Tricky mastering question

[Benshik]

Hey guys,
Here's a tricky mastering "challenge" i'm trying to resolve, and i was wondering if anyone here could give me any tips:

I've got a song with soft verses and hard choruses. Special huh?
And it seems i cant find the perfect compressor settings. When the verses sound full and good, the chorus sounds too pumpy and overcompressed, when the chorus sound good, the verses are too dull. Im using Ozone. What would be the best thing to do?

a- In live, automate the gains, ratio, etc settings of the ozone compressor?
b- Master with two ozone instances - one for chorus and one for verses - and inside a rack jump from one to another. Wow this could lead to weird results...
c- Render 2 audio tracks. One with chorus, one with verses. Master from 2 tracks instead of one (could be problems with tails on some effects though) Are there engineers doing this btw?
d- Keeping it simple ang keep on finetuning compressor settings, there must be a way to make it sound right
e- ?

What do you guys think?
Well thanx a lot

Ben

[leedsquietman]

1. Use 2 compressors (one for the softer part, one for the harder part) and automate them.

2. Use some kind of parallel compression set up so the first one addresses the subtle part and a second compressor to address the faster attacks.

3. Ride the volume faders MANUALLY / automate volume (don't use compression).

Don't overcompress - the loss of transients is a cause of 'dullness'. Also make sure you play with the attack and release times so you don't get the pumping artifacts, sometimes lengthening the release time can help. If there are auto release settings, try them first and if that doesn't work then adjust manually until you get in the zone.

Mastering is typically one stereo mixdown, but you can mixdown with more than one track, or indeed with several stems, but it would cost more money as more time and effort is required.

What compressors do you own ? I'm not personally a big fan of the Ozone compressor.

[leedsquietman]

Use Multiband compression with care. Very easily misused/abused, especially among novice users.

It is possibly another option, but unless there are very distinct frequency range differences in the louder and softer parts of the music, I would say it is behind options 1 and 2 in my list.

[Tone Deft]

No offense but this is definitely not a good idea... imho

And why not? Please elaborate.

the multiband dynamics plug in is for applying different compression/expansion to different frequency ranges. the OP needs to apply different compression settings for different parts of his track, not different frequencies.

he could use the multiband twice, the same way people are suggesting he use a standard compressor but it seems like he wants to affect all frequencies the same.

[Tarekith]

#2 - Probably the cleanest option, but it's all academic without some audio to listen to.

[tw1nstates]

I am amazed that no-one has said that he shoud re mix it.

If it's such hard work to get it to gell together then re-mix the sucker.

Best advice I have heard is if you need to spend loads of work mastering something then it's no good and you should go and pull it apart.

Start with the kick, then add the snare and rest of the drums, balance these 9chcek against other material)

then add the bass, other parts, keep checking against otehr commercial material. Check the kick and bass together on their own, snare and hats, check the synths and samples against the hats, make sure that there isn't too much frequency masking etc.

if you get the mix right, and this includeds chorus / verse sections then it shouldn't be hard to master.

For further reading buy Mixing with your mind (look it up) by stav. The mixing Engineers handbook by Owinski(sp?)
plus others I am sure ppl can recommend.. . .

[Grappadura]

I am amazed that no-one has said that he shoud re mix it.

If it's such hard work to get it to gell together then re-mix the sucker.

Best advice I have heard is if you need to spend loads of work mastering something then it's no good and you should go and pull it apart.

Start with the kick, then add the snare and rest of the drums, balance these 9chcek against other material)

then add the bass, other parts, keep checking against otehr commercial material. Check the kick and bass together on their own, snare and hats, check the synths and samples against the hats, make sure that there isn't too much frequency masking etc.

if you get the mix right, and this includeds chorus / verse sections then it shouldn't be hard to master.

For further reading buy Mixing with your mind (look it up) by stav. The mixing Engineers handbook by Owinski(sp?)
plus others I am sure ppl can recommend.. . .

