Does a Very Good Mix Need to be Mastered?

Well I've been under the impression that you can't master just one song, and that you would only master it in relation to other songs, eg to put onto a CD.

I'm quite a noob though so I'm probably wrong, I think everyone's ideas will differ.

I think someething that is often overlooked about the mastering process is that it's critically important because it ensures that technical specifications are properly met.

There's such a focus nowadays on loudness and timbre in mastering, that people tend to forget all the boring stuff that has to be done as well. Things like:
- make sure format specification is met
- specify precise cue sheet markers and track segmentations
- check, double check (triple check?) for transfer and output errors
- determine/correct phase/zero-point discontinuties between individual tracks
- ensure proper mono-collapse or other fold-down behavior on stereo/surround mixes
(I'm sure there's more, but I'm not an expert either!)

The dynamics processing/EQ/image balancing/reverb are all "extra" features that have sort of leaked into the process over the years. Some of these processes were actually developed way back for mono vinyl, in order to help the medium accomodate the music (that is increasingly less important as our media gets more advanced).

Is a mastering engineer strictly necessary? I would vote no. But I think that at minimum, the above mentioned stuff should happen by someone at some point in the process from written song to recorded release.

ORIGINAL: rob.pulman

Well I've been under the impression that you can't master just one song, and that you would only master it in relation to other songs, eg to put onto a CD.

I'm quite a noob though so I'm probably wrong, I think everyone's ideas will differ.

Mastering singles happens all the time. Has been since the beginning of time. The work you do to an album project will be slightly different because now you have to concern yourself with the song order and relative levels from song to song (track indexes, stuff like that). In terms of mastering a really good mix, yes, you probably still need to do it for no other reason than to compete with the volumes of songs these days. Squash the $#@! out of it and make it nice and loud and crackly. Good stuff.

Well I've been under the impression that you can't master just one song, and that you would only master it in relation to other songs, eg to put onto a CD.

Rob -- this seems true more or less. The ME will want to arrange your album based on musicality, your input, audience, genre, etc. ... and give some thread(s) of consistency no doubt (like a faux-painted 'show-house').

Larry

-- You deal with this a lot. I think you hinted that squashing dynamics for "loud and crackly" is detrimental to the art, but catches the listener (at least on the first take, before she inevitably turns down the volume).

Btw, I've only had one commercial release, and it was mixed & mastered by the same team. Unbeknownst to me, the whole time during recording they were tweaking the final output compressor. It was a shocker because I was expecting to send it to a mastering house later, but they said "oh we already did that". ‘Turned out great. I guess that's what you're talking about, right P?

SD -- This is what I mean. I myself *master* strait in S7 and hardly use Sound Forge at all anymore. Furthermore, a lot of 'presence' in the high mids and 'air' (>5Khz) affords "crackling" (a good thing for my ears when used judiciously (in the loudness race).
-- Going for that 'happy medium' (pleasing both artist and listener(s) somehow).

There's such a focus nowadays on loudness and timbre in mastering, that people tend to forget all the boring stuff that has to be done as well. Things like:
- make sure format specification is met
- specify precise cue sheet markers and track segmentations
- check, double check (triple check?) for transfer and output errors
- determine/correct phase/zero-point discontinuities between individual tracks
- ensure proper mono-collapse or other fold-down behavior on stereo/surround mixes
(I'm sure there's more, but I'm not an expert either!)

Dave -- Some these things we do in CD-Architect: Red-book, markers, track segmentations, etc. That "double check (triple?) for dither and output errors" requires feedback from an ME, or an unbiased mixing engineer who understands dithering. I won't argue that.
-- Methinks there are many mundane habits that a mixing geeks need to learn ... and to require continuous feedback from others ... as they aspire to mix, master, and produce.
--"Mono-collapse", if that means listening on a mono speaker ... seems also a mixer's nightmare. The evolved-paradigm now seems to keep music stereo-wide and dynamic (dynamic despite the *necessary* squashing wars). Mono kills so much of that ... Its been suggested that: a good ME might could redeem a mix separately (i.e., making a second master (or third master?))
-- one master that is better for mono-play in airports and elevators.
-- Another master that contains wide-dynamics to allow better compressed-FM-radio play.
-- Another one for the car
-- Another one for the theater, living-room, etc.

