Noise problems

[dumpydoctor]

Hi, I have a studio in an apartment that mostly consists of college kids and the walls are pretty thin. I make hip hop beats which tends to be a bit bass heavy at times. My setup consists of 2 Adam A7 monitors, a KRK 10 subwoofer, and acoustic treatment.

While I would love to turn it all the way up while mixing/producing a song, its not possible because of how ridiculously loud it can get. My neighbors would knock on the wall. So I tend to keep it almost halfway up but then I notice how sloppy my mixes tend to be because im not listening to it at full volume. I have recently decided to move to downtown Chicago to work on music in a 2 bedroom apartment. I have alot of questions. Do you think apartments in the city will be more lenient? Do you think that the walls might offer more soundproofing? My current apartment does have crappy walls. Or am i out of luck and will probably just have to mix/produce with my volume no where near full? any tips or advice would greatly be appreciated.

 

[Wallengard]

I suppose that's the price you're gonna have to pay for having neighbours immediately on the other side of the wall where you have set up a studio with subwoofers and all. While some places obviously offer more isolation than others there's no real way of telling.. So unless you're going to build a room within that room, I would be hoping for decent neighbours rather than hoping they won't hear it, because they most likely will.

 

[dumpydoctor]

Thanks, is there any cheap ways you know of that can help me contain my sound a little better besides acoustic pads/basstraps?

 

[Wallengard]

You mean to try and keep the noise out of your neighbours place?

Putting pads and such won't do anything to soundproof anything.., at least not enough for your neighbour to appreciate it.

 

[krushing]

If you look up some guides about monitoring levels, you'll find that most of them don't suggest monitoring very loud - in fact, it's often suggested that you monitor at "conversation level" (which translates to 79dB SPL), rather than turning shit up loud as possible – so I really doubt your mixes are sloppy because you can't turn it up.

And well...apartments are always gonna be problematic, especially with a subwoofer.

 

[dumpydoctor]

I see. Must be my mental messing up and me thinking that a sound should be louder than it actually is due to my low volume. Thanks for that monitoring level tip.

 

[JSoundsOnline]

You dont need the have the volume high to mix. for beginners there are 3 things you need.
-Studio monitors(they need to be faced at you(Same Level.) tie a string together and attach both ends to your speakers. the middle of the string is where your face should be.
-basic studio headphones
-Car( play you mixes loud in the car) this helps understand your mix(loud)

understand your mix down in different places,, so that you will not need to mix LOUD