Welcome back!
Today we are going to expand a little bit on my video about
kick drum synthesis in that we are going to discuss a way to EQ your kick drums
to give them a little more punch while still maintaining your low end.
This can be accomplished using any multiband or two single band equalizers and can be used on synthesized kicks as well as sampled kick drums. I prefer to use the EQ3 7-band that is standard with Pro Tools. The parameters are going to vary depending on the style of kick that you are trying to create but I will give you a general idea of where you want to start and from there it’s really up to your ears and judgment. For the purpose of this tutorial we are just going to use one kick drum but this concept can also be applied while using multiple layered kick drums. In the case of layered kick drums you would more than likely be using one kick EQ-ed so that it was only the desired low frequencies and the second being the low-mid to high frequencies. For single kick drum equalization we are first going to enable the low pass filter and set the Q to 24 dB which will steeply cutoff the higher frequencies. Here’s where your hearing comes into play. You are going to sweep the higher frequencies between about 4 to 10 kHz to remove any hissing but still maintaining a good high presence which we perceive as the attach of the kick. For the second EQ we are going to use a notch filter with a Q of about 8 to 10. Set the gain to -18 dB and sweep the frequencies between 30 to 50 Hz until you find the definition of the kick desirable. You can then bring the gain back up to about -6 dB which will have effectively reduced undesirable muddy frequencies. If you solo A/B the difference between the EQ-ed kick and the non-EQ-ed kick it will sound like the kick has been dampened but when it is incorporated into the mix you have effectively carved out room for those frequencies in other instruments. Now with a little compression added to the end of the signal chain you’ll have a nice punchy kick drum that effectively sits in your mix without losing its fidelity.
This can be accomplished using any multiband or two single band equalizers and can be used on synthesized kicks as well as sampled kick drums. I prefer to use the EQ3 7-band that is standard with Pro Tools. The parameters are going to vary depending on the style of kick that you are trying to create but I will give you a general idea of where you want to start and from there it’s really up to your ears and judgment. For the purpose of this tutorial we are just going to use one kick drum but this concept can also be applied while using multiple layered kick drums. In the case of layered kick drums you would more than likely be using one kick EQ-ed so that it was only the desired low frequencies and the second being the low-mid to high frequencies. For single kick drum equalization we are first going to enable the low pass filter and set the Q to 24 dB which will steeply cutoff the higher frequencies. Here’s where your hearing comes into play. You are going to sweep the higher frequencies between about 4 to 10 kHz to remove any hissing but still maintaining a good high presence which we perceive as the attach of the kick. For the second EQ we are going to use a notch filter with a Q of about 8 to 10. Set the gain to -18 dB and sweep the frequencies between 30 to 50 Hz until you find the definition of the kick desirable. You can then bring the gain back up to about -6 dB which will have effectively reduced undesirable muddy frequencies. If you solo A/B the difference between the EQ-ed kick and the non-EQ-ed kick it will sound like the kick has been dampened but when it is incorporated into the mix you have effectively carved out room for those frequencies in other instruments. Now with a little compression added to the end of the signal chain you’ll have a nice punchy kick drum that effectively sits in your mix without losing its fidelity.
Happy synthesizing!
This definitely a great explanation of how to EQ a kick. I think people that are new to mixing will find this topic very helpful and learn something new. I like the examples at the end those are very helpful.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Derek! This one definitely caters to new engineers and I thought that it was an important one. I often find that new comers haven't put thought into carving out their lower end. Thanks for reading!
DeleteVery informative.. EQing can make all the difference especially if you are trying to bring out kick drums. In my opinion, if the drums don't knock a certain way I wouldn't really give a song a chance.
ReplyDelete