Audio mastering is an essential part of the music production process, it is also the last stage of the process before being pressed and released.
Music and art are expressions so when it comes to mastering, keeping the artistic edge and flare alive is still key to what we do as mastering engineers, we don’t simply want to make it unbearably loud, we want to enhance the overall sound and essentially just make it sound polished. So, how do we go about mastering then?
This all starts with the client, after all, you are the reason we do this job. Although we are an online business specialising in un-attended mastering sessions, we still pride ourselves on keeping our clients up-to-date and in the loop with every part of their mastering. We offer a few different services and usually when the client is getting in touch they will have already checkout out our mastering services page and our FAQ page.
So, how does the process work for the mastering engineer?
1. Mix Review – This is the first part of the process. We check that the mix is feeling good and there is nothing in the mix that stands out or needs attention i.e. not out of phase etc. If the mix is feeling like it may need another look then we’ll get back to the client to get them to look at it before we spend time mastering. If the mix is good then we’ll begin the process of mastering but before that we look at the reference tracks.
2. Reference Tracks – We want our clients to be happy that they will get the sound that they are after and one way we do this is by getting as many reference tracks as possible.
As a side note here, unlike recording studios or producers, mastering engineers don’t tend to be genre specific and tend to have mastered literally every style under the sun. We work a lot with Bollywood movies (they like the tracks loud and they love the high frequencies), then we also work with hip-hop producers, house producers, folk bands, metal bands…I could carry on but you get the gist. (Below is a SoundCloud playlist with a few things we’ve worked on recently).
3. Mastering – So after listening to the mix, and checking out the reference tracks we set up a new project and start working our way through the tracks. Throughout the process of mastering you’ll here reference tracks being played back (Spotify is a lifesaver here) as the engineers are working to try and get the sound you’re after. The engineers use their analogue gear along with software plugins to achieve the sound. Once their happy they’ll run off the masters.
4. Sign off – This is the part where the client get’s to listen back and check they are happy with the masters. This means that if the client is happy with how they sound and don’t want anything else doing or changing then the masters are ready for publication and duplication. The mastering engineer will then make you a listening copy of the master and a DDP copy of the master ready to be sent for duplication.
5. Changes to masters – If you’re unhappy with how your masters are sounding our mastering engineers will be more than happy to look at your tracks again. Once they’ve looked at your tracks and made the changes you wanted they’ll send you your tracks back through masteringworld.com.
Check out the mix of tracks that come through the internet doors of masteringworld.com
Word of warning: Tracks below may contain explicit content.
The loudness wars, are they a thing of the past? Or are they still present? It’s pretty hard to judge these days. Bob Katz thinks that it may be over, or at least on the way out.
The loudness war has been present for a long time, and was supposed to have began way back in 1950’s when people would prefer to listen to the louder vinyl presses on jukeboxes. Luckily back then there was a limit to how loud you could press a vinyl. Digital recording then subsequently removed this limit, C.D.’s were able to play audio data regardless of the amplitude, and decades later, here we are.
What is the loudness war?
The loudness war is the perceptual loudness of music, it is getting artists albums/singles to be louder than other records, especially their competitors. As I said in my previous blog, everything does sound better louder. Obviously this isn’t the only reason, if things are louder, they stand out more, whether that be in a good way or not.
What effect does it have on music?
Since the 1980’s music has being getting gradually louder and louder and this has been detrimental to the dynamic range of the audio, and the overall quality. The loudness of a record and the dynamics of a record are important to the overall sound. The issue with making tracks louder means that you begin to lose dynamics due to limiting and compression. Mastering itself is beneficial to your music and really brings your tracks to life, but this intent on making everything louder has side effects on the quality of audio, and takes away a tracks dynamics.
What will happen to music now?
The loudness war is by no means over yet, but if Bob Katz is anything to go by, it is definitely on the way out. Maybe this will be the time that we see tracks not being compressed and pushed to their peak and seeing VU meters going crazy, maybe, just maybe things will soon become less about how perceptually ‘loud’ a track is and more about its dynamics and the headroom of the track.
If people want their tracks loud to match up to their competitors why would they stop mastering like this?
