ok, I trying to flatten out freq response of my bassline completelly for some reason, is it possible? I use multiband compressor but obviously without much success. It always looks like i didn't compress much, because frequency response always looks the same pretty much. I have -8db in the mid range and my goal is to even out with highs and lows. How to do that? I'm a novice in music production, so if you have any advice would be great.

 

You don't have to EQ/Compress a certain instrument track just so you make it look in a certain way in the spectrum analyzer. Use your ears, not your eyes. Spectrum analyzer shouldn't get over your ears. It's there to be handy for certain tasks, but it shouldn't get over your ears.

So... back to your question... Even if it would be possible to flatten out a instrument track completely, then i think it would sound anything but musical.
Sometimes, flat doesn't mean "musical". Back in the day, they've used 4-track rocorders in order to give birth to hits and people were jamming their legs on the dance floor like crazy. My advice is to check that particular track in the context of your whole track and eq/compress it accordingly or with a certain purpose that you have in mind.
Think about what do you want to get from that track or how do you imagine it as an end result. Just hum/sing it in your mind, even the drum grooves. Use your creativity first and don't get cought in the technical obsession.

There's official/famous songs out there splitted in "multi-track" packs and if you would drop the analyzer over a bassline, you'll see that most of them doesn't look absolutely flat.

Sometimes, in a mix session, if you want to compress something, you don't have to do it drastically. Even 2-3db of GR would work nicely, which probably will look the same in the analyzer, but who gives a nap as long as it sounds different IN YOUR EARS. On every mixing task you approach, the ears are the main Judge and the eyes are the second in the order.

If there's anything in particulary you would like to know, write your question below.

All the best!

 

This question really doesn't make a lot of sense.

Maybe if you could explain why you'd want to do that, we could help more specifically.

 

Maybe that's how he define the "polished" word when it comes about mixing. But anyway... we'll look forward for his question if there's any particular reason for his "flattening" needs.

 

It is completely unnecessary to flatten out the response of an instrument because that is just not how sound works.

Sound is like throwing a stone into a pond, the initial ripple is the fundamental frequency, and the ones after are the Nth harmonics.

What you're trying to do is throw a stone and have a continuous set of equal ripples which is unnatural.

If you were to flatten out the response, you would essentially be playing the same note across N octaves.

 

I use compression to get rid of some peaks and bass rider to keep a balance between low and high notes and it seems to be enough, this flattering option
doesn't make a sense to me as low freq need to have more energy for our ears to cut through the mix.

 

I wont question your objective, but as you said you'r novice, you must know something:

Even the most simple sinusoidal wave form played on a synth will give different frequency response as its pitch changes.
You can easily see that for yourself by initializing any synth and load a single sine wave in its oscillator, play 2 different notes, and you'll see how the frequency response changes, this is part of sound's physics.

So, to achieve a flat response, and view it on an analyzer, if your bass line plays more than one different note, you will have to equalize each note differently. Even so, this is close to impossible.

Or your bass have to play only one note, and do so at the same dynamic always.

I'm saying the same as MYCbeats perfectly explains, another way.

If you could give link to the song or part of it, may be we could understand and help better. But if you want to have a more even sensation on your bass track, then you should use (multiband)compression.

 

ok, I watched Evoke´s tutorial about bassline sound design. And he said that we need a flat frequency response across the spectrum, and he used multiband compression and some eqing to achieve that.
So I recorded 1 note with basic notch filter to add some basic movement.And I got mess in my spectrum. Now I want to flatten that out because my next step is to put that in ableton´s sampler to add some FM modulation to it. But in order to FM sounds good in a sound It is a must to have a flat freq response of that sample.
What´s your thoughts about that?
Thanks you all for your responses

 

Culturekid, am i right in assuming your making a style of electronic dance music? If so, i think i understand what you are trying to do; the difficulty with basslines in dance music is that they must have an even response when you are using several different notes, else you can get massive volume differences and the dynamics of your kick & bass will be totally askew.

