I try a few things, raise some faders add some eq's mess around with limiters, but the sound is still not right.
So I start listening to other people's stuff. and my ears say "That's the stuff, listen to how clean and crisp that signal is. Listen to how every instrument coalesces into one cohesive sound. You should make your music like that", and my brain says "sorry".
I keep wondering if there's something I need that I don't have, like good speakers or fancy mixing equipment. Then I wonder if the investment would be pointless because I lack some sort of unattained skill.
So I search for tutorials.
I find some where it's another guy just messing around with stuff until he gets it where he likes it but he can't explain why.
I find others where experts say "dude, you have to get monitors (fancy speakers) for this you can't expect to get a good mix using headphones or pc speakers."
Anyway, here's the sum of what I know thus far when it comes to mixing:
1. The signal must not go over 0db. ( otherwise it gets all choppy [clipping] )
2. Adjust levels for each instrument against one-another, this is called "mixing".
3. Do "something" with the final track that makes it sound really really good, this is called "mastering".
My ultimate goal it to get my music to have that "fullness" and "punch" that most electronic music has.
From what I've gathered so far, this has to be created artificially, you can't just increase the volume because that would make the signal very noisy. Instead you have to "simulate loudness" through emphasis by turning down other instruments in the mix (sidechaining).
But there's something else to it. I play a song I downloaded at the same volume as something I've made and the former sounds a lot louder and clearer even though it's the same volume.
All of this is keeping me from being inspired to make music because I can't get a good resulting mix, and I end up just giving up on music stuff for a while.
