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Hi David. In which mixing course(s) can I find these settings, these tricks for low ends? EDM? I'm thinking of buying a 12 inch sub from Eve Audio too even if the 3070 that I have reproduces 30 hertz not too bad. This will help me better understand what is happening in the sound. THANKS
Excellent tips here. All of my mixing is live work, and a lot of the time when people bring along backing tracks for their performances, I need to fix something on the low end...by a lot of the time, I mean almost all the time. In my smallest rig I'm typically using at least two 18" subwoofers, so they have no trouble recreating the low end. When it's uncontrolled, it's simply too much. I love bass that shakes the walls (who doesn't) but it still needs to be controlled.
This video is so timely for me. I decided just this weekend to get serious about fixing my bass lines to satisfaction and spent all night trying to figure out why my bass is either too nasal sounding or hollow or just out of control. I want it to feel like a ball I can pass back and forth in my hands if that makes sense. Powerful but with boundaries and controllable. Thanks for the tips! I will keep this info in mind today as I continue.
Cool, thanks for using my mix on this video David! I took your advice from the mix feedback you gave and it helped a lot! This pretty much highlights why I need better sub monitoring. None of my playback systems could reproduce that well enough for me to detect it as an issue.
@@GR3DGE which one? The 1st I don't remember, something I mastered for a client. The 2nd and 3rd is Bella Kelly ua-cam.com/video/Vzag8oKVn08/v-deo.htmlsi=gxNLZqFnczpsz64m
Dave genuinely gives you the good stuff. If you deal with such low hz then this is critical. You can look at it like the Fletcher curve but for energy.
this video just blew my mind, i mix all the time but rarely play my mixes on smaller speakers. so my mix sounds great literally everywhere; however at work rn i just played my song over the speaker systems & it was distorting soooo much! i was humbled & decided to hit the YT tutorials. i literally never tame my sub range because most my playback systems translate low end very well. i rlly think this is the exact reason why my mix sounds so bad on these speakers. ty sm for this video im so happy i just found ur page, instant sub
Cutting frequencies at 30Hz can potentially free up headroom in your mix, especially if there's unwanted low-frequency rumble or noise in your audio. Removing unnecessary low-end content can prevent your mix from becoming cluttered and make it easier to control the overall balance. However, it's essential to use EQ judiciously and not overdo it, as excessive cutting in the low end can make your mix sound thin. Always use your ears to judge what frequencies need adjustment, and remember that the impact on headroom is just one aspect of the mix.
Anything lower than 40 and lower than the key of E in the 1st position you will not hear on sound systems or headphones of the day, but PA's will pick it up because they have sub bass.
@@b00ts4ndc4ts With calibrated headphones you can easily hear/feel everything except below 20hz. It is smart to plan your tracks fundamental notes (usually kick tail etc) to not go under E because the sub is vibrating so slow that it's going to eat every other hz coming from the massive PA. What comes to cutting in master, like unknownunknown said, it can potentially free up some headroom, but cutting with really sharp slope may introduce resonance or ringing depending if the eq is linear or not.
@@laine1967 when I mix I look at it like building a house and then renovating it. I make sure everything has the room it needs by using eq. I don't have the money for the right headphones to mix, so I make do with my monitors, but I one of the lucky ones because I have the use of a music venue PA to check my mix
@@b00ts4ndc4ts Using Sonarworks Sound Reference ID combined with Goodhertz Can Opener did miracles for my mixing. It works even with budget headphones. There are some nice tutorials for this combo. Can't recommend enough. Still also using big PA like you to check the final balance hehe :)
this is an incredible treatise on low end mixing...you summed up in a few minutes what took me years of trial and error. very very on point. Just a helpful set of solutions that worked for me: The trick for me was to compress the lower frequencies of heavy bass producing instruments (kick, bass etc...) from 50hz to below . but before you can do this you need 2 things and BOTH are necessary: 1) CORNER bass traps to discern the SUB frequencies by attenuating the lower frequencies below 80hz 2) Large speakers...Yes its true...if you dont have large speakers (8" and above) You cant hear or better yet feel the frequencies down there NOTE: I also, Hi pass the bass (30hz and above) and kick (35hz and above) and other instruments depending on the needs of the mix.
Bought a sub a few years ago. Best purchase you can do for not ideal situations. Feeling the bass is incredible and exciting. I only have my sub set to approximately 1.5 dB. Enough for my situation to complement my 8 inch and enough to mis it when bypassed.
This makes total sense, and is also the reason why Bass players will mix a 1x15 cab and another cab that might be 4x10 or even 6x8 because the big speaker handles the low lows, and keeps the rest of the range cleaner, whilst the smaller speakers handle the mids and above. Great video David, despite already knowing this about bass guitar my brain had not actually made the connection in the context of Mixing
To put it simply, large speakers handle low end better. But because of their mass, they don't translate.higher frequencies well. They have so much inertia, that they will just overshoot or not reverse polarity fast enough. That's why you'll have cabinets with two or more drivers and a cross-over filtering for each driver.
Not only that, but i have come across many projects in the past (both mine and from other artists) who boost way too much their low end, thus reducing drastically their dynamic range available for a balanced mix. It's insane how less is more most of the time when speaking about sub bass frequencies. I will say however that your video explains this in such simple yet advanced manners, i always come back to your videos for a little "knowledge refresh" :)
this is so true... big base bottoms = amplified base...rocket scientist not needed ... A&B a reference track in headphones....notice how you can hear the song without your ears closing... when you play your mix if your ears close even a little bit then its too much energy around 30... just lower it until your ears breath.... I agree with this content
Agreed 100% but…why doesn’t this generation know how to spell? Base and bass are two different things. May seem picky but at some point, we gotta hold *correction* eachother accountable. Base not= bass. 🙄
Yeah, very true. I am always surprised how little lowend some of my favorite artists/mixes have compared to my mixes before I start to really balance everything.
no need to be technical buddy .... no one's talking about drugs or baseball...... perhaps maybe that was an auto text mistake ..... stay in context of the conversation please @TFE_JxxP
@@dennismilton5210 i inderstand the auto-correct thing. It was a poke to liven things a bit from my end. But 1. What are you mad for… I agreed with you. 2. Mixing is about technicality. 3. There’s a reason the comment was liked multiple times. Don’t play with me. The fact remains, Bass and Base are two different things. Get out of your feelings because you used the wrong word. Chi-Chi Man. If someone continues to call you Donald after you introduced yourself as Dennis, would you correct them or nah?👀 well okay then.
Dear David. Thank you for another great lesson. My advice: instead of buying the next plugin spend the Money on something like isoacoustic pucks to decouple your Monitors. Huge step in precise Monitoring the low end. Another old trick : touch the rims of your monitor speakers if the lows are defined or already wobbling. If you do not physically feel the attack of your kick drum because Everything is already rumbling you have a problem.
Unfortunately that’s also often poor arrangement of the bassline / kick. Can’t tell you how many times i’ve been mastering/mixing, and had to bend over backward doing tricks because the artist just doesn’t arrange their bass and kick well in the first place. A good mix starts in the arrangement/composition.
I always think of it in terms of the fundamental being the absolute, and the harmonics being the relative. The fundamental hits a set level determined by the vibe of the song, and the harmonics just get saturated to the point where they show up in the right places (adding density, being able to determine notes clearly on smaller speakers, appropriate aggressiveness etc) outside of the sub region.
