Get Clarity in Busy Song Arrangements with EQ
Short helpful article on how to declutter dense mixes by using basic regular EQ
Achieving clarity in a dense mix can be both time consuming and headache-inducing, but good old EQ is still one of the most effective tools to bring each element of a track into focus. By making the right decisions on how to shape each sound sonically, you can make sure that no instrument overshadows another, while maintaining a thick and cohesive sound.
In this first post of mine I will break down four simple key strategies for using plain and regular EQ in even the most complex or heavy mixes. In my opinion, getting a mix in good shape is easier if you first make the instrument levels solid and consistent before using EQ, and I recommend getting the different parts of your song under control by use of compression, first. But today we are talking about EQ!
1. Knowing Frequency Ranges
In a busy mix, the first step is identifying where different sounds live on the frequency spectrum. Different instruments and elements naturally occupy different ranges (e.g., bass, mids, highs), but overlaps can create muddiness. EQ helps to create this needed space for each element.
Low-end management
Start with bass-heavy instruments, these have the most energy and need to be prioritized. Make sure that kick drums, bass guitars, subs and and synth basses don’t crowd each other. Cutting certain frequencies in one and boosting in another can maintain low-end balance.
Midrange clarity
The midrange is where most of the musicality is heard. Guitars, vocals, pads, pianos, and synths tend to sit here. Use EQ to make sure these elements don’t clash by boosting one and attenuating similar frequencies in another. Remember, and this is always true, these sounds do not need to sound great in solo, they need to complement each other.
High frequencies
Bright elements, like hi-hats, shakers, sometimes vocals, can be adjusted to maintain their presence without overpowering other sounds. Be cautious with boosts in the high-end, as too much can pretty often create harshness. Most of the time, leveling the instrument’s volume is enough. And it’s also important to understand that you can often successfully cut the high frequencies out of many instruments in the “midrange family”, so that the hi-hats or bright percussion, or whatever it may be, can be left alone to provide the brightness to the song, on their own. Layering too many treble-heavy sounds on top of each other often kills the top-end and makes a song dull. In my opinion, the listener should be quickly able to easily judge which sound is contributing brightness, which sounds are providing the mid frequencies, and which ones are perceived as bass-heavy. Any song, no matter how unusual or crazy it may be, should be easy to understand SONICALLY.
2. Cutting Problem Frequencies
Every mix will have troublesome frequencies that need taming. These could be resonances, harsh tones, or low-end rumble that muddy the mix. Use a parametric EQ to identify and reduce these areas.
EQ sweeping technique
One of the always recommended mixing techniques is to sweep through the frequency spectrum using a narrow bell boost, to find resonances. Once found, apply a cut to reduce their impact. I think this is perhaps good for beginners, but it’s definitely not a method I recommend doing all day. You will tire your ears even if you don’t make a loud narrow sweep, and you will be better off simply trying to figure out if there is an area that sounds bad to you, by listening. If there is, make a fairly wide boost and see if that makes it worse. If it did, go ahead and make a small dip in that area - problem solved.
With time and practice, you will learn to skip this altogether and simply make a small cut when and where you hear a problem. It is also true that making less complex (or convoluted) EQ “fixes” will seem more logical to you, over time. A single wide 2dB dip at 2k, to mellow out an overpowering sound, will sound infinitely better than four deep, narrow band comb-filter looking cuts, that target “resonances” you discovered only after sweeping.
High-pass filtering
Many elements just don't need bass frequencies, because they are not audible in the context of the mix anyway. Listen to individual sounds while you have your full mix playing, and figure out which of them that you can’t hear any bass from. Use high-pass filters on instruments like pads, guitars, vocals, samples (but also snares, toms, percussion) to eliminate unnecessary low-end energy. This opens up the mix, allowing important low-end elements like the kick and bass to be defined.
