Dumbass question - what's meant by 'mono' mixing?

[Chrisulrich]

Dear Anyone.

As far as my limited understanding goes - anything that comes out of 2 speakers is stereo, left and right. So when
YouTube advises me to check my mix in mono, do they mean the output of just one speaker? If I've used panning to get sounds out of the way of eachother, I wouldn't be able to hear them if the mix was only coming out of one speaker, would I? And if I remixed it so it sounded good coming out of one speaker, and panned all the sounds so they were all coming out of one speaker, surely it would sound awful if I brought the other speaker back - you'd have a faint electrical hiss on one side and a loud track coming out of the other side.

I know the above must count as one of the dumber questions on the forum but keep coming up against this on YouTube"

 

[RFR]

Switching to mono when you have two speakers simply collapses the stereo image and it comes out of the center . Nothing is panned anymore.

It can be very useful for mixing. Mixing like this you can carve out space via eq rather than location in the audio space.
Nothing is fighting something else.

 

[VomitHatSteve]

Stereo technically means something more like "existing in 3 dimensional space". Two speakers is the usual interpretation, but that's really just the minimum. 5.1 surround sound is also a form of "stereo"

But what the recommendation to listen in mono really means is to send a mono signal to both left and right channels and listen that way. Your DAW likely has a mono toggle option. If not, you can open the file in Audacity and click the "split stereo to mono" option on the track

A big part of what this step is actually for is checking for phase issues between your L and R channels.

 

[rob aylestone]

Think of it as an old radio, or a tv, or even some laptops. If you take a track, and duplicate it, try panning one fully left and the other full right. Then press the ‘phase’ or polarity reverse button and it often sounds even better. If you do that when you are listening in mono, that channel totally vanishes.rarely a problem for stereo listeners, but somebody listening on a radio would lose tracks. Imagine if it was the vocal. Vocal? What vocal?

 

[gecko zzed]

Even if you have two speakers going, if the signal going to each is the same, the result is mono. Most DAWs have a button on the master fader to switch from stereo to mono (and vice versa) which collapses the stereo mix into a mono signal which then goes out to each speaker.

 

[DrewPeterson7]

Most DAWs have a button on the master fader to switch from stereo to mono (and vice versa) which collapses the stereo mix into a mono signal which then goes out to each speaker.

Yeah - this is a really useful feature. Push of a button, you collapse to mono, with the exact same thing coming out of both speakers... then push it again and you have your full stereo spectrum again.

It can be very useful for mixing. Mixing like this you can carve out space via eq rather than location in the audio space.
Nothing is fighting something else.

For me, this is the bigger upside, beyond simply checking for phase alignment. That CAN be a problem, and a stereo spread can help hide phasing issues... but if you've done a good job on your tracking there shouldn't be much. Rather, collapsing to mono is a pretty great "let's simulate a bad listening environment" exercise, where two instruments that may sound alright panned away from each other, on your studio monitors where you have good stereo imaging, suddenly are on top of each other in mono and fighting for the same frequency space in a mix. It's easy to say "that isn't a problem, they're panned seperately and that shoyuld take care of it," and be done with it... but plenty of real-world listening setups have poor stereo imaging, so this is a good way of ensuring your mixes translate on them.

And, it's absolutely NECESSARY if you mix on headphones, where your L and R channels never interact in the same acoustic space.

 

[volltreffer]

The idea behind this is on one hand that you hear phase issues, otoh that you will be able to understand what people in the next room will be hearing.

 

[CoolCat]

I remember reading a book on Beatles and engineering and the whole history condensed to Mono and Stereo coming about in their Albums.
All the singles were Mono, the Albums were Mono mixed then slowly mixed releases or Mono or Stereo and eventually released Stereo only.
Decades later a CD collection of Mono and Stereo released.

Geoff Emerick mentioned he would mix in Mono first and get it to sound right, comps and EQ but then if a Stereo mix was needed he would do some panning but not changing the original EQ etc.

It was fun to compare later, like Sgt Pepper was always said to be better in Mono and comparing it is an obvious different mix, more FX on the Mono and just different.

I still think if a person wants a MIX to sound the same everywhere and in different environments Mono is probably the best.
Stereo is fun for headphones and maybe allowing more sound sculpturing and more freedom to spread the sounds and noise out.

George Martin mentioned in a book a common mix set up was Vocals center, Drums Center, and other stuff slightly off to the sides but he didn't go full right or full left.

I hear versions of remastered Beatles stuff and some of it is horrible, in my car, maybe in someone elses room it sounds good but Im amazed how horrible some of the rematsereds sound.

A person could make a fine multi track recording in Mono....leave everything center panned...maybe a fun recording exercise?

 

[TalismanRich]

I have stereo Beatles albums where most instruments are on one side and vocals on the other. It was weird but apparently the people buying the albums didn't really care. It was the songs they were after.

 

[CoolCat]

and most radios AM would be pumping in MONO, right. so the two tracks would be broadcast as Mono.
I was rabbit holding a bit on this , so the Beatles releases were Mono to the White Album, with stereo versions available as secondary.
Sgt Pepper mixed Mono in 3 weeks, with Beatles present and then they left and a Stereo mix done in 3 days.
The Mono mix of Pepper has more Flangy/ Mixed FX...

a deep diver in BEatles YouTuber had snips of Revolution in Mono vs Stereo and a huge mix difference....and that's from the 1960's, the remastered remasters and then repeated seems to be a lot of versions to keep up with.

I was too young in the 60's to pay attention to stereo taking over.
But I recall my older brother turning me on to listening and stereo with headphones on was mind blowing, that was really separated compared to speakers in stereo.

It is amazing the skill the engineers had to layer and layer and still have a great Mono recording.
No Panning issues! just everything EQ and Compressed...Reverbs and hit record?

 

[bouldersoundguy]

I have stereo Beatles albums where most instruments are on one side and vocals on the other. It was weird but apparently the people buying the albums didn't really care. It was the songs they were after.

In the early days of stereo it was still a bit up in the air as for how to use it. One early concept was rhythm section on one side, "color" instruments on the other, vocals center. In the earliest days they didn't even have pan pots (panoramic potentiometers), just three position switches for left, center, right.

 

[TalismanRich]

In the early days of stereo it was still a bit up in the air as for how to use it. One early concept was rhythm section on one side, "color" instruments on the other, vocals center. In the earliest days they didn't even have pan pots (panoramic potentiometers), just three position switches for left, center, right.

You mean like my first mixer?

 

[bouldersoundguy]

You mean like my first mixer?

View attachment 152953

Pretty much. The UA 610 started with 3-position switches and got upgraded to 5-position switches after a while (kind of reminiscent of the Strat pickup selector switch).

 

[RFR]

Pretty much. The UA 610 started with 3-position switches and got upgraded to 5-position switches after a while (kind of reminiscent of the Strat pickup selector switch).

That would actually be cool to build one. Say, a 16 channel console with all 5 way strat switches for panning.
But it’s just an idea, I’m not gonna build one.