Really great video, man. I actually kind of realized this on my own years ago but haven't thought about it for years because I have a pretty nice system that pretty much never distorts no matter how loud I play it or how low the bass gets, but I definitely remember experiencing these issues back in the day when I had smaller, lower quality speakers and no subwoofers. I love that you got so worked up about people cutting the deep lows out of a mix, I also don't approve. Those are so essential to the low end sounding proper, even if you have no content that's strong at 40hz and below, cutting it does something to ruin the impact of your low end. Especially if you use a steep slope while cutting them out.
"Sub range is expensive to monitor correctly". Couldn't agree more! One trick is to play the mix on different speakers, usually inside a car. For whatever reason, cars have a very well rounded surrounding to hear things that even studio monitors don't show. I found listening in a car to be a very good reference to compare what we do on the studio monitors. After doing adjustments according to what I hear in the car, the low end of my mixes sounded way better on any speaker including headphones.
That' happens for 2 reasons: 1, you know your car way better than your studio (not good) because probably you don't listen to music casually in your studio, and 2, your studio has a really bad frequency response. Car can be a good check but it should never be where you make important decisions about your mix
Thanks you so much. I was having issues with low end in my mixes. I only have 6 inch drivers in the studio monitors and good room treatment. I have a good sub downstairs and one in the car. But having to mix and then drag the files downstairs to play it only to find the bass isn't right, then go back upstairs and remix and then do that cycle multiple times was becoming a real pain. Other UA-cam mix tutorials all talk about using headphones etc. But I just finally decided you have to hear and feel the low end from 60hz down. There's no option other than having a 12 inch driver. And the last thing I want is to get my song played on some mega system at a club only to find out the low end is out of control. So I decided - 'You cant mix what you cant hear'. And the simple truth is it's gonna take some money to hear it. Not that much, but some. Thanks David!
The 5% difference can also be continued with the car analogy where once you reach a point of diminishing returns you end up paying thousands of pounds/dollars for that 5% of performance that will set you above the rest, this is a good way to think about how important that 5% really is which also emphasises the importance on translating that to every aspect of the mix to the best of your ability. Some great knowledge as always. 👍👍👍👍
Getting low end TIGHT when loud, was always the hardest part for me, and you will need to put your time in on it, because the recordings make a difference on what you need to do obviously. Great vid advice, as always.
You came on the right time David, i've been sttruggling with how much of low endo to put on a mix and had been working on a error and trial game until get a good result. Thanx for helping me to think!!
The timing of this video, for me personally, couldnt be any more flawless even if you tried! 😅 Ive been working on a mix for a while, mainly using it as a learning/experimemtal mix. And Im at the very end of it and have been playing with the low end and just experienced similar problems as what your covering. So Ill be sending it to you shortly (1-2 days). But this High Pass hype is wild man! I suppose its one of the pro's to not going to school for audio or working directly under someone with set ways. And if you have decent discernment your pretty good at separating good from BS info online. So I have never high passed or cut frequencies just because. Of course Im definitely not saying that I do it all perfectly either 😂! Your a God send to me bro! Thank you!
Great video Man.. Im so glad you speak out about all the talk about cutting the master at 30 & 40. Great video. Ya you shook my walls and was killer clean. Crazy.. ya sounds BA
Well, if the argument for cutting at 30hz and 17khz is because most consumer listening speakers can't produce much if anything below or above that then to me that makes sense. I mean, mixbustv proves that point when saying that the smaller speaker will try to produce the frequency information it can not and that vibration is what can cause the distortion. And if you add modern day marketing tactics through social media platforms like Tiktok to that argument, where most people will listen/watch on their phones and the media will be shared through their phones or mono/low power bluetooth speakers, then it makes even more sense. If the cutting works for cleaner playback on these types of devices then why not? That would mean however that the artist would need a different mix for playing live, which is a viable option. All that I got from this video is that its better to lower the sub frequencies. kthxbai. I've watched a bunch of video's from this channel in the past few weeks and the pattern I'm recognizing is that of disproving or making a claim and then referring to "online literature" or just showing the end results, but not how to get there. And then linking to paid mixbustv courses instead is just pure self promotion while dismissing the other players or even entire discussions in this YT space. Obviously many things would be too specific, but these hypotheses or discussions often aren't that specific. Not hating, these are just observations. Its cool, I get it and I'm not a potential Mixbustv customer anyway, even if only for just making these observations, if you get what I mean...
Great tips here! Thank you. I think I learned it from one of your other videos, but I use a shelf and not a HPF for controlling my low end to still leaving some sun intact to avoid a weak sounding mix. Using reference tracks to get my sub levels in the ball park helps tremendously versus trusting my ears… mine are little liars that say everything sounds good when in fact, my mixes are typically trash until I use a reference track.
Bro I swear u go so indepth with ur videos ur the best and most genuine I'll admit, from u did that video on how to calculate the return delay from outboard gear 🎯
Extremely helpful as always, and good videos can urge questions: Should we take into consideration the size of the room that a song will be played? I have read that low frequencies need a lot of space in order to hear or feel them.That's why, if this is correct, huge speakers will not reproduce very low frequencies in smaller rooms no matter how big the speakers are or how well the rooms are acoustically treated. The question is: the bigger the room (rectangular with excellent acoustic treatment), the more we can hear or feel the low frequencies or there is a room size that above it the volume of those frequencies stops raising (or it rises too little to be taken into consideration). Except if low frequency formation has nothing to do with the room size so there is no question. Tnx!
Just for understanding subs. If you’ve ever tried out a Subpac, absolutely it will encourage you to be more minimalist in your subs. And you get cleaner mixes. It’s similar to the ‘finger on the speaker cone’ trick. Even just having listened to a few tracks i know well with a Subpac on, it gave me some useful data. I’m not affiliated with them at all, nor am I suggesting buying one, just saying it encourages you to do one thing: keep your subs from getting cluttered.
Great video! I was thinking about creating a separate project where I add in the sub after the track is mastered but your explanation makes it clear that the issue isn’t with the imbalance of levels within the daw but the speakers being overloaded in the lows. So even if I did that the sub would still need to be balanced for it to move the speakers properly. Thanks a lot of this one!
As usual David hits the target right at the center. This the issue I'm getting a lot as a mixing engineer for more than 20 years... People actually hires me mostly for "my" low end, this is exactly what I do, I am trying not to put too much load on the very bottom end and I try my best to control, like below 50hz... I am still struggling how to deal with clients that got used to the accidental distortion in their rough and how to make the illusion of clean basses sounding louder than they actually are without making the sub region explode, I don't have one or few recipe, I'm always doing different things to get there... There are a lot of commercial songs that are big hits that don't have the sub controlled well... The first thing coming to my mind is "Mask Off" by Future, great song, big hit, but by the time you try to turn it up on the small speakers the cones go crazy and start to distort... It does that as well on 8'' high end studio monitors, and on 10'' as well, although I have to push it a little bit more to get to the point of breaking up but it does it, controlled songs sounds twice as loud at the same level... Mostly trap songs have that problem, to the point that I started to think that I may be doing something wrong by trying to control it... Cheers
Yeah it’s weird if they hire you because you did great mixes/masters in the past, but when you fix the balance of the bass, they act like you ruined the track. "I A/Bd it with my mixdown and it sounds weak on my system." What are you listening on? "5 inch Rockits." 🙄
@@sub-jec-tiv Well, as I said... There are plenty of poorly balanced hit songs when it comes to low end... It has to do something with the artist/producers being attached to the rough mix... After all, demoitis is a disease every producer and artist has nowadays... Mixing became more a psychological game than what it is... Most of the time I feel like a therapist...
@@sub-jec-tivIt seems I always have to ask this question, what are u listening on , folks ears aren't there yet but always programmed to their ruf mix lol
Shoot maybe start doing what David was talking about and bussing out some saturation but try to replicate the digital distortion the kids are feeling these days.
