Bass Button EQ Allowances

[rivv3t]

That's actually a really good point - I guess we typically go for some degree of "flatness" because we expect variations of all types in the systems our music eventually gets played on. BUT, if you're into pushing the limit in terms of bass, you've got to mix for the system with the most bass - otherwise, you'll end up blowing out someone's speakers. Do I get what you're saying?

Kind of.


We're doing this for other people. If you're not making music for other people.....then .....you ain't no fuckin musician.


I don't think it's necessary to mix for the system with the most bass. A 12b boost @ 50Hz in a car ...god, I'd like to see that. KaBOOM! Better be a tank.


It needs to compare with what you like to listen to....what you "reference" to.....there...some tech talk woohooo. Most people do....ask them....most people do mess with the EQ or they wouldn't even exist.

So you got to do the best you can with what you've got. "Average" is a pretty "relative" term.........personally I think industry standard "flat" sounds like complete shit....



But yeah that's kind of what I mean.

 

[metalhead28]

Furthermore, I am not discounting your theories....if they work for you that's great!

 

[metalhead28]

A 12b boost @ 50Hz in a car ...god, I'd like to see that. KaBOOM! Better be a tank.

That is the clincher right there.... See, if I had a desire to do that, I know it would make any album that I own sound like complete shit. The people who want to do that are only concerned with how much SPL their subwoofers create rather than how good their music sounds. That is a BIG difference.

 

[rivv3t]

Another aspect that you are ignoring is that some people, like myself, actually invest in high end audio gear. I have a very good sound system in my car, (as well as my home) and when I leave the EQ settings flat anything I listen to still pumps and sparkles because I have good equipment. I am one of those people who appreciates a good sounding album all the more because I can hear what it is really supposed to sound like rather than destroying it with some horrid sounding bass boost circuit. I'm not knocking anybody who listens on a cheap stereo, I'm just saying that you can't ignore the other guys either.

Some people....not the majority. Not myself. Hey, man Black Sabbath's first album is on my playlist and I'll probably have it buried with me. I'm an ollldschool metalhead. (Not these days...into trip hop and ambient music. Indie punk & industrial. Still like Pink Floyd but not too much of what's on the radio ...these days.) Saw Yngwie Malmsteen warm up for Ronnie James Dio in a crowd of about 1,000 tops and Pantera when they were warming up for Exodus.

But it sounds like shit compared to my Perfect Circle CD. Remastered or not.

And it sounds like shit because I don't set my EQ that way. You NOT setting your EQ is still a setting....completely and absolutely "flat" technically speaking would be....dead silence? Yes, I think it would.

The other guys....if you think in reverse....are precisely the ones I had in mind when I ventured out on this quest.


I want it to sound ...the way other CDs sound when I turn off the EQ. (Basically OK but adjustable without getting mud.)
I've accomplished this. If that sounds good to you then glory be.

Seriously, man.........you pretty much initiated the insults.

But whatever...this is a discussion. And I'm assuming most of us are pigheaded Americans....it's to be expected.

 

[Halion]

I saw pimp my ride yesterday (stupid car tuning program on tv). They put a 23" woofer in the back of a car. Let me repeat that: a twen-ty-three-inch woofer.

Bassboost button eat your heart out, some might say.

 

[rivv3t]

I saw pimp my ride yesterday (stupid car tuning program on tv). They put a 23" woofer in the back of a car. Let me repeat that: a twen-ty-three-inch woofer.

Bassboost button eat your heart out, some might say.

Dude, that's exactly what I'm saying. There's no way of knowing what it'll sound like in that car. But a few basic audio devices like...a ghetto blaster....flat-ref monitors....headphones...home stereo...basic car setup...will do the trick.

Speaking in average terms. And the trick....is allowing room for people to play with their EQs and boosts. A well balanced mix isn't necessarily going to do that. There is a formula for it though....and Steinberg's Free Filter isn't going to cut it.

What a piece of crap investment that was.


I've repeatedly said (and I know I'm near raving by now) that this is a quick home fix for DIY enthusiasts. It works. Better than I had hoped.

It made my mix..."flat". And able to be played next to my favorite bands with my favorite EQ settings. God, this is a mindfuck of a thread.

 

[metalhead28]

Okay what this seems to be boiling down to in my eyes is this:
You do in fact want your music to sound like modern albums based on your numerous mentions of that fact.
You feel that you need to do a bunch of corrective EQ'ing to achieve this result.
I too like the sound of alot of modern music.
Therefore have you considered the possibility that we expect to have the same amount of bass content in a properly mixed, finished, mastered album and that you simply have a natural tendency to initially mix things in an unbalanced fashion and therefore need to apply across the board corrective EQ to get it there?
I'm not trying to slam you, it's just that your constant mention of a bunch of contradictory points seems to be pointing me in that direction.
But like I said before, whatever works for you man. More power to ya'.

 

[metalhead28]

It made my mix..."flat". And able to be played next to my favorite bands with my favorite EQ settings.

My point in my above post is that perhaps some people are able to achieve that "flatness" with their ears anyway......

The unavoidable conclusion to this thread is that you feel that you mixed your stuff too bass heavy to begin with and had to compensate for that in order to match it up with professional releases. There is nothing wrong with that and there is nothing wrong with the fact that you have developed a tool to help yourself out. But you are making claims that everyone else is doing it wrong and that is just silly.

 

[rivv3t]

Okay what this seems to be boiling down to in my eyes is this:
... have you considered the possibility that we expect to have the same amount of bass content in a properly mixed, finished, mastered album and that you simply have a natural tendency to initially mix things in an unbalanced fashion and therefore need to apply across the board corrective EQ to get it there?

NO. We don't. Do you like 2Pac Shakur? Tricky? How bout Bauhaus or Ministry? Aphex Twin?

Check out the bass levels on some of their "standard" "flat" mixeddown/glass-mastered and commercially pressed CDs. They're nothing even remotely comparable to most metal bands.

They're FAT. But they don't rattle the woofers when you hit the boost...unless you're actually trying to get that effect. What I've done here is achieve that same touch, reGARDless of bass level preferences in the mastering studio.

No. We're not going for the same thing at all, man. Sorry. I like music. Not just one kind at one setting. To me that's the whole joy of stereos and CDs altogether. There is no default "flat" setting other than what you have when you don't use EQ/Bass Boost and the limit you can push it to before it pops your cones. None whatsoever. If whatever labels you buy records from have so called "standards" then so be it.........that's mainstream industry. That's highend FM RADIO broadcasting and standard compression/volume levels being blasted from the towers....that's time in the editing booth at KSPU or whatever. That's a bottomless pit of cash spent on extra labor.

It's all different. There are no f%$!@ rules when it comes to mixing. But there are when it comes to mastering. Corrective EQ? Shit man, that's what mastering is all about.

I don't want my shit played on KSPEW anyway. I'd rather die.

 

[metalhead28]

Well, no, I am not a fan of rap music but I am quite familiar with how it sounds and how it translates on my sound systems. I have a wife who likes hip hop music and I have installed a sound system in her truck that caters to that type of music. (big subwoofers and big wattage) I also think (and so does she) that most albums sound perfect with no kind of boost on anything....with the controls totally flat. Like I was saying before, unless you enjoy exagerated bass when you listen to music these concepts don't mean anything to you. And most hip hop that I listen to on my car's system, on which I almost exclusively listen to rock and metal, seriously pounds.....to the point that I would want to turn the bass down, and it's not because I don't like bass it's just because I can't hear anything else. So as I said you must obviously enjoy extreme bass when you listen to music, hence the tendency for overdoing it to the point of requiring correction. Also if you think that hip hop albums and metal albums have such drastically different bass than you must not have listened to too many metal albums lately. No they don't have droning tones or an 808 thumping, but they would be just as quick to distort a little cheap speaker with a bass boost turned on with a slamming kick drum. Metal fans also want to feel the kick drum in their chest. But where we differ is that I would mix for that rather than mixing in anticipation of someone boosting the hell out of the bass with an EQ. I tend to think that people would only do that if their speakers or sound system as a whole was inadequate, not because they thought the album itself required it, and in that case it would probably distort or sound bad anyway.

 

[rivv3t]

Like I was saying before, unless you enjoy exagerated bass when you listen to music these concepts don't mean anything to you.