I've observed: When we crit each other, we encourage the artistic elements and temporarily eschew the loudness race.
The best mixes invariably have wide Peak to RMS dynamics (crest factors) of 15+ dcbs. with varying dynamics and transients being heard throughout.
They are also stereo-widened to the max.

This Sonar-Song-Forum-paradigm seems to me a very good thing, even for the noisy car (though I've become quite the volume-knob jock): IIRC, FM radio play itself should auto-compress and add crackle to our *finished pieces* anyway.

ORIGINAL: ohhey

I don't think so. You have to remember that mastering became a part of the music production process before we had the total automation and unlimited effects of the DAW. Also, the final product was always a different format of media then the mix was recorded on. So there was really no way to make a production ready mix.

Today it's different. The final product (the mix) can be a digital file ready to put on CD, you don't have a middle "tape" to deal with. You can also add all the things that might have been done in mastering right on the main bus before you export. So you can make the final product right out of the same system that does the tracking.

You may want to do some mastering if the mix didn't turn out exactly like you wanted it to but doesn't require a remix. You may still need to do the fade and trim on the ends of each song, and there are also things that might need to be done that didn't even exist in the old days like sample rate conversion, bit reduction (with dither). So mastering today may not include the same tasks it did then but we still use that word to describe the prduction step.

+ 1 Well put Frank !!!!!!

Voxengo plugins >>>>>SoundForge>>>>CDA and Ears can go a long way

Does the M.E. finish your less exquisite oil-paintings, too?

A tempting analogy here is that have you seen the difference between a beautifully painted canvas when the artist has finished it and left it lying around the studio?

Then having seen the difference after the final varnish or lacquer has been applied to bring out the brilliance of the original colours and to protect it against the ravages of time, then mounted and framed to emphasise it proportionally, then hung in a gallery to give it the fullest context?

Sure the artist can take care of all these seemingly ancillary things but all too often will make a pigs ear of it and make it less appealing to the viewer, he may choose the wrong finishing medium and although it looks good for two weeks he hadn't grasped the fact that those colours he chose are already starting to fade, the viewer moves on to the next picture because the mount has too much space at the top, the frame is too chunky or whatever and worst of all its been hung in some place behind the door where no one looks.

All of which is OK if you are a sullen kind of artist that is making an irrefutable statement and will decry any attempt at commercialising his art for the philistine art buying public.

But normally you are turning to a mastering engineer in order to help shift product by the bucket load and he or she will stand a better chance with a proven track record of applying those finishing touches to your work of art in order to pack the gallery than in reality you are likely to. Of course there are exceptions to every rule, but there are plenty of better mixers, engineers and producers than you or I who wouldn't stake their income on taking that chance.

Having said that though why not try it you never know you might be the next Bob Katz.

ORIGINAL: rsp@odyssey.net

-- Bob Katz may have alluded to or spoken something like: “a good mix needs little-to-no mastering.” But that sounds like a cop-out, IMHO.

-- I tentatively say, “a good mixing engineer already knows how to master his own mixes, 99% or so."

Philip, you are something else. Saying something Katz says is a copout? There is a reason the guys like Katz, Ludwig, Clearmountain, and other top mastering engineers get paid the money they do. There is a reason the top talent in the world consistently goes to these guys to get thier stuff mastered by them. Keep in mind, these mixes are done by the top mixing engineers in the world, recorded on world class state of the art equipment, and then are sent to a top mastering engineer.

Why do you suppose that is?

Randy

-- Methinks because they’re the best Mix Engineers and MEs alive $$$.
-- Some musicians and the world obviously need good MEs.

