Hi guys got a little technical question.

I was sweeping the progressive house scene on beatport and listened to Hardwell - Kontiki, and i was impressed at how loud the song was so i decided to buy the song and analyze it on my daw.

I was shocked when i saw that the song had only 3db difference between the RMS and peaks without losing any dynamics and still sounding well without distortion. I know the song had probably been limited and compressed insanely but still, when i try to do it myself i get at max 4.5 db difference (between rms and peaks) without saturation and without losing the dynamics. But still not near the hardwell track.

Something i noticed on my meter is that the track was clipping, like going over the 0dbfs (on the one of hardwell)i checked my levels on the fader it was at 0db

I'm wondering how this guy can go so close to 0dbfs with his RMS and sounding still like there are some dynamics in it...

Any suggestions or techniques are welcome as i'm kinda stuck into finding out how he did it.

Here is the track in youtube, but if you guys really wanna hear it i suggest you download it or buy it, and have a listen (and check metering)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72iW6LCoY08


i'm really curious what you guys think of it !!

Saturation, Compressor, Multiband Limiter, Clipper,... there are many ways to get rid of those annoying dynamics. Some are using multiple compressors in row, others just slam it with a hammer like multiband compressor/limiter.
If you still need another dB, try and cut everything you don't need with a dramatic filter curve. Cut away the kick bellow 40 Hz, the bassline below 75, lead instruments 250 or even higher, hihats around 1000.

If you know that your mix is going to be very loud, you can already setup the mastering-effects chain on the master channel, so you hear the results of your mix cleaning directly. This will also hold you back from putting too much reverb on the instruments, as it will appear way too loud when processed through the mastering chain.

But to be honest, I don't think it sounds good. If you turn it down a little bit, you'll notice that it's actually very thin and without any deepness.

To me it seems like it was produced by following the old photographer saying: "if it's bad, make it big!" (...or loud)

Basically that's it. Just cut everything you don't need, compress and limit until it hurts.
You know, these mixes are basically optimized for loudness in every aspect. So to make it that loud, you need a really good and clean mix. Make sure the elements have enough room and don't clash. Then compress it really hard to glue the mix together and take advantage of the space you made for the elements. Also like already said, it can be helpful to mix into a compressor and limiter (But take care not to overdo it!).
Also keep in mind that these dances mixes somehow have their own 'rules'. So you see, if you would limit a rock track like a Hardwell track, it would sound awful (Metallica - Death Magnetic...). There are not magic tricks to make a track loud, it is just a matter how you use your tools.

Thx guys for the responses, i guess i'm not using those tools in an optimal way.

were u listening to the track in ableton with the warping on? the warping in ableton adds some distortion that makes songs clip that would otherwise be peaking at 0. If that was the case, see if it clips when you take the warping off

Dynamics?

Personally I thought the drums almost completely disappeared because everything was compressed and limited so much. I really think the OP should go back and listen more carefully - when all the big instrumentation is playing you can just about hear the 909 tom-like things (although without any power whatsoever) and the claps just recede into the background into obscurity. I couldn't hear anything in the way of snares in the busy part of the mix.

That song does not have much of anything in the way of dynamics. The OP does know that dynamics actually refers to the difference between quiet and loud?

Admittedly I was listening on my pathetic PC speakers (although they're reasonable quality, just don't have volume), but really, I'm not sure I want to listen to that mush on my big speakers or monitors. Not that there's anything wrong with the music itself. Just the mix.

I can't imagine that mix having any power whatsoever in a club because there's no snappy drums to drive a rhythm. It's all about big synth lead and compresing so tightly that the reverb washes everything else out.

Sorry...that's an awful undynamic mix IMO.

In respect of the technical question - that amount of squashing is pretty easy to do though. Use as many compressors as you can on everything. Especially have zero or very short attacks on any drum sound. The instrumentation sounds like it probably had long-ish releases on any comps so that the compressor is always working. Work your compressor meters well into the red.

Simply because it didn't sound like it was pumping that much, I'd be surprised if he didn't use a multiband limiter and drove it extremely hard in every band.

You'd use zero attack to kill drums that way, and a reasonably quick release too.

