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Making a Scene – AI for Mixing Workflow: Automating First Passes

Mixing is the stage where songs finally come alive. It’s where all the pieces—vocals, drums, guitars, keys, bass, and more—start to feel like music instead of a pile of recordings. But let’s be honest: if you’re an indie artist or home studio musician, opening a session with twenty or thirty raw tracks can be intimidating. You hit play, and instead of hearing a band, you hear chaos. Vocals are too loud, the snare is exploding in your face, guitars are lost somewhere in the mud.

That’s why every professional studio used to have an assistant engineer. The assistant’s job was to handle the “first pass.” They would walk into the control room hours before the main engineer arrived, sit at the console, and start balancing levels. They’d bring the lead vocal forward, push guitars to the left and right, make sure the kick and bass weren’t fighting, and clean up any ugly gain issues. It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t creative. But it meant the engineer could come in later and start mixing on a solid foundation.

Today, AI does the same thing—but in minutes instead of hours.

The First Pass: Then and Now

The old studio workflow went something like this:

The assistant rolled back the reels on the tape machine and patched everything into the console. They’d spend an hour just getting gain staging right—too hot and the tracks would distort, too quiet and you’d be stuck fighting tape hiss. Then came balancing. They’d ride the faders until nothing was overpowering anything else. Panning came next, placing instruments across the stereo field so the mix felt like a band standing in front of you.

Only when all that groundwork was done would the head engineer walk in, listen to the rough balance, and start shaping the real mix. They’d add EQ, compression, reverb, delays—the creative moves that gave the track its vibe.

Now imagine skipping all that prep work. With AI, you load up your raw tracks, hit “analyze,” and in a few minutes the software has balanced levels, panned instruments, and set safe gain staging. The role of the assistant is now handled by a machine that never gets tired, never loses focus, and works at lightning speed.

What AI Actually Does in a First Pass

When you use an AI mixing assistant, here’s what happens under the hood:

• It scans the loudness of every track.

• It compares the tracks against one another and decides which ones should be forward (like vocals) and which ones should sit back (like background guitars).

• It sets the faders so the whole thing feels balanced.

• It assigns panning based on typical instrument placement.

• It adjusts gain so nothing clips and everything has headroom.

When you hit play after an AI first pass, the music suddenly feels organized. It won’t sound finished, but you’ll recognize your song. Instead of chaos, you’ll hear structure.

AI First Pass vs. Final Mix

It’s worth repeating: AI doesn’t replace mixing. It replaces the busy work.

The AI first pass is like a freshly primed canvas. The painting isn’t there yet, but at least the surface is ready. You don’t hear tone shaping, character EQ, or vibe. You hear balance, clarity, and a safe starting point.

The final mix, the part you control, is where the magic happens. That’s where you decide how much grit the vocal needs, how roomy the drums should sound, or whether the guitars should shimmer or snarl. Those choices are creative, not technical. That’s why AI isn’t a threat to mixing—it’s a gift. It gives you more time and energy to focus on the art.

Why This Matters for Indie Artists

If you’re running a home studio, you don’t have an assistant engineer. You are the assistant, the engineer, the producer, and often the artist too. That means every hour you spend wrestling with faders and clipping tracks is an hour you’re not being creative.

AI takes over the assistant’s role. It makes the first pass so you can jump straight to mixing. That’s a huge advantage if you don’t have endless time or money.

Let’s Walk Through Some Tools

Alright, let’s get practical. Here are five tools indie musicians can use right now to let AI handle their first pass. I’ll walk you through what each one does, how to use it, and where to find it.

1. iZotope Neutron 4

Neutron has been around for years, but its Mix Assistant feature is still one of the most powerful AI helpers available.

Here’s how it works. You drop Neutron onto your tracks, or better yet, onto your mix bus. Then you run Mix Assistant. The plugin listens to your song, identifies the instruments, and sets levels automatically. It even builds a rough balance with the vocal sitting clearly in front, the drums tight, and guitars tucked neatly into place.

It doesn’t stop there. Neutron also gives you suggestions for EQ and compression. For example, if your vocal sounds muddy, it might cut some low-mid frequencies. If your snare needs more snap, it’ll add a boost in the high mids. You can accept its suggestions or tweak them to taste.

It’s like having an apprentice engineer who not only sets up the mix but also whispers advice in your ear.

Try it yourself here: https://www.izotope.com/en/products/neutron.html.

2. BandLab Studio

Maybe you don’t even own a DAW. Or maybe you just want something simple and free. BandLab’s online DAW has AI mixing built right in.

When you upload your tracks to BandLab, the system runs Smart Mixing in the background. It sets levels, pans instruments, and gives you a quick mix without you touching a fader. It’s like having an entry-level assistant engineer who never complains and works online.

