Mastering - The Final Frontier

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Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Mon Sep 17, 2012 4:10 pm

So I attended my very first mastering session last week for a project I'm producing and have been working on for a while now. I've sent projects to J at Archive Mastering before, but this was the first time I've attended a session. I wanted to go down with Andrew at first but he was kidnapped by his wife and forced (presumably at gun point) to go to Greece. So I brought Nick with me instead. He was on the fence about getting his album professionally mastered, so it seemed liek I good idea to show him what all went into it.

First of all, I love the location. So much that I'm seriously considering moving Fluid to the woods somewhere because of it. Secondly, I was super nervous that morning going in. I have a lot invested in this album personally so it was important that it didn't completely suck balls. I was very worried that I was going to show up and not recognize my own mixes in a properly treated room. I had prepared as much as I could and I even got Andrew to have a final listen and made some tweaks based on his recommendation. But I was still nervous.

I showed up about 4 minutes late (got lost) and we introduced ourselves while he uploaded the tracks into his rig. I brought 44.1/24 wav files with me on a thumb drive and he loaded them into his computer which took just a few minutes. The mastering suite itself was under construction. Although it was sonically accurate, he was in the middle of renovating and he was about to start painting.

First step was to listen to all the songs in order to get an idea of what we were dealing with. This is the part that I figured was going to hurt a little. But he starts playing back the first track, and lo and behold, it didn't collapse on itself. It took the better part of 20 minutes to get through the whole album since he was able to skip forward through the songs when he got the gist of how they were comprised sonically. After we finished the initial listen of all the songs, he asked me if I had any general comments to make before we get started. I told him that although I wanted the album to be somewhat competitive in comparison to other releases of this day and age, I didn't want to sacrifice dynamic range completely to that end. He was in agreement with my thoughts on the direction and then we were off.

So, by 10:40am we were already into the opening track of the album. I let him work through the first song without saying a word. He said that if I have anything to say at any point just to let him know but I'd hate mixing a project like that, so I did what I would want my clients to do: Wait until he's ready to present the master before offering my opinions. He finished he pass and I listened to it. I liked what I heard but I couldn't hear any reduction of dynamic range whatsoever so I questioned he on it. He admitted that he didn't do any compression on this track, because he wanted to see how I liked it without any to start with. I then told him that I was expecting compression on many of the mixes since I mixed them fairly dynamic to begin with. However that compression was not a means to get louder necessarily, I wanted the mixes to be less dynamic and I wanted it done at this point in the process instead of at the mix stage. He was in agreement with my reasoning and he did another pass. This time he nailed it. Really floored me actually.

By shortly after 12:00pm we were halfway through the album but we needed to take an ear/brain break. He gave us a tour of the studio while we chatted. He actually can do tracking there, he has a 24 track 2" machine and a small live room, with a dead room to go with it. He mostly used that to track his own band. Technically this was our lunch break but Nick and I didn't actually eat anything.

By around 1:30pm we kept going to finish the last half of the album. Things were going well until some random guy showed up and we took a break for about 5 minutes. Turns out that random guy was Joel Plaskett. I didn't realize this until after he had left. He asked me what we band we were working on, and I told him it was a singer/songwriter that I was producing from saint John, NB. I told him it was my first time at an attended session and he "It's pretty great here eh?" to which I agreed. He left after dropping off a 1/2" reel to be mastered and wished us well with our project. I wished him well with his project also and that was that. After he left Nick asked J if that was in fact Joel Plaskett, and J said that indeed it was. (That reminds me, I need to send him a copy of the CD when it's released.)

By around 4:00pm we were dealing with the spacing between songs and the fades. I really enjoyed this process, and I'm glad I was here for that because it's way easier to deal with it right there. It was done pretty quickly and then we waited while the whole thing was being processed to be ready to print.

I took the opportunity to do a little post mortem with him, to discuss any common issues he was detecting with the songs that might offer so insight into monitoring issues. I was surprised to hear that there were no consistent issues in terms of the frequency spectrum throughout the album. He was especially surprised given that the low end is usually hard to get right (especially in an untreated room like ours.) He did say that in some of the songs there was a bit too much 500-700Hz in the electric guitars that he had to tame but that we were talking 1-1.5dB so nothing to substantial.

Overall I had a really great experience and Nick is no longer on the fence about shelling out the bucks to get his album professionally mastered. I will never go anywhere else to master my projects. J is really the kind of guy I want taking care of the last stage of the production. He gets it.

We went for Chinese after the session then we met up with Jon Goud who introduced us to Laser Tag.

On the highway we get settled in, engaged the cruise control and popped in the reference CD. The difference was immediately noticeable, I'd say even more so than it was in the mastering suite itself. Likely since I was really used to hearing these songs in my car. It's really hard to fully explain what he did. There's some crazy audio voodoo magic that I don't fully understand at work. It's not EQing and compression.

