CD/Audio Mastering - Recording Studio Tips

Rule #1. There are no rules. Be creative. Create a major "Wow!" factor. Create something unique with a twist. Ask yourself, "What is different about our music?" Imagine the unimaginable and bring it into being.

Organize all your files, plug ins, folders, track groups, audio files, mix sessions, etc. Never break this rule!

Do a pre-mixdown clean-up session. Take time to erase all the throat-clearing, lip-clicking, guitar blips, the out-take solos, etc. You'll feel fresher at mix time, because you can concentrate on the creativity, not the housekeeping.

Common issue: When you add clarity to vocals with eq, the SS's jump out too much. I remember the first time I heard this as a young engineer and I thought, "How cool!" -- but these days it's not cool anymore! Natural sounding SS's are much better, and most software de-essing or multiband compressors take time and add to the stack of digital processing in the mix. Easy solution: use your volume automation (I prefer doing it manually with the line-with-dots -- fader riding isn't always fast enough to just duck those quick SS spots) to soften the SS's and SH's and sharp T's etc. This keeps the SS's natural sounding and reduces the need for an extra de-esser plug in. Sometimes less (processing) is more.

Key: Remember, your DAW is not a mixer. It's a big calculator. The more processing you do, the less coherency remains from the original source you recorded. The initial recording stage is so important to get that tone solid and meaty (better word clocking and A-D converters help a lot). Also check your volume automation (line-dots) and see if there are massive amounts of those dots that aren't really changing levels at certain points, but are just hovering... select-delete excess automation dots so the computer doesn't have to calculate and calculate tiny up-down-hover moves that may not be doing that much.

Be effective but not addicted. It's easy to go banana's with this.... you don't have to erase every speck of sound that isn't the exact part of each individual track. Take leakage for example (the bleed-through of a different instrument into any given track - like rhythm guitar leaking into drum overhead tracks). Leakage on different tracks can add dimension and fullness in some cases. In fact, some leakage gave a sense of acoustic space to many vintage recordings. However, if the leakage on one track is making other tracks sound tubby or blurring an image that you want more precise, then clean the track as needed - or reduce the level of the areas of "space" where the instrument isn't playing - this is a form of manual gating.

Since we started the Separation Mastering process (back in '05) we've had a lot of experience "seeing" into the inner workings of a lot of mixes. Most often the majority of enhancement we do is on drums and vocals. Over-processing tracks is a growing concern. So much advertising is spent on software products and A-List engineer's "favorite settings" and of course the favorite "Turn the knobs all the way up!!!" advice....... We submit to you that the lost art of "Less is more" should be a healthy balance in your bag of tricks!

Example: We often hear drums that have been overly compressed. This can create a cool sound, but often this cool sound works better in a mixdown than it does once it hits the mastering rig. Loud CD Mastering changes the dynamics of your mix. So if you've compressed a snare drum and the compressor's attack is slower (than a limiter, for instance) -- then the transient spike of that snare will be substantial, while the body of the snare will be reduced by the compression.

Thus you think you're getting a nice "pop" on that snare and a smooth sounding decay. Nice. Up till the point when we get it into the mastering rig, and in order to bring up your overall level, we have to (fast attack/ fast release) limit that initial transient of your snare. The more that transient comes down, the less we're retaining the sound you had, and it starts to extend or sustain the decay of that snare... thus making the snare start to sound more like it did in the studio, and less like it did in your mix. If we have more control over the drums by using Separation Mastering, we can work with this issue more so than if we only have a stereo mixdown.

Waveform Polarity

We're one of a few mastering studios who will work with Separations, and thus we are better able to "look under the hood" at the components of many mixes. We've seen a common mixing problem: the drums are OUT OF POLARITY in over 60% of home recording projects. This means that if you zoom in and look closely at the leading edge of a given drum (kic, toms, snare) -- the waveform goes down first instead of up first. Not good.

This means the speaker reproducing your sound is pulling first instead of pushing first. The initial excursion always goes up first. In nature, sound never pulls first. In the womb we hear 9 months of a heartbeat that is polarity correct. This means that if we hear a kic drum that is out-of-polarity, at some level, it is uncomfortable to us.

ALWAYS check to be sure that your digital recording system is giving you the correct polarity. This is different (but kinda sorta similar) than phase. ERK! Some plug ins may say "Invert Phase" -- when this is being done over the entire track, not just one side or one portion -- it's really inverting the polarity, not the phase. Read more and see images of polarity examples.

Distinction: Phase is relative to something else - polarity is "absolute" - which is just a fancy way of saying it only relates to itself. Sometimes these terms are used interchangeably. Yikes, whatta ya gonna do? Nobody's wrong... we spend too much time obsessing over "wrong" when the bottom line is using what works vs. what doesn't work. Reduces arguments and internet flame-throwing.

New! Since we've been in the "mindset" of mastering with Separations, we've developed better solutions even when we're given stereo mixes for mastering. There's much more that can be done now than before, and sometimes it's as simple as sending us a dry snare track along with your stereo mix.... when we encounter this issue. Frankly, we couldn't have predicted how much more "out of the box engineering" that we would now be putting into the mastering process in 2009! As the plug in's and computers have gotten better, we've gotten better in our basic engineering skill sets - all for your benefit.

