Tips on Choosing Headphones and Monitors When Mixing Down Your Music

By Greg Mason

Many of the most popular headphones in the world - the ones you get for free when you buy a Walkman - are inherently tinny and cold sounding, with hardly any bass frequency response. So be careful not to make critical mix decisions based solely on how it sounds in the headphones. And make sure you understand the characteristics of the phones you're using. Probably the best advantage to checking the mix with the "cans" is to get a fresh perspective. A new angle almost always exposes some flaw or at least suggests a question you hadn't yet considered. Professional studios typically feature both near-field monitors and much larger "Main" monitors, mounted high in the wall or on stands. Home/Project studios usually cannot afford such a luxury, due to both cost and space issues.

But is it such a luxury to have a second set of monitors? The answer is 'no' and 'yes'. No - Pro engineers spend 80-90% of their time using the near-fields. The two purposes of the "mains" are to check the bottom end of your mix (it's difficult to tell just how much air you're pushing with near-fields,) and to impress the client (artists and A&R-types want to get excited by the final mix and like to "turn it up 'til their ears bleed.") You can definitely get by without super-sized monitors if they're not feasible for your studio. But... Yes - You should absolutely have an alternate set of monitors to complement your near-fields. A perfect mix will sound good in all different types of speakers out in the real world, and the engineer should have a clue how the mix "translates" in different settings.

You should play a dub (copy) in the car as part of the mix process, but having two places to check in the studio is useful and efficient. Your alternate monitors should have different characteristics than your near-fields, whether they're wall-mounted loudspeakers with 26" woofers or a cheap boom box.

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