Thanks for this video! Really appreciate the valuable & practical instruction and advice you give here! I am becoming a big fan of your channel and will check out some courses!
That's why I always put on the sub while working. I use an ADAM Sub 15 with ATC SCM45 Pro's and 2nd set are smalle Dynaudio BM12's. The sub is not loud at all. In fact sometimes you wonder if it's there at all. It's to extend the low, not crank it up. Sure I always check without sub too but I really detect too much low sooner than later. Thanks for the tips!
Good advice. I will say, I was listening this on inears on the train and they indeed tried to recreate the bass at the cost of everything. But the first AND second example you showed both distorted everything into oblivion. Only the 3rd and 4th example sounded clean and good. Another thought on this: while the last song sounded the best, possibly because it was better mixed or produced, another thing that's mega important with this sub stuff is WHICH note you are playing. F, F# or G sound really good because of the specific freq they hit. So make sure you choose your key if you really want to hit the right low end.
In fact E hits at around 41 Hz, F at around 44 Hz, F# 46 Hz and G note hits at around 49/50 Hz. Exactly the frequencies that sound clean in the low end.
2:50 this „air“ „body“ argument is excellent to check bass on good monitors. I guess you did a videos about this long time ago. However good to know more. I just think that in case you can’t trust the environment, maybe a professional headphone is the choice. There is a conflict between judging reverb on external monitors with bad environment vs bass. The reverb on external monitors might be very confusing, principally for me mixing big spacious music. Important, however, and maybe the key to all this, is to understand how our perception is easily deceived, and manage from there the tools that are at disposal.
"Your problem is not that your speakers cant reproduce that range. your problemn is that those speakers will TRY to." Hands down the best bit of advice on low end in the typical bedroom studio setup.
People should know that below 27.5hz there is no musical notation but the level is very important too, just like above 6khz where the ear only understands nuances, excellent video, I think it is the first that someone recommended to me a video where someone says something really meaningful and very useful.😚
Great video. It seems like sub energy that sustains def needs to be reduced with low shelf, fader rides, compression etc. But shorter bursts of sub energy can be bigger in the mix--but still managed with the above tools--because their shortness prevents them from swallowing up the rest of the mix.
Great video, I actually had this exact problem earlier today. My mix had a lot of sub bass and while it was okay on my big speakers everything broke apart when I tested it on a small JBL speaker. After a while I figured that I could drastically lower the volume of the sub bass and it still sounded cool (and more controled) on my big speakers while translating much better to other systems.
Great stuff! I haven’t found it but would like to know the song ID that is a bad sub bass example at 3:45. The atmosphere is great in my opinion and the vocals are so catching ❤
I really love this video. I've been paying closer attention to my low end as of lately. Not sure who's does this this but i like to reference my mixes and I'll lightly touch the cones of my yamahas with my fingertips so I can feel the sub it's reproducing and compare and contrast and I'll do this at low volume so I'm getting a more accurate depiction.
Ti ho appena scoperto. uno dei pochi che dice la verita'. complimenti davvero, sicuramente imparero tanto dai tuoi video. un saluto dalla romagna. grazie
Wow! So great to be able to actually see what's happening down there. My stuff (indie rock) doesn't have much happening down below 40hz, but I think what's been helping me is using izotope tonal balance control. Because my monitors are small I rely on it to show me if there's too much low end down there compared to my references. There's also Sonible smart:balance that I think there's a review of on this channel I meant to check out.
hey I really liked this video, and am keen on looking at your courses. Unfortunately your website says the content is not available for my region. I'm from India, please let me know if there's another way to access your courses. thank you
I use skull candy crushers they have haptic drivers when fixing the levels between the kick drum and bass guitar i slowly turn the bass guitar up until kick stops thumping then i back the volume down till i can feel it start to bump again
I think what really helps is taking a handfiul of songs that are mixed well by pros and are intended and club/radio crossovers and analyze the sub level and standardize your productions to match those levels within a 2dB range
@@mixbustv Of course you can, and I wouldn't discourage people from using analyzers. But I understand where you're coming from :) Great video btw, I was merely tagging onto what you've presented.
Tremendo, me hiciste escuchar todo lo que decís, en unos monitores pequeños de 5´. Suena increible el tema del final. Gracias por compartir éste conocimiento de manera pedagógica y clara.
Great advice as always David, absolutely agree. But I figured out that a low-cut SOMETIMES can do well on particular scenarios or genres, like EDM and electronic music without losing the desired wight. Just would like to hear if you never do any low cuts on a master bus, or low frequency instrument busses, or even on the bass source channels itself ? Do you control the lows with dynamics and levels only ? Of course with some EQ moves, sidechain and saturation when needed I guess. From my experience in some cases the low end can sound even tighter and still powerful when cutting the master bus. But I´m also aware about pre-ringing in linear phase mode, or phase shifting in regular eq´s. I know some guys are using low shelves instead of low-cuts to avoid phase issues, but on the other hand sometimes I can achieve a tight and powerful low-end even by using (”forbidden”) steep cut filters, f.e. more then 24db/oct. I still remember the rule: the steeper the filter the bigger the problems, but like I said, sometimes it works for me. That's why I´m asking if this is a general rule for you to never cut the master bus ? So maybe its time for me to overthink my experience completely and never have to deal with pre-ringing and phase stuff on the lows again. Thanks man, high value content at all !
Let me ask you this question: Are the results you get from your choices supporting the song? If so, then you're doing it right. Of course we all have our own opinions on the "proper" way to mix a song. But lets take a step back and realize, we all have our own opinions and nobody can tell another person the right way. If your choices make the song better, then continue doing what you do. It's as simple as that to be honest. And I agree with you with cutting some low end to tighten up the sub frequencies. It's allowing your speakers to work more efficiently. Your speakers have to vibrate at a certain rate based on the harmonic content it's projecting from its tweeter and woofer. Imagine you are mixing a song and there's energy around 30hz on a kick which isn't doing much at all for the intelligibility of the kick drum. Well, by keeping that 30hz energy, you're telling your woofer to 'push and pull' at an unnecessary rate. So if you roll off those unnecessary frequencies around 30hz, you're allowing your speaker to work on the MOST IMPORTANT frequencies of the kick drum. This means you'll get a more defined kick drum. As far as using low shelves instead of low cut filters goes... That's a personal preference. Phase shift normally isn't an issue because if it was, we would avoid EQ since that's how EQ works (by shifting phase). So unless you EQ something and hear some smearing occurring or something weird, why would you worry about the effects of a tool you choose to use? That's like driving a car and worrying about catching a red light. Phase shift isn't necessarily a bad thing unless it causes issues in what you're hearing. And in that case, of course you're going to do something different. Also remember, phase shift is part of a "sound"! Just like old circuitry on vintage gear had negative side effects.... It still gave desirable results despite its flaws. So to answer your question... Should you roll off low end on a kick drum or should you not? The answer is, it depends on the song and the results you and the artist are aiming for. Both ways can work.
