I know before just a few months ago, when I would try to master a track...I would attempt to enhance the track, nearly upgrade my mix in the mastering stage...but it was a game failing diminishes. I would throw everything I had at the master; I'd use multi band compression, exciters, reverb, saturation, clipping, expanders...now I may be exaggerating a bit...I probably didn't use ALL of those processes on everything, but the point is I would try more than I should.
These days, my chain is as follows...
Character EQ
Passive EQ
Single-Band Compressor
Brickwall Limiter
(sometimes I'll clip my converters, but not always)
But today I won't be talking about processing. I won't even talk about touching the track. Because the area I think many people mess up in mastering is much more fundamental then what and how do you EQ...
I want to be upfront. I haven't been mastering for very long at all. But I have recently had the chance to learn from some guys with some 'grey hair' who've been doing this job for a bit. I'll share a few of the things I learned from those experiences, but as you know with mastering (more so then mixing), there are trade secrets and even house secrets. There are many engineers who have special processes, gear, techniques that they use to produce their masters...so as such...I'll be keeping the information here vague and we won't get into anything too particular.
You need to be able to spot a fake. When Federal Agents are trained to spot counterfeit currency they ARE NOT trained with counterfeit money. No, instead they learn to handle the genuine article. They learn the feel of it, the weight, how it folds, how it reacts to water. Point is if they learn the real thing inside and out, its easy to spot a fake.
I was taught the same for mastering. You need to have excellent references. You need to take time to find these. Be deliberate on the ones you choose, because your references are conditioning your ears to how a record should sound. Be intentional on what you put in your ears. Take your time to find songs that are excellent from start to finish, from production, to tracking, to the mix and the master. Find what your gold standard is. Then when you have quite a few in many different genres, or at least the ones you work within...it's time to listen!
You need to listen very critically to your references. You need to know what a great mix sounds like and how it translates. Listen to how wide different genres choose to be. What goes where? Learn what a great bass/kick blend sounds and feels like. How does it move your speakers? If you walk out into your hall, how does it translate then? How bright is good and how bright is too much? Find some tracks with a loud vocal, some where the vocal is nearly buried, where guitars are bright and in your face, ones with great powerful low-end, maybe some hip-hop with very little low-end, pop songs where the mids are forward, some 'smiley face' frequency blends, a dark sounding master, one that's on the edge of too bright, really wide tracks, narrow ones, songs with loud RMS and ones with quiet ones. These are just a few examples of questions you should be asking yourself and things to look for in your references.
After you feel like you've listened to your tracks enough, take a break for your ears to rest and then listen some more. Your success in knowing what something needs and what it doesn't need is based on how well you know your "gold standard". If you're prone to do car tests, listen to your references in the car. If you're going on a trip...listen to your references. Play them back so much you get bored of them and you can describe in detail how much they move your speakers and what the frequency blend is like.
If you do this religiously...it will become second nature when mastering a track how much something needs or when it's good to go.
I have a fat stack of references and I paid as much for them as I have some of my more expensive hardware gear. You have to invest into your craft. I'll warn you, this isn't going to be cheap. Look to spend about $20-$25 per album. I personally recommend HD Tracks for full quality lossless audio. I've been very pleased with my experiences with them and I'd wholeheartedly recommend them for audiophile music.
Now, for those of you who've made it this far...I'm sure you want to know what some of my references are. But I'm not going to tell you. Not because I'm some secretive jerk who doesn't want to share 'the cookies with the other kids', but because it would actually be a disservice to you. Part of the journey and fun is rummaging through a bunch of music and having to make up your own mind on what 'good' is. Having to do the homework yourself will make you much better. This is something I learned from a conversation I had with a great mastering engineer, Brian Lucey. Forming your own opinions is how you develop your own color and style within your work.
But if you never know how to 'define the fence' then you'll never know when you've gone too far or where the lines are to color in.
I know that's not the sexiest topic for mastering. But the truth is it's the unattractive stuff...the simple things that have value. If you get this right, so many other things will fall into place.
Many of you will be turned off by the time commitment it's going to take (because it's going to take a really long time just to find your references). And others of you will probably never do this and continue doing what you already do. But those of you who follow through with this advice to the letter...I promise...maybe not next month or the one after that...but with time....you'll see an improvement in your work and this art of mastering will be less mysterious to you as well.
be kind+make good music
