Too much bass in my beats.

Discuss the various methods you use in music production, from compressor settings to equipment type.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By DSTR / deStar Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:00 pm
mr_debauch wrote:his monitors (left and right main speakers) are ONLY doing 80hz and higher because he has a subwoofer which is only for low frequencies (everything below 80hz)

don't cut out 80hz and below in your mix... that would be ridiculous. okay, sure... do that on the snare channel or the high hat channel... but not on the master.

you need that 20-80 hertz range... that is where the thump in your kick drum lives.. cutting that off would almost entirely mute an 808 bass drop (not exactly, but it is an example)


Thanks! That's what I thought.

But why does he say:

Lampdog wrote:Tame that bass with a filter on your bassier samples or on the main bus. Hi pass filter w/cutoff of 80hz


?

I thought cutting at 80 Hz seemed exaggerated... I have read at multiple places that cutting in the 20-30 Hz (with a Highpass filter) range is usually the norm...

I also read this: http://www.homestudiocorner.com/get-mor ... ss-filter/ This guy DOES cut everything below ≈ 80 Hz and says it works!

Sooo confused...

I just want my beats to sound good in my car (cars in general) and in live venues! They sound nice in my studio monitors and in my headphones. But not anywhere else! Too much bass!

:WTF:
Last edited by DSTR / deStar on Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By mcroepster Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:23 pm
DSTR / deStar wrote:Sooo confused...

I just want my beats to sound good in my car


Buy a Cadillac :nod:



:mrgreen:

peace :smoker:
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By mr_debauch Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:40 pm
well what you need to do is fit in your lows together so they mesh..

try using some parametric EQs..


for example, you may have a bass synth but it is not as low as 50hz.. it might be one of those lower midrange bass tones. well that may not be needed down in the 50hz range even if there is a bit of the synth trickling off down that low.... the part you find sonically appealing may be higher up in the 250-300hz area.. great, so use the parametric EQ to curve off at 200hz and it cleans up the 20-200hz area so you have more room when that 808 hits.. know what I mean?


it's not something easy to say in a general sense... it differs from beat to beat.


the easy way is to say.. well cut the bass off... or use a parametric EQ to slightly lower the bass frequencies..... however what you really need to do is mix them in so your end result has less of a muddying effect... or you dont wind up with too much of something.


if you have more then one sound or instrument in the bass range... find out where they clash or overlap and try and slot them in together by shaving their frequency ranges off with EQs... if that makes sense.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By tapedeck Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:51 pm
lots of misunderstanding and a little misinformation in this thread.

you can't just slap a filter at a particular frequency and 'cut' everything below that. it doesn't work that way. that's why there is a 'slope' or 'db / octave' parameter. it is a gradual thing.

lamp said to 'tame' it below 80 - this is better terminology as 'taming' will be more appropriate than 'cutting'. i think a gentle 80hz hipass will help, but i also am not gonna tell you that is the only thing that could be wrong.

there are a lot of clues in here, but none of them is a definitive answer.

get yer monitoring right.
mix properly.
try on different systems.

you have to do all of that. :mrgreen:
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By Lampdog Fri Aug 30, 2013 1:18 am
I typed a long ass reply earlier and it didn't even post up?!

Oh well, you guys already explained what I was going to elaborate on anyway.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By sciguy Fri Aug 30, 2013 3:48 am
DSTR / deStar wrote:
Sorry... Another thing I don't understand. If the bass under 80 Hz is cut on the Master, should no sound come through the sub if it is set at 80 Hz and below?

I'm confused :oops:



no worries :)

A filter doesn't block off 100% of frequencies outside its range.

The way a (highpass) filter works (lowpass would just be the opposite) is that above its cutoff frequency, it leaves frequencies unchanged. But anything below the cutoff, it attenuates. But it's not like all of a sudden those frequencies are gone. The further below the cutoff frequency, the more it's attenuated. It follows a slope, known as the slope of a filter. You'll see 12dB/octave, 24dB/octave filters, for example. What that means is that if you go one octave lower (again, with a hpf), the frequency is going to be attenuated 12 or 24dB more.

So having an 80Hz lowpass followed by a 80Hz highpass doesn't cut out the bass entirely, it just makes it quieter.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By Lampdog Fri Aug 30, 2013 4:19 am
Yeah that.


Filter freq, not volume. Everything else remains. Exactly what sciguy stated.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By DSTR / deStar Sat Aug 31, 2013 10:48 pm
Hi, and thanks again to all of you that are trying to help me out.

Here’s a recap:

When I mix in my home studio, my beats sound fine and well balanced.

I sit about 5’ from my speakers. I have M-Audio BX5a monitors. They range 56 Hz - 22 kHz. My monitors are at ear level. I have no choice to put the monitors against the wall because my room isn't deep enough.

This is my studio:

Image
Image

My beats also sound just fine on small speakers (I tried three different systems in my apartment) and laptops.

