Mastering Myths and some cold hard facts Pt1

[Danny Danzi]

Ok, we've covered some of the major stuff that you need to do in this field with eq's, compressors, leveling, limiting, stereo field, DC offsets etc.

Now that you're all done, you want to send this stuff away to be duplicated. You can take your chances and send an audio or data disc, but it is also essential to add what we call a "PQ sheet". These sheets list all the information time wise as well as pauses and other information that you NEED to consider.

For example, here is a PQ sheet of my last album which I have just re-mastered for myself due to their being 2 different versions of this album that have 2 different songs. There is one for the US/Euro crowd with its own bonus track, and one for Japan with its own bonus track.

(Real quick, if any of you get a deal or licensing in Japan, it is mandatory that they get bonus tracks due to paying way more than we do for media. Because of this, I felt it was cool to give my US/Euro fans THEIR own bonus track so they'd not feel left out. So there are 2 different bonus tracks.)

I wanted to make my own version of the CD so I could listen to all tracks. Here is a copy of my PQ sheet and what every client that works with me gets at the end of their session. I will explain what it is you are seeing and what is "necessity".

The first thing you see is company information etc. Under "Project DanziLand" you will see some other information. UPC/EAN is a unique code given to you for this album for tracking purposes. This also helps for soundscan type things and helps to track sales etc. If you don't have a record deal, you don't need to input this information. It always comes in a 13 digit code and will need to be registered in order for it to have significance, so don't just make one up.

Moving down into the time boxes, we see titles and running times. All the way to the right you see an ISRC code which I have left blank.

*Taken from the ISRC site* What is an ISRC? The ISRC (International Standard Recording Code) is the international identification system for sound recordings and music video recordings. Each ISRC is a unique and permanent identifier for a specific recording, independent of the format on which it appears (CD, audio file, etc) or the rights holders involved. Only one ISRC should be issued to a track, and an ISRC can never represent more than one unique recording.

ISRCs are widely used in digital commerce by download sites and collecting societies. An ISRC can also be permanently encoded into a product as its digital fingerprint. Encoded ISRC provide the means to automatically identify recordings for royalty payments.**

An ISRC code comes in the format of country code, which for me would be US, then a unique series of letters given to you by the ISRC that allows you to have your publishing tracked. These numbers identify you with the recording as well. The remaning numbers in the code represent the year of the recording and then the specific text number per track. So for example...a proper ISRC code may look like this and you can have 99999 per year.

US_KEZ_09_00001

The 00001 would be your first song. So it's country code, your unique code, and then the song #. If you did a 10 song cd using the above code, it would look like this for that album.

US_KEZ_09_00001
US_KEZ_09_00002
US_KEZ_09_00003

And so on until US_KEZ_09_00010.

For your next album or other songs you put out that year, you would start with US_KEZ_09_00011 and so on. At the end of the year, you would start the numbers all over again and change the year so it would look like this now.

US_KEZ_10_00001

Anyone can get their own ISRC number by simply googling ISRC and they are free. For US users, usisrc.org is where you would go. Do not worry about this if you are not putting anything out that is for sale or being tracked for publishing. You will not need anything like this. But these are some of the things you need to consider if you are doing mastering and calling yourself a mastering engineer.

Next we see titles of my songs and track times in the pic as well as the second pic. You will notice on the songs DanziLand through Let It Go that there is a total track time for those songs with one pause at Let It Go. The reason for this is because DanziLand the song through to Just A Matter Of Time have no pauses. Those songs segue (pronounced seg-way meaning glued) together. Yet, there are still individiual times per song listed as well for them. The rest of the album has pauses, so this is why you will see "total" times per song for those. Anytime there is a pause, you get a total. If there is no pause, you will not get a total until there is a pause or the album finishes.

Though these first few songs may seem to run together from the way I am explaining them, they are indexed and ARE legitimate tracks on a CD player that you can skip to. However, the purpose of those songs being together are due to a mood I was trying to capture and in one of them, it simulates someone pulling the plug on a record player while the music is still playing....kinda like that dying out sound. This in turn goes down to a G eventually when it dies and the next song which is in G starts over top of it making a killer segue into the next song without interrupting the action.

