I adore him. He is so grounded and down to earth. You can learn so much from him. I love to watch his interviews. He never has an attitude and he is very versatile and adaptive. He is always willing to learn and use new technology. What an asset to the community as a thought leader. Wish him much love and success.
"Once it's digital... why making analog again?" Totally agree with that! Recording with the best possible quality and the closest to the final sound as you can, that's what I hear repeatedly from legendary professionals in most videos. And that gets you to a point where digital is all you need to mix to an industry standard.
Thanks for that interview! I am ITB since 1994. I was always fighting with tape noise and wobbling of tape, until I heard the piano recorded in digital. I finally knew that I could get rid of that annoying chorusing of the harmonics of the piano. And today, if I want that back, I can get PSP Pianoverb2 and get that sound again! Gat all the analog just before AtoD. It will be preserved forever, or until you loose your backup files!
@@MobiusMinded An early version of ProTools TDM. Lots of SCSI drives (two actually). Only 4 outputs and inputs interface. And a few years later I finally had 16 ins and 24 outs. And a 24bit mixed with 56bit summing. This is the moment I should my Otary MTR90Mk1 (I started my digital journey with an AudioMedia III card synched to the Otari's SMPTE creating backups of tracks and slave tapes)
@@MaxCarola I remember Pro Tools still being called Sound Tools - 4 tracks in & out - on the Mac NuBuss format. I think TDM 6 bit Pro Tools came in around ‘96/97. I worked on Smashing Pumpkins Adore in ‘98 and that was done entirely on a Pro Tools black face TDM 16 bit. Probably one of the first all PT albums…. although mixed to 1/2” Ampex ATR.
What I have learned from him is that the Analog equipment is expensive and their is a good feeling turning knobs. I think you can get to the end result faster with analoge gear but everything that can be done on analoge absolutely can be done ITB. It may take longer for you to get there but it can be done. Also recall makes it a better deal. I am still hybrid just because I can get to the end result faster and I enjoy analoge equipment.
As a guy who came up learning and working in the days of analog studios (starting out in ‘79) I can attest to its limitations; I mean, yeah, at the time, consoles, tape machines and OB processing gear were what was being used, what we had, and so we learned and used that workflow. But, everyone who worked in that environment were absolutely aware that analog had more than its fair share of limitations, and downsides, too, as well as ongoing maintenance and repair costs… While I’m sure that I could still adeptly edit tape with a grease pencil, razor blade and block, that doesn’t meant that I WANT to, and I absolutely do NOT miss having to tie up a console because it was currently in use for a particular song/mix… And, while many consoles did have store/recall automation, not every console setting was stored…not to mention the outboard processing gear, which had no store/recall features, which meant that to remix a track to alter even one little element of a mix, all that gear had to be re-patched, and each processor had to have each of its settings returned to being as close as possible to where they were on the previous mix… I think there are many from that time who tend to look back upon the analog studio era through “rose-colored glasses”…they remember the good parts, (and there were a few good things) but they tend to ignore the not-so-good things, or even the things that were a huge pain in the ass…(and, in fairness, I’ve occasionally done that myself, remembering back with a “selective” memory). These days, with digital and DAW’s, I can work completely ITB, and, with multiple clients/projects in the same day, easily and quickly recalling different projects with the click of a mouse - AND with every single setting reloading EXACTLY as they were last saved… I have no desire to look back with any sense of nostalgia or longing for those days, nor do I have any desire to ever return to an analog workflow, either. IMHO, of course.
The point made at 8:30 about it being the artist's art and not the mixers, man... that took me a while to figure out!! To have that sort of perspective in my 20s would've been helpful, but i suppose most learn it over time as well.
Ha! Loved the Freakshow Industries mention. Their approach and presentation is brilliant! (I've never used them on a mix-bus, though. Too timid! That's why Andrew is Andrew ...)
i honestly would have loved one followup on the last point. talking about going to a kickdrum, looking for frequencies that are wrong, only when it's needed, which is a great puristic approach, but he follows it up with saying that it's just knowing how to listen, and that in turn, just comes from all the experience so what do we, new to mixing, without the ability to listen do? either "pointlessly go look at the kick drum", or just leave it unmixed? because it will be fine for most untrained/beginner ears i really am trying to understand what the best mindset is when approaching mixing as a beginner loved this interview
you like what you like (39:50). it's not pointless tweaking if you're aware of what you like or don't like about your mix and you're going towards what you like with your tweak. it's never about it being good enough for untrained ears. it's about it being -good enough- *great* for *your* ears. and your ears will only be 'untrained' in that you may not immediately know how to get your kick (as it is in context) from point a to point b, from the moment you hear there's something off about it (47:20). the best mindset for a beginner is the same as the best mindset for the expert: play in the sandbox (27:47). for you it could mean playing with compressor plug-ins as a fun way of discovering them. "how to listen" does come from experience (and i'm sure andrew's extensive experience with hardware has been invaluable in honing that sense for him), but follow the thread. there are records you love--study them more. there are mixes of yours that you dislike--study them more. revisit them after a long time away from them. notice what you missed at the time. and most of all play, do, record, mix. but don't think you don't have the ability to listen. it's not that you don't have it. that's not quite a fair extrapolation of andrew's concept. andrew's point is that it will evolve for you and don't get lost in the sauce EQ'ing things without that process being connected to either 1) your vision--as derived from records you like and sounds in your head, or 2) your sense of adventure and fun. which can include fun that you have while experimenting with tools that you don't fully understand. and approaches to mixing that you don't know for sure will work. i think john congleton said if there isn't at least some part of you that's completely sure that what you're doing is wrong and can't possibly work, then you're not on the right track. and don't rule out hardware as the answer to how to get from a to b. andrew could be wrong about that. there are many people who disagree, and his ITB argument used to be based on avoiding conversions. the honorable dude that he is, he has conceded that point. what remains for him is that he would be leaving money on the table were he mixing on a console. and he is clearly following a sense of play after having done it one way for 20 years. don't limit yourself to following what andrew thinks is fun. i personally find hardware much more beautiful sounding than plug-ins. and when i say much more, it's a very subtle difference that may or may not matter to 'untrained ears.' and it's never been about untrained ears, as stated. good luck, have fun!
