— Mike with the Mic (303.501.7888)

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Waveburner offers some excellent plug-ins for basic overall mastering of small, simple projects.  The multipressor, for example, is a great tool for pinpointing areas in your mix that need attention.  Also, Waveburner offers a couple different brickwall limiters to ensure that your mixes don’t clip.  However, if you use too many plug-ins, you may notice that your CD is very different from your in-box mix.

I used Waveburner while mastering my most recent project, and I loved the versatility of the Multipressor, the simplistic, transient-free nature of the Linear Phase EQ’s, and the ease of use with the standard and adaptive limiters, but I noticed a little something that took a bit of wind out of my sails: my CD master sounded completely different.  And not in a good way.  In more of a “what if I buss an obnoxious click noise to my kick drum and sucked out all the bass” kind of way.

My only guess as to why this occurs is that Waveburner attempts to process while it burns, which, as my ears tell me, clearly does not work.  I have read various accounts of this on other blogs and message boards as well, so I know I’m not crazy and I’m not just hearing something that isn’t there.  This unfortunate situation led me to master entirely in Pro Tools - and my predicament turned into another golden opportunity.

After reading up on various mastering limiters and deciding that I didn’t want to troubleshoot our Ilok USB key for the rest of my life, I decided to try out the Massey L2007 mastering limiter.  I’m glad I did.  This intuitive little bad boy, combined with Maxim earlier in the mastering chain, allowed an incredible amount of control over the volume and overall tone of my project without squashing my snare, kick, or any other valuable piece of audio.  Within the hour I had achieved the requisite volume needed in this volume war era without crushing my poor mix to death.  From there it was merely a test of balance before I had the mix I wanted.  A bounce and a few cut up tracks in Waveburner (yes, it still serves a function) and I had my final mix.  Well, after addressing a few embarrassing digital clicks and pops in a few of the tracks….but it wouldn’t be fun if there weren’t problems every step of the way, would it?

-Rex Anderson

CCM Studios

Denver Recording Studio Blog

While recording and mixing go somewhat hand in hand as the image of what a project should be begins, takes shape, and is put into place, mastering is a completely different animal.  I’ve found myself frustrated by how mastering is usually portrayed as an arcane, mystical art that must never be attempted by mortal men.  I rejected this view and attempted to master my own project.  This is when I learned the crucial difference between fantastic Genelec monitors and every other speaker one would potentially hear music played through, particularly crummy Volkswagon speakers.

The infamous ‘car test’ would, without fail, take my hours of hard work, ingenuity and hope and dash against the rocks of bassless, harshly-intonated paper cones.  This is where, I’ve learned, mastering becomes the difficult beast it is: how do you make a recording sound as good as it can sound in a galaxy of different setups?  The short, simple answer I’ve settled on is, you can’t.

In my second to last master mix, I really felt I had it down.  The cymbals are sparkling, the bass is kicking, the guitars are ripping things to shreds.  Then I do the car test, no bass.  Too thin.  The volume level was there, but there was too much high end and not enough ‘butt’.  I almost give up in frustration, but then I take my project home.  The headphone mix is perfect.  The home speaker test is perfect.  Then I realize, maybe I just have crappy car speakers and I really shouldn’t beat my head in trying to appease the cheap VW speaker Gods.  So now I am taking a chance.  I am hoping my future listeners will subscribe to high fidelity and listen to Masters on a good sound system.  And even if they don’t, I hope that they understand that nothing is perfect, and to just enjoy what I’ve made for them.

For additional thoughts on mastering, namely my personal approach, please

Random Battles: ‘Masters’, drops on August 14th at Bit Gen 5 in Baltimore!

-Rex Anderson

CCM Studios

Denver Recording Studio Blog

-Rex Anderson

CCM Studios/Denver Recording Studio Blog

Random Battles

This first installment of our guide to great guitar sounds focuses on my journey to creating the rhythm tracks on Random Battles‘ EP, Masters, which will be released August 14th.  As this was my first project as a newly minted recording engineer, I had (and continue to have) a lot to learn to achieve the right sounds.  The project called for, above all, huge sounding hard-rock-to-metal type rhythm sounds, the kind of chunkiness found in modern rock albums ranging from Foo Fighters to Lamb of God.  The challenge was to make a record that was sharper, clearer and more rockin’ than any previous album I had made with drummer Andy Porter in Entertainment System, all while learning the ropes of audio engineering.  With our goals in mind, I began to record.