Okay.


So......if I wasn't talking to you..........why...in the fuck...did you reply to my post? It obviously wasn't intended for you.

 

[rivv3t]

Alright...proof is in pud...someone want to hear a mixdown example and compare it to a another beefed up and boosted track?

It'll just be two 44/128 mp3 examples and a simple 100% norm mixdown. No mastering. I'll run them through the Winamp disk-writer plugin so you get exactly what I get.

If you think it sounds wrong....thenyouneeeedtoadjustyour EQ because that's

whatit's therrrrrreforrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

It sounds good next to my other CDs ...in my listening space....and that's what it's all about.

I'll be back.

 

[metalhead28]

Okay.


So......if I wasn't talking to you..........why...in the fuck...did you reply to my post? It obviously wasn't intended for you.

Because when I jumped into this bottomless pit of lunacy, it was because you seemed to be aiming at regular old rock music. You even mentioned that you were getting your masters as good as Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.....I didn't realize that you were really shooting for the "Bass Master Funky Trunk" type of thing.....But hey, it's cool if you can make it sound like a Pink Floyd album, dude.........

 

[metalhead28]

If you think it sounds wrong....thenyouneeeedtoadjustyour EQ because that's

whatit's therrrrrreforrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

OOOHHHHHH...I get it now....

Yeah dude........you're right.

 

[rivv3t]

Because when I jumped into this bottomless pit of lunacy, it was because you seemed to be aiming at regular old rock music. You even mentioned that you were getting your masters as good as Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.....I didn't realize that you were really shooting for the "Bass Master Funky Trunk" type of thing.....But hey, it's cool if you can make it sound like a Pink Floyd album, dude.........

Nooo...I'm going for an average. I don't change my EQ much. And I don't sound like a Pink Floyd album because I'm not Pink Floyd.

I can get my levels up to theirs and not have to change the EQ much if at all. That's what I'm saying. You're not listening.

Whyn't you :roll: up another joint?

 

[metalhead28]

I'm going to stop arguing with you now for two reasons:

1. My work day is now over and I'm going to stop playing on a message board for overtime pay and go home.

2. You are doing a good enough job making yourself look like an idiot and you don't need my help anymore.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Man - I was wondering what that smell in here was!!!

What an awful load of bullshit in this thread - all of it coming from rivv3t............

 

[Farview]

I try to get my mixes to sound like I would normally play a song on any commercial system (slight V and added bass).
Peace.

This is your problem. If you put the 'V' curve in the master, when someone else listens to it on a stereo with that 'V' shaped EQ curve, it just makes it worse. You are effectively EQing it twice.

 

[rivv3t]

Man - I was wondering what that smell in here was!!!

What an awful load of bullshit in this thread - all of it coming from rivv3t............

No, you know what, man? I didn't start shit in here. I came up with a quick fix for EQ peaks in home indie recording and you guys act like this is a proME only forum.

Your egos are what's rattling the woofers. Fuck this forum.




For those of you who aren't simply interested in arguing or slamming people and actually saw the sense in what I was saying I'm going to post these two clips for you to download.

I don't care if it's "standard industry format" or not .... none of these guys in here are industry standard. Even the ones that work for "such and such a studio" because if they were really all that they wouldn't be wasting their precious time in here and that's a damned fact.

My point is to simply show that you can get a legitimate mixdown ready for mastering at home that won't make your box rumble when someone hits the bass button or plays with the EQ.

Most of these guys in here just like to show off their studio vocabulary and make people on simple budgets and limited knowledge/experience look like damned fools without even listening to what the other person was really saying in the first place. And that just sucks ass. You know who you are (the sort of people commonly refered to as "haters", yes?) and you can just fuck off with that trip. I think I speak for more than myself here. You guys are assholes to the newbies here.

I won't be coming back.

Anyway, just clips.. nothing real solid. Was bored and goofing around with my gear:

 

[rivv3t]

This is your problem. If you put the 'V' curve in the master, when someone else listens to it on a stereo with that 'V' shaped EQ curve, it just makes it worse. You are effectively EQing it twice.

You're not LISTENING, man.. I'm not putting no V in the god damned master EQ.
Jeeezus CHRIST Almighty.


Fuck this forum.