Sudio (not a mistype) Monitors

So, I worked on a track a few weeks ago and it sounded great on my speakers and on a couple pairs of headphones. I sent it to a few people and they couldn't hear the bass line that was incredibly prominent to me.

At that point I realized I needed a way to listen to my stuff on horrible speakers. I found this thing at Wal Mart for $17 yesterday and it works like a charm.



http://www.hasbro.com/tiger/toothtunes/default.cfm?page=default&product_id=20388

Your average portable radio speakers nowadays sound a little too good. These are a little better at simulating say -- the lame speakers in an average laptop or iMac.

So what exactly are you trying to achieve with these?

To get a feel for what a song would sound like on even the worst set of speakers. They sound only slightly better than an iMac or laptop's speakers . . .

You're not gonna base your mixes on that are you?

On everything. The idea is to make it sound good on every single possible system. Headphones, speakers, cheap speakers, cheap headphones. If you get a great sound on everything you did it right.

DJ Hellfire wrote:You're not gonna base your mixes on that are you?

google Mr. Quincy Jones and the Yamaha NS10

I don't think it's possible. You're asking for something that is just out of reach of proper balance. How can you expect something to sound good on speakers that sound like shyt? I haven't heard anything (bass lines especially) that sound good on laptop speakers. I think the idea is to make your mix sound good on all good/decent sounding systems, not shytty systems. I mean, I ain't gonna try to make my shit bump on my clock radio. Won't that comprimise the playback on actual good speaker?

Google 'grotbox'.

And 'auratone'.

DJ Hellfire wrote:I mean, I ain't gonna try to make my shyt bump on my clock radio. Won't that comprimise the playback on actual good speaker?

Well, yeah if you used only crappy speakers to judge something.

The idea is to find the perfect balance. What do you think Phil Spector's whole wall of sound idea was about. People were listening to stuff on crappy AM radios back then and that's what he needed to mix with in mind; nowadays people are listening to your stuff on crappy earbuds and laptop speakers, so it's not like things have changed.

how do you guys not get it? he's saying if he can understand how his mix sounds thru his monitors, his headphones, and the walmart speakers, then he can make the necessarily adjustments to get the mix as true as possible thru any speakers it may encounter. if you guys aren't doing this then you're pushing wet spaghetti up a hill.

Muied Lumens wrote:Google 'grotbox'.

And 'auratone'.

Yeah, see, those speakers aren't actually shytty speakers. From what I read, they are acutally supposed to be accurate speakers. I don't think using actual shytty speakers and changing your mixes according to them is an ideal mixing technic. Maybe I'm wrong, but...

EducatedHands wrote:how do you guys not get it? he's saying if he can understand how his mix sounds thru his monitors, his headphones, and the walmart speakers, then he can make the necessarily adjustments to get the mix as true as possible thru any speakers it may encounter. if you guys aren't doing this then you're pushing wet spaghetti up a hill.

I don't get how you can try to get a 'true' mix using 'untrue' speakers. Just doesn't make sense to me. I understand the idea of getting your shyt to sound good in most systems, but not down-right shytty systems that aren't even capable of sounding good at all.

bedouin wrote:

DJ Hellfire wrote:I mean, I ain't gonna try to make my shyt bump on my clock radio. Won't that comprimise the playback on actual good speaker?

Well, yeah if you used only crappy speakers to judge something.

The idea is to find the perfect balance. What do you think Phil Spector's whole wall of sound idea was about.

Yeah, but this is what I don't get. Say you have your mix sounding 100% the way you want it on your studio monitors, in your car, in your living room but then on your radio at work, which isn't that great, there is something that you don't like. You grab your $17 Walmart jump offs and hear something similar to your work radio. So you make the necessary adjustment and now it sounds the way you want at work and on the Walmarts. Now when you go to play it back in the car, the studio or in your living room, won't it not sound 100% like you had it before?

If the majority of the people are listening to your stuff on iPod earbuds and laptop speakers, they're just as important as the folks with great systems.

If someone previews my song on their iMac I want it to catch their ear immediately; the idea that, "Oh, maybe I should play this on something better to see how it sounds" won't come to 95% of the common listeners' minds.

Bedouin,

You got the right idea. In fact, most people are actually listening to their music through bad speakers (not booming speakers, nearfields or studio monitors & unless you have NS10's, I would say your way is the right idea.

I have a friend that uses Tannoys and the bass response on those is massive (problably why Dilla used them). Anyway, he experienced the exact same issue as you and solved it similar way.

Good stuff.