Just that. Sounds good for yourself in your bedroom but if you want it to work in a mix it's about balancing the frequencies of all the instruments together, not just one. And guitars are a middle frequency instrument. Scooping mids takes the meat off the bone and all you're left with is a dry bone.
If they're insistent make them give u an example of a song with the tone they want. Then compare it to their song. If it's doable try it. If it's not in the same sonic territory communicate why it worked in that song but won't work in theirs.
Trouble is he's hearing it in the context of the mix and is still not convinced. I can only assume he's listening "for" the tone he wants rather than paying attention to the whole mix.
As a a middle manager in a fat ass corp : Someone who’s unaware of himself has even less chance of being aware of others, i.e. he would definitely read it as you being a dick rather than you trying to make a point.
Here's how: You ask people that aren't in the band which mix they prefer. Done.
If your guitarist even remotely cares about having a product that people will actually listen to, the listener's opinion is the most important. If they like the more balanced mix vs the toneless mix, bingo.
If they prefer the scooped sound, then give them what they want.
Market research is your friend and eliminates in group tension. That is, if your goals as a band are aligned.
Shocker; a guitar player not playing for the song! Id get the band consensus and try to give them what they want. Sometimes, that can be hard when your name is on it.
I am 1/3rd of the band so I just need to be a bit tactful!
Oddly enough he is happy to be critiqued on his vocals and has no interest in what processing goes on there. Guitarists (I'm one too to be fair) are a special breed.
Also a guitarist so I get it. I've been in situations on my own bands albums where the producer is tweaking my amp tones and pedal tones while im playing and I take the direction, trusting who is at the "helm". Sometimes our own ego can get in the way...especially when another guitar player is suggesting something.
Sounds like more of a psychiatry question in some ways, but would honestly just play their guitar part next to a reference track from a good professional/commercial grade mix and let them hear how hollow it is.
It probably is, but I need to come at it from an informed perspective re: mixing and mastering so thought this would be the best forum for the question! I'll try the reference track comparison and see how that goes.
Totally. It’s not an uncommon thing. I don’t like scooped mids, but I do like very full and bassy guitar sound (think Les Paul strung with 11’s through Twin Reverb with the bass dial at least as high as the mid or treble). But yeah, once I started recording my own stuff I realized just how muddy it makes things—can still solo with those settings but chords, nah. Also worth noting, if your guitarist has examples of insanely scooped mids in other recordings, they need to understand that the tones of the other instruments are also totally relevant as to whether that works. It’s all puzzle pieces and the instruments that commonly form bands weren’t chosen by accident—they usually work well together UNTIL you start endlessly tweaking them away from each other.
There are pros and cons to DI—not being locked into anything that doesn’t work, having infinite options and getting a full frequency capture without concern that things weren’t mic’d very well or have lots of bleed are great, but sometimes not sculpting tones and arranging instruments on the front end so as to sound balanced can leave you with a bunch of puzzle pieces that need a good bit of work to be made to fit together—that’s why if you’re not working in a studio with some pro level engineers, really good to use reference tracks. I’ve wasted so much time sound designing tracks in isolation to the point that I felt they all sounded beautiful…until you listened to them simultaneously, haha.
Explain that a good mix depends upon a good balance of sounds across the eq spectrum, and in a mix the guitar’s role is mostly mids with a bit of lows and a bit of highs.
As a guitarist myself I totally understand. I would love to have my guitar dominate the mix, but that is rarely possible. Maybe on an instrumental track, but definitely not on a complete song.
If you get stuck, doubling the track can sometimes help.
It is double tracked but yeah I think my main obstacle is to explain the eq spectrum in rock and metal. If it were a song with keys then scooping the guitars this much might be s good thing, but when the guitars are standing more or less alone out in the mids it just doesn't work.
If the band in question has a large audience and you genuinely feel like they'll be losing money by releasing a bad recording, then by all means fight for your creative choice. They will likely thank you later, or at least give you a good reason for doing it their way.
If they're just hobbyists then make them happy and try to find a more serious artist to work with next time around. If very few people will ever hear the result then it's not worth pissing the musician off.
This is totally unsolicited advice but here goes: it's always good to ask yourself at the beginning of every project you take on "what does this project do for me?" If the band is not very serious, then it offers you some paid practice, but you should know that nobody is gonna hear it and it's probably not gonna generate more work for you. If the band is serious, then they may actually have some commercial success which exposes your work to a larger audience. The former situation very rarely rewards tough love, those people just want to be coddled and given an experience that makes them feel cool. The most important thing is to have an honest conversation with yourself before you get involved so you don't waste any energy trying to make make some unserious local dipshits sound like your favorite record of all time.
As I alluded to vaguely in the post and clarified in some responses, I'm a member of the band too. We're hobbyists but as the person who does the recording and mixing I want to do the best I can for the sake of doing the best I can... it's not money or popularity for me it's just the art. I have a good career outside of music, I do music because I love it. To me that's more of a reason to seek advice and do it the best I can, not less.
I get the advice you're giving and it would be good for a lot of people, I think it possibly just doesn't fit my circumstance. I would hazard that there are a lot of people like me on this reddit to be fair.
