Well...you don't have to...
...but I've heard many a shit mix sound like total shit in a shit environment...and yet somehow, you put on some quality commercial music, and it seems to always rise above the listening environment.
I'm not saying the environment has no effect....just that that commercial stuff transcends it a lot more than home rec stuff in many a case...and one of the areas that is often the most problematic, is the low end, which is exactly what the OP is complaining about.
I say that also from personal experience in trying to get that big, fat low end of commercial music that just seems to fill the room in a nice punchy way, yet never boomy or muddy or interfearing with anything else.
It's taken a lot of different approaches (I think the stuff I'm currently working on is finally getting there).
So I don't find it odd at all that there is a big audio sound quality difference between the two in the same crappy room.
For Shure, exactly. But that is not quite what I'm focusing on. A good production has less flaws', likely better tuned' to translate better- and that means less nasties popping up in all the various and bizarre listening situations.
But one ought to be able to pin down (learn by careful comparison) some constants', that being freq shifts that apply (almost) w/o regard to a sources quality. 'Almost' because the ref has to excite or land on or in the room's adoration points. But again, a well balanced mix is less likely to get whacked' than one that is peaky', or 'one note perhaps.
Mixsit, what frequency on the bass drum do you feel needs reducing? Thanks.
IDK, I'm not going to chase it down. It's that prominent freq of the kick. It seems to me compared to commercial refs I use, they are lighter in general.
However when it's reduced.. In my experience what happens in fleshing out the low end in a mix is you get to a 'blend as this best or initial try based on the path and what you heard getting there. And when I begin the questioning process- brought on by realizing the mix in a different light, you begin to chip away at source(s) 'problem in question'
One of the first things that can happen is the 'warmth balance you had- can be lost.
That- can lead to.. Are other instruments in the mix thinned out perhaps too much, or too high?
When you bring up the low end in these others, is it a better compromise? Some where in between? Or, perhaps you are led into the same conclusion, that what you had is, was the best compromise?
Man, let me say this stuff for me.. is really tough! I have to go round and round to get to wherever I get to.
So, no 'high horse' here.
