Your opinion: How does it sound on your speakers?

[El culto]

Hi there,

first of all, IMO it´s a great EP but I know this music may be not everyone´s cup of tea.

I´m mainly interest in your subjective opinion about the SOUND (not the music/composition/arrangement/style) on a specific track and how the sound translates or "feels" for you on your speakers (please don´t use headphones):

IMPORTANT: For this questions I refer to the 3rd track "Sleep" only:

https://fussganger.bandcamp.com/album/ep-1

These are NOT "pro-engineer-questions" only, so I´m interested in all opinions.

1. What´s  the trade and model of your speakers?

2: By running this track ones or several times, is there anything in the balance of the sound which is annoying for your ear? If so, which section feels wrong - please write the time of the section(s)

3: Is there a parts of the track you would like to hear louder or quieter? If so, which section? - please write the time of the section(s)

(4): For all the artists here on the board - imagine you are the mixing and/or mastering engineer of this artists, which part(s) of the track you would definitely EQ? Please write the time of the section(s) + approximate range of the problematic frequency and say roughly what you would change (i.e. increasing/decreasing frequencies etc)

Thanks for your participation!
Tomas

[Altus]

I don't have time to give this a really good listen (nor provide the details you're asking for). Overall, I think it sounds fine, but if this was something I was mixing/mastering, the two things I'd change:
- The kick is a little mushy. This is likely by design though.
- The hihat sound that is brought in front and centre starting at 3:20 quickly grates my ears, especially when its accompanied by another at 3:54.

[APK]

Superb EP.
--------------------
Listening on Event 20/20  (passive), up fairly loud.
Sounds excellently mastered to me. Excellent bass. Elements all well balanced and separate.Good panning.
I'm having trouble finding something to dislike, or that I would change.
Perhaps a little too busy either side of 3:50 -- too much pressure, if you know what I mean. Get a headache if it carried on like that for long.   
Of course, it's not the style music I work with or master. But I do listen to it.

[Julio Di Benedetto]

Listening on Focal Twin6 Be active.

Surprised it was mastered quite soft,  I would expect it slammed which would not be good.  Listen to it 3 times at low volume, medium and quite loud. 

At low volume the track really picked up at 2:17 with the addition percussion, gave the track a nice brightness and this was the same with all additional material.  The vocoder voice at 4:30 added a wide almost metallic depth.

Medium volume the track held together but the brightness I liked at a lower volume started to overshadow the rest of the music

Played back loud the brightness turned brittle.....probably would cut the mid high frequency at mastering to try to maintain the brightness I like but tighten the dynamics.  Low end was fine.  At the mixing level Id just do this to each electronic type percussion track with care.  Dont want to make it too mute because the contrasting elements generally worked well.  Very good production.

[El culto]

I don't have time to give this a really good listen (nor provide the details you're asking for). Overall, I think it sounds fine, but if this was something I was mixing/mastering, the two things I'd change:
- The kick is a little mushy. This is likely by design though.
- The hihat sound that is brought in front and centre starting at 3:20 quickly grates my ears, especially when its accompanied by another at 3:54.

Hi Mike,

thanks  a lot for your comment!

On which speakers you have listened to the track?

Greetings,
Tomas

[Julio Di Benedetto]

Hey Tomas.....the need to want to know what we are listening through is important to this experiment for you.  I am curious to know whats your goal.  do we hear what you hear or what is good and bad.  The only reference you suggested was what may annoy us with the mix/master.  Im very interested in what the outcome may be but there is lots of room for personal taste, so long as this is not scientific which is boring anyway and I would much rather given personal opinion.  If you say wait and be patient for the outcome...I will wait.

[Altus]

On which speakers you have listened to the track?

I wasn't listening on my monitors, just some Logitech 2.1 computer speakers. Basically, the type of speakers most people would use while listening on a computer. I got the impression that's the type of monitoring you were looking for . . . Judging by the other comments, perhaps not. 

[Julio Di Benedetto]

So Tomas...a week has passed......what was the purpose of this?  Did it answer anything for you?

[El culto]

So Tomas...a week has passed......what was the purpose of this?  Did it answer anything for you?

Hey Julio,

I will explain more soon :-) Still in the middle of some additional tests.

BTW: Instead of fighting in other threads, particular this one would be something for my audiophile friends CCT / Ekstasis to participate and share their opinion. But nope….just silence!

Greetings,
Tomas

[Julio Di Benedetto]

 

[El culto]

I will give it another call here for some more contributions!