It would have to be several dB limiting on every band, and no doubt he then used an overall wideband limiter over the whole thing at the end with a fairly normal mid length release to smooth it back out again a bit.

And yeah, as already mentioned, you can Eq out loads af bass to give more room for compressing/limiting. And no, you don't need loads of sub bass to get a mix sounding bassy - the most power in terms of what you actually hear as bass is not what most newbs think of. i.e it's the harmonics up in the next octave that have the power. Not the 80Hz and below. Really. That's a very neat way of removing the power frequencies that trigger compressors etc and yet keeping a bassy sound. If you want to make it sound like it's bassier (although in reality not) you can boost up the lower mid band a bit. Anything from 100Hz to maybe up to 300 Hz, although too much at near 300 will make it quite boomy and potentially muddy.

Here's a warning though - if that mix was meant as a general release, as in for radio, it's not going to sound good. The type of channels that play that type of music tend to limit their output to the extreme as well, so if they limit it on top of the already overdone limiting, it is going to sound pretty awful on radio. Possibly though, that mix you posted was taken off a radio channel or whatever that had already been double limited. Because I have to hope the label has the sense to make a mix with some kind of dynamics in it for clubs.

Thats what I was saying when I referred to own 'rules'. These tracks aren't made to have a great amount of depth or clarity or anything. Like many tracks that are out today, Hardwell's tracks are made to have a brutal impact on big systems. And with brutal impact I don't mean nice snappy, groovy drums, I mean a brutal block of anything that kicks the kids right into the face...or the balls. I don't think it's a bad thing, it's more a style. As long as people still know that producing like this is not suitable for every genre, I don't see anything negative about it.

I don't know if you heard one of the official releases but this seems to be a lot louder in my opinion

Im going to go through a phaze of overcompressing soon to try and get my mixes a lot louder, i suppose one of the best ways to learn something properly is to overdo it for a bit then ease back when you know the effects of it properly

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2Ozau-JP1Y

1.Multiband Sidechain (all lows are ducked when the kick hits to provide more headroom down there,thus giving the ability to have the kick alot louder in the mix without the worry of clipping etc)
2.shit loud kick (somewhere near 0db)

3.shit sparse arrangement (not alot going on everything near enough plays on the beat)

4.suppose it's the same as 3(minimal instrumentation)

5.compress-limit to fuckery (doesn't sound as obvious because there aint alot going on in the arrangement,so usually in this case it means you can get away with alot more gain reduction than usual)

In summary,the key to these mixdowns is more in the sparse arrangments than anything else

When you say compress/ limit, do you mean everything? I hear a lot of people say 'compress everything hard' - do they actually mean EVERYTHING - like clap, hi hat kick etc. as well as synths and bass, perc etc.?

Don't know if there is a bit of confusion around this 'compress everything' term but it seems to be confusing me slightly..

Cheers

In this particular example i'd say near enough everything has some form of brutal gain reduction on it,most likely limiters on the buss's and compression with a fairly short attack on the individual tracks,Honestly though, you don't want this sound if you intend to play your stuff out.

This is going to sound like the audio equivalent of porridge on the radio and on a large club PA, the main give away being that when you play the thing low you can just about discern the transients and everything gets swamped in audio gravy (compliments of the kick and not the nice kind of audio gravy)

If you play for example a mixdown by the likes of feedme (just for comparison), play his tracks low you can tell apart every single detail and his transients cut like a prison shiv

If you are genuinely after this sound though the whole methodology is to make sure not very many (if any) peaks get through before the tracks hit the master, therefore giving you the option to squash it even more with a limiter and probably multiband compression to force the perceived loudness out of the track

Hope that helps

I think this is more a Beatport thing. I've bought tracks there and they are compressed to hell, but never go over 0 dbs. It's also the fact that it's prolly an mp3 which brings its own issues to the table. I think the only way to get a proper read on the track is to have the CD.

Actually the master WAV would be better I think. These can be also bought at Beatport

Lots of interesting replies, i think that having few instruments helps alot in boosting the sound and even have the feeling that there are still dynamics in it.

But when having a robust arrangement with many instruments in it its more difficult, everything get squashed and no dynamics anymore.

Thx again for all responses