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No, never been a Scientologist. [snicker] I
amazingly did not bring my dear old 200W-channel Sony AV900 with me, nor the
four rebuilt Altec-Lansings I had hooked up to it, when I moved to London in
2000. It was a bit of a mad dash to get over here and out of the Alhambra
apartment I'd lived in for 12 years, and the original intent was to come back in
2001 to get the rest of my stuff out of storage once and for all. Sigh, my
Juno-106 and the entire CD collection (except Lou Reed-to-Rolling Stones, and
Van Halen-to-ZZ Top, oddly enough, great stuff to continue practicing with in
the albeit long interim)... Well, one of these days I'm coming out there to get
it, and hopefully will be combining this with a gig or five as
well.
I don't think Reznor was on that disc - I remember
seeing one with his name on it at the late, great Poobah's in Pasadena, the same
week Bowie and Reznor appeared on MTTV looking all leathered and chummy, to
introduce the video (which has Bowie looking over his shoulder to see Reznor in
the distance, following)... oh, and it was Ice Cube, not Ice-T... what an old
poop I'm becoming. If you had mentioned to anyone in the early 1970s that
people in their fifties-sixties would wax nostalgic about glitter/glam, or that
Bowie would still be at it, what a strange reaction that might have
been...
Was that version of I'm Afraid of Americans"
done with Nine Inch Nails artist Trent Reznor? I think I have that one,
and it has serious low end, but nothing that appeared to damage or distort my
equipment... are you playing with tin cans stephen? ;)
On Jan 7, 2008 4:32 PM, Stephen Goodman < spgoodman@earthlight.net>
wrote:
What
you're describing is an awful lot like something I encountered on a
Bowie
CD in 2000... Right before I left the US to get married I got ahold of
a
-gasp!- CD extended single of "I'm Afraid of Americans"... The first title
cut is fine, and the second, a remix with Ice-T... but the third track
had
this really annoying low freq sound, repeated rhythmically (making it
even
more annoying)... it made my woofers make a wet 'dlptdlptdlpt'
(think of
your lips imitating a motor boat, lowered around 10 octaves?)
sound that
frankly made me wonder if the track was engineered for
those
half-the-size-of-the-trunk subwoofers for vehicles most of the
world outside
LA wouldn't see until "Fast and Furious" came out... I so
avoided the track
that I burned the other tracks to my own CD, making a
10-minute version of
the title song.
While it made me wonder if
the track was deliberately done that way, to
rattle the car next to
you.. what you're saying here balances it out for me.
Maybe the track was
just a victim of too much work.. Did anyone else get
this
disc?
Sorry to interrupt with the OT musing.
Sent: Monday, 7 January, 2008 15:26 PM
Subject: Re:
Powered Subs...on to mastering
> I've been doing a lot of mastering and mixing lately
on a project and have
> learned a lot of new methods and techniques.
I've heard folks say
> mastering and mixing is a black art, now
I know why. In these particular
> songs, they sounded wonderful on my
headphones. There were some really
> cool and deep things going on in
the 44hz range and below, and some others
> in the 62hz range. It all
sounded great through my headphones, but those
> frequencies were
reeking havoc on my consumer stereo systems - car stereo,
> portable
stereo, etc. They were really prominent resonant frequencies that
>
were rattling the hell out of the speakers and causing distortion. And
it
> wasn't a level problem...all my stuff was compressed/limited and
below
> 0db, and there was no redlining in my original recordings. It
only had to
> address troublesome resonant frequencies. So, I
had to go back and
> re-master the files, adding a high pass filter
that rolled everything off
> below 60hz. That did the trick, but I
really miss the sound in the
> headphones. And I'm sure there are some
hi fi systems that would have
> produced the original files well, but
I can't expect everyone to have a
> system like that. Then I
started fine tuning some of the other songs,
> doing a frequency
spectrum analysis, watching and listening for other
> resonant
frequencies, unusual spikes, etc....correcting them with various
>
parametric EQs and so on. Then it got complicated, because if I
was
> altering a whole mix, then I could not fix one problem from an
instrument
> in the mix, without changing the frequency of another
instrument...so I go
> back to the source tracks/wavs, etc, etc. I
could spend hours and hour
> just on one song and still not be
satisfied with the results, or waver
> between two different
approaches. Is there a simpler approach?
>
> I'm
wondering what others uses as a consistent approach to
>
mixing/mastering their music. For example, after you remove the
DC
> offset, do you apply a unique approach to applying EQ? What about
> compression/limiting? On average, how much of a threshold do
you apply?
> Do you suck the dynamic range out of your mixes to
maximize volume, or are
> you very conservative and preserve as much
of the original dynamic range
> as possible, sacrificing some volume.
What sort of tools are you using? I
> use Waves L2, and the whole
sweet of others in that package. Ever use
> Waves MaxxBass? I
read some articles that recommended it during the master
> process,
but I did not like the results. It altered too many other
>
frequencies in my mix beyond my original intent.
>
> Moreover,
the idealist/purist in me would like to preserve as much of my
>
original dynamic range and frequency character as possible. And,
quite
> honestly, if I ever catch a sound guy altering the EQ on my
guitar when it
> is was not meant to correct a problem but only server
his own idea of how
> a guitar should sound, he will hear some sharp
words from me. I spend a
> lot of time on the tone of my guitar,
and do not appreciate a sound guy
> butchering it because of his own
sound aesthetic. As they say, "If it
> ain't broke, don't fix
it."
>
> So, if I want to preserve as much of my dynamic range
and EQ as possible,
> what is the bare minimum I should be doing to my
final mixes to ensure
> they don't generate problems on the average
listener's stereo system? One
> source I found said to elminate
anything below 60hz because most systems
> wouldn't be ableto
represent it. I suppose if I wanted to be a purist, I
> would
only ensure my overall level is at or close to 0db, and not apply
>
any compression whatsoever...because once you do that, you are
already
> altering the original dynamic range of the piece. Then, in
principle, I
> should not have to mess with frequencies with EQ
whatsoever, unless there
> are serious playback issues on common
stereo systems. That is the
> direction I would like to head, but I
struggle with competing with other
> mixes out there in the same
genre that are so ridiculously loud because of
> the amount of
compression/limiting applied, followed by level increases.
> How much
of a change in dynamic range, from original source to mastered
>
recording can a human ear identify? If, just as an example, I start
with
> a -60db to 0db range (where only 10% of my material is above
-10db), and
> master my file so that 40% of my material is above
-10db, what am I
> sacrificing to obtain an overall perceived
increase in level? I suppose
> this is where the black art comes in,
because it's not as if there were a
> low of physics that dictates how
this should be done; rather it is based
> on subjective or relative
engineering practices.
>
> Any thoughts or best practices would
be appreciated here on how to be both
> a sound source
preservationist, yet a playback friendly sound engineer at
> the same
time.
>
> Kris
>
>
>
>
>>
Krispen Hartung wrote:
>>> As many folks know on the list, I use
laptop processing via max (looper,
>>> other octave effects)
that completely transform the sound of my guitar.
>>> It is not
uncommon for me to play a low E on the guitar (82.4hz), and
>>>
then apply a two octave drop. I'm not sure what that would
be.
>> Divide the frequency by two for each octave you drop.
(Multiply by two
>> for every octave you raise.)
82.4/4 = 20.6Hz. You're definitely into
>> the
subwoofer's range.
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>>
Bill
>>
>
>
>
>
>
--
---Miles Ward
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