Knowing your levels, and learning how to separate your ears is fundamental. But the most crucial thing is knowing your mp3's or records. Find out the BPM of all of your records, so you know the tempos when you’re starting out.The next step is balancing your headphone and your monitor levels. You don’t want your headphone mix to be too loud to the point where you can’t hear your monitor mix, and vice versa Downbeat. If you know where the downbeat is,
then you start listening for the snare, and matching the snare up to the other one. If you know the snares of both records, it helps you distinguish between them. In
many environments, and especially in your headphones, it’s easier to hear the snare than the kick.
A lot of times, the bass frequencies are so low that they all blend together. That’s why I think most people mix off the snare.
The hardest part is being able to distinguish the two records when you are slowly blending them in. I call that “separating your ears.”
