LPF/HPF on 'lectric geetars...

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Armistice

Armistice

Son of Yoda
Stuff I'm working on now tends to have lots of electric guitar parts... not necessarily strumming / chordy stuff, more like rhytmic lines playing in and out of each other, sometimes, but not always all playing at once.

Current track has 8 parts - 3 sets of doubles and a couple of other ones. Normally I'm in the cleanish to mild break up area tone-wise and using a mix of single coil and humbucker guitars through valve amps.

Pre-mixing, it's an absolute mess, but I'm finding that a reasonably heavy hand on the HPF on all tracks cleans up the low end mud. No surprise there, fairly standard I'd have thought..

I'm also finding that hitting them at the other end with an LPF too and a bit of light compression is making them all gel together into a coherent sound... this is more surprising to me and I wonder if some of this is because the classic "rock" sound of 60s / 70s / 80s etc. that's probably imprinted on my head, probably, by the time it got to a vinyl disc or cassette where I did my formative listening, probably didn't have anything much up high anyway, and so I now prefer the sound without the top end. Seems less brittle to me.

Just an observation... not a real question, but I'm curious as to others experiences when tracking lots of electric guitars and trying to get them to fit and not overpower everything...
 
When I am mixing I usually do both HPF and LPF on most guitar tracks within a mix so to me that sounds normal, sometimes though I won't touch it, but there are times when too high end is a bad thing.
 
I usually just scoop the low-mids when I have multiple electric guitars. What frequency are you setting the LPF at?
 
I'm with you Arm. I have always been fairly heavy on the high pass (200-350Hz), but just started noticing how hitting the LP can also really bring all the parts out. Cutting down to 8K and sometimes even 6K can certainly help (depending on how forefront each needs to be). A gentle boost around 1K-2K usually helps with the bringing out for me too. I've also played with "combing" on the EQ...i.e. making very sharp Q notches that gently boost at the nicest freqs on each guitar and then notching them down on the rest. Gives really sweet clarity and separation to each guitar.
 
NEVER LOW OR HIGH PASS......

unless it's needed.

it ends up being 'unnecessary' math you are doing to the digital wave files.......

AND


if you are not using LINEAR PHASE ACCURATE EQ'S.....

then you may very well be adding phase problems and artifacts to your mix that you do not want.




that said.......


i DO use low pass on any tracks that i did not get right to start with.
and i always end up tweaking mids and highs on almost every track.

but i use a nice EQ (Waves Linear Phase EQ) on sub busses, and will use the SONITUS eq (remember, i'm on Sonar 6PE) to add color to things i want to tweak, but usually only subtractive eq.
 
Most electric guitars have a resonant peak around 5K, and a steep drop off that. The sounds coming off the string in this frequency range are mostly the non-harmonic noises from pick attack, string rattle, and finger squeaks. Anything any higher than that pretty much has to be harmonics generated from the distortion in the amp and/or noise from the amp itself.

But most guitar speakers also roll off precipitously at this point or even lower, so that a lot of that harsh, fizzy, pokey nastiness gets knocked down before it gets to your ears or the mic. Anything in that higher couple octaves that actually gets recorded is either just plain noise, or that strange combination of rapid reflections that we call air. Sometimes this can help a guitar track sound like it's in a space, but sometimes -especially when you're piling a bunch on top each other like this - it can make things feel a little distant and almost blurry in a way, and that's if it's not just plain fizzy and nasty. A have found a number of times that lowpassing to sort of "help" the speaker rolloff can actually bring a guitar into focus and almost make it stand out better in a mix.
 
Armistice said:
Current track has 8 parts - 3 sets of doubles and a couple of other ones.
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And I thought I was nuts.
I'm working on a tune right now that has 4 sets of double tracked gutars, plus another one going as stereo. :p

I usually don't HPF/LPF as a rule....and I try to anticipate any frequency build up for multiple instruments during tracking. IOW, I'll deal with it at the amp and by guitar and pickup selection, and also arrangement...etc.
That said....when it's mix time, if I gotta roll off something, I will...but generally I don't go for that accentuated mid tone just tp make the guitars stand out more. I like the guitars to add to the low-end....and AFA the high-end, like I said, I usually deal with that during tracking, as I generlaly hate spiky-bright guitars.
 
Just for discussion. Why does it always seem to be 'HP'? How about low shelves, or maybe a bell dip where it's needed is called for?
And if we're dumping all that much lows, think about setting it up lighter to begin with?
One reason-- Probably the guitar player is still there and he'd be indignant if he knew how thinned his big sound ended up being :eek:
(Yes I have to eq tracks to dial them in too.
IDK, my process is to go 'Now, let's see what we have', sort it out, land on what they need..
 
