Just a bit of a contrarian take on masterbuss processing and self mastering added prior to sending for pro mastering.


My Byrd is massive in the UK just now and IMO makes incredible Friday night fun packed music.


Now he says something here that I myself had been thinking a while back when I sent a track to a label to master. I was worried they would loose some of the natural energy I'd spent a long time coaxing, and in my opinion that's then exactly what happened, some energy and ermmm flava was somehow lost.


Danny sums it up perfectly at 3.35 when he says "when you take it(own mastering) off and send it to mastering house, you loose some energy".

Now I can imagine people thinking this is nonsense, but what I think can happen is you spend weeks with your 'baby' endlessly tweaking masterbuss settings, way longer than an outside jobbing mastering guy would so you kinda gradualy and organically tweak it to an energy level that fits like a glove. You may not have his experience but you know your baby intimately and may have tweaked the mastering for weeks or even months on ened whereas he might have an hour with it.

So I'm specifically not saying you don't need separate mastering, but I am deffo from the school of thought that some, even a lot of masterbuss mastering can actualy be a bonus.

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i sometimes use ozone's multiband on some frequencies before i send it to mastering, i've found most mastering engineers won't work so much on the sparkle but more on the "corrective-ness" of it all

as long as you apply it as "creative compression" there is nothing wrong with it, but don't overdo it and also do not dither since once on 16bits the 24bit dynamic range potential is lost and the engineer has less dynamic range to work with.

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isnt that the exact reason why you should have someone else master it?

because you get too "intimate" with you're track like you said, so there for you are inpaired to make the proper judjements.

not only that, but "shaping the dynamics" is destructive, it's a one way street and there is no way back from a wrong turn. so "sort of" getting that vibe (like 70% right, but not quite exactly how you want it), most of the times ruins the potential to get that vibe a 100% afterwards, not "preshaping" this vision yourself actually helps to engineer to fulfil your vision.

Ofcourse non of this is relevant, if you know exactly what your doing and if u can trust your ears, monitoring and room. But then you also wouldn't need the engineer to spice up your track.

At the end of the day there is not 1 sole religion on the creative part. However common sense around dynamics and destructive editting should always be taken into consideration. once it's imprinted and quantized/dithered to 16bits it's gone forever.

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quote:

Originally posted by Raphie as long as you apply it as "creative compression" .

creative compression is the only reason you would do it. Some people want a certain that is a creative choice. That isn't the mastering engineers job unless I suppose you have a long standing relationship with him and he knows what you like.

The mastering guy isn't going to make your tune pump. Well I should clarify, a real mastering engineer won't but all the EDM guys that pretend to master will because that is about all they really know how to do.

I think you would be surprised to find mastering tools like a mc in most studios on almost every buss. The overheads are getting it, the bass is getting. That is how you make pop sound like pop. Not saying its good or bad but shit Raphie, you irk me.

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i feel you should send the mastering house your version as a guide, and an un-effected one for them to work on.

basically saying, "This is what I want. Get me close to this while smoothing anything I might've overlooked when I did it."

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quote:

Originally posted by kadomony i feel you should send the mastering house your version as a guide, and an un-effected one for them to work on. basically saying, "This is what I want. Get me close to this while smoothing anything I might've overlooked when I did it."

Agree with this and L4C's sentiments - Mastering engineers are meant to do very subtle things, and I wouldn't look for them to add energy as such to my track. If I wanted them to, it would only be because they have access to some compressor I don't (shadow hills etc) and I trusted them implicitly, otherwise hell no, it's something the producer should be doing.

The interview more tells me that their particular strain of DnB really uses a lot of brickwall buss and master limiting, so I understand why he wants it on there before sending it to the mastering house (again because the mastering engineer should not be adding energy or drive so when they master it, it doesn't have his preferred aesthetic).

I personally feel that his "mastering" is more actually an engineering/producing aspect, not mastering in the traditional sense.

Also, very true about sending at as 24bit.

You would be surprised how many people ask for a certain vibe from a supplied example track. Ofcourse none of this is applied unsollicited.
only thing i am saying is, that if you don't know a 100% sure how to get there, it better to explain what you want, than to sort of apply it on forehand

quote:

Originally posted by Looney4Clooney creative compression is the only reason you would do it. Some people want a certain that is a creative choice. That isn't the mastering engineers job unless I suppose you have a long standing relationship with him and he knows what you like. The mastering guy isn't going to make your tune pump. Well I should clarify, a real mastering engineer won't but all the EDM guys that pretend to master will because that is about all they really know how to do. I think you would be surprised to find mastering tools like a mc in most studios on almost every buss. The overheads are getting it, the bass is getting. That is how you make pop sound like pop. Not saying its good or bad but shit Raphie, you irk me.

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i would be surprised if these were actually professionals having mixed it by a professional asking the mastering engineer for a vibe. That would surprise me. What wouldn't surprise me are EDM producers getting their tracks mastered for 10 quid thinking mastering will make their tracks sound hype asking for like a hands up hype vibe. I'm never surprised by the number pof idiots that don't know what a mixing engineer is , what a mastering engineer is and what those processes involve. I suppose in most cases, the 10 quad mastering guys just load up the vibe from the preset list and the problem is really a non issue.

And if you don't know how to get there, you ask an engineer. It is a mixing issue and should not be done at the mastering stage.

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"This is why Superman works alone." GC
old stuff from days gone by (2001-2004)
Mad For Brad's gay little contest

Reality is not always your perfect world. So sometimes u do indeed both. But we're shifting discussion again.

We're talking bedroom producers here, not session artists recorded by a hired recording engineer, who is going to handover the induvidual tracks to the hired mixing engineer, near always this is a 1 man show with no budget for "pro's" whatsoever.

it's always funny to read how your perspective depends on how the discussion is going, in a "pro" discussion you come with the not relevant for bedroom argument, in a reallife bedroom producer topic, suddenly everything is different in "pro" land.

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if you added some sort of disclaimer to your posts, I'd stop. Put in your signature something along the lines of , I am a bedroom producer and despite my wicked setup, I kinda don't really know what i'm doing.

THe problem is that you speak like you do and people will take your advice which is often pretty bad.

___________________
"This is why Superman works alone." GC
old stuff from days gone by (2001-2004)
Mad For Brad's gay little contest