EQ.. I don't buy it

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maxman65

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Going back a few years I had a guild 25 guitar and I recorded it with an akgc1000. Whatever inherent brittleness that guitar presented it was made double with that mic. The results were hideous .worse still I had the dubious benefits of a synth module which was essentially a mud machine. Apart from all the inherently bad components and lack of knowledge (which still persist today) i still find that I can't believe in eq.
It interests me also that nobody ever seems to ask the question whether the arrangement itself is unsympathetic to a balanced presentation of the song . Nobody ...ever.
If I think of using eq I already know something is much more fundamentally wrong which doesn't really say much for eq I guess
 
It's a good point, but maybe taken too far?
EQ has been a vital tool in audio recording for as long as....audio recording?
It might not get mentioned quite as much but it's true, and not ignored, that if the arrangement doesn't work eq isn't going to fix it.

I almost always eq my vocals in a mix, though.
Taking even the simplest setup of a guitar and voice there'll almost definitely be some eq going on, but you can't really fault the arrangement there!
I guess with all components chosen and matched (including the environment), eq may not be necessary, but that's got to be the 0.1%, right?

In general, though, I do agree the idea of jumping straight into 'fix it' tools grows and grows and that's not good.
We see that plenty, where the approach is to tinker with layers upon layers of fix-it plugins where, really, the solution is to mike up differently, or whatever.
 
Yeah agreed. I guess it's got to have some use somewhere but from my experience it's a red flag for something much worse. And when I start playing with eq it's basically just like sawing off neatly just above where a leg has already been blown off. Virtually useless
 
Bad analogy. In fact fiddling with eq is like delicately dabbing with cotton buds at the immediate site of where someone's head has been blown off. Utterly futile
 
Well, I suppose it depends on what's wrong with the recorded track.
If you listen and think, 'oh god, that is awful! I'd best break out the eq' then sure....that's misguided.
If, on the other hand, you're listening and think, 'you know, the vocal could do with being a touch more present' then grab an eq. :)

I think it's the same deal for song arrangement, environment, instrument choice...everything.
If it sucks really hard then eq is not the tool.

If your amputation analogy holds up then, I agree, there's more wrong that some subtle eqing will fix.
 
Have you ever listened to a song thinking it's drenched in reverb and underneath it's actually bone dry. I wonder many eq fiddlers ponder on that one
 
You're pretty much dismissing a tool because it doesn't work in cases where it's not the right tool.
I don't believe in hammers, 'cos screws...
 
I am with you on the general idea that people should consider their arrangement and other factors before jumping to tools that, they think, will fix all.
Really if it needs fixed it should be re-recorded.

Those tools, broadly speaking, should be for taste and preference.
 
Yeah . In some ways it's a conversation with myself . From my experience I know something is very essentially wrong if i even think of eq fiddling . So on that level I find it a great tool unused . For me it serves as an alarm bell which is actually very useful
 
Expressed differently I've probably learned more from being tempted to use eq than I've ever succeeded in actually using it
 
If something sounds badly wrong or very out of place I usually think bin it or retrack it.

That wasn't always true, though. Plenty of times I've tweaked and tweaked and tweaked to make something fit...and failed.
You gotta learn somehow. ;)

Try not to be put off eq across the board, though.
There's nothing at all wrong with a tweak here and there as a mix develops.
 
It's a critical piece in audio recordings, one of the earliest things that were probably learned about and adapted, first by instrument/room/vocalist choice, then by using different mics, etc. If it wasn't useful, I suspect they'd have left those knobs of the consoles that helped create the recorded sound most everyone still wants to emulate.

Now, as the saying goes, you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, so it all starts with the performance, and then its capture. Get that right, and all we have to do is not screw it up in the mix. But, IMHO, you're going to need some EQ almost anytime there's more than one track, unless it's a tuba and piccolo duet, perhaps.

Edit: actually, for home recorders, if you're not high-passing everything, you risk detracting from the end result.
 
Yes I'm nowhere near that stage . It will be interesting to see if I ever get there . It sends me back to the start every time . Not a bad thing necessarily
 
Meeting you half way, there's how things should be and how things really are; Not often the same thing.

I'm not going to pretend that everything I record sounds just as I want it to from the get go.
We're all fighting our environments and limitations.

I have a bass that I know always sound flabby...I have to eq most things to compensate for the sound of my room.
In the ideal world you'd use a different bass or treat the room but, right now, it's what I've got.

I suppose there's a place between knowing what you can't fix before the mic and remembering what you can.
That's the place to be. ;)
 
Yes its taken me hours and hours of attempted recording to wonder whether micro inbuilt condensers may be a dramatic limitation. I still don't actually know until I get the mic. I have played with eq briefly and for me it's done nothing . Yes the room is a big one I think . Despite my particularly humble surroundings this camper is suprisingly neutral . Instinct tells me that parts probably(relatively ) ok against other possible factors
 
One of the pros on here said something very interesting . It alluded to a voice and a guitar and how much inherent clash there can be . I have a very decent acoustic guitar but a strummy delivery is inherently dirty or potentially smothering . Create space through dynamics and sympathetic interplay was his thrust .very astute . A thousand times more potent than any post eq
 
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