All that is well and good. My point is that a good mixing engineer is probably much better than a mediocre mastering engineer, essentially. Here are just few quaint (quirky? questionable?) hooks by Katz. You judge:

“Decibels: Not for Dummies” --p.65 (Mastering Audio)
“Between the Devil and the Deep Blue See” -- p.80
“Mastering is the art of compromise” – p.103
“Practice is the best of all instructions”—p. 104
“The perfect mix may need no master at all”--p. 109

Katz does not want to be worshipped. None of us do. He appreciates a bit of crit. Katz is a gifted ME. He’s sin-prone like you and I; his expository style and extraneous hooks don’t always jive with "Mastering Audio", IMHO. They can stumble noobs like me, too. I'd like to read what Ludwig and others presently conclude.

Should you accept good mixing as your master or reject it?!

Admittedly, "copout" is probably the wrong philosophical word (note my disclaimer). "Oversimplification", “confusing”, “hard-to-understand” “rhetoric”, “off-topic”, or “hand-waving” might be more politically correct. I don’t know. I’m just an aspiring ME with human rights to question what appears as hypocrisy.

Obviously, Katz book invoked this thread and remains sort of a measuring stick for my *Mastering* and even my *Mixing*. I can’t separate the 2. Sorry!

Katz is one of the best ME authorities (for noobs and advance MEs), but not the final ME authority on your music! Should modern R&B, Progressive, and Rap genres gravitate toward Katz with their pieces? I seriously doubt it. Methinks they have bass-line novelties and vocal parameters that exclude Katz' conservative *conceptions* of mastering audio.

ORIGINAL: rsp@odyssey.net

Granted, with the availability of pro level plugins today, we can make our mixes sound better. However, I've always understood "mastering" to be the last part of the process before manufacturing. The part where the mixes are "crafted" to be uniform, so that they sound as good as they can sound, in every type of listening enviroment, whether it be home, car, club, radio. This is achieved by mastering engineers, with highly trained ears, and done in acoustically designed facilities, using the best equipment available.

I just can't believe that a home recordist is going to be able to achieve that level of quality, using plugins in thier bedroom. Especially if the "mastered" recording is going to be issued commercially.

Randy

If the bedroom recording fails to sound good it will not be because it wasn't mastered or the quality of the gear or plugins. Everyone now has access to better "quality" then most hit records had at the time they were made. If you fail to create a song that sounds good don't blame the setup.

On a side note "quality" is clearly not required anymore. Rip a professionaly mastered modern CD into your wav edtior and look at it. Most of them have clipped wavforms, other types of non content related distortion, no dynamic range at all... I could go on and on. If you could go back in time and have a mastering engineer from the 60's or 70's listen to that they would laugh at you. The days of mastering "gatekeepers" being able to insure uniform product are clearly over for good.

Content is king. If the song is good and the mix is even close to listenable people will love it.

The music biz is a cruel and shallow money trench, a plastic hallway where thieves & pimps run free and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side. Hunter S. Thompson

Ah! The bright light of music biz shining in my darkness!

To be fair, it seems Randy speaks for commercial reality (10% of us?): Top-notch Mixing Engineers plus Mastering Engineers are at least "called-upon" to fix the rock-star (song and album wise)

The days of mastering "gatekeepers" being able to insure uniform product are clearly over for good.

Content is king. If the song is good and the mix is even close to listenable people will love it.

Frank, this is both bold and encouraging. Old paradigms die hard. The likelihood of you or I beating the old school by using computers and forums seems to be getting great. Why would I want to hire an ME when the Song-Forum fixes me and polishes me on every level of production.

I'd hope to see the mastering houses and other *large processors* shrink-down to personal levels
… and allow some of us amateur mixing engineers to command this craft well above their level
… even circumvent the old-school of music production, ASAP.

ORIGINAL: doncolga

Hey,

In regard to this, how close should a mix be to "sounding done" before I "master" it? I'm finding that I can put parts down and mix a song, and it seems what gets me close to a finished product quickly is done when I put Ozone 3 on the stereo bus, maybe slightly adjust overall EQ, maximize the volume (I try not to squeeze it much at all), multiband, etc...I just wonder am I doing this backwards. Should I be tweaking the MIX instead of the end?