Anyway, these correct timings are sent into a manufacturer's machine that will be doing your duplication. They love to see numbers as it makes their job way easier and this also promises you no write errors or miscalculations. I send 3 copies of the mastered material to manufacturers. An audio cd burned at 1x to prevent possible write errors, a data CD and a complete CD image. This insures you get what you paid for and everything is correct as it should be.

As you can see, there is much more that goes on behind the scenes. Especially in an entire album situation. Most of you guys master for one song etc and kinda just do what you need to do and move on. However, this is the stuff you will seriously need to consider if you get serious with this stuff. On the second pic at the end, you see total CD run times etc so you always know what you are up against. Hope this helps.

[TonyB]

DD,

I'm familiar with the mastering of compilations (i.e., CDs), but I'm finding the need to have single songs mastered (i.e., thank digital downloading for that....iTunes, mp3, CDBaby, etc).

I see more and more mastering houses offering single-song rates, and in fact, that's about all I do nowadays when I send material out of mastering.

Most of my clients who do an entire CD in my studio are happy with my in-house mastering process (personally, I'd rather send the CD out to an ME myself, but it's there call; I can do a decent enough job to pull it off for the client). Obviously, cost is a factor for the clients and are happy with the quality-vs-cost tradeoff.

However, most of the time I;ve been having clients recording a song or two or three at a time, not for a CD, but for digital downloading. No problem. They don't mind paying the $75 to $100 extra to have an independent ME master the song.

What are your thoughts on this? I do use an independent ME on all of those songs that will be for sale digitally as well as played on the radio. I have a few songs in radio rotation in the local area. I would never have them played on-air if I self-mastered them.

[Danny Danzi]

Originally Posted by TonyB

DD,

I'm familiar with the mastering of compilations (i.e., CDs), but I'm finding the need to have single songs mastered (i.e., thank digital downloading for that....iTunes, mp3, CDBaby, etc).

I see more and more mastering houses offering single-song rates, and in fact, that's about all I do nowadays when I send material out of mastering.

Most of my clients who do an entire CD in my studio are happy with my in-house mastering process (personally, I'd rather send the CD out to an ME myself, but it's there call; I can do a decent enough job to pull it off for the client). Obviously, cost is a factor for the clients and are happy with the quality-vs-cost tradeoff.

However, most of the time I;ve been having clients recording a song or two or three at a time, not for a CD, but for digital downloading. No problem. They don't mind paying the $75 to $100 extra to have an independent ME master the song.

What are your thoughts on this? I do use an independent ME on all of those songs that will be for sale digitally as well as played on the radio. I have a few songs in radio rotation in the local area. I would never have them played on-air if I self-mastered them.

Same here for me TB...I do the singles quite a lot myself these days due to the digital download thing. In this day and age, cost is what matters most to people over quality. As much as it pains me to say that, it's quite meritable because it can be pricey just on the guy you choose to do your mastering as well as how much studio costs can be.

For example, a guy like Bob Katz would charge double what I charge, but in my opinion, I do the same thing if not more thorough because I'm the most anal human being on the planet. LOL! Bob is great I'm not saying I'm better than he is, but there are things he's had to fix for me in the past that would have NEVER gotten by me as the mastering engineer. Sure we're all human and can make mistakes or over-look a few things, but there are some things that you just don't miss because they are fundamentals. Like for example, as a recording engineer, you know to crossfade your punches and remove dead space in the beginning of clips and in the ends. You just know this and do it automatically without thinking about it or asking yourself "hmm, did I crossfade that punch" or without going over every single punch while solo'd to check for clicks or little pops.

Bob missed a few things like specific fade times, fade times too short and cut off, no crossfade at all into a segue....he fixed it all free of charge but my point is, those things are no-brainers that should not be missed. I've never missed one in all my years of doing this. Not a single click or pop gets by me...not a single 60 cycle hum due to guitars left wide open or CRT hum buzz...if I can hear it and there is a way for me to remove it or mask it, it's gone. I usually catch this stuff before we master the material and the client sends me a test mix. I tell them to try and remove it, but I also test to see if I can in case they can't.

