EBOOK DAMN GOOD MUSIC PRODUCTION TIPS EDUARD | KORTHI THERE! Over the last couple of months I've been posting short, text based music production tips over on my Instagram (@eduardkort). As | ran out of creativity (and patience) for doing those, | decided to put all tips into a little ebook and give them away for free. Now don't get all butthurt, because | AM going to release video based tips ona consistent basis with an even greater “hands on" factor and even more know - ledge bombs than before. So without further ado, here are 50 tips in no particular order: PREFACE1.WIDEN UP! Use a Mid-Side EQ on your master bus. Cut anything below 120Hz and brighten the high end by increasing the gain by 1 or 2 dB using the Side mode. Your bass will stay tight and your sides open up. PAGE 12.TAPE EMULATION One of the greatest features of tape recorders is that they limit the amount of low end in a very musical way. Put your bass, kick or entire mix through a tape emulation plugin and your low end will become smooth, compact and in focus. PAGE 23.HOW TO - CLEANER MIX Put an EQ on the master bus. Set up a semi-narrow bell and boost it a lot. Sweep it between 250Hz and 500Hz until you hear a nasty sound. Flip the EQ and cut that portion by 1 or 2 dB. Your overall mix should sound better now. PAGE 34.BASS PERCEPTION To increase the intellegibility of bass ina mix, try to add harmonics one octave above it. Create a parallel channel and use a saturator, distortion plugin ora harmonic exciter. Then blend it to taste with the original bass. PAGE 45.FATTEN UP VOCALS A great trick for fattening up thin vocals is sending it to a short delay (7Oms- 120ms) and boosting the low mids just on that delay track. Cover with some reverb after and there you go! PAGE 56.REDUCE HARSHNESS Harshness is annoying, especially on guitars, cymbals and vocals. Use a dynamic EQ between 4kHz and 5kHz, zero in on the offending frequency and cut it out. PAGE 67.MIXING VOCALS When mixing vocals on top of an (EDM) drop, make sure to duck the volume of the lead synths a couple dB on where the vocal is. This way it will always stand out even in the busiest part of the track. PAGE 78.HOW TO - LEAD SOUNDS Try to put a short hihat on every note of your main melody. This will let your lead pop out even more. Instead of a short hihat you can use white noise, which also creates some extra harmonics on top of your lead. Mix them in very gently, just loud enough that you'd miss them when muted. PAGE 89.GAIN- STAGING Gainstaging, simply put, is the management of level across a signal path. It entails considerations such as signal-to-noise ratio, headroom and the tonal changes that occur as a result of changing gain along the way. In the digital age, gainstaging barely matters. Digital is a linear system, meaning all you really have to do is not clip the signal. PAGE 910.SAMPLED INSTRUMENTS When using virtual instruments like drums, piano or strings, turn down the velocity and pull up the channel volume and/or compress for a more realistic sound PAGE 1011.HOW TO - PHAT LOOPS Duplicate and split frequency bands with an eq so that you have 3 bands: high-mid -low. Put Waves RBass (or similar) on the low band to beefen up the lows, a transient designer on the mids for extra snap and definition and a stereo widener on the highs for some extra spread. PAGE 1112.HOW TO - WIDE SYNTHS Add stereo movement to mono synths (or other mono sounds): Duplicate the track and hard pan left and right. Put a compressor on one tarck and an expander on the other. Enjoy. PAGE 1213.REALISTIC PERCUSSION Put a slow modulating phaser in parallel to your hihats or shakers for subtle variation to make it sound less like a static loop. PAGE 1314.BIGGER DROPS Use a filter to reduce the amount of low end in the verse our buildup and bypass the filter in the chorus for more impact. PAGE 1415.RICH MELODIES Any melody line (vocal or instrumental) can be made richer by adding a harmony (chords), sending it to a reverb and muting the dry sound. Blend to taste. PAGE 1516. VOCAL TRICK Use breaths creatively. Copy an intense sounding one and paste before a phrase or transition to add drama and intensity. PAGE 1617.PRESERVE PUNCH When adding delay to sounds with really sharp transients, put a transient designer or compressor with a moderately fast attack/fast release before the delay to preserve the punch. PAGE 1718.CRISP, AIRY VOCALS Create a parallel channel of your vocal, compress it hard (6-10dB). Insert an EQ after the compressor and and boost a couple dB at 8kHz-12kHz, filter lows below 60OHz and add back into the mix under the main vocal. De-ess, if sibilance becomes a problem. PAGE 1819.ADD MOVEMENT TO PADS 1. Create a stereo delay channel. 2. Set for a slow ping-pong delay. 3. Send from pad to delay to taste. 4. Insert a slow modulating phaser or flanger after the delay in the signal path. PAGE 1920.ADD SPACE TO KEYS AND SYNTHS 1. Insert a stereo delay across key/synth channel. 2. Set the delay times to 211ms and 222ms left and right accordingly. 