JPF Home Page Forums Musician Gear and Techniques Recording Studio and Gear Forum Any tips on Eqing Reverb?

I seem to just stick with whatever is in default, but it can get cloudy

Or any tips on reverb in general? I always end up liking my vocals dry more than reverb, seems to lose something, especially in quiet passages

Reverb in the olden days lost some of the higher frequencies so if you want to emulate that, roll off your highs above 3k gradually. I like reverb to be there but not be obvious in the mix (unless it's for a special effect or a certain song). So add it until it's too much then back off a bit. Hall reverb rings for a longer time while room reverb fades away quickly. Modern singer/songwriter music is generally drier than it used to be.

If you are mixing several instruments (as in a band), give each instrument a different amount of reverb to simulate the space they are in.....maybe an acoustic guitar dry and an electric with reverb and delay. Sometimes, a little bit of slapback echo/delay sounds better (less muddy) than reverb.

The general conciseness out there is to roll off the highs and lows before hitting the reverb. Because highs built up in a reverb tend to get spitty and lows like to rumble.

I always roll of a lot of the lows.
When you think you have just enough reverb take it down another notch. Depends on what effect you're looking for though.

Vic

Reverb is has been used to give a hall sounding effect and is used sparingly. If you want to adjust the volume levels for the basic recording you have to do it after you have done the track or tracks. It was done manually in past recordings before all the gimmicks that are available today.

I normally set mine on 2 or 3. Less is more. Carry on with your serious discussion.

John

Reverb is ok but Mostly I stopped using.

Thanks all. I have played with reverb as far back as they were separate rack mountable units, and took up space and had to be wired to and fro.

I also use software reverb. Cakewalk used to come with lexicon reverb which I liked the best so far.

I just don't love a lot of reverb, but I know it's needed.

I go as low as 15% verb. The minute it sounds like I'm in some place, I don't like it

.

Here is something that's going to not only give you a great mix but it's also an industry secret.

Dial down the reverb and start using delay.

Reverb causes too much muddiness in the mix.

Use delay with a tad bit of reverb to get the effect you desire.

Let me put it this way . . . amateur use reverb, pros use delay.

Ahem........


In my camp, verb is as useful as any other effect available, it all depends on what you want from it.

Trust your ears.

Three cents.

SPEAKING AS SOMEONE WAS WAS BROUGHT UP ON AUDIO RECORDING

The largest problem you will have with Digital is Vocals Thats why you need to E Q your

Vocal sound to something that sounds close to the old Audio way of recording

Reverb and Delay is something else that you can add to your vocal mix according to what

sound you are after

The main important factor on any Demo of a New Song is VOCALS , delay or not delay is a

personal thing to you as with any pre set effect

Get The Vocals right on a great Song you are 90 per cent there

Its subjective and one person preference will be another persons headache

Recording For the finished article involves a completely different ear , and most

on here wont have anything close to it

Top Class Sound Producer/ Engineers are a rare animal

Your song is not going to be rejected because the listener hates your reverb mix but

stick to a simple pre set;

If you are talking about vocals ? your E Q will be based on dry vocals anything you add

to the vocal effect will be governed by the EQ you have set on a dry mix so ,

number one in your effects list ,


Question -- are you talking about E Q for an instrument apart from vocals ???? if so I have no idea

what to advise

Best Of Luck all the samei

I can trust me ears, but a lot of times my ears don't like any reverb on vocals.

But when everything else in the mix has varied colors, a dry vocal doesn't sound natural, which is weird cause a dry vocal is natural.

Cheynne, pitching songs to the market is almost non existent.

I was never really a song pitcher anyway, it was more for me to record. But nowadays nobody records other songwriters stuff.

Maybe in the real cheese pop world, and in some country circles you can still pitch songs, or more so, show songs to people you already know.

and song demos, ar nearly dinosaurs.

Now the idea is to have a finished product, one so good that a major artist can simply sing over your track and it's done.

There might be indies who work the old way...