Mastering is a personal preference, you may want loud masters, or you may want quieter more dynamic masters. These days television broadcasters normalise sound, radio broadcasters do a similar thing and online outlets are beginning to add loudness normalisatin, some have been doing this for a long time already. Spotify have had loudness normalisation in place since the company began, so perceptually everything was the same level. This works both ways, if tracks are compressed and loud with no headroom they are brought down to within their ‘limit’ and tracks that aren’t crushed and compressed are brought to that same perceived loudness with space for headroom. So there is no reason to just completely change the way you master your tracks but it’s just something to bear in mind when mastering.
How will my masters sound on loudness normalised outlets?
This all depends on the masters themselves. If the masters are tasteful, dynamic and loud then your tracks will sound great. If the masters are over compressed, limited and overly loud then the normalised version will sound flat and even less dynamic with no headroom at all.
Normalisation allows for dynamic headroom with the masters, if your tracks are overly compressed and squashed then they will come out with no dynamics at all.
What does it all mean?
Well this means that dynamics may be the main priority in mastering, rather than pushing the loudness to the limit and losing all these wonderful dynamics. This is by far something that won’t be a quick turnaround and change over night. Hopefully with digital outlets adding these normalisers mastering engineers can once again think about dynamics more than loudness, and so can the artists.
It would be nice to think that this has come almost full circle and that we can think of mastering more than just making a track louder, hopefully soon enough this will be the case.
Some labels have already begun making masters made for C.D.’s and online outlets, whether this will catch on is another question altogether. Mastering if it’s done tastefully should still sound great regardless of the playback method, and, you can always turn off (on most outlets) the peak normalising feature. We’ll see over the next weeks, months, maybe even years whether Bob Katz was right, he probably will be.
Writer – Roy Dykes
Also check out Dynamic Range Day to learn more about the Loudness War.
Visit Mastering World for more information on different mastering services we offer.
Five essential things to remember when mastering your tracks.
Mastering is a pretty tricky art, just like anything, it takes practice. If you’re a home producing musician/composer, then mastering is something that can really help your mixes sound really polished.
Here’s a short, but important list of things to keep in mind when mastering:
1. If the mix isn’t good, mastering won’t fix it.
Mixing is an art in itself, and if you’re producing, engineering, mixing and mastering the project then good luck. The problem with the ‘all-jobs-one-person’ kinda setup is the fact that you are intimately familiar with the track. You’ve probably listened to it hundreds of times over the last few days. A good bit of advice here is to do a mix, one that you are happy with, take a few days away from hearing it, then play it back to yourself, and begin mastering. Allowing yourself to have a break from hearing the track will remove you from it slightly, hopefully then making your master sound incredible.
2. “So, I have a few cool plugins and stuff. Will this do?”
Yes, obviously you won’t get the same sound as a mastering facility, but the plugins can be of help.
One of the main differences between a home/project studio is going to be the fact that you will probably be using a lot of digital plugins, unlike purpose built mastering studios who use a lot of the opposite, analogue hardware. When working with digital, it is also a really good idea to be careful, don’t overuse things, use plugins with finesse. They always say less is more, right? Normally when diving into mastering tracks, we use majority hardware analogue equipment and some delicately placed software limiting, maybe some multi-band and basically do what we think will sound best for the mix.
A lot of plugins come with presets for ‘mastering’. I would categorically say don’t use these. Use the plugins by all means to sort out particular issues that you have addressed but as I said earlier, if the mix is good, you probably won’t need these. So, if there are some horrible frequencies happening that need notching out, or you think it could benefit from some multi-band EQ, go for it, but only use these things if the tracks need it. Don’t use presets. Listen to Tony ———>>>>
3. Is it louder or does it actually sound better?!
Every morning I drive to work with my music pretty loud, this morning I was harnessing the 
grunge vibe with Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’, which was on Radio 1, unexpected?! I like this track, it sounds good, its aggressive sounding and all that cool stuff, but everyone likes their music louder, and perceptually everything louder sounds better. So the one battle you find you have a lot of the time when mastering is having an equal balance of ‘loudness’ to ‘dynamics’ (there is a day dedicated to this every year, check out Dynamic Range Day). You can easily end up losing one in favour of the other. A lot of people will play their tracks next to another artists and the tracks will be quieter, fair enough, you mastered it at home, but, you need to master dynamically, and not by just turning up the master fader. Like I said earlier, you need to treat the knobs with finesse and elegance. Keep applying different EQ, apply some limiting, try things out and see what it sounds like.
4a. Testing (A/B Testing): “This setting sounds good, but so does this one?!”