3. Pan and add feedback to taste. NOTE: Adjust mix to 30% if used as an insert effect instead of a send effect. PAGE 2021.COVER UPA PITCHY VOCAL 1. Create a delay channel for the vocal. 2. Set the delay to less than 100ms timed to the track. 3. Insert a chorus or a flanger after the delay in the signal path. 4. Set the chorus mix to greater than 50% and deeper than normal. 5. Send from vocal until the tuning becomes less noticeable. PAGE 2122.HUGE BACKGROUND VOCALS In order to avoid frequency clashes and make room for the lead vocal, pan your background vocals the following way: 1. Pan the lowest notes/harmonies towards the center. 2. Pan the highest harmony voices towards the outside. 3. Any mid-harmonies should be panned in between. PAGE 2223.PRESERVE BASS 1. Duplicate bass track. 2. HPF duplicated track around 250Hz. 3. LPF original track at the point of the HPF on the duplicate. 4. Add subtle overdrive to the original track. 5. Add some attack with a transient shaper to duplicated bass. Note: Blend to taste, group and compress lightly for glue. PAGE 2324.MIX BUS GLUE To achieve dynamic balance and add "glue" to the mix, consider mixing into a compressor right from the start of your production. Set up a VCA - style compressor (SSL / API 2500 master bus compressor) with a ratio of 2:1 or 4:1, slowest attack and fastest release with no more than 2-4dB of gain reduction. NOTE: Bypass and A/B often to avoid overcompression. PAGE 2425.HOW TO - HUGE TOMS On tom bus: 1. Insert an EQ, lowcut around 70Hz and boost in the 5kHz are a to emphasize the stick hit. 2. Dip slightly anywhere from 300Hz- 800Hz to get rid of mud. 3. Compress 3dB to 6dB (slow attack, slow release). Inrecease the release for more body. 4. Send to dedicated short decay reverb. NOTE: Adjust predelay to separate tom attack from reverb PAGE 2526.BETTER REVERB On reverb send: 1. Insert a widener or an M/S processor after reverb. 2. Send the reverb to the SIDES to leave space for the vocal and instruments. 3. Increase the MIDS in the center and cut the very highs and lows to help the reverb blend better into the mix. NOTE: Compress to taste. PAGE 265 SIGNS OF AN AMATEUR PRODUCTION 1. Too Narrow Ba eosmen im em ale eo lanai cola ee Late Re eT sure to check the width. Good mixes spread themselves like a blanket across the entire stereo spectrum, whereas poor mixes hit you straight into your eardrums with a single audio beam. Make use of your humble panning tools and aim for balance in your panning decisions. 2. Too Cluttered Now think depth. There’s nothing worse than a track that has been mixed so that the parts sound like they are playing through a tin can. This is usually a sign of bad monitors being used at the mixing stage. Keep instruments of the same frequency apart. Start with the low end. From there, spread everything equally across the frequency spectrum. 3. Too Loud Height (dynamic range). This is the ratio between the loudest and quietest part in the mix. The general trend in music production over the past decades has been to process mixes by (ab)using compressors and limiters to squash the dynamic range of an entire mix resulting in overcompression. While those techniques used to work, they've now become so extreme, that they're having the opposite effect.5 SIGNS OF AN AMATEUR PRODUCTION 4. Lacking a Hook One of the problems with your average tune is exactly that: it’s average. It lacks that certain something that grabs your listeners ear and makes it stand out from the crowd. As that crowd is getting increasingly, well, crowded, nowadays any tune worth it’s salt need some kind of hook to make it instantly noticeable and memorable. Produce a song Adar Daal etal Mc lala calm oe Tae Tella eel a) Cal Belo emailed 5. Too Perfect While | don’t want to sound like my dad here, but the slick production sheen that’s imparted by today’s music technology can often make tracks sound too sterile and uninspiring. We know you don’t wanna sound amateurish, but your music might benefit if you make things a little more organic, raw and a little earthier (unintentional hipstery!). ay27.COMPRESSION TIP 1: ATTACK Try to not use the fastest attack on everything: Many instruments, particularly guitars, will stand out more with the extra "front" you get from allowing the initial transient through a compressor unscathed. Bass instruments can also benefit from the extra definition provided by a good attack transient, allowing them to punch through a dense mix. PAGE 2728.COMPRESSION TIP 2: FX RETURNS Don't forget that effect returns, particularly reverbs and delays are just as fair game and in need of compression as any of your individual instrument tracks. For example, if your delay doesn't quite fade away as you'd like, or you want to bring up and draw out the sustain of a reverb tail, then compressing the return may give you the control you're after. PAGE 2829.COMPRESSION TIP 3: SOUNDCLOUD Any format uploaded to Soundcloud gets transcoded to a 128kbps mp3 file