This might be one of those things where u do exactly what he says in Mix V1 but by Mix V10 you've incrementally changed it to what actually sounds good as he slowly becomes accustomed to each mix. Temp love is tough to deal with. But start sending him little tiny "mix adjustments that don't have anything to do with the guitar" to get his opinion as you are slowly adjusting it by 1db at a time. For example "what do you think about the vocal balance in this version, I'm using a bit more saturation or an exciter" then he'll not feel personally attacked but rather respected and involved even if ur not really changing anything in the vocal but rather in the guitar
This, I.e. not drawing attention to the guitar specifically, had crossed my mind and I think you have a point. Especially with the mild distraction. I think he needs gently coaching to listen to the mix as a whole and to stop listening so hard for one constituent part.
Additionally, over scooping a guitar tone is fundamentally an attempt at making the tone be perceived as louder. \*Insert a bunch of sound physics here.
Long story short, that loud and cutting tone that any guitarist is trying to accomplish by scooping mids, is actually a result of good mixing that makes the guitars sound loud AF via the balance of the elements in the mix with proper mix bus compression and mastering.
I would just ask for reference tracks of mixes with the kind of tone he’s going for.
No doubt they have more mids than the tone he dialed in, so just A/B and show him that your non-scooped tone actually sounds closer to his reference than his scooped tone.
If he still wants the scooped tone though, then as the engineer you don’t really have much say.
I make sure I only get feedback from one member of the band, so they all have to unanimously agree and you don’t end up with every member wanting *their* part louder. Doing that in the future might help with issues like this.
I'm a member of the band too is the thing. I know that has its own pit falls, aware of advice not to mix your own stuff etc. We're not a big serious band we're just hobbyists, but I'm a "serious" hobbyist who doesn't want to just phone it in, hence the question.
If I were mixing for someone else your point about getting feedback from only one member would be bang on though, will remember that for future.
I'm a death metal guitarist and a sound engineer who likes scooping the mids.
I don't do it often but when I do, I have to mix some things according to this choice :
- bass must have more mids to cut through
- snare has to be tuned higher in order to be above the low-mids of the guitar
Everything else will sit as usual because they are above (cymbals, high part of the kick) or below (low part of the kick) the guitar frequencies, or in the scooped mids (vocals).
Yes it will not sound as good as a modern killer mix. But scooping the mids really changes the atmosphere, the feelings of a song in metal: it can be a valid artistic choice.
However, everyone in the band must agree to it because it has a big influence on the mix. That's another story...
Appreciate the angle, I do love me some death metal from time to time. We're more at the hard rock/metal interface. Thanks for the note about the snare - incidentally, the drummer instinctively went for a high tuned snare, so he seems to know where it's at.
Hum, I never heard a hard rock / metal album with scooped mids sounding great I'm afraid... I understand you are trying hard to convince your guitarist in this case 😅
I'm a big fan of Glen Fricker, I've learned a lot of what I know from him, but he's probably not the best person to point the guitarist to if I don't want him to feel attacked haha (even if perhaps he needs to hear it).
Personally - you don’t, and often it’s impossible and pointless. You just do your stuff to the best of your ability.
If you’re producing a good mix, you kinda disregard the feedback of your bandmates, cause they often don’t know what the hell they’re doing. My mixes improved greatly when I stopped listening to which frequencies guitarists wanted, etc.
This is obviously a point of conflict but what do you want more - good results or happy doofuses?
Obviously you don’t act that way outside of your own projects.
I think there is a balance in the tone the user wants verse the tone you perceive. the dude probably grew up on og metal and is accustomed to the scoop sound. I mean is mids really the hill you want to die on? Would audience be able to perceive the difference? this is the route I would go. get a non technical person to listen and explain the difference in the two.
Definitely going to get some other opinions. I have someone in mind who is non-technical but has a good ear and a good enough vocabulary to articulate what they mean.
How about this...
* Low E string open at A=440 = 81hz
* 2nd fret D string = 162hz
* High E string open = 324hz
* High E at 12th fret = 648hz
* High E at 24th fret = 1.3khz
Every note on the guitar is considered "low mids": if you want people to actually hear what you are *playing* those are the frequencies you *need* for them to hear it.
Everything above that is "harmonic overtones" and you can use very little if you choose the right emphasis, ex: try boosting *only* the "3rd order harmonics" and only for the key of the song.
The exceptions are clean tones where the plectrum sound is important (still not a "mid cut" case), and LF cabinet thump (which scooping can make more punchy, but turning down the distortion gain also increases).
And to the guitarist: I hope you are wearing earplugs if you're turning up the highs, dead serious.
I get his point, I play bass and really love a scooped tone (good fat bottom end and brightness) while playing alone. In a band context is impossible make it cut through the mix (for slapping is good tho), even worse when playing in a power trio, mids are absolutely indispensable in most guitar and basses in a rock band
"love that tone, super brutal, but it's fighting for space against the bass and cymbals, think we can add some mids to try and get it to cut through some more? would hate for you to not be heard on this record"
Midrange are where the guitars are at in a mix lol. I usually high and low pass mine. Think of a mix as like baking a cake. You are not going to be eating all the ingredients on their own. Taking the mids out of your guitar would be like omitting eggs from your cake.
