Doubt about limiter and mastering tracks at home.

CMolena

CMolena

Active member
Hey guys!

I'm not a guy who likes to master songs too loud. I dont like how some modern music sounds so loud and compressed.
When I master things at home I usually try to make the mixes to hit -7.5db RMS. I really dont like to go any higher than that.

But I'm working with a new band and they want me to master it louder. They want their record to sound as loud as QOTSA's Lullabies to Paralyze, which is unholy loud.

SO here comes the trouble...whenever I push the limiter too hard on the mix, it appears to kind of distorts it a little bit aswell. Not in a nice way. Especially with high frequency signals such as hit hat or really screamy guitars, I distorts to a point that is really painful to listen and makes everything sound squashed.

Then if I turn the threshold down again...it sounds normal.

Problem is, when you hear the QOTSA record, it sounds 10X louder than my mix and it isnt distorted a single bit.

Does any of guys have or had trouble with this? My DAW is Studio One 2.
 
I have no experience with Studio One, but I do know that the stock Cubase limiter is - well, very limited. It sucks to be honest.

I have way better results with FabFilter Pro-L. It not so cheap but worth every penny if you are attempting mastering yourself. I am sure they have a trial to see if it works for you.

Edit: Yep. 30 day fully functional trial. Give it a shot man! :)

FabFilter Pro-L Link
 
CMolena said:
...when you hear the QOTSA record, it sounds 10X louder than my mix and it isnt distorted a single bit.
Click to expand...

I know everyone feels that with modern DAW technology, anyone can cut a pro mix at home like the big studios can.

Things to consider...
Their levels were probably raised from the start and then again in stages...not just one limiter at the end of the mix.
They may have used a lot of hardware gear, not just plugs.
Finally...the thing was mixed by a pro, and then probably mastered by a different pro with yet another pile of mastering gear.

That's a lot of shit for the average home rec guy to overcome....just sayin.....
 
When I do master tracks I mix for clients, which is something I try to avoid as I rather use a mastering engineer at another studio, I tend to compress & limit in stages.

I will put all the songs up in the software, plug in something like a 670 compressor on each of the songs and use this to bring the song volumes into line, sometimes this compressor is not doing very much. I usually have an eq plugged in before the compressor as some fine tuning may be required as adding compression sometimes changes the sound of the song as well as the volume.

I then plug a compressor across the master stereo bus, this is sometimes a 670 again, sometimes something else that takes my fancy on the day (different strokes for different music types).

I then will follow that compressor with a limiter, sometimes a multi-band limiter, again it depends what we want from the music.

Now I should say that the way I set up the compression on the individual songs and the way I set up the stereo bus compressor is often very different, even the individual songs are very different depending on the actual song. I don't hit hard with any of these compressors and by the time I get to the final limiter it is only catching the wayward peaks not smashing the daylights out of the mix.

There may be other approaches to this but as I always say there are no rules in recording and always many different ideas to try.
Alan.
 
You're hitting -7.5dB RMS - what are your peaks hitting? If those high frequency things like the hi hats are giving you a problem, are you compressing them in the mix so they are less an issue when mastering?
 
mjbphotos said:
You're hitting -7.5dB RMS - what are your peaks hitting? If those high frequency things like the hi hats are giving you a problem, are you compressing them in the mix so they are less an issue when mastering?
Click to expand...

I set the limiter so the peaks would hit -0.5db. No, I'm not compressing the Overheads in the mix (which is where the hi hat sound comes from).

I usually master in the same session that I mix. Do you guys think that using that much plugins in the same session could cause this 'distortion" problem? Could you guys notice the difference between the two mixes I posted?
 
7db of dynamic range?!? Is this some kind of joke? Is it Japanese harsh noise? WTF do you expect it to sound like? It can't possible sound good.
 
ashcat_lt said:
7db of dynamic range?!? Is this some kind of joke? Is it Japanese harsh noise? WTF do you expect it to sound like? It can't possible sound good.
Click to expand...

HAHA! We posted at the same time. No way those mixes are at -7db RMS. If they are, it's not even distorting. It's exploding. Not the first time this subject comes up.
 
RAMI said:
HAHA! We posted at the same time. No way those mixes are at -7db RMS. If they are, it's not even distorting. It's exploding. Not the first time this subject comes up.
Click to expand...

Ok, I understand you consider this a very loud level. I do too, I usually prefer when they are at a lower RMS level.

The "Not So Loud" mix is hitting -7.5dB RMS, the "Loud as Hell" one is probably hitting -5dB or so...

