smokeAndMirrors
New member
I often find myself listening to a mastered version of my tracks and thinking "that sounded decent in the final mix, but my multiband compression (or excitation or stereo with adjustment or EQ tweak) has actually made an instrument sound relatively louder." And so I go back to my mix project and pull the instrument levels down a bit.
Is this contrary to the spirit of "pure" mastering which deals only with an audio track? Is it common practice? Or is it better to try to find a compromise setting which reduces the relative boost whilst partly fixing the compression issue?
Is this contrary to the spirit of "pure" mastering which deals only with an audio track? Is it common practice? Or is it better to try to find a compromise setting which reduces the relative boost whilst partly fixing the compression issue?