I’ve been djing for about a year and a half and in the last two months purchased ableton suite and have been addicted to it ever since. The only problem I’m currently running into is that I’ve been producing with my 2012 macbook and hdj-2000s plugged directly to the built in soundcard. And when I listen to what I’ve created out other speakers it never sounds as good.
I’m currently looking for either an audio interface or some different headphones. What exactly would make the most difference? I’ve been looking into getting some open back headphones but will that really make that much of a difference?
This is an ever evolving quest for producers until you actually get it i’d say. I’m not sure what the magic formula is, but i do know that with each production you make you should be seeing at least some slight improvement in quality. A lot of this has to do with how good the mastering is, but at the same time you want your track to be as a slick as possible before it even gets to that stage. So the mix down becomes very important in that regard. Mixing on cans is doable, and you can make decent sounding tracks, but once you get used to monitors they will be that much better for sure. At that point its just practice, practice, practice.
Most Macbooks actually have “alright” built in sound, so worse comes to worse and that’s all you have, it shouldn’t be TOO big of an issue. Likewise, the headphones you’re using now aren’t THAT bad either, so I’m not sure getting new ones will by itself help. I’d recommend seeing if you can borrow something different from a friend for a night, just to try it and see if it helps.
Kind of what Graz is saying, sometimes it just takes practice to get that polished sound, and it’s not down to the gear.
Its not about your soundcard bro. If it sounds good it sounds good. If you need to hear all of the frequencies more i would say get better headphones. The Senheisser HD280 are like 100$ and have good low end response and noise cancelation.
If you want better sound its all about tutorials…