Comment by function_seven | Hacker News Reader

Comment by function_seven | Hacker News Reader

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That's not the idea here. The idea is to settle on a consistent standard so that listeners don't have to constantly adjust equalization for different recordings.

I deal with this all the time. One album might sound great with both bass and treble cranked up, while another one will be waay too boom-y and I have to trim the bass down to the middle.

If some standard were agreed upon for frequency response through the chain of elements (mics, processors, monitors, etc.), then listeners would be able to set their EQs to what they like, and leave them there.

Of course I'm over-simplifiying a bit. Different artists/producers/engineers will have different subjective opinions on the "right" mix, but at least there wouldn't also be an additional complication of the variety of monitors and studio equipment settings lurking underneath their adjustments.

There is a standard. It's an acoustically treated room with monitors that produce a reasonably flat frequency response from 20Hz to 20kHz.

That's the reference.

Some items - microphones particularly - deviate from that because they can be chosen to deliberately colour the sound. But the reference itself isn't news. It's been a thing since at least the 1950s. The only difference now is that the standard is a lot more achievable and affordable than it used to be.

I doubt there's a single pro or semi-pro producer or engineer who isn't aware of this.

All but the very noobiest noobs understand that mixes need to "translate" to a variety of different speaker systems, from cheap earbuds, to car stereos, to high-end hifi.

Making a mix that does that needs good monitors, or at the very least the kind of skills and trained ear that can make a good mix on budget equipment. (Which is certainly possible, but harder to do.)

At the mid/high end it's just not an issue.

If you don't like the EQ on something, understand it's there because someone wanted it that way. It's very unlikely to be because because someone couldn't hear what they were doing.

translation is the job of a mastering engineer, not the mixer.

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