How To Listen

00:00:07
Good morning children! Today, we're going to talk about how to listen.

00:00:11
I know what you're thinking: you've got ears, you know how to listen.

00:00:15
But the reality is: you've got ears, you know how to hear but do you know how to listen? Let me show you.

00:00:21
Think about Thriller, by Michael Jackson.

00:00:24
If you've been alive on earth, for more than 2 minutes, you've heard Thriller.

00:00:27
But have you listened to it? Does it have real drums or electronic drums? Is it bright, is it dark? Does it have a string section, or a horn section? Does anybody play some descending major 7 arpeggio somewhere in there? Ha! Have you listened to it? If you have, you should know.

00:00:48
So today, we're going to listen to music with a focus Not Michael Jackson's Thriller, he wouldn't let us but some really great track nonetheless.

00:01:00
The first thing to be mindful of is your aural memory.

00:01:03
Somebody please, write Aural Memory on the screen so that you know what I'm talking about because I do have a slight...

00:01:08
but perceptible French accent. So, Aural Memory.

00:01:12
I think there are 2 kinds of aural memory: long term, short term.

00:01:16
The long term kind is your musical and sonic culture...

00:01:20
something you develop over the years.

00:01:23
It's the reason why it takes a long time to learn how to mix or produce a record You are educating your brain over the years on what you like and don't like, on what other people like or don't.

00:01:34
It's a lifelong process.

00:01:37
Say you live in New York City and you don't use your car too much.

00:01:41
But it's still your reference for your mixes.

00:01:43
Maybe you haven't been in your car listening to music for 10 days.

00:01:46
But if you take that mix and go in that car you will know right away if the mix is right or not.

00:01:53
That's your brain remembering how music is supposed to sound in that environment from 10 days ago.

00:01:59
But not just from 10 days ago, from having been in that situation many, many times over the years.

00:02:04
The problem with long term aural memory is that it's fickle and not super reliable, because it's very environment-based.

00:02:11
Meaning the place you were in when you built that memory the mood you were in when you built that memory the devices you built that memory through good or bad speakers, headphones, old headphones...

00:02:21
a car that you liked, a car that you didn't like.

00:02:24
All that taints the memory.

00:02:26
So it takes an averaging over the years for you to be able to get a real idea of what things actually sound like.

00:02:33
Fortunately, to compensate for the fickleness of the long term aural memory we have the short term aural memory.

00:02:40
Short term aural memory is what you naturally use when you're working on your production and mixes.

00:02:45
As in: play something... boom, boom, boom...

00:02:47
raise the vocal 1dB, play it again. boom, boom, boom... Do you hear the difference? You're removing the physical environment from the variables because you're playing everything on the same set.

00:02:57
So now, you can focus on the difference between the 2 different passes.

00:03:02
Unfortunately, even short term aural memory is not that easy to use. It takes time and work to develop it.

00:03:09
Most people, even professionals, listen to music the way their girlfriends do.

00:03:14
Meaning our girlfriends either like the song or don't.

00:03:17
They couldn't care less about the sound of the bass drum or if the vocal is bright.

00:03:21
Really, they don't care. But we should care! That's why we have to learn to develop our listening skills so we can pinpoint our attention on one part of the mix or the whole mix, or that other part of the mix, at will.

00:03:33
Let me show you.

00:03:35
Listen to this track, I'll play it twice.

00:03:38
First, raw, and then I'm gonna change something.

00:03:41
But you don't get to see what I change. You just have to listen.

00:03:44
Check it out.

00:03:46
First pass.

00:04:05
Now, I change something. Check it out! Ah! Did you hear the difference? Do you think you heard a difference? Was there a difference? Am I trying to trick you? What's the difference? Let's practice! I'm gonna go back to no change, the original.

00:04:37
Now, focus on the bass drum and the bass.

00:04:41
Try and tune out the rest of the song just focus all your attention on the bass drum and the bass.

00:04:48
First pass.

00:05:07
With the change...

00:05:25
Ok, so you may have heard it, or you may not.

00:05:28
But I do promise there's a difference.

00:05:30
If you haven't heard it it means that your current ability to retain the memory of the sound is shorter than the length of the sample I picked.

00:05:41
What if I pick a shorter sample and I just alternate? It's gonna be 2 bars, and you'll see on the screen On and Off.

00:05:48
See if you can hear a difference now. Still focus on the bass drum and the bass.

00:05:53
Check it out. First flat, and then effect.

00:06:21
It's easier with a shorter sample, right? Let me show you what I was doing.

00:06:25
Here's the EQ I'm using.

00:06:28
+1.98dBs at 145Hz, shelf.

00:06:32
So it definitely will affect the bass drum and the bass.