to save bandwith for streaming. Conversion to 128kbps creates excess artefacting, which gets stacked on top of your track and causes it to gain volume, which in turn causes it to clip if you left no headroom during the mastering process. Leave enough headroom while mixing and/or pull the limiter ceiling on your master channel back 0,5dB-1dB to leave room for the conversion artefacts. PAGE 2930.COMPRESSION TIP 4: SHAPE Instead of thinking about compression as a way to "make things louder", think of it as a tool to change the shape of a sound. Think of shape in terms of a sound's envelope: (ADSR) Attack, decay, sustain and release. Attack is an another way of saying how sharp will the transient sound be. Release is how much tail or sustain you want to emphasize. Threshold determines at what amplitude the compressor starts working. Ratio is how hard it is going to work. PAGE 3031.COMPRESSION TIP 5: CIRCUIT TYPES There are four main compressor circuit types: VCA, Opto, Fet and Vari-Mu. While all of them are essentially tools to control dynamics, they achieve it in different ways, producing all kinds of extra effects while doing so. Knowing those types, their distinct features and the right context to use them in, can easily elevate a production from mediocre to great. PAGE 3132.ON THE MUSIC INDUSTRY Bear in mind that the music business is not out there to be your friend. It is there to make money for record labels, which means sometimes artists get exploited in the process. Once your career is getting near the record label stage, you'll need to prepare yourself accordingly: Learn the basics of entertainment law and publishing deals. Get an honest, hardworking team of people around you to look out for your interests. Don't expect your record label to do any of that for you. Work hard. Be a strategic motherfucker. PAGE 3233.HOW TO DEVELOP A SIGNATURE SOUND Having a unique and recognizable sound is something producers and engineers should work towards to. This requires out-of-the-box thinking and reliable tools (amongst other things). One good and affordable way to start developing a signature sound is routing sounds out of your DAW through guitar pedals. Buy a cheap pedal on ebay/from a garage sale and use it across your DAW to add texture and interesting effects that VSTs can't provide. Being unique = doing things differently. PAGE 3334. VINTAGE TECHNIQUES - 1 Run your sounds through emulations of oldschool samplers and mess with the samplerate and bit depth to add grit, noise and lo-fi vibe to a sample. Both lead lines and synth chords can be given more body in the mix with this technique. Try automating the sample rate across synth hooks for movement or for ear candy across longer segments. Drums can also benefit from the same kind of vintage treatment. PAGE 3435.VINTAGE TECHNIQUES - 2 A common technique that can add analogue warmth to your tracks is the use of overdrive to inject subtle addition harmonics on key tracks. Once again, guitar pedals are a great choice for those with access to the hardware. Another one is applying tape processing to simulate "wow" and "flutter" similar to older recordings. A combination of bitcrushing and tape saturation should do the trick. PAGE 3536.HUGE 808S Try this: Duplicate 808 track and run it through a distortion plugin until it sounds full and rich in overtones. Then throw on a lowpass filter and cut away all of the harsh harmonics - might be as low as 400Hz or lower. Then, with the whole song playing, blend the parallel signal back in with the dry. Listen for the presence of the 808 to suddenly become much thicker and apparent. PAGE 3637.EQ: BEFORE OR AFTER COMPRESSION? A common debate amongst producers and engineers is it to whether put an EQ before or after a compressor. Although there is no definite way of doing this, try the following approach: Filter out unwanted frequencies BEFORE the compressor, because you don't want them boosted anyways. Place another EQ (maybe an analog modeled one for flavor) AFTER the compressor and then boost the desired frequencies. Treat. Compress. Enhance. PAGE 3738.COMMERCIAL POP VOCALS If you have a vocal that you can't get to cut through a mix, use this trick: 1. Duplicate the vocal track. 2. On duplicate: Boost the mids with a wide Q, follow up with a compressor and compress a fair amount. 3. Place an EQ after the compressor and boost the lows and highs a couple dB with a shelf to even out the sound. 