Production question

[Gert van Santen]

Gorman, Declan schreef:
> Hey all,
>   I am re-visiting a track that I made a while back and have a question
> regarding one aspect of it that is bothering me.  The main synth line
> which is prominent throughout the track drowns out a lot of the other
> sounds when the filter is opened up and while I still want to retain the
> dynamics of the sound I don't want it to drown out every thing else.  I
> presume I should be using a compressor but as I'm still getting to grips
> with compressors I am unsure as to what settings to use.  I could be
> wrong so please correct me if I am.
> 
> You can download the track from here ->
> http://www.degomusic.net/mp3/dego/dego_Rev_It_Up.mp3
> 
> Cheers!
> 

Some remarks:

1. Drowning out sounds by other sounds 
seems to be rather common these days. I 
think it started with Daft Punk.
First I thought it was ridiculous, but 
now everyone seems to be using it. What 
might have seemed  a mistake at first, 
has grown into a trend quickly. Although 
I feel it's already a bit old now. Even 
Madonna does it...;-)

2. That synth line you are using, is 
using up more or less the complete level 
and frequency bandwidth. If you don't 
want it to drown out other stuff, you 
can basically do one or more of the next 
3 things:

* take the level of that sound down for 
god's sake (hehehe...;-)
* take some of the frequencies away that 
can also be found in other sounds (low 
end, hi mids?)
* use compresion on the sound itself. 
This will always make you lose some of 
the dynamics, but hey, it'll give your 
track it's power back.

To be honest, I don't think the sound 
you are using is so dynamic. It's just 
LOUD ;-)

Nice theme, btw.


-- 

:-)

G e r t  v a n  S a n t e n
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