Why the Chris Lord-Alge Plug-in Bundle is Dangerous to Your Mix

I’ve been on something of a plug-in binge lately.

I know my friend Joe Gilder will cringe when he reads this. He’s the mix wizard with the stock plug-ins and he keeps churning out smooth-sounding mixes like there’s no tomorrow.

Which is kind of my point, which we’ll get to in a moment.

I recently purchased the a $400 off discount so I couldn’t help but jump on the offer.

CLA in Action

The CLA bundle is a ton of fun to play around with! They’re easy and straightforward plug-ins that adds some extra punch and sweetness to your sound.

For instance, in this folk pop mix I just put on the CLA Unplugged plug-in on the acoustic guitar bus, slapped on a preset, tweaked some settings and voilá!

Instant mix sweetener.

But there’s a catch…

Why CLA or (Insert Artist Here) Plug-ins Should Never Be Your First Purchase

Do you want to know the reason the CLA Guitars worked so well on my acoustic guitar bus?

Because it was already mixed.

Each individual acoustic guitar track was EQ’d and compressed. They were already sounding pretty damn good so the plug-in just took it the extra mile.

You shouldn’t buy these plug-ins if you want to learn how to mix. They’re GREAT shortcuts and they really help sweeten your mix.

But you don’t learn how to mix with them.

They’re just faders you pull up or down. You don’t learn how to compress by pushing a fader up or down and selecting push, spank or wall.

You also don’ improve your EQ by selecting Upper, Lower, Roof, Top or Bite. 

No, you improve your EQ’ing by learning where specific sounds are in the frequency spectrum.

Only then does it really make sense for me to recommend plug-ins like this.

They’re awesome, don’t get me wrong. But they’re no substitute for actually knowing how to mix.

Learn to Mix First

For the proven process to finishing more mixes, learn the step-by-step mixing process right here. 

If you liked this post, share the love: