crimsonwarlock wrote: ↑12 Mar 2024
dvdrtldg wrote: ↑12 Mar 2024
Agree with the first part of that
But when it comes to "use your ears", isn't the issue that a track might have some low-end content that you *can't* hear when you solo the track? But then if you end up with 20 tracks with the same sort of redundant low-end content, it starts to sound muddy in the mix?
Of course, removing low-end rumble on a channel is a good idea. I use spectrum analyzers like everyone else. However, I don't go looking around at EVERY track with an analyzer to see if there is any low-end rumble. I use my ears first, and only when I suspect a problem (that I can hear), I look at the track I suspect for that. And yes, that can be quite a few tracks, but never all of them.
Putting a HPF on every track in your mix will result in a bad-sounding mix in most cases. To be honest, I have much more trouble managing the high-end (or lack thereof) in my mixes.
Throw in a kick and a bass (instrument) note in your sequencer, playing at the same time.
Flip the polarity of one. Hear something changing?
Undo.
Move one just a few ticks away. Hear the difference?
Undo.
Start applying a high pass filter to the bass note (since it probably will be silent below 40 Hz). You hear that something is changing, right? Yet you probably didn't even cut up to 40 Hz.
You know what's happening, right?
Let's say, your kick and bass in a song play together perfectly. The bass is nice and clean up to 40 Hz, but the kick has some ugly rumbling going on below 30 Hz, which sounds unpleasant and even hits below 20 Hz. You would rather apply an HPF on the kick only, risking ruining the sound, because of phase shift that can cause frequency cancellation? You may end up with with both sounding dead when they play/hit together at the same time.
In such case, it's far smarter to put both in a group channel, and then apply a single HPF.
If your mix is doing great, but there's some rumble left to remove, say only below 30 Hz, which you don't find pleasant sounding and want silent (cause you didn't have any content planned below 30 Hz), then what do you do?