Audio engineers and music producers throw around a lot of confusing terminology. Most of it is shorthand for more complex techniques and situations. This article is a glossary of some of the most common audio production jargon I’ve heard and used in my career as a mix engineer and music producer. Hopefully this will provide some context and new information for those of you who are unfamiliar with the weird words of the music production nerd. I’m going to start with some of the most common terms and move slowly into some of the more obscure ones.

Dry vs Wet

A sound that has zero or very little added effects is dry. A sound can be dry if it was just recorded in a soundproof room with a close microphone. Anything can be considered dry if it feels sort of flat or lacking intriguing textural qualities. Of course this is a matter of taste. But dry is mostly used in relation to reverb and space. If a sound is up-front in the mix, lacks depth or the reflections of a reverb, it is considered dry.

Wet, on the other hand, means the opposite. I vocal that is too wet might have too much reverb or delay. It could also be too wet in other ways, maybe it has too many other effects such as a flanger or chorus.

How to make something drier or wetter: If using a plug-in or hardware effect, look for a knob that says dry/wet, mix or amount. These are the most common labels. Turning a knob clockwise usually makes it wetter and counter-clockwise makes it drier. If you’re using a reverb send, you’ll want to raise the amount sent to make a sound wetter and lower the amount to make it drier.

Muddy

This is another very common term used in the music production world. A sound is considered muddy when it has too much going on in the mid range frequencies. I apply this to the low-mids specifically. Anywhere from 100hz to 650hz is my target range for mud cleanup.

The sound of mud is a congested, overly warm and fluffy sound that is somewhat bassy but mostly mid range. Clearing up mud is really important and is one of the main jobs I do when mixing songs for other artists. Controlling mud is one of the easiest ways to get closer to a professional sounding recording.

How to reduce mud: I wrote a much longer article on this that you can check out. The quick answer is to use an EQ to cut out frequencies that are bothersome. The key is knowing your monitors and headphones enough to judge when this is happening and learning to not over-EQ or reduce too much of the selected frequency. You can create even more problems by reducing frequencies so much that the original sound looses all it’s body. Balance is very important. Cutting too much can make a sound thin.

Boomy

This is similar to mud in a lot of ways but describes more of a loud, resonant frequency that is poking out of the mix. Most likely in the bass or low mids. Kick drums can be boomy, meaning the drum is pushing too much of a low or sub frequency and need to be tamed. Bass can be boomy, meaning certain notes in the low end are standing out much more than others. A boomy vocalist could also be described as chesty. Meaning the microphone and the timbre of their voice has too much low end.

How to fix a boomy sound: Compression, EQ and harmonic distortion are ways to do it. You could compress the sound to even out the louder, boomy areas. You could EQ or high-pass the sound to get rid of the low notes if they aren’t needed. And more creatively, you could run the sound through any number of distortions, tape simulators or harmonic exciters to lift the sound into a mid-range zone and hopefully reduce the frequencies in the lower end that are sticking out. My advice, try a combination of all three.

Timbre

Pronounced “tam-bur.” Timbre is the overall texture and personality of a sound. It’s a loose term that describes the essence of the sound. Frequency, dynamics, texture, harmonics, space and more make up a sound’s timbre.

How to highlight the timbre of a sound: Listen to the sound in the context of the song and try to pick out the important aspects it’s adding to the mix. Find the unique part of the sound you want to highlight. The sound may have other areas that can be reduced or cut out. Understanding the important personality this unique sound provides to the song will help you consider what sort of treatment it needs to properly place it in the mix.

Mono vs Stereo

Although this seems very basic to some, it’s really important to consider this before working with a specific sound. Mono is an audio file made up of one single waveform. Stereo is an audio file made up of two waveforms that simultaneously create sound. They have a left and a right channel, one for each speaker. Stereo files share some identical audio in both channels that combine to form a mono signal to our ears. They also contain audio that is unique to each channel. The differences give our ears the impression of the stereo image.

How to make a sound mono or stereo: If you recorded a sound yourself with one microphone into one mixer channel, this sound will be mono. If you recorded something like a synth with two audio cords (or a stereo cord) into two inputs on your mixer, you should have a stereo sound if each channel is panned left and right.

What if you want to make a stereo sound mono or a mono sound stereo? There are plug-ins that control width as well as which channel of a sound you’d like to use. In some DAWs you can pan both channels of a stereo track to be completely centered, this creates a summed mono signal. You can also mute one side and center the other.

