You’ve probably heard of ‘Brauerizing’, the unique approach to mixing of Michael Brauer. His technique is in many ways the opposite of conventional mixing, specifically in terms of its use of compression. Conventionally we use channel compression on inserts and then mix into a 2 bus compressor. If a track needs compression it happens at the channel insert, pre-fader. The signals we are mixing through the faders is already compressed, and the entire mix ultimately hits a compressor on the stereo bus.

There are of course exceptions to this, submix compression, crush busses and the like but I’m sure you recognise this ‘typical’ approach.

Brauer developed his ‘Brauerize’ technique when mixing an Aretha Franklin record in the mid 80s. He found the approach described above limited his choices as, in his pursuit of more bass, he found when he dialled in more bottom end the stereo compressor pulled the vocals down and if he pulled the compression back the level wasn’t controlled adequately. Ultimately his solution became what we now know as Brauerizing.

Brauerizing is much misunderstood, possibly because people latch onto the details of Michael’s setup, specific processor choices and the steps needed for calibration, rather than focusing on the idea behind the approach. The central concept which makes Brauerising different is that rather than compressing signals as channel inserts and mixing this pre-fader compression into a stereo bus, Michael doesn’t (usually) use pre fader channel compression feeding into a 2 bus compressor. Instead he mixes into any of four stereo busses, each with their own bus compressors and sums the results at the 2 bus.

Why 4 Busses?

The reasons for using 4 busses are historical, based on the number of busses available on the SSL consoles he was using, indeed the first iteration of this technique used 3 busses because that was all that was available on the console he was using at the time. On each of these busses are a compressor, and in some cases other outboard as well. These are chosen for timbre and each sounds deliberately different. This is part of the approach but another part of this approach is that it escapes the interdependence of a mix which relies on a single 2 bus compressor for much of its dynamic range control. The ‘glue’ which is valued by so many is, in part, what this technique allows the mixer to escape.

These 4 busses are fed the key ‘food groups’ of the mix. Allowing Michael to separate out the compression for these different instruments rather than having the entire mix converge at the stereo bus compressor. Importantly, this mixing into the processing busses is post fader and the source channels aren’t routed to the stereo bus. The stereo bus is fed from the outputs of the four processing busses. Of course this approach is open to experimentation and multiple instruments can be routed to multiple busses, additional processing is added, for example five compressors being used on the vocals on a Coldplay project. Much of the processing in this style of mixing is in parallel. However the majority of the processing used by Brauer is there for tone, the gain reduction introduced is usually light and often negligible.

Although a strictly analogue process in its development, relying on the routing flexibility of large format consoles, Michael has changed his attitude to Brauerizing ‘in the box’ and has moved to a system based around an Avid S6. In his new series with PureMix Michael details his approach and how it is also achievable in the box.

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