Low-pass filtering
Less talked about but equally important as high-passing is low-passing. Lots of sounds really do not need any high frequencies at all, and only risk clashing with and damping down the actual bright sounds in your mix, such as bright vocals, hats, ride cymbals etc. Also important to mention is that many bright sounds (especially from samples) go much too wild and extreme in the top-end. As a mixer, I very, very often low-pass bright percussion sounds at 15k, or 17k, because they sound too piercing.
No listener ever said: “Man, the shakers in this track sound so lovely at 18k.” I have also attended a mastering session once where the vinyl test cut resulted in nothing but a crazy laser gun-like sound, because some white noise style percussion simply had too much energy in the extreme top-end, for reproducing onto the vinyl groove to even be possible.
3. Using EQ to Separate Instruments
When multiple instruments compete for attention, they can blur together, making the mix feel cluttered. The peaks, or transients of the sounds can get smushed, or the tonality of one sound can get masked and become inaudible. EQ can help create separation between similar-sounding instruments by shaping their tone. Add more to one, and less to the other. You make the decisions about which sound takes the front stage.
Complementary EQ
Apply opposite EQ adjustments to competing elements. For instance, if two instruments share the same frequency range (like a synth and a guitar), cutting 2-3kHz on one while boosting on the other can make both sound distinct.
Vocal clarity
In busy mixes, vocals often need more attention. By cutting frequencies in other elements where the vocal sits (typically around 1-4kHz), you make room for it to cut through clearly without increasing its volume too much. One tip to make this process easier, is to bus all your non-drum, non-bass, and non-vocal instruments to one bus, and that way you can make these cuts or adjustments across them all at once.
Kick & bass definition
Typically only one of these two, in any given song, will need real sub bass. Meaning bass below 70hz or so. This depends on the track, but for me, usually on songs where the kick plays more repeatedly in a pattern, it needs to have sub frequencies taken away to not become fatiguing for the listener. Then you can afford to “allow” the bass instruments to retain more sub bass. And conversely, in tracks where you have a more steady 4/4 beat (like club music), it sounds nicer to let the kick drum have all its sub frequencies intact!
4. Subtractive and Additive EQ
Another age-old and hyped tip with mixing and mastering is that instead of boosting frequencies to make sounds more prominent, it’s often more effective to use subtractive EQ, removing problem areas that interfere with clarity. This is all well and good but obviously you can add as much EQ by boosting frequencies as you want, and there is nothing wrong with doing so! But there are definitely benefits to subtractive equalization:
Reducing masking
Masking occurs when two elements occupy similar frequencies, and one overshadows the other. By using subtractive EQ on the element that you decide should be LESS featured in the mix, you can let the key sound (such as vocals or lead instruments) be heard more easily without crowding.
Subtle adjustments
Instead of boosting areas just because you want to hear them more, small reductions where you think it's appropriate tend to maintain the natural tone and original vibe of the sound while still improving clarity. For instance, a cut at 250-300Hz on synths, pads and FX can often reduce muddiness, making things more audibly defined.
Bold boosts are great
Especially with the type of EQ’s that are modeled on vintage types, that infer saturation and distortion while boosting frequencies, it can sound very nice to really crank those dials and boost either bass, mids or top-end. Don’t be afraid of wild experimentation. The more you actually use these machines or plugins on different sounds (sources), the better you will be at gauging when and how to implement their effect on your music. If you never cranked a sound too hard for its own living good, how are you supposed to know what “too much” even means?
Takeaways
Over time, by understanding how to identify and balance frequencies, cut problematic areas, and use EQ strategically to separate instruments, you can bring clarity and precision to even the most crowded mixes.
It’s not about boosting everything, but making sure every element has its own space, or pocket, to breathe. Make good use of removing top-end from sounds that do not need it, and remove bass from sounds that aren’t supposed to have any.
Master these EQ techniques easily by doing song after song, and your mixes will sound clearer and more professional without becoming at all overstuffed or chaotic.
Happy mixing! Let me know in the comments what you’re working on right now, and don’t forget:
“Without music, life would be a mistake.”