That said, for little things I put out, there's no reason for me to pay Bob. But for an album, by all means I might go to him once again. I've come a long way though since he mastered my album in 2004. So I very well may take the chance myself. The only thing that would make me consider him is if I was so biased that my test masters were receiving some negative feedback from the people I'd be sending some preview stuff to.

I think what you are doing for clients is fine for DD's and even albums. But for something like a worldwide release or something for radio or TV, it's better to let someone that excels in that field make the right calls unless you yourself have that experience and can do the job with great results. It all depends on what the client's goals are or how important the release is as well as where it will end up. See it puts you in a bad spot too because you have listened to the mixes 1000 times while mixing. Most guys have one set of monitors...how do you even know what to fix once you click on that export button out of your DAW? See what I mean? That's the tricky part.

Hey, if you ever need an extra ME, you know where to find me. Give me the work, I'll cut you a killer deal you won't be able to refuse. I give studio's that give me work as well as people that become friends 50% off as a "thank you" for the work. So you got me in your back pocket if you ever need anything man.

[TonyB]

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

For example, a guy like Bob Katz would charge double what I charge, but in my opinion, I do the same thing if not more thorough because I'm the most anal human being on the planet. LOL! Bob is great I'm not saying I'm better than he is, but there are things he's had to fix for me in the past that would have NEVER gotten by me as the mastering engineer.

Yeah, but I'd pay extra to have Bob Katz credited for mastering some of my mixes. They'd have to be special projects. (i.e., not the run-of-the-mill neighbor garageband.) But you're right, having Bob Katz credited on my own project would get alot of "cool factor / credibility" points, but does not necessarily mean I got the best mastering product.

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

"hmm, did I crossfade that punch"

I fall victim to that in my rush to "get the song outda door!"

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

Bob missed a few things like specific fade times, fade times too short and cut off, no crossfade at all into a segue....he fixed it all free of charge but my point is, those things are no-brainers that should not be missed. I've never missed one in all my years of doing this. Not a single click or pop gets by me...not a single 60 cycle hum due to guitars left wide open or CRT hum buzz...if I can hear it and there is a way for me to remove it or mask it, it's gone. I usually catch this stuff before we master the material and the client sends me a test mix. I tell them to try and remove it, but I also test to see if I can in case they can't.

This is why I take it to an independent ME. The ME has the outboard gear and room specifically designed for mastering work....plus a set of "objective" ears vs "subjective, tired, fatigued, too much in the forest" ears.

I don't have the equipment to catch those snap, crack, pops, hums, etc.

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

It all depends on what the client's goals are or how important the release is as well as where it will end up.

Yeah, agree. Many of the local clients I get don't have high expectations and just get a thrill hearing their song on MySpace (warts and all).
They could barely afford to pay the cost for studio time.

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

See it puts you in a bad spot too because you have listened to the mixes 1000 times while mixing. Most guys have one set of monitors...how do you even know what to fix once you click on that export button out of your DAW? See what I mean? That's the tricky part.

Yeah, I have two sets of monitors, a boombox, two regular stereos, and an mp3 player. But....even so....my ears are too accustomed to the entire mixing process that they just went through.

As you are aware, you'll put a mix down for a couple of days, come back to it, and think to yourself (or scream out loud)..."what the hell was I thinking?" (all because you're ears have had a chance to recover and now you're standing outside the forest and have a broader (hopefully more objective) perspective). (and can you loan me more parantheses)

Chuck Ainlay says that all the time!

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

Hey, if you ever need an extra ME, you know where to find me. Give me the work, I'll cut you a killer deal you won't be able to refuse. I give studio's that give me work as well as people that become friends 50% off as a "thank you" for the work. So you got me in your back pocket if you ever need anything man.

Will do!

[Danny Danzi]

Originally Posted by TonyB

Yeah, but I'd pay extra to have Bob Katz credited for mastering some of my mixes. They'd have to be special projects. (i.e., not the run-of-the-mill neighbor garageband.) But you're right, having Bob Katz credited on my own project would get alot of "cool factor / credibility" points, but does not necessarily mean I got the best mastering product.