Thats absolutely true. Throughout my career as an engineer, one thing all engineers hate is the recall. Holy shit does that take time & its a pain in the ass to do. I hated every minute of it. Thats why MANY engineers now mix out the box (computer). Its easier, you can recall any song and it will always sound the same. Unlike analogue when you recall it it does not sound the same, no matter how hard you try. And if you are working on a long project, The studio is on lock down, meaning no one can touch any outboard gear or the console, until the song was over. And even then the song had to be fully released, before you can make sure that you would want to normalize the desk for the next project after you back it up and save it. Its just a pain. And if the iomega Bernoulli disk got damaged in any way, well lets just say it will be the worst day of someones life. (it happened to me once in a major studio). I nearly shit bricks when it happened. It was a nightmare for a month. Im so happy we can now recall almost instantly. Though i do miss the analogue console. But these days people cant use analogue consoles in their house. The electric bill will skyrocket., because its extremely expensive to run the console. They are electricity hogs. I myself now use (2) SSL UF8's and (1) UC1... to control Presonus Studio ONE v5.4..... & massive amounts of VST-Synths & plugins. Its just Awesomeness hehe !!
There's a way I mix analog on a non-recallable analog console and rack gear but I still have full recall of what would need to be changed. I basically just re-record all tracks back out through compressor-eq chains to new tracks, in passes of up to 8 simultaneous tracks. All reverb and send effects are from the daw. All volume is done through the computer and the summing I'm hearing at that point is all digital. When I done -printed re-recording all tracks through the gear, I then bring the new gear printed tracks out all at once for analog summing on my console, 8816 summing mixer, or both by using my console as a giant (56 channel) submixer for the 16 channel neve. All analog faders (and usually the neve knobs) are set to unity gain. Sometimes I adjust volumes of things in the computer when I hear the new summing sound. I have also done this where I do the re-recording through gear stage while simultaneously coming back out through the console so I can hear the analog summing while I'm re-printing through my chains, but it makes life very complicated and I find my pre-analog summing mix to not need alot of changes once it hits the analog summing so I almost always do it in the two stages. The key is not ever touching analog console settings and leaving all faders at unity during summing other then pan for mono tracks. The magic of analog summing is not the faders, it's simply the electronics of running through the channels and main buss. DAW faders and sends are of course recalled in your project. At any point I can run this mix again changing volumes, reverb delay amounts etc, which are almost always the kind of things and artist would want to change. I occasionally put a plugin EQ over top of a printed track with the analog stuff on it. I never ever have had a client say can you change the compression on this piano, vocal, bass, guitar etc? Only on rare occasions can you change the eq of a sound? BUT on key tracks like the vocal and bass I print multiple versions through different eq and compression settings or units so I have choices when I get to the end if I need. My method not only gives you full recall of what matters with all analog processing, it lets you use your gear over and over. Besides my board EQs I have about 9 good 2 channel EQS but only one of those is a Massive Passive. I can use that Massive Passive 20 times in a mix if I want and it's like I have 40 channels of it. There's only one thing that can get hairy about this method and thats using analog drum buss compression, but I'll only go into that if you really want to know it. Yes this method is more complex and time consuming than old school mixing on a board with some outboard but the advantages are huge. Oh BTW I'm also using Studio One 5 and if you're curious I can do as many passes in and out of the computer as I want with no perceivable signal degradation. I'm using SSL Alphalink converters. I use an Allen & Heath ML5000 which is a mostly transparent console for bussing through my outboard (and occasionally some eq) No I don't always mix analog, In fact most of the time I mix ITB. What determines that is how much the client can spend. I charge 5x more for an analog mix then a digital one. I hundreds of the best plugins, but no, an analog mix still sounds different and IMO better. Shoeps is probably getting tracks recorded through tasty Compression and EQ. That's still analog mixing to me, just on the way in.
The issue is that the Music Industry has been behind the real engineering in science...AMS Neve etc.....coming up with their GUIs to recall Analog....but this is the norm in real science engineering...etc..the truth is that it has already been too long and that is an old console.....etc
Lol. He's probably thinking....Adelle. You know that tiny little albulm that I got lucky to be involved with and launched me into the stratosphere. He's such a good and talented dude. Love his vibe and his work. I didn't even know that he was involved in doing live sound for big names like that. That is awesome and explains some things. The live audio world is a great place to cut your teeth as an engineer and I can't think of anything more demanding then being involved with monitor mixing for MJ. He was very paticular about his in ears and really didn't like them, so I'm sure they had to be perfect. And honestly we all know in the live world that FOH is the glamour job and monitors is a lot of work and pressure.
Ok, so I searched for some of Low Roars music on UA-cam and to my surprise I had already heard some of it and loved it....while playing the video game Death Stranding. I used to always say I have to find some of this music when I played it, definitely some brilliant music. I never completed the game, I’ll have to make time and get back into it someday but I’m glad I know whose behind the music for Death Stranding now.
I’d give anything to be able to sit with Andrew as he mixes a song. It’s all good watching videos but being able to ask questions on the fly would be awesome. One can dream.