For indie musicians who just want to get a demo together without buying expensive software, BandLab is a lifesaver. You can sign up for free here: https://www.bandlab.com.

3. Sonible smart:EQ 4 and smart:comp 2

Sonible takes a slightly different approach. Instead of doing the entire first pass, their plugins focus on individual tracks.

Say you’ve got a vocal that just doesn’t sit right. You drop smart:EQ 4 on it, hit “learn,” and the plugin listens. Within seconds, it adjusts EQ to remove muddiness, reduce harshness, and bring out clarity. It’s like an assistant engineer who’s really good at cleaning up a track before it even hits the mix.

On drums, you can use smart:comp 2. It analyzes the kit and applies compression that keeps everything punchy but controlled. Again, it’s not creative—it’s corrective. It gets you to a balanced, professional starting point faster.

You can find them at https://www.sonible.com.

4. LANDR Mix AI

Sometimes you don’t even want to open a DAW. Maybe you just want to hear what your multitracks sound like balanced. LANDR’s Mix AI lets you upload your stems and get back an instant AI mix online.

It’s not going to give you the same flexibility as Neutron or Studio One, but for a rough demo or first pass, it’s surprisingly effective. It’s like sending your session to an assistant engineer who works overnight and emails you back a balanced version in the morning.

Check it out here: https://www.landr.com.

A Real Session Example

Let’s bring all this together with a real workflow.

Say you’ve just finished recording a rock track at home. You’ve got sixteen tracks: drums, bass, two guitars, keys, a lead vocal, and a stack of backing vocals. The raw session is messy. The vocal is too hot, the snare is ear-piercing, and the guitars are lost.

Step one is to open the project in Studio One. You run AI Mix Console’s Smart Level, and instantly the gain is balanced. You hit Smart Pan, and suddenly the mix feels like a band in a room. Already it’s night and day compared to where you started.

Next, you drop iZotope Neutron on the mix bus. The Mix Assistant fine-tunes levels even more, giving you a smooth balance across the board. Now you can actually hear the song.

For the vocal, you open Sonible smart:EQ 4. In ten seconds it cleans up the muddiness and makes the voice shine. For drums, you load smart:comp 2, and the kit suddenly feels tight and punchy without you touching a single ratio or threshold knob.

Finally, you add your own touches: some reverb on the vocal, compression on the guitars for bite, and automation on the chorus to make it hit harder. Within an hour, you’ve gone from raw chaos to a mix that feels alive.

Case Study: AI to the Rescue

I once worked with an indie artist who had tracked a five-song EP at home. The recordings weren’t bad, but the mixes were a mess. Vocals were way too loud, drums buried, guitars lost in the mud. They were convinced the project would take weeks to fix.

We ran iZotope Neutron’s Mix Assistant on each track. Within fifteen minutes, every song had a balanced rough mix. Suddenly the artist could hear their music clearly. Instead of drowning in technical problems, we focused on adding warmth, vibe, and emotion.

By the end of the day, they said, “For the first time, mixing didn’t feel like fighting my tracks.”

That’s the difference AI makes. It doesn’t finish the job, but it gets you past the wall of chaos and into the creative zone.

The Future of AI Mixing

We’re still in the early days. Right now, AI is like the perfect assistant engineer: it handles the prep work, keeps things clean, and gives you a safe starting point. But soon, AI will go further. It will learn your taste, remember your past mixes, and even suggest creative moves based on the vibe you’re chasing.

Imagine telling your DAW, “Give me a 90s grunge feel,” and the AI sets levels, pans, EQ, and reverb to match that style. Or imagine it suggesting three different rough mixes with slightly different flavors, the way an assistant might offer multiple setups for you to choose from.

But no matter how advanced it gets, AI won’t replace the final mix. The choices that make a song emotional and unique—the magic of deciding whether a vocal should feel intimate or epic, whether a snare should snap or thud—those will always be human.

Wrapping It Up

Mixing used to start with hours of grunt work done by an assistant engineer. Today, AI does that job in minutes. Tools like iZotope Neutron, Studio One’s AI Mix Console, BandLab Studio, Sonible’s smart plugins, and LANDR Mix AI give indie artists the same head start that big studios used to enjoy.

The first pass is no longer a barrier. It’s a launchpad. And when you let AI handle it, you can finally focus on what mixing is really about: creativity, emotion, and storytelling.

So the next time you stare at a messy session and feel overwhelmed, remember that you don’t have to do it alone. Load up an AI assistant, let it make the first pass, and then dive into the fun part. After all, music isn’t about balancing faders—it’s about making people feel something.

And that, no matter how advanced the technology becomes, will always be your job.

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