Re: [LAU] Some new music made (mostly) with Linux -- comments on mix?

Excerpts from Ken Restivo's message of 2010-04-11 04:47:55 +0200:
> On Sat, Apr 10, 2010 at 05:51:00PM -0400, Monty Montgomery wrote:
> > > I agree with the suggestion to make sure you rid yourself of anything
> > > below 50hz. I'm not sure, but this could be what's causing the trouble
> > > on some systems.
> >
> > Heh, well, the problem with car bass and clubs is usually they're very
> > very underdamped and also very peaky. They want to seem powerful.
> > It's way easier to get Big Volume at 100Hz than 50, so guess what
> > cheapy systems do... When you hear a Honda with the hood rattling from
> > bass, I'd bet a hamburger it's around 100-125Hz.
> >
> > That said, even with the peaky response and the lack of damping, the
> > original recording isn't compressing/leveling the bass much/at all.
> > The notes and hits are varying in power by maybe a factor of three or
> > four. Compression is usually the way to even that out and make sure
> > you don't have a mix of 'OK' and 'way too hot'. It's hard to do that
> > in a recording without having the instruments in seperate tracks, so I
> > didn't really try in the version I sent to the list. It's all the
> > multiband smoothing it out, and that works better above bass.
>
> Thanks! And also thanks for the mastered/reverbed files. If you used JAMIN, I'd love to see the actual *.jam files to see exactly what you did so I can learn from that.
>
> So, replying kind of to everyone:
>
> As for bass rolloff, I'm rolling off with Glame Highpass 4-pole filter at 38Hz right now. There ain't nothing below that.
>
> The kick is boosted by 1.5dB at 50Hz. The bass is boosted by similar amount at 60Hz. I'll play around with different values, also rolling off 80Hz on bass.
>
> The kick DOES have compression, SC4, from memory: 5ms, 4:1, 100ms release, and it grabs from 2dB to 8dB of gain reduction. Bass is just limited with a nice tube compressor at recording time; the bass player's fingers are their own compression (he's got an active preamp bass, and he plays loud).
>
> As for clips, I sure hope there aren't any on the guitar, and I'd be surprised if there were. What you're hearing on the sax is the "slap" of the reed he was using. I've got a compressor on that too.
>
> The snare is mic'ed top and bottom (phase adjusted in Ardour), and there's compression on both of those channels.
>
> I'll try messing around with 100Hz and figuring out what's in that range, also maybe notching it out.
>
> As for compression, I don't understand how it could solve the "car stereo problem". I am NOT hearing sudden peaks of energy on car stereos, I'm hearing just way too much kick, ALL the time, and also way too much bass, ALL the time. Come to think of it, I'm hearing way too much low mids all around on car stereos and club systems, even the guitar and vocals... starting to point towards that 100Hz area... perhaps I'll try hauling those out.
>
> Thanks everyone for the comments!
>
> -ken

From what I remember from the days I spent at a (admittedly small)
studio I'd say forget everything below 50Hz. You know how filters work,
-3dB at cutoff and then it depends how steep the filter is, so if you
set it at 50Hz you'll still have some stuff below that.

Purely from what I remember I'd say you're playing with too low
frequencies. I think of bass at 100Hz+. Kick is a different story, it's
character is at way higher frequencies and its bass may not matter at
all.

This is all very generalised, of course. I didn't play with the mixes at
all, just listening as I type. I don't even have anything set up to do a
proper level/volume matched A/B comparison and Montys mixes are far louder.

Hope it helps anyway.
Oh, and nice music ;)

Regards,
Philipp

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Received on Sun, 11 Apr 2010 11:30:00 +0200