Yes and one can be a pestering nuisance if sitting next to me when I'm in the studio working. I'm OLD old school. Having him and his knowledge at hand whenever I need his opinion and expertise in this internet world is beyond anything we could do just a handful of years ago. Be thankful my friend.🎵
I have imposter syndrome for all aspects of my life…the writer, the beat maker, the song designer, the mixer, the masterer, the distributor, the critic, the commentator…..the golfer, the hockey player.
I would have enjoyed this a lot more if you hadn't spent half the episode trying to get him to talk about analog gear he no longer uses. I'm much more interested in hearing him talk about what he actually does. I doubt I'll ever be within 1000 feet of a Neve in my life anyway.
Oh for fucks sakes guys, WHY didn't you think about what ROMAN GOD 808 himself, Mr. Rome8180, wanted to hear from your guest? RUDE. Good thing he's been so kind to let you know what he wants so you can go and get the fuck in your time machine, redo the interview, edit and upload to Rome8180's liking.
It's just harder and harder to justify the cost and space of analog mixing when you can carry a laptop around that gets you 95% of the way there sonically. That, and 99.999% of the end-listeners can't tell the difference. The "bad" of plugins comes entirely from people misusing them. Blame the worker, not the tool.
@@phillipemery572 You have the world of plugins at your fingertips. You can achieve sonically so many world class sounds You like the Neve sound, pull it up in your DAW!! Maybe the API , one finger away. What about the SSL sound, it's right there. Create, mix and master right in the box! Musically, it's a great time to live in!! Oh I almost forgot, one of the greatest collection of plugins known to man alongside the legendary Pro Tools and Waves, Eventide!!!!!!! Man oh man, Eventide , in a class by itself.!!!
That’s excellent! Not the fact that he is fully in the box... which is fine... I mean the fact that he eighty-sixed the Neve. _It doesn’t always HAVE to be a Neve. Sheesh.👍
I have the same process as and Andrew that's freaking crazy. Fix it with overdubs. Getting that good sound from the jump with mic pre amp and gain staging . Only slightly messing with levels until it's time to mix
Are you a professional mixer or bedroom musician?!! Most people agree about itb mixing but Andrew himself states he still believes in analogue tracking
@@nickmandleberg Hey no need to get salty, i am a professional musician for 35 years plus, owned the console and the whole shebang and yes I still do track with all my outboard gear in a nice room but, once I'm in the box it stays that way unless I'm looking for a particular sound that I'm certain only a piece of hardware will give me and only then do I send stuff out into the analog domain which happens very very rarely, mixes for me nowadays are a 100 percent in the box.... I love and agree with everything that Andrew says in all his interviews about in-the-box mixing versus the console outboard route.
Funny, how people who make a living on making records and endorsing analog emulations, have no idea of weird creative effects. I mean these things exists for about 10-15 years from different bedroom developers. Anyway great interview.
So heres my big question I hope someone can answer? Recording digital- what happens when you crunch all those tracks and stems and plug ins into 1 stereo master bus? Do you lose subtle sounds that the analog world didnt suffer from?
Well, kind of. The summing is one part of why people loved analog, but the digital version of that is basically the converter. So the ADDA (Analog to Digital and Digital to Analog) converters are what takes all those digital numbers and adds them together and converts them back and forth. In the old days when digital was just starting to come on the scene there was vast differences in the quality of the converters. A very audible and noticeable difference and the really high end converters that did it well were very, very expensive. These days, even the regular converters in consumer devices from guitar center available for 150 bucks are very good and hard to tell the difference between them and the expensive ones. You can tell the difference, but the differences are very small these days and getting smaller all the time. You can get a great recording from the converters on an X32, and anyone trying to tell you otherwise is probably trying to sell you expensive crap that won't actually make it sound any better. For me, there are a few places that digital and analog differ. Digital is super clean and with the converters now, what you put in is exactly what you get back. That was definitely not the case with analog. Analog would add distortion, other wise known as saturation, to a signal where the transformers or tubes or various other electronics in the signal path would add even or odd order harmonics which would do a few things. It would naturally compress the signal slightly because as you add harmonics there is a type of upwards compression that happens because it adds frequency content to the signal that wasn't there before and fills out the signal sort to speak. We have plug ins now that can replicate the hardware and add those harmonic in, but you have to add it in after the fact unless you tracked with it because the normal audio interfaces are very transparent and clean. Sometimes that what you want, but if you want something more analog you can add stuff like saturation and different types of distortion in by just using a plug in. They have plug ins available that mimic almost every piece of analog gear including the neve preamps that Andrew sold. So if he wants that type of coloration he can just add that in with a plug in and have total control of it. it's kind of crazy. That was way too long and I'm sorry if you knew any of that. So I appologize if that came off wordy or anything, but I figured I give it a shot. The differences between analog and digital is something that has kind of been a passion of mine because I do live sound, and when I use an analog board, I don't need to work as hard to get it to sound good as I do on a digital board. But the added effects racks and stuff like that on the digital board make up for it, don't get me wrong. Also, when I am listening to different converters, the actual differences I can hear a lot of the time come from the clarity of the sound stage. On Analog or high end converters, I can almost reach out and touch an instrument because it is clearly defined in the stereo field. Same with vinyl records. With digital it is just a little fuzzy. Like I know which side it is on, but because it is in reality a reconstruction from an estimated curve.....it just isn't as clearly defined. But the really high end converters are better about and stuff that is recorded with higher sample rates gets it even better. But the difference is so small, that even though I know it is there, I can't probably pick it out in a blind listening test. So is it really that important? Probably not. Lol. And if you really want analog summing, you can always buy a piece of outboard gear that they make specifically for that. The good ones allow you to pan stuff and add saturation and what not. So If you had some high end digital and wanted to do a really nice vinyl record, you could always mix down the stems and run it through an analog summing box and kind of do a quick remix of the stems while panning the stuff out and what not and cut it straight to vinyl from there. So you can get the best of both worlds. Analog is far from perfect though. Actually the imperfections is precisely what makes it sound so good. It's the distortions and the frequency roll off and the natural upward compression and stuff like that.
