Stereo, mono, binaural or surround-sound ?

I've worked with this episode's guest in all these formats and more over the many years we've been working together - but which does he prefer, and why ?

Richard Durrant describes himself as an "Indie Classical" musician, which I think is a pretty good summary - but doesn't really take into account the fact that he also toured with Sky, worked as an accomplished session musician for many years and has released albums in a brilliantly eclectic variety of other genres and styles over the years.

In this conversation we talk about:

• Why Richard records in an "acoustic igloo" (and what that is)
• Mic techniques for guitar and dealing with "wolf notes" on stringed instruments
• Real spaces versus digital reverb
• Touring (and performing) with a bicycle
• Performing Bach's cello suites on Banjo and Ukulele - how and why

Full links on our website:

www.themasteringshow.com/episode-99

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

'Stem mastering' has provoked a ton of debate recently, with people claiming it crosses the line between mixing and mastering, interferes with the artist's intent, and isn't even really mastering at all !

But if that's true, why would Abbey Road, one of the biggest mastering studios in the world, offer a dedicated stem mastering service ?!

In this episode I talk to Oli Morgan, who specialises in stem mastering and mixing in mastering in Dolby Atmos at Abbey Road, about all these questions and more. We talk about:

• How he got started in mastering (and what that has in common with me)
• His perspective on stem mastering – when and how it can be helpful
• How (and why) stem mastering is a key element for working in Immersive Audio and Dolby Atmos
• What we can learn about dynamics from working in Dolby Atmos
• Why the 'pressure sound' may not be all about heavy limiting
• How we might be able to have our cake and eat it in the quest to balance loudness and dynamics

Full links on our website:

www.themasteringshow.com/episode-98

Mentioned in this episode:

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

The term “legend” gets thrown all the time in audio production circles, but my guest this episode really deserves it.

I’m sure you already know this but Ken Scott has worked with the Beatles, David Bowie, Elton John and Supertramp amongst so many others, so I was delighted when he agreed to join me for this episode !

There were so many things we could have talked about it was hard to know where to start, but here are just a few of the topics we covered:

* Why Abbey Road trained their engineers in mastering before they were ever allowed to engineer a recording session

* The value of mentors - and being thrown in at the deep end

* Mixing in sections (instead of using automation)

* When limited resources are a Good Thing

* Re-mixing Ziggy Stardust in Dolby Atmos (with added drum samples…!)

* …and how the new mix translates to stereo

Full show notes on our website

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-97

Mentioned in this episode:

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

We’ve been using “soft clipping" in mastering for over 20 years at this point, but it suddenly feels as if it’s all anyone is talking about ! New plugins, new suggestions about how to use it, and wild new claims about how amazing it sounds.

Except it doesn’t.

At least – not all the time, and not for all material.

In this episode Joe Caithness and I dig deep into the details and talk about:

* What clipping is, and what it isn’t

* The crucial differences between hard and soft clipping

* What makes a great clipping plugin (and why comparing them is a nightmare)

* Some of our favourite clipping plugins and how we use them

* The kinds of material that work best with clipping, and what type to use

* The golden rule to follow if you want to experiment with clipping yourself

Full show notes and links on our website:

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-96

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

The Billboard Top 50 global singles from the first half of 2024 have an average loudness of -8.3 LUFS

So that’s how loud we should be making our masters, right ?

Well…

It certainly might seem that way, but in reality it’s a bit more complicated than that. This is only one of the interesting results that Ian Stewart presented in his latest blog post for iZoTope, and in this episode I asked him back on to really dig into some of the details and nuance.

Plus I also wanted to talk to him about the amazing plug-in that got invented during the last episode he was on ! (Well, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it 😛)

During the show we talk about:

* What that -8 LUFS average result REALLY means, and how much attention you should pay to it

* Who the most successful artist in the Top 50 is, and the loudness statistics of their music

* The problem with the title iZotope chose for the post

* All the other results, trends and biases in the data

* Basslane Pro, the plug-in Ian worked with Tone Projects to develop, why it’s unique - and how The Mastering Show helped it happen !

Full show notes on our site

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-95

Mentioned in this episode:

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

People are always asking me about mastering for vinyl, and I’m happy to try and help based on the experience I have. I don’t actually cut vinyl myself though, so that advice is always limited and second-hand.

So for this episode I decided to talk to a genuine expert on the topic - Scott Hull from Masterdisk - and really get into the details.

Scott’s knowledge and experience of cutting vinyl is enormous, as you’ll hear, and I took full advantage of that in this episode ! Some of the things we talked about include:

The 4 stages of vinyl production, and why each is important

How making assumptions about vinyl mastering can backfire

Why choosing which plant is going to press the records is crucial

The crucial role of the lathe - and it’s setup

The myth of duration on vinyl - why “20 minutes per side” isn’t a hard and fast rule

Why less limiting allows you to cut louder on vinyl

What is the magic of vinyl ?

Full show notes and links on our website

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-94

Mentioned in this episode:

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

I’m always arguing for balanced dynamics rather than loudness for it’s own sake, but some people have a different opinion - high loudness is important, and even beneficial.

Nick Di Lorenzo is one of them - he says that loudness is important regularly on his YouTube channel. So in this episode I invited him on to explore that idea in more detail, and really get into the nuances of the topic. Do you need to be mastering loud ? Topics include:

* The practicalities of loudness

* What makes things sound loud anyway ?

* Record labels versus loudness

* Why loudness IS important

* Why LUFS don’t matter, and

* The difference between loudness and LUFS

Full show notes on our website

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-93

Mentioned in this episode:

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

You can't go a day without someone telling you how loud your music should be, these days.

"Everything has to be -8 LUFS"

"EDM has to be -6 LUFS or louder"

"-11 is the perfect balance"

"Just master everything to -14"

...but they can't all be right !

In fact, none of them are, and even more importantly, they may not even be talking about the same thing. And the differences are really important. So in this episode I try explain really clearly and concisely:

The 3 different types of LUFS

The difference between them

Why it’s crucial to know which type you’re talking about

Why mastering to integrated targets makes no sense

When -14 LUFS isn’t loud enough – and why ?

Why it’s not about ‘how loud’, it’s about how you make it loud

Why integrated LUFS values are the result, not the goal of mastering

Full show notes on our website

https://themasteringshow.com/episode-92

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian

Tools

For Ian's mastering plugins, click HERE

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian