when u can't find a good reference for your track what do u do?

maybe because u don't know tracks that have same instrumentation per section etc...so whats best approach to take if u want to reference?

 

I create my own reference, my own approach. Of course.

 

how? what u mean? thanks!

 

I think you’re maybe misunderstanding what a ref track is - it doesn’t have to have the “same instrumentation per section” as the track you’re working on. It doesn’t even have to be the same genre.

Generally with ref tracks, you’re not trying to slavishly copy the entire mix - they’re used to help give you a reality check when you’re working, and a few markers to let you check you’re on the right track.

So for example, you may decide you like the general kick drum sound (or general overall low end) of a particular track, so use it as a guide to balance your bass and kick instruments, and dial in your dynamics processing.

You may also like eg: a vocal sound from a totally different track. So you keep that track in your project as a reference too. Maybe that voca is super bright, but really works, so you make a mental note to check your mix against the reference - if your vocal ends up brighter than the ref, then maybe you need to think about dialling it back a bit.

These are just a couple of examples, but I’m sure you get the idea. It’s not about trying to copy an entire mix (unless you’re mixing for a client, and they’re literally bringing you a ref track and saying “I want my track to sound exactly like this”) it’s about having a few reference points to keep you grounded and objective as you progress through the mixing process.

It’s very easy to lose perspective while mixing - brain fatigue, ear fatigue, mentally going round in circles, etc - it’s especially easy to end up making everything way too bright/dark, or overcompressing stuff, or whatever. Having good ref tracks to double check against helps you spot these issues before you end up wasting 6hrs going on a direction that isn’t gonna help the track.

And as I said - it’s not about finding a song that’s written, arranged and performed incredibly similarly to yours (because if you found a song like that, then shouldn’t that be a song that maybe you need to keep working on your track to give it some distinction/uniqueness??) - it’s about finding sonic reference points that you can use to keep yourself working towards the vision you have in your head.

The genre, content of the song, performances, etc are actually pretty much largely irrelevant in most cases, it’s the sonics - the frequency balances, dynamics, etc that you should be paying attention to.

 

"The genre, content of the song, performances, etc are actually pretty much largely irrelevant in most cases"

 

Do you know how when you have a computer problem, of whatever sort. You hop on over to google, and it turns out you are the only person to have ever typed your problem in to their little algo-thing. What is the likelyhood it turns out you are doing something correctly?

This is sort of like that.

 

This time I’ll answer seriously because maybe, maybe something will stick (although I hardly believe it anymore) …

say you got a reference song that sounds perfect. You work on your mix for hours, you stop working and play the reference. If at that moment the reference sounds too dull or too muddy or too thin or too bass heavy, or whatever other tonal balance related attribute, then your mix is broken on the opposite (because the reference is perfect and you temporarily hear it “broken”) and your ears are used with (and compensate for) that broken sound.

What you can do: make a break every 4 minutes on the clock. 30 seconds don’t listen any music and 30 seconds listen the reference. This will refresh and reset your ears to the proper tonal curve. Then start your song again and notice what is wrong tonally - what is too much, what is too less and adjust.

 

I always have an idea for reference tracks to find,
underestimated part of working with audio is to listen lots of music,
philosophy of using reference tracks properly is not to directly compare (that's what beginners do) but to recalibrate your ears and mind to get back into reality

 

I've collected about 25 tracks I think, and -know- sound absolutely solid, different genres.
The list changes over the years but suffices for anything reference. (sidenote: tracks for reference, not for comparison!
Thats a different thing all together.)
Listen to a lot of music outside of what your working on and take mental notes.

 

if he can’t identify a bunch of reference songs with all the music in the world right now, then his musical taste is toast

 

I disagree with the intro and outro of your statement. The rest are some pretty good points overall.

Just as the notion, that a reference track has to be identical in every aspect to the song you are mixing / mastering is faulty, yours ("reference track can be anything and must not have anything in common" paraphrased) is also an overstatement.

I think there is an accurate position in between these two extreme ends of the spectrum. I think that genre matters, because there are genre-specific expectations, that you would want to fullfil as a mixing engineer. There is a reason why human mind tends to construct such categories.

