The Mastering Show

It’s either the most powerful mastering technique known to man, or it isn’t really mastering at all, depending who you ask. Some people love it, others hate it, and some are mortally offended just by it’s name.

Why does stem mastering provoke such passionate debate ? In this episode we dig into the topic to figure out the answers to these and other questions...

* What is stem mastering ?

* In fact, what really is a stem, anyway ?

* Why do some mixers find the idea offensive ?

* What are the benefits and pitfalls of stem mastering ?

* Why will stems often not sound exactly like the mix ?

* Does stem mastering really help your client ?

full show notes and links on our website

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-75

Mentioned in this episode:

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

It’s happening. Spotify are switching to using LUFS for their loudness normalization. If you’re thinking ‘I thought they already used it', that’s understandable - but they didn’t.

They will in future though, and in this episode we talk about why the change matters, especially in the short-term. But also about when it doesn’t matter, and why it will hopefully matter even less as time goes on.

Topics include:

Why we don’t use Spotify

What we use instead, and why - and some of the differences

How normalization on Spotify used to work

How it’s going to work

What happens in the meantime