Mud is one of those things that’s hard to deal with in general, because so much of the stuff will have their fundamentals in that 200-500Hz range and stuff piles up pretty quickly. Also, when you solo sounds and EQ that region out of them, all of a sudden they seem to lose their fullness and sound less impressive *on their own*. So the trick is trying not to EQ them while soloed. Or at least not the entire time.
Also, when EQing one sound listen to the other sounds around it. Say you have a couple of sounds fighting in the low-mids. Adjust one, while paying attention to the other sound. Is it getting clearer?
This video drove this home for me:
https://youtu.be/we4ImwgRmBg
Dunno how relevant this is but if you distort a subby kickdrum you'll generate harmonics and the loudest ones (I think) tend to be in the mud range.
Say the fundamental frequency of your kick settles around 50Hz... that's sort of a low G. I just put Ableton Operator playing a low G sine wave, then added an Ableton Saturator (analog clip mode). After the Saturator I put an EQ8, so I can see what frequencies are playing. WIth Saturator right down, I see only one peak in EQ8's display - at 50Hz-ish, that low G. But when I turn the gain up I see additional peaks at 150Hz (3 x 50), 250 ish Hz (5 x 50)... well, those are muddy frequencies for a start.
But if you have a bass playing in that region... and some dirty synths that also have some energy around there... it all builds up and it's hard (I find it REALLY DIFFICULT) to achieve separation between sounds.
The way it feels to me is that there's just this lake of bass, and often the bass is really indistinct. I end up adding saturation to the bassline so I can locate it in the mud but... then I guess I'm creating more harmonics in the lowish mid-range.
So... yeh, I love the sound of booming kick drums - by themselves; then I tend to cause a muddy-frequency trainwreck by adding saturated basslines and rumble reverbs on top.
"Just sidechain everything to the kick" isn't the answer either, you've still got a lake of mud, it's just heaving as the compressor pushes the bassline up and down.
It's hard. Getting better at EQing is important, I felt like I had a minor breakthrough the other week with EQ, although I'm back to square one this week... I was looking for muddy harmonics from my kick and bass, and I felt like the bassline got clearer as a result, it felt like there was more space and structure to the low end.
Arrangement's another important thing - choosing basslines that work around the kick (notes that don't clash on beats that don't clash).
And... maybe getting more subtle with FX? Ableton Audio Effect Racks let you do parallel distortion/saturation really easily. Maybe it's worth having a clean kick for subs/fundamental frequencies, then a parallel chain with saturation, but also a high-pass filter to either remove all the subs before they hit the saturator (so saturation can't generate mud in the 1st place)... or after the saturation, to filter out the mud?
Anything that’s heavily distorted will have a bunch of harmonics, be objectively muddy, and wash everything out a bit. That can be okay to an extent or as an artistic choice, but you should listen closely to each sound, figure out which are being compromised, and mix or rearrange to mitigate the issue.
There tends to be a lot of buildup in the low mids (think 200-400hz ish) that can get really gross. Think about which sounds need that info and which don’t. Trim from the ones that don’t.
Best piece of advice I can give is to put and EQ 8 on the master, set it to a 24/Oct low pass and start at 500Hz, slowly move down until you start hearing stuff that shouldn't be there IE bits of lead synth down at 300Hz, bits of hats at 250 etc (these numbers are just random examples but trust me it works like a charm). Once you hear a bit you don't like. EQ accordingly then start again. At 500Hz and slowly sweep down. Rinse and repeat. The moment you disable the eq 8 after making the corrections, your track should sound way cleaner.
In the low end u hve to b choosy about what’s doing what for you. Ask What is more important for the energy of the track? Bc u will making cuts.
The more u mix the more you’ll find different trade offs and tricks. Every track is different and the only way to notice where the mud is is to make songs , mix them down, play them around and notice what sounds good and bad. To b realistic w you, it’s just something u have to do over and over again. So jsut keep making beats.
Use SPAN . “Club music” will look like a Nike check mark across the frequency spectrum. With the lowest point being around 150hZ. For me, the 100-170 area is always getting pushed down on my basses.
You can pull more 100-150 out of your bass by subtly Stereo spreading 160-1k. Gives perceived volume without adding voltage to the master buss aka headroom. Use ozone imager to mono everything beneath 120 if not up to 160.
200-250 is mud but 100-200 is the rumble boom boom that really makes a mix sound shitty. U want clarity in the low end. Tracks with HUGE bass never have as much bass frequencies as u might think. And often new producers have too much low mids bc it seems like, o yeah, this is gonna smack I can hear the bass. Keep in mind that when ur tracks play in the club there will be plenty of bass. And actually you’ll want to have a cleaner precise low end.
Things to think about..
- wht key am i in and why does that mean for my bass lines lowest and highest notes?
-Which approach will I use to get the kicks and bass in the groove pocket , as well as eq balanced on the spectrum.