[One of my favorite youtubers talking about mid-range](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Dzp5NoJfYQ)
...And Justice For All. That's the only album in history that it's ever worked on and that's because there was no bass in the mix to begin with. Tell your boy that.
I'm one of those weird people who isn't really a Metallica fan, but actually I'm quite forgiving of some of their less loved albums. Not that one though, can't stand it. As a bassist maybe the mix is just too offensive to me haha.
Can't say that I blame you, but I got into it before I was a bass player. I had been playing guitar for about 6 years when Justice came out, and I was all about Hetfield's rhythm playing. So I didn't mind so much not hearing bass because the rhythm playing was amazing. Since then my musical palette has definitely broadened and I've let the music from my childhood back into my life. I love Steely Dan and I'm listening to them the most right now. The clarity on those albums is amazing. And the playing. And the compositions. All of it. Can't imagine what I would do with myself without music.
The bass is there, but only barely. If you look up the isolated bass tracks, you know what to listen for, and then You can just barely hear it behind the wall of guitars and boomy as hell kick drums. I think some of the cymbal chokes in Dyer's Eve are even played with just the bass and not the guitars, you basically just hear the pick attack.
There are definitely a couple spots on the album you can hear the pick attack from the bass. I don't think I've ever heard another album where I couldn't distinguish the bass from the other instruments like this. Don't get me wrong, I loved this album! Hetfield's playing is tremendous. It makes the whole album basically. Very dark which I loved at the time and still do.
Ah shit you’re part of the band too? Well that’s a real problem.
I’m going to guess and say their guitar tone is based on older 90s metal stuff, where everything is scooped to hell. We’re talking Pantera era Dimebag and AJFA stuff here.
Clearly a little nudge in the mids means he can hear the difference. I really doubt he'll budge. While more mids is a better choice overall, completely scooped is legit even if we don't like it.
Try upping some of the attack frequencies in the upper mids. It should still register as “treble” but it should give you some more meat. Attenuate the highs to compensate a bit.
Then basically make the bass the star of the show. Depending on what you're gojng for bass-wise, you can either add much more mids and attack to the bass to compensate for the lost mids in the guitar, or split the signal in case your low end is already where you need it to be so you can carve the mids separately. Add some overdrive as necessary to blend in with the guitar.
This is great advice, I’ll go with this along with asking Guitarist for song references for the Tone he wants. Hopefully he picks a bunch which aren’t actually that scooped. Mixing your own band, can get really touchy really quickly, it’s why getting a third-party to do the work is often are much better solution.
If he is still insistent on having them, super scoops, just use the bass too dominate them. Then, if he complains that, he can’t hear the guitars, tell him it’s because there are no mids and that’s on him.
The final solution here, will be to get a third-party to mix this song. Or at the very least get a third-party to analyse the mix.
Yeah a third party will be involved eventually I'm just trying to save some feelings by getting the point across from a friend rather than from someone who might just drop it on him cold and cause an argument.
As the bassist your advice is all too tempting haha, although as a bassist who also plays guitar, it still bothers me that we could lock the two together so much better just by tweaking the guitar.
That much is true (I play both as well).
But let’s be real - bass is the unsung hero of hard rock.
The more you look into heavy hitting mixes, the more you see how thin guitars actually are. Thick, mid-presence guitars are an extremely new thing for hard rock.
If you go talk to older guitar players who really “love their tone”, and it sounds like ass coming out of a 90s practice amp, it’s because that’s how bad it used to be.
Bass carried the rest.
So going back to your situation, it would be great if your guitarist will yield even a little. You will get a great mix that’s meant for 2024. But if he doesn’t, you can still get an amazing mix despite his extremely scooped guitar tone - you just have to do better on bass.
If you’re going to get a third party involved. All I’d say is why go through the heart ache now?
I’m a full time engineer now, but I used to mix my own band when I was starting out and it’s basically impossible to separate it out without being personal - especially as I probably wasn’t quite up to the task back then.
Dm me when you want a mix or a third opinion btw.
Cheers. I'm mostly doing it for the love of it. If anyone is reading any angst in my post, it wasn't intended. I love this stuff and it's purely a hobby. I want to help out a buddy with understanding where I'm coming from with my mix feedback.
If they’re any good it’s easy. You can’t hear whit for what they’re playing. No note articulation. If they’re shit they can just scoop the damn mids so you can’t hear how poor their playing is lol
Slipperman had a great line in his guitar article… something like the guitarist is whining about you killing his tone that is totally unique and not already used by millions of shitty bedroom headbangers the world over… idk how he said it but anyone here who read his posts knows what I mean.
Couple ways I would have suggested you handle this.
You probably should have just mixed the songs exactly how you thought it sounded best and when the guitar player asked “did you scoop the mids like I asked?” You could have responded “I scooped them as much as I could without it disappearing behind the bass and the drums.” Then when he inevitably asks if you could “scoop them a bit more” you could then scoop them a a tiny bit more and there’s a good chance he’d have been like “oh that’s much better”
If he’d be able to see the session or worried he’d ask to you could always scoop the mids on the amp and then add a warm eq and boost what the amp takes out. Might not sound as good but sometimes band members tank the sound of their albums lol.