@@kayakbandits9894 well hopefully it wasn't too wordy. You never know when people are trying to be serious or not, but I figured I'd throw it out there anyways.
havent watched yet but i assume that if most people dont listen to music using hifi systems and rarely buy records then yeah what is the use of consoles and walls of outboard gear if it sounds really good (plugins) vs really great (analog outboard gear); probably doesnt matter for listening. is this the main reasoning why he switched over, or do i have to watch a painful long conversation here lol.
That's heartbreaking 00:13:30 - a friend of mine did a record shortly before the pandemic and the studio guy was playing around with all the expensive plugins vs the real solid tube-compressors, solid preamps (without taking more money, because he had the time during the pandemic) - the "real thing" was so much better. Not only from my personal taste, everything had more "live" in it and was sitting better in the mix. IMHO
Yes but does Andrew Scheps produce and _release_ In-The-Box (ITB)? Andrew Scheps has work...a job. And rightfully so. He earned it. He's got his 10,000+ hours but... not for nothing.... Is he the one releasing the song or do his mixes have collaboration with major label studios who process the song through hardware by the time it comes to be release time? I'm not slamming Andrew. I'm challenging Andrew. Can anyone with a laptop and an estimable know-how of their DAW, release a song from a 100% laptop/headphone/DAW studio mix? I mean one that demos longevity and some pay, lol. Do new DAW artists have to suffer at the hands of a major label machine who has all the toys and that train the *ears* of the multitudes of listeners who don't stop to ask themselves what their music diet consists of? Was Grammy award winning India.Arie's song "Video" really produced on a laptop or was it visited by a Motown-Grammy studio just before official release? Whats really left of the purported "bedroom producer" era?
Maybe the life before The Box heavily influences life in The Box. His role is not “producer” in the traditional sense, so no, he won’t be doing the release machinations: his role is mix engineer (mostly), so the material he has to supply is ultimately a set of tracks ready for final mix, or mastering, or stems for incorporation into a larger project, etc, etc … ultimately, your work in the box has to translate to the needs of the downstream consumer whether that is another engineering process, or a release platform like Spotify. There are people who can assess a mix and perform a set of enhancements to that mix to make it work on ANY platform, and for that you usually need a set of tools which include: a good room, a few sets of reference monitors, a HUGE set of ears and a craftsman’s approach to tweaking.
Record companies just care what is coming through the speakers. However, record companies also love to spend unnecessary money; because it comes out of the artist’s share, and the labels want their artists in debt to them.
You cant record through analog going in and then push it out on a board to mix and through external analog compressors and what not and say im 100% in the box. Hes confused what that means. Hybrid system is not 100% in the box. A mic straight into the interface and the mouse and speakers are your only gear. Thats 100% itb.
"Once it's digital I don't see any reason to ever make it analog again". That's quite a statement there!
I adore him. He is so grounded and down to earth. You can learn so much from him. I love to watch his interviews. He never has an attitude and he is very versatile and adaptive. He is always willing to learn and use new technology. What an asset to the community as a thought leader. Wish him much love and success.
He is God of mixing, defining standards.
A.S. is one of my favorite people to listen to for realistic approaches to music production.
Hey B.W. - You know you made it when people abbreviate your name! All the best, R.H. ;)
Chillest dude on earth, God I love Andrew Scheps...
InstaBlaster
I had ONE lesson with this bloke and I still have 'Scheps note's' as my go to.
Best quote "There is no such thing as a musical emergency"
Andrew is such a realistic and down to earth guy. Simply zero mumbo-jumbo nonsense that is so often the case in this business.
"Once it's digital... why making analog again?" Totally agree with that! Recording with the best possible quality and the closest to the final sound as you can, that's what I hear repeatedly from legendary professionals in most videos. And that gets you to a point where digital is all you need to mix to an industry standard.
Because you have a tape player in your 1988 mitsubishi starion lol.
14:00 - “My wife and I both loved the console” - you don’t hear that every day. Good for you, Mr. Scheps!
Thanks for that interview! I am ITB since 1994. I was always fighting with tape noise and wobbling of tape, until I heard the piano recorded in digital. I finally knew that I could get rid of that annoying chorusing of the harmonics of the piano. And today, if I want that back, I can get PSP Pianoverb2 and get that sound again! Gat all the analog just before AtoD. It will be preserved forever, or until you loose your backup files!
94? What were you using then? Dyaxis? Studio Vision?
@@MobiusMinded An early version of ProTools TDM. Lots of SCSI drives (two actually). Only 4 outputs and inputs interface. And a few years later I finally had 16 ins and 24 outs. And a 24bit mixed with 56bit summing. This is the moment I should my Otary MTR90Mk1 (I started my digital journey with an AudioMedia III card synched to the Otari's SMPTE creating backups of tracks and slave tapes)
@@MobiusMinded And in 1991 I believe, I tested a prototype of PT I believe was version 0.89... Still unconvincing at the time.
@@MaxCarola I remember Pro Tools still being called Sound Tools - 4 tracks in & out - on the Mac NuBuss format. I think TDM 6 bit Pro Tools came in around ‘96/97. I worked on Smashing Pumpkins Adore in ‘98 and that was done entirely on a Pro Tools black face TDM 16 bit. Probably one of the first all PT albums…. although mixed to 1/2” Ampex ATR.
@@MobiusMinded believe me. I payed for it.
