thanks again, guys. and yes, this is purely scratch, track wise, other than the rhythm guitars. the bass is a vst (trilian) and is definitely getting truncated in spots, via the master track eq settings. the drum track is addictive drums, but i will hopefully get a real player i know to do the actual track. i will have to go back and individually eq all the tracks, taking all these suggestions into account.
you guys are great.