How Much Low End Should I Cut

And Why!

You probably see this all over the internet...”don’t forget to low-cut the bass below 50Hz dude”! So many producers are offering the wrong opinions on the matter that we decided to dive into this enormously important topic. The simple answer is...there is no simple answer!

It really depends on the kick! No idea why you would cut your sub at 50Hz if you are rocking a thin tech-house kick and expecting some sort of a low-end magic trick.

I have personally shaved the sub at 20, 30, 40, and even 50 in some cases...but it ALL DEPENDS ON THE KICK! Why are we not talking about that? If you are making an SHM banger like “One”, your kick is going to be boomy and massive, with a huge release...most older Swedish House Mafia songs have these supermassive kicks. In this case, there really is not much space in that sub-area for a baseline
that has a lot of lows.

Now let’s take a look at any Tech-House banger and if you notice, the kicks are mostly stumpy with a very short release time, and a lot less boom. This leaves A LOT of space for that sexy low sub, and if you were to shave that sub too much, the whole low end would collapse.

Now let’s talk about the other important factor nobody talks about.
Take a look at this graph and notice the amount of sub present on a baseline in the
key of C vs the key of B root notes.

It is very clear that the key of B in the same octave is going to give you drastically less low end than the deep key of C. So in this particular case, how can you simply say, “Let’s just save it”...when in reality we are actually missing a lot of the sub in the cause of B, and have too much in C. Ok, you got me...what about the rumble? Ok fair enough, if you want to clean up the rumble it is safe to shave those SUPER LOWS(20Hz and below). But in all other cases please use your ear and a spectrum analyzer! You can get a free one from Voxengo and it rocks!!!

Just to be clear, the rumble below 20Hz is just the sub-frequencies we will not be
able to actually hear anyway, so it’s best to cut them out for a tighter mix-down.
But even there, it just depends on so many factors.

There is absolutely no right way to do this because so many factors are involved.
But if you want the basic formula...with massive kicks you shave more sub on the
baselines and with short Techy tracks, there is much more room for that massive
sub in your baselines.

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