Beat This! Competition - July 12-13, 2023

[2GooD Productions]

Hitting it without distortion or horrible pumping or killing your transients.

Can be hard to hear in the moment too when working on it.

When its pumping I want it to be deliberate, but yeah, when you have been working on something for hours on end, its likely the mix will be fucked. Best to take a break and mix again with fresh ears. But thats pretty impossible when you leave your beats until last minute dot com, we have all done it and will continue to do it, because its something we do

 

[Iron Keys]

When its pumping I want it to be deliberate, but yeah, when you have been working on something for hours on end, its likely the mix will be fucked. Best to take a break and mix again with fresh ears. But thats pretty impossible when you leave your beats until last minute dot com, we have all done it and will continue to do it, because its something we do

Exactly that!

Can be hard to hear it even when you volume match or turn it down. Then suddenly you hit export listen to it back and you're like hangon what's going on here!

 

[OGBama]

Not gone’ say which one I voted for but it had me free flowing like some “99 and 2000” Juvie in this bitch.

 

[stfushawtyy]

To all my producers...please learn how to mix/master your songs. I know you want to be lazy and take the easy path in life but trust me....you will thank me later. Hitting -9 lufs is not that difficult and most plugins can be downloaded for free or cracked

​

 

[junkee]

To all my producers...please learn how to mix/master your songs. I know you want to be lazy and take the easy path in life but trust me....you will thank me later. Hitting -9 lufs is not that difficult and most plugins can be downloaded for free or cracked

bruh this you?

 

[VVS]

Exactly that!

Can be hard to hear it even when you volume match or turn it down. Then suddenly you hit export listen to it back and you're like hangon what's going on here!

Volume matching what? Just get a loudness meter and check if the lufs are bouncing around -9. Dynamics and perceived loudness are two separate things. Obviously, you don't want to over compress the life out your channels/buses for the sake of increasing "loudness". I use 0db gain staging for those who want to google it. Knowing which frequencies to cut, how to use parallel compression on a kick and bass will greatly enhance anyone's mix. Add in a sprinkle of glue compression and throw on a decent limiter on the master bus and you're 90% there.

 

[Iron Keys]

Volume matching what? Just get a loudness meter and check if the lufs are bouncing around -9. Dynamics and perceived loudness are two separate things. Obviously, you don't want to over compress the life out your channels/buses for the sake of increasing "loudness". I use 0db gain staging for those who want to google it. Knowing which frequencies to cut, how to use parallel compression on a kick and bass will greatly enhance anyone's mix. Add in a sprinkle of glue compression and throw on a decent limiter on the master bus and you're 90% there.

Volume matching - matching the before/after levels after processing to see if you've altered the sound in a beneficial way and not just fooled by volume changes. Sometimes it's necessary to do so. I find one of these times being the mix bus.

You might think "yeah the kick bits harder now" but it just might be because the track overall is louder. If level matched and the kick punches better than it did before, then we good. It's not always as straight forward as that. But generally speaking

 

[Iron Keys]

0db gain staging

You mean 'Clip To Zero' method or?

 

[2GooD Productions]

Volume matching what? Just get a loudness meter and check if the lufs are bouncing around -9. Dynamics and perceived loudness are two separate things. Obviously, you don't want to over compress the life out your channels/buses for the sake of increasing "loudness". I use 0db gain staging for those who want to google it. Knowing which frequencies to cut, how to use parallel compression on a kick and bass will greatly enhance anyone's mix. Add in a sprinkle of glue compression and throw on a decent limiter on the master bus and you're 90% there.

When using compression you will volume match the after compression signal with the pre compression signal, because compression lowers the volume you adjust the gain to volume match the original. The peaks will be lower but the overall volume will be the same and the perceived volume will be louder. Volume out equals volume in is a very important thing about compression I learned from a member here many many years ago.

 

[VVS]

Volume matching - matching the before/after levels after processing to see if you've altered the sound in a beneficial way and not just fooled by volume changes. Sometimes it's necessary to do so. I find one of these times being the mix bus.

You might think "yeah the kick bits harder now" but it just might be because the track overall is louder. If level matched and the kick punches better than it did before, then we good. It's not always as straight forward as that. But generally speaking

I use a simplified approach lol. But yes, logically that makes sense. We can talk engineering theory all day long...what's important is the final result. So let's do a comparison after the winner is chosen to see who's got the best mix!

 

[Fade]

RESULTS!

See what went down:

Beat This! Competition Archives

www.illmuzik.com

Props to all those that entered and to those that took the time to vote.

 

[Delta Skeltah]

Aye dope job @Iron Keys you had my vote.

 

[Fade]

Congrats @Iron Keys that's some dope shit. A lot of really good beats in this, I knew it was going to be a tough one. Dope turnout too.

 

[Iron Keys]

West West y'all

 

[Iron Keys]

Aye dope job @Iron Keys you had my vote.

Loveee brother!

 

[2GooD Productions]

@Reg. Sized Pako Nearly got my vote, just something I really like in the subtleness of it, but voted for @Iron Keys in the end

 

[Fade]

@Reg. Sized Pako Nearly got my vote, just something I really like in the subtleness of it, but voted for @Iron Keys in the end

Agreed. That was a unique sound.

 

[Soap]

Well played @Iron Keys you deserve the win i voted for you the beat was really good !

 

[VVS]

West Coast beats are not my flavor but congrats to @Iron Keys.

Honorable mention on good mixes (to my ears):

1. Wheel Up and Rewind
2. Teer
3. Blue Dye
4. Check me

 

[InsideOutBeats]

Congrats @Iron Keys on another win, dope stuff man, love it!
Many thanks to those that voted mine 2nd.