"We'll Fix It in the Mix": The Era of Unlimited Tracks

[Nikola]

[Esoteric]

What did he mean about the "red light going on" with analog, and documenting what's there and not intent? I don't understand that part (around 6:30 mark)

[Nikola]

He said, with analog You cant wait last minute to think about how song should sound and how should be mixed, You have to listen and write-down what things to do during recording session.
2" analog tape has some limitations, and one of them is, the more you replay or re-record on 2 inch tape over and over and over again, you lose hi-end frequency/transient response, so You have to work fast and make small amount of mistakes if non at all (its far from being bad as it sounds).
In reality its rare that tape would really loose that much quality, only if some moron engineer or artist is non-stop re-recording his verses and engineer is non stop replaying whole song trying to mix it right.
Working with analog gear and tape is totally opposite way of working in digital domain with computer and pluggins.
Digital has no limitations when it comes to playback or re-recording, you can also save all settings of a project/song, effects, faders position, and come back later and continue from last saved position.
But that makes people lazy and too much relaxed, these days everyone is like "oh dont worry we'll fix that later". Skilled/talented artists dont need fixing at all.
With analog you couldn't fake performance, if you sound bad or off-tempo theres no fixing, while in digital, you can screw it and chop it, quantize it, autotune it, and so on.

Not to mention that when you are working completely without any analog outboard hardware, just computer and virtual pluggins(virtual instruments, effects, dynamic compressions) it sound 2D and too clean, mixes without character, thats why many people bash digital.

So Best thing these days is to use computer only as multi-track recorder, and route/send all layers/channels on mixing console and tru outboard gear and mix it like you would normally do with multitrack tape machine.
That way of working is called hybrid mixing (involves digital and analog) nothing new, all professional studios are doing that way since digital recording became standard (12 years ago), but lately lots of pro studios are being closed, due to many bedroom studio owners that charge as much as big boys offering simple recording setups (microphone, microphone preamp, cheap audio interface, midi keyboard and cracked pluggins) equals wack quality and no experience.