Donny

In some cases you can fix the mix, it just depends on how much time you have to spend on it. If the project needs to get done to meet a deadline then maybe not. That's when the main bus effects can fix the stuff you don't have time to fix. Low end problems are a good example. In some cases you may need to do some EQ or leveling on several tracks to fix a boomy low end. But that takes a bit of trial and error and in some cases the results are not much different then hitting it with a mulitband with just the low end active.

It's nice to be able to do a perfect mix when you have the time. With the mastering jobs I did in the past we couldn't do a remix. The multi-track was at the studio and it would cost big bucks to spend enough time in there to get it right and the customer just didn't have the money. But they could pay me a lot less to fix it in mastering.

There were also things I could fix that could not have been fixed in the mix at the time (the tape days). For example timing problems where I would make tiny cuts to tighten up a part or use SoundForge to fix pops and clicks caused by a bad DAT recording with errors. Fade ins and outs... even pitch shift bad notes in some cases. SoundForge could do that and this was long before autotune.

For example I had a jazz record where the only thing going on (that you could hear) was the solo horn. I was able to pitch shift one note and paste a good one over a bad one and use the pencil to fix the transition. Back in those days this was shock and awe... the customer didn't even know that sort of thing was possible. You could not tell where my edits were. To this day when I listen to the CD even I can't remember where they were. I really felt like a hero when the project was saved and the label released the CD.

So I guess in the right situation (going back to the subject of the post) when you don't have a good mix... yes mastering can still do wonders.

if someone is having an album worth of material readied for commercial release, the wise move would be to have it professionally mastered.

+++ to do otherwise would be foolish.

For those of us who post to soundclick and make one or two disks for friends.... Ozone3 and other polishers work fine.

I believe it depends on the audience and at what level you are trying to relaistically reach. As a rule so far - (being a relative nooby) - I believe that the sensibility and care that I put into my own mixes and "self-mastering" is well within the range of good stuff ! Not being a professional musician, my intended audience at this time is me; my family members; friends and co-workers, or any stranger walking by that will give a listen. So far on my "early release" CDs the responses have been: "Oh my God that sounds great; you did that at home!!!; that is you ! It sounds so professional.....etc, etc...". That works for me and is a good reinforcement after millions of hours of tweaking and downloading this or that VST for the right sound,, Not one person so far has commented: "Geez this sounds like you did not have your stuff done by a professional mastering engineer! - or "I can't believe you did not have that guitar track mastered in another way.

I believe that the sensibility and care that I put into my own mixes and "self-mastering" is well within the range of good stuff !

You can absolutely achieve great quality results at home with some decent software and good speakers. But I think the point is putting the product through another level of quality control. You don't need to pay $800 to get your disk mastered by a top tier mastering guru, but having a fresh set of "trained" ears scrutinize the mix can usually generate better results than one guy doing everything.

The thing is. If someone listens to something so much, the sound they hear becomes comfortable, and any change, even an improvement, can come as an unwelcome shock. People become proud of their work, even possessive, and it is best to put the project into someone else's hands to achieve results more consistent with competitor's products.

I recently had a project where I received a somewhat muffled recording of an orchestra to be mastered. I did the logical thing and corrected the right heavy stereo image, enhanced the presence and clarity of the orchestra with some careful EQ, reduced the muddy timpani, and brought the level up just so the highest peaks (in the loudest piece) reached full scale. The music director listened to it and said, "It sounds different from the original ("master" is what he said, but he meant the unmastered copy). ..and.. It is to loud (he didn't believe me when I said you just have to turn down the volume on the receiver, which was almost all the way up.)"

He was so used to listening to the raw version that he rejected any change. So basically what I gave him was a cropped version of the original slapped on a disk and asked the production guy not to put my name on it.

I call this the "2001 Syndrome" (coined from the movie 2001 A Space Odyssey where the director created is own temp music track and fell in love with it to the point where he threw out the score written specifically for the movie, which probably fit the action much better.)

Another examle - Do any of you guys listen to XM radio. ON some channels there are songs that sound terrible - both in the quality of the compositions and recordings - and I egotistically wonder to myself - How did these guys get on XM...!! Apparently on some of the stations - like The Loft - they play obscure, I guess new artists...and what engineering took place - no idea!

Got it ! and understand.