Gonzo brings up a good point.
The steeper your db/oct, the more artifacts you'll introduce. If you take a generic EQ and start to gently LPF something, the out level will be a bit higher than in the in, unless you take away large chunks of the signal.
 
Thanks guys... food for thought.

Given previously I've done mainly acoustic guitar based songs with electrics for accent, I'm having the odd challenge with using all electrics... I suspect I need to pay a bit more attention to the EQ settings as I'm tracking, I'm probably going too bassy...

I'm not unhappy with the results so far, it just struck me as strange I was continually shelving off high frequencies..
 
Schwarzenyaeger said:
Gonzo brings up a good point.
The steeper your db/oct, the more artifacts you'll introduce. If you take a generic EQ and start to gently LPF something, the out level will be a bit higher than in the in, unless you take away large chunks of the signal.
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No, Gonzo threw in a completely meaningless red herring. These "artifacts" that you are talking about are part of the action of the filter, and literally make it work the way it does, are only a problem if they're a problem, and almost never actually are. If it sounds better, it's better, period.
 
I'm not sure why Gonzo says NEVER HPF or LPF. I totally disagree. I HPF all my electric guitars. All that low end nonsense muddies up the mix in a hurry and makes for big problems at the mastering stage in today's digital age of pushing things hot into compressors and brick wall limiting, since the low frequencies eat up the compressors/limiters the fastest.

In a busy mix it's not uncommon to HPF electric guitars up to 150hz or even higher, unless you're chugging away in the first couple frets on the low E string or open E. I've HPF up to 300hz with electric guitars before. Forget the numbers. Forget the display. Just close your eyes and listen - move the HPF up until the mix sounds clean and balanced.

As for LPF, I don't use them as often. When I do it's just to clean up stuff about 12k or so where there's virtually no useful information. But you have to be careful, because there can be a lot of harmonic information up there that we don't notice when it's there, but you notice when it's missing.
 
Greg_L said:
I don't EQ my guitar tracks at all. I must be doing it wrong. :(
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So since we can pretty much know ( by way of your track record :) you're not doing it 'wrong', how about an opine'? I don't record much big' distorted guitars, much less dense stuff so I'm not faced with high density mixes so much.
Would you say most of the low shaping comes from- the amp dialed in, the micing? A bit of both? Just in general as that's about a close as this can get :)
 
Armistice said:
Well get on a damn plane and come show me how to do it then... I won't ask twice... :thumbs up::laughings:
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Buy my wife and I some plane tickets and hotel accommodations and I will happily come over there and help you out in person. :D

mixsit said:
So since we can pretty much know ( by way of your track record :) you're not doing it 'wrong', how about an opine'? I don't record much big' distorted guitars, much less dense stuff so I'm not faced with high density mixes so much.
Would you say most of the low shaping comes from- the amp dialed in, the micing? A bit of both? Just in general as that's about a close as this can get :)
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Lol. Okay, you asked for it.

Yes. Learn your gear. If you're just flying by the seat of your pants then you're gonna have to fumble-fuck your way through a mix. Drums, guitars, pianos, kazoos, whatever. If you're recording something new to you, there will be growing pains. If someone never records overdriven guitar tones, then one day they decide they're finally gonna rock out, it's not going to go well without some trial and a lot of error. What makes one guitar track stand out from another? Clarity. Dynamics. Punch. Variety. Cut the gain, turn up the volume, use different guitars, amps, or speakers. When layering guitar tracks just record cleaner than you think you need to. Turn down the gain and turn up the volume. That's a good place to start to get layered guitar tracks to have some clarity and definition. A loud cleaner amp sounds much bigger and more articulate than a low volume amp with a ton of gain. With less gain there's more room to fit things together. When you don't have mush and fizz taking up space, you have more room for tone.

I'm with that Gonzo guy on this one. Why are so many people having to roll off an entire range of frequencies? That's excessive IMO. And what's worse than that? Doing it by default because you think you're supposed to. I would guess that if people are having problems with the low end of their guitar tracks, they're simply using the wrong mic placement and/or they're dialing in the amp wrong. I say "simply" because it's easy to do it wrong. It's much harder to do it right. Learn your gear. Experiment.

If you just have to EQ because you've been trained to fiddle with things and won't be able to sleep at night if you don't, HP/LP is excessive IMO. It's too drastic. It's destructive. You can't just look at a speaker frequency graph and roll off everything not in the spec range of the speaker. Shelves and little notches do a much better job IMO. If you have too much guitar build up <200hz, don't roll it all off like fucking goofball. Just shelve it. An overdriven electric guitar sound is a complex thing. It's traditionally a midrange instrument, but there is low and high end information there. There are a lot of harmonics and overtones and feedback and all sorts of little goodies packed into all that fury.