Amazing vid David! Would love a video about hard vs soft knee compression and when you use it, I feel like it’s one of the least explained & understood compressor controls
Easily one of the best low end mix videos on the internet. And there are a LOT haha. This is especially important becuase of lot of genres these days really do benefit from extended low end down to crazy frequencies like 30 or 40 or even lower. The other thing that I think is important is how much sub is in your kick. Its impossible for us to process sub energy in a quick, articulate nuanced way but when you have a spaced out kick pattern like that its nice to have that little sub tail. In your mixes I felt that sub tail a lot more, again I think because of how controlled your sub bass was. I feel like theres been a lot of focus on sidechaining sub frequencies to make room in the kick, which is useful but really can't stand on its own
How do we solve the problem for people using small speakers? I’m asking because many 808 and kick samples have a lot of sub frequencies below 30Hz. Should the volume of the low-end element be the loudest part of the mix? Are there plugins that can help, such as multiband compression on 30Hz and below? What are the different methods to mix 30Hz and below? I’ve tried controlling 30Hz and below with multiband processing, but I feel I can only get the results you’re mentioning by high-passing under 30Hz.
That’s great advice. I’ve found over the years that memorizing the visual representations of healthy EQ curves from different genres is very helpful for low end management.
Furthermore, a correct room and groups of speakers that can reproduce all frequencies are vital because the headphones send the sound directly to the ear, however when we listen with speakers, information from R and L reaches both ears. This unmasks many problems both in the room if it is poorly treated and in the music itself that are negligible even if you have top-of-the-range headphones due to their nature.
Great vid! Question, why do you use -10 as the top of your Freq Analyzer on the TC Clarity? You were referring to that as 0db, but your clarity is set to -10db
thanks! @@arodalan3961 its kind of important, as we really couldn't see the difference in peak level between the two low-ends he was comparing. One could be peaking at -8 and the other reaching full scale 0db. Which would make a huge difference when listening back.
Very easy to hear the low end take over and distort. I get a lot of hip hop tracks delivered this way ;) People never like to hear this when I mention it to them, I blame it on music produced primarily on laptops lol When I let them listen to it in the studio they get it. Speaker excursion baby! Great vid!
Sometimes i mix first all the other elements in a way that everything sounds loud but clean, bringing the hi mids and the highs to the limit until they become fatiguing, tame them to make them sound not fatiguing and then i dose the low range elements at the end.
The low end is a little out of control, but dayum the mix is strate up glass on ice. Shit is so dang clean. Shout out the mixer. And the producer. Vocals are f'n ridiculous. That's soo similar to my sound. I live the crisp control of that top end dude. Good video again
Another fantastic video...thanks for the super info, also needed a help in choosing a near field studio monitor..I am building a professional studio and was thinking of buying a pair of Neumann KH 120 ii and then saw a pair of JBL 305 in your setup and was wondering if I should go for a pair of JBL 308 P and whether they are good compared to the Neumanns considering huge price difference between both..thanks in advance for your reply
I don't mix in the JBL only edit and listen to computer audio. I like Neumann monitors, I don't like that model. None of them is fit for a "professional studio" you will need a lot more money for that.
What do you think about keeping a bit of 30Hz in rock/metal songs? I usually see a steep rolloff after 46/56Hz in most rock and metal productions with a bump around 60Hz but I have a lower sounding, big kick in my studio that have most energy around 39-43Hz. I mean the bass drum in the studio drum kit goes that low and is shaking walls in other rooms when you play it
It really depends on who you're mixing for. As said in the video, most smaller speakers and systems don't (and some hifi enthusiasts would say shouldn't) have filters to cut out the deep lows and thus might have some trouble dealing with bass that low. Given that a lot of the "romance" in rock music sits mostly in midrange it might slightly hurt you overall transparency/openness, transients etc. But personally I'll always be mixing for people that want the full spectrum but then it becomes double important that your deep lows are controlled and well balanced with harmonics etc.
go the headphone route.. speaker means room= modes= mehh amp: ifi zen dac is enough (bass button is very good) headphone budget: Sundara headphone better: ARYA +HD 600 is sooooo good (i own 3000$ headphones) the HD 600 is impressive i rarely use my speakers anymore (gaithain) use EQ learn ur equipment u wont regret
Such a useful video thank you! My engineer is cutting my mixes at about 30 / 40 - I feel they always sound thin.. May I just clarify; You said NOT to cut on the master (Providing my mix is balanced)
Being able to hear that range VERY well, that's the main issue. Once you can, it's fine tuning filters, dyanamic eq and compression, sidechain and saturation
This is so true, but i would like to know, how much is a lot of energy, how do you mesure how much is too much if you dont have those big ass speakers or if your monitrs don't distort even if you can´t hear a lot of sub bass information, i mix on my adams a7x, and they are not cool with sub info but they dont distort so is hard for me to know when i'm overdoing sub energy, in your meter i see the energy about -40, thats a great point? of course i know you should not mix with eyes, but when you can hear, eyes are great.
Thank you for the guide. I'm not an expert but in my experience it's very hard to reduce low end energy such as below 40hz without affecting sounds. I only use plugins and don't have any hardware and I feel that even if I cut 20hz for example, it still seems to cut 60+ hz which is noticeable. It's hard to find the best plugins which can control low frequency.
Unless you have unwanted frequencies below 40 there isn't much reason to lowcut anything that deep. What you're hearing at 60+hz is probably the extensive phase shift you get from filters. Rather you want to control with compression and/or enhance with harmonics, layering, or distortion so you can get a full sound with less sub energy. Investing in good monitoring and room acoustics tends to be the best solution here.
Thanks for this, I decided to use my monitors built in high pass filter and let the sub do the heavy lifting. They do seem to be more detailed in the mids now
Do you have any insights on bass harmonics that mess with the harmony? It's one of those gray areas that can really confuse my ear. That subtle dissonance is what makes a lot of stuff sound fat, but it can also sound ugly, even lower interval limit for instruments above it taken into account. I have several ways of dealing with it, from subtle reduction of freqs to straight up replacing them with sines that allign with the 12edo harmony, which can be REALLY tedious.
The same thing occurs when a drummer hits their cymbals too hard, you get "poling". The cymbal is being hit so hard that it cannot bloom or resonate, it just craps out.
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Hi David. In which mixing course(s) can I find these settings, these tricks for low ends?
EDM?
I'm thinking of buying a 12 inch sub from Eve Audio too even if the 3070 that I have reproduces 30 hertz not too bad.
This will help me better understand what is happening in the sound.
THANKS
Excellent tips here. All of my mixing is live work, and a lot of the time when people bring along backing tracks for their performances, I need to fix something on the low end...by a lot of the time, I mean almost all the time. In my smallest rig I'm typically using at least two 18" subwoofers, so they have no trouble recreating the low end. When it's uncontrolled, it's simply too much. I love bass that shakes the walls (who doesn't) but it still needs to be controlled.
Highly appreciated - thank you !
This video is so timely for me. I decided just this weekend to get serious about fixing my bass lines to satisfaction and spent all night trying to figure out why my bass is either too nasal sounding or hollow or just out of control. I want it to feel like a ball I can pass back and forth in my hands if that makes sense. Powerful but with boundaries and controllable. Thanks for the tips! I will keep this info in mind today as I continue.
Cool, thanks for using my mix on this video David! I took your advice from the mix feedback you gave and it helped a lot! This pretty much highlights why I need better sub monitoring. None of my playback systems could reproduce that well enough for me to detect it as an issue.
Can we get a song id? Sounds amazing
@@GR3DGE which one? The 1st I don't remember, something I mastered for a client. The 2nd and 3rd is Bella Kelly ua-cam.com/video/Vzag8oKVn08/v-deo.htmlsi=gxNLZqFnczpsz64m
This is why I love SPAN the free spectrum analyzer. There are a ton of youtube tutorials on how to use it also.
Dave genuinely gives you the good stuff. If you deal with such low hz then this is critical. You can look at it like the Fletcher curve but for energy.