00:06:35
Let me show you what's going on. When there's bypass, nothing happens.

00:06:38
When I remove the bypass, you hear the correction. Here we go.

00:06:58
Now you get it.

00:07:00
Let's go one step deeper in this spirit.

00:07:03
I'm gonna take the bass off...

00:07:06
select a longer period of time...

00:07:10
and then I'm gonna first play the sample flat.

00:07:32
Now, I'm gonna turn on a shelf.

00:07:34
1.6dB at 3k shelf.

00:07:37
The whole high end is gonna go up like this Pay attention to the high end, the hi-hats and see the difference in shine.

00:07:45
Same length of sample.

00:08:06
Did you hear it? Yes? No? Maybe? Were you focused? Were you listening to the high end? If you heard something in this particular case, I tricked you.

00:08:17
I played the same thing twice, but I changed something on the screen.

00:08:21
If you heard something, it means that your eyes took over your ears and fooled you. It happens all the time.

00:08:27
We've all been caught playing with an EQ for 15 minutes and then realized it's off.

00:08:31
But for those 15 minutes, we actually heard something.

00:08:34
We are kidding ourselves into hearing things.

00:08:37
If you didn' hear it, but were kind of like wondering... should I be hearing it? It means you're still not quite sure what you're hearing...

00:08:45
your brain is taking over your ears and standing in the way of the perception.

00:08:50
The key is to really focus on listening and forget about the thinking and especially turn off your eyes.

00:08:58
So, I'd like to recommend...

00:09:01
to always remember to turn the screen off.

00:09:04
Turn the light off Or, just look the other way when you're listening for something very important.

00:09:11
I always look down, or to the side. I never look at the screen when I want to make a critical assessment, and I definitely don't look at the plug-in UI because that is guarantee to fool you.

00:09:23
Another advantage of closing your eyes is that once they're closed and you 're listening to music you can start assigning virtual, visual positions to every instrument in the mix in kind of a virtual space or canvas if you will.

00:09:37
Some people call it visual mixing.

00:09:39
Dimensions you should consider are top to bottom which is bass at he bottom, mids in the middle, hence their name and then highs, well... up high! Then, there's left to right, that's also easy, right? Left. Right. We know that one.

00:09:54
More complicated: the z plane, the front to back, the 3D thing.

00:09:58
You know, here, here, and here.

00:10:01
And there's also dynamic.

00:10:03
Dynamic is kind of like the 4th dimension because we're used to think of it as a vertical thing because we're used to looking at faders.

00:10:10
Less fader is quieter, and more fader is louder, so we think of it this way But the reality is that if you close your eyes and listen to music if something gets louder, it's gonna feel closer.

00:10:21
That, combined with other tricks, lets you do the z plane.

00:10:24
But it's kind of different.

00:10:25
We're not gonna get into how to achieve that right now I just wanna get into listening to it and trying to see if you can feel that, if you can get that feeling.

00:10:33
because if can you get the feeling, then you can recreate it when you're mixing.

00:10:37
I'm gonna give you some example.

00:10:38
In this track, the first thing to listen to is the z plane.

00:10:43
How far up is the bass drum? Where's the snare drum? Behind it? At the same level? Where is the vocal? Behind it further? Now, if you compare bass drum and snare drum are they at the same frequency height, or a little higher? Do they really feel like that? And then, guitars.

00:11:01
The guitars are left and right. But there's a guitar in the middle too.

00:11:04
So, how does that feel? Can you close your eyes, and actually visualize that stuff? Try it! Close your eyes.

00:11:48
I'm not gonna get into how to achieve this right now.

00:11:52
What's important is you should at least have that on your mind when you listen to music. Because if you can feel that then you can recreate that feeling and apply those principles and create that environment in your own mixes.

00:12:05
In the spirit of trying to achieve what you hear is what you get here's an interesting exercise.

00:12:10
I'm gonna play you 2 examples back to back.

00:12:13
Example A, and example B.

00:12:16
Which one do you like best? Which one sounds better? Which one's more your bag? Check it out! Here's A.

00:12:23
Close your eyes.

00:12:41
B.

00:13:00
B's more exciting, right? It's more in your face, more aggressive.

00:13:04
Right? Now, let's do something else. Let's go back to A play that for a few bars, and then I'm gonna play a new example called C.

00:13:13
First, A, then C. Here we go.

00:13:32
C.

00:13:50
Just for good measure, I'm gonna do that again.

00:13:52
I'm gonna play A from where the synth comes in.

00:13:55
Listen to how it sounds.

00:13:57
And then I'm gonna play C at the same spot.

00:14:00
Listen to the drums bass drum and the bass and listen to the overall tone of the song. Here's A.