Yeah, it's definitely nice to have a grammy dude on your album, that's for sure. But see, the thing about that was, we did such a killer job on the mix, the mastering process for our particular album was more the basic stuff. He didn't have to perform any surgery because we sent him previews asking him his thoughts...so we had everything primo before it even went to him based on his comments. It's funny, I did a test master myself before I sent it to Bob. I made up my mind not to listen to it until I got Bob's back.

When it got back here and I compared, I was quite proud of myself. The only differences I noticed were mine was a little louder, and Bobs was a bit more stereo spaced. He felt the need to spread things a bit more...which in my opinion didn't hurt or help the mix. All subjective really. But our eq curves were VERY similar...and at the time in 2004, I considered myself fair at this, but nowhere near where I am now. The one I just did that I supplied the PQ sheet for....Bob Ludwig would be proud of me. LOL!

Originally Posted by TonyB

I fall victim to that in my rush to "get the song outda door!"

I take care of them as soon as I do the punches so I never miss one. Weird thing with me T, I got such weird hearing I can literally hear little clicks come through while the entire tune is playing that will make me check a CF to make sure it's been dealt with. Sometimes you may need to slip edit a bit more than normal. I remember the last time I got my hearing tested, the lady looked at me and said "you so did not hear that...put that finger down, dogs hear that not humans!" LMAO!! I said "Maam, you don't know who you're dealing with here. You can mute a TV's sound and I can walk in with my eyes closed and tell you whether it's on or not because I can hear the freakin' tube in the TV sending out that high pitched EEEEEEE!" Hahahaha!

Originally Posted by TonyB

This is why I take it to an independent ME. The ME has the outboard gear and room specifically designed for mastering work....plus a set of "objective" ears vs "subjective, tired, fatigued, too much in the forest" ears.

You're doing everything the right way in my opinion. If you have a client that asks you to do it, I'm sure you're capable of it just by the way you talk man.

Originally Posted by TonyB

I don't have the equipment to catch those snap, crack, pops, hums, etc.

That's the thing...most times your pricey monitors may not even catch it. At the end of every mastering session, I listen through a set of AKG K 240 DF's to make sure everything is nice and tight and there are no pops, clicks or bad fades or cross fades etc. After that, I do another test at all marker points where specific tasks were done using a set of closed end Sennheiser HD-280 pro's. Nothing gets by them...you can't hear yourself think or talk when they are squeazing the living crap out of your brain. LOL!!

Originally Posted by TonyB

Yeah, agree. Many of the local clients I get don't have high expectations and just get a thrill hearing their song on MySpace (warts and all).
They could barely afford to pay the cost for studio time.

Totally agree there. For stuff like that, you Sir, are a Godsend to them.

Originally Posted by TonyB

Yeah, I have two sets of monitors, a boombox, two regular stereos, and an mp3 player. But....even so....my ears are too accustomed to the entire mixing process that they just went through.

You said the magic words there T. "My ears are too accustomed" etc. This is very difficult to get out of for any engineer, myself included. I have quite a few sets of monitors here. Each are room tuned with a plugin from IKMultimedia called ARC. I can mix or master on any of them because of this killer little plug and make the right calls. Whatever speakers I do the mix on, I make sure I don't master using the same.

I'll reference them from time to time, but I won't make any calls or changed based on what they tell me. For the most part, (if you've heard my little Dream Theater example in the bash this part of the site) I usually mix on Adam A-7's and master on room tuned NS-10's with a sub....or vice versa. Or I have a set of Tannoy that rock pretty hard and then 3 sets of consumer type monitors I use as well and a set of Tascam speakers that look like car speakers.

The Adam rig and the NS 10 rig are sent into a Samson C Control and all the others all have independent power amps and are sent out via soundcard outputs. So all I have to do to jump into another realm is change an output driver or press a button. Even my Realtek soundcard is used as I can just send right to it out of the project to listen in a pc consumer environment as well.

