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ok so use fruity loops 9, and i just got done making my subbass sounding exactly how i want it. however, when i put it in a pattern with my other melody, it just seems to clip really bad, and drowns out the melody almost completely. when the melody and bass are played seperately, neither of them really even come close to clipping, how can i fix this?

jheart wrote:ok so use fruity loops 9, and i just got done making my subbass sounding exactly how i want it. however, when i put it in a pattern with my other melody, it just seems to clip really bad, and drowns out the melody almost completely. when the melody and bass are played seperately, neither of them really even come close to clipping, how can i fix this?

mixing and mastering thread
all about gain structuring and eq work

Your mix is a box. There is only so much space in there. If you want something to be big, something else is going to have to be small.

But if you build the song right, all the elements should fit like puzzle pieces.

In general you want to carve the eq of all your elements so that they sit well together and do not clash on one frequency area .

For instance, find the sweet spot in frequencies of both elements that are clashing and dip the eq while you boost the other....kinda like mirror opposites.

In your case, you probably just need to cut all the low freq of your melody and all upper freq of your sub. Mirror opposites.

Also you can hard pan elements left and right to give more space....but in your case you dont want to pan your sub. But you can pan your melody a lil...good to do anyway to widen stereo field.

Hope this helps

turn everything down equally, einstein.

Recessive Trait wrote:turn everything down equally, einstein.

No point in the sarcasm bro.
Some people should read up beforehand granted.
I myself have made this mistake before and received an alpaca or two in return.
But constantly flaming people for noobish questions, all exept the, hole do i make a wobble and how do i make a rusko/datsik and whoever else bass which has been covered nigh on 1000 times is not helping.
Sorry if I'm just reading this wrong.

But to OP - original poster in case you don't get this.
It really is all about eqing and possibly compression.
Basically you're gonna really wanna take the really low frequencies off everything if it mostly substep, lovestep, chilled dubstep.
Possible wrap a tiny amount of tape distortion on it.
Try lo cutting everything at around 20-100k on frequency scale.
Am I right? Dunno, cba to look lol.
Also possibly try some compression, have the attack rate set around 2ms and the realease around 200ms
Also adjust the threshold to around -10db
I find this helps make a nice subbas fit nice in the mix and just have the kick sit above this at around 110khz.
Bit tipsy though so not really sure hah.

dr-zitbag wrote:It really is all about eqing and possibly compression.

No it's not.

In fancy speak it's gain staging, in plain speak, all that shit is too loud.

OP says melody doesn't clip, then bass doesn't clip, but together they do clip. That's because they are too loud. Turn each of them down, and if everything is too quiet, turn your speakers up.

And hell... I don't know what the sticked thread is called anymore, but I think it's mixing and mastering or something. Read that and understand it.

Production Knowledge Base

OH MY GOD!!! THIS IS NOT AN EASY THING TO FIX!!! Welcome to making dubstep, or anything with lots of bass for that matter......

I usually turn the sub as high as it will go, then mix the rest of the song to the bass... bass will EAT your music. I spend 75% of my production fitting sub-bass into my music and holy shit, it's still not working the way I want it. Try mixing it then listening to it on tons of different types of speakers to make sure it works okay.... you don't want to give a cd to a friend and blow their speakers out.... because IT WOULD BE YOUR FAULT sadly enough

try cutting everything above 120Hz and every below 40Hz from your bass, you can even cut it higher than 40Hz (sometimes I have to go to 60Hz so it doesn't kill normal speakers).

Isturite wrote:I spend 75% of my production fitting sub-bass into my music and holy shit, it's still not working the way I want it.

Isturite wrote:OH MY GOD!!! THIS IS NOT AN EASY THING TO FIX!!! Welcome to making dubstep, or anything with lots of bass for that matter......

I usually turn the sub as high as it will go, then mix the rest of the song to the bass... bass will EAT your music. I spend 75% of my production fitting sub-bass into my music and holy shit, it's still not working the way I want it. Try mixing it then listening to it on tons of different types of speakers to make sure it works okay.... you don't want to give a cd to a friend and blow their speakers out.... because IT WOULD BE YOUR FAULT sadly enough

try cutting everything above 120Hz and every below 40Hz from your bass, you can even cut it higher than 40Hz (sometimes I have to go to 60Hz so it doesn't kill normal speakers).

dont fucking do that for gods sake itll be a disaster.

gain structure is the solution here. try having your kick hit at around -10 and sub at around -12. Mix the rest of the song back in to those two reference points. Thats not a concrete rule but will get you in the right ballpark.......read the big gain structure thread NOW.

dr-zitbag wrote: It really is all about eqing and possibly compression.

it's all about a good arrangement, then relative levels. eq & comp come far behind those 2 biggies.

Isturite wrote: try cutting everything above 120Hz and every below 40Hz from your bass, you can even cut it higher than 40Hz (sometimes I have to go to 60Hz so it doesn't kill normal speakers).

Sub shouldnt have any harmonics that spread that wide man... Its a fuckin sub.... usually, just a sine wave (single frequency by nature of how sound works as waves of energy accross time)... Alot of people, myself included, slightly deform our sines to add warmth/character/an extra freq or two for it to touch down on, but nothing so sever you should ever have more then an octaves span on your sub man. That makes no sense, next octave is your mids... if, say, you have a root note at 40 htz (Roughly an e note) ... Your 80htz mark is your whole octave span, so any kind of note patterning you do should even shift that single/small frequency sine around any further then that really, I cant think of any melodies making a 13 semi jump anywhere, much less on subs.

Also, nothing should 'kill normal speakers' if the spekaers cant pick up a frequency, then they cant, it wont 'kill' them as long as it sits properly in the mix. I could put a massive, massive sub through my grandmas transitor radio, wouldnt 'kill it' just owuldnt pick it up. Think about it, have you ever had probablems listening to loefah on laptops aside from the sounds not being there? It doesnt hurt anything unless its mixed wrong.

Isturite wrote: I usually turn the sub as high as it will go, then mix the rest of the song to the bass... bass will EAT your music. I spend 75% of my production fitting sub-bass into my music and holy shit, it's still not working the way I want it.

Well, ummm... Your first sentence is cause, the bit about 75% is your effect. You should NEVER mix ANYTHING anywhere NEAR full meter man, thats a terrible, terrible terrible idea. -6db is half headroom for an mp3... So, if you have drums at -6db, and sub at -6db, everytime they hit at the same time, regardless of frequency, youve filled your headroom. Read maccs mixing and mastering thread. I just bit his example right off the first page.

Isturite wrote:Try mixing it then listening to it on tons of different types of speakers to make sure it works okay.... you don't want to give a cd to a friend and blow their speakers out.... because IT WOULD BE YOUR FAULT sadly enough

You shouldnt have to do that... You should know your monitors and your meters well enough to be mixing this shit down clean enough you dont worry about hurting other systems. The only reason anything would ever 'blow' someones speakers is if you put a ridiculous amount of preamp, clipped, over drived craziness.


Dont take the long reply as dickish man, read a bit, reference with the mixing thread at the top...

And that should answer O.P.'s question to....

/thread

stappard wrote: dont fucking do that for gods sake itll be a disaster.

You typed that while I was posting what I just did.

I didnt know I was aloud to be that blunt about it.