Hey all. I am a bandless, studioless, fake drum using nobody and I would like it if we had good long discussion about mastering.

How important is it, really?

Why do you have to send your music "off to the mastering guy"--why can't you just do it yourself?

Is it magic? Is it just listening with an experienced ear and tweaking things a tiny bit if they're already pretty good?

I record in Reaper and do everything myself, including the programming of drum tracks by hand, basically. Tedious and not as good as having a real drummer chained up in my basement but way better than some other options.

I take care to pan, EQ, and adjust the levels of all my tracks so that the final mix sounds what I would call good. I have JBL monitors and sub. I don't mix with headphones. But I always wonder what I'm missing out on if I had filled out the appropriate forms, recited the appropriate incantations, and sent it off to The Mastering Guy. Would the track I received back sound magically, profoundly different? Would I even care? I mean I'm happy listening to surf music recorded in garages in 1962, converted to digital, uploaded to youtube, reconverted to mp3, and downloaded onto my hard drive...

Can anyone share their experience with this? Like, it'd be awesome to have a "before mastering" and "after mastering" track to compare along with any commentary, for instance. But even without that hard evidence, this is the place to cover any and all aspects of this subject. Pretty please.
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p.s. Here's a pic of a shirt I designed to help us get in the mood. What mood that is depends on where you look, I suppose.

I do it myself with AI mastering plugin. People say it sounds nice and I also like the result. I had different experiences with “mastering guys” before, from good to negatIve, and like it now better) When I want to tweak master mix a little with hands I use Grand Finale software but that happens not often. I was learning by videos for a year a so, but I had some time and inspiration.

BUT! If you have a possibility to work with a really good specialist who also understands the genre - do it! It’s not a rocket science but demands knowledge, experience, and a really good ear.

Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine

https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki

Lost Diver

https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin

Last edited: Dec 14, 2023 01:22:07

For best results, this process should be performed for each release medium. This is where a professional might be required - the output for pressing to CD will be different from the output for pressing to vinyl (or release to streaming.)

Jonathan the Reverbivore

The Reverbivores

Please check out our latest album The Reverbivores Watch TV!

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Mastering not only helps to make loudness levels more consistent, it also helps to sonically glue the project together. It is a chance to EQ, compress, limit the mixed stereo track, check for any audio errors, and as a result produce a more “professional” sounding recording. The mastering process will also prepare the final files for duplication on many formats. I will often use Ozone to master our more informal/digital only recordings and hire someone to master our releases that also come out on physical media.

Canadian Surf

http://www.urbansurfkings.com/

peanutswilson wrote:

Something I've noticed on recordings that haven't been mastered is they can sound like different mixes on different stereo systems/speakers. Things can either jump out or be buried in the mix. Can anyone answer if this is down to lack of mastering? or is it just bad mixing?

JMO, but I’d say that was a bad mix. Last summer, I recorded a song I wrote, more as just an exercise in arranging. Because of this, I mixed it through headphones, where it sounded fine. I had a copy on my spartphone and played it through a car stereo, via Bluetooth, and the mix sounded much different. Now, I do not claim this to be a good mix, but instead a very slapdash job, but it was interesting. Strangely, if I play it through my home stereo, it sounds great.

The artist formerly known as: Synchro

When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.

Samurai wrote:

peanutswilson wrote:

Something I've noticed on recordings that haven't been mastered is they can sound like different mixes on different stereo systems/speakers. Things can either jump out or be buried in the mix. Can anyone answer if this is down to lack of mastering? or is it just bad mixing?

Anyway it will sound different on different sources but it should sound more or less good on all of them. But I find it pretty impossible to make it sound good everywhere, so my main references are my portable bluetooth speaker, my sport headphones and my car audio, as I think that’s where most people will listen to it.

That’s entirely true. Back in the ‘60s, at least some producers, devised ways to hear a new recording over an AM car radio, as sort of a final test, because they knew that was where there audience would be most likely to hear it.

The artist formerly known as: Synchro

When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.