Multiband compression is a possibility, but nowadays there are also smart EQ's which will analyze the fundamental of the incoming note and shift your EQ point up or down to match it, making sure your EQ boost/cut will be at the correct corresponding frequency for the notes played.

I can recommend trying an EQ called surfEQ from sound radix, it can even out your bassline when you play several different notes, its one of more musical sounding EQs i have heard.

 

Technically you can flatten out all the frequencies from any audio source and get silence..
But, in this case, a "flat frequency response" basically means that you need to record your sample the way it sounds.
Speakin' poorly... just leave the sound alone!
Dont mess up with the EQ (even the amp one if you record through this) and record "as is".
Take just a look to the gain stage..
You basically need a "raw" sound that you will manipulate later via modulation.

Hope it helps!

 

but when I apply fm to that raw sound it sound awful because I have severeal peaks and when I modulate that fm knob it starts to cause problems. that is why iam trying to achieve that flat response without peaks. I know sentence is a bit messed cause my english is not good, obviously..

 

I agree on everything said before me.
Read some stuff the guys above pointed you to.
You're working on a bass you say? Well, a bass is...Bass. Trying to make its amplitude similar on all spectrum range with turn it into something else.
can't get what you mean with "flattening".
Any change in the frequency domain is achieved with equalization and filtering, not with dynamics processors as compressors/limiters/gates.

 

Also, some peaks he may find in the spectrum analyzer, those peaks might represent the harmonics of that particular sound and if you flatten them completely, it won't gonna sound as musical as before. For example, i saw a video in the past, featuring Morgan Page on Waves's YT channel and he was "tunning" a white noise by boosting with an EQ (Waves H-EQ which features that little keyboard panel under the analyzer, just as the new FF Pro-Q2) fundamental frequencies with narrow Qs at octave intervals, in order to emphasize the root note of that white noise to fit his song's scale. As far as we know, white noise is flat, that's why it sounds neutral regardless the song you use it as an ambience texture. So by flattening up a bass sound completely, you might make it sound more sterile and less musical.

 

to be honest i dont want to create something musical right now my goal is to create sound that is flat like pink noise but i cant because i have several peaks in the spectrum. All i want is to experiment with multiband compression.......Where you guys learned using multicomp...My problem with multiband compression is that I cannot/dont know how to bring those peaks down and bring the rest up.

 

my bassline stretches from 45hz to 18khz...I want to create sound that is flat like pink noise.... dont care is it musical or not right now

 

"Flat dynamic", instead of "Even frequencies"
You are speaking about notes not being equal level. That's another thing than frequencies. It is dynamic.

A lot of ppl use a smooth compressor, like CL1B, to even out notes levels.

Or (advanced technique), if there are only some notes "spiking" in the mix, a dynamic EQ set to those frequencies. When there are only harmonics, they pass through. When there is a fundamental hitting threshold, level is lowered.
Dynamic EQ is harder to learn, but more effective on subtle tasks

For now, try a smooth compressor.

 

I agree, but regarding compressors, most of them will smooth out the levels, not particullary and only the "smooth" ones. It's just a matter of how you tweak them.

 

what you will find is that he is not using multiband compression but doing the old trick of using the multiband compressor to frequency split the sound.
then turn up the highs with the output level of that frequency band.
you chould do this with shelving eq on the highs and lows but if you want to do it the same way as him.

make a fx rack with a multiband compressor in
set your frequency ranges
then duplicate it so you have 3 chains of it in the rack.
then on one solo the highs then the next solo the mids and finally on the last solo the lows.

then using eq to further reduce and peaks he dose not like.

if your clever you could use ProAudioDSP DSM V2 part of the plugin alliance bundle which also contains bx control that will sort out making your bass frequency's mono.


also when you put the sound in sampler and use fm on it the horrible sound you get dose it sound harsh and metallic?
if the answer is yes then welcome to fm synthesis as that is the nature of fm when it produces sidebands.