Gain Staging FAQs: Your Guide for Heavy Mixes

You’ve got a killer song. The riffs are gnarly, the drums are pounding, and the performances are tight. You throw everything into your DAW, start pulling up faders, and… it sounds like a mess. Everything is either clipping, distorting in a bad way, or just feels weak and undefined. Sound familiar?

Chances are, the problem isn’t your plugins or your playing—it’s your gain staging.

This isn’t some arcane, analog-only concept. In the world of modern metal production, where the standard for polish is insanely high even for bedroom producers, nailing your gain staging is the single most important foundation for a powerful, punchy, and clear mix. Let’s break down the questions we hear all the time.

What the Hell is Gain Staging, Really?

In the simplest terms, gain staging is the process of managing the volume level of a signal at every point in its path.

Think about a guitar signal chain:
Guitar → Overdrive Pedal → Amp Head → Cabinet → Microphone → Preamp → Your DAW

At every one of those arrows, there’s an opportunity to turn the signal up or down. That’s a stage. Gain staging is making sure the level is just right at each step. In the digital world of your DAW, the chain continues:

Audio File → Clip Gain → Insert Plugins (EQ, Compressor, etc.) → Fader → Mix Bus

Your job is to make sure the signal isn’t too quiet (introducing noise) or too loud (causing unwanted distortion and clipping) as it passes through each of those digital stages.

Why Does Gain Staging Matter In a DAW? Don’t I Have 32-bit Float?

This is the big one. Yes, technically, your DAW’s internal engine has a massive amount of headroom. You can crank a fader into the red, and as long as your master bus isn’t clipping, you won’t get that nasty digital distortion.

So why bother? Because your plugins weren’t designed for that.

Most of the plugins we love—the FabFilter Pro-C 2, the Slate Digital VMR, the UAD 1176 collection—are modeled after analog hardware. That hardware was designed to operate at an optimal level, known as "0 VU." When you send a signal that’s way too hot (like -3 dBFS) into a plugin designed to work best around -18 dBFS, you get ugly results:

• Compressors over-react: An 1176-style plugin will slam the signal into oblivion before you even get a chance to dial it in. Check out our metal compression secrets to understand how crucial input level is.
• Saturation plugins distort harshly: Instead of adding warm, pleasing harmonics, a plugin like the Soundtoys Decapitator will just turn into a fuzzy, cheap-sounding mess.
• EQs can behave weirdly: Some analog-modeled EQs can introduce strange artifacts or harmonic distortion when hit too hard.

Proper gain staging isn’t about avoiding clipping in your DAW; it’s about feeding your plugins the level they need to do their job properly.

The Magic Number: What Levels Should My Tracks Be?

The common guideline you’ll hear is to aim for an average level of -18 dBFS on your individual tracks.

Why -18? Because in the digital world, -18 dBFS is generally calibrated to be the equivalent of 0 VU on an analog console. It’s the sweet spot most plugin developers use as a target.

This is a guideline, not a law. The real goal is headroom. You want to leave yourself space to boost EQs, add compression, and make other mixing moves without instantly clipping the channel. If your peaks are hitting around -10 dBFS and your average is around -20 dBFS, you’re in a great spot.

To make this easier, grab a VU meter plugin (the Klanghelm VUMT is a great, affordable option) and put it on your tracks. Set it so -18 dBFS = 0 VU. Now you have a visual reference for hitting that sweet spot.

How Do I Actually Do This? Clip Gain vs. Faders

This is a critical workflow distinction that separates the pros from the amateurs.

Faders are for balancing. Clip gain is for staging.

Your faders are your creative tool for setting the relative balance of instruments in the mix. Before you even touch them, they should all be at unity (0 dB). The actual level management should happen before the fader.

A Practical Workflow for Any Mix

1. Import all your audio files. This includes rendered VSTi tracks from libraries like GetGoodDrums or Superior Drummer 3.
2. Set all your channel faders to 0 dB (unity gain). Don't touch them yet!
3. Use Clip Gain. Go through every single audio track—kicks, snares, guitars, bass, vocals—and use your DAW’s clip gain (or item gain in Reaper) to adjust the level so it averages around -18 dBFS.
4. Check with Pre-Fader Metering. Most DAWs let you switch your channel meters to show the signal level before it hits the fader. This is the perfect way to confirm your clip gain adjustments are working.
5. Start Your Static Mix. Now you can start moving your faders to create a basic balance. Because every track is starting from a healthy, consistent level, you’ll find that mixing becomes way easier and more intuitive.

Gain Staging DI Guitars & Virtual Instruments

Modern metal presents unique challenges, especially with low-tuned, high-output instruments.

Taming Hot DIs

Are your DI guitar tracks from an 8-string with Fishman Fluence pickups clipping your interface on the way in? You’re not alone. If the signal is already recorded and it’s kissing 0 dBFS, your first move should be to pull the clip gain down significantly before it hits your amp sim.

Feeding a super-hot signal into a Neural DSP or STL ToneHub plugin will choke out the amp’s dynamics and create a fizzy, compressed mess. Pull that DI down by 10-12 dB. You’ll find the amp sim breathes more, feels more dynamic, and sounds much closer to a real amp. This is absolutely critical for learning how to get killer modern metal guitar tones.

Drum Libraries and Synths

This applies to Superior Drummer 3, GGD, Kontakt, or any other virtual instrument. Don’t just leave their output faders maxed out!

The first "stage" of gain for a VI is inside the plugin itself. Use the internal mixer in your drum library to balance the kit pieces and turn down the master output of the plugin so the stereo track it feeds in your DAW is hitting that healthy -18 dBFS average.

How Does This Impact My Mix Bus?

If you gain stage every individual track correctly, the magic result is that your master fader won’t be slammed into the red.

When all your tracks are at a healthy level, their combined output on the mix bus will naturally leave you with plenty of headroom. You should be aiming to have your full mix peaking around -6 dBFS to -3 dBFS on the master fader before you add any mastering limiters.

This gives you (or a mastering engineer) the room needed to apply final limiting, EQ, and compression without instantly distorting everything. It’s the final piece of the professional mixing puzzle.

See How The Pros Do It

Theory is one thing, but watching it applied to a real-world session is another. This is the kind of foundational work that every single one of our Nail The Mix instructors does before they even think about adding a compressor or EQ.

Want to see exactly how producers like Will Putney, Kurt Ballou, or Dan Lancaster set up a massive metal mix for success? The Nail The Mix sessions catalog is packed with hundreds of hours of pros showing you their every move, from initial gain staging all the way to the final print. It’s your chance to see these concepts transform a good recording into a world-class mix.

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