In this guest post I made for The Pro Audio Files, I show how to EQ heavy guitars, listening in mono, using a sweeping technique to notch out nasty resonances, and a low shelf to balance low end with bass.
The track I’m mixing is from my Mixing In Reaper Volume 2 video training class. find out more
TL;DR
- We have two rhythm guitars and a lead guitar that has delay and reverb printed on it.
- REAPER’s stock EQ (ReaEQ) is an excellent tool for this.
- I always EQ my guitars in mono. You can find a mono button in the master track in REAPER.
- Grab one band of your EQ and make a narrow 12 db boost and start sweeping around until you hear a nasty resonance.
- Once you find a peak like that, go into the controls and turn the gain down to somewhere between -3 and -6.
- Repeat the process if necessary.
- A/B your guitars with and without EQ.
- Make sure that you are making it better.
Comments
6 responses to “How to EQ heavy distorted guitars in a mix”
Hi Jon, I read about this sweeping technique a lot, but I found it always challenging to identify those nasty frequencies myself. Your video was quite helpful in this respect. Thanx! 🙂 One question: You’re using some keyboard shortcuts for making the EQ bands narrow. How does that work? Looks quite efficient. 😉
just mousewheel I think!
Wow, that was quick. I just tried it and it worked. I should try the mouse wheel more often in Reaper. It might have some other magic in some situations I’m not aware of. Thanx, Jon. 🙂
That’s very helpful, thank you 🙂
What action did you use to connect ReaEQ to the keyboard shortcut?
Track: Insert/show ReaEQ (track EQ)