Kick then Bass / vice versa. making room

hi i think a thread may have been removed? cant remember what the original thread was about but it ended up me asking this question:

they say if you have a kick with lots of sub then you should have the bass above it and let the kick occupy the bottom end. theres also the flipside of that coin, say you have a real subby bass, you should have the kick above the bass…
so when making room for either the kcik or bass.  whats the cut off point on the hpf for either the kick or bass?
for example lets say we want the kick to be the bottom carrier and the bass above that. at what point would you say is too much or too little to roll off the bottom of the bass to allow them both to sit together without the bass interfering (not enough) or sounding weak (too much)?  ;):wink:

thanks

There is really no set rules. Use your ears, and a spectrum analyzer if you think your ears are deceiving you.

here’s the link [url]http://forums.sonicacademy.com/Topic17011-10-1.aspx[/url]

It all depends on what kind of kick and bass your using, its a really hard question to answer unless you have examples of the audio/samples your using.

[quote]closey1200 (14/04/2010)[hr]It all depends on what kind of kick and bass your using, its a really hard question to answer unless you have examples of the audio/samples your using.[/quote]yes of course, i understand that. just wanted a few pointers of what to listen/look(spectrum ana) for. is there a point at which its just known that the bass wont feel “bassy” anymore? like hpf at 100hz? 150hz? etc.
howies tip about the spectrum analyzer was very helpful. that the first peak in the spectrum is the fundemental and the rest after that are just harmonics. makes the analyzer abit more “clearer”  to read. :wink:
thanks for your reply dude :wink:

[quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]closey1200 (14/04/2010)[hr]It all depends on what kind of kick and bass your using, its a really hard question to answer unless you have examples of the audio/samples your using.[/quote]yes of course, i understand that. just wanted a few pointers of what to listen/look(spectrum ana)for. is there a point at which its just known that the bass wont feel “bassy” anymore? like hpf at 100hz? 150hz? etc.

howies tip about the spectrum analyzer was very helpful. that the first peak in the spectrum is the fundemental and the rest after that are just harmonics. makes the analyzer abit more “clearer” to read. :wink:

thanks for your reply dude ;)[/quote]



I love feeling appreciated!

[quote]howiegroove (14/04/2010)[hr]
I love feeling appreciated![/quote]

i would send you a box of chocolates but i think the international postage would be on the heavy side… :stuck_out_tongue: sorry :wink:

Its all good bro! I appreciate the gesture.

practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.





all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol

[quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.


all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol[/quote]thanks jon. im starting to realise after all these years of making music theres never going to be one day when i wake up and “know it all”.  its becoming apparent that its a process of continuous development. which could last a lifetime.

[quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.





all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol[/quote]thanks jon. im starting to realise after all these years of making music theres never going to be one day when i wake up and “know it all”. its becoming apparent that its a process of continuous development. which could last a lifetime.[/quote]



at least we’ll have something to keep us busy lol. we should be cool to dj still when we are in our 80’s, i watched a program the other day about hearing apparently if you are aged between 15 and 21… 50db for more than 1 hour can cause damage to your ears but at the age of 65-80 you would need more than 256db for more than 4 hours to cause the same damage. my thinking is if i learn how to write music now, when i’m 80 i can bang them out in a club with out worrying about my ears hahaha

[quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.





all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol[/quote]thanks jon. im starting to realise after all these years of making music theres never going to be one day when i wake up and “know it all”. its becoming apparent that its a process of continuous development. which could last a lifetime.[/quote]



at least we’ll have something to keep us busy lol. we should be cool to dj still when we are in our 80’s, i watched a program the other day about hearing apparently if you are aged between 15 and 21… 50db for more than 1 hour can cause damage to your ears but at the age of 65-80 you would need more than 256db for more than 4 hours to cause the same damage. my thinking is if i learn how to write music now, when i’m 80 i can bang them out in a club with out worrying about my ears hahaha[/quote]



Nice!

[quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.





all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol[/quote]thanks jon. im starting to realise after all these years of making music theres never going to be one day when i wake up and “know it all”. its becoming apparent that its a process of continuous development. which could last a lifetime.[/quote]



at least we’ll have something to keep us busy lol. we should be cool to dj still when we are in our 80’s, i watched a program the other day about hearing apparently if you are aged between 15 and 21… 50db for more than 1 hour can cause damage to your ears but at the age of 65-80 you would need more than 256db for more than 4 hours to cause the same damage. my thinking is if i learn how to write music now, when i’m 80 i can bang them out in a club with out worrying about my ears hahaha[/quote]



256 dB is pretty loud…you would need something like 1000000000000000000 Watts of power to generate that :stuck_out_tongue: not that this would be your biggest problem since the loudest noise possible on earth is around 190dB :hehe:





but lets hope that we can still DJ at 80, well this guy is like 68 now:

