Will mastering a cd take out the mud?

[LSchefman]

>>IME its pretty easy to screw up either one... but I think its WAY harder to get a coherent end result going piecemeal then with live tracking, not the least of which is due to performance. <<

My point is that it's important to make sure the basic tracks are good. My point is not that one should track instruments one at a time, it's that recording live takes a more skilled engineer because there are more variables and a lot happening at once.

Yes, it's easy to screw up either way, but when tracking live, the engineer needs to have a good handle on the recording process. One instrument at a time is pretty simple stuff.

In fact, when I write music for ads, I use either or both approaches depending on the track. But there are engineers I like to work with on live band sessions who I think do a better job than I do, and I hire them when I have a decent budget. So maybe that's my own bias, but I've heard way too many crappy live session tracks, and find that it takes a really talented engineer to please my ear.

Just my two cents. YMMV

[KungFuLio]

Originally Posted by Julia343

Low Pass filter your guitars a 125 Hz and actually use a -12 db shelf at around 100 and lower. That's bass territory. This will get rid of the mud on your guitars.

I hope you meant Hi Pass Filter...

[Julia343]

Originally Posted by KungFuLio

I hope you meant Hi Pass Filter...

Yeah, I meant high pass filters. Definitely..... the weather was crazy here yesterday. My inner ear was acting up and I couldn't tell up from down part of the time. i could feel the squall lines coming in. i'll edit the post.

[mchi.stephen]

like other guys said earlier, mastering is just a final polish, a little eq here and there and that's about it.

if the pre-mastered track sounds bad, chances are that it will sound the same or actually worse after being mastered.

[Sneed Hearn]

Yeah, from what i understand, especially recording digitally, each track is additive on the low and high end. A lot of guys seem to, right off the bat, put high and low pass filters on each track right off the bat.
This something that used to plague me before I found out what to do....just tons of low end mud. If you don't cut it out before hand it just keeps piling up.

[MichaelK]

I deleted an earlier post because it didn't say what I meant to say, which is this...

During mastering, inherent problems with the mix sometimes become even more obvious. Depending on what those problems are, they might or might not be fixable at that stage.

Remember that any adjustments in mastering will affect the whole mix, even if only one or two instruments are causing the problem. Sometimes fixing one problem creates another. Then you either have to choose between a rock and a hard place, or go back and re-mix, in which case you'd also have to master again. That can get expensive.

[dognmoon]

I'm not an engineer by trade and have nothing technically specific to offer, but- having just finished my own solo/vanity project- I think it's important to have the mix be SO good that if you didn't have the budget for mastering, it's still listenable. I would caution you not to expect the mastering process to fix problems for two reasons. 1) because it rarely can, and 2) it's going to stress the relationship between you and the mastering engineer. You don't wanna make him feel like he's only worth your money if he does his own job AND makes up for the job of one or more people who dropped the ball earlier in the process.

Good luck, and I hope you still find something positive about the recording experience and/or final product.

[pbradt]

No, If you don't have a clean mix, mastering won't help.

[GerryJ]

Originally Posted by DSnellen79

My band just finished at the studio. We listened to the pre-mastered mix and the guitar tone sucks and the over all sound is muddy. This is my first rodeo so I was wandering if the mastering process will take out the mud and clean up the sound?

advice from Earl Slick, who's been around 35+ yrs-

http://www.guitarplayer.com/ArtistVi...id=40510296001

'mastering' used to be a discreet technical skill, how to carve the signal into vinyl loud and rich sounding but without distortion or skipping the stylus needle from the groove. That's all gone now, what remains of 'mastering' is really making a collection of songs sound good and fairly consistent in tone, volume, etc.
That's why you'll read occasionally in interviews with engineers in TapeOp or other sources, they'll say "so-and-so's tracks were mixed so well we hardly had to do anything to them."

[Julia343]

If you can't get the mix right because of the quality of the mix tracks, then you can always brick wall compress the hell out of the track so no one can tell. "Death Magnetic" anyone?

If you're going to do your own mastering, it is best to have some dedicated mastering software, and that stuff ain't cheap.

[moosin]

it's got to sound good before you go master it. You can't seperate sounds in mastering, just enhance whats there

[harvestmark]

I have not read the previous posts, so forgive me if I am repeating anything.

Mastering will not fix a poorly recorded guitar tone. That should've been handled when you recorded the tracks. The mixing process can help, but that should ultimately be handled when you record. Make sure you are getting the tone you want. DO NOT count on a process later to improve it. It's SO important to get the tone at the source before anything else.

The mixing process can help cover for inadequate recording processes, but only so much. I wouldn't count on it to fix a big problem.

So, people seem to be thinking lately that mastering can fix a bad mix. No, it can make a good mix better, it can balance the frequency range a little if it is a little bass/treble heavy/light, it can make the mix louder, but it will not alter the tonality of specific instruments.

I am an engineer. My mixes sometimes need help in terms of bass content, crispness, dynamics, and overall volume. That's what I count on from a mastering engineer. Not to fix my bad sound. I need the mixes to be broadcast-able. He helps me with the last few layers to get there.

What I tell people when asked about mastering is; It adds the final layer of sheen on a mix, nothing more.

I believe lately, people are relying on mastering engineers to fix stuff that the original recording or mixing engineers should handle. It's not the mastering engineer's job. They need properly engineered projects to do their job properly.

Mark Miller