kbps track, or are there places you can buy a better quality file? Sorry for the noob questions on this.

 

Absolutely not! A full-rate wav or aiff! Any mp3 will have frequencies missing! Why compare to that?

Well no, one can actually use a Match EQ too. But just as a comparison is good too.

Not when it's a hit track, no!

edit: (unless it's WAP!)

 

Thats what I was meaning, where do you get those from these days???

 

Last edited: Jan 6, 2021

From a CD?

 

Last edited: Jan 6, 2021

Just have a look at greg scott (Kush Audio) point of view about reference mixes.

 

Simple mistake, dont take it personally, and its not made you look a twat at all!

What I am meaning is, from modern tracks, CD's arent generally available like they were.

 

Will give that a watch

 

Greg is right about Match EQ on a mix not being very useful.
But I use it on individual instruments, by finding sections of a song that reveal what I want.