What's your biggest producing frustration?

[jonathanm]

Oct 15, 2009, 1:45pm, watksco wrote:Female vox and szziblanczzze.Hey, Scott. Do you have a good de-esser? If not, you may want to try some of the free plug-ins out there that are pretty good, such as Spitfish.Jonathan

[ernstinen]

I agree, kick and bass. I've been listening to FM radio a LOT recently on my car stereo, which sounds really good for a stock stereo. It's amazing how different "professional" recordings differ on this. --- It seems in today's music, the bass is usually rolled off at lower frequencies (about 40 Hz) than the kick, which has more attack. Sometimes it's the opposite! On some current recordings, you can define easily both the kick and the bass. That's hard to do, but what you need to strive for. If you listen to any U2 song from the past 5-10 years, the bass guitar is HUGE, but you can still hear the kick drum.In the old'n days of vinyl, everything was chopped off at about 60 Hz because the stylus would jump out of the groove of a record if there was too much bottom end on it. But some bassists, like Motown's James Jamerson, had a big but well defined low end on his recordings (pissing off Paul McCartney, who demanded his engineers to put more low end on Beatles' records). A great recording to listen to from back then is "I Was Made To Love Her" by Stevie Wonder. Jamerson's bass just JUMPS out of that record, probably because the rest is almost painfully upper-midrangey! There's the bass part, and almost nothing else below about 1-2 kHz.So, yea, kick and bass for me!Ern

[ibanez468]

Mazz, GGalen, & Steve, thanks fellas! Still experimenting, still learning, but happier with the results.

[elser]

Oct 15, 2009, 2:30pm, ibanez468 wrote:[quote author=fretnoise board=nick thread=16250 post=168064 time=1255638748]Cool track, kinda reminds of Herbie Hancock 'Dis Da Drum', one of my favorite albums.Thanks elser. Ya' know, I've got that CD and have only listened to it once or twice. I'm gonna hafta' pull it out and give it another listen. Which are your favorite tracks on there?I really like the title track, Mojuba and Hump. It's almost a text on how to get unusual but slammin grooves. On the title track there are 3 bass parts all happening at the same time.

[robbylane]

Drums, because I do not know "drum speak" (for programming) and my excellent HUMAN drummer (who is also my brother) moved away. The other issue is in trying to avoid unwanted distortion, usually with vocals. What contributes to my problem is that I take a totally barebones approach to recording. MY recording room is totally "untreated" and I always use dynamic mics. I do have a great AKG condensor mic, but I live in the land of LOUD vehicles that always drive by, so unless I build me a vocal booth, I have to go with the less-sensitive but good-sounding dynamic mics.

[markjsmith]

Low end is my toughest nut to crack in general! It sounds different on every set of speakers to me so sometimes it can be extremely frustrating!-Mark

[mojobone]

My cat keeps jumping in my lap when I'm mixing.If I don't let him up on my lap, he pretends to chew the cables. It's not a problem when tracking guitars, though; he runs out of the room when I do that.

[t4mh]

MojoI know how to take care of cats in the studio. Get a fiddle... Problem is you'll have claw marks on the walls.Keith

[mojobone]

That's why I sold the fiddle.

[stoney]

Hello everyoneJust wanted to say massive thanks to all who have commented, never thought the thread would receive so many interesting responses.Was great reading and sharing your comments! The frustrations that is music and production is never ending but boy does it bring some joy too which always out weighs the frustration!Very best regardsDarren (stoney)