Mixing Snoop Dogg, Mayer Hawthorne with Apollo & UAD

If you’ve listened to mainstream rap within the last two decades, chances are you’ve heard Jason Schweitzer’s work. The Grammy‑winning mix engineer has earned a platinum reputation among rap royalty, with credits that include Snoop Dogg, Wiz Khalifa, Busta Rhymes, Dr. Dre, Eminem, and many more.

Here’s what Schweitzer had to say about developing your intuition as an engineer, the importance of having a musical background, and the UA hardware and plug-in chains he used to craft Mayer Hawthorne’s Grammy‑nominated hit “How Do You Do.”

How did you get you start as an engineer and producer?

I graduated from Cal State Chico with a major in music performance and recording arts, and within about a year I got hired at a studio in Los Angeles. My internship lasted seven months and then I became an assistant in 1999. I went independent in 2001 and have been on my own since then.

Prior to that, you were a musician — what led you to a career in engineering, rather than performing?

I got into audio technology in a practical, hands-on way. I was always responsible for doing sound for the groups I performed with, and I realized that recording could be a satisfying (and fun) way to be creative and engage in music professionally, while building a stable career at the same time.

How has your background as a musician informed your career as an engineer?

It’s really important for engineers to have a musical background. Knowing how to play an instrument and read music has been so important for me.

I spent the first 22 years of my life playing and performing, so that gives me a different perspective when it comes to creative choices in the studio — it informs my process. I can hear the inside rhythms of different instruments and understand the deeper, inner workings of the song and make decisions more intuitively.

Can you describe a time when your perspective as a musician solved a problem in the studio?

I remember opening up a rough mix from an engineer who was working with an A-list artist and producer. The team thought the song needed more drums, but couldn’t decide.

They already had a full drum kit, plus three kick drums and additional snares. Ultimately, you couldn’t hear the drums because the engineer had so many plug‑ins on the master fader. I took those off and it sounded better instantly. They were too deep into the process of engineering and had lost track of the needs of the song.

Your discography has a lot of hip-hop in it. What’s it like recording A-list rappers in the studio?

I’ve worked with a lot of major West Coast rappers. My first job ever was with Dr. Dre. And my first ever mix was Kurupt’s album Space Boogie: Smoke Oddessey.

Most of the hip‑hop artists I’ve worked with are very creative and driven when they’re in the studio. Artists like Kurupt and Snoop Dogg in particular are very inspiring to work with, and I’ve learned a lot just by being around them.

How did you start working with Snoop Dogg?

Honestly, just being around. I met him through Fredwreck, who was part of the Dogg Pound. Back when I started, we were at the studio everyday. I would be working with Kurupt, and Snoop would just walk in. They would joke with me about being new to the business, but Snoop was always cool. Ultimately, I think they like that I’m easy to work with, and that’s how I’ve gotten projects from them.

How is engineering hip-hop different than engineering for someone like Macy Gray?

Macy uses a lot more live instruments. She might have programmed drums but everything else will be live, so you’ll find yourself recording guitars, Fender Rhodes, bass, and backup singers.

In general, you’re dealing with straight-up programmed music in hip-hop. So it’s nice to be able to stretch out as an engineer and work with some live elements.

What was it like working on the Mayer Hawthorne album?

That process was a lot of fun. He’s a huge Detroit Motown funk guy with an enormous wealth of music knowledge. During the mixing process, he’d send me these obscure reference tracks from bands that I’d never heard of. When you work with someone who’s that hands-on, it’s really easy to hone in on the sound.

A lot of the songs had twelve or thirteen iterations. He kept changing the music and tweaking small things — usually just enough to give the track a different groove. But sometimes the smallest changes would completely alter the feel of the song.

Did the label have any creative input?

They liked the mixes, but complained that they were too authentic! They were considering him a Janelle Monae or Bruno Mars type of act. They said it wouldn’t stand up on the radio against other songs.

They asked, “What can you do to keep the core of the mixes, but make them sound a little more modern?” So I swapped out the reverb, made a couple EQ and balance adjustments. We resubmitted it, and just by doing that, they accepted it.

You typically use a minimal, in-the-box mixing rig. What kind of hardware were you working with?

I did the whole thing on my laptop. I had a UAD-2 SOLO card at the time, which could only handle maybe 15 plug‑ins.

What did a typical plug-in chain look like on How Do You Do?

Basically, I tried to envision what I would be doing if I were mixing at a console. I used the Neve 88RS Channel Strip on vocals and the EMT 140 Plate Reverb and Pultec Pro EQ on pretty much every song. The EP‑34 Tape Echo found uses on guitar tracks, as well as the LA‑2A and LA‑3A compressor plug‑ins.

How have UAD plug-ins influenced your workflow?

Apollo and UAD plug-ins have allowed me to build a signal flow that gets that analog warmth back into my mixes. And I don’t choose them just because they’re cool plug-ins. I choose them because I trust that UA got the emulation right and that it’s going to give me the vibe I need.

At a past NAMM show, I did presentations of the Mayer Hawthorne song “The Walk.” Prior to the show, UA requested the stems so they could get the session ready.

I came to find out that their Chief Scientist, Dave Berners, had already heard the song on the radio. He told me that he’d been admiring how good and vintage-sounding the song was and asked me if I thought it was possible to get that same sound with plug‑ins. He didn’t realize that the track had been mixed completely in‑the‑box using UAD plug‑ins!

Can you offer any advice for up-and-coming mix engineers?

Less is more. I’ll open up sessions from newer engineers and they’ll have an insane amount of plug-ins on every single track. That’s a surefire way to make something not sound good. If you’re going to use a plug‑in, learn about it. Go through the presets, see how other engineers use it, and extrapolate from there. Just throwing more processing on is not always the way to go.

If you open up my sessions, you might find tracks without any plug-ins on them. If I put a Neve 1073 plug‑in on something, I’m putting it there because I want that sound.

That’s a huge thing for me — just learning the craft of engineering to the point where the motions become instinctive. It takes years of experience and hard work to learn how to do the craft right, but it’s worth it.

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