MAGIC EQ FREQUENCIES

Before I’m even going to reveal my magic EQ frequencies, I want to take this opportunity to give every one a little advice; I’d rather advice every one to cut before boost. EQ in general works better “subtractive” than “additive”. (low) Shelving before compression will help your compressor to act smoother, and cutting before boosting will help you to create a better overview of your mix. Keep this in mind or it will haunt you for the rest of your entire career and probably also your life.

I strongly advice you to sweep around the following frequencies and play around with the amount of subtractive and additive dB’s. Keep in mind that you can apply more dB/ octave subtractive than additive (!!!). These issues have been addressed in an earlier post which you can find here.

For some of the subtractive work I make use of side-chaining in the form of dynamic-eq. The reason for this is that it sounds more transparent rather than static.

THE MAGIC CHART

40 CYCLES
Reduce to increase overtones and recognition and tighter sound of kick drum. Shelf equalization.

64 CYCLES
Increase to add more fullness to kick drum (fundamental, 1st harmonic). Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

72 CYCLES
Increase to add fullness to bass. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

100 CYCLES
Increase for fullness to floor toms. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Increase for warmer sound of piano and horns. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0 for piano, and 1.3 for horns.
Increase for warmer sound of strings. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce to decrease boominess of vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

120 CYCLES
Reduce to increase clarity on all instruments except, kick, bass, toms and other low-end related instruments. Shelf equalization.

128 CYCLES
Increase for harder sound, clarity and punch to kick drum (2nd harmonic, 1st overtone). Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

200 CYCLES
Increase to add fullness to snare, guitars, and vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3 for snare and guitars, and 1.0 for vocals.
Reduce to decrease gong sound of cymbals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

240 CYCLES
Reduce to decrease muddiness of vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of 1.0.
Reduce to decrease sustaining sound of bass. Peak equalization with a Q of 2.0.

300 CYCLES
Reduce to decrease muddiness of mid-range instruments. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce on kick drum for clarity of mid-range instruments such as vocals and pads. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

500 CYCLES
Reduce to decrease cardboard sound. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce to decrease ambience on cymbals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

600 CYCLES
Reduce on kick drum for clarity of lead vocals body. Peak equalization of 1.0.
Increase to add guts/ body to lead vocal. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Trick: reduce on all backing track instruments to achieve clarity, and put lead vocal solid on top of the backing track (instruments).

740 CYCLES
Reduce on snare to increase clarity of over-heads, hi-hats and cymbals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

900 CYCLES
Increase for clarity and punch of bass. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Reduce to remove cheap sound of guitars. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

1,000 CYCLES
Increase for body of keyboards/ synthesizers. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

1,500 CYCLES
Increase for clarity and pluck of bass. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

2,500 CYCLES
Increase for attack of snare. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Increase for more attack of electric and acoustic guitar. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

3,000 CYCLES
Increase for more clarity and harshness of lead vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Increase for more attack on low piano parts. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce to increase breathy, soft -sound on background vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce to increase overtones of bass, and clarity of other instruments. Shelf equalization.
Trick: reduce on all backing track instruments to achieve clarity, and put lead vocal solid on top of the backing track (instruments).

4,000 CYCLES
Increase for attack of kick drum. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Reduce to decrease harshness of electric guitars (rock guitars). Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

5,000 CYCLES
Increase for presence of vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Increase for attack of toms. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Increase for attack of piano and (acoustic) guitars. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Reduce to make instruments appear more distant. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Reduce to remove cheap digital sound of reverbs and other digital effects. Shelf equalization.

7,000 CYCLES
Increase to add sharpness/ bite on synthesizers. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Increase to add sharpness to piano. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Increase to add sharpness to guitars. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Increase for dull singer. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.
Reduce for less “S” sound on vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 2.0.

10,000 CYCLES
Increase for air on vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.
Increase on overall stereo mix (2TR) to add air and brighten up the final mix. Shelf equalization.

14,000 CYCLES
Increase to make sampled synthesizers sound more analogue. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0
Increase for air on cymbals, strings, and flutes. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.3.

16,000 CYCLES
Increase for air on vocals. Peak equalization with a Q of about 1.0.

Note: Please keep in mind that the following are approximate values and are song dependent and root key related (!!!).

I hope this chart will help you to create better and cleaner sounding records. And as for any thing you can always reach me on royalcollegeofsurgeonsinc @ gmail . com.

Signing off from Studio A at Glenwood Place Studios in Burbank, CA.

The Music Surgeon

The Art of Picking the Right Drum Samples

Todays post is some thing I find very important for all producers of all levels. But we only experience it with aspiring producers. Please watch the video posted below before you continue to finish reading this blog post.

First off all I don’t want to go ahead and dis-credit my man Kayne West. He’s an awsum producer and I have loads of respect for him. However this video shows one of the most important factors in producing music. With my background as a producer of dance music a few years back, I can’t stress how important it is to pick the right drum samples for your song.

Picking the Right Drum Samples
Loads of times when I mix tracks for aspiring producers I have to deal with wrongly sampled and/ or picked drum samples. Samples including to much crackle and noise or even worse samples with nothing to it. In short samples we hardly can work with or do any thing with it at all. Sonically choosing the wrong samples does affect your final product in a major way sonically. You can hear Mr. West talk about it:

“Although the song is hot, the drums ain’t right.” – Kayne West about Stronger.

On top of that he added that because the drums aren’t right, the kick drum doesn’t hit in the clubs.

The main reason why that happens is perfectly explained by Timbaland in the very same video example above:

“You can’t compress some thing that isn’t there.” – Timbaland about the kick drum in Stronger.

Please keep these two quotes in mind at all time. Write it down and live it, is basically what I want to tell you.

The lesson for today: Every time you produce a track go and find clean samples with body.

Layering Your Drums
Another thing I can’t stress how important layering your drums is. Timbaland shows that more then clearly in the exampled video above.
A lot of tracks I receive for mixing from seasoned producers like Brian Michael Cox, Rodney “Darkchild” Jerkins, and others have three kicks, three snares. The reason for this is that some samples lack frequency respons, or you want to accentrate a certain frequency region such as the low end or attack. Therefore layering your drum sounds to make up for this and support your overal drum sound will make your beat sound much and much stronger. Also make sure when you use EQ during this stage that it is way more better to cut then boost.

The lesson on this for today: Beat making starts with your drums, so you have to make sure they’re tight before building on top of them.

Editing Your Samples
Adding to these issues it is also important to edit your samples when building your beat. Make sure every single samples starts from the start of the sample. There’s nothing more annoying and lacking in “punch” than tracks with a beat where the samples aren’t tight. Note: I’m not talking about quantizing or it’s vallues, especially not the fantastic rythmic quantization groove of the Akai MPC’s.
Another thing with editing your drum samples I want to address is to pitch them to the right root key. We need to tune them a lot of time and if you have got the luxury of an engineer during your production sessions, it isn’t a problem but for those who work outside of their bedroom studios and can’t effort that luxury, please listen and re-tune your samples to the right root key that will save you at the end of the day a lot of money and your demo’s will sound sonically way better, more pleasant, and tighter.

I hope I have helped you in some way by posting this blog. Please be adviced if you are about to let me mix a session or you have questions in general please contact me via email on royalcollegeofsurgeonsinc @ gmail . com or via iChat/ AIM screenname mirrormixing.

Signing off,

Yours sincerely,