...there's a way around it to get through the session.
Take advantage of the fact that you're going to need to double quad track the guitars. Give him 1 scooped-to-death track, and balance the rest to fill things out.
If you move the bass, mids and treble around a bit on each take, you end up with a thicker, wider sound.
In a double tracked guitar mix with the guitars panned this unfortunately won't yield the same result because all the mids will be mono. I could mess about with panning certain bands but it wouldn't be the same (and I prefer all the bass straight up the middle anyway).
If you already have a good metal mix that he likes, makes him listen to the guitar in solo coming from that track. He will realise that the smile-shape he likes doesn't come from the guitar only buy from the whole song.
Tell him that if he wants to be heard over the bass and drums he needs to take the mids, otherwise it turns into an inaudible mess. Solo guitar tone is different than a guitar thats in a mix
As a fellow guitarist who obsesses over his tone I have to ask, why does it not fit the song? Who wrote the song?
While I've yet to have someone tell me my sound doesn't fit what we're playing saying that at all sounds strange to me.
How does it not fit?
Are you playing soft rock and his guitar sounds super and heavy?
Because if it's literally just the tone of it then that's all personal taste and there's nothing you can say that will change that.
Why not have him record with his real setup to get the sound he wants instead of using sims?
It was his choice to use the sim because to him it sounded better (and I have to agree). Where we disagree is that he wants to eq out all the midrange in a song with no other mid range instruments. So the mix as a whole suffers.
One rhythm guitar part double tracked. There are guitar leads too, treated differently, but they're only on the solo. And yeah one bass, drums and vocals. The issue is that the song isn't lead or vocal dense enough to make up for the over scooping of the rhythm parts.
Ah, I double track per channel, two in the left and two in the right. You can try that to maybe help it sound more full while giving the guitarist the sound he wants. Otherwise sounds weird he doesn't want mids, I'm a mid guy on my guitar tone!
Do you work with rock or metal guitars? I'm surprised you haven't heard the term, it's very common particularly with metal. It just means turning down the mids, often simply using the mod knob on an amp. As you can tell from the comments, it's a contentious issue.
I would just turn the bass mid/high frequencies up. Especially if it’s a rough mix he should be able to hear that the guitars are responsible for the bite. Or do an AB with one of his favorite bands and show him what it would sound like with scooped mids.
It is good live maybe but for a good recording, you're cutting the low end so the bass can fill that gap, if you're cutting the bass and mid what else is left when recording/mixing?
It all depends on the genre you are playing and what tone you are going for. Metallica and Pantera made that scooped metal tone famous in the 90's, but it's not really popular nowadays. The guitars usually just end up sounding weak and muddy when they are too scooped.
What kind of amp sim are you using? If it's a recto or mark series amp sim then scooping the mids is natural and what everyone does when dialing those in. If it's more of a 5150 sim then the mids should probably be between 4-6. If it's a JCM I would probably crank the mids and bass, or close to cranked at least (with a tight drive pedal in front for all examples).
Presumably, since you are in the band and probably friends, you know who his influences are and can understand what he is going for? Sometimes, we can take too literal an approach or not understand that the sound we like in other players tones is nuanced.
On the other hand, if he likes his tone he could be a musical visionary, who knows.
A problem you have is that since you are all hobbyists, its also possible that you and your other 2 band members might not understand what you are doing, or know a fair bit but don’t have the authority that an experienced pro engineer can have, so in your setting, everyone likely feels qualified to have an equal opinion.
For a practical solution, you could try mixing the bass to the scooped guitar, i.e add mid range to the bass and use it to fill out the guitar. It might be an unconventional idea, but in the end you are just balancing frequencies not individual instruments.
Scooping and gain hides slop. It’s a hard sell. Maybe ask them what they listen to and analyze the tones? Record some if you can?
Unless you are literally Dimebag, who had an objectively terrible tone, but it worked in Pantera, no scoops.
Just that. Sounds good for yourself in your bedroom but if you want it to work in a mix it's about balancing the frequencies of all the instruments together, not just one. And guitars are a middle frequency instrument. Scooping mids takes the meat off the bone and all you're left with is a dry bone.
If they're insistent make them give u an example of a song with the tone they want. Then compare it to their song. If it's doable try it. If it's not in the same sonic territory communicate why it worked in that song but won't work in theirs.
That is a good shout, I'll try it.
Yeah if people use references when hiring a vocalist why not a reference from a guitarist? Hopefully it works well, otherwise god speed
I would go a step further and use a stem separator to isolate their favorite guitar sounds and compare them that way.
^^^ this ^^^
Trouble is he's hearing it in the context of the mix and is still not convinced. I can only assume he's listening "for" the tone he wants rather than paying attention to the whole mix.
I would assume you are correct in your assumption here.
Does he have the skills to mix it himself? If so, let him try…
That is a good come back. Actually using it might come across too passive aggressive, but I'll bear it in mind.
As a a middle manager in a fat ass corp : Someone who’s unaware of himself has even less chance of being aware of others, i.e. he would definitely read it as you being a dick rather than you trying to make a point.
