“Whenever I get ready to approach a mix – my objective is to bring what the artist, producer, and label had envisioned as the ultimate realization of their project and work into fruition.  The key for me is to respect the demo mix that I am presented with. That mix often represents years of hard work, and is vital to a greater understanding of the song.  That combined with an understanding of the lyrics and some conversations with the artist, producer, and label gives me the direction I need to approach the mix.  My talent lies in taking whatever I’m given to work with, and bringing it to the ultimate level, while preserving all the emotion, feeling, and vibe that was present in the original idea.”

One conversation with Joey and you’ll realize there’s a lot more that goes into his mixes besides his technical knowledge, his carefully selected racks of outboard gear, and his perfectly tuned mix room.  His passion for every track he works on announces itself in the vibe, character, and uniqueness of the final mix.  Joey’s dedication to exploring the demo mix, immersing himself fully in that raw expression, before sitting down to start working on the track is what makes him such a highly sought after mixer.

Born in New York, Joey started playing keyboards and bass while also acting as the “band engineer”, with his Tascam 4 track recorder.  It became apparent that his passion lied in learning how to capture the energy of a song as a recording and mix.  After reading that his favorite engineers knew their equipment so intimately, he became interested in the technical side of how all the gear he was using worked electrically and acoustically from the inside out. This thirst led him to college at the University of Miami.  Joey was accepted into the university’s renowned program combining electrical engineering with audio engineering. In addition, the university had one of the best performing arts music programs in the country; affording Joey great musicians at his fingertips that were eager to explore their craft in the studio.  Joey’s studies on the internal workings of the equipment gave him an intimate understanding as to how it could be used in non-obvious and creative ways.  He quickly became the “go-to” guy for those looking to have the best sounding records.  His reputation spread and Joey started attracting clients from outside the school.  While in Miami, Joey spent his summers working at the famous Criteria Recoding Studios (now The Hit Factory), further honing his skills and gaining access to Neve and SSL large format consoles as well as a seemingly infinite supply of outboard equipment.

After graduation, Joey was offered a job and began designing high end studio equipment for Apogee Electronics in Los Angeles.  Joey’s experience with recording and mixing gave him a unique approach to design ideas for new studio electronics.  While working for Apogee, Joe met world renowned mixing engineer Bob Clearmountain who is closely associated with the company.  Joey began learning as much as he could from Bob, and spent all his free time at Bob’s Mix This! Studio. They became and remain good friends and colleagues. 

“Bob isn’t one of these “secretive” mixers that hides his settings or techniques, if you’re like “wow Bob, how did you get that sound?”, he’d just show you.  Bob knows it’s more then settings and gear that make a mix.  One of the most valuable things I learned from Bob is the importance of lyrics, and how that effects the mix, the vocal is always up when Bob is mixing, the lyrics guide you as to how the track should feel and sound; this is where a lot of your mix ideas and decisions are seeded.  From that point on I adopted a similar approach.”

After five years in Los Angles, Joey decided to move back to his home of New York City, and pursue mixing full time.  Although, recording and mixing almost every genre of music from his Miami and Los Angles years, Joey was drawn to hip-hop, and started working with DJ crew The Executioners as well as DJ A-Trak, and others. 

“I remember the moment I fell in love with mixing hip-hop; I was hanging out with Rob Swift from the Executioners while he was doing a mix for one of his tunes. Having recently been immersed in the prestine mixing world of L.A., I was taken aback with how Rob was treating the track, the console was lit up like a christmas tree, things cranked everywhere, clip lights flashing, but at the same time sounding great. The key was the vibe and the resultant sound.  I began developing a style that took all of the technical aspects from my Miami and L.A. days and coupled that with this strictly vibe oriented mixing I was exposed to.”

Joey’s background and experiences working with different music genres and mixing styles as well as his intimate technical understanding of the gear he uses gives him his unique sought after mixing style.  He’s consistently being asked to apply his style of mixing to rock projects, pop projects, jazz, as well as his cornerstone hiphop. 

“Over the years I’ve been fortunate to work with brilliant musicians and producers. I’m continually blown away by the music being made, constantly molding and developing my mixing technique to accentuate the artist’s expression.”