For a lot of percussion loops with no chords or musical variance, it simply means it's root note is F.

Any time you start to build huge amounts of intensity in a track, you're bound to have a few elements lose out in the end. You can do adjustments on the fly with automation, such as moving EQ bands or lowering/increasing volumes, to help keep parts in the frame, but not every sound will make it through in the thick of it.

The thing is, they don't necessarily have to. The human ear can only tune into and focus on about three or four distinct sounds at once. That's why simplicity sells so well: you only need a few decent sounds or 'hooks' in the track to keep someone attentive. The same applies for intense parts or huge transitions. If you have a big riser or FX track taking centre stage, it's going to snap focus away from other bits. That works in your favour! Let the other parts fall to the wayside for a moment, otherwise it's going to sound way too busy, and that's what starts to lose listeners.

If you have a listen to some of Andrew's tracks, especially in those big, intense parts before the track reaches a climax (Nobody Told Me is a great example), there's at least ten or so sounds going off at once. Pads, sweeps, chords, synth plucks, you name it. But listen to how each one shifts around and shares the limelight, rather than fighting to stay there. The chords come in, but then lose some sheen as the supersaw riff comes forth. When the pads reach their swell, the little melodic sounds in the background take a seat momentarily. You can really control how your track impacts upon listeners when you keep in mind that only a few parts will hook them at a time.

It's how producers like Andrew can get away with such a dense, populated arrangement, but not sound like a big mess. Listen to how parts share the spotlight. You only need a few hooks at a time to keep a listener engaged.

Quote from: Kinesthetics on January 15, 2016, 06:44:09 am

What you're hearing with the ASIO driver is pristine, unaltered audio. If it's sounding like trash in other software, it could be making it's own alterations to the sound. Broadband boosts in the bass end are a really common EQ make-up with some general software and audio drivers, to compensate for low-quality sound systems.

I'm listening to it within my DAW, I just switch between the ASIO driver and the internal sound card.

Your internal soundcard's driver might be the culprit.

If you're on Windows, right-click the speaker icon in the desktop notifications tray (bottom right of desktop toolbar), select 'Playback Devices', right-click whichever playback device takes over when you switch to internal soundcard, then right-click that and hit 'Properties'. Go over to the Enhancements tab, and un-check anything selected.

It's a really bad issue especially with RealTek drivers, which come with all sorts of adjustments set by default. Un-check any that are there, then try the audio again in your DAW.

A large number of overall mix issues are solved with levels and panning, long before you even touch an EQ or other tool.

A combination of both headphones and monitors works really well. Like Xilent, I'm doing most of my mix on headphones, but the monitors are crucial for sensing sound space and stereo; two things that headphones do a piss-poor job of representing. Even without a decent room or acoustic treatment, getting monitors really improved my mixes.

It's a quick way of accentuating parts of your track. For example, people often use it above chord riffs and leads. It adds a really strong sense of presence and clarity to parts by filling up the high spectrum, and since the human ear responds to treble fastest of all (Equal Loudness Contour), it tends to be the bit that stands out the strongest.

White noise works really well as an enhancer to many parts of tracks, even as far as bass-line top ends and as transient clicks on kicks in place of cymbals or other percussive strikes. It's getting to the point where it's a bit overused, though.

The high RMS peak most definitely starts with the mix first. You can only smash the fuck out of a track with a limiter so much before it just distorts instead.

As mentioned, the Equal Loudness Countour (Fletcher-Munson Curve) acts as a great guide to making a track that comes across as very loud. We tend to pick up on boosted mids much before boosted highs or lows.

Thanks guys! That Sub 37 looks really impressive.

Matt, I had my eye on the Mutable DIY kits they had (the Shruthi I think), and I thought I recognized some of their modular units in the pic. Really interesting sound shapers.