I was wondering if anyone could possibly shed some light on this issue. The reason im asking is because my mixes sound 100x worse than the stereo version when I check them in mono. If someone could give these two intros a quick listen id love to hear some advice on what you think would be a good next step for mixing these. They're both the same intro, one is just in mono. I haven't actually completed a song before, and should probably start using some stereo enhancers since I don't actually do that. I've also heard that the bass in the stereo track is too wide, even though i have a dedicated sub track that is already in mono. I'm guessing even frequencies above 100Hz should be mono too?

Stereo Mix:
https://soundcloud.com/alex-burelle/dear-new-york-alex-burelle-remix
Mono Mix:
https://soundcloud.com/alex-burelle/mono

I heard mono-first mixing is quite a solid technique. But there's a catch. If you mix in mono, you eventually will come to the point when you need to do some panning (and other changes) to build a stereo image. More wide you make the image, more changes are gonna happen to your mono version. So you end up endlessly balancing between perfectly translated mono mix and nicely wide stereo mix...

So yes, I also like to mix in stereo with occasional mono checks.

Depends on your priorities. I would try to turn off all stereo enhancers to check, if that mess isn't caused by them. If not, I'd prefer nicer sounding stereo mixes as that's the way your listener wil go to "enjoy" your track by. Only today's usecases for mono mixes are cell phone speakers and some clubs, where your track would be masively altered by room acoustics anyway.

Well I like the stereo one better. But I think I know what's causing the difference you refer to. Usually basses aren't adviced to be that wide. Make it narrower and try to get the stereo imaging elsewhere higher.

...also if you are happy not using enhancers, don't. They get stuff wider, but if you care about mono version, they make the situation even worse for you. Monoe'd signal from enhancers tends to be kinda phasey.

There are respected engineers that mix a lot of big records mostly in mono - read an article recently about Kendrick Lamar's engineer, who mixes 95 percent of his stuff on a mono aura tone cube - I also find myself doing a lot of balancing (levels, checking eq settings) on my a avantone cube in mono, switching back and forth to my main monitors (stereo). To me it is a good supplement!

That's right Miles. But checking it in Mono as well doesn't hurt - it always tells me additionally if my balance is kinda right. Interestingly what I found is I will check the right amount of reverb on mono too - summed up onto a single mono channel i find it easier to tell u when a mix is cluttered by to much reverb sometimes... But again, my Main speakers are stereo.