We spent studio night listening through and finishing mixes for the upcoming record. With Beamer and KBilly adding some fresh ears, and Mike contributing some notes as well, we were able to knock out tweaks to about 90% of the material.

I can’t stress how great it was to have other people listening to the mixes with fresh perspectives. In an effort to maximize our time, I try to get the mixes dialed in as much as possible before everyone else comes over. That way they don’t have to sit through me doing hours of vocal edits, drum track cleanup, cross-fades, comping, blah blah blah.

The tough part of getting the stuff ready like that, though, is that after I’ve listened to the mix about one quadrillion times, I almost don’t know what I’m listening to anymore. Are the drums too loud or not loud enough? Should I juice the guitars more (ROCK!) or take it easy (boo, hiss!). Are the vocals coming through? Maybe I should just re-record the whole song…

Yes, it’s a descent into auditory madness. So when everyone else takes a listen, they can offer valuable suggestions that I might never have heard. Thanks, guys.

We got a little burned out on mix number nine, so we’ll pick up with it tomorrow or Friday, and we have a little bit of tracking to do to fix/finish a couple songs. We should still be able to get the songs out for mastering by Saturday. At least that’s the current fantasy.