Ermin Hamidovic: prog-metal mastering engineer, Systematic Mixing Guide author, Nail the Mix instructor
Ermin Hamidovic mastered Animals as Leaders' The Madness of Many and has worked across Periphery-adjacent prog-metal records, and wrote The Systematic Mixing Guide that defines the djent mixing approach. What strings fit his rhythm-guitar lane.
Reviewed by the Change Your Strings editorial team ·
Ermin Hamidovic is the Australian mastering engineer who mastered Animals as Leaders' The Madness of Many, and is widely reported to have mixed or mastered other prog-metal and djent acts including Periphery, Intervals, Architects, Plini, and Northlane. He also wrote The Systematic Mixing Guide, a production book that codifies the modern djent mixing approach, and teaches through Nail the Mix. His lane is 7- and 8-string prog-metal and djent in Drop A, Drop G, and lower. String choices that fit: heavy-gauge 7-string sets (.010–.062) and 8-string extended-range sets tuned to drop F or below.
Who Ermin Hamidovic is
Ermin Hamidovic is an Australian mastering engineer whose confirmed and widely reported catalog is a cleanest reference point for how modern extended-range metal is mixed and mastered. He mastered Animals as Leaders' The Madness of Many (2016), and production press widely reports additional prog-metal and djent work with Periphery, Intervals, Architects, Plini, and Northlane, bands whose musical identity is built on 7- and 8-string guitar work.
He is also the author of The Systematic Mixing Guide, a book that documents his approach to mixing and mastering modern metal. Unlike the video-first URM platform, Systematic is text-first reference material, diagrams, EQ curves, compression chains, routing decisions explained in print. It's the djent producer's equivalent of a technical manual, and it is widely cited.
His ongoing studio is Systematic Productions, based in Australia. He is an active musician on bass and guitar, which differentiates him from pure-engineering peers the same way Eyal Levi's Dååth guitar background does, he mixes from the perspective of someone who has also been in the tracking seat.
This page is the guitar-string context for his production lane. We describe the strings that fit his production style; nothing here is a direct endorsement claim absent sourced citation.
Production signatures
Four things identify a Hamidovic-era prog-metal mix:
- Extended-range low-string clarity. 7- and 8-string low strings in Drop A, Drop G, and below occupy frequency real estate that overlaps with bass guitar and kick drum. His mixes consistently separate those sources, the extended-range guitar is audible as a guitar, not as an indistinct low rumble. That separation starts at tracking and specifically at string gauge.
- Programmed-drum integration that doesn't sound programmed. A large share of prog-metal and djent records use edited or programmed drums. His mixes avoid the "clicky fake drum" trap by treating the guitar track's attack transients as part of the drum's rhythmic environment, which requires clean, fresh-string guitar attack.
- Instrumental-band frequency balance. Animals as Leaders and Intervals are (or were) largely instrumental. Without vocals as the midrange anchor, the guitar and bass have to carry the frequency real estate a vocalist would normally occupy. Gauge decisions that support rich harmonic content (fresh strings, defined pick attack) matter more in instrumental contexts than in vocal-forward metalcore.
- Systematic approach as signal. His book and mixing content emphasize reproducible technique over gear-chasing. Records mixed in his lane tend to sound consistent across multiple albums from different bands, the production reference is the constant, not any single artist's gear. Gauge and string choices that fit his lane are the ones that support that reproducibility.
Strings that fit the Systematic-era prog-metal lane
7-string Drop A / Drop G (25.5" scale)
.010–.062 is the anchor 7-string gauge. .010–.059 if the low string feels too stiff in Drop A. Ernie Ball Skinny Top Heavy Bottom Slinky Cobalt 7-string (2730), D'Addario NYXL 7-string, Elixir Nanoweb 7-string variants all fit.
7-String Skinny Top Heavy Bottom Slinky Cobalt (.010–.062)
Why this one: The heavy-bottom Cobalt 7-string set that anchors the prog-metal and djent lane Hamidovic mixes in. Defined low-string attack lets the mix engineer cut a kick-and-bass pocket without fighting the guitar.
8-string Drop E / Drop D (26.5"–28" scale)
Custom sets running up to .072–.074 on the low F#. Manufacturers stock several 8-string options (Ernie Ball 2625, D'Addario NYXL 8-string); many players build custom from singles.
6-string Drop B or lower (for the prog-metal 6-string lane)
.012–.056 Not Even Slinky Cobalt or equivalent. The heavier end of the 6-string Cobalt family.
Coated for long-form tracking
Instrumental prog-metal records often take weeks per tracking phase. Coated strings (Elixir Nanoweb, Ernie Ball Paradigm) outlast the tracking window without requiring a string-age audit mid-session.
Why the Systematic lane rewards instrument-level clarity
Vocal-forward metal mixes can cover for less-than-perfect guitar tracking by letting the vocalist carry the melodic foreground. Instrumental prog-metal cannot. Every choice at the tracking stage, pickup height, string gauge, string age, pick thickness, amp choice, carries more weight in the final mix because there's no vocal melody to distract from a weak rhythm attack or a smeared low note.
Hamidovic's published writing and mixing content repeatedly points at this. The mix decisions he describes assume a tracking source that is already tight, musical, and well-intonated. Gauge choices that support that assumption are the ones that fit his lane; gauge choices that require the mixer to compensate are the ones that don't.
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