Panning Advice in EDM?

J

JackQuade

New member
Hello all,

I've got a question here about panning in EDM -- that's a broad term so I'll narrow it down for the sake of getting more precise answers from you all.
The genre I'm most interested in is Progressive house... euphoric house. The big guys like Avicii, Swedish House Mafia, and so on.
I'm interested in learning more about panning in songs like these. My question arises from conflicting view points about this:

Some say "Take your lead, duplicate it, and pan one hard left and the other hard right." The idea here is to make things as big and wide as possible.
Others treat the stereo field like holy ground which should only be used carefully and subtly.. in order to give the very special element(s) which is (are) stereo a characteristic that stands out in the mix.


The question could continue, describing more and getting technical of course, but I'll just stop it there and leave the rest for the wolves (sorry, I'm not calling you guys wolves... but the forums can be brutal sometimes, so maybe I am)

So how do you feel about panning, stereo management, and such?
Let me know your thoughts and opinions.
Thanks!

- Jack
 
To begin with, i hope you don't copy your lead and just pan the copies hard L / R. This will only push the signal higher and cause trouble. You could delay(not the effect), detune or fx them tho to stand out with hard panning. Big is nice, but wide isn't always necessary when it comes to vocals, let the instruments take care of that instead and let the vocal be the center of attention - in the center. Some words or phrases could use some backing vocals tho to give it extra power. This is just my opinion in the genre. What's so charming with music is that nothing's 'really' wrong or perfect, try yourself forward!
 
I think it's a trick question.

As long as there's a good sense of overall width throughout the entire song,
I don't feel that there's a hard and fast way to go about doing it.

I've noticed that it tends to be different from artist to artist, and even different
from song to song from an individual artist.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
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THeoCe said:
To begin with, i hope you don't copy your lead and just pan the copies hard L / R. This will only push the signal higher and cause trouble. You could delay(not the effect), detune or fx them tho to stand out with hard panning. Big is nice, but wide isn't always necessary when it comes to vocals, let the instruments take care of that instead and let the vocal be the center of attention - in the center. Some words or phrases could use some backing vocals tho to give it extra power. This is just my opinion in the genre. What's so charming with music is that nothing's 'really' wrong or perfect, try yourself forward!
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He's talking about the lead synth, not the lead vocals.
A lot of club systems are in mono so I keep my main lead in mono, use reverbs+delays on another channel to make it wide with stereo-izer.

Sometimes I use two different tracks like you do and pan left and right and detune one side slightly different than the other and it makes it sound really fat.
 
SwagProductionz said:
i hear people pan the basses to let the kick stand out more
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If you get good results from that, go for it.

Keep in mind that the bass frequencies are often reproduced by a monophonic subwoofer in most systems, but if your basses have a lot of midrange information, it could help clear that out.

Definitely risky though, something where you'd really need a good idea of what you're doing to not screw it up.
Stereo bass can sound really weird on headphones and large-woofer speakers if done incorrectly.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
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This is what i do
1. Duplicate, hard pan them left and right. And take one (doesn't matter left or right) and add a delay 100% wet at a short delay time (about 10~13% is what i go for). This delay can make your lead sound really big.
2. Mid-side eq the lead and boost the high end, cut the low end of the side eq and slightly eq the mid. This will give you the stereo image you want as the mid and the side have different characters.
3. Duplicate the track, take one of them and high pass it to a point where you can mostly hear the top whitenoise-like part. Add a hall reverb and slap a stereo imager or utility on and mix that properly with the original lead.

Hope this helps :)
 
DenzelDollars said:
Oops what I was meant to say was 'side chain compression' sorry If I was misleading. Must have posted that one late at night aha.
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So I presume you mean after bouncing down your track to master? You sidechain the entire mix to help the kick stand out more? Then bounce down again I presume to master?
 
DenzelDollars said:
Not at all, why would you presume after bouncing down to master?
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What are you side chaining with the kick? I presumed the whole song if you are trying to make it cut through? I thought you'd want the whole mix to duck on every kick?
 
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SimonT said:
What are you side chaining with the kick? I presumed the whole song if you are trying to make it cut through? I thought you'd want the whole mix to duck on every kick?
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Let me iterate lol, the bass is sidechained with the kick, since in most mixes they are both fighting for space in the same frequency range having the bass duck a little everytime your kick hits helps it become louder and more audible. If your kick still feels buried within the mix try sidechaining the lead synths for example.
 
DenzelDollars said:
Let me iterate lol, the bass is sidechained with the kick, since in most mixes they are both fighting for space in the same frequency range having the bass duck a little everytime your kick hits helps it become louder and more audible. If your kick still feels buried within the mix try sidechaining the lead synths for example.
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Sorry mate you did say sidechain in the first place. Good advice mate. So you only duck the bass a touch?
 
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