Advice on the mastering/EQing of this song?

[NotThatBright]

Any advice regarding the mastering of this song would be appreciated (a cover of Strange Denial by Bad Religion). It's been EQ'd and mastered to my "current specifications", which could use some sharpening up.

This is the first time I reduced the lower frequencies of the bass guitar (or set any frequencies below 0dB in the EQ, for that matter).

Thanks!

https://soundcloud.com/user92696274096/strange-denial/s-0AdmV

 

[TripleM]

I like the guitar sound. I like the vocal sound too. I think the guitars are a little too loud and the vocal a little too soft.

Bass is at just about the right level. Maybe boost it a small bit.

The drums are the thing that needs the most work to me. The snare and kick are a little muffled. The cymbals can sound a bit swishy at times, but I can't tell if that's SoundCloud doing it or if it's on the track.

The lead guitar sounded a little out of tune. Particularly that little bit right at the end of the song.

But I actually think this is a pretty good song and a decent mix.

 

[NotThatBright]

I like the guitar sound. I like the vocal sound too. I think the guitars are a little too loud and the vocal a little too soft.

Bass is at just about the right level. Maybe boost it a small bit.

The drums are the thing that needs the most work to me. The snare and kick are a little muffled. The cymbals can sound a bit swishy at times, but I can't tell if that's SoundCloud doing it or if it's on the track.

The lead guitar sounded a little out of tune. Particularly that little bit right at the end of the song.

But I actually think this is a pretty good song and a decent mix.

Thanks for the feedback. If you can help with any of these questions, I'd appreciate it. These will all refer to the snare...

Any advice on how to make the snare less muffled-sounding? Is it just a matter of EQing it differently? I compress it a little, but not much, because I get a lot of bleed from the hihats into the snare mic and the more I compress it the more the cymbals dominate the track.

Also, I'm using a $30 mic (though made for a snare)... if I sank up to $130 on a snare mic, would it make a marked difference? I was using a $30 mic (made for a kick) on the kick until a month or two ago when I got a D112, which made a enormous difference, but I'm operating under the assumption that a cheap mic wouldn't sound that much different that a good one on a snare. What do you think?

Thanks again.

 

[TripleM]

I don't know that I can definitively answer all your questions. But I'll give you some general advice.

To bring out some snap to the snare, you might focus on the 5K-10K range. I'd try to keep the boost below 4db and make it rather wide (maybe 2 octaves). You'll need to play around with it. Don't mix by numbers. You might be able to get rid of high-hat bleed by using a gate. Assuming you're using a DAW, you should be able to find a plug-in if your DAW doesn't have one.

Will a $130 mic work better than a $30 mic? Probably, but there are no guarantees. Mic positioning is as important as the mic itself. Where did you place the mic when you recorded this? An SM57 is a mic that is commonly used on a snare. But there are others too. The 57 probably beats most $30 mics.

Was the D112 used on this recording? If so, I think you can get a better sound via placing it in a different spot.

 

[NotThatBright]

Google just saved me the indignity of having to ask you what a DAW is. And a gate!

I never used any software before, just a Tascam DP-24 for everything involved. It does have a "noise suppressor" (which I suppose would be a gate), on it which I never thought to use... I'll see if that cuts down on the hihat bleed.

My snare mic is a miniature mic that's clipped onto the top rim of the drum, pointed at about a 70-degree angle toward the middle, and about 3/4 of an inch from the drumhead. I tend to whack it about twice per song. Especially when I'm consciously trying to avoid it.

Yes, I used the D112. I have it pointed inside the hole on the reso head, directly at the inside of the batter head. After getting no treble at all from my last kick mic (and therefore no "click" sound of the beater hitting the batter head), I wanted to make sure I got tons of it this time around. How do you recommend I set it up?

Thanks again.

 

[NotThatBright]

By the way, the EQ settings I used for the kick are:

+12dB @ 3.8kHz

-9dB @ 250Hz

+10 dB @ 60Hz

 

[TripleM]

Google just saved me the indignity of having to ask you what a DAW is. And a gate!

Those are some big EQ numbers. The frequencies you're boosting/cutting are in the (sort of) standard frequency ranges for boosting/cutting kick drums. So that's good. But the amounts you're adding/cutting are pretty big. You also seem to be on the right track with the position of your mic (or at least it seems that way to me). But that EQing suggests there is a problem. I'm kind of stumped. You have a decent sounding kit that's properly tuned? Maybe try to post a pic of your mic positioning?

 

[NotThatBright]

I'm not at my house, or I would take a pic of it. The kit sounds fine. Pearl drums, birch, got it a few months ago. I do have a mattress cover wrapped around a beach towel inside the kick, touching the batter head (I like the "thud" sound). Could it be because I dampen the hell out of it?