Dude, you are a living Cyberpunk 2077 character. Neato!
this video just blew my mind, i mix all the time but rarely play my mixes on smaller speakers. so my mix sounds great literally everywhere; however at work rn i just played my song over the speaker systems & it was distorting soooo much! i was humbled & decided to hit the YT tutorials. i literally never tame my sub range because most my playback systems translate low end very well. i rlly think this is the exact reason why my mix sounds so bad on these speakers. ty sm for this video im so happy i just found ur page, instant sub
Cutting frequencies at 30Hz can potentially free up headroom in your mix, especially if there's unwanted low-frequency rumble or noise in your audio. Removing unnecessary low-end content can prevent your mix from becoming cluttered and make it easier to control the overall balance.
However, it's essential to use EQ judiciously and not overdo it, as excessive cutting in the low end can make your mix sound thin.
Always use your ears to judge what frequencies need adjustment, and remember that the impact on headroom is just one aspect of the mix.
Anything lower than 40 and lower than the key of E in the 1st position you will not hear on sound systems or headphones of the day, but PA's will pick it up because they have sub bass.
@@b00ts4ndc4ts With calibrated headphones you can easily hear/feel everything except below 20hz. It is smart to plan your tracks fundamental notes (usually kick tail etc) to not go under E because the sub is vibrating so slow that it's going to eat every other hz coming from the massive PA. What comes to cutting in master, like unknownunknown said, it can potentially free up some headroom, but cutting with really sharp slope may introduce resonance or ringing depending if the eq is linear or not.
@@laine1967 when I mix I look at it like building a house and then renovating it. I make sure everything has the room it needs by using eq.
I don't have the money for the right headphones to mix, so I make do with my monitors, but I one of the lucky ones because I have the use of a music venue PA to check my mix
@@b00ts4ndc4ts Using Sonarworks Sound Reference ID combined with Goodhertz Can Opener did miracles for my mixing. It works even with budget headphones. There are some nice tutorials for this combo. Can't recommend enough. Still also using big PA like you to check the final balance hehe :)
Every time you think you can't top the information on this channel you make a video like this. Hat off David
this is an incredible treatise on low end mixing...you summed up in a few minutes what took me years of trial and error. very very on point.
Just a helpful set of solutions that worked for me:
The trick for me was to compress the lower frequencies of heavy bass producing instruments (kick, bass etc...) from 50hz to below . but before you can do this you need 2 things and BOTH are necessary:
1) CORNER bass traps to discern the SUB frequencies by attenuating the lower frequencies below 80hz
2) Large speakers...Yes its true...if you dont have large speakers (8" and above) You cant hear or better yet feel the frequencies down there
NOTE: I also, Hi pass the bass (30hz and above) and kick (35hz and above) and other instruments depending on the needs of the mix.
Bought a sub a few years ago. Best purchase you can do for not ideal situations. Feeling the bass is incredible and exciting. I only have my sub set to approximately 1.5 dB. Enough for my situation to complement my 8 inch and enough to mis it when bypassed.
Damn u got an 8 inch - congrats
This makes total sense, and is also the reason why Bass players will mix a 1x15 cab and another cab that might be 4x10 or even 6x8 because the big speaker handles the low lows, and keeps the rest of the range cleaner, whilst the smaller speakers handle the mids and above. Great video David, despite already knowing this about bass guitar my brain had not actually made the connection in the context of Mixing
To put it simply, large speakers handle low end better. But because of their mass, they don't translate.higher frequencies well. They have so much inertia, that they will just overshoot or not reverse polarity fast enough. That's why you'll have cabinets with two or more drivers and a cross-over filtering for each driver.
Not only that, but i have come across many projects in the past (both mine and from other artists) who boost way too much their low end, thus reducing drastically their dynamic range available for a balanced mix. It's insane how less is more most of the time when speaking about sub bass frequencies. I will say however that your video explains this in such simple yet advanced manners, i always come back to your videos for a little "knowledge refresh" :)
this is so true... big base bottoms = amplified base...rocket scientist not needed ... A&B a reference track in headphones....notice how you can hear the song without your ears closing... when you play your mix if your ears close even a little bit then its too much energy around 30... just lower it until your ears breath.... I agree with this content
Dope comment thank you
Agreed 100% but…why doesn’t this generation know how to spell? Base and bass are two different things. May seem picky but at some point, we gotta hold *correction* eachother accountable. Base not= bass. 🙄
Yeah, very true. I am always surprised how little lowend some of my favorite artists/mixes have compared to my mixes before I start to really balance everything.
no need to be technical buddy .... no one's talking about drugs or baseball...... perhaps maybe that was an auto text mistake ..... stay in context of the conversation please @TFE_JxxP
@@dennismilton5210 i inderstand the auto-correct thing. It was a poke to liven things a bit from my end. But 1. What are you mad for… I agreed with you. 2. Mixing is about technicality. 3. There’s a reason the comment was liked multiple times. Don’t play with me. The fact remains, Bass and Base are two different things. Get out of your feelings because you used the wrong word. Chi-Chi Man. If someone continues to call you Donald after you introduced yourself as Dennis, would you correct them or nah?👀 well okay then.
Dear David. Thank you for another great lesson. My advice: instead of buying the next plugin spend the Money on something like isoacoustic pucks to decouple your Monitors. Huge step in precise Monitoring the low end. Another old trick : touch the rims of your monitor speakers if the lows are defined or already wobbling. If you do not physically feel the attack of your kick drum because Everything is already rumbling you have a problem.
Unfortunately that’s also often poor arrangement of the bassline / kick. Can’t tell you how many times i’ve been mastering/mixing, and had to bend over backward doing tricks because the artist just doesn’t arrange their bass and kick well in the first place. A good mix starts in the arrangement/composition.
Redlining an engine and the performance dropping is the best explanation I have heard. Thank you
I always think of it in terms of the fundamental being the absolute, and the harmonics being the relative. The fundamental hits a set level determined by the vibe of the song, and the harmonics just get saturated to the point where they show up in the right places (adding density, being able to determine notes clearly on smaller speakers, appropriate aggressiveness etc) outside of the sub region.
Really great video, man. I actually kind of realized this on my own years ago but haven't thought about it for years because I have a pretty nice system that pretty much never distorts no matter how loud I play it or how low the bass gets, but I definitely remember experiencing these issues back in the day when I had smaller, lower quality speakers and no subwoofers. I love that you got so worked up about people cutting the deep lows out of a mix, I also don't approve. Those are so essential to the low end sounding proper, even if you have no content that's strong at 40hz and below, cutting it does something to ruin the impact of your low end. Especially if you use a steep slope while cutting them out.
"Sub range is expensive to monitor correctly". Couldn't agree more! One trick is to play the mix on different speakers, usually inside a car. For whatever reason, cars have a very well rounded surrounding to hear things that even studio monitors don't show. I found listening in a car to be a very good reference to compare what we do on the studio monitors. After doing adjustments according to what I hear in the car, the low end of my mixes sounded way better on any speaker including headphones.
That' happens for 2 reasons: 1, you know your car way better than your studio (not good) because probably you don't listen to music casually in your studio, and 2, your studio has a really bad frequency response. Car can be a good check but it should never be where you make important decisions about your mix
Simple formula: David teaches, I listen. 💯🙌🏻🔥
Thanks you so much. I was having issues with low end in my mixes. I only have 6 inch drivers in the studio monitors and good room treatment. I have a good sub downstairs and one in the car. But having to mix and then drag the files downstairs to play it only to find the bass isn't right, then go back upstairs and remix and then do that cycle multiple times was becoming a real pain. Other UA-cam mix tutorials all talk about using headphones etc. But I just finally decided you have to hear and feel the low end from 60hz down. There's no option other than having a 12 inch driver. And the last thing I want is to get my song played on some mega system at a club only to find out the low end is out of control. So I decided - 'You cant mix what you cant hear'. And the simple truth is it's gonna take some money to hear it. Not that much, but some. Thanks David!