My doubt basically was, can an average home recording guy master songs as loud as a comercial mastering engineer, without crushing the mix? Could you guys answer that and maybe even give me some examples of how you master your own songs?
 
No, that's not what I mean. I'm saying that there's no way your mixes are hitting -7RMS. Even the loudest commercial mixes MAYBE touch -9 RMS, and that's very few mixes, and that's ridiculously loud. -7RMS would be distorting beyond all holy hell.

There's something wrong with your metering or....something. Almost NOTHING hits -7RMS....I know, I know, now you're going to post that ridiculous chart you once posted that showed some songs hitting 0db RMS. :laughings: It's wrong and it's impossible. No way your mixes are hitting -7RMS. Impossible, unless they're ridiculously distorting the shit out of everything.

Most commercial mixes are about -12RMS to maybe -10RMS. That's about as loud as they get. Not -7RMS. Doesn't happen.
 
RAMI said:
No, that's not what I mean. I'm saying that there's no way your mixes are hitting -7RMS. Even the loudest commercial mixes MAYBE touch -9 RMS, and that's very few mixes, and that's ridiculously loud. -7RMS would be distorting beyond all holy hell.

There's something wrong with your metering or....something. Almost NOTHING hits -7RMS....I know, I know, now you're going to post that ridiculous chart you once posted that showed some songs hitting 0db RMS. :laughings: It's wrong and it's impossible. No way your mixes are hitting -7RMS. Impossible, unless they're ridiculously distorting the shit out of everything.

Most commercial mixes are about -12RMS to maybe -10RMS. That's about as loud as they get. Not -7RMS. Doesn't happen.
Click to expand...

That ridiculous chart I posted once was from a site that seems pretty good. I just posted as a source of comparison and not to prove myself or anything. Unfortonately that is the only reference I got and I understand its pretty limited.

But anyway, did you took a listen to my mix? Have you noticed a difference between the two? To me the "Not So Loud" one is pretty ok mastering-wise. Its not distorted or anything. Now the "Loud As Hell" one is incredibly squashed to me.

Now, ok, maybe I cant monitor things right and I'm really sorry for that. In Studio One, you can view the RMS levels on the master fader. That is my reference. If its wrong could you tell me how to do it? Just so I dont go posting things that doesnt make sense.

Oh, just one more thing, my doubt from the start of the thread basically was...can I master my client's song as loud as "Lullabies To Paralyze" from Queens Of The Stone Age? Because they asked me that they wanted a mix as loud as that one. If I cant master it as loud as that without crushing the mix, I will say to them that they if they want louder, they can pay a real mastering engineer.

Thanks in advance for every info.
 
I am into harsh noise, so some parts of some of my mixes do get that loud, but...

There's no reason that you can't get levels similar to commercial recordings at home. If you have some experience and knowledge you should be able to get there without making any more of a mess of the thing than the "big boys" do. Obviously you don't have that knowledge or experience, but the only way to get it is to keep trying, and failing, but hopefully getting a little closer easy time.

To get the least possible dynamic range at the master stage, you really have to control the dynamics at every stage of the process. Ideally it starts with arrangement, then with tight erformances, then you dial in sounds at amps and whatever, then compress and limit each track, then in groups, and then finally on the master.

But I said "compress" and "limit". A slower, less aggressive compressor will help you inflate your RMS and bring the varying peak levels closer to some norm without really crushing them, so that the more aggressive limiter doesn't have to work quite so hard overall, and works more consistently. I use a really long RMS window and set the pre-comp/lookahead in the middle of that, and it's almost too easy to get absurd loudness that sounds surprisingly good.
 
When referencing RMS levels it helps to specify the measurement tool. Some use a 0dB square wave and some use a 0dB sine wave. The ones using the sine wave will show a given file as "louder" (lower RMS number) by several dB than the ones using square wave.
 
CMolena said:
In Studio One, you can view the RMS levels on the master fader. That is my reference.
Click to expand...

I don't know studio One, but I know that someone else (I think TripleM) had a metering issue in REAPER a few weeks ago, similar to yours. He thought mixes were a certain level but it was wrong. What I suggested he do was check for an "Offset" in REAPER's master fader. It turned out that it was set to +5 or something. He ended up changing it 0.00db and everything was ok after that.The same thing might be the case in your situation. See if there's some kind of "Offset". There must be a reason it exists in REAPER, so maybe it exists in all DAW's. If your Offset is set to +5 (for example), you'll get a reading of -7 when it's really -12.

I'll try to listen later. I can't right now.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top