Part of the fun mastering is testing what sounds better, whether that be through hardware or software. If you’re testing software, change between a few settings and see what sounds best to your ears. If you’re using hardware, do exactly the same. If you’re unsure, check with someone else, see what they think. The majority of the time you will probably both agree on the same setting.
4b. Testing (Test your masters): “Nan, can I play my techno master in your Punto?”
Test you’re masters out. Try and test them anywhere you can, through a bunch of different types of speakers. A good test is to run your masters through laptop speakers, laptop speakers for the most part are pretty bad, so it’s a good way of hearing what other people may hear. This is obviously the opposite end of things, as well, try listening to them on the biggest speaker system you can find, if you know a live sound engineer (that trusts you), get them to play it in-between acts through the in house PA system. Maybe also consider car stereos, small computer speakers, iPhone speakers, 97p headphones, decent headphones, iPod headphones and literally anything that you can, hell, why not put your iPhone into a Pringles tube and use a home made speaker, literally, anything. Once you’ve tested the masters, edit anything within the master that you picked up on whilst testing then do exactly the same experiment again until you’re totally happy.
5. “That sounds awesome, I think I’ve mastered my track!”
Cool. You’re done. If you’re thinking of sending these tracks off to get pressed to vinyl or C.D., maybe even tape (do they still do cassette tapes?) make sure that this master is the ONE. Once your masters are pressed, they are pressed, and you won’t be able to change anything, unless you master and press again. Make sure you’re totally sold on the sound before you commit to sending this stuff to the factory.
If you’re happy, then your tracks are ready to go. If you’re mastering multiple tracks for an album or E.P. make sure they are all sitting nicely together and flow with each other level wise, otherwise certain tracks would overall be quieter than others, so make sure they are all at a relative level. If this is all in order then your good to go.
Just remember it can take time to get that perfect sound you’re after.
Writer – Roy Dykes
Check out this link on Dynamic Range and Loudness from Sound on Sound Magazine.
Virtually Attended Mastering
Over the last few days we’ve been super busy updating our website and adding tonnes of extra bits of info to it! One of these was ‘Virtually Attended Mastering’.
What is ‘Virtually Attended Mastering’?
Virtually attended mastering is the same as attended mastering, only you’re not physically in the room! The idea behind this is to keep the engineer and client as connected as possible, this makes the whole experience of online mastering less ‘online’ and more personal. Mastering engineers love having people in the studio, it’s human interaction that they crave!
We tend to work with a lot of clients who live in India, many of these clients are sound engineers, composers and mix engineers. The best way for us to master their tracks is to have them “in the room”, so to speak. With the client listening to a live stream of the audio they are able to hear everything as it happens. This is great for both parties, the mastering engineer can then get immediate feedback on the masters, saving time in the long run. It’s not only beneficial for mastering in countries with a huge time difference, its also pretty good if you’re a few miles away. It’s just breaking down that boundary between engineer and client, which is pretty hard when you’re an “online” mastering company.
Now we are able to chat and master with our clients without them having to travel to the studio…India to Wales is a pretty long journey.
This service is available at our premium rate prices, and unfortunately we do not offer this option with the ‘Any Studio’ rate. Get in touch with the studio and/or engineer to find out more about this feature.
Check out the studios on masteringworld.com to find out more. Hafod Mastering, Super Audio Mastering and LOUD Mastering.
Writer – Roy Dykes
Pro Sound Interview with Masteringworld.com
A few months back Donal was out in Mumbai visiting his clients, engineers and studios he has been working with over the last few years. Whilst he was over there ‘Pro Sound Systems’ magazine interviewed him about his work with mastering Indian movies. Check out the interview below.
Go to mastering world’s India site to check out a full list of clients and films Hafod Mastering have worked on.
Short and sweet backstory of how Hafod Mastering began working on Indian movies:
Hafod Mastering started working with Indian clients a few years back. Donal began working with composers Shankar Ehsaan Loy and sound engineer Ashish Saksena. Donal soon refined the craft of mastering for Indian clients and has since gained a tremendous amount of work within the Indian film industry and non-film work as well. Donal has worked with such composers as A.R. Rahman. (Don’t recognise the name? A.R, Rahman composed the soundtrack for the film ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ and has recently co-written the track ‘Birthday’ with Will.i.am), Amet Trivedi (Composed for movies such as Queen, Bombay Talkies and Lootera), Shankar Ehsaan Loy (Composer for London Dreams, Don 2 and Aarakshan) and lots more.
Writer – Roy Dykes
Mastering World Blog 