PureMix - Mixing "Words to Say" in Pro Tools (2015)

You may have seen producer Fab Dupont and the South African band The Arrows take the song ‘Words to Say’ from demo track to a mix-ready session in the free 6 part video series called 'From Creation to Mix'. In this 80 minute video, Fab Dupont unveils his final release-ready mix of that same ProTools session. 'Words To Say' is a great example of modern pop production with a mix of acoustic and electronic drums, layered synths and guitars tracks and lots of cool production moves. Since this is an enormous session, instead of starting the mix from scratch, Fab deconstructs the existing mix that made it on the final record. Instrument by instrument and track by track, he describes every setting, explains the thought process behind every decision and shares all the tips and tricks he used to make this song sound huge.

This mix was performed with 95% plugins except for analog summing and some limited analog 2-Bus processing.

This is a great opportunity to see how the pros manage a big session and what goes into mixing a major label release.

Plugins used:

UAD: DBX160, SPL Transient Designer, LA2, EMT140, EMT250, Lexicon 224, MXR Flanger, Moog Filter, Pultec, IBP, Neve 1073
Soundtoys: Decapitator, Panman, Devil-Loc, Echoboy
Sonnox: Oxford Dynamics, Oxford EQ, Suppresser, Limiter
Plug & Mix: Digital Reverb, Transcontrol
Massey: Tapehead
Avid: Eleven, Boom, Xpand2
Waves: H-Delay