Every professional recording is given to a professional real life human mastering engineer before it gets released.
Today, one of the most common questions a mastering engineer will hear is “can you make my track LOUD?!”
The Answer? “Yes! If it's needed."
But there is more to mastering than this.
Mastering is a marriage between the art of record production and the science of consumption formats.
It’s about lending a fresh pair of ears to a project or a final mix, in order to pinpoint what adjustments should be made to help a project sit alongside the records people love.
The creative process is then carried out by those who have made it their specialty only to master and not mix recordings.
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Mastering also ensures level and tone consistency between each track on an album, from start to finish.
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The last thing a tired producer or artist wants to hear is “hey, you missed a bit!”
In the process of crafting the perfect sonic experience for your listeners, mastering engineers DO NOT miss a thing!
Mastering is a completely different listening discipline to mixing. It is a skill that takes a long time to refine, and even the world’s most renowned mixing engineers will NOT master their own mixes.
Producers and artists spend months carving away at their creative projects, carefully crafting the perfect mix. A mastering engineer will then step in to make any final adjustments (be they subtle, surgical or sharp) and ensure that mixes sound amazing in any of today’s digital formats.
Mastering begins at the point where artists should STOP carving away at their mix, accept what is, and allow a fresh pair of experienced ears to take things to the finish line.
In bringing recordings to the finish line, mastering engineers can apply adjustments to help songs shine like diamonds.
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The mastering engineer also prepares and packages material for release and distribution, making sure that it meets the technical specifications for replication or upload. This is one of the processes that producers get bored with and mastering engineers get nerdy about ;)
No two mastering engineers are the same. Mastering is a creative and HUMAN process.
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