Developing Listening Skills

[SimonT]

Hi All!

Can anyone give me any advice on how to improve my listening skills (production wise).

If I was to listen to a track say on di.fm or you tube (I'm talking more electronic music here) say I like a certain sound or element to that track, is there any tips anyone can give me to help me dissect how that sound or element was achieved?

I was thinking earlier about vocals for instance. Say I heard a really lush vocal on a track, something tells me, without the person who achieved that vocal, explaining how it was achieved, I'm never gonna know.

I need the person to tell me, how it was recorded (what environment) and what type of mic was used with which polar pattern and why. Then what the person did to the vocal, maybe compressed (but what threshold, ratio, attack and release were used and why), then they might say it was then eq'd using such and such an eq. Low end perhaps was rolled off to stop it clashing with the bass and kick drum perhaps or because a certain low end frequency range wasn't needed in the vocal within a mix. It was cut here and boosted there and for what purpose or why. Then maybe de-essed, then reverbed perhaps but then those elements explained as well.

Is this the case?

Thanks!

 

[DarkRed]

Hi All!

Can anyone give me any advice on how to improve my listening skills (production wise).

If I was to listen to a track say on di.fm or you tube (I'm talking more electronic music here) say I like a certain sound or element to that track, is there any tips anyone can give me to help me dissect how that sound or element was achieved?

I was thinking earlier about vocals for instance. Say I heard a really lush vocal on a track, something tells me, without the person who achieved that vocal, explaining how it was achieved, I'm never gonna know.

I need the person to tell me, how it was recorded (what environment) and what type of mic was used with which polar pattern and why. Then what the person did to the vocal, maybe compressed (but what threshold, ratio, attack and release were used and why), then they might say it was then eq'd using such and such an eq. Low end perhaps was rolled off to stop it clashing with the bass and kick drum perhaps or because a certain low end frequency range wasn't needed in the vocal within a mix. It was cut here and boosted there and for what purpose or why. Then maybe de-essed, then reverbed perhaps but then those elements explained as well.

Is this the case?

Thanks!

I think the best is to try to isolate various elements in mixes you like in terms of your focus on the content you analyse, try to put words on the sound and ask processing related questions about it. This is similar to cooking, you need to be able to describe each nuance of the experience, then reverse engineer that into ingredients, processing etc.

It can also help to seriously lower the amount of music you consume for some time, let's say you love an EDM track really much and want to make it sound like that with your own productions. One way is to then just listen to that track over and over and nothing else, then gradually pay more attention to more details every time you play it. Eventually you will be able to memorize and list all dynamic effects, sounds etc. in it to the point that you can now begin to also form an understanding about how all of this came together.

And all of this becomes easier the greater the perspective you have about signal processing and gear.

Try to also describe the qualities you like, with words/terms you find are most accurately representing that. Then start to link these kinds of qualities to various types of specific effects, like for instance FET compressor, instead of compressor.

 

[SimonT]

Good bit of advice there DarkRed.

What does FET stand for in FET compressor. Can't find it anywhere on the tinterweb, and what would a FET compressor do (compression wise, or sound wise) that a usual compressor wouldn't?

EDIT:- Found it. Field Effect Transistor.