all the instrument tracks complement each other. If you are soloing instruments up and EQ-ing them, that tells me 2 possible things. 1. You didn't track properly and you're trying to fix problem areas. OR 2. You are so into EQ-ing individual instruments for good sound that you are doing more harm than good. Each time we EQ something by itself, we are EQ-ing it as an entity. This is not always a safe move. As soon as you make something sound good on its own, you will probably fail miserably when you put this instrument in the mix with other instruments. Each instrument adds something to the field that another may not. Then again, some will share like frequencies so this is where you need to be careful of frequency masking. When we EQ something all alone, we allow too much space within that instrument to be present via EQ. We need to always EQ within a mix because each instrument helps to make up the over-all sound. For example, a lot of new engineers feel bass guitar needs to be low endy. This is not the case realistically speaking. If you listen to a pro album without using an EQ in a music player (all onboard EQ's for players like Winamp, Win Media, etc. here in DanziLand are permanently disabled for life...don't use them) and find a spot where the bass is alone, you will notice it doesn't have anywhere near the low end people think it should have. The bass you think you hear comes from all the other instruments adding to it when the full mix plays. The lows in the guitar, the kick drum, the keys…they all make
that you should solo something up, is if you are having problem frequencies messing things up that you can’t hear due to all the When you hear a guitar in a mix, you guitar players...it doesn't have other instruments playing. Now, the low end in it that you think it there are some engineers that have such a grasp on this, they does when you try to cop the sound. Listen to it closely in a spot can solo up and get a great EQ curve. This takes a very long time where the killer guitar tone is all to accomplish and again, will alone. The bass you think you depend on whether or not you hear is the bass from the bass know what to listen for. guitar as well as over-all bass overtones from the sum of bass, If you are taking a week, several guitar, and even kick drum at weeks or months to mix: times. So each sound literally reinforces the others. If we solo things up and EQ them, we end up 1. Get a good set of monitors, tune them, tune your room and with mud and a bunch of other honest when I tell you, that ARC stuff that will make your mixing plugin works...and this will change endeavor a time consuming your world. nightmare. So to sum this up really, here are my thoughts. 2. Once you do number 1 above, The art of mixing means creating you will now be able to hear the sound space for each instrument. right things. There will be things that you couldn't hear before If you solo an instrument up and because your room/monitors EQ it, you are going to make it sound good all alone. This means were bringing out too much, or masking the stuff that shouldn't you will probably make it too thick, use too much bass in it and have been masked. This will totally change your world now you will wonder why this great that what you hear TRULY is what sound you just spent 2 hours tweaking just doesn’t work in the you hear. mix. The only time (in my opinion) up the full EQ spectrum as an entity.
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