Trying to make Kick loud without clipping

[Andreas G]

Originally Posted by DarkEcho

Andreas, you said that your stuff peaks at -12, you mean thats the highest any one instrument's level ever gets? do you limit them to -12 or just alter the level so that -12 is the max it ever gets?

I just alter the levels.

Originally Posted by DarkEcho

Also, I thought gain staging had to do with the levels of different peices of equipment going in and out of eachother, for instance, wouldnt proper gain staging for a drum sampler and a DAW be your sampler loud enough to where its not in the red, and then whatever level you want in your DAW, where as improper gain staging would be having the volume too low in your sampler but turning it up really high in your DAW to compensate?.

That's right!

Originally Posted by DarkEcho

Maybe I am confused about what gain staging is.

I found that proper gain staging ITB and OTB is very different. Perhaps you think of gain staging more like an OTB-guy.

[Andreas G]

Originally Posted by Methlab

I track in peaking around this level. I have not mixed this low though...I usually mix louder...I may try what you are doing though...any hints on how you get it loud after? I mean we all know mastering is the way, but I have heard MEs say .."you want a loud song? Mix it loud"....So I'm interested in what you do in that area.

Others than the usual stuff I have no special trick or technic and my mixes are probably not superloud. When doing Rockstuff I do try to get a lot of punch and power in the mix but rather by feeling than by watching a rms-meter. Perhaps try another mastering guy :-)

[Alex Niedt]

Originally Posted by Methlab

I track in peaking around this level. I have not mixed this low though...I usually mix louder...I may try what you are doing though...any hints on how you get it loud after? I mean we all know mastering is the way, but I have heard MEs say .."you want a loud song? Mix it loud"....So I'm interested in what you do in that area.

But they mean mix it to sound loud, do they not? It doesn't matter where you're actually peaking.

[rimskidog]

wouldnt proper gain staging for a drum sampler and a DAW be your sampler loud enough to where its not in the red,

No actually. If you are recording at 24bit there's no need whatsoever to have the signal hotter than hell going in. You should still be averaging -12 dbfs if not -18. The more headroom you leave at this stage the better quality you will get coming out (see my sig). You can squash and limit the hell out of it later if you aren't sending it ot an ME but for mixdown just make it sound as good as you can and don't worry about loud (which is all a very long way of saying:

... or make everything else quiter

[mOjO FET]

Try changing your pan law.

Michael

[Eganmedia]

If it sounds good in solo and sounds good when it's louder than the rest of mix, I'd guess there's other stuff happening in the mix that's masking the kick. Try muting some instruments and see if the kick pops out without having to raise its volume. Sometimes the low end of a bass can fight terribly with a kick. So can the accumulated low end of a bunch of electric guitars, keyboards, etc. Rather than adding more processing to an already good kick sound, try thinning out the jungle of other crap that's obscuring it.

[AllAboutTone]

Are you using good preamps ? or any ? thats helps a lot.

[jimmyjimjim]

Originally Posted by patrox247

Turn down everything else, and raise the master fader. Done

Spot on.

[CrankyRayHanky]

Use more than 1 mic: inside, outside, a foot back. I currently use the ae2500 which has 2 built in, a D6, and a 4047 a footback. Thunderous

[musicguitar]

I know this might not be the best answer, but you could try using some samples with a sound replacer program (drumagog, etc.) to get the punch/attack, and blend it with the original kick. Also, try pulling out the low-end on the guitars and panning hard left and right for a lot of other instruments to allow the kick to really shine and cut through

[Ironklad Audio]

Practise ducking techniques

booyah!

assuming you've attempted most of the well-known tricks as far as compression/EQ go, and the kick still won't cut through, this is where i would look to next

[DarkEcho]

This is all good advice but I have to laugh because I am pretty sure i've mentioned that I am using Battery kits a few times already.. thanks for the tips but I am not working with recorded kick drum this time haha.

now, to RimSkiDog, when I open Battery 3, all of the cells are set to their default volumes. which are usually zero.. for proper digital gain staging, I should leave these at the default volume and send them to multi outs and adjust the volumes within the DAW right?

to sum up the gain staging, isnt it better to leave it up to the last program in the chain to decide the volume of something rather than have it changed by the source programs?

[rimskidog]

I don't use samples so this will not be right on point, but think of it this way. If you see you samples as audio-in you would deal with them so that everything was at unity except the trim. Thus if you use the voloume of your sample on playback to ensure your signal int your DAW averages around -18 dbfs then you are probably ensuring you have the best signal stregnth (and therfore the best quality you can capture). Make sense?

[DarkEcho]

ok so I need to use the volume control within battery to make each individual sample average -18 on each execution inside the DAW, then they will all be the same volume and can be volume adjusted accordingly from within the DAW

[gurubuzz]

Originally Posted by DarkEcho

ok so I need to use the volume control within battery to make each individual sample average -18 on each execution inside the DAW, then they will all be the same volume and can be volume adjusted accordingly from within the DAW

Just cut them all the same amount...you want the relative mix to stay intact.

[gurubuzz]

Also remember that Gain staging is important in the analog world to keep the signal as far above the noise floor as possible...

if you are staying in the box, gain staging becomes irrelevant......


AND remember the clearer the Kick the louder it sounds....Choose which will be the boss in the lo frequency the bass or Kick and do try ducking the bass with kick..it will sound louder without being really louder.

[Methlab]

Originally Posted by Alex Niedt

But they mean mix it to sound loud, do they not? It doesn't matter where you're actually peaking.

I guess..well thats kind of confusing the way you worded it. I track in at low volumes and it does indeed make a difference. my mixes don't clip, but they peak near 0..what I do is start with the kick, so everything is built around that. So to mix lower, I would simply start with the kick peaking at a lower volume. I will give it a shot sometime.