4. Blend in with the original to taste. This will give the vocal a commercial sound and keep the illusion of dynamics. PAGE 3839.KEEP SOUNDS UPFRONT In situations where you want to use a large reverb but keep the sound towards the front of the mix, consider increasing the reverb's predelay time to around 70ms-150ms. Long predelay settings will detach the reverb tail from its source, allowing the original to sound upfront, but still have a sense of ambience floating behind it. PAGE 3940.MAKE SPACE/ADD DISTANCE WITH EQ In composing the stereo image of your mix, you not only have the option to pan things horizontally, but you can also push them back into distance, away from the listener. Reverb is the most obvious tool for this job, but you can also achieve the illusion of distance by removing some of the high-frequency content of a sound (i.e. shelving/lowpassing a sound). PAGE 4041.HOW TO - FAKE HARMONIES If you want to emphasize certain melodic phrases of a solo vocal, you can create authentic "fake" harmonies by using Melodyne (Flex Pitch, etc...). Duplicate the phrase twice and place the duplicates a third (fifth, seventh...) above and below the main phrase respectively. Bring the formants down on the upper and up on the lower a little bit to compensate for the "Chipmunk-/Darth Vader effect). Mix and pan to taste. PAGE 4142.AGRESSIVE RAP VOCALS 1. Duplicate vocal channel 2. Insert a compressor and compress hard! (6dB-10dB of GR). 3. Insert a distortion plugin and distort. Boost dominant frequencies between 2kHz and 4kHz with an EQ after. 4.Mix subtly under the original vocal. PAGE 4243.HOW TO - SUPER WIDE BASS 1. Duplicate the bass track twice and pan one left and the other right. 2. Insert a lowcut on one new channel around 250Hz. 3. Insert a lowcut on the other channel around 150Hz and insert an overdrive or distortion to alter the sound a bit. 4. Adjust level of left and right channels in relation to the original to taste. PAGE 4344.HOW TO -WIDE GUITARS 1. Create a delay (send) channel. 2. Set the delay to 30ms or less, else you will hear it as a separate slap. 3. Add an overdrive or distortion plugin before the delay in the signal path. 4. Add a slowly modulating plugin after the delay (chorus, flanger...). 5. Pan to taste. PAGE 4445.RETAIN PUNCH WHILE LIMITING Here's a tip on how to keep transients intact, while applying soft-to moderate limiting: Try putting a transient designer before you go into the limiter. Add some attack and reduce just a bit of release. This will give the signal some “forwardness", which will help the transients to retain punch while the limiter control the peaks. PAGE 4546.PHATTER SYNTH CHORDS Here's a nice way to add some grit and fullness to your synth chords: 1. Duplicate channel. 2. Add saturation/distortion for extra harmonics. 3. Use a bandpass eq/filter to find the sweet spot that sounds good in the distorted channel, but is lacking in the original. 4. Blend to taste with the original. 5. Group and compress both channels lightly for glue. PAGE 4647.BETTER BASS TRANSLATION Adding stereo width to a synth bass can help it translate better on small speakers: 1. Duplicate bass channel. 2. Add some crunchy distortion and use a 60Hz high-pass filter to roll off the lowest sub frequencies. 3. Place a utility plugin on the duplicate bass and invert the phase on the left channel. This will turn the duplicate into a side- only signal that adds complementary width when listening in stereo, but cancel out completely when heard in mono. 4. Mix to taste with original. PAGE 4748.HOW TO - VOCAL CHOPS 1. Load an acapella into a sampler, then adjust the start point until you get a position that responds well to jamming via MIDI (usually a long vowel). activate the glide function and play the sample an octave or two higher than its natural pitch. 2. Add a short/small room reverb with plenty of wet signal (around 80%) mixed in, followed by distortion Use an EQ to tame fuzzy highs and boomy lows. 3. SLAM everything into a limiter. Go fora crazy amount of gain reduction, to get the obvious pumping effect between the notes. NOTE: Use Autotune and a formant tool to alter the sound even more. PAGE 4849.WHEN TO USE MULTIBAND DISTORTION The most obvious use for multiband distortion is when you're looking to beef up a particular frequency region within a dense, multilayered singal such as a layered synth sound. If you simply apply single-band distortion over the whole frequency range, the low frequencies will most likely trigger the distortion effect first (as they carre the most energy), muddying up the low end and creating a distorted mess. Instead, a multiband distortion plugin can be used to focus the effect only on the mid/high frequencies, while leaving the bass/sub area completely clean, so you can push the upper areas much harder and exaggerate the effect even further. PAGE 4950.HOW TO BOOST YOUR WORKFLOW Ever got a track finished, only to find out that id doesn't stack next to your favorite commercial mixes? Start comparing it early on, rather than right at the end and the continue to do so with every vital change. Also, hitting the save each time will overwrite the previous stagesm. Instead, when you've made a few significant tweaks, SAVE AS, and create numbered versions. Render a mix out whenever you do this so you can easily compare to your current version- sometimes, you might decide to revert to an earlier, better mix. PAGE 50THE END THANK YOU FOR READING! FOLLOW ME ON MY SOCIAL MEDIA FOR MORE USEFUL RESOURCES: FACEBOOK.COM/EDUARDKORT INSTAGRAM.COM/EDUARDKORT