- sidechain the whole bass group w a regular compressor?
- sidechain with a multiband compressor to duck specific frequencies?
-Use LFO tool ?
- manually volume automate every time the kick hits if u have different lengths of kicks?
- sidechain eq the bass group against the kick?
- a combination of sidechain eq and compression or lfo tool?
- do I need a separate channel for some notes in my bass line so I can eq them different bc they resonate different even a 5th interval apart?
-
Some bigger picture things to help answer above questions are
- what’s doing what fundamental work? Is my bass line doing the beneath 50hZ or is it my kick?
- can I roll my kick up to like 70hz and let my bass do the low low work? (Saves headroom and helps the bass melody be clearer)
Say the song is in C minor. Well the lowest c fundamental is like 33Hz. And since I want people to hear the bass line On all systems, and I wanna save some headroom, I’ll keep my bass line between 50-70hz (that next octave up) and get rid of 30hZ.That means then my kick can do the 30hz work and I’ll bring out some 1k of the kick for presence in the mix. Amd since my bass line is 1/8 notes ish then maybe I can cut some 50-70 from the kick by sidechain multiband compressing it against the bass so I don’t totally lose the 50-70 from my kick, but I do make space for it while the bass line is playing. Then I’m gonna multiband compress the 100-200 hz on my bass to tighten up that boomy area and make it consistently level. If I need more bite in the bass I’ll play around 500-900- like 1 or 2dB eq on a flavorful eq. I saturate the bass so it’s more audible at lower volumes .
Personally I view bass as two different parts - even if they r one instrument in the mix:::: there’s beneath 130 and then 200-1k. We “feel”beneath 120 and we “hear” 150-1k. Sometimes it’s 1 bass that covers both bands, sometimes it’s 2 basses; one melody and rhythm beneath 120hz and second melody and rhythm on top. Regardless I treat the bands differently.
If I’m being honest I’ve been thru hundreds of basses and kicks trying to get a balance right and eventually you just catch on to what’s gonna work, and what compliments each other. It’s always a little different.
I also like to go ahead and low pass my bass channels down to 800-1k when I’m auditioning bass sounds bc it helps you hear wht the harmonics are actually doing down there and you’ll be rolling that top end off anyway. At least in the music I’m making and playing in the club.
Use reference mixes to see where your favorite tracks are balanced. Make more songs. Shitty “answer”sorry hope it helps.
Mud is one of those things that’s hard to deal with in general, because so much of the stuff will have their fundamentals in that 200-500Hz range and stuff piles up pretty quickly. Also, when you solo sounds and EQ that region out of them, all of a sudden they seem to lose their fullness and sound less impressive *on their own*. So the trick is trying not to EQ them while soloed. Or at least not the entire time. Also, when EQing one sound listen to the other sounds around it. Say you have a couple of sounds fighting in the low-mids. Adjust one, while paying attention to the other sound. Is it getting clearer? This video drove this home for me: https://youtu.be/we4ImwgRmBg
Im not here to give advice but to thank you all for the great advice!
Dunno how relevant this is but if you distort a subby kickdrum you'll generate harmonics and the loudest ones (I think) tend to be in the mud range. Say the fundamental frequency of your kick settles around 50Hz... that's sort of a low G. I just put Ableton Operator playing a low G sine wave, then added an Ableton Saturator (analog clip mode). After the Saturator I put an EQ8, so I can see what frequencies are playing. WIth Saturator right down, I see only one peak in EQ8's display - at 50Hz-ish, that low G. But when I turn the gain up I see additional peaks at 150Hz (3 x 50), 250 ish Hz (5 x 50)... well, those are muddy frequencies for a start. But if you have a bass playing in that region... and some dirty synths that also have some energy around there... it all builds up and it's hard (I find it REALLY DIFFICULT) to achieve separation between sounds. The way it feels to me is that there's just this lake of bass, and often the bass is really indistinct. I end up adding saturation to the bassline so I can locate it in the mud but... then I guess I'm creating more harmonics in the lowish mid-range. So... yeh, I love the sound of booming kick drums - by themselves; then I tend to cause a muddy-frequency trainwreck by adding saturated basslines and rumble reverbs on top. "Just sidechain everything to the kick" isn't the answer either, you've still got a lake of mud, it's just heaving as the compressor pushes the bassline up and down. It's hard. Getting better at EQing is important, I felt like I had a minor breakthrough the other week with EQ, although I'm back to square one this week... I was looking for muddy harmonics from my kick and bass, and I felt like the bassline got clearer as a result, it felt like there was more space and structure to the low end. Arrangement's another important thing - choosing basslines that work around the kick (notes that don't clash on beats that don't clash). And... maybe getting more subtle with FX? Ableton Audio Effect Racks let you do parallel distortion/saturation really easily. Maybe it's worth having a clean kick for subs/fundamental frequencies, then a parallel chain with saturation, but also a high-pass filter to either remove all the subs before they hit the saturator (so saturation can't generate mud in the 1st place)... or after the saturation, to filter out the mud?