What I have learned from him is that the Analog equipment is expensive and their is a good feeling turning knobs. I think you can get to the end result faster with analoge gear but everything that can be done on analoge absolutely can be done ITB. It may take longer for you to get there but it can be done. Also recall makes it a better deal. I am still hybrid just because I can get to the end result faster and I enjoy analoge equipment.
As a guy who came up learning and working in the days of analog studios (starting out in ‘79) I can attest to its limitations; I mean, yeah, at the time, consoles, tape machines and OB processing gear were what was being used, what we had, and so we learned and used that workflow.
But, everyone who worked in that environment were absolutely aware that analog had more than its fair share of limitations, and downsides, too, as well as ongoing maintenance and repair costs…
While I’m sure that I could still adeptly edit tape with a grease pencil, razor blade and block, that doesn’t meant that I WANT to, and I absolutely do NOT miss having to tie up a console because it was currently in use for a particular song/mix…
And, while many consoles did have store/recall automation, not every console setting was stored…not to mention the outboard processing gear, which had no store/recall features, which meant that to remix a track to alter even one little element of a mix, all that gear had to be re-patched, and each processor had to have each of its settings returned to being as close as possible to where they were on the previous mix…
I think there are many from that time who tend to look back upon the analog studio era through “rose-colored glasses”…they remember the good parts, (and there were a few good things) but they tend to ignore the not-so-good things, or even the things that were a huge pain in the ass…(and, in fairness, I’ve occasionally done that myself, remembering back with a “selective” memory).
These days, with digital and DAW’s, I can work completely ITB, and, with multiple clients/projects in the same day, easily and quickly recalling different projects with the click of a mouse - AND with every single setting reloading EXACTLY as they were last saved…
I have no desire to look back with any sense of nostalgia or longing for those days, nor do I have any desire to ever return to an analog workflow, either.
IMHO, of course.
Andrew is the coolest calm and I love that he DOESN'T GAIN STAGE ! :)
Good one. "Gain Stage" and "DAW natives only" - I can't hear that anymore.
The point made at 8:30 about it being the artist's art and not the mixers, man... that took me a while to figure out!! To have that sort of perspective in my 20s would've been helpful, but i suppose most learn it over time as well.
Dude is so chill. What a legend!
Ha! Loved the Freakshow Industries mention. Their approach and presentation is brilliant! (I've never used them on a mix-bus, though. Too timid! That's why Andrew is Andrew ...)
i honestly would have loved one followup on the last point. talking about going to a kickdrum, looking for frequencies that are wrong, only when it's needed, which is a great puristic approach, but he follows it up with saying that it's just knowing how to listen, and that in turn, just comes from all the experience
so what do we, new to mixing, without the ability to listen do? either "pointlessly go look at the kick drum", or just leave it unmixed? because it will be fine for most untrained/beginner ears
i really am trying to understand what the best mindset is when approaching mixing as a beginner
loved this interview
you like what you like (39:50). it's not pointless tweaking if you're aware of what you like or don't like about your mix and you're going towards what you like with your tweak. it's never about it being good enough for untrained ears. it's about it being -good enough- *great* for *your* ears. and your ears will only be 'untrained' in that you may not immediately know how to get your kick (as it is in context) from point a to point b, from the moment you hear there's something off about it (47:20). the best mindset for a beginner is the same as the best mindset for the expert: play in the sandbox (27:47). for you it could mean playing with compressor plug-ins as a fun way of discovering them.
"how to listen" does come from experience (and i'm sure andrew's extensive experience with hardware has been invaluable in honing that sense for him), but follow the thread. there are records you love--study them more. there are mixes of yours that you dislike--study them more. revisit them after a long time away from them. notice what you missed at the time. and most of all play, do, record, mix. but don't think you don't have the ability to listen. it's not that you don't have it. that's not quite a fair extrapolation of andrew's concept. andrew's point is that it will evolve for you and don't get lost in the sauce EQ'ing things without that process being connected to either 1) your vision--as derived from records you like and sounds in your head, or 2) your sense of adventure and fun. which can include fun that you have while experimenting with tools that you don't fully understand. and approaches to mixing that you don't know for sure will work. i think john congleton said if there isn't at least some part of you that's completely sure that what you're doing is wrong and can't possibly work, then you're not on the right track.
and don't rule out hardware as the answer to how to get from a to b. andrew could be wrong about that. there are many people who disagree, and his ITB argument used to be based on avoiding conversions. the honorable dude that he is, he has conceded that point. what remains for him is that he would be leaving money on the table were he mixing on a console. and he is clearly following a sense of play after having done it one way for 20 years. don't limit yourself to following what andrew thinks is fun. i personally find hardware much more beautiful sounding than plug-ins. and when i say much more, it's a very subtle difference that may or may not matter to 'untrained ears.' and it's never been about untrained ears, as stated. good luck, have fun!
Thats absolutely true. Throughout my career as an engineer, one thing all engineers hate is the recall. Holy shit does that take time & its a pain in the ass to do.
I hated every minute of it. Thats why MANY engineers now mix out the box (computer). Its easier, you can recall any song and it will always sound the same.
Unlike analogue when you recall it it does not sound the same, no matter how hard you try. And if you are working on a long project,
The studio is on lock down, meaning no one can touch any outboard gear or the console, until the song was over. And even then the song had to be fully released,
before you can make sure that you would want to normalize the desk for the next project after you back it up and save it.
Its just a pain. And if the iomega Bernoulli disk got damaged in any way, well lets just say it will be the worst day of someones life. (it happened to me once in a major studio).
I nearly shit bricks when it happened. It was a nightmare for a month.
Im so happy we can now recall almost instantly. Though i do miss the analogue console. But these days people cant use analogue consoles in their house.