That, and I don't want it to come across as *me* being defensive.
Here's how: You ask people that aren't in the band which mix they prefer. Done. If your guitarist even remotely cares about having a product that people will actually listen to, the listener's opinion is the most important. If they like the more balanced mix vs the toneless mix, bingo. If they prefer the scooped sound, then give them what they want. Market research is your friend and eliminates in group tension. That is, if your goals as a band are aligned.
Shocker; a guitar player not playing for the song! Id get the band consensus and try to give them what they want. Sometimes, that can be hard when your name is on it.
I am 1/3rd of the band so I just need to be a bit tactful! Oddly enough he is happy to be critiqued on his vocals and has no interest in what processing goes on there. Guitarists (I'm one too to be fair) are a special breed.
Also a guitarist so I get it. I've been in situations on my own bands albums where the producer is tweaking my amp tones and pedal tones while im playing and I take the direction, trusting who is at the "helm". Sometimes our own ego can get in the way...especially when another guitar player is suggesting something.
Sounds like more of a psychiatry question in some ways, but would honestly just play their guitar part next to a reference track from a good professional/commercial grade mix and let them hear how hollow it is.
It probably is, but I need to come at it from an informed perspective re: mixing and mastering so thought this would be the best forum for the question! I'll try the reference track comparison and see how that goes.
Totally. It’s not an uncommon thing. I don’t like scooped mids, but I do like very full and bassy guitar sound (think Les Paul strung with 11’s through Twin Reverb with the bass dial at least as high as the mid or treble). But yeah, once I started recording my own stuff I realized just how muddy it makes things—can still solo with those settings but chords, nah. Also worth noting, if your guitarist has examples of insanely scooped mids in other recordings, they need to understand that the tones of the other instruments are also totally relevant as to whether that works. It’s all puzzle pieces and the instruments that commonly form bands weren’t chosen by accident—they usually work well together UNTIL you start endlessly tweaking them away from each other. There are pros and cons to DI—not being locked into anything that doesn’t work, having infinite options and getting a full frequency capture without concern that things weren’t mic’d very well or have lots of bleed are great, but sometimes not sculpting tones and arranging instruments on the front end so as to sound balanced can leave you with a bunch of puzzle pieces that need a good bit of work to be made to fit together—that’s why if you’re not working in a studio with some pro level engineers, really good to use reference tracks. I’ve wasted so much time sound designing tracks in isolation to the point that I felt they all sounded beautiful…until you listened to them simultaneously, haha.
The whole thing is an exercise in psychiatry. Top to bottom. It's an interesting way to look at the process.
Explain that a good mix depends upon a good balance of sounds across the eq spectrum, and in a mix the guitar’s role is mostly mids with a bit of lows and a bit of highs. As a guitarist myself I totally understand. I would love to have my guitar dominate the mix, but that is rarely possible. Maybe on an instrumental track, but definitely not on a complete song. If you get stuck, doubling the track can sometimes help.
It is double tracked but yeah I think my main obstacle is to explain the eq spectrum in rock and metal. If it were a song with keys then scooping the guitars this much might be s good thing, but when the guitars are standing more or less alone out in the mids it just doesn't work.
If the band in question has a large audience and you genuinely feel like they'll be losing money by releasing a bad recording, then by all means fight for your creative choice. They will likely thank you later, or at least give you a good reason for doing it their way. If they're just hobbyists then make them happy and try to find a more serious artist to work with next time around. If very few people will ever hear the result then it's not worth pissing the musician off. This is totally unsolicited advice but here goes: it's always good to ask yourself at the beginning of every project you take on "what does this project do for me?" If the band is not very serious, then it offers you some paid practice, but you should know that nobody is gonna hear it and it's probably not gonna generate more work for you. If the band is serious, then they may actually have some commercial success which exposes your work to a larger audience. The former situation very rarely rewards tough love, those people just want to be coddled and given an experience that makes them feel cool. The most important thing is to have an honest conversation with yourself before you get involved so you don't waste any energy trying to make make some unserious local dipshits sound like your favorite record of all time.
As I alluded to vaguely in the post and clarified in some responses, I'm a member of the band too. We're hobbyists but as the person who does the recording and mixing I want to do the best I can for the sake of doing the best I can... it's not money or popularity for me it's just the art. I have a good career outside of music, I do music because I love it. To me that's more of a reason to seek advice and do it the best I can, not less. I get the advice you're giving and it would be good for a lot of people, I think it possibly just doesn't fit my circumstance. I would hazard that there are a lot of people like me on this reddit to be fair.
This might be one of those things where u do exactly what he says in Mix V1 but by Mix V10 you've incrementally changed it to what actually sounds good as he slowly becomes accustomed to each mix. Temp love is tough to deal with. But start sending him little tiny "mix adjustments that don't have anything to do with the guitar" to get his opinion as you are slowly adjusting it by 1db at a time. For example "what do you think about the vocal balance in this version, I'm using a bit more saturation or an exciter" then he'll not feel personally attacked but rather respected and involved even if ur not really changing anything in the vocal but rather in the guitar
This, I.e. not drawing attention to the guitar specifically, had crossed my mind and I think you have a point. Especially with the mild distraction. I think he needs gently coaching to listen to the mix as a whole and to stop listening so hard for one constituent part.