00:14:16
C.

00:14:27
Isn't that interesting? Obviously, C is crunchy, the bass goes away the bass drum is pushed back, it doesn't sound so good.

00:14:33
The fun thing is that B, which we liked a lot and C, which we do not, is exactly the same thing played at different levels.

00:14:42
If I play A and then B, being the crushed mix but loud, I like B.

00:14:48
If I play A and C, which is the exact same crushed mix but at the same level, I like A better.

00:14:54
The moral of this story...

00:14:57
is that before doing anything, you've got to match your levels.

00:15:00
If you don't match your levels, you're fooling yourself.

00:15:03
Same thing as you're fooling yourself with your eyes.

00:15:05
Level will fool you into thinking that things are better.

00:15:08
The louder, the better.

00:15:10
That's a big lesson. So whenever you do compression whenever you do drastic EQ, make sure that you listen pre and post at the same level.

00:15:20
Otherwise, you're lying to yourself.

00:15:23
Let's go deeper into the tricks your mind can play on yourself.

00:15:27
Here's an interesting thing: first example, second example...

00:15:30
Try and feel the difference.

00:15:32
Number 1.

00:16:09
The second example sounds so dark and dull, right? The problem in this case is that it is actually our base mix which has been sounding great to us since the very beginning, it's always been our pick.

00:16:21
It's not dull, it's just right.

00:16:23
Listening to a bright version of it for 20 seconds makes it feel dull, but in reality, it's not.

00:16:30
What you hear is not always what you get.

00:16:33
You have to be very careful when you work to not fool yourself into wanting more high end and being stucked with it.

00:16:39
For example, say you're EQ'ing a vocal and you're doing that trick when you jack up the frequency and you're looking for what you're looking for. Fine. You find it.

00:16:47
If you do that for too long...

00:16:49
say you have 5dBs at 10k, and looking for the exact right spot when you're gonna bring it back down it's gonna feel dull.

00:16:55
So what are you gonna do? Jack it back up! And what that's gonna do? Ruin your mix.

00:16:59
You've gotta be really careful about that stuff.

00:17:02
It's all about intent listening and being careful about what you do and being mindful of what you do.

00:17:09
Here's another one.

00:17:11
Tonight, when you're done working on your music don't touch anything, especially not the volume knob.

00:17:15
Leave it as is. Then come back in the morning and press Play.

00:17:18
Just how loud is it? Insanely loud? Was that you listening at that level last night? No way! Yes way, it was you! Are you crazy? No! Why is it so loud? Because throughout the day, while you were working levels crept up. Why? For the same reason we just saw. Maybe you played it loud a little bit then you don't really want to bring it back down, plus louder feels better.

00:17:39
Louder always feels better. It's not better, but it feels that way.

00:17:43
So be careful.

00:17:44
As I said at the very beginning...

00:17:46
the environment taints the perception of the music.

00:17:49
It gets in the way, you are fooling yourself.

00:17:52
Make sure you keep your levels in check.

00:17:53
We'll do a whole video on monitoring techniques.

00:17:56
But for now, leave that volume knob alone.

00:18:01
Last, but not least in the art of listening here's an interesting way to regain perspective when you've lost it...

00:18:07
the perspective...

00:18:09
Say you're mixing, and you're done... it's the best thing you've ever done.

00:18:14
Call someone to come listen with you. Just to see how that feels.

00:18:18
I guarantee you it will be a completely different experience.

00:18:21
It needs to be a human being... the cat, or the dog won't do.

00:18:24
Now, they don't have to be professionals, but it's fun with professionals especially if you have access to two kinds of professionals.

00:18:31
Some whose opinion you respect and people whose opinion you do not respect like the drummer in the band for example.

00:18:37
Check this out.

00:18:38
If you listen to the same mix with somebody whose opinion you respect and two minutes later with somebody whose opinion you don't respect it's gonna feel completely different.

00:18:47
It's fun to try, and it gives you a good insight on how much your mind is playing tricks on you at all times.

00:18:54
As twisted as it sounds, the first step to not be lying to yourself is to know that you are lying to yourself, at all times.

00:19:01
Critical listening is an active experience.

00:19:03
You need to practice and get better at it.

00:19:05
You need to build your short term aural memory and your long term aural memory.

00:19:09
You need to remember, just remember, to get rid of the distractions as much as possible.

00:19:15
Turn the screen off. Close your eyes.

00:19:17
Look elsewhere. Don't let your eyes kill you.

00:19:20
Don't let the levels kill you. Don't let the brightness kill you.

00:19:23
But more importantly make sure you always have our girlfriend around to listen to the final mix before you deliver it.

00:19:28
Et voilà!