I was very happy with my mixes, but I was excited about the mastered mixes. That's the best way I can explain it.
"Volume automation takes time. You don't got that kinda time. You could be getting naked with somebody somewhere." -Slipperman

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Thu Sep 20, 2012 12:08 am

Great post. It really is such a great learning experience. I knew you'd love it.

Can't wait to hear the end product.
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It just fills Forum pages..." --compasspnt

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Sat Sep 22, 2012 3:52 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:On the highway we get settled in, engaged the cruise control and popped in the reference CD. The difference was immediately noticeable, I'd say even more so than it was in the mastering suite itself. Likely since I was really used to hearing these songs in my car. It's really hard to fully explain what he did. There's some crazy audio voodoo magic that I don't fully understand at work. It's not EQing and compression.

I was very happy with my mixes, but I was excited about the mastered mixes. That's the best way I can explain it.
I find the biggest thing for me, along the lines of what you are describing, is that the mixes translate from place to place much better after being tweaked. Taking what sounded good to you in your CR, and make it sound more like that everywhere else. I also agree with being "excited" by the results. I've said many times, it just sounds more like a proper "album" to me and less like something unfinished.

...and I totally know what you mean by "voodoo". There's stuff going on in J's process that is just adding so much to the final quality of the master. It's the stuff that's impossible to explain to others... You just have to experience it.

I meant to ask... Why 44.1 mixdown? Is that the rate you're tracking at these days?
"Once again, it is NEVER the gear that makes a good record.
It just fills Forum pages..." --compasspnt

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Sat Sep 22, 2012 4:18 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:
I meant to ask... Why 44.1 mixdown? Is that the rate you're tracking at these days?


I've always tracked to 44.1/24 and I will continue to until I can actually tell the difference between that and 88.2 or 96.
"Volume automation takes time. You don't got that kinda time. You could be getting naked with somebody somewhere." -Slipperman

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Sat Sep 22, 2012 4:29 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Malcolm Boyce wrote:
I meant to ask... Why 44.1 mixdown? Is that the rate you're tracking at these days?


I've always tracked to 44.1/24 and I will continue to until I can actually tell the difference between that and 88.2 or 96.
Cool. Just curious. Most people are surprised to hear how many people track at 44.1 or 48, and have little intention of changing that anytime soon.

I guess I forgot you mentioning that before, but now it rings a bell. I for some reason thought you were a 48K guy like me. :-D
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It just fills Forum pages..." --compasspnt

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Sat Sep 22, 2012 4:57 pm

I might make the jump to 96k next year and try a whole project like that. Maybe I can now hear a difference but it might take really working with it to tell if I am really gaining anything. A/B testing this kind of thing is probably not the way I will be able to tell. I mean I doubt anyone will hear my mixes and go... "dude it would sound way more moist pro at 48/88.2/96".

Kinda like the whole analog summing thing.... the difference is probably going to be mostly felt in the work flow.
"Volume automation takes time. You don't got that kinda time. You could be getting naked with somebody somewhere." -Slipperman

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Sat Sep 22, 2012 5:14 pm

I always think it's important to only be changing one variable at a time when trying to make a serious evaluation like that. I hear too many people commenting on sample rate choice, not taking into account that they are using entirely different systems and other massive variables that probably affect the sonics far greater.

I'm not saying I don't believe in higher sample rates. Just that in my system, I don't hear a difference for the better when I go there. I do use 96K whenever it's possible live, simply based on the lower latency, and I certainly don't hear any degradation any time I've tried the comparison. Sometimes for practical reasons, it's 48K, but that's a whole other scenario.
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It just fills Forum pages..." --compasspnt

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Sat Sep 22, 2012 5:20 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:I always think it's important to only be changing one variable at a time when trying to make a serious evaluation like that. I hear too many people commenting on sample rate choice, not taking into account that they are using entirely different systems and other massive variables that probably affect the sonics far greater.

I'm not saying I don't believe in higher sample rates. Just that in my system, I don't hear a difference for the better when I go there. I do use 96K whenever it's possible live, simply based on the lower latency, and I certainly don't hear any degradation any time I've tried the comparison. Sometimes for practical reasons, it's 48K, but that's a whole other scenario.



Agreed. I like changing one thing at a time, for exactly that reason. That's why I'm not constantly trying to "upgrade". I was talking to a guy in the shop a few nights ago that thought it was interesting that I was "still on Pro Tools 9". I asked, "Why, is it broken or something?"
"Volume automation takes time. You don't got that kinda time. You could be getting naked with somebody somewhere." -Slipperman

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Re: Mastering - The Final Frontier

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Sat Sep 22, 2012 6:44 pm

Still on Sonar 7PE here. Same thing.... Does what I need. Way behind the times though... :oops:
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