The electric bill will skyrocket., because its extremely expensive to run the console. They are electricity hogs.
I myself now use (2) SSL UF8's and (1) UC1... to control Presonus Studio ONE v5.4..... & massive amounts of VST-Synths & plugins. Its just Awesomeness hehe !!
There's a way I mix analog on a non-recallable analog console and rack gear but I still have full recall of what would need to be changed. I basically just re-record all tracks back out through compressor-eq chains to new tracks, in passes of up to 8 simultaneous tracks. All reverb and send effects are from the daw. All volume is done through the computer and the summing I'm hearing at that point is all digital. When I done -printed re-recording all tracks through the gear, I then bring the new gear printed tracks out all at once for analog summing on my console, 8816 summing mixer, or both by using my console as a giant (56 channel) submixer for the 16 channel neve. All analog faders (and usually the neve knobs) are set to unity gain. Sometimes I adjust volumes of things in the computer when I hear the new summing sound. I have also done this where I do the re-recording through gear stage while simultaneously coming back out through the console so I can hear the analog summing while I'm re-printing through my chains, but it makes life very complicated and I find my pre-analog summing mix to not need alot of changes once it hits the analog summing so I almost always do it in the two stages. The key is not ever touching analog console settings and leaving all faders at unity during summing other then pan for mono tracks. The magic of analog summing is not the faders, it's simply the electronics of running through the channels and main buss. DAW faders and sends are of course recalled in your project.
At any point I can run this mix again changing volumes, reverb delay amounts etc, which are almost always the kind of things and artist would want to change. I occasionally put a plugin EQ over top of a printed track with the analog stuff on it. I never ever have had a client say can you change the compression on this piano, vocal, bass, guitar etc? Only on rare occasions can you change the eq of a sound? BUT on key tracks like the vocal and bass I print multiple versions through different eq and compression settings or units so I have choices when I get to the end if I need.
My method not only gives you full recall of what matters with all analog processing, it lets you use your gear over and over. Besides my board EQs I have about 9 good 2 channel EQS but only one of those is a Massive Passive. I can use that Massive Passive 20 times in a mix if I want and it's like I have 40 channels of it. There's only one thing that can get hairy about this method and thats using analog drum buss compression, but I'll only go into that if you really want to know it.
Yes this method is more complex and time consuming than old school mixing on a board with some outboard but the advantages are huge. Oh BTW I'm also using Studio One 5 and if you're curious I can do as many passes in and out of the computer as I want with no perceivable signal degradation. I'm using SSL Alphalink converters. I use an Allen & Heath ML5000 which is a mostly transparent console for bussing through my outboard (and occasionally some eq)
No I don't always mix analog, In fact most of the time I mix ITB. What determines that is how much the client can spend. I charge 5x more for an analog mix then a digital one. I hundreds of the best plugins, but no, an analog mix still sounds different and IMO better. Shoeps is probably getting tracks recorded through tasty Compression and EQ. That's still analog mixing to me, just on the way in.
The issue is that the Music Industry has been behind the real engineering in science...AMS Neve etc.....coming up with their GUIs to recall Analog....but this is the norm in real science engineering...etc..the truth is that it has already been too long and that is an old console.....etc
Lol. He's probably thinking....Adelle. You know that tiny little albulm that I got lucky to be involved with and launched me into the stratosphere. He's such a good and talented dude. Love his vibe and his work. I didn't even know that he was involved in doing live sound for big names like that. That is awesome and explains some things. The live audio world is a great place to cut your teeth as an engineer and I can't think of anything more demanding then being involved with monitor mixing for MJ. He was very paticular about his in ears and really didn't like them, so I'm sure they had to be perfect. And honestly we all know in the live world that FOH is the glamour job and monitors is a lot of work and pressure.
Ok, so I searched for some of Low Roars music on UA-cam and to my surprise I had already heard some of it and loved it....while playing the video game Death Stranding. I used to always say I have to find some of this music when I played it, definitely some brilliant music. I never completed the game, I’ll have to make time and get back into it someday but I’m glad I know whose behind the music for Death Stranding now.
Definitely one of the best interviews I've seen with Andrew. You guys caught him in a great mood lol.
I’d give anything to be able to sit with Andrew as he mixes a song. It’s all good watching videos but being able to ask questions on the fly would be awesome. One can dream.
Yes and one can be a pestering nuisance if sitting next to me when I'm in the studio working. I'm OLD old school. Having him and his knowledge at hand whenever I need his opinion and expertise in this internet world is beyond anything we could do just a handful of years ago. Be thankful my friend.🎵
Wow, great interview. Thanks!
I hope he starts teaching. He would be such an amazimg teacher and mentor.
He really would!
I have imposter syndrome for all aspects of my life…the writer, the beat maker, the song designer, the mixer, the masterer, the distributor, the critic, the commentator…..the golfer, the hockey player.
🤩 pure wisdom. He shares with such confidence that instantly makes him great
Men, Andrew Scheps is Great!
Thanks guys! Andrew: thanks again for your invaluable wisdom!
Our pleasure!
Great interview, thanks
I'm glad I watched this rather than listening to the podcast. I swear the host and Andrew sometimes sound like they're the same person 🤣
I would have enjoyed this a lot more if you hadn't spent half the episode trying to get him to talk about analog gear he no longer uses. I'm much more interested in hearing him talk about what he actually does. I doubt I'll ever be within 1000 feet of a Neve in my life anyway.
We hear you… But that old gear is just too fun! lol🤣
Here mate...just blame your lack of enjoyment on ME...there...feel better?
Couldn’t disagree more. Love hearing about the gear! Start your own podcast. Get Andrew on and interview him about what you want.
