I’m gonna say you you can EQ drums, and should when it’s necessary. As for just putting an EQ on every track, no. That said, I probably EQ or filter the majority of tracks in any given mix somewhere along the line. But it’s always because I’m consciously making the decision to use EQ on something to a specific end. I wouldnt just assume I’m going to or should use it until I hear something I need to change about it. And I use different EQ plugins in different circumstances so I’m not going to presume which one is right until that moment. Thats just how I work though
I think the advice of reducing EQ use to a minimum is generally good, I just wouldn’t treat it as a hard rule. I think Hubb’s advice of EQing a drum sample to get it basically in the right place from the get go, and then arranging that processed sample which you know has a nice transient (which is the thing that makes drums more sensitive for this) from the beginning is the best call. I still wouldn’t say your drums are like, automatically going to sound like shit just because you had an EQ on your snare track. The proof is in the pudding really but its good to be aware that phase rotation is a thing which can affect your drum transients especially.
On the other hand I filter the shit out of many many sounds I use in my tracks (not drums as often but absolutely any other element) and regularly filter things then add fx then filter them again, etc. Which of course is creating phase rotation each time but practically it isn’t some kind of horrific thing you should always avoid. Filtering and resampling and filter envelopes etc are such an integral part of achieving the types of sounds you hear in dance music that I really don’t think people should be afraid of it. You mainly have to watch out for your kicks and snares (maybe toms too). The transient of a hi hat or something is less critical imo because it isnt a hard hitting sound in the first place , and removing the low end of a hit hat with unnecessary muddly low content is well worth the potential that a few hits might be altered in a way that is probably barely perceptible
worth mentioning that instead of going to boosting on eq you can often do something else like using saturation/drive to give it more harmonics and sound thicker. Which inherently creates a certain amount of compression as well.
I tend to do much more cutting than boosting (not a rule tho again) with EQ and often when a sound doesnt sit right it’s not something that necessarily you need to jump to EQ, unless its clearly that you need to filter the his or lows or cut a certain freq band or something like that. But, if a kick just needs more highs I definitely might whack on a pteq-x and crank the high boost. If it sounds fine, great.
I feel largely the same way about stereo fx on drums. Its more about knowing what the potential problems are and avoiding that than saying “dont use stereo fx on drums”. If you use parallel processing for your fx you can put all sorts of shit on different drum elements without destroying the original sound. There’s a limit too, but using stereo delays and verbs, in subtle ways as well as obvious ones to create space on drums is critical to them not sounding flat and bland imo. A simple fast delay with low feedback and a bit of stereo separation can do wonders for drum hits again provided its parallel and you arent sacrificing the dry track to do that
Edit: sorry I always write the longest responses out on these topics I just start going and have trouble reigning it in
i reckon optical might have the best mixdown across all genres i can think of, that brooding cold, clear bass heavy crunchy thing
i think drums are probably much more related to bass than we tend to consider given how they occupy the same frequencies / struggling for space
i really think you should watch those two vids. he shows how the speaker cone has to move to keep up with waveforms - and that is probably exactly where it shows you cant really widen or phase out the drums eventhough it sounds good in your room
also the no sidechain thing or atleast no compressor sidechain idea, makes sense. i imagine the pump that happens could easily be as loud as the loudest transient you have in your track when its translated to some system, but at home it just sounds like it mildly dips
those types of losing energy is probably the issues we sort of wont notice
but as a whole means a lot when its supposed to be able to be played back on anything
‘compressing together’ sounds, like what a bus or group does or an analog desk could help with
definitely limit some sounds together if needed, but it doesnt immediately make a lot of sense to want one universal attack or release on a bunch of different transients which i assume a compressor would have to impose on the situation
its probably one of those cases where we are being fooled by a bit of extra volume ITB
except if the comp adds some fuzziness or rounds off some transients or the threshold ends up doing some tone thing where it dips something you couldnt find except for when coupled together in a group
no, thats a great post and i do the same things you do here too
i just wished i had been more conscious about not doing these sorts of transient reducing things we end up doing, when i came up with my sound
but yeah definitely detractive/cutting EQ is safer than additive and if you use filter envelopes its usually possible to almost make a new transient, it just doesnt translate as good as ‘protecting’ the originally recorded sounds transient, because that transient is a natural occurence where the transient isnt just a dynamic thing but a tonal thing and an engineered thing
like anything we do on a recorded sound would in some way go against its premise, but especially dynamic stuff - not to be understood as we cant or shouldnt enhance the ‘‘opposite’’ attribute to any sound, but we sort of think older recordings are less dynamic and its usually the other way around because they had a bigger dynamic range than we do, nowadays
Yeah I set the final bus jcompressor with a pretty high attack, like 35-42ms, to let the little transients through, ofc this doesn’t circumvent the problem entirely but at leas it stops the kick from completely squashing the hats. I think.