Thanks!
Tomas

[Horizon 1982]

So Tomas...a week has passed......what was the purpose of this?  Did it answer anything for you?

Hey Julio,

I will explain more soon :-) Still in the middle of some additional tests.

BTW: Instead of fighting in other threads, particular this one would be something for my audiophile friends CCT / Ekstasis to participate and share their opinion. But nope….just silence!

Greetings,
Tomas

I'm not audiophile, you got it wrong. I couldn't care less for 5k oxygen free cables. Or gold plated wall power socket.

[petekelly]

Can't partake as I'm a 'headphone-ist', I shall have to take this to the European court of human rights

stamps feet and walks away...

[El culto]

Can't partake as I'm a 'headphone-ist', I shall have to take this to the European court of human rights

stamps feet and walks away...

LOL 

Interesting! So, it means you do all your work just with headphones?

Greetings,
Tomas

[Julio Di Benedetto]

Crossing the Threshold.....this would be a good opportunity to take part.  Express your opinion on what you hear in the music sample Tomas supplied.

"Gold plated wall power sockets"....thats really funny

[petekelly]

Interesting! So, it means you do all your work just with headphones?

Yes, I haven't used speakers to monitor or mix since 2003. I've listened to music primarily on phones all my life and I've now adapted to using them all time. I know conventional wisdom says that 'you can't mix on phones', but (for me) I much prefer the whole headphone 'experience'.

[El culto]

Interesting! So, it means you do all your work just with headphones?

Yes, I haven't used speakers to monitor or mix since 2003. I've listened to music primarily on phones all my life and I've now adapted to using them all time. I know conventional wisdom says that 'you can't mix on phones', but (for me) I much prefer the whole headphone 'experience'.

Thanks for your reply! For about 1 year I´ve worked as well on headphones only. I do agree, the whole "experience" is quite impressive (very 3 dimensional feeling) but after a while I realized I had big troubles to judge what´s going on in the bass. At the beginning I´ve managed to adapt it by listening to reference material but it wasn´t very easy. When I switches back to speakers (including a subwoofer) it was kind of a revealing. But then I missed the "whole listening experience" my headphones provided and I wished to have these back on the speakers  It´s clearly a big difference when it comes to "listening enjoyments" where I definitely prefer headphones. Meanwhile I found luckily a setup where my speakers are sounding very similar to my headphones so I can easily double-check if I´m on the right path.

BTW: Which model of headphones you are using?

Greetings,
Tomas

[Seren]

I too use headphones for everything (my studio is not the shape or size to use my speakers properly)...

There was a radio programme recently that explored the shift in radio listening from headphones to speakers, describing how people stepped away from purposeful, intense and personal listening to shared experience and doing other things such as eating - making the music a secondary element of the experience.

People even danced to it which they could not with the headsets.....

Back to subject - it can be hard to get things right, but I use the approach that I make it as good as I can on my headphones, then accept that it will generally sound different on every other sound source.

I use Grado SR 325's to record and mix, then Beyerdynamic DT931's to see how it might sound on hi-fi's, then on smaller sennheiser headphones for more general sound.....

[El culto]

I too use headphones for everything (my studio is not the shape or size to use my speakers properly)...

There was a radio programme recently that explored the shift in radio listening from headphones to speakers, describing how people stepped away from purposeful, intense and personal listening to shared experience and doing other things such as eating - making the music a secondary element of the experience.

People even danced to it which they could not with the headsets.....

Back to subject - it can be hard to get things right, but I use the approach that I make it as good as I can on my headphones, then accept that it will generally sound different on every other sound source.

I use Grado SR 325's to record and mix, then Beyerdynamic DT931's to see how it might sound on hi-fi's, then on smaller sennheiser headphones for more general sound.....

Hi Seren,

thanks for your input!

Is there a link/stream to this radio program you´ve mentioned? Would be interesting to hear it!

Yeah, the adapting to other sound sources is always a bit problematic. When i´ve mixed on headphones only then (generally speaking) it sounded great on most other headphones but lacks then on speakers…visa versa  Probably here you have to find a compromise….Luckily I´ve managed now to find something completing each other.

Greetings,
Tomas 

[Seren]

I don't know if there is a link - it was on BBC radio 4 and called 'learning to listen' - I only caught the programme halfway through.

They were using diary writings to explore the changes in listening styles following the invention of the loudspeaker - though I think they interpreted the change to more casual listening as progress....