When I listen to my beats in cars or when I play in live venues, my beats have so much bass that you can’t even hear the hi-hats! (However, beats from other producers don’t do that!)

I guess I could install acoustic panels as some of you recommended, but as you can see, I have no walls to put them on!

So I tested the sound in two other rooms in my apartment. Unfortunately, my beats always sound the same in every room. Here are the two other rooms:

Image
Image

All I can think of right now, is buying a subwoofer to try and recreate that bass, because If I hear what’s really going on, I’ll be able to shape the sound of my beats to make them sound like they should!

But I live on a third floor, and my downstairs neighbor is literally going to kill me if I get a subwoofer!

I hear what you’re saying mr_debauch. But in my studio, my beats aren’t muddy at all! Everything is crisp!

With this and all the problems I got/get with the Renaissance, I'm slowly giving up. I haven't done a new beat in almost a year. All I get is frustrations. I don't know what to do anymore! :cry:
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By Lampdog Sun Sep 01, 2013 4:27 am
Instead of a sub, maybe better spec'd headphones that can recreate deep bass a bit better?! Maybe a cheaper alternative than a sub. Wont bother the neighbors either. What headphones do you use and what are the freq specs?
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By mr_debauch Sun Sep 01, 2013 4:42 am
if the bass is killing things like the hats... is it possible a compressor on the master is doing that?
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By Coz Sun Sep 01, 2013 6:57 am
DSTR / deStar wrote:With this and all the problems I got/get with the Renaissance, I'm slowly giving up. I haven't done a new beat in almost a year. All I get is frustrations. I don't know what to do anymore! :cry:



First off, don't give up. You're making the same mistakes we all make to some degree, coupled with the fact that your monitoring situation obviously isn't right.

Are you using any kind of analyzer plugin on your master? I've mentioned this before to you but I don't know if you got hold of one?

I'm sure we could give much more specific advice if you upload the wav so we can check it out properly.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By Lampdog Sun Sep 01, 2013 1:31 pm
Coz wrote:I'm sure we could give much more specific advice if you upload the wav so we can check it out properly.

I'm waiting on that also! 2 wav's. One that plays nicely at the venue and the other rogue bassy wav, just so so we all here ca compare on our own setups and see what the problem is hands on, right in our own zone. We'll only get so far with guessing and talking. At some point we gotta get our hands dirty for proper and complete help.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By DSTR / deStar Sun Sep 01, 2013 8:01 pm
Lampdog wrote:Instead of a sub, maybe better spec'd headphones that can recreate deep bass a bit better?! Maybe a cheaper alternative than a sub. Wont bother the neighbors either. What headphones do you use and what are the freq specs?


I use AKG K240 Studio headphones. Frequency Range: 15 Hz to 25,000 Hz. ( http://www.zzounds.com/item--AKGK240STU )

mr_debauch wrote:if the bass is killing things like the hats... is it possible a compressor on the master is doing that?


On my master, I use the L2 Ultramaximizer. But again: my mixes sound just fine in my studio, in my living room with my other system, on my computer with another system, on my tiny radio in the kitchen, etc. The bass issue is in cars and in live venues.

Coz wrote:Are you using any kind of analyzer plugin on your master? I've mentioned this before to you but I don't know if you got hold of one?


No… I spent too much money on Waves plug-ins this year, so I decided to skip the analyzer. I tried free ones, but they always crash the MPC. Anyway, when I want to analyze a beat, I open my wav in Audacity, and use the Plot Spectrum.

Coz wrote:I'm sure we could give much more specific advice if you upload the wav so we can check it out properly.


• Two beats in one wav on this one (it changes at the 3:17 mark):

http://dstr.lafacade.com/mpcforum/songs ... luence.mp3

In the first part, for the bass line, I use the Sine Bass from MPC Bass. On the second part (starting at 3:17), I use the Dub Bass from MPC Bass. The level of the bass track is at 45 for both beats.


• In this beat, the bass is included in the actual samples. So no bass added:

http://dstr.lafacade.com/mpcforum/songs/dirt.mp3


• In both beats, I use the Renaissance HPF with a cutoff at 30 Hz, and the Renaissance LPF with a cutoff at 19999 Hz on the master.

Lampdog wrote:I'm waiting on that also! 2 wav's. One that plays nicely at the venue and the other rogue bassy wav


I can only provide my original wavs. At the venues, the soundmen used their consoles to remove my excessive bass.

Thanks!
Last edited by DSTR / deStar on Sun Sep 01, 2013 10:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Too much bass in my beats.

By AntonPD Sun Sep 01, 2013 8:47 pm
for me, theres not too much bass (but i'm only listening on philips shp2000's, so i could miss sub bass)

in the first one, the sine bass is tiring, it's too high in the audible range. if you do that a lot, i can see why some mixers would think they need to take out bass.. but that would make the kicks sound really small (and they're already not really in the foreground.)

i'd work on your monitoring situation and pay attention to the bass/kick relationship (spectrum, evenlope and volume wise)
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