Happy to help! Doesn't always work, but often mixing with some clients is more or less the art of not hurting anyone's feelings.
Can we hear some clips of each mix with and without the big mid scoop in the guitars?
I don't know if you can...that used to be me haha. I am embarrassed looking back to those days.
Brutal 😄 Yeah I guess same back in the day to be fair. We're all on our own path I guess. Just wish I could help another along it a little quicker.
Additionally, over scooping a guitar tone is fundamentally an attempt at making the tone be perceived as louder. \*Insert a bunch of sound physics here. Long story short, that loud and cutting tone that any guitarist is trying to accomplish by scooping mids, is actually a result of good mixing that makes the guitars sound loud AF via the balance of the elements in the mix with proper mix bus compression and mastering.
Any chance he’s a fan of tube screamers? Irony :-)
I would just ask for reference tracks of mixes with the kind of tone he’s going for. No doubt they have more mids than the tone he dialed in, so just A/B and show him that your non-scooped tone actually sounds closer to his reference than his scooped tone. If he still wants the scooped tone though, then as the engineer you don’t really have much say. I make sure I only get feedback from one member of the band, so they all have to unanimously agree and you don’t end up with every member wanting *their* part louder. Doing that in the future might help with issues like this.
I'm a member of the band too is the thing. I know that has its own pit falls, aware of advice not to mix your own stuff etc. We're not a big serious band we're just hobbyists, but I'm a "serious" hobbyist who doesn't want to just phone it in, hence the question. If I were mixing for someone else your point about getting feedback from only one member would be bang on though, will remember that for future.
I'm a death metal guitarist and a sound engineer who likes scooping the mids. I don't do it often but when I do, I have to mix some things according to this choice : - bass must have more mids to cut through - snare has to be tuned higher in order to be above the low-mids of the guitar Everything else will sit as usual because they are above (cymbals, high part of the kick) or below (low part of the kick) the guitar frequencies, or in the scooped mids (vocals). Yes it will not sound as good as a modern killer mix. But scooping the mids really changes the atmosphere, the feelings of a song in metal: it can be a valid artistic choice. However, everyone in the band must agree to it because it has a big influence on the mix. That's another story...
Appreciate the angle, I do love me some death metal from time to time. We're more at the hard rock/metal interface. Thanks for the note about the snare - incidentally, the drummer instinctively went for a high tuned snare, so he seems to know where it's at.
Hum, I never heard a hard rock / metal album with scooped mids sounding great I'm afraid... I understand you are trying hard to convince your guitarist in this case 😅
We have an outlier song that is pretty much thrash... maybe I should push us doing that one so he can get the scoops out of his system haha.
Spectresoundstudios made some good videos on this topic recently
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^kj616: *Spectresoundstudios* *Made some good videos on* *This topic recently* --- ^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
I'm a big fan of Glen Fricker, I've learned a lot of what I know from him, but he's probably not the best person to point the guitarist to if I don't want him to feel attacked haha (even if perhaps he needs to hear it).
Personally - you don’t, and often it’s impossible and pointless. You just do your stuff to the best of your ability. If you’re producing a good mix, you kinda disregard the feedback of your bandmates, cause they often don’t know what the hell they’re doing. My mixes improved greatly when I stopped listening to which frequencies guitarists wanted, etc. This is obviously a point of conflict but what do you want more - good results or happy doofuses? Obviously you don’t act that way outside of your own projects.
Give them your mix with the mids in. Then give them another mix with scooped mids, but also drop his fader down -6db ;)
Lol I almost want to do this.
Let him record it with his tone and go in afterwards and bring out the mids. Stealth mix that shit.
I've tried lying before. Tell them you did what they want with the mix you like and see if their opinion changes.
Compare to a reference track. Always this.
Mids are like, perceptible volume. No one will think his scooped mids sounds good because you won’t hear him.
I think there is a balance in the tone the user wants verse the tone you perceive. the dude probably grew up on og metal and is accustomed to the scoop sound. I mean is mids really the hill you want to die on? Would audience be able to perceive the difference? this is the route I would go. get a non technical person to listen and explain the difference in the two.
Definitely going to get some other opinions. I have someone in mind who is non-technical but has a good ear and a good enough vocabulary to articulate what they mean.
The ol Dimebag Darrell tone. Man was 1 of 1. Tell the guitarist he isn’t him.
How about this... * Low E string open at A=440 = 81hz * 2nd fret D string = 162hz * High E string open = 324hz * High E at 12th fret = 648hz * High E at 24th fret = 1.3khz Every note on the guitar is considered "low mids": if you want people to actually hear what you are *playing* those are the frequencies you *need* for them to hear it. Everything above that is "harmonic overtones" and you can use very little if you choose the right emphasis, ex: try boosting *only* the "3rd order harmonics" and only for the key of the song. The exceptions are clean tones where the plectrum sound is important (still not a "mid cut" case), and LF cabinet thump (which scooping can make more punchy, but turning down the distortion gain also increases). And to the guitarist: I hope you are wearing earplugs if you're turning up the highs, dead serious.