The 5% difference can also be continued with the car analogy where once you reach a point of diminishing returns you end up paying thousands of pounds/dollars for that 5% of performance that will set you above the rest, this is a good way to think about how important that 5% really is which also emphasises the importance on translating that to every aspect of the mix to the best of your ability.
Some great knowledge as always. 👍👍👍👍
Getting low end TIGHT when loud, was always the hardest part for me, and you will need to put your time in on it, because the recordings make a difference on what you need to do obviously. Great vid advice, as always.
Couldn't have said it any better... amazing teaching skills...🖤🖤🖤
You came on the right time David, i've been sttruggling with how much of low endo to put on a mix and had been working on a error and trial game until get a good result. Thanx for helping me to think!!
The timing of this video, for me personally, couldnt be any more flawless even if you tried! 😅 Ive been working on a mix for a while, mainly using it as a learning/experimemtal mix. And Im at the very end of it and have been playing with the low end and just experienced similar problems as what your covering. So Ill be sending it to you shortly (1-2 days). But this High Pass hype is wild man! I suppose its one of the pro's to not going to school for audio or working directly under someone with set ways. And if you have decent discernment your pretty good at separating good from BS info online. So I have never high passed or cut frequencies just because. Of course Im definitely not saying that I do it all perfectly either 😂! Your a God send to me bro! Thank you!
Thanks so much David! 🙏🏼 blessings
No other channel like this one, nobody talk about the things you find here. That simple. Thank you D!
Worall
What a great video. No one is teaching this but you. Thanks man.
Great video Man.. Im so glad you speak out about all the talk about cutting the master at 30 & 40. Great video. Ya you shook my walls and was killer clean. Crazy.. ya sounds BA
🙏🙌
Well, if the argument for cutting at 30hz and 17khz is because most consumer listening speakers can't produce much if anything below or above that then to me that makes sense. I mean, mixbustv proves that point when saying that the smaller speaker will try to produce the frequency information it can not and that vibration is what can cause the distortion.
And if you add modern day marketing tactics through social media platforms like Tiktok to that argument, where most people will listen/watch on their phones and the media will be shared through their phones or mono/low power bluetooth speakers, then it makes even more sense. If the cutting works for cleaner playback on these types of devices then why not? That would mean however that the artist would need a different mix for playing live, which is a viable option.
All that I got from this video is that its better to lower the sub frequencies. kthxbai.
I've watched a bunch of video's from this channel in the past few weeks and the pattern I'm recognizing is that of disproving or making a claim and then referring to "online literature" or just showing the end results, but not how to get there. And then linking to paid mixbustv courses instead is just pure self promotion while dismissing the other players or even entire discussions in this YT space. Obviously many things would be too specific, but these hypotheses or discussions often aren't that specific.
Not hating, these are just observations.
Its cool, I get it and I'm not a potential Mixbustv customer anyway, even if only for just making these observations, if you get what I mean...
i don't know anyone who can explain complex subjects this clearly and to the point like you do
Great tips here! Thank you. I think I learned it from one of your other videos, but I use a shelf and not a HPF for controlling my low end to still leaving some sun intact to avoid a weak sounding mix. Using reference tracks to get my sub levels in the ball park helps tremendously versus trusting my ears… mine are little liars that say everything sounds good when in fact, my mixes are typically trash until I use a reference track.
WOW!! Best advise I've seen on low end. Can not thank you enough for this. My mixing just did a 180.
Bro I swear u go so indepth with ur videos ur the best and most genuine I'll admit, from u did that video on how to calculate the return delay from outboard gear 🎯
Extremely helpful as always, and good videos can urge questions:
Should we take into consideration the size of the room that a song will be played? I have read that low frequencies need a lot of space in order to hear or feel them.That's why, if this is correct, huge speakers will not reproduce very low frequencies in smaller rooms no matter how big the speakers are or how well the rooms are acoustically treated.
The question is: the bigger the room (rectangular with excellent acoustic treatment), the more we can hear or feel the low frequencies or there is a room size that above it the volume of those frequencies stops raising (or it rises too little to be taken into consideration). Except if low frequency formation has nothing to do with the room size so there is no question.
Tnx!
Not played in, mixed in. Yes room is 50% of your monitoring system
Hey, thanks for showing us this David!!
Just to inform everybody UAD's LA-2A is free until October 31st
Just for understanding subs. If you’ve ever tried out a Subpac, absolutely it will encourage you to be more minimalist in your subs. And you get cleaner mixes. It’s similar to the ‘finger on the speaker cone’ trick. Even just having listened to a few tracks i know well with a Subpac on, it gave me some useful data. I’m not affiliated with them at all, nor am I suggesting buying one, just saying it encourages you to do one thing: keep your subs from getting cluttered.
Great video! I was thinking about creating a separate project where I add in the sub after the track is mastered but your explanation makes it clear that the issue isn’t with the imbalance of levels within the daw but the speakers being overloaded in the lows. So even if I did that the sub would still need to be balanced for it to move the speakers properly. Thanks a lot of this one!
As usual David hits the target right at the center.
This the issue I'm getting a lot as a mixing engineer for more than 20 years... People actually hires me mostly for "my" low end, this is exactly what I do, I am trying not to put too much load on the very bottom end and I try my best to control, like below 50hz... I am still struggling how to deal with clients that got used to the accidental distortion in their rough and how to make the illusion of clean basses sounding louder than they actually are without making the sub region explode, I don't have one or few recipe, I'm always doing different things to get there...
There are a lot of commercial songs that are big hits that don't have the sub controlled well... The first thing coming to my mind is "Mask Off" by Future, great song, big hit, but by the time you try to turn it up on the small speakers the cones go crazy and start to distort... It does that as well on 8'' high end studio monitors, and on 10'' as well, although I have to push it a little bit more to get to the point of breaking up but it does it, controlled songs sounds twice as loud at the same level...
Mostly trap songs have that problem, to the point that I started to think that I may be doing something wrong by trying to control it...
Cheers
Yeah it’s weird if they hire you because you did great mixes/masters in the past, but when you fix the balance of the bass, they act like you ruined the track. "I A/Bd it with my mixdown and it sounds weak on my system." What are you listening on? "5 inch Rockits." 🙄
@@sub-jec-tiv Well, as I said... There are plenty of poorly balanced hit songs when it comes to low end... It has to do something with the artist/producers being attached to the rough mix... After all, demoitis is a disease every producer and artist has nowadays... Mixing became more a psychological game than what it is... Most of the time I feel like a therapist...
@@sub-jec-tivIt seems I always have to ask this question, what are u listening on , folks ears aren't there yet but always programmed to their ruf mix lol
Shoot maybe start doing what David was talking about and bussing out some saturation but try to replicate the digital distortion the kids are feeling these days.
Thanks for this video! Really appreciate the valuable & practical instruction and advice you give here! I am becoming a big fan of your channel and will check out some courses!
That's why I always put on the sub while working. I use an ADAM Sub 15 with ATC SCM45 Pro's and 2nd set are smalle Dynaudio BM12's. The sub is not loud at all. In fact sometimes you wonder if it's there at all. It's to extend the low, not crank it up. Sure I always check without sub too but I really detect too much low sooner than later. Thanks for the tips!
Good advice. I will say, I was listening this on inears on the train and they indeed tried to recreate the bass at the cost of everything.
