Mixing & Mastering - a third option...

Hi!

I would love your thoughts on this. Usually I see two ways of mixing and mastering on the MPCs. One way is to mix and do some kind of premaster directly in the box, which I think could work. Option two is to create, export stems or individual tracks and mix and mastering in a DAW - also a great option. However, today I tested a third way: I opened the project (originally made on MPC One +) in the MPC VST application in a DAW (Bitwig in my case) and did mastering in Bitwig while had the mixes untouched in the project and the VST app. Why haven't I seen this option used by others? It's more like people prefer the first two ways. What am I missing!? What's the point of exporting to audio tracks in the DAW when you can use the app and its different tracks and busses inside the MPC - then do some mastering chain on your DAWs master channel.

Thanks for your thought in advance.

Peace!

It all comes down to personal preferences. I used to load in the MPC Software as a VST in Logic and track out and mix down that way. But I stopped doing that because it took too much time resetting levels and assigning inputs and outputs. Mixing down in the MPC works best for me.

There’s a fourth option: pay for a proper mastering engineer - they’re a dying but necessary breed. Considering all the long-established engineers have had years of experience and built up the tools and refined their rooms, plus they all make themselves available online and many will do stem mastering, these days you’re getting a bargain

sparky wrote:There’s a fourth option: pay for a proper mastering engineer - they’re a dying but necessary breed. Considering all the long-established engineers have had years of experience and built up the tools and refined their rooms, plus they all make themselves available online and many will do stem mastering, these days you’re getting a bargain

That's that best way. You get to focus your time & energy on making quality beats thats original & let the people who have years of experience do what they do best.

Too many artist since the mid 2000s trying to be MR. Everything, but then complain about how music was better in 60-90s... well that's because James Brown wasn't mastering his music, making the all the artwork, head of the PR team, driving the tour bus, directing the video...etc.

I get that we can do more of those things because of the unlimited excess of software & cheaper hardware, but the time you have on this earth is limited, so choose how you spend your attention wisely...or not.

i figured the reason they made it possible to launch the mpc software as a vst inside a daw was for that purpose and maybe along the way to add elements exclusive to a daw into the beat... if they built it, i would assume there are people that use it.

Menco wrote:It all comes down to personal preferences. I used to load in the MPC Software as a VST in Logic and track out and mix down that way. But I stopped doing that because it took too much time resetting levels and assigning inputs and outputs. Mixing down in the MPC works best for me.

Yes, Im thinking about mixing everything as good as possible in the box and only do the final master bus in DAW. For the sake of "better" limiters and LUFS meters. Not saying the limiter in the box is bad, but to get equal levels of them beats. Yes, as much in the box as possible.

Would never pay a master engineer as of being totally unknown for 30 years in the game and never made any cash from it, oh wait, maybe that's why?!

Anyone who knows how to mixdown properly is going to do it in a DAW. The MPC itself lacks way too many necessary mixing tools that will affect the ability to hit a pro level LUFS measurement when you get to the mastering stage. All of which tools are readily available as AU/VST plug-in's.
Of course, what type of music you make matters too. Mixing within the MPC will produce a more dated or classic sound. So if that's what you're going for, then that is the simplest option.