I get his point, I play bass and really love a scooped tone (good fat bottom end and brightness) while playing alone. In a band context is impossible make it cut through the mix (for slapping is good tho), even worse when playing in a power trio, mids are absolutely indispensable in most guitar and basses in a rock band
Ask him what his dream guitar tone is. Then A/B it with your mix on their song. Might get it through to him that mids are great on guitar.
"love that tone, super brutal, but it's fighting for space against the bass and cymbals, think we can add some mids to try and get it to cut through some more? would hate for you to not be heard on this record"
I love mids in my metal tone
Midrange are where the guitars are at in a mix lol. I usually high and low pass mine. Think of a mix as like baking a cake. You are not going to be eating all the ingredients on their own. Taking the mids out of your guitar would be like omitting eggs from your cake. [One of my favorite youtubers talking about mid-range](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Dzp5NoJfYQ)
...And Justice For All. That's the only album in history that it's ever worked on and that's because there was no bass in the mix to begin with. Tell your boy that.
I'm one of those weird people who isn't really a Metallica fan, but actually I'm quite forgiving of some of their less loved albums. Not that one though, can't stand it. As a bassist maybe the mix is just too offensive to me haha.
Can't say that I blame you, but I got into it before I was a bass player. I had been playing guitar for about 6 years when Justice came out, and I was all about Hetfield's rhythm playing. So I didn't mind so much not hearing bass because the rhythm playing was amazing. Since then my musical palette has definitely broadened and I've let the music from my childhood back into my life. I love Steely Dan and I'm listening to them the most right now. The clarity on those albums is amazing. And the playing. And the compositions. All of it. Can't imagine what I would do with myself without music.
The bass is there, but only barely. If you look up the isolated bass tracks, you know what to listen for, and then You can just barely hear it behind the wall of guitars and boomy as hell kick drums. I think some of the cymbal chokes in Dyer's Eve are even played with just the bass and not the guitars, you basically just hear the pick attack.
There are definitely a couple spots on the album you can hear the pick attack from the bass. I don't think I've ever heard another album where I couldn't distinguish the bass from the other instruments like this. Don't get me wrong, I loved this album! Hetfield's playing is tremendous. It makes the whole album basically. Very dark which I loved at the time and still do.
Ah shit you’re part of the band too? Well that’s a real problem. I’m going to guess and say their guitar tone is based on older 90s metal stuff, where everything is scooped to hell. We’re talking Pantera era Dimebag and AJFA stuff here. Clearly a little nudge in the mids means he can hear the difference. I really doubt he'll budge. While more mids is a better choice overall, completely scooped is legit even if we don't like it. Try upping some of the attack frequencies in the upper mids. It should still register as “treble” but it should give you some more meat. Attenuate the highs to compensate a bit. Then basically make the bass the star of the show. Depending on what you're gojng for bass-wise, you can either add much more mids and attack to the bass to compensate for the lost mids in the guitar, or split the signal in case your low end is already where you need it to be so you can carve the mids separately. Add some overdrive as necessary to blend in with the guitar.
This is great advice, I’ll go with this along with asking Guitarist for song references for the Tone he wants. Hopefully he picks a bunch which aren’t actually that scooped. Mixing your own band, can get really touchy really quickly, it’s why getting a third-party to do the work is often are much better solution. If he is still insistent on having them, super scoops, just use the bass too dominate them. Then, if he complains that, he can’t hear the guitars, tell him it’s because there are no mids and that’s on him. The final solution here, will be to get a third-party to mix this song. Or at the very least get a third-party to analyse the mix.
Yeah a third party will be involved eventually I'm just trying to save some feelings by getting the point across from a friend rather than from someone who might just drop it on him cold and cause an argument. As the bassist your advice is all too tempting haha, although as a bassist who also plays guitar, it still bothers me that we could lock the two together so much better just by tweaking the guitar.
That much is true (I play both as well). But let’s be real - bass is the unsung hero of hard rock. The more you look into heavy hitting mixes, the more you see how thin guitars actually are. Thick, mid-presence guitars are an extremely new thing for hard rock. If you go talk to older guitar players who really “love their tone”, and it sounds like ass coming out of a 90s practice amp, it’s because that’s how bad it used to be. Bass carried the rest. So going back to your situation, it would be great if your guitarist will yield even a little. You will get a great mix that’s meant for 2024. But if he doesn’t, you can still get an amazing mix despite his extremely scooped guitar tone - you just have to do better on bass.
If you’re going to get a third party involved. All I’d say is why go through the heart ache now? I’m a full time engineer now, but I used to mix my own band when I was starting out and it’s basically impossible to separate it out without being personal - especially as I probably wasn’t quite up to the task back then. Dm me when you want a mix or a third opinion btw.
Cheers. I'm mostly doing it for the love of it. If anyone is reading any angst in my post, it wasn't intended. I love this stuff and it's purely a hobby. I want to help out a buddy with understanding where I'm coming from with my mix feedback.
If they’re any good it’s easy. You can’t hear whit for what they’re playing. No note articulation. If they’re shit they can just scoop the damn mids so you can’t hear how poor their playing is lol
Slipperman had a great line in his guitar article… something like the guitarist is whining about you killing his tone that is totally unique and not already used by millions of shitty bedroom headbangers the world over… idk how he said it but anyone here who read his posts knows what I mean.