There are two different approaches I used to track rhythms: traditional amp miking and direct input with Guitar Rig.  At first I relied primarily on the latter as it allowed me to get an approximation of what I wanted without having to go through the trials of what mics to use, where to place them, how to treat the room, etc.  The benefits of Guitar Rig are:

- A huge library of amp, cabinet, mic, and effects simulations to easily dial in what you want without buying expensive gear

- The ability to learn (approximately) how each of the ‘big name’ amps are supposed to sound

- The ability to change the sound completely even after you’ve recorded

- No mics, no space and no amp needed

Now, the purist in me wasn’t satisfied just using Guitar Rig, so I tried a number of different mic combinations with my Orange Dual Terror.  Over the first several recording sessions, given various levels of success and failure, each song on the album ended up using a different setup.

One tried and true method is to use an SM57 parked dead in the center of one speaker, straight on.  I tried this with an Oram and a Grace, and eventually the Grace won out due to less coloration and overall being less finicky with EQ settings.  I sent this signal to two tracks, hard panned in the mix.  This provided the darker, bassier ‘chunk’ to the sound.  After a while I added a Shure 414, about a foot away from the other speaker, run through a Universal Audio LA-610.  This gave me the top end the SM57 tends to lack.  In the interim, I tried using a second 57 angled about 45′ from the center of the cone, which blended with the other 57 nicely, but I found didn’t add much to the overall tone.  I also tried a U87 to do what the 414 does in my setup, which is add top end, but its setup was much more specific in terms of placement and compression settings, which led to me using the 414 in its place.

To pick up more room sound (something I seldom needed in an ‘everything up to 11′ kind of record), I mic the open back of the cab, usually a KM 184 or other small condenser parked right in between the speakers.  Excellent for a little extra ambience.

Eventually, by the time I tracked Double Dragon and Castlevania, I discovered my current formula: use the 57 and the 414, pan one left and one right, then double the track using Guitar Rig.  This way I get my amp’s tone and my performance with an additional track that I can make sound however I want, thus allowing me to color each song in a unique way.  Double tracking is a must for that big rock sound, as well.  If you feel your rhythms are stale or not present enough, change your settings and play again.  Play through once with a dark, bassy tone and again with a bright, glassy tone, and mix to taste.  Remember, you can always take away, but it can bee difficult to add to tones after the fact.

Rex Anderson

CCM Studios/Denver Recording Studio Blog

- Mike With the Mic

CCM Studios.com

Broken Tongues.com

Another way of looking at it… the heavier the music, the more equal the vocal and snare levels should be; the lighter and more poppy the music is, the higher the vocal can sit above the kick and snare.

When in doubt, make a copy and listen to it in your car and on your computer… between these two listening environments you should find vocal-volume Nirvana!

- Mike with the Mic

CCM Studios.com

Denver Recording Studio Blog.com

Broken Tongues Music

Tracking drums is one of the most complex tasks a studio performs.  Most setups involve anywhere from one to a dozen mics, all requiring different preamps.  Finding the right microphone and preamp for each piece of kit can be a daunting, if not extremely costly, endeavor.  Most people will tell you the hassle is worth it; engineers take a great deal of pride in their setups and many will only record drums acoustically.  Electronic drums, however, have come a long way in recent years and provide a much simpler, cleaner alternative to recording live acoustic drums.  Take a look at the pros and cons of each method…

Acoustic Pros:

-Unique sound; captures how your drummer really sounds

-Easier on the client, who is used to his/her own kit

-Depending on the engineer’s experience, this is the most intuitive and straightforward method of capturing drum sounds

-(possibly a negative, though I feel it’s a strength) Forces the right sound to be captured during a session rather than attempting to “polish” it into being during post

Acoustic Cons:

-Setup can be very time consuming

-Getting the “right” sound can be incredibly difficult

-Isolating each piece of kit is very difficult; some bleed will occur

-Mic bleed can make editing extremely challenging

-If something is not properly captured during a session, the work will likely have to be completely redone

Electronic Pros:

-translates to MIDI information, which is easily edited

-The sound of each drum can be changed after a session

-Setup is far simpler than mic’ing

-Each drum is isolated, so no need to worry about sound bleeds

Electronic Cons:

-Many drum samples can sound “fake” or too clean and perfect

-The kit can feel uncomfortable if a drummer is not used to using pads

-Ambience cannot be captured; you’re more or less stuck with the way your samples sound

-There may not be much of a sense of accomplishment knowing everything about your session can be easily changed and edited

-The feeling of a particular take may change because of the lack of “real” drums at the drummer’s disposal

-Latency issues may arise

Obviously any good engineer/studio can and will be equipped to utilize either method to accomplish the goals of their projects, but both methods of drum tracking are valid and should be taken into consideration.  Of course, if there is no drummer involved with your project, you can always use EZ Drummer…

-Rex Anderson

CCM Studios

Denver Recording Studio Blog