But the first AND second example you showed both distorted everything into oblivion. Only the 3rd and 4th example sounded clean and good.
Another thought on this: while the last song sounded the best, possibly because it was better mixed or produced, another thing that's mega important with this sub stuff is WHICH note you are playing. F, F# or G sound really good because of the specific freq they hit. So make sure you choose your key if you really want to hit the right low end.
In fact E hits at around 41 Hz, F at around 44 Hz, F# 46 Hz and G note hits at around 49/50 Hz.
Exactly the frequencies that sound clean in the low end.
2:50 this „air“ „body“ argument is excellent to check bass on good monitors. I guess you did a videos about this long time ago. However good to know more. I just think that in case you can’t trust the environment, maybe a professional headphone is the choice. There is a conflict between judging reverb on external monitors with bad environment vs bass. The reverb on external monitors might be very confusing, principally for me mixing big spacious music. Important, however, and maybe the key to all this, is to understand how our perception is easily deceived, and manage from there the tools that are at disposal.
Thanks a lot for this super advice!!! Great video!
"Your problem is not that your speakers cant reproduce that range. your problemn is that those speakers will TRY to."
Hands down the best bit of advice on low end in the typical bedroom studio setup.
People should know that below 27.5hz there is no musical notation but the level is very important too, just like above 6khz where the ear only understands nuances, excellent video, I think it is the first that someone recommended to me a video where someone says something really meaningful and very useful.😚
Great video. It seems like sub energy that sustains def needs to be reduced with low shelf, fader rides, compression etc. But shorter bursts of sub energy can be bigger in the mix--but still managed with the above tools--because their shortness prevents them from swallowing up the rest of the mix.
Thanks for the lesson...really helpful and informative.💎💎💎💎
Great video, I actually had this exact problem earlier today. My mix had a lot of sub bass and while it was okay on my big speakers everything broke apart when I tested it on a small JBL speaker. After a while I figured that I could drastically lower the volume of the sub bass and it still sounded cool (and more controled) on my big speakers while translating much better to other systems.
All of your videos are great. I’m learning so much about what I been doing wrong.
Thank you, thank you David...this was very helpful.
Brother, I feel humbled after learning this. Thank you tons!
Great stuff! I haven’t found it but would like to know the song ID that is a bad sub bass example at 3:45. The atmosphere is great in my opinion and the vocals are so catching ❤
I don't remember, it was one of my client's and I'm not even sure is released yet
I really love this video. I've been paying closer attention to my low end as of lately. Not sure who's does this this but i like to reference my mixes and I'll lightly touch the cones of my yamahas with my fingertips so I can feel the sub it's reproducing and compare and contrast and I'll do this at low volume so I'm getting a more accurate depiction.
Ti ho appena scoperto. uno dei pochi che dice la verita'. complimenti davvero, sicuramente imparero tanto dai tuoi video. un saluto dalla romagna. grazie
Yeah, my speciality, when it comes to mixing! Deep punch hitting fine-tuned bass!
Wow! So great to be able to actually see what's happening down there. My stuff (indie rock) doesn't have much happening down below 40hz, but I think what's been helping me is using izotope tonal balance control. Because my monitors are small I rely on it to show me if there's too much low end down there compared to my references. There's also Sonible smart:balance that I think there's a review of on this channel I meant to check out.
hey I really liked this video, and am keen on looking at your courses. Unfortunately your website says the content is not available for my region. I'm from India, please let me know if there's another way to access your courses. thank you
You can write to bookinghfs@gmail.com and let us know what product you're interested in.
I use skull candy crushers they have haptic drivers when fixing the levels between the kick drum and bass guitar i slowly turn the bass guitar up until kick stops thumping then i back the volume down till i can feel it start to bump again
I think what really helps is taking a handfiul of songs that are mixed well by pros and are intended and club/radio crossovers and analyze the sub level and standardize your productions to match those levels within a 2dB range
You can't analyze if you can't hear it properly.
@@mixbustv Of course you can, and I wouldn't discourage people from using analyzers. But I understand where you're coming from :) Great video btw, I was merely tagging onto what you've presented.
Tremendo, me hiciste escuchar todo lo que decís, en unos monitores pequeños de 5´. Suena increible el tema del final. Gracias por compartir éste conocimiento de manera pedagógica y clara.
Great advice as always David, absolutely agree. But I figured out that a low-cut SOMETIMES can do well on particular scenarios or genres, like EDM and electronic music without losing the desired wight. Just would like to hear if you never do any low cuts on a master bus, or low frequency instrument busses, or even on the bass source channels itself ? Do you control the lows with dynamics and levels only ? Of course with some EQ moves, sidechain and saturation when needed I guess. From my experience in some cases the low end can sound even tighter and still powerful when cutting the master bus. But I´m also aware about pre-ringing in linear phase mode, or phase shifting in regular eq´s. I know some guys are using low shelves instead of low-cuts to avoid phase issues, but on the other hand sometimes I can achieve a tight and powerful low-end even by using (”forbidden”) steep cut filters, f.e. more then 24db/oct. I still remember the rule: the steeper the filter the bigger the problems, but like I said, sometimes it works for me. That's why I´m asking if this is a general rule for you to never cut the master bus ? So maybe its time for me to overthink my experience completely and never have to deal with pre-ringing and phase stuff on the lows again. Thanks man, high value content at all !
Let me ask you this question: Are the results you get from your choices supporting the song? If so, then you're doing it right. Of course we all have our own opinions on the "proper" way to mix a song. But lets take a step back and realize, we all have our own opinions and nobody can tell another person the right way. If your choices make the song better, then continue doing what you do. It's as simple as that to be honest.
And I agree with you with cutting some low end to tighten up the sub frequencies. It's allowing your speakers to work more efficiently. Your speakers have to vibrate at a certain rate based on the harmonic content it's projecting from its tweeter and woofer. Imagine you are mixing a song and there's energy around 30hz on a kick which isn't doing much at all for the intelligibility of the kick drum. Well, by keeping that 30hz energy, you're telling your woofer to 'push and pull' at an unnecessary rate. So if you roll off those unnecessary frequencies around 30hz, you're allowing your speaker to work on the MOST IMPORTANT frequencies of the kick drum. This means you'll get a more defined kick drum.
As far as using low shelves instead of low cut filters goes... That's a personal preference. Phase shift normally isn't an issue because if it was, we would avoid EQ since that's how EQ works (by shifting phase). So unless you EQ something and hear some smearing occurring or something weird, why would you worry about the effects of a tool you choose to use? That's like driving a car and worrying about catching a red light. Phase shift isn't necessarily a bad thing unless it causes issues in what you're hearing. And in that case, of course you're going to do something different. Also remember, phase shift is part of a "sound"! Just like old circuitry on vintage gear had negative side effects.... It still gave desirable results despite its flaws.
So to answer your question... Should you roll off low end on a kick drum or should you not? The answer is, it depends on the song and the results you and the artist are aiming for. Both ways can work.
Amazing vid David! Would love a video about hard vs soft knee compression and when you use it, I feel like it’s one of the least explained & understood compressor controls
My very first series in probably 2016 has it all. The playlist is called ultimate compression tutorial or something like that
@@mixbustv thanks!! I think I missed it in there
very good at explaining his logic behind what he does.
ayy yall don't be cutting no balls off your mix now 🤣🤣🤣 Thank you for this Gem David
I imagined that in a southern accent and it broke me
@@JoeyFTLhahahahahha 😂
Easily one of the best low end mix videos on the internet. And there are a LOT haha. This is especially important becuase of lot of genres these days really do benefit from extended low end down to crazy frequencies like 30 or 40 or even lower. The other thing that I think is important is how much sub is in your kick. Its impossible for us to process sub energy in a quick, articulate nuanced way but when you have a spaced out kick pattern like that its nice to have that little sub tail. In your mixes I felt that sub tail a lot more, again I think because of how controlled your sub bass was. I feel like theres been a lot of focus on sidechaining sub frequencies to make room in the kick, which is useful but really can't stand on its own
"Sub range is very expensive to monitor correctly" ... such a good quote.