Oh for fucks sakes guys, WHY didn't you think about what ROMAN GOD 808 himself, Mr. Rome8180, wanted to hear from your guest? RUDE. Good thing he's been so kind to let you know what he wants so you can go and get the fuck in your time machine, redo the interview, edit and upload to Rome8180's liking.
Tell us you don’t get it without saying it…
Complaining that this video wasn’t dumbed down for myopic hacks is hilarious.
Bravo!!! Cheers from Barcelona
What a interview! Enjoy alot. My number is #909 subscriber... ;) keep publishing...
Love it we are all just humans trying to do our part and make art for others to also enjoy
Plugins have taken over!! I love the boards, but, plugins are getting better and better!
So many great plugins out there
They're horrible!! I'd rather hear a cassette than protools!
It's just harder and harder to justify the cost and space of analog mixing when you can carry a laptop around that gets you 95% of the way there sonically. That, and 99.999% of the end-listeners can't tell the difference. The "bad" of plugins comes entirely from people misusing them. Blame the worker, not the tool.
@@phillipemery572 You have the world of plugins at your fingertips. You can achieve sonically so many world class sounds
You like the Neve sound, pull it up in your DAW!! Maybe the API , one finger away. What about the SSL sound, it's right there.
Create, mix and master right in the box!
Musically, it's a great time to live in!!
Oh I almost forgot, one of the greatest collection of plugins known to man alongside the legendary Pro Tools and Waves, Eventide!!!!!!! Man oh man, Eventide , in a class by itself.!!!
@@new2dayuser151 I'd also include Airwindows too. Console, Channel1-9, ToTape, IronOxide, BussColors, Density etc are superior to any Nieve
@@SamHocking And you know what??
There's a padded cell with a straightjacket with your name on it waiting for you!!
You crazy as hel##@!!!
Andrew selling the Neve: "with great power comes great responsibility"
Unicorn poop and a Spinal Tap reference; I love you Andrew.
I would have paid to see this interview! ;)
That’s excellent! Not the fact that he is fully in the box... which is fine... I mean the fact that he eighty-sixed the Neve. _It doesn’t always HAVE to be a Neve. Sheesh.👍
He also said he owns a BCM10 tho... Yes yes yes it does always have to be a Neve... (Or API)!!!
Craziest plugins ever (35-37min). I just got them!
even Scheps voice sounds profesh on this vid...knows his shit!
Great job. Thank You! 🎙
Lovin the Stiller shirt
this is GOLD!
I have the same process as and Andrew that's freaking crazy. Fix it with overdubs. Getting that good sound from the jump with mic pre amp and gain staging . Only slightly messing with levels until it's time to mix
Solid! Damn ass SOLID.....just sayin thank you,... again
Andrew just disappointed these guys big time hahahaha, love Andrew,I am in the box for the last 10 years and loving it ❤️
Are you a professional mixer or bedroom musician?!! Most people agree about itb mixing but Andrew himself states he still believes in analogue tracking
@@nickmandleberg Hey no need to get salty, i am a professional musician for 35 years plus, owned the console and the whole shebang and yes I still do track with all my outboard gear in a nice room but, once I'm in the box it stays that way unless I'm looking for a particular sound that I'm certain only a piece of hardware will give me and only then do I send stuff out into the analog domain which happens very very rarely, mixes for me nowadays are a 100 percent in the box.... I love and agree with everything that Andrew says in all his interviews about in-the-box mixing versus the console outboard route.
Funny, how people who make a living on making records and endorsing analog emulations, have no idea of weird creative effects. I mean these things exists for about 10-15 years from different bedroom developers.
Anyway great interview.
Great interview!
Freelance "tryna make records" Man really said tryna lmaoo
SPACE: MEDITATION. SPACE: GAP BETWEEN INHALATION AND BREATHING
Excellent
once Waves starts naming plugins after you, you don't need to feel like an imposter anymore.
I am perplexed that these guys never heard of John Cage or 4'33'' being that their job is music.
0:44 the cat is coming
I too suffer imposter syndrome. I hate playbacks and when i listen an think it sounds great, i think anyone could have done it.
I always thought how can 0s and 1s digital be polished by outboard gear that doesn’t have any of that.
Awesome
Does anyone know whom Andrew is referring to when he says "Serbin" or something like that at 34:39 ...? Thanks!
Mixer
Serban Ghenea
Thanks so much!
Did you know schelps own a pet cat called eps lol kidding just saw. A cat in the back ground walk away since he was going to talk about migrating
Im trying to listen but their voices sound identical
⚡️Fuzz Bomb 💣
So heres my big question I hope someone can answer? Recording digital- what happens when you crunch all those tracks and stems and plug ins into 1 stereo master bus? Do you lose subtle sounds that the analog world didnt suffer from?
