MP3 examples of songs before and after MASTERING?

[fenix]

keep in mind, one of the primary purposes of mastering is consistency and cohesiveness between all the tracks on your CD.

Consistency is easy if the songs were recorded in same studio at the same time and mixed similarly.

 

[sonicpaint]

You'd be surprised.

If you really think that you would be surprised. Have you recorded a whole album yet? If you have I'm sure you'd know that things can be quite different when you put all the songs in the right order and listen through.

Just a thought.
sonicpaint

 

[fenix]

^ yes i've recorded a whole album. Mastering was a breeze for it because it was simple poppunk songs in your face (no soft parts). They were all tracked the same time and mixed the same way. All songs had the same mastering process done to them and they all sounded consistent, not because they were mastered the same, but because they were mixed the same.

 

[Robertt8]

Damn!

Fenix! That song is GREAT! I also find it mixed and mastered beautifully!

Well done!

Did you do that on a home system?

Hat's off to you!

 

[kylen]

fenix - very inspirational DIY mastering job !

Major victory for DIY -
I lowered the mastered version about 6dB and listened to them both - there's a pretty big difference you've made adjusting the dynamics, eq and stereo field mostly for the better. Very cool to listen to the actual music and lyrics too !

Minor criticism -
The upper mids seem a little drawn in and slightly fatiguing to my ear, I notice it on the vocal mostly - I wonder if the stereo field adjustment did that or if it's simply the new density from the multiband (?) - yep I'll guess it's a very slight dynamics issue that has a little too much energy in there or breathing slightly - can I guess the band is 1.8KHz to 3.6KHz somewhere in that octave there ? No that's too easy I always go for that one - a sweep would pick it up. Ha Ha this sounds so good and I want to sweep it - such a small detail too...

Maybe you'll mention what tools you used - don't tell how - you gotta keep some mystic !

I like it - that's what I'm shooting for in my DIY garage - I'd love to compare an example of mine but I don't have anything that good at the moment ! Thanks for sharing - very cool, it made my night !

kylen

PS my nearfields (Alesis M1 active) are a touch harsh - still breaking them in. The song sounds sweet in my mid size speakers though. And I owe myself a room freq adjustment which I'm working on so - there you go - I'm using my DIY listening room !

 

[fenix]

Re: Damn!

Fenix! That song is GREAT! I also find it mixed and mastered beautifully!

Well done!

Did you do that on a home system?

Hat's off to you!

Yeah, it was mixed on Protools LE. Masterd on PT LE with the waves mastering bundle or whatever it's called. It's the bundle with L2, LinMB, Broadband EQ, ect. It's the same song in the mix contest thread.

 

[philsaudio]

I actually just got back from the studio where I had the opportunity to listen to a pre-mastered and final radio mastered version. Some friends of mine are working with Tree Studios here in ATL to get their latest single ready for radio. In their particular song, the biggest differences I could pick out immediately was that:
- guitars were pulled out and given a lot more punch
- vocals were cranked up
- the low end was boosted
- they cleaned up the drums (cymbols/hat hits) with a sampled kit
- they brought in extras to do some overdubbing on the lead vocals to give it more presence
- they clipped the intro to bring the song to under 3:20
- compressed the hell out of it (can't really hear it, but you can definitely see it when you load the waveform into an editor)
- eq'd throughout

The above discription sounds like the original tracks were remixed rather than what I consider mastering, which is an operation performed on a mixed two track song.

Phil

 

[vermades]

Yo FENIX!

This is the message I'm getting when I try to check out the site...

"This users account has been disabled for violating terms of service.
If you feel you are getting this message in error, please contact an administrator."

...so, needless to say, the link doesn't work. I'd still love to hear them though.

I don't know about you guys but knowwhere radio whatever is called is the worst site ive ever been to. I've tried it god knows how many times in the past, click on link, brings me to select player, select player, brings me to the home page, ok click back, select other player, brings me to home page, i finally got it to work by doing the right click save as, but other than that i thought it was horrible. Every other site works fine.

 

[Fusion2]

I don't know about you guys but knowwhere radio whatever is called is the worst site ive ever been to. I've tried it god knows how many times in the past, click on link, brings me to select player, select player, brings me to the home page, ok click back, select other player, brings me to home page, i finally got it to work by doing the right click save as, but other than that i thought it was horrible. Every other site works fine.

it's slow on the weekends i believe, but it's free, which few things are nowadays...