TesseracT

POLARIS mix
tutorial

This 3+ hour tutorial video covers how the drums, bass and vocals were mixed for TesseracT’s “Polaris” album.

Drums…

  • Gain structure

  • Dealing with phase and correlation

  • How to treat and EQ the kick drum

  • The "sub kick trick"

  • How to treat and EQ the snare

  • Treating overheads and room mics

  • Creating smooth reverbs

  • Using reverbs and gates to achieve a sense of space and depth

  • Using kick and snare layers for reinforcement

  • ADSR techniques

  • Parallel compression

  • Using a distorted mic channel for reinforcement

Bass…

  • General EQ problem areas I always address

  • Multiband compression to tame resonance and hi mid clankyness (fret buzz etc) to help it sit in the mix

  • I talk about an ancient, go to distortion plugin I've used in my bass chain for 10 years

  • Compression and side chain compression

  • Adding distortion in parallel to enhance the growl/piano like quality of the bass.

VOCALS…

  • Mixing vocals from scratch

  • Smoothing out dynamics of vocals using compression

  • Smoothing vocals using EQ & dynamic EQ to tame resonant build ups

  • Controlling sibilance and harshness using de-essers and multiband compression

  • Using saturation/distortion to help fill out a vocal sound.

  • Adding subtle width to a single tracked mono lead track

  • Creating smooth reverbs to add a sense of space

  • How to deal with delays

  • Dealing with vocal layers/BVs so that they fit in the mix. Layers everywhere!