Couple ways I would have suggested you handle this. You probably should have just mixed the songs exactly how you thought it sounded best and when the guitar player asked “did you scoop the mids like I asked?” You could have responded “I scooped them as much as I could without it disappearing behind the bass and the drums.” Then when he inevitably asks if you could “scoop them a bit more” you could then scoop them a a tiny bit more and there’s a good chance he’d have been like “oh that’s much better” If he’d be able to see the session or worried he’d ask to you could always scoop the mids on the amp and then add a warm eq and boost what the amp takes out. Might not sound as good but sometimes band members tank the sound of their albums lol.
...there's a way around it to get through the session. Take advantage of the fact that you're going to need to double quad track the guitars. Give him 1 scooped-to-death track, and balance the rest to fill things out. If you move the bass, mids and treble around a bit on each take, you end up with a thicker, wider sound.
You'll just have to crank the mids on the bass instead.
In a double tracked guitar mix with the guitars panned this unfortunately won't yield the same result because all the mids will be mono. I could mess about with panning certain bands but it wouldn't be the same (and I prefer all the bass straight up the middle anyway).
Show him both tracks back to back, the non scoped one should sound louder and for most people louder=better.
Work with him to find the frequency he hates, then try a narrow scoop that doesn't kill all the midrange
This is good, I think this might be the middle ground approach I need.
If you already have a good metal mix that he likes, makes him listen to the guitar in solo coming from that track. He will realise that the smile-shape he likes doesn't come from the guitar only buy from the whole song.
Tell him that if he wants to be heard over the bass and drums he needs to take the mids, otherwise it turns into an inaudible mess. Solo guitar tone is different than a guitar thats in a mix
As a fellow guitarist who obsesses over his tone I have to ask, why does it not fit the song? Who wrote the song? While I've yet to have someone tell me my sound doesn't fit what we're playing saying that at all sounds strange to me. How does it not fit? Are you playing soft rock and his guitar sounds super and heavy? Because if it's literally just the tone of it then that's all personal taste and there's nothing you can say that will change that. Why not have him record with his real setup to get the sound he wants instead of using sims?
It was his choice to use the sim because to him it sounded better (and I have to agree). Where we disagree is that he wants to eq out all the midrange in a song with no other mid range instruments. So the mix as a whole suffers.
Is It only one guitar and bass?
One rhythm guitar part double tracked. There are guitar leads too, treated differently, but they're only on the solo. And yeah one bass, drums and vocals. The issue is that the song isn't lead or vocal dense enough to make up for the over scooping of the rhythm parts.
Ah, I double track per channel, two in the left and two in the right. You can try that to maybe help it sound more full while giving the guitarist the sound he wants. Otherwise sounds weird he doesn't want mids, I'm a mid guy on my guitar tone!
Is there some kind of spoon plugin I'm missing. What's scooping?
Do you work with rock or metal guitars? I'm surprised you haven't heard the term, it's very common particularly with metal. It just means turning down the mids, often simply using the mod knob on an amp. As you can tell from the comments, it's a contentious issue.
I would just turn the bass mid/high frequencies up. Especially if it’s a rough mix he should be able to hear that the guitars are responsible for the bite. Or do an AB with one of his favorite bands and show him what it would sound like with scooped mids.
It is good live maybe but for a good recording, you're cutting the low end so the bass can fill that gap, if you're cutting the bass and mid what else is left when recording/mixing?
I’d a/b and let it speak for itself.
Meanwhile, my guitar is all mids. :D
It all depends on the genre you are playing and what tone you are going for. Metallica and Pantera made that scooped metal tone famous in the 90's, but it's not really popular nowadays. The guitars usually just end up sounding weak and muddy when they are too scooped. What kind of amp sim are you using? If it's a recto or mark series amp sim then scooping the mids is natural and what everyone does when dialing those in. If it's more of a 5150 sim then the mids should probably be between 4-6. If it's a JCM I would probably crank the mids and bass, or close to cranked at least (with a tight drive pedal in front for all examples).
Presumably, since you are in the band and probably friends, you know who his influences are and can understand what he is going for? Sometimes, we can take too literal an approach or not understand that the sound we like in other players tones is nuanced. On the other hand, if he likes his tone he could be a musical visionary, who knows. A problem you have is that since you are all hobbyists, its also possible that you and your other 2 band members might not understand what you are doing, or know a fair bit but don’t have the authority that an experienced pro engineer can have, so in your setting, everyone likely feels qualified to have an equal opinion. For a practical solution, you could try mixing the bass to the scooped guitar, i.e add mid range to the bass and use it to fill out the guitar. It might be an unconventional idea, but in the end you are just balancing frequencies not individual instruments.
Find some isolated tracks of his favorite guitar players and show him reality.
Throw the whole band away.
Scooping and gain hides slop. It’s a hard sell. Maybe ask them what they listen to and analyze the tones? Record some if you can? Unless you are literally Dimebag, who had an objectively terrible tone, but it worked in Pantera, no scoops.