But technically, a bad mix of reverb on vocals or on anything can cause a song to get rejected, if it's not immediately sounding good, and easy to hear, it will force them to say...next....

But today you need master quality recordings, just to sound like you belong in the conversation.

Especially in a time when anybody can get "pretty good" recordings, either at home or paying somebody to do it.

You need better than what everybody else has, from song to recording

All that aside most of what you say I agree with

At the end of the day Its the song that counts, If you worked for or with a Publisher

Then you would be pitching , to all and sundry , believe me its still the way to go

I have had some half good recordings sent me , but they stood out because they

pulled me in, .

A lot of bull shine gets around about quality, mainly by small time hustlers wanting work

Most wannabe writers on here are obsessed with writing a country song, I know its not

your bag or mine ; There is a big market out there for Great songs but not necessarily

Country Music ,

It's not the way to go, at least not for me. Publisher Schmublisher..

It's a different world now, publishers are deader than record labels.

It's a giant free for all. Everybody's got songs, everybody's got recordings, everybody's got performers, everybody's got delusions that their stuff is special and great. the only thing that not everybody's got is a real opportunity for the song to do anything.

My advice? Stop pitching, and keep writing for fun.

I used to make mistakes in my reverb programming by mixing in room that itself was very echoey

This would inevitably lead me to underestimate the amount of real reverb and my tracks would sound just horrible

So first order of business: make sure you're monitoring in a soundproofed room. Otherwise your reverb is going to be haywire and no amount of EQing will help

As for EQing, make sure to add a high pass filter and roll off all top-end frequencies. Then add a low pass filter and roll off all low bass frequencies as well. Focus on the mid-bass, mid-treble frequency range

Yep. When I think about "demos" and "pitching", I think about sending a demonstration recording of a song to someone who might shop it to an established artist who might be interested in recording it. Today, I'd only do that if Rod Taylor dropped by to give me a ride backwards on his Time Machine, ideally a few decades ago.

Those of us who compose and perform have better luck these days selling the recording itself, and the market is in TV/Film cues. Sometimes a good song is perfect for a cue of 10 seconds, sometimes for background music, sometimes a cover of a song gets used in lieu of the original recording, for peanuts...and the peanuts go to schlepps like me screwing around with Cubase in my living room. I know a lot of folks from TAXI who spent the last decade focused on creating music to match the stated needs of the TV/Film industry, and many of them are fully self-supported now, with an ever-expanding library of "cues" that generate a little money here and there. Some of my friends are making six-figure incomes this way, and they drink scotch on weekday afternoons if they like. Their quarterly royalty statements are 20+ pages long, with a lot of small things adding up to a big return.

The vast majority of them however only make a little extra money from this, a few hundred bucks or so in the quarterly statement from ASCAP or BMI or SESAC. I got a quarterly statement recently for one song that was used on an obscure reality show and made $39.99.

But if I had to place all my chips in selling my idea for a song, or just a lyric...I would find a functioning, recording composer quick and partner up. No one is buying visions these days, they need the end-result.

That said, here's a great article on EQing reverb:

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/use-reverb-pro-1

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/use-reverb-pro-part-2

Great article thanks!

I only have a windows setup with a dj mixer for hardware. But reverb seems to give off a more arena like sound when used in discreet amounts after the main track or overdub. The first tracks or overdubs being more dry.

I like this technique the best for eqing in general.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhZUPRwXMs0

Using a multi-band compressor is also a very good way of taming bad frequencies.

Then for reverb I use eq only on 2nds and 3rds to cut both the highs and the lows so that they dont build up when played along with a primary vocal or something else. It is the usual issue with the lows and low mids building into mud. I read somewhere that the highs extend the tail so it is good to pull them back to reign it in.

With what I have used with software verb has either come with .wav or Audacity. With hardware I have used a dj mixer the size of a cigar box and a mixer I obtained second hand that went kaputz.
But what works in that is very individual.

There is the professional setup with the duplicate environment to the studio.
I hav'nt looked in to the convention of that yet.
Posts like this are informative.