[url=http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Meet-DJ-Derek/article-678558-detail/article.html]http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Meet-DJ-Derek/article-678558-detail/article.html[/url]

[quote]seanl (15/04/2010)[hr][quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]practice, patients and knowledge many many pro’s claim to still suffer from problems with bass and kicks working really well, from what i understand its not about making it perfect but more about getting a happy medium with clarity, punch, depth, impact and power.





all i know is i’m far from cracking it lol[/quote]thanks jon. im starting to realise after all these years of making music theres never going to be one day when i wake up and “know it all”. its becoming apparent that its a process of continuous development. which could last a lifetime.[/quote]



at least we’ll have something to keep us busy lol. we should be cool to dj still when we are in our 80’s, i watched a program the other day about hearing apparently if you are aged between 15 and 21… 50db for more than 1 hour can cause damage to your ears but at the age of 65-80 you would need more than 256db for more than 4 hours to cause the same damage. my thinking is if i learn how to write music now, when i’m 80 i can bang them out in a club with out worrying about my ears hahaha[/quote]



256 dB is pretty loud…you would need something like 1000000000000000000 Watts of power to generate that :stuck_out_tongue: not that this would be your biggest problem since the loudest noise possible on earth is around 190dB :hehe:





but lets hope that we can still DJ at 80, well this guy is like 68 now:

[url=http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Meet-DJ-Derek/article-678558-detail/article.html]http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Meet-DJ-Derek/article-678558-detail/article.html[/url][/quote]



why would you ? db is something completely different my headphones are 107 db and my monitors are 88db and my sound card is 110db, which one do you think is the loudest.



just because something has a billion watts doesn’t mean it has to have a huge db count. dB is a logarithmic unit used to describe a ratio. The ratio may be power, sound pressure, voltage or intensity.


[quote]jon_fisher (14/04/2010)[hr]at least we’ll have something to keep us busy lol. we should be cool to dj still when we are in our 80’s, i watched a program the other day about hearing apparently if you are aged between 15 and 21… 50db for more than 1 hour can cause damage to your ears but at the age of 65-80 you would need more than 256db for more than 4 hours to cause the same damage. my thinking is if i learn how to write music now, when i’m 80 i can bang them out in a club with out worrying about my ears hahaha[/quote]





i used to dj out on a weekly basis and my hearing got that bad that the ringing would not stop till the following friday just in time to do it all again on the saturday night lol i looked into getting ear plugs but they were just to pricey at the time

also i work in the building trade so add working with noisy equipment full time and years of djing my hearings quite bad it drives the wife mad cause i have to have the telly on so loud and often dont hear what she says (but that is what most would call selective hearng lol)

Jon those values are most propobly sensitivity, I’ve thoutht you were refering to laudness , and yes it’s a logaritmoc scale and you would need that much power for exactly that reason ( provided that we talking music from speakers :slight_smile:

[quote]seanl (15/04/2010)[hr]Jon those values are most propobly sensitivity, I’ve thoutht you were refering to laudness , and yes it’s a logaritmoc scale and you would need that much power for exactly that reason ( provided that we talking music from speakers :)[/quote]



that could have been sensitivity that they were talking about on the program to be fair, i’m not going to pretend that i know that much about db, watts

I wish I knew less about dB and more about making music lol :smiley:

[quote]seanl (15/04/2010)[hr]I wish I knew less about dB and more about making music lol :D[/quote]



i wish i knew as much about music as i do about random crap lol

[quote]jpgetty2win (14/04/2010)[hr][quote]closey1200 (14/04/2010)[hr]It all depends on what kind of kick and bass your using, its a really hard question to answer unless you have examples of the audio/samples your using.[/quote]yes of course, i understand that. just wanted a few pointers of what to listen/look(spectrum ana)for. is there a point at which its just known that the bass wont feel “bassy” anymore? like hpf at 100hz? 150hz? etc.

howies tip about the spectrum analyzer was very helpful. that the first peak in the spectrum is the fundemental and the rest after that are just harmonics. makes the analyzer abit more “clearer” to read. :wink:

thanks for your reply dude ;)[/quote]



You can take this further and get the kick and bass to match in key. Set Ableton’s spectrum analyzer to maximum resolution (16384) and lowest refresh rate (40 ms) on the kick and bass tracks. It will show you the kick’s note as well as its frequency. Eg. Kick at 50Hz is a G(0). In the case of house you’ll want your bass above the kick (DnB the reverse - where kicks tend to be higher up, usually around 80Hz). Since you’ve got the note of the kick you can play your bass line to fit in key. You might for instance want to have it a fifth higher so you’d play your bass on D(1). Your track will be in the key of G. Strap a spectrum analyzer on the master channel to check the frequencies are gelling together.