I'm gonna show you 2 versions of the same track. See if you can hear what's different between them. So between the 2 versions, I haven't changed any of the sounds.
The mix wasn't changed at all. Almost everything is the exact same. The only difference is the octaves of the notes have been changed.
My music used to sound super cheesy 'cause I would use the wrong octaves for synth sounds and bass sounds. So how do you pick the right octaves? It seems so basic, but this is by far the easiest way to keep your track sounding powerful instead of cheesy.
Let's talk about the synths first. Then at the end we'll talk about the bass, which can really ruin your whole mix. With the synths it's more about the feeling they give you.
With the bass it's more mathematical. I want this lead sound to have a big triumphant feel, but this octave isn't really giving me that feeling. So we gotta experiment.
Let's try up 2 octaves. It definitely sounds more triumphant, but it's at the risk of sounding a little too cheesy. Now let's split the difference and try the octave in between those 2 octaves.
That sounds more like the sweet spot for the feeling I'm going for. But we don't wanna lose any power, so I need a lower synth that compliments this lead synth for that. I can use this stab sound, but I want that to sound deeper.
So let's try moving it down an octave. And this is where I see a really common mistake. People see the frequency spectrum of this sound and they'll see that the low end of the sound is competing with the bass.
And what they'll do is move it up an octave or even 2 octaves and that's their solution to make room for the bass. You have solved the problem of leaving space in the low end for the main bass sound, but the problem is you've made it sound super cheesy in the the process. The solution is simple.
Just go with the deeper, cooler sounding octave, but just EQ it to make room for the bass. You'll see both versions are taking up the same frequencies. With the deeper version, you're not hearing the root note at all, but you're getting all those pleasing harmonics and overtones that come with the deeper sound.
Not everything has to sound deep though, with these two background synths, I want those to feel more light and atmospheric, and I get that feeling a lot more when I move those layers up an octave. That'll help lift up and elevate the rest of the synths. All of these synth sounds are from my new preset pack.
Modern Synths Vol. 2 Vol. 1 ended up being in some huge tracks like 0800 Heaven by Joel Corry.
And I think Vol. 2 is even better. But we still need to talk about the most important part, the bass.
I know there shouldn't be any rules when it comes to making music, but if you want a powerful, balanced mix this is a pretty good rule to follow. The bass from version 1 might sound fine on phone speakers, but if you took this into a nightclub and played it on big speakers, it would sound completely weak. The sweet spot for subwoofers is really between 30 and 90 hertz.
They're really good at playing those frequencies. With this bass it wouldn't even come through on some subwoofers at all. It's just not low enough.
But you can also have the opposite problem. If your bass is too low, subwoofers can't accurately play those frequencies, and the limit of human hearing is like 20 or 30 hertz anyway. So you're adding all this heavy low end noise, making the mix super muddy when we can't even hear those frequencies.
And we don't wanna just do the same thing we did for the stab and cut out the lowest frequencies. 'cause at a certain point, those harmonics and overtones just sound really bad. So the solution is easy.
If you have a bass playing, just make sure the root note is between 30 and 90 hertz. And you don't have to move the whole bassline up and down. It could just be 1 or 2 notes that are the problem.
So you can just move those 1 or 2 notes that are outside the range without having to change the key of the track. Now I'll show you by doing that, this bassline is between 40 and 80 hertz, so it's firmly in that sweet spot. Thank you guys for watching.
Peace.
