Mixing a Crushing Of Mice & Men Bass Tone

Getting bass to sit right in a dense metal mix can be a serious battle. You need it to be powerful and anchor the low end, but you also need it to cut through without turning into a muddy mess. In a mix with down-tuned guitars and pounding drums, that’s no easy task.

Fortunately, Aaron Pauley of Of Mice & Men gave us a peek into his surprisingly minimal and effective approach. He demonstrates that you don’t need a twenty-plugin chain to get a killer bass tone. It’s all about context, a few key EQ moves, and knowing when not to over-process. Let’s dive into his method for crafting a bass tone that perfectly gels with the rhythm section.

Start with Context: How Bass and Drums Gel

Before you even think about soloing that bass track and EQing it into oblivion, stop. The single most important relationship for your bass is the one it has with the kick drum. Aaron’s first move is to listen to the drums and bass together to hear how they interact.

His mixing style is often “top-down,” meaning he has a lot of processing on his main busses. Because the tracks are feeding into multiple stages of compression down the line, a lot of the transient shaping and gluing happens naturally. This is a huge advantage, as it means he doesn’t have to get overly surgical with notching out competing frequencies between the kick and bass right away. The stacked compressors help tame transients and make everything sit together nicely.

The main takeaway here is simple: make your initial EQ decisions with the drums playing. That’s the only way to know if you’re actually creating space or just carving the life out of your tone.

Carving Out the Perfect Bass Tone with EQ

With the bass and drums playing together, you can start making targeted EQ adjustments. Aaron’s process is a masterclass in efficiency, focusing on just a few critical areas to clean up mud and enhance character.

The Essential “Anti-Wonk” Cut

Ever notice that weird, unpleasant low-mid buildup in bass guitars? Aaron calls it the “wonky” frequency area, and it often lives somewhere around 200 Hz. It doesn’t add power, just mud. To fix this, he uses a classic search-and-destroy technique:

1. Create a narrow boost with a high Q on your EQ.
2. Sweep it around the 200 Hz area until the most unflattering frequency jumps out.
3. Once you’ve found it, turn that boost into a cut, pulling the “wonk” out of the signal.

This single move instantly cleans up the bass and creates more definition in the low end.

The Mid-Range Scoop

Next, he makes a slightly broader cut in the mid-range. This is a common move in metal mixing, similar to the ‘huge bass scoop’ used for clarity, to help the bass stay out of the way of the guitars and vocals, allowing it to own the low end while the guitars dominate the mids.

Boosting the “Metallic Scrape” for Character

Here’s where it gets interesting. Instead of just cutting, Aaron uses EQ to enhance a very specific part of the bass tone’s personality. He listens for the subtle, metallic string scrape sound and uses a very narrow EQ band to find that exact frequency. You can hear it as a high-pitched, almost whistling sound when boosted.

Once he finds it, he doesn’t slam the boost. He just nudges it up slightly to bring that texture forward, then might even pull it back down a little. It’s a subtle move, but it adds a layer of aggression and detail that helps the bass slice through the mix on smaller speakers. It’s a perfect example of building a unique tone, a philosophy shared by bass gurus like Nolly Getgood.

Using a Limiter to Control the Low End

To make sure the low end of the bass stays consistent and doesn’t have any wild peaks, Aaron reaches for a simple tool: the Waves L2 Ultramaximizer. He admits it’s a bit of a “misuse” of the plugin, but he’s essentially just using it as a transparent limiter to put a ceiling on the bass level.

However, in reviewing the mix, he points out that the recorded bass performance is already incredibly consistent. The waveform is practically a brick. In this case, he notes he might not even need the L2. It’s a great reminder to always use your ears. Don’t slap a plugin on just because it’s part of your template; if the track doesn’t need it, leave it off.

The Pro Secret for a Disappearing Bass

What do you do if your bass sounds great soloed but vanishes once the full mix is playing? Aaron shares a killer reinforcement trick for this common problem.

1. Duplicate Your Bass Track: Create a parallel channel, a key step in powerful parallel processing.
2. Isolate the Lows: On the duplicate track, use an EQ to aggressively filter out almost everything except the fundamental low-end frequencies. You’re creating a pure sub channel.
3. Crush It with Compression: Compress this duplicate track heavily, almost to the point of distortion. You want to create a super-consistent, solid block of low-end energy.
4. Blend to Taste: Mix this compressed sub-track in underneath your main bass track. Blend it in just enough to reinforce the low end and keep it present, without making the whole mix feel boomy.

This parallel processing technique gives you the best of both worlds: the clear, articulate tone of your main track, plus the unwavering power of the sub-reinforcement track. It’s an advanced technique you can find in deep-dive production and mixing courses.

Learn the Full Of Mice & Men Mix

Aaron Pauley’s bass mixing approach is all about making smart, minimal moves that serve the song. It’s about:

• Mixing in context with the drums.
• Making surgical cuts to eliminate mud.
• Using creative boosts to enhance character.
• Applying dynamics control only when necessary.
• Using parallel processing to solve common problems.

These tips are powerful on their own, but imagine watching Aaron apply these concepts to every instrument and mix the entire Of Mice & Men song “Mosaic” from start to finish.

With Nail The Mix, you can. You don’t just get the tutorials; you get the actual multitracks from the session. You can follow along as Aaron explains every plugin, every fader move, and every decision he makes. Stop guessing and start learning from the pro who actually mixed the record.

See exactly how it’s done and get the stems to try it yourself by checking out the hundreds of sessions available. It’s your chance to be a fly on the wall and learn the full process directly from the source.