Mix sounds great through speakers and monitors. But like ass through headphones

[leandroab]

Pretty much. I would like to know what would cause this?


If you want, you can check my soundclick and soundcloud pages for examples (although 99% of them just sound like plain shit haha)

 

[JamesM]

I think you're producing a little thin.

That said, your mixes sound good to me. I'll take the "get in the car and drive around" mix test over anything. Give that a try.

 

[Pedro Assault]

headphones and studio monitors lie..... headphones will always sound crappy and WILL misrepresent your sound. the car idea may be a little inconvenient, but it totally does the job as long as your car's speakers are not blown or very old and have a bunch of blank CDRs. I wish i can figure out a way to mix in master in my 98 honda accord. Think about it, unless you are playing lots of gigs, most people will listen to you in their cars more so than anywhere else. i have been in situations where we paid alot of money to get a good professional recording, have it sound totally awesome through the producers studio monitors, burn of a few masters for the band, get to our cars and find out the mix was totally off. thumping drums in the studio were almost none existent, vocals drowned out the guitars........
. the guy that recoded us keep saying we were being too picky, until we dragged him out to hear what we heard.

if you have any kind of computer recording program or recording device,.... run AUX out to a
$100-150 home stereo. nothing too fancy, walmart's run of the mill selection is just fine( if it has the red and white aux jacks, its good enough) use it as your monitor system. DO NOT BUY STUDIO MONITORS! headphones are fine for the writting process and recording tracks, just terrible for mixing.

 

[JamesM]

I was totally agreeing with you until you said not to buy studio monitors, then you just went full retard.



They ABSOLUTE key to getting a perfect mix is listening on as many sources as you can. That INCLUDES monitors.

 

[beerybobb]

I was totally agreeing with you until you said not to buy studio monitors, then you just went full retard.



They ABSOLUTE key to getting a perfect mix is listening on as many sources as you can. That INCLUDES monitors.

+1

 

[leandroab]

They ABSOLUTE key to getting a perfect mix is listening on as many sources as you can. That INCLUDES monitors.

Considering you have them properly set up in a proper room with proper isolation. Which is never the case unless you're in a studio

But I would say, mainly, that the guitars sound thin and I can't quite hear the bass through headphones. While Everything sounds fine through my stereo (with subwoofers). I compared countless bands with countless types of mastering and mixing, and they all sound great on both. Go figure

 

[atomicriffmastr]

"DO NOT BUY STUDIO MONITORS!" Oh yeah? Maybe you should go tell that to Adam Dutkiewicz and Andy Sneap.

 

[KingAenarion]

My process tends to be like so

I use good flat studio Monitors to make sure I'm hearing what's going on with the actual raw audio. Particularly the EQ and the way in which compression affects the sound and other such affects.

I then create a mix on these monitors... never listening on other speakers to start.

I then listen through the mix critically on the following:

iPod with basic headphones.
iPod with In Ear headphones (the Apple ones)
iPod dock (a cheapish Logitech one)
Studio Headphones
Computer speakers
Car stereo


I take notes on issues with the sound vs the original mix...

I usually find that there is some issue with the particular style of music.
For instance in low tuning Metal and Dance music there isn't enough bass because I've over compensated.

In Indie and folk styles usually the Acoustic is too bright and some of highs are too brittle and weak...

In slightly more produced music like Pop and Rock there isn't enough EQ differential between instruments and things get muddied up.

That's what I've learnt so far anyways.

 

[Prydogga]

Considering you have them properly set up in a proper room with proper isolation. Which is never the case unless you're in a studio

When is that ever not the case? Get some mopads under em, and you'll be fine. Sure 'proper' sound treatment will make it a whole lot more accurate, but it's no reason not to use monitors. If you have them, USE THEM. If you don't, GET THEM. NAOW.

 

[leandroab]

When is that ever not the case? Get some mopads under em, and you'll be fine. Sure 'proper' sound treatment will make it a whole lot more accurate, but it's no reason not to use monitors. If you have them, USE THEM. If you don't, GET THEM. NAOW.

Dude, I have a pair of BX5a's hahah

By proper sound treatment, I meant all the crap like symmetric rooms, bass traps, paddings, symmetric speaker placement (equilateral triangle), tweeters in line with ears, blablabla...

 

[keshav]

Dude, I have a pair of BX5a's hahah

By proper sound treatment, I meant all the crap like symmetric rooms, bass traps, paddings, symmetric speaker placement (equilateral triangle), tweeters in line with ears, blablabla...

