Too much bass in current popular music? I want to stay with the times but dang...

I also want to like my music when I am finished with it.
What is with all the bass in current recordings. I've been listening to the local top 40 pop station some and I last year I bought the first Paulo Nutini, I heard and liked "New Shoes:, I saw him live on one of those Isle of Wight shows or something like that... anyway... everytime I play it I have to totally readjust the EQ on my stereo in my truck. Anything from the 90s or earlier sounds pretty good with my standard custm EQ but I have a hard time getting a good sounding mix (from a CD or from the radio) on most new music. Do you ever make two masters of your mixes? Do youalways save your mixes before you master so that if you master or get your mix mastered and don't like it you can re-master?
 
I have a Pioneer system in my truck and usually if I like something i'll turn the loudness off run the bass on 2, mid on 2, and treble on 4 or 5... 70s stuff I may turn the bass on 3 and treble on 6.... but this new stuff is hard for me to dial in and when I mix something I want it to be appealing tothe current ear... which means I am going to have to figure out how to mix in a bass sound that I might think is too much... or I could just mix the for my ear... country music does not seem to have this bass heavy mix on everything.
 
Any thoughts on allthe bass in current pop music? Is it in there for the dance floor?
 
I just need to fire up my Pioneer SX-1010 or my Sansui 881, throw on an LP... and smile. Gotsome of those nice wood lattice front speakers togo with the Sansui... I need to get some good 70s floor speakers that will handle the 1010... I ordered some dead mint Realistic Mach 2 speakers, same out of a "ladies club" great deal, they were in perfect shape... the ebay seller (no lie) wrapped them in brown paper and shipped them UPS from WA to GA... they came with a couple of bashed corners and a hole poked in the back of one... I got a discount and gave them away... time to try again... need to balance between the sund I want and the look the wife wants.
again I ramble, sorry... it has been a long day. Both grandchildren spent last night and today was the 3yo birthday party here... aat least I am not as old as I feel.
 
Happy Memorial Day... don't forget to honor the Confederate dead too... it has been long enough. The first Confederate Memorial Day (Decoration Day) was held about ten miles from here in 1865, under occupation.
 
Hard to believe I posted this to ask about bass in current records but I did... ignore the rest, laff.
 
Julien

jbow


I also want to like my music when I am finished with it.
What is with all the bass in current recordings. I've been listening to the local top 40 pop station some and I last year I bought the first Paulo Nutini, I heard and liked "New Shoes:, I saw him live on one of those Isle of Wight shows or something like that... anyway... everytime I play it I have to totally readjust the EQ on my stereo in my truck. Anything from the 90s or earlier sounds pretty good with my standard custm EQ but I have a hard time getting a good sounding mix (from a CD or from the radio) on most new music. Do you ever make two masters of your mixes? Do youalways save your mixes before you master so that if you master or get your mix mastered and don't like it you can re-master?
 
I have a Pioneer system in my truck and usually if I like something i'll turn the loudness off run the bass on 2, mid on 2, and treble on 4 or 5... 70s stuff I may turn the bass on 3 and treble on 6.... but this new stuff is hard for me to dial in and when I mix something I want it to be appealing tothe current ear... which means I am going to have to figure out how to mix in a bass sound that I might think is too much... or I could just mix the for my ear... country music does not seem to have this bass heavy mix on everything.
 
Any thoughts on allthe bass in current pop music? Is it in there for the dance floor?
 
I just need to fire up my Pioneer SX-1010 or my Sansui 881, throw on an LP... and smile. Gotsome of those nice wood lattice front speakers togo with the Sansui... I need to get some good 70s floor speakers that will handle the 1010... I ordered some dead mint Realistic Mach 2 speakers, same out of a "ladies club" great deal, they were in perfect shape... the ebay seller (no lie) wrapped them in brown paper and shipped them UPS from WA to GA... they came with a couple of bashed corners and a hole poked in the back of one... I got a discount and gave them away... time to try again... need to balance between the sund I want and the look the wife wants.
again I ramble, sorry... it has been a long day. Both grandchildren spent last night and today was the 3yo birthday party here... aat least I am not as old as I feel.
 
Happy Memorial Day... don't forget to honor the Confederate dead too... it has been long enough. The first Confederate Memorial Day (Decoration Day) was held about ten miles from here in 1865, under occupation.
 
Hard to believe I posted this to ask about bass in current records but I did... ignore the rest, laff.
 
Julien

Yep Julien, I question this also. It seems that quite a few things we would consider "bad choices" seem to creep into today's mixes. One is sub low bass as you have mentioned. It almost makes me think that quite a bit of this stuff was mixed/mastered with earbuds in mind since most of the world listens on them these days. This is really starting to be an upsetting trend that is degrading the quality of music in my opinion. Not only that, but the loudness wars are actually sporting clipping areas in some of the songs more frequently. I was starting to somewhat accept the super loud thing as long as there weren't apparent "overs", but now it's just gone too far. There is also quite a bit of vocal sibilance being accepted these days too...which is a pet peeve of mine.
 
I had the luxury of talking to Grammy Winning Engineer/Producer/Author Khaliq Glover a few weeks ago and asked his thoughts about engineers/producers that get a bit too much acclaim when realistically, they aren't doing anything that spectacular. He agreed with my thoughts but also made a mention of how an engineer or producer lacking skills may bring other things to the table just by being in the room. Though I'm still having a hard time getting my head around his response, I can see where there must be a certain level of comfort that needs to be there.
 
But that said, I still think some of these guys are over-rated and I sincerely wonder how they get the jobs they get. Who makes these calls for extreme sub-low bass, vocal sibilance, excessive volume to the point of clipping and over-all sound degradation.....the record lables.....the artists? Surely someone making the call here is cluleless and could care less about fidelity. I purposely turn business away when jobs like this come at me. My name has to go somewhere on this...and thankfully for me, I'm in a position where I don't have to take on everything that comes through my door. One of the greatest feelings for me is to tell a potential client "sorry but you'll need to go to someone else if you would like your music ruined by loudness". I just don't believe in the "customer is always right" policy and will never take on a job that fits that bill. If I was no longer in a position to turn business away, I'd do something else before I'd add to this mayhem. Music just isn't some "thing" to me, I live it. It's like how I'm against littering to the point of not even throwing a gum wrapper out the window of my car or even allowing a piece of dental floss to fly out. Littering is littering regardless how small the piece of trash. That's how I feel about music...it's being "littered" with this stuff...and for what? Can't people hear that this stuff just sounds horrible? I just don't get it.
 
I'm like you....I prefer the older stuff....70's 80's and early 90's where production still had what *I* consider all the right stuff. Quick story for you. I get super busy here in my studio. So much so, there are times when I may have to sub something out. When I do this, it goes to someone credible like Bob Katz etc. I happened to try this other guy (who'll I won't mention which in all reality, I SHOULD mention to spare anyone from ever going to him!) who used to be a pretty famous rock star turned mastering engineer. Let me tell you man....clueless is an understatement. He's fast and delivers on time...but too fast. So fast that of course I had to go over the job myself only to find out there were overs, non-removal of DC offsets, no difference in EQ curve at all compared to my final mix, (could I have nailed it that spot on? LOL) pops and clicks that showed up that were not in my original file, weird crossfades between songs, sub-low bass below 30 Hz...I mean, what the hell!?
 
I called the dude up and asked him a few questions about his work. He was clueless either because he simply didn't know what was needed to be done as a Mastering Engineer, or he didn't do the job himself like he promised me. I paid him for the job and told him I'd never use him again because I could not use this stuff. He offered to fix it but I wanted no parts of it and fixed it myself. A week later I got an email from him with a refund stating how sorry he was. He had listened to the stuff and realized it sounded like absolute dog bawls. Guys like this use their star status and popularity to do things they shouldn't be doing until they learn how. Another thing that has probably helped him other than his "name" is when you get something from a major label, your editing session as an ME doesn't even need to take place. It's so tight, polished, edited and spot on, you only check it for your own peace just to make sure they didn't miss anything. They NEVER miss anything. This dude gets stuff like that on a daily basis....it's so good as is, all he has to do is pretty much slap a limiter on it and get the gaps right for the CD/PQ sheets etc.
 
Anyway, sorry for the rant...but yes, as you can tell, this stuff really annoys me too. I keep on hoping that one day I'll wake up and everyone degrading audio will have woken up as well. How can they not hear this? I just don't get it and will never understand it. :(

It's simple.  We live in an ever-increasing lo-fi world (except for video), that promotes faster and cheaper.  I think sometime in the not-so-distant future that someone will expose people to music with headroom, done correctly and played on decent gear and it will blow people away with what they've been missing.  Then the pendulum will swing back that way for a while.  Of course, the fear there is that people's ears may not be able to handle it after becoming used to the crap being pushed on them over the last several years...

Flossing and driving... surely you can't be in that big of a rush Danny.....

I think it's all of those things and the fact that alot of people now are buying car systems ( an home systems too) with huge honkin subs in them, capable of creating a seismic disturbance..... so the producers are putting the low frequency musical data there to give them a thrill. On most systems without a sub, that stuff is simply inaudible for the most part.

just 2 centavos....

Danny, yeah... compensating for the lack of a sub can place way to much low freq data in the mix when you play it with a sub.... I like bass in the music, and that is the reason I opted for a sub in my studio. I will often switch back and forth after I have what I think is a completed mix..... from sub, to without sub, to headphones and ear buds to check the mix on the lower end.....


funny: "feel ma bile ducts rattelin"   reminds me of something I heard many years back.  I was working in a house doing some electrical work.  Two black ladies were sitting at the table eating lunch and talking. A TV commercial came on about the taste wars with Pepsi and Coke. I noticed both products on the kitchen counter so I asked which one they liked best. I will never forget the one ladies answer.... she said...and I quote: "I likes Pepsi, cause I kin tastes it better when I burps" ..... I about lost it....

I too, floss while driving.... after eating lunch on the way to a job, the last thing you want is food hanging from in between your teeth when you smile at the customer.... so I use those cool little flosser picks. They have a piece of floss pre-strung at one end... so it's a one handed deal to floss and drive.   I have seen some people using real floss while driving.... I think you need at least one hand on the wheel..... !!!!