Monitor speakers are an essential item for mixing any music in your home studio. You can mix in (good) headphones but it is always worth having monitor speakers to listen back to get a true sound of what your finished product will sound like to the end listener.
If you are going to spend most of your money on one item then these should be that item. It is an investment and if you buy well they will hopefully last you a long time.
My current speakers have been a mainstay in my studio for about the past 5 years now is my monitor speakers. I’ve got no reason to change them, they are awesome.
They are my Yamaha HS7s (available here on Amazon). When I first bought them I did a lot of research. Checked out what other friends had etc.
I found that a lot of my friends who were producing electronic music on a budget had opted for the KRK Rokit 5s. These are great speakers for their price there is no denying. Especially if you are just messing around or maybe doing a bit of live mixing for example.
The problem is the reason they sound so good is partially down to the fact that the bass is quite ‘over-hyped’. This means whatever you play will sound awesome.But it is not really giving you a realistic impression of what everyone else will hear when they play your music.
The great thing about the Yamaha HS7s is that they give you a true impression of the sound. They don’t overemphasize the bass as much and therefore, what you hear is what you get. This is what you should be looking for in a monitor speaker. The last thing you want is your friends telling you they can’t hear any bass through there iPhone headphones.
I bought them in white but they are also available in black if that suits your studio look more.
These are powered speakers with each speaker having its own input. So you could technically just run one of these speakers on its own….not that you would want to.
They come with some nice added features that you wouldn’t get on cheaper speakers which allow you to tweak little things to get the perfect sound.