How do we solve the problem for people using small speakers? I’m asking because many 808 and kick samples have a lot of sub frequencies below 30Hz. Should the volume of the low-end element be the loudest part of the mix? Are there plugins that can help, such as multiband compression on 30Hz and below? What are the different methods to mix 30Hz and below? I’ve tried controlling 30Hz and below with multiband processing, but I feel I can only get the results you’re mentioning by high-passing under 30Hz.
And this is why you're the best
That’s great advice. I’ve found over the years that memorizing the visual representations of healthy EQ curves from different genres is very helpful for low end management.
What's going on bro. I love your channel, you've helped me out allot. I appreciate you.
Glad to hear it!
Furthermore, a correct room and groups of speakers that can reproduce all frequencies are vital because the headphones send the sound directly to the ear, however when we listen with speakers, information from R and L reaches both ears. This unmasks many problems both in the room if it is poorly treated and in the music itself that are negligible even if you have top-of-the-range headphones due to their nature.
Great vid! Question, why do you use -10 as the top of your Freq Analyzer on the TC Clarity? You were referring to that as 0db, but your clarity is set to -10db
Good point
thanks! @@arodalan3961 its kind of important, as we really couldn't see the difference in peak level between the two low-ends he was comparing. One could be peaking at -8 and the other reaching full scale 0db. Which would make a huge difference when listening back.
Very easy to hear the low end take over and distort. I get a lot of hip hop tracks delivered this way ;) People never like to hear this when I mention it to them, I blame it on music produced primarily on laptops lol When I let them listen to it in the studio they get it. Speaker excursion baby! Great vid!
Sometimes i mix first all the other elements in a way that everything sounds loud but clean, bringing the hi mids and the highs to the limit until they become fatiguing, tame them to make them sound not fatiguing and then i dose the low range elements at the end.
The low end is a little out of control, but dayum the mix is strate up glass on ice. Shit is so dang clean. Shout out the mixer. And the producer. Vocals are f'n ridiculous. That's soo similar to my sound. I live the crisp control of that top end dude. Good video again
That would be me lol both and singer would be my gf 😄 90% of the track ls.I use for videos are either my productions, my mixes/masters.
Awesome
Another fantastic video...thanks for the super info, also needed a help in choosing a near field studio monitor..I am building a professional studio and was thinking of buying a pair of Neumann KH 120 ii and then saw a pair of JBL 305 in your setup and was wondering if I should go for a pair of JBL 308 P and whether they are good compared to the Neumanns considering huge price difference between both..thanks in advance for your reply
I don't mix in the JBL only edit and listen to computer audio. I like Neumann monitors, I don't like that model. None of them is fit for a "professional studio" you will need a lot more money for that.
@@mixbustv Thanks so much for your valuable feedback, appreciate
Thank you!!! David :) You are our Forever Guru!!! ♥
What do you think about keeping a bit of 30Hz in rock/metal songs? I usually see a steep rolloff after 46/56Hz in most rock and metal productions with a bump around 60Hz but I have a lower sounding, big kick in my studio that have most energy around 39-43Hz. I mean the bass drum in the studio drum kit goes that low and is shaking walls in other rooms when you play it
It really depends on who you're mixing for. As said in the video, most smaller speakers and systems don't (and some hifi enthusiasts would say shouldn't) have filters to cut out the deep lows and thus might have some trouble dealing with bass that low. Given that a lot of the "romance" in rock music sits mostly in midrange it might slightly hurt you overall transparency/openness, transients etc. But personally I'll always be mixing for people that want the full spectrum but then it becomes double important that your deep lows are controlled and well balanced with harmonics etc.
go the headphone route.. speaker means room= modes= mehh
amp: ifi zen dac is enough (bass button is very good)
headphone budget: Sundara
headphone better: ARYA
+HD 600 is sooooo good (i own 3000$ headphones) the HD 600 is impressive
i rarely use my speakers anymore (gaithain)
use EQ learn ur equipment u wont regret
Having Geithains, while using headphones seems to me like having Hayabusa while riding on a bike ! ))))
Such a useful video thank you! My engineer is cutting my mixes at about 30 / 40 - I feel they always sound thin.. May I just clarify; You said NOT to cut on the master (Providing my mix is balanced)
i like this dude he helps alot more then alot of these bs youtubers
Thank you very, VERY much, David! You're truly THE COOLEST for sharing this.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience BIG eye opener!
" Sub range is very expensive to monitor "...DAMN!!!
I love your channel..had to come back to this video! What’s your opinion on side chain eq? I don’t think I’ve seen you speak on this. :)
Good shit, I get what you saying but how do we implement these techniques like not cutting the lows but controlling the energy of the lows?
Being able to hear that range VERY well, that's the main issue. Once you can, it's fine tuning filters, dyanamic eq and compression, sidechain and saturation
Funny I was overwhelmed with happiness when I started watching this youtube.
One of the best videos David!
This is so true, but i would like to know, how much is a lot of energy, how do you mesure how much is too much if you dont have those big ass speakers or if your monitrs don't distort even if you can´t hear a lot of sub bass information, i mix on my adams a7x, and they are not cool with sub info but they dont distort so is hard for me to know when i'm overdoing sub energy, in your meter i see the energy about -40, thats a great point? of course i know you should not mix with eyes, but when you can hear, eyes are great.
Boss moves always, cheers Dave, Legend
You really care about the mixes that get sent out into the world and get upset where people give bad advice, Thats why I always listen to your advice.
Thank you 🙏
Thank you for the guide.
I'm not an expert but in my experience it's very hard to reduce low end energy such as below 40hz without affecting sounds.
I only use plugins and don't have any hardware and I feel that even if I cut 20hz for example, it still seems to cut 60+ hz which is noticeable.
It's hard to find the best plugins which can control low frequency.
Unless you have unwanted frequencies below 40 there isn't much reason to lowcut anything that deep. What you're hearing at 60+hz is probably the extensive phase shift you get from filters. Rather you want to control with compression and/or enhance with harmonics, layering, or distortion so you can get a full sound with less sub energy. Investing in good monitoring and room acoustics tends to be the best solution here.
You are amazing. I look up to you a lot thank you for your wisdom, god bless your soul
Thank you so much!
@@mixbustv Commented on the wrong account but no, thank you! I'm going to keep on working hard on becoming the best version of me :)
Thanks for this, I decided to use my monitors built in high pass filter and let the sub do the heavy lifting. They do seem to be more detailed in the mids now
Do you have any insights on bass harmonics that mess with the harmony? It's one of those gray areas that can really confuse my ear. That subtle dissonance is what makes a lot of stuff sound fat, but it can also sound ugly, even lower interval limit for instruments above it taken into account. I have several ways of dealing with it, from subtle reduction of freqs to straight up replacing them with sines that allign with the 12edo harmony, which can be REALLY tedious.
The same thing occurs when a drummer hits their cymbals too hard, you get "poling". The cymbal is being hit so hard that it cannot bloom or resonate, it just craps out.
What a great video. Very important topic for EDM stuff. Thank you!