Practically (an example): The way bass is handled in Trap, Classic Rock and House Music is completely different for example. Why would you want to reference a country song, if you want to produce a Trap banger? Unless of course you are Lil Nas X.

 

What is the difference between "reference" and "comparision" in your books? I just wonder, since you highlighted the difference these two terms have for you?

 

Haha, reference I mean dynamic, freq, volume, colour, cohesion and correct refs. If the track matches the required.
Comparison just how good or sheit the track, ep or album is in comparison with the reference track or vice verca ...
if that makes any sense. edit: ah sorry, sonically vs. musically.

 

Last edited: Aug 19, 2022

Correct - saying that it "must not have anything in common" is an overstatement. It's also an overstatement I didn't make. Paraphrasing or not, you've got the wrong end of the stick and/or exaggerated for effect, to the point of distorting what was actually said.


"A reference track can be anything" - if it gives you a useful point of inspiration, then yeah, absolutely it can.

Yep, there are certainly some broad genre-specific expectations in a lot of genres.

The way you actually stand out within basically any genre is by satisfying enough of the average listener's expectation, while also giving a track some kind of uniqueness that will make it stick in their brain in a way that other tracks that are slavishly 'toeing the line' won't.

But you can ofc just pick the 5 most popular artists from your chosen genre, and concentrate all your efforts on sounding like a perfect amalgamation of them - your stuff will still be moderately successful with a certain crowd of listener. Personally I'd rather be exploring cool new shit than regurgitating trends/the past, but to each their own.

Because it often leads to more interesting results? It prevents a track from sounding like 3,758 existing other tracks sticking in their neat little genre lanes? Because you learn new techniques and approaches that you wouldn't think of if you just concentrate on genre convention?

(More specific to your country/trap example - have you heard the low end in some modern country?! It goes real hard).


I get clients bringing in 'out of genre' references all the time - I'd say at least 80% of projects I work on, there's at least one sonic or stylistic reference that's from a totally different genre, but there's some quality about it that catches the artist's ear, so we work out how that translates to the production we're working on.
No-one is trying to ape something just for the sake of novelty, or create some weird classic rock/trap mashup.

Out-of-genre references are also quite often a lot more useful, because you're picking the absolute best example of a particular attribute of a production - for example, I personally think a lot of the low end in modern rock/metal mixes is shite, so I tend to use pop and hip hop as references, because a lot of the producers/mixers in those genres have devoted massive amounts of time and effort into making their low end really slap.
There's also techniques that have developed in those genres that can be very successfully translated over to others (with a bit of creative/lateral thinking).

That doesn't mean you make your rock song low end sound exactly the same, but if you use it as a vibe check, you can often get way more interesting/exciting results.


To give you one more example: about 10 or so years ago, I was producing/mixing a lot of rock bands, and tbh was getting kinda bored (and nowadays rock accounts for less than about 20% of what I work on, because it's largely become so incredibly formulaic). I was also working with an increasing number of pop artists.

I started applying a lot of pop vocal production/mix techniques that I'd picked up to rock vocalists I was working with, and very quickly I started getting a lot of emails and calls from other rock artists that had heard those records, and wanted their shit to pop out of the speakers in a similar way.

Obvs the techniques and aesthetic weren't fully appropriate for every project, but it took me in new directions, and gave me some extra tools in my repertoire to pull out when I saw fit.

Anyways, the point is I personally want to be always adapting my approaches - partly cos doing the same shit over and over is boring af, but mainly because no-one wants to listen to the same shit over and over. If you reference stuff from all over the map, in my experience you get way more interesting (and in a lot of cases, technically better) mixes out of it.

But it really depends on your open-mindedness, willingness to experiment, and in a lot of ways, one's ability to see the wood for the trees.

 

Last edited: Aug 19, 2022

I use a bad one

 

What do you do? You can start here.

 

As well as using a reference track it's also important to check that your music theory is robust, I email every track I make to Foster and he invariably finds mistakes. I usually have to redo the whole track in order to please him, following his strict music theory rules of course. You can hear my stuff at blandcrap.com/crinklebumps.