Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 http://dafydd.se/stuff/9.mp3 The performance is sloppy, I know, and the bass sounds really fake. What can be done to improve the sound here? On some speakers, this sounds crispy, but weak - on others, mumbled and heavy. General, as well as specific, advice would be greatly appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowBlade Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 As I learned if it's getting mumbled and heavy. Turn down the bass on your amp. Recording you should have the bass at like 2-3 on your amp. Check the thread "Tame the bass for unicef". My guitar amp in that track had it's bass set at 2 and it turned out pretty thick but not muddy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 2-3 out of 10, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darangen Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 I actually have the bass on my amp cranked to about 6-7 of 10 for some of my sounds. The rule of thumb here is that there is no rule of thumb, each guitar is going to sound different in each amp you plug it into. If you had my exact guitar, but plugged it into your amp, it'd sound different - or if you had my exact amp but plugged your guitar into it, it'd sound different as well. The next thing you have to decide is what sound you're looking for. I usually prefer to get a nice full sound from the amp and record that purely. It's ok to have bass on the rhythm guitars, it helps fill out the sound and keeps the guitar from sounding super thin. Some people scoop out all the mids so it cuts more. If you're planning on adding vocals, cutting the mids a little bit usually helps give the vocals the room they need. My advice is leave the bass on the guitar while recording, don't kill it before it gets into your DAW because it's a pain in the rump to try and fix a sound after it's been recorded. Make your guitar sound sweet, rich and full coming out of your amp. Then record that exact sound into your song. Once you have that awesome sound in your project, add a high-pass eq and set it to roll off frequencies below about 120 hz. That'll make room for the bass. If you're adding vocals later, go ahead and knock out some frequencies around 2k hz, a 2-3 db reduction should be more than enough. If you're familiar with sweeping for resonant frequencies, do that. If not, learn how - then do it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 There's some painful resonance frequencies in the filtered parts in the intro and ending here, so I guess I should check those out. I do plan on adding vocals, yes. You mean I should only cut mids in the sections with vocals though, right? Is it a good idea to compress mids with vocals as the sidechain (so the guitars cut mids only when the vocals are actually playing)? I'm going to re-record these takes anyway, I'm thinking I'll record the clean signal and then send that through a bunch of different amp settings (I use a line 6 pod). But yeah, good idea to keep the whole recording and mess with eq in the DAW. I found boosting at 3kHz or so helped open this up (haven't done it in this version). You've been a big inspiration to me in the past, Darangen. Just wanted to let that out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darangen Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 You mean I should only cut mids in the sections with vocals though, right? Is it a good idea to compress mids with vocals as the sidechain (so the guitars cut mids only when the vocals are actually playing)? Yeah, that's an option. I usually have my rhythm guitars bus'd and cut a few db out at 2k hz on the bus, but I don't usually have a part where the rhythm guitars are the focus. I've found that usually electric guitars don't have many defining characteristics around 2k, and while they would definitely sound bad if you scooped everything out there, there isn't a noticeable difference between cutting 2-3 db out in that range, as long as your Q setting is appropriate. I'd set the Q around 4 or so - but you'll have to see how it sounds with the vocals there. If the vocals are struggling, adjust it accordingly. The key is finding what works for the song. What works for one song may not work for another, and while there are general guidelines for mixing and eq'ing, in the end you have to tweak it to fit the project you're on. I'll be trying to keep an eye on this, but if you upload a new version send me a pm and I'll make sure I don't miss it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowBlade Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 I actually have the bass on my amp cranked to about 6-7 of 10 for some of my sounds. The rule of thumb here is that there is no rule of thumb, each guitar is going to sound different in each amp you plug it into. If you had my exact guitar, but plugged it into your amp, it'd sound different - or if you had my exact amp but plugged your guitar into it, it'd sound different as well.The next thing you have to decide is what sound you're looking for. I usually prefer to get a nice full sound from the amp and record that purely. It's ok to have bass on the rhythm guitars, it helps fill out the sound and keeps the guitar from sounding super thin. Some people scoop out all the mids so it cuts more. If you're planning on adding vocals, cutting the mids a little bit usually helps give the vocals the room they need. My advice is leave the bass on the guitar while recording, don't kill it before it gets into your DAW because it's a pain in the rump to try and fix a sound after it's been recorded. Make your guitar sound sweet, rich and full coming out of your amp. Then record that exact sound into your song. Once you have that awesome sound in your project, add a high-pass eq and set it to roll off frequencies below about 120 hz. That'll make room for the bass. If you're adding vocals later, go ahead and knock out some frequencies around 2k hz, a 2-3 db reduction should be more than enough. If you're familiar with sweeping for resonant frequencies, do that. If not, learn how - then do it. Well I guess what I mean is it depends how much bass you already have in the mix. Like a lot of my songs have a fair amount of bass in the drums and bass instruments already and I find if I have much bass on my amp there gets to be just too much lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 A Q of 4, huh? Doesn't tell me much... Again, should I assume you mean on a scale from 1 to 10? Sure, there's no universal solution, but there's probably a good amount of general advice I haven't heard yet, and someone more experienced than I am in this field probably has some specific advice on this particular mix, too. Maybe heeding it doesn't give me the sound I'm after, but I'll learn something in the process anyway, and it might beat randomly turning the knobs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowBlade Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 A Q of 4, huh? Doesn't tell me much... Again, should I assume you mean on a scale from 1 to 10?Sure, there's no universal solution, but there's probably a good amount of general advice I haven't heard yet, and someone more experienced than I am in this field probably has some specific advice on this particular mix, too. Maybe heeding it doesn't give me the sound I'm after, but I'll learn something in the process anyway, and it might beat randomly turning the knobs. Yes on a scale of 1-10 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 Aight, thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowBlade Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 Aight, thanks However all my amps go to 11. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darangen Posted March 8, 2011 Share Posted March 8, 2011 This is what I mean by Q: Notice that the High Pass is set to around 140 hz - this makes plenty of room for the bass and kick drum to shine through without thinning out your guitar sound. If you look at parameter 4, you'll see it's set to 2khz, with the Q at 4 and gain at -2.5db. This will open up enough room for most vocals (at least it works for mine) without destroying your guitar sound as well. This is usually how my guitar bus EQ looks, because I make it sound sweet and awesome before recording it. If your guitar sounds tinny, you might want to do a low pass EQ. For example, on parameter 6 on this particular EQ I'd set it to about 14khz. ONLY IF IT'S TINNY THOUGH! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 8, 2011 Author Share Posted March 8, 2011 Very educational, thanks a lot! I knew what you meant by Q, but not what you meant by 4. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darangen Posted March 9, 2011 Share Posted March 9, 2011 To give you an idea of what mine sound like, with and with out drums and bass, take a listen to this: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dafydd Posted March 9, 2011 Author Share Posted March 9, 2011 I didn't like that tone at all, but thanks for sharing anyway Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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