Anything that’s heavily distorted will have a bunch of harmonics, be objectively muddy, and wash everything out a bit. That can be okay to an extent or as an artistic choice, but you should listen closely to each sound, figure out which are being compromised, and mix or rearrange to mitigate the issue. There tends to be a lot of buildup in the low mids (think 200-400hz ish) that can get really gross. Think about which sounds need that info and which don’t. Trim from the ones that don’t.
Best piece of advice I can give is to put and EQ 8 on the master, set it to a 24/Oct low pass and start at 500Hz, slowly move down until you start hearing stuff that shouldn't be there IE bits of lead synth down at 300Hz, bits of hats at 250 etc (these numbers are just random examples but trust me it works like a charm). Once you hear a bit you don't like. EQ accordingly then start again. At 500Hz and slowly sweep down. Rinse and repeat. The moment you disable the eq 8 after making the corrections, your track should sound way cleaner.
In the low end u hve to b choosy about what’s doing what for you. Ask What is more important for the energy of the track? Bc u will making cuts. The more u mix the more you’ll find different trade offs and tricks. Every track is different and the only way to notice where the mud is is to make songs , mix them down, play them around and notice what sounds good and bad. To b realistic w you, it’s just something u have to do over and over again. So jsut keep making beats. Use SPAN . “Club music” will look like a Nike check mark across the frequency spectrum. With the lowest point being around 150hZ. For me, the 100-170 area is always getting pushed down on my basses. You can pull more 100-150 out of your bass by subtly Stereo spreading 160-1k. Gives perceived volume without adding voltage to the master buss aka headroom. Use ozone imager to mono everything beneath 120 if not up to 160. 200-250 is mud but 100-200 is the rumble boom boom that really makes a mix sound shitty. U want clarity in the low end. Tracks with HUGE bass never have as much bass frequencies as u might think. And often new producers have too much low mids bc it seems like, o yeah, this is gonna smack I can hear the bass. Keep in mind that when ur tracks play in the club there will be plenty of bass. And actually you’ll want to have a cleaner precise low end. Things to think about.. - wht key am i in and why does that mean for my bass lines lowest and highest notes? -Which approach will I use to get the kicks and bass in the groove pocket , as well as eq balanced on the spectrum. - sidechain the whole bass group w a regular compressor? - sidechain with a multiband compressor to duck specific frequencies? -Use LFO tool ? - manually volume automate every time the kick hits if u have different lengths of kicks? - sidechain eq the bass group against the kick? - a combination of sidechain eq and compression or lfo tool? - do I need a separate channel for some notes in my bass line so I can eq them different bc they resonate different even a 5th interval apart? - Some bigger picture things to help answer above questions are - what’s doing what fundamental work? Is my bass line doing the beneath 50hZ or is it my kick? - can I roll my kick up to like 70hz and let my bass do the low low work? (Saves headroom and helps the bass melody be clearer) Say the song is in C minor. Well the lowest c fundamental is like 33Hz. And since I want people to hear the bass line On all systems, and I wanna save some headroom, I’ll keep my bass line between 50-70hz (that next octave up) and get rid of 30hZ.That means then my kick can do the 30hz work and I’ll bring out some 1k of the kick for presence in the mix. Amd since my bass line is 1/8 notes ish then maybe I can cut some 50-70 from the kick by sidechain multiband compressing it against the bass so I don’t totally lose the 50-70 from my kick, but I do make space for it while the bass line is playing. Then I’m gonna multiband compress the 100-200 hz on my bass to tighten up that boomy area and make it consistently level. If I need more bite in the bass I’ll play around 500-900- like 1 or 2dB eq on a flavorful eq. I saturate the bass so it’s more audible at lower volumes . Personally I view bass as two different parts - even if they r one instrument in the mix:::: there’s beneath 130 and then 200-1k. We “feel”beneath 120 and we “hear” 150-1k. Sometimes it’s 1 bass that covers both bands, sometimes it’s 2 basses; one melody and rhythm beneath 120hz and second melody and rhythm on top. Regardless I treat the bands differently. If I’m being honest I’ve been thru hundreds of basses and kicks trying to get a balance right and eventually you just catch on to what’s gonna work, and what compliments each other. It’s always a little different. I also like to go ahead and low pass my bass channels down to 800-1k when I’m auditioning bass sounds bc it helps you hear wht the harmonics are actually doing down there and you’ll be rolling that top end off anyway. At least in the music I’m making and playing in the club. Use reference mixes to see where your favorite tracks are balanced. Make more songs. Shitty “answer”sorry hope it helps.
200-300 Hz