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Interesting question and I see a lot of people have put in their share on this. Sorry didn’t get a chance to read all of the input on this but the way I see it is as follows:
Let’s identify the problem first. Cancellation happens when you have two identical frequencies that are in exactly opposite positions in their respective wave form. It basically works on the principal of 1 + -1 = 0. Equally if you have the wave forms in exactly the same position in the wave form this will give the effect of amplification.
Now let’s talk about the Bass sounds themselves. Unless you are playing two identical tracks or the producers used exactly the same patch with the same effects and level of compression (Unlikely but not impossible) you are not going to affect everything. This does not mean that it couldn’t sound ugly but you get the picture.
As a basic guide you can break the bass sounds down into three main areas. You have your low bass, your mid bass and your high bass. Keep in mind that the below are just guidelines.
Low Bass – Sub Frequencies often playing a simplification of the main bass line used to give a bottom layer for the rest of the mix to sit on.
Mid Bass – Often where your main bass melody is written, in trance this is the characteristic rolling bass line that you hear.
High Bass – The stabby aspects of bass which will often be a complementing melody based on the Mid.
You will have many variations of this but this will give you a pointer in the right direction. Depending on the patch used and the mixing of the track it is entirely possible that the mid can have frequencies that falls into either the high or the low range so it’s not impossible for them to share frequencies, especially on another incoming track. In other words it also depends on the bass sound that was used.
Simplification of the actual problem, the next question is how you combat this?
Firstly there is no real way to tell for sure before you play a track especially in a club environment, but it all boils down to how you manage the track that you are mixing in and this is all done using EQ. You also have to bear in mind that exactly the same principles apply to the kick too and in my experience this is the element most likely to cause cancellation issues rather than the bass.
Mixing in key is not going to make things worse or better as there are so many other factors that need to be taken into account. You also have to remember that when it comes down to musical notes especially in the synth age, when you have a complex patch it is very likely that even if the dominant frequency may be different it is entirely probable that there will be other frequencies in the patch shared by other notes. Harmonics etc.
When playing on a big system it’s the bass that is the most noticeable and gives the impression of being the loudest (When I say bass I mean the bottom end of the track not the bass patch). This is why you have to pay most attention to this when mixing. A lot of what you do as a DJ comes down to understanding the structure of the music as well as your skills to use EQ.
As far as the EQ goes, a simple rule of thumb is to only give to the incoming track what you have taken away from the outgoing track. Your starting points however, may vary greatly depending on the mixer that you are using and indeed the system you are playing on. I have played on systems in the past where whatever you appear to do with the bass EQ it made no difference, it was just this wall of sound, and in those cases you have to roll with it. In those instances you either have to rely on your headphones or the booth monitors. But as mentioned before, what you hear on the booth monitors and headphones does not always translate into what the main PA is doing. Sometimes you can’t win.
The bottom line is that EQ and suitable placement of tracks are the answer. You will often find that guys who seem to seamlessly mix tracks together tend to use musical structure more than the ability to play two bass lines together.
If you use phrase matching correctly this should also go a long way to help. Many of the change overs that I use are very quick as I tend to use breaks and other major events in the track to introduce incoming tracks.
A lot of this also comes down to knowing your music well, it’s all well and good having a collection of 10’000 mp3s on your hard drive but if you don’t have any connection with the music then you are mixing blind. That said many songs today follow a similar structure so perhaps not so much of an issue as it used to be.
To summarise:
Mixing in key – Correct use of EQ would nullify any potential issue that this could cause. Using this would open up so many other opportunities in your mixes. This does seem to divide a lot of people but ultimately the choice to use it or not is yours. Often when you find two tunes that just sound as if they were made for each other and it becomes one of your favourite mixes, then it is highly probable that they actually have some harmonic characteristic that makes them work in that way.
EQ – Mastering this skill is the answer cancelation issues.
Phrase Matching – This is the first step to mastering the correct place to drop tracks into the mix.
Knowing your music – This will assist you with your phrase matching in order to get the best mixes.
Just my two pence worth.
Cheers
Nem
EDIT - A crossfader is totally pointless for what we do as a general rule. Does depend slightly on genre, i.e. your Drum and Bass, Breaks and Dubstep guys might have a different opinion but for 4 to the floor EDM it’s not really much use.
High Pass Filtering works in a similar way to EQ, i.e. it removes unwanted frequencies depending on the roll off. Nice if you have it on a mixer but certainly not essential and even debatable if it actually makes the mixes better as the cut can seem unnatural.
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https://www.mixcloud.com/Calvin_Karass/
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