Originally Posted by TonyB

As you are aware, you'll put a mix down for a couple of days, come back to it, and think to yourself (or scream out loud)..."what the hell was I thinking?" (all because you're ears have had a chance to recover and now you're standing outside the forest and have a broader (hopefully more objective) perspective). (and can you loan me more parantheses)

Chuck Ainlay says that all the time!

Yeah I know that feeling all too well....errr I used to. For the most part these days, that little ARC plugin has stopped all that mix mayhem for me man. I'm usually perfectly ok with all eq settings and effects. When I fix something, it's usually a level that needs to come up or down. I'll take fixes like that over eq issues that made me take a week or longer on a mix anyday!

[TonyB]

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

Yeah, it's definitely nice to have a grammy dude on your album, that's for sure. But see, the thing about that was, we did such a killer job on the mix, the mastering process for our particular album was more the basic stuff. He didn't have to perform any surgery because we sent him previews asking him his thoughts...so we had everything primo before it even went to him based on his comments. It's funny, I did a test master myself before I sent it to Bob. I made up my mind not to listen to it until I got Bob's back.

When it got back here and I compared, I was quite proud of myself. The only differences I noticed were mine was a little louder, and Bobs was a bit more stereo spaced. He felt the need to spread things a bit more...which in my opinion didn't hurt or help the mix. All subjective really. But our eq curves were VERY similar...and at the time in 2004, I considered myself fair at this, but nowhere near where I am now. The one I just did that I supplied the PQ sheet for....Bob Ludwig would be proud of me. LOL!

This little ditty should be posted on everyone's CR wall!

It's always good to hear from the ME: "I didn't have to do a thing to it!" or "Just needed a little shine, that's all!"

You're right: Is it worth the extra money just to hear Bob Katz tell you that!

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

I take care of them as soon as I do the punches so I never miss one.

Yeah, that's called "discipline" and I need to do that more. I fall victim to: "That's a trivial fix. I'll come back to it later." Guess what? It ends up going to the ME. Ugh! Embarrassing!

I got both the AKG K 240's and Sennheiser HD-280's. However, I only used them for tracking. I've been using the Sony 7506 for mixing. I'm going to try the 240 and 280.

Thanks for the good discussion on the life and times of mastering! It was helpful.

[Danny Danzi]

Originally Posted by TonyB

I got both the AKG K 240's and Sennheiser HD-280's. However, I only used them for tracking. I've been using the Sony 7506 for mixing. I'm going to try the 240 and 280.

Thanks for the good discussion on the life and times of mastering! It was helpful.

Ah right on...I'd go with the 240's over the Sony's. I have them too...they seem (to me at least) to accentuate too much low end. I use them for drummers because they are soo darned loud. The 240's seem to be exactly what I hear in my monitors to be honest minus the extra bass I get with the sub due to my room characteristics. The HD 280's, great for tracking and disecting a mix listening for artifacts etc. Before I got the stuff I have now, I mixed through the 240's religiously. I did a decent job, but always panned things a bit too much because they sounded so cool in cans, ya know? I had just ns-10's with no correction or anything....and man, even when I got something to sound good through them, it still sounded like ass everywhere else. LOL!! Now that they are tuned and have the sub to help them out, I love them. But they sure didn't get much use other than tracking for the first 15 years I've had them.

Yeah try those 240's T, I think you'll be impressed. If I had to pick a set of cans to mix through, those would be the one's I'd do it with. Just watch your low end. As soon as they start to rattle, you're using too much low. Yeah, thank you for the chat too...been fun on this end as well as informative hearing your side. Take care...hope to talk soon in another thread or something.

[Svencanz]

Hey Danny,

This little thing probably fits under this heading?

Audio mid/side encoder/decoder plugin - MSED - Voxengo

Where do I actually "connect it" in Cubase?
At the moment I only use the standard stereo buss, run all my tracks to that. I suspect with a "spacer" thing like this I might have to get into having more busses, or something?

Cheers,
Sven

[Danny Danzi]

Hi Sven,

I believe it would, but I'm not familiar with this plug at all. I downloaded it and will check it out and get back to you on this one.

[edub357]

great post danny d very helpful! keep them coming. whens pt2 dropping?