There are many ways to turn a mono signal stereo. A quick and easy way is to duplicate the mono sound, pan the original to the left and pan the new one to the right. Then, by delaying one channel 12 to 20 ms you will get enough of time difference for your ears to consider the sounds separate but still related. Pitch, pitch modulation, phasing, and other creative treatments can also differentiate identical sounds that are panned opposite of each other. There are many plug-ins that help with this.

Width

The perceived distance across the stereo field is a sound’s width. If something sounds like it is coming from the far left and the far right, it is very wide.

How to make a stereo sound wider or narrower: The stereo method above is one way to achieve stereo separation and create the illusion of width. Putting a sound through a stereo reverb is another way to add width (as well as depth). Sending a sound to a stereo delay can also make it seem wide. There are also imaging plug-ins like the Waves S1 that can increase or reduce the stereo field of a sound. Ableton has the utility plug-in that does the same.

Depth

So you’ve mastered the left and right stereo field, depth is the location of a sound front to back. Reverb is the most common and effective way to push a sound back in a mix. Reverb creates a surrounding reflective texture that creates the illusion of time and distance.

This can be a small subtle amount like a room reverb which has a very quick reflection simulating the sound of small rooms or even a car interior. There are also very long reverbs that simulate churches or stadiums or even long digital spaces that don’t exist in the real world.

How to create depth and push something to the back of a mix: The natural way would be to record in a room or location that sounds great and has tasteful reflections. The further away the microphone is from the sound, the further back the sound will seem in the mix. This is why professional studio recordings sound so great, because they have a natural room sound that essentially glues the sounds together. It also gives our ears and brain an imagined space to place the sounds in.

You can also add reverbs and delays after recording. A slap delay is a good way to create a quick echo that can sound like a wall, alley or street. A reverb is just a dense set of very closely timed delays. Either way, pushing a sound back into a mix means adding reflections to cue our ears that it is further away from us. Bringing something closer to the front of a mix means reducing reflections so we’re only hearing the direct sound without any perceived environment.

DAW

Digital audio workstation. The software that you record, mix or produce music with. Ableton Live, Pro Tools, FL Studio, Logic, Reaper, GarageBand.

Thin

A sound is usually described as thin when it is lacking body, or bass and mid range. Cymbals and hi hats are examples of thin instruments. An acoustic guitar can seem thin if recorded a certain way. Thinness is subjective. It depends on the expectation we have for the sound and how that sound fits into a mix. A thin kick drum usually isn’t ideal. Neither is a thin bass guitar.

How to make a sound thicker: There are many ways to add body and low-end to a sound. The easiest way is to grab an EQ and crank up the missing frequencies. You can also try the opposite, reducing high treble frequencies so the lower frequencies seem more prevalent.

You can also thicken sounds by using distortion, guitar amp simulators, creating a duplicate in a lower octave, or adding darker reverbs/delays.

One of the most interesting ways to thicken something is to track a meatier instrument underneath the thin sound. Two instruments playing the same part can often create a more complex and appealing sound while also increasing production value. Just be careful not to overcrowd the mix. Blend the lower instrument subtly until it adds just enough body.

Boxy

Boxiness is a really big problem in diy recordings and amateur mixes. When you have too much mid range, you might have a boxy sound. I would look into the frequency range of 500-1500hz. The most common culprit in my experience is around 700-1100hz.

How to reduce boxiness: use an EQ to cut frequencies in the mids. Search for offending frequencies until you find a spot that clears up the cluttered, boxy sound.

Sibilant

If you’ve ever mixed vocals that were recorded on a cheap mic, you’ll know what this is. Sibilance is simply when the “S” and “T” sounds of a vocalist are much louder than the rest of the vocals. Our ears are very sensitive to these treble frequencies so it is very important to control them in a mix.

How to control sibilance: Learn to use a de-esser. This is a kind of targeted compressor that focuses on frequencies in the high treble area. It reduces harsh sounds above a specific threshold and frequency. Too much reduction can give a singer a lisp. Learning how to de-ess effectively is a subtle art.

Plosive

If you record vocals without a pop filter, you might hear plosives. These are bursts of air that create a boomy, heavy sound in a recording. Usually you’ll hear them when a vocalist uses words that start with the letter “P” or “B.” Those syllables tend to push a lot of air into the mic, overloading it.

