There are lots of words that have established meanings in the music-making community — some terms that go back decades. As newcomers enter the fray, frequently there is confusion about what those terms mean. Here’s one example that has been discussed quite frequently, so I thought I’d set the record straight.
This has been a troublesome issue for years to me as a mixer, and it only seems to be getting worse. It was recently highlighted by one of our industry’s luminaries, legendary mixer Bob Clearmountain, who posted on Instagram trying to clarify.
“Hi guys. I wanna talk about something that’s been kinda bugging me lately. I hear a lot of people referring to original multitrack files as ‘stems.’ I hear that all the time. ‘Well, we’re going to send you the stems to mix.’ Well, I usually don’t mix from stems. Stems are actually subgroups of tracks, like you might have a stereo stem of a drum set or a stereo stem of all the guitars or all the keyboards. Original multitracks with everything separate, with all the drums on separate channels, those are not called stems. And a lot of people call them that these days, and it’s just wrong . . .”
I want to hop on that bandwagon, too, because this has been a source of confusion for clients for many years.
What’s the difference between stems and multitracks? It’s simple.
Stems
Stems are stereo submixes of components within a mix. This started years ago (even before the dawn of the DAW age), when we would print the finished MASTER mix for duplication (like on physical media such as vinyl, cassette, or CD — I know, I’m old). Then we’d print an INSTRUMENTAL mix (INST — instruments only with no vocals), a TV TRACK (full mix minus the lead vocal for use on TV shows when the artist is performing without a band, hence the name), and a VOX ONLY mix (lead vocal plus background vocals with no instruments). If you combined the INST mix with the VOX ONLY mix, then you could re-create the master, but the balance between the two (instruments and vocals) could be adjusted in mastering if necessary.
Once the labels discovered they could adjust volumes without going back for a remix, they began requesting INST only, BGVs only, and LEAD VOC only so they could balance those components in post. All these stereo submixes would have all the processing and reverb from the original mix but with certain elements missing (what is called “Mix Minus”). Then someone realized you could do the same with certain other instruments, as well, and have control after the fact.
Fast-forward to the early 21st century, and things got really crazy. For orchestral remixes, I might routinely print as many as 17 “stem” mixes (stereo submixes) of components, breaking it all the way down to the elements such as I list below. This allowed the labels to go back and make adjustments after the fact without engaging (or paying) the original mix engineer. Plus, they could use the stems to make gaming, performance, or practice tracks to sell — another revenue stream. (Nothing wrong with additional revenue streams, right?)
Here’s what stem mixes might look like for a single song.
- DRUMS
- BASS
- GTRS
- KEYS
- PIANO
- PERC LOOPS
- LEAD VOC
- BGVS
- STRINGS
- WOODWINDS
- BRASS
- HORNS
- ORCH_PERC
- HARP
Multitracks
When the original recording is done, individual tracks are designated for individual instruments. These may (or may not) include processing (EQ, compression, effects) on the individual parts, depending on the tracking engineer’s preference or skill level. When delivering multitracks for an overdub or mix session, the track listing will typically look like the following:
- Audio 1
- Audio 2
- Audio 3
- Audio 4 . . .
Just kidding. Nobody would ever do that, right? They should look like this:
- Kick
- Snare_Over
- Snare_Under
- HiHat
- Tom1
- Tom2
- Tom3
- Overhead_L
- Overhead_R
- DrumRoom_L
- DrumRoom_R
- Piano_Lo
- Piano_Hi
- Keys_L
- Keys_R
- Bass_Dir
- Bass_Amp
- AcGtr
- AcGtr_Double
- ElecGtr_1
- ElecGtr_2
- Lead Vocal
- BGV 1
- BGV 2
- BGV 3 . . .
- BGV 125
and so on.
When you deliver the multitracks to a mix engineer, you want to make sure he has the original files to work with. You do not want to send a mixer just the stems with all the processing, balances, and compression already applied because then you are tying their hands and not allowing them the flexibility to do their job.
NOTE: Before You Send Multitracks
Sending multitracks to the mix engineer does not mean you can skip all the decision making. Don’t send them 15 tracks of the lead vocal and expect them to put together a “comp” of the lead vocal. That’s the producer’s or artist’s job. And don’t send 36 tracks of electric guitar and think, “They can just sort this all out.” I’ve seen it happen too many times where all the time that should have been spent mixing was instead spent sifting through tracks. Let the mix engineer do their job, which is mixing, and you provide them with what they need because the more time they spend figuring out what all is on the tracks, the less time they have to actually create a great-sounding mix.
Check out Bob Clearmountain’s Instagram post.