Well, kind of. The summing is one part of why people loved analog, but the digital version of that is basically the converter. So the ADDA (Analog to Digital and Digital to Analog) converters are what takes all those digital numbers and adds them together and converts them back and forth. In the old days when digital was just starting to come on the scene there was vast differences in the quality of the converters. A very audible and noticeable difference and the really high end converters that did it well were very, very expensive. These days, even the regular converters in consumer devices from guitar center available for 150 bucks are very good and hard to tell the difference between them and the expensive ones. You can tell the difference, but the differences are very small these days and getting smaller all the time. You can get a great recording from the converters on an X32, and anyone trying to tell you otherwise is probably trying to sell you expensive crap that won't actually make it sound any better. For me, there are a few places that digital and analog differ. Digital is super clean and with the converters now, what you put in is exactly what you get back. That was definitely not the case with analog. Analog would add distortion, other wise known as saturation, to a signal where the transformers or tubes or various other electronics in the signal path would add even or odd order harmonics which would do a few things. It would naturally compress the signal slightly because as you add harmonics there is a type of upwards compression that happens because it adds frequency content to the signal that wasn't there before and fills out the signal sort to speak. We have plug ins now that can replicate the hardware and add those harmonic in, but you have to add it in after the fact unless you tracked with it because the normal audio interfaces are very transparent and clean. Sometimes that what you want, but if you want something more analog you can add stuff like saturation and different types of distortion in by just using a plug in. They have plug ins available that mimic almost every piece of analog gear including the neve preamps that Andrew sold. So if he wants that type of coloration he can just add that in with a plug in and have total control of it. it's kind of crazy. That was way too long and I'm sorry if you knew any of that. So I appologize if that came off wordy or anything, but I figured I give it a shot. The differences between analog and digital is something that has kind of been a passion of mine because I do live sound, and when I use an analog board, I don't need to work as hard to get it to sound good as I do on a digital board. But the added effects racks and stuff like that on the digital board make up for it, don't get me wrong. Also, when I am listening to different converters, the actual differences I can hear a lot of the time come from the clarity of the sound stage. On Analog or high end converters, I can almost reach out and touch an instrument because it is clearly defined in the stereo field. Same with vinyl records. With digital it is just a little fuzzy. Like I know which side it is on, but because it is in reality a reconstruction from an estimated curve.....it just isn't as clearly defined. But the really high end converters are better about and stuff that is recorded with higher sample rates gets it even better. But the difference is so small, that even though I know it is there, I can't probably pick it out in a blind listening test. So is it really that important? Probably not. Lol. And if you really want analog summing, you can always buy a piece of outboard gear that they make specifically for that. The good ones allow you to pan stuff and add saturation and what not. So If you had some high end digital and wanted to do a really nice vinyl record, you could always mix down the stems and run it through an analog summing box and kind of do a quick remix of the stems while panning the stuff out and what not and cut it straight to vinyl from there. So you can get the best of both worlds. Analog is far from perfect though. Actually the imperfections is precisely what makes it sound so good. It's the distortions and the frequency roll off and the natural upward compression and stuff like that.
@@aholder4471 You sir get the UA-cam answer of the year award! 😂 Thank you
@@kayakbandits9894 well hopefully it wasn't too wordy. You never know when people are trying to be serious or not, but I figured I'd throw it out there anyways.
Me too.
Such a shame Andrew went with Pro Tools and not Studio One, if he's happy with PT he would adore S1. 😎
what about tracking?
progress.
at 36:00 it wl'd a freak show
havent watched yet but i assume that if most people dont listen to music using hifi systems and rarely buy records then yeah what is the use of consoles and walls of outboard gear if it sounds really good (plugins) vs really great (analog outboard gear); probably doesnt matter for listening. is this the main reasoning why he switched over, or do i have to watch a painful long conversation here lol.
Tell me about John cage???? WTF!!!! 😜
3 people are incorrect
Does that mean he also tracks in the box.
Everything I'm guessing? You mean into a digital audio interface? I'm guessing so.
i think hes just the mixing engineer; its recorded into a DAW by someone else (producer) i'm guessing..
He literally says he still advocates tracking analogue and owns a BCM10
That's heartbreaking 00:13:30 - a friend of mine did a record shortly before the pandemic and the studio guy was playing around with all the expensive plugins vs the real solid tube-compressors, solid preamps (without taking more money, because he had the time during the pandemic) - the "real thing" was so much better. Not only from my personal taste, everything had more "live" in it and was sitting better in the mix. IMHO
Yes but does Andrew Scheps produce and _release_ In-The-Box (ITB)? Andrew Scheps has work...a job. And rightfully so. He earned it. He's got his 10,000+ hours but... not for nothing.... Is he the one releasing the song or do his mixes have collaboration with major label studios who process the song through hardware by the time it comes to be release time? I'm not slamming Andrew. I'm challenging Andrew. Can anyone with a laptop and an estimable know-how of their DAW, release a song from a 100% laptop/headphone/DAW studio mix? I mean one that demos longevity and some pay, lol. Do new DAW artists have to suffer at the hands of a major label machine who has all the toys and that train the *ears* of the multitudes of listeners who don't stop to ask themselves what their music diet consists of? Was Grammy award winning India.Arie's song "Video" really produced on a laptop or was it visited by a Motown-Grammy studio just before official release? Whats really left of the purported "bedroom producer" era?
Maybe the life before The Box heavily influences life in The Box. His role is not “producer” in the traditional sense, so no, he won’t be doing the release machinations: his role is mix engineer (mostly), so the material he has to supply is ultimately a set of tracks ready for final mix, or mastering, or stems for incorporation into a larger project, etc, etc … ultimately, your work in the box has to translate to the needs of the downstream consumer whether that is another engineering process, or a release platform like Spotify. There are people who can assess a mix and perform a set of enhancements to that mix to make it work on ANY platform, and for that you usually need a set of tools which include: a good room, a few sets of reference monitors, a HUGE set of ears and a craftsman’s approach to tweaking.
Can anyone with a laptop..? No, but can you do it all on a laptop... absolutely. Me 50 year tape veteran
Record companies just care what is coming through the speakers. However, record companies also love to spend unnecessary money; because it comes out of the artist’s share, and the labels want their artists in debt to them.
You cant record through analog going in and then push it out on a board to mix and through external analog compressors and what not and say im 100% in the box. Hes confused what that means. Hybrid system is not 100% in the box. A mic straight into the interface and the mouse and speakers are your only gear. Thats 100% itb.
"is it like selling a sailboat?" lmao... not that relatable
sounds to me like he needs to buy another board....