How to reduce plosives: Record with a good pop filter and engage a high-pass filter around 80-100hz. The pop filter will slow down sudden bursts of air and the high-pass will keep the sub-bass out of the recording.

Clipping

Clipping can happen in the digital and analog world. If you record a bass directly into an interface and you hear distortion, this is analog clipping. Clipping that happens inside your daw is digital clipping such as turning a fader up so high that it creates distortion.

When a sound goes above the zero db threshold, it clips. This can sound good in some situations like with guitar pedals and amps or even vintage mixing gear. Usually in the digital world, it sounds pretty bad but it can also be a stylistic choice.

How to avoid clipping: when recording, give yourself plenty of headroom, 6 to 12 db of space is good but it should be set for each musician’s playing style. When mixing in a DAW, leave yourself a similar amount of headroom on each channel. Make sure the sounds have space before hitting the zero db mark and you’ll have a clean recording.

Air

Air is the extreme top end of a sound. 10Khz and higher is the area I refer to as air. It can be a beautiful part of a sonic palette when used correctly. It can create harshness and thinness when used incorrectly.

How to increase or reduce air: use a shelf or bell EQ to boost certain frequencies above 10k. 14Khz is my go-to to add sparkle to a master track. You may need to reduce this area too. Use an EQ to pull down frequencies that are sounding too harsh. This should warm up the sound in a very effective way. As always it’s about finding the right balance and knowing what a sound needs.

High-pass vs low-pass vs band-pass

All three of these are referring to EQ filter slopes. High pass means you are letting the highs pass through the filter, cutting the bass. Low pass means the opposite: letting the lows through the filter while cutting the treble. A band pass is the combination of both: letting only the middle section between both filters through.

These filters can be as wide and steep as your EQ allows. Steeper EQ curves usually add more resonances while shallower slopes are much smoother and subtle. They can also be moved throughout the frequency range. Learning your high and low pass filters is one of the first things you should do as a beginner recording engineer.

Punchy

This term can be defined slightly differently depending on who you are talking to. In general, punchiness is referring to the size of the transient, or initial impact/attack of a sound. For example: many artists want their kick and snare very punchy. You want to feel like these two drums are cutting through the mix on their initial percussive impact.

Some people refer to punchiness as a specific frequency zone. For drums this could be somewhere between 85hz and 300hz. It’s the area that hits you in the chest.

How to add or reduce punch: You can reduce the punch of a sound by compressing it (essentially reducing transients to smooth it out) or by reducing EQ at it’s base frequency. Meaning, the part of the sound that provides body.

You can add punch by using a transient designer or by boosting a little EQ in it’s base frequency. Base doesn’t necessarily mean bass. Something to think about.

Pumping

When you can hear a compressor working too hard, you’re probably hearing pumping. This is a term that refers to the sound a compressor imparts as it latches down and reduces audio. It is a very constrained, almost ugly sound. It can be a stylistic choice as well. Usually pumping happens when rhythmic instruments are over-compressed or not compressed properly.

How to fix pumping: The easiest way is to help the compressor work less. First, add a high-pass filter before the compressor and take out any bass that isn’t needed. Sometimes you can remove more than you’d think and still end up with a great sound. Bass makes compressors work.

Next, work with the attack and release of the compressor. You may want a longer attack so the compressor waits longer to kick in. You also may want a shorter release so the compressor disengages faster. These changes will help the compressor become more transparent. Learning attack and release techniques takes time and usually has to do with the tempo and timbre of the sound you’re compressing.

You can also just use less compression to reduce pumping.

Bus

A bus (or buss) is a term from the old-school days of analog studio recording that we still use in our digital audio workstations. A bus is a channel that routes any number of audio channels into one single channel so a group can be treated as one single sound.

The master channel in your DAW is your most used bus. Pro Tools has a lot of bussing options. Ableton and other newer production programs use groups or sends which are types of busses. There are also internal routing possibilities in most DAWS that help you send audio to various channels.

How to bus: Group channels, or create a channel to route multiple sounds to. Use that new channel to treat that group of sounds as one item (for example, drums).

This has been my glossary of audio nerd terminology. Hopefully there was something in here you didn’t already know. There are plenty of other industry terms to go over and I’ll write another list soon. If you are looking to hire a professional mix engineer to push your productions to the next level, please contact me. I love working with new artists and have affordable, indie musician rates as well as discounts for multiple songs. Check out some of my previous work and reviews from former clients.