Nearfield monitors don't involve nearly as much room involvement, so you don't have much of a problem there. It's all about knowing your monitors, what they accentuate and what they're shy on. That just comes with time.

 

[Taylor2]

headphones and studio monitors lie..... headphones will always sound crappy and WILL misrepresent your sound. the car idea may be a little inconvenient, but it totally does the job as long as your car's speakers are not blown or very old and have a bunch of blank CDRs. I wish i can figure out a way to mix in master in my 98 honda accord. Think about it, unless you are playing lots of gigs, most people will listen to you in their cars more so than anywhere else. i have been in situations where we paid alot of money to get a good professional recording, have it sound totally awesome through the producers studio monitors, burn of a few masters for the band, get to our cars and find out the mix was totally off. thumping drums in the studio were almost none existent, vocals drowned out the guitars........
. the guy that recoded us keep saying we were being too picky, until we dragged him out to hear what we heard.

if you have any kind of computer recording program or recording device,.... run AUX out to a
$100-150 home stereo. nothing too fancy, walmart's run of the mill selection is just fine( if it has the red and white aux jacks, its good enough) use it as your monitor system. DO NOT BUY STUDIO MONITORS! headphones are fine for the writting process and recording tracks, just terrible for mixing.

Don't listen to this guy.
Not to be rude....but you have no clue what you're on about mate.
Just because an AE doesn't have his monitors set up properly doesn't mean that monitors are bad to listen to.



The key is to listen on as many sources as possible, WHEN THE MIX IS DONE.
That being said I mix entirely on high quality headphones that are flatter and more true then most monitors under $800.

Besides, if you're not listening through the same source as originally done, you will always hear something different.
My headphones are fantastic at making things sound like crap.
As any proper monitoring source should be doing.

That being said, it also depends on what kind of 'crap' it's making obvious.

My old headphones have a boost in the lower mids, makes things sound nicer, but causing me to mix thin, where's my new ones expose that and are really true in the low end.

 

[Prydogga]

Dude, I have a pair of BX5a's hahah

By proper sound treatment, I meant all the crap like symmetric rooms, bass traps, paddings, symmetric speaker placement (equilateral triangle), tweeters in line with ears, blablabla...

Yeah, that's what I meant too. Not having that isn't an excuse to NOT use your monitors, and when you have monitors as good as yours I don't know why you wouldn't use them. Maybe the mix sucks on your headphones because of the quality of headphones.

But yeah, basically. Listen to something you create in every form and device you can to gauge how it sounds.

 

[leandroab]

I do use my monitors. I use them to mix and master my shiz...

I'm only bummed cuz it was sounding awesome through them, and my stereo, but like farts through my iphone.

It's not about the headphones, because when comparing other bands, through the monitors, stereo and headphones, they all sound nice.

 

[TreWatson]

"DO NOT BUY STUDIO MONITORS!" Oh yeah? Maybe you should go tell that to Adam Dutkiewicz and Andy Sneap.

or joey sturgis, or devin towsend.

theyd laugh at you.

 

[Inazone]

This is where mastering comes in. Not "slap a plug-in on it and go" mastering, but having someone go through every song, applying compression and additional EQ for consistent results, and ending up with something that sounds more or less the same through any method of playback. I just endured many brutal (in a bad way) hours of mastering, and what was disturbing was to see an EQ analysis program show WHY our mix wasn't sounding like recent metal releases:

They scoop a TON of frequencies, boost a couple, and do everything possible to get the loudest finished product. We ended up doing a bit of that ourselves, but as the acting producer, I told the engineer that we were only willing to go so far in the name of Almighty Volume. I played the finished mix (not mastered) on my car stereo, home stereo, office PC speakers and cheap earbuds, told the engineer the results, and used that as our basis for mastering. The mastered version didn't come out sounding exactly like the finished mix, but the volume and overall consistency were the way they needed to be, and it doesn't sound much different between earbuds and blasted home stereo speakers. My only regret is that the very "organic" vibe we aimed for when recording and mixing (raw guitar tone from miked amps, natural "thump" on the drums, vocal-sounding fretless bass, etc.) came out sounding pretty run-of-the-mill after mastering.

Slate Digital has a mastering plug-in than will get you sounding pretty close to "real" mastering without having a lengthy signal chain. Not sure what it costs these days, or if there is a limited trial version you could try out, but it might give you some better perspective on how you can expect your mixes to sound. Also, has started selling the VRM (virtual room monitoring) component of their hardware interfaces for $99, which simulates different room dimensions and speaker types through headphones. I have that on my Saffire Pro interface, and it's pretty wild.