ahh those newfound hats in trap-music - issues
jungle is all about hiding the hats
but actually he does mention something related to this and says straight up
when a snare or kick hits at the same time as hat, why dont you just draw in volume indiv/ highlight the hats inbetween those k and sns -because then it sounds more uniform than a comp having to calculate evy time
yeah thats clever. good application of one of the best pieces of advice from the god macc in the old dsf mixdown thread, to make all your mix decisions as early in the signal chain as possible
also damn im gonna remember this one
re: master bus compression, i dont trust myself enough w a compressor still so i go parallel comp around 50/50. at least i’ll always have half my transients
just get very very familiar with your effects, to the point where a specific tool with a specific configuration pops into your head when you listen back. If you know what everything does you’ll know if you actually need it to improve something, rather than feeling sticking things on a track cos you heard snares need to be compressed or something.
Loafah who used to pan his subs ? That Loafah?
Jokes. He is a big inspiration to me. I love the guys sound.
I only really use subtractive EQ. I know the regions i want various drums to occupy so ill cut alot of that region out of another sound so they sit together instead of compete. I might have an open hat and a closed hat, and i might pull out the highs from the open hat to give the closed hat room to breathe up there.
And i definitely cut everything below say 150 so the kick and sub have space.
Ill also avoid having hats/snares/claps hitting at the same time if possible. So a i might remove closed hats that drop at the same time as a clap or snare so that they dont compete. I find this also creates some nice stuttery shuffling hat patterns.
I firmly believe that the tune gets what it needs to sound good. Other rules be damned (mostly). If i want to boost 20 db at 500hz to make a synth do some weird noise then i will. If it sounds good then it acceptable.
i’d try not to think about it like that. there’s no ‘x’ type of snare, just get very familiar with what an effect does and you’ll start to instinctively know what you need to achieve the sound you need, if the source sound allows it. The more you know instinctively about the tools you have the less you need to remember a bunch of theory, or even really think about it
This used to be my issue with creating a jungle sound. I still kind of suck at it.
But now I use longer cymbal sounds and compress the shit out of it. That way you get that
breathing from the comp and the sloshing high end on the drums.
The more you know instinctively about the tools you have the less you need to remember a bunch of theory, or even really think about it
It really is about what result we are talking about. What goes for most people including me, is to do what you say. But we could get results like Optical or at least results that lends itself better to a club environment than what is just passable as ok sounding or possible to fix with an engineer afterwards. Most of what is being said here, is not to care more about theory, but actually that a lot of complex solutions like EQ or compression can get in the way and is maybe better avoided.
funnily enough maccs mixdown thread on doa had the same reaction where everyone suddenly realized what headroom and dynamics mean.
super guy
only weird bit is he was often doing his work on headphones with a pre-amp
which im sure is a great solution to get really clear signal - but also wild and dangerous to ears
That’s how it goes, man. Spend a couple years studying byzantine music and that’ll happen. Or spend any amount of time messing with other tunings, basically.
