In a moment I’m going to share with you some concepts and techniques that I’ve observed over nearly 25 years of working with many Grammy Award-winning artists and producers.

I’ll take you INSIDE the thought processes that go on in the recording studio so you can dramatically BOOST the quality of your Next Hit Song.

These are NOT just engineering tips, but HOW TO THINK tips to ENSURE that your music ends up sounding just the way it did in your head.

This will save years of trial and error and guesswork for the average musician, songwriter, singer, producer, and artist trying to find a competitive edge that will make their songs stand out.

Whether you’re trying to get signed to a record label, sell your own CD independently, or post your music on MySpace, you need your music to EXPLODE out of the speakers to give yourself an edge.

Before you start doing anything, the first thing you should do is listen to some reference CDs of several different types of songs that are similar to what you’re trying to work with.

Then listen to your music and immediately go back and listen to a few more CDs so that a mental image forms in your “mental ear” of how you want your music to sound. What is your intention?

Why is it important to do this? Well, it will help you get familiar with the REAL sound of the speaker system you’re listening to, even if it’s your own. Our ears quickly adapt to the listening environment and our minds will make us think that we are hearing things accurately when in fact we have simply “filled in the blanks”.

If the CDs you just listened to sound loud and clear and your song sounds darker and a bit weak in comparison, then you have an idea of ​​what you need to work on to improve your quality.

You have to get used to it to have a point of reference so you know exactly what you’re trying to do, before you start doing anything. As you continue to work, take periodic 15-minute breaks, and then listen to your reference again. This is crucial because our sonic memory is very short and our ears WILL ADAPT and can deceive us.

A question I’m always asked is “What’s the best way to start polishing and mixing the new song I just wrote, so it ends up having the same impact and quality as the CDs I buy?”

My advice is: after hearing a few references, listen to your song and get a mental image of how it actually sounds compared to it. What is the actual sound quality? And then imagine how you want it to sound. What was missing compared to the reference?

Always start with a vision. Always know your destination before you start. A big mistake many people make is diving in with no idea what they are really trying to do.

You have to form a mental image to make it clear to you, then make it happen. If you don’t have a clear vision, you only have a 50/50 chance that the outcome will work or not. Then you probably won’t know how to fix it if things start to go wrong because you didn’t know exactly what you were trying to do in the first place. Always know your destination before embarking on any journey.

You have to build the impact in your song like building a house one brick at a time. The trick is to identify the main items and make sure they NEVER get lost.

If you add something new and suddenly a main part of the beat you heard before isn’t so clear, get rid of it, lower it, or move it in and out. Don’t fall in love with anywhere. Get rid of it if necessary.

One article is not enough to distill 25 years of information, so I will be sharing many more tips and tricks with the music community in the future. Music is not a mystical secret process within the reach of a select few. I want to do what I can to help anyone interested in improving the quality of music in general.

Copyright 2006 Khaliq Glover aka Khaliq-O-Vision