Author Topic: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?  (Read 30381 times)

Xyroid

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DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« on: January 08, 2016, 06:17:51 am »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd


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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #1 on: January 08, 2016, 07:25:38 am »
It's all gonna be dependent upon the key of your track and all that good stuff, but a good starting point is to try and have a 100 Hz kick and a 200 Hz snare. From there, you can just high pass everything else at like 150-200 Hz and your low end is free to work on its on. With DnB especially you want to make sure your kick has a nice tight tail, so that there's no bleedover between the end of your kick and when the compressor lifts off the sub.

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #2 on: January 08, 2016, 07:34:39 am »
Worth noting that in bass music, like Drum n Bass, the kick will often sit above the sub bass in the mix. Sitting the kick higher up around 80-120hz lets you fill the low end with bass/sub bass elements. You will need to make room for each one in the mix, so try not to have too much kick weight under it's fundamental range that's going to fight the sub for space. Make dips and cuts in the bass for the kick, too.
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Mat_Zo

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #3 on: January 08, 2016, 07:52:18 am »
Really short sidechaining with the kick and snare, although it's really difficult to get rid of clicks when you do that. So i make sure i have my mid basses grouped with the sub before I sidechain, and this usually sorts out most of the clicking problem. With DnB, its also important not to make your kicks too long, snares as well.

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #4 on: January 08, 2016, 08:00:03 am »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd



As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Mat_Zo

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #5 on: January 08, 2016, 08:25:39 am »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd



As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me

TeeBee

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #6 on: January 08, 2016, 02:12:36 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd




As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me


-This is why I came up with a tually cutting into audio .I find in logic,any volume fade shorter than 16 actually creates a click on the file as well btw . the new proc2 has lookahead ,so that one is much less clicky , but the clicks come due to waveforms being drasticly cut beyond the nought line ,a slower attack on the sc comp usually sort this i find anything less than 3ms will get you a click . But then you defeat the purpose of getting the very transient of the sidechain free as it will overlap .A way to do this is to create a silent sc track that is a few clicks off the grid to feed the sc compressor so the 3ms attack hits from that source 3-4 ms early . Do I make sense here ?!?! Hehe

Yens

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #7 on: January 08, 2016, 02:17:39 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd




As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me


-This is why I came up with a tually cutting into audio .I find in logic,any volume fade shorter than 16 actually creates a click on the file as well btw . the new proc2 has lookahead ,so that one is much less clicky , but the clicks come due to waveforms being drasticly cut beyond the nought line ,a slower attack on the sc comp usually sort this i find anything less than 3ms will get you a click . But then you defeat the purpose of getting the very transient of the sidechain free as it will overlap .A way to do this is to create a silent sc track that is a few clicks off the grid to feed the sc compressor so the 3ms attack hits from that source 3-4 ms early . Do I make sense here ?!?! Hehe

I understand every production related word in this text, but when i put everything together it doesn't really make sense to me. But that's probably because i'm not good in putting theory into practice  :-\

noidywgnivek

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #8 on: January 08, 2016, 02:56:33 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd




As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me


-This is why I came up with a tually cutting into audio .I find in logic,any volume fade shorter than 16 actually creates a click on the file as well btw . the new proc2 has lookahead ,so that one is much less clicky , but the clicks come due to waveforms being drasticly cut beyond the nought line ,a slower attack on the sc comp usually sort this i find anything less than 3ms will get you a click . But then you defeat the purpose of getting the very transient of the sidechain free as it will overlap .A way to do this is to create a silent sc track that is a few clicks off the grid to feed the sc compressor so the 3ms attack hits from that source 3-4 ms early . Do I make sense here ?!?! Hehe

I understand every production related word in this text, but when i put everything together it doesn't really make sense to me. But that's probably because i'm not good in putting theory into practice  :-\

I think he means that he uses a sidechain thats a few ms ahead of the grid. This way you can set the attack time a little bit longer so you don't have clicks, but still have the entire transient freed up.

Scribit

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #9 on: January 08, 2016, 03:00:33 pm »
^^^ thats a pretty good idea. The only issue I can potentially see is that it creates a weird groove being slightly ahead of the grid
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Yens

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #10 on: January 08, 2016, 03:07:43 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd




As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me


-This is why I came up with a tually cutting into audio .I find in logic,any volume fade shorter than 16 actually creates a click on the file as well btw . the new proc2 has lookahead ,so that one is much less clicky , but the clicks come due to waveforms being drasticly cut beyond the nought line ,a slower attack on the sc comp usually sort this i find anything less than 3ms will get you a click . But then you defeat the purpose of getting the very transient of the sidechain free as it will overlap .A way to do this is to create a silent sc track that is a few clicks off the grid to feed the sc compressor so the 3ms attack hits from that source 3-4 ms early . Do I make sense here ?!?! Hehe

I understand every production related word in this text, but when i put everything together it doesn't really make sense to me. But that's probably because i'm not good in putting theory into practice  :-\

I think he means that he uses a sidechain thats a few ms ahead of the grid. This way you can set the attack time a little bit longer so you don't have clicks, but still have the entire transient freed up.
So, by using for example a ghost kick ahead of the grid?

Seneta

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #11 on: January 08, 2016, 03:17:15 pm »
I had a go at it with this tutorial but didn't sc it at the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vs_pA0T1zzA

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #12 on: January 08, 2016, 09:01:44 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd



As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me

Yo Mat, one really easy way to get rid of the clicks on the sub is to put a low pass after the sidechain and filter out the click :) only works for sub though since you probably wouldn't want to filter out harmonics of other sounds

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #13 on: January 09, 2016, 12:08:27 am »
I think the reason why the click appears is because compression happends in realtime and thus it takes a few ms for the compressor to register the trigger signal which means that a tiny part of the sound goes through the compressor unprocessed. Then the compressor triggers and the fast attack time distorts the waveform for a split second during the volume change. The added harmonics result in a click because any sound event shortenr than 50 ms is perceived as a click i think. I havent tried this, but couldn't one way to prevent this be to add a sample that is like 50 ms long right before your ghost kick and then set all sidechain compressor atack rate to 50 ms so that the volume automation happends before the trigger solve the problem?:)

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Re: DnB Help - How do you mix the kick and subbass?
« Reply #14 on: January 09, 2016, 01:10:39 pm »
I don't know how to mix the kick and subbass

What I'm doing is I'm using the sidechain compression method

How about the EQ? from what hz range should the kick be where it doesn't clash with the subbass, or how should the subbass be eq'd



As Mat mentioned,really quick sidechaining , but that isn't always getting good enough results .The best way I find is actually cutting a hole in the element I want ducking and tailoring the volume curve to the curve of the kick/whatever I want prominent for that split second .I also look at a bus with both sources going to that and make sure I manage to keep the volume about the same as when the kick/snare goes by itself to maximise headroom overall .A loud,punchy mix is made on the channels,not the master .-TeeBee

Do you have any tips on getting rid of sidechaining clicks? this is something thats always bugged me

Yo Mat, one really easy way to get rid of the clicks on the sub is to put a low pass after the sidechain and filter out the click :) only works for sub though since you probably wouldn't want to filter out harmonics of other sounds

Yeh, I do this sometimes, but it still adds a 'lump' where the transient should cut it out completely. I guess I'll just have to do it the long way like TeeBee said...


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