I'm not all-in on the stupid generic "if it sounds good it is good" mixing philosophy. I mean, I get it, it's for end results. Fine, whatever. But it's also a mindset that enables and allows plenty of room for the dreaded "fix it in the mix" philosophy. I tend to focus more on trying to sound good before you even get to that point. If it truly sounds good, it is good, and you won't have to fix it in the mix. This is all assuming you're tracking your own stuff though. If you're handed a bunch of garbage tracks to deal with, then you do what you gotta do.
 
So, basically, if you track it right, it will mix right. No need for "majik" or the dreaded Sucks/Awesome knobs...Truly great advice.
Love to hear Greg's advice. Always shows me what I'm doing wrong. I tend to EQ in the mix (with everything playing) because I'm not 100% sure of what I want when I track. My stuff mostly comes out mediocre. I think what I need to take away from this is, "If you don't like your sound and have to tweak it, just re-record it till you like it."
 
BroKen_H said:
So, basically, if you track it right, it will mix right. No need for "majik" or the dreaded Sucks/Awesome knobs...Truly great advice.
Love to hear Greg's advice. Always shows me what I'm doing wrong. I tend to EQ in the mix (with everything playing) because I'm not 100% sure of what I want when I track. My stuff mostly comes out mediocre. I think what I need to take away from this is, "If you don't like your sound and have to tweak it, just re-record it till you like it."
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Lol. Maybe, if you have the want or the time to keep re-tracking, then by all means knock yourself out. At the very least you will gain valuable experience with your own gear, and that's never a bad thing. I'm not saying EQ is a useless tool that everyone should avoid. I'm saying that if you have to do drastic things to make something work, then do it if you want, but try to do better next time. The results will be better. Isn't the golden standard ideal scenario a faders up mix that requires no EQ? Virtually impossible for sure, but the closer you can get to that, the better, wouldn't you think? For me, I like writing, I like playing, I like tracking, I like mixing. What I don't like is fixing. I don't know about anyone else, but I'd rather play with my amp knobs and mic placements instead of DAW plug-ins. I'm not an expert or anything. I'm just a guy that home records like everyone else. But I spend my time and money getting the best source sounds I can and my mixes usually fall together to my satisfaction without much fuss. And my recording philosophy is track good sounds to begin with.

Being "not sure of what you want" is, IMO, a real problem that needs to be dealt with before you press record. It's probably a common problem. And that kind of problem is easily made worse by having a shit ton of mixing options to fiddle with. It's one thing to track good sounds, but you have to know what your idea of a good sound is. A good sound isn't just the sound you want to hear. It's a sound you want to hear that's also a sound that will work in the context of a mix. It's like the old story of Garage Joe the Guitar Hero going into a studio with his rock star ideas of what constitutes a legendary guitar tone, and then he's told by the engineer to reel it in a little bit because his gained up fizzbomb guitar sound will sound like ass when recorded. Your live/jamming rock and roll guitar tone and your recorded sound will probably be close, but not the same. I play gigs all the time and can very rarely use my at home sound for live action. And when I get home, I don't usually record with the same settings I just used live the night before.

Well, I do have one amp that can pull it off - the mighty JCM 800. :D
 
Sorry, didn't mean minor tweaking. Meant total makeovers.

The not sure what you want bit is usually from recording as you write. Things get done, then scrapped, then redone as the song takes shape. I can hear in my head what I want the end to sound like...sometimes. But I can't play all the parts without first recording one or some...therefore the EQ in the mix is part of my creative process. Much easier if you're doing a cover, or working with something you're just re-doing.
Just saying, once it's done, if something has become so far off that I need to make it sound like something it isn't, it's probably best to re-record.

As always, thanks for the insights.
 
Brian Miller said:
I'm not sure why Gonzo says NEVER HPF or LPF. I totally disagree. I HPF all my electric guitars. All that low end nonsense muddies up the mix in a hurry and makes for big problems at the mastering stage in today's digital age of pushing things hot into compressors and brick wall limiting, since the low frequencies eat up the compressors/limiters the fastest.
Click to expand...

What GONZO is saying is...get it right during tracking.

If your guitars always have that much low end that they're "muddying up the mix"....maybe you need to adjust your guitar/amp/mic position...etc....so that what you are tracking doesn't create those problems and forces you the automatically HPF all the time.
I have 10 guitar tracks on a current mix....not-a-one has a HPF as a necessity...and heck, I may chunk up the low end even more on some.

Think about it.
One is a "fix" to a problem...the other is findind a better way to track so there is no problem.

I think people are obsessed these days with using the HPF all the time....like there's this "you don't need" those LFs perspective...so just cut them out of everything, which in this digital age actually goes more towards creating bright/strident mixes.
I'm not saying you should never do that...HPF/LPF....but it's one thing to subtly correct EQ as you mix, it's another to by-default, just HPF or LPF everything, as some "better" way to mix....IMO.

YMMV.....
 
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