Jeff Ellis, Grammy-winning mixer known for Doja Cat, Frank Ocean, and d4Vd, explains why he asks for full DAW sessions instead of stems, and why that distinction matters more than most producers realize. Dry stems strip out the production aesthetic entirely, while over-processed wet stems leave no room for improvement, and most producers, even at the highest levels, don't know how to stem their work in a way that preserves what made it sound good in the first place.
The practical implication for anyone on either side of a mix handover is that delivery format is worth a conversation before the session starts, not a assumption made at the point of export. Talking through options upfront, whether that means a DAW session, selective stems for specific elements, or something in between, sets the ceiling for what the mix can actually achieve and avoids having to work around a degraded version of the track once you're already in it.
His house-remodeling analogy makes the philosophy concrete: if the tile in the bathroom is great, you don't smash it during a renovation. The same logic applies when a chaotic, over-processed vocal chain has become the sonic identity of a track, with everything else built around it. Knowing when to leave something that looks like a disaster completely intact is part of the taste required for mixing.
From opening around 200 DAW sessions a year, Jeff's observation is that almost everyone is doing too much. Roughly 70 to 80 percent of his work right now is removing processing rather than adding it, which says a lot about where most mixes actually need help.