RSR515 - Collin Dupuis - Crafting the Perfect Mix Through Microphone Choices and Techniques

Recording Studio Rockstars

Lij Shaw

Music

4.8 • 543 Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2025

⏱️ 115 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What's the secret to crafting a killer mix? Grammy-winning mix engineer Collin Dupuis joins us to share his insights on mixing techniques, room acoustics, and creative chaos. Known for working with The Black Keys, Lana Del Rey, Angel Olsen, he discusses the evolution of music gear, collaboration, experimentation, clarity in mixing, effective file management, and tools like Soundflow and Samply that streamline workflow. Collin talks about vintage recording equipment, the revival of classic multitrack tapes, and automation in modern mixing. He shares experiences with in-person learning, challenges working with musicians of varying skill levels, techniques for enhancing drum sounds, the importance of headphone mixes for drummers, microphone choices and design, and the historical impact of Stevens tape machines. From live-to-two-track recording to innovative mixing, Collin offers valuable insights into pushing creative boundaries.

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My guest today is Collin Dupuis, a Detroit-based multi-Grammy nominated and two time Grammy winning mixer, producer, and musician working with artists like Yves Tumor, Angel Olsen, Lawrence Rothman, Special Interest, Boy and Bear, and many others. He also plays drums in his band Zoos of Berlin.

In 2024, Collin came to my studio to teach a mixing masterclass that was a ton of fun. We had a full studio of dedicated producers and engineers from near and far. We learned a ton about Collin's sophisticated mixing method, including a better understanding of how a mix template can work in your home studio and a deep dive into RX and how it can improve your mixes.

Collin has been a guest on the podcast in episodes RSR252, RSR341 and RSR404.

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Listen to this guest's discography on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0WU3Rx4o79aPlCDRnq4O0m?si=abcc86915abc4b5a

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Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode of Recording Studio Rockstars is brought to you by Isotope, Native Instruments,
0:06.8	Adam Audio, and S-A-E Institute. You're hearing my voice right now mixed through isotope,
0:13.4	ozone, and velvet on atom audio monitors and headphones. Make sure to get my free mixing course
0:20.0	at Mixmasterbundle.com,
0:22.3	and please check out our awesome sponsors using the links in the show notes.
0:26.9	And please like and subscribe to this YouTube channel
0:30.0	because it's a great way to help support this show.
0:32.6	Now get ready to rock.
0:34.7	So I've created my mixer template in Soundflow that I have things like drum focus,
0:40.4	bass focus, keyboards, strings, synths, whatever, background vocals, lead vocals. Then I have some
0:46.4	custom ones. So if I want to create groups or things, if I want to hear, say, the keyboards and the
0:50.0	vocals together, I can press that one and only see those on the screen. I can get myself where I'm
0:55.1	only bringing those into focus and then I can go and make a balanced choice between those. And I have to be like zooming around to make that balance choice. They're just all the faders in front of me. And I can go, okay, me turn this up, turn that. Okay, cool. That's how it sounds good. and get to that point of hearing those things quickly
1:10.9	like if i was on an analog board i'd go okay here's the vocals here's the keyboards and go
1:15.5	you know that's the most streamlined way of doing it Welcome to Recording Studio Rockstars.
1:32.3	I'm Lid Shaw, and this is the podcast created to help you become a rock star of the recording studio.
1:44.0	At Isotope, mixing and mastering just got even smarter.
1:49.5	Velvet gives you silky vocals with sibilance learn de-sing, dynamic tone shaping, and
1:56.1	declick, all in one plugin.
1:58.9	And ozone 11 now includes clarity, upward compression, and AI-powered STEM focus to help
2:05.3	you master like a pro.
2:07.4	Use code Rock 10 for 10% off, ozone or any of Isotopes incredible plugins at Isotope.com.
	...

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