Why should he remix it if he´s got everything he needs. his only misconception was to think he should only employ one compressor for all of it. but since he´s got the right settings on different compressors, he only has to combine.

[Benshik]

Hey guys,
thanx a lot to all of you, some really useful tips in here!
I indeed am relatively happy with the mix, sounds good and i wanna keep it a little raw and homemade (its pop, rock, indie, electro, blabla, whatever, doesnt need to be ultra clean like house or smtg)
so i believe its quite mastering ready. And i wanna try to master myself, which isnt an easy task.
I tried to experiment but so far im not happy with the overall sound im getting.
the verses are simpler in terms of arrangement, and when i compress them to sound almost as loud as the chorus, using two different compressor settings, it makes the richer and more elaborated chorus sound too weak. arrgh thats tough. im almost considering now to keep the verses quieter. arrgh, what should i do with these damn verses???

i should analyse audio files of bands with extreme chorus/verses variations, like the pixies or nirvana, just for fun.

btw I did quite a bit of volume automation on individual tracks, should i automate master level on the verses to make em lauder without compressing?

[quartertone]

I would just ask whether the OP has checked all of the individual tracks in the mix for low frequency content, making sure that ensemble instruments are not stepping on ultra-low kickdrum and bass tones (75-120 Hz or so). High shelving can work wonders with careful selection of frequencies. Definitely try this before doing anything as complicated as a multiband limiter. I know that by the time I was able to use one of those without just making a bigger mess, I wasn't having this kind of problem anymore anyway.

The double-compressor swap is a good idea as well - but def. check the sub-bass frequencies before adding further complications!

[ciw]

Fix it in the mix.

If it isn't easily fixed with automation in the mix, it may be easier to duplicate several tracks, including the fx chain. Delete the verse in one copy and the chorus in another. Now route the verse tracks and chorus tracks into different groups and apply different processing to each group. This will take care of any concerns about effect tails.

If you can't be bothered, then yes, fix it in the mastering stage with a rack or something. You may need to save final limiting until after the split mastering rack.

[Benshik]

Fix it in the mix.

Yep...
After a trip back to the mix, i realised the vocals might have been too compressed on the mix stage, and when i recompress the whole thing in the mastering stage, they bring the whole song down. fuck. getting a song out yourself is really like riding a road full of unexpected twists... and steps back. now i'll have to go back on a mix which sounded good as a draft, but which sounds dull once on a mastering chain. And i thought my album would be out soon :-/

I know some would recommend me to pay for a pro to do it. Well we did, and i was so appaled by the result that i decided to be control freak til the end and do it myself. Well, almost myself, coz fortunately i've got friends to give me precious advice, and i truly appreciate the tips i get from this forum (in which i used to spend more time when i was less busy, few years ago ) So thanx! And as some ppl here suggested, back to volume automation in the mix! fucking compressors....

[leedsquietman]

How pro was the 'pro' you used ?

There are quite a few cowboys out there that will run your mix through some type of preset EQ curve (such as Harbal or Voxengo's curve EQ) set up to music from your genre, and then bang on an L2. This can produce results anywhere from barely acceptable (but louder) to absolute trash.

Then again, did you leave proper headroom and dynamics in your mix to give the mastering engineer a chance.

Mastering is a very difficult art to master, on a stereo mix, anything affects EVERYTHING, (i.e. even the smallest EQ changes, or compression or gain changes can add up to a huge difference in the sound). Also if you overprocessed things, when that gets volume maximized it can go from sounding good in the draft mix to washing everything out like a tsunami. Reverb and mod FX especially. When you're mixing and the reverb and mod FX aresounding just right, back off them a bit. This will sound a bit less 'impressive' but when your track is mix finalized/mastered it will become more present in the end product.