Hitch: If you've newly arrived to the Digital Audio Workstation recording/ mixing world -- our solutions work wonders but time is needed to produce the outstanding results created by this process. Account for this possibility in your budget. We don't commonly use "one-button-fixes-all" engineering techniques, because every project/ sound is different. We come from 20 years of analog recording and mixing -- and there's a fundamental understanding of sound that comes from that experience. We remember how big and smooth the sound of analog tape was -- and we also totally dig what technology offers today! So... book time with us or keep reading...

Allow for more time than you think you need to mix. There's nothing worse than thinking it will take three hours to mix a song, and it ends up taking five hours. You're under pressure, the engineer's under pressure, and the studio's next client is pacing back and forth in the waiting room. Have extra money (if you're paying the studio) on hand, so that if you go over budget (always the case) you aren't sweating bullets.

Be conservative with stereo buss compression. If you use it, bypass it from time-to-time - match the volume with-and-without to be sure it's helping the whole sound. I recommend making master mix versions both with and without limiting/compression added level. I don't recommend using compression just for the purposes of getting your mixes louder on pre-mastered CDRs! Mastering is the best place to get more level. Overly compressed mixes box the mastering engineer into a corner, reduce the openness of the mix, and lower the number of enhancement options.

Don't be conservative with stereo buss compression. Wha???? Remember rule #1. There are no rules. You might get the coolest sound ever by turning the knobs all the way up. Your sound is your sound. Just don't think that compression is the magic bullet.

Be conservative with a "mastering processor" like a Finalizer or stereo "mastering" plug-ins. They can seem too good to be true. In fact, they can make your mix seem a little easier, but in the long run, lack the spark and vitality you could have with a little more work on the "insides" of the mix. Focus on getting the mix you want by using good processing on the individual tracks, even if you have to work a little harder to get it all nailed. Usually the extra energy pays off - just don't burn out from over-doing plug-in addiction!

Quick tip: It's not best, in our experience, to record your project at 44.1 even if it's going to end up as a 44.1 CD. 48k 24 bit sampling rate is definitely better. The higher the sampling rate, generally the smoother the sound. However you'll want to allow for the processing capabilities of your computer -- because 88.2 and 96 will make your computer and your plug ins work harder. Be sure that your stereo buss does not ever go into clipping (digital overs) when it is set at Unity Gain -0-. Even better: keep 2-3 dB of headroom in your stereo mixdowns! Once you know you're not making any digital overs, remove your master fader if possible - your mix will sound better!

A-B your mix with great sounding commercial CDs - Level-match and compare your mix to the other CD's and adjust according to what you hear over your monitor system! For every four hours of mixing, spend one hour within that time listening to your "competition." I know, it can be a stretch to listen to the best recordings in the world up next to yours. So what! Stretching makes us better engineers! A better sounding mix than yours is not an insult - it's an opportunity to improve your skills. Every reference CD you hear is another opportunity. Be sure to include older, more conservatively mastered CD's in your reference selection so you have a sense of more musically-based dynamics vs. the super-squashed levels of some newer albums.

The A-B technique helps you get your sonic "bearing" around balance, frequency spread, panning, vocal placement and more. Since commercial CDs have such different volume levels, you'll want to compare your mixes without it just being a volume contest. When you A/B - only play short segments of music - 10-20 seconds - and then switch over to the other reference.

If your mix doesn't impress you as much when you first A-B to a big-name album, don't rag on the engineer (or yourself)! Mixing is a process, and being diplomatic will save you time and increase the creative flow. Just say, "I like a lot of what we have now, and I'd like to get a little more of [fill in the blank]. I'd like to listen to these to get some ideas." Be sure to check out my page on commercial CD references, and see Studio Monitor Madness for more info about the actual speaker system and it's effects on mixing.

Quick Tip: Get a pair of Grado SR80 headphones (about $100) but special order the foam muff that comes with the SR60. This is important because the open-foam of the SR80 makes it sound too edgy and brittle, but the full-covered foam of the SR60 is just right. You can use a single hole puncher for paper and punch one small hole in the center of the SR60 muff if you want a tiny bit more high end to come though. I use the more expensive RS2 cans (I still prefer the SR60 muffs because it "sits" the phones closer in to your ears and increases the bass response) every day in the mastering studio and for the price of either of these headsets you'll get big insights into your mix.

Want a great in-ear headphone to go with your iPod? Get these from Mapleshade.

I recommend both of these headphones for gaining an additional perspective, but not for fully mixing all the time. They also reveal distortion very nicely.

If you're not sure about me giving you this A-B advice, listen to Tom-Lord Alge who says, "...it can help to put up records that you like, compare them whilst you're working and try to copy the sound. I've done that." Still not convinced? How about when I interviewed Stephen Marcussen in EQ Magazine/Pro Sound News and he said, "...just put in a commercial CD, see what it is you like about the CD and go for it." See the complete interview here. More info here on effective ways to A-B.

© Copyright 1998 - 2011 John Vestman