MONO (checking frequencies)

[pepperjack]

i still don't truly understand the whole listening to mix in the end in MONO. in logic, do i just hit the mono button on the master track, then listen if any changes are dramatic. if so, my pan, delays are messing things up???

peppa

[sourceslut]

i do it to hear any phase cancellations. if you record two guitar takes and one of them goes through a reverse phase guitar lead it might sound bad in stereo but it will almost disappear in mono. i was asked before to listen to someones mix and when i pressed mono the vocal and gutars almost completly disapeared.im not sure how he got it so wrong.total phase cancellation is actualy very difficult to achieve in practice.

[pepperjack]

so if i hit mono, and something sounds a bit different, what do i do to fix it.

and doesn't everyone listen to your mix in stereo?

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by pepperjack

so if i hit mono, and something sounds a bit different, what do i do to fix it.

and doesn't everyone listen to your mix in stereo?

Always better to do mono checking on one speaker. You can get a single powered Fostex 6301B which also doubles as a limited-bandwidth check.

There are many situations where someone might hear your mix in mono. Depends on a lot of things.

If it's played at a club, on TV, if someone hears it through a mono radio, some computers have only one speaker, if someone hears something over a stereo from the next room, etc.

Some people say "screw the mono compatibility", some don't.

[Kiwiburger]

Only the best engineers check mono compatibility. Because these guys know that most of the population actually do listen to their mixes in mono, or severely compromised stereo which is basically mono.

A lot of "stereo" effects turn to crap in mono. A great example is a typical stomp box chorus pedal. To save circuitry, these boxes typically just invert the phase to create a second output. Sounds big with a stereo guitar rig, but if mono'd - the wet sound just cancels out to nothing.

Or say your piano sound depends on a fast autopan - that autopan will be totally gone in mono. That's where you might revise your idea, and use a fast tremolo and a slow autopan. That way, it sounds fine in mono, and just gets better in stereo.

But what do I know ... go ahead, ignore mono compatibility ... please ... make my day ...

[gainstages]

kiwiburger is right! you'd be surprised how much of what you hear on the radio is just mono.

another benefit of checking in mono is for help in panning - yes, i said PANNING. tweaking your panning in mono can help you take a good mix and make it great.

when you think you have something where you want it, acs gtr, hihat, whatever... switch to mono and then slowly sweep the panning back and forth a bit. sometimes, you won't find anything special, but there are times when you will hear the track come into better focus - switch back to stereo and enjoy the results.

it works. enjoy

[Kiwiburger]

It helps to understand the pan law of your mixer. DAWs often give you pan law options.

Basically - if you take two identical signals (say the left & right channels of a mono track) and pan them to the centre, you get twice the volume (+6dB) than if you panned that track to the hard left or right. So as you pan from left to right, the level appears to rise and fall.

If the two signals are not exactly the same (say left & right channels of a stereo track) then the level increase is less than 6dB- say nominally 3dB.

Mixers can have compensation circuitry/code to reduce the gain (-6dB or -3dB) as you pan towards the centre.

Personally - I prefer to turn this off.

If checking the panning in mono, be aware of what your pan law is doing.