I suggest you read up on some good mixing books such as Bobby Owsinksi's 'The Mixing Engineer's Handbook' and the mastering companion he has to go with it 'The Audio Mastering Handbook'.
http://bobbyowsinski.com/The_Audio_Mast ... ndook.html watching some of the video clips here is a good exercise too.

Tarekith offers a good service for reasonable rates. Check him out, he will probably give you a free sample.

[Benshik]

There are quite a few cowboys out there that will run your mix through some type of preset EQ curve (such as Harbal or Voxengo's curve EQ) set up to music from your genre, and then bang on an L2. This can produce results anywhere from barely acceptable (but louder) to absolute trash.

Well his own stuff sounds pretty good and he works in a pro studio (which is where we met). We got along pretty well so i asked him for some help.
not only he did master my song, he practically mixed it. he wanted to use his beloved waves plugins so i sent him separate tracks of all vocals and instruments, in 2 version, dry and with effects
i also sent my draft mixes so knows the sound im after, coz the balance between instruments is far from being typical, jst to add complexity to verses/chorus relation.

maybe he got too much space to manoeuver, and he came up with an appaling sound. my draft mix sounded muuuuccchhh better. but now i see that i cant bring this draft mix past a good sounding draft mix. i still want it to sound a bit messy, coz some things are intentionaly done "improperly", but it should just shine a bit more... arrrghhh!!

[ciw]

The ideal mix will need no mastering other than a little limiting to bring the loudness up a touch.

I'm not there yet - I usually end up applying a bit of mastering eq (which could obviously be fixed in the mix if I had the time, but I don't).

See if you can track down some tuition from someone experienced at mixing. Bring them your best effort at a mix (probably on your computer) and see what they do to improve it. Very worthwhile experience, but it's hard to track down such people of course... well worth paying for if you find someone good.

[leedsquietman]

With no disrespect, mixing and mastering ARE 2 seperate skill sets.

Mixing is the most important factor in any recording. If the mix is bad, mastering is not the miracle cure to fix it.

If you are doing a mastering job and you have some ideas on remixing, you must work those through with a client first. I've done sessions where I've gotten stems (from several bands), and the temptation is to do more than clean them up a bit, sort out noise or glitches and get the sound polished a bit and louder which is typically a large part of mix finalizing mastering (mastering technically includes getting everything ready for pressing, PQ lists, etc, etc). There is a temptation to add things in, change the reverbs, add FX etc. If you do this you must inform the client and give them a chance for rebuttal.

I've done this for 3 or 4 groups and ultimately, compromised on some ideals, with several changes before it was OKed, or deferred to the client's wishes and left alone, except for polishing the sound up a tad and getting it louder. Clients gave you the mix the way it was because they liked that vision - even if your ideas for the mix are revolutionary and sit better with an independent unbiased crowd, the control freak in all artists is resistant to change, so anything in mixing someone else's work is a negotiation. Even for the best mixers in the world - the Dave Pensados and Michael Brauers and Bruce Swediens' of this world, even with their skills, regularly get told 'no' and to make changes by the producer/artists/label management etc.

You should have asked your producer friend if he could master the mix the way you've mixed it, and if he was keen to do his own mix, either agree to it in principle but with you having final say on the mix and able to request changes, or just politely say 'no thanks, I like my mix as it is'.

A lot of producer/engineers don't have adequate mastering skills, they quite often do as I said before, use some kind of tool such as Harbal and then run it through an L2 to volume maximize - this makes the mix louder and is OK for a quick demo, but isn't a proper mastering job.

Get those books by Owsinski, practice, practice, practice train your ear, get familiar with the processes, then read Bob Katz's 'Mastering Audio - The Art and The Science' (2nd edition). Mastering is less glamourous than mixing, but to do it well requires a LOT of knowledge and experience. Even for those who think they're doing OK and throwing Ozone or T-racks and seemingly making a difference - there is a lot to learn and you will go back to your first few masters and think 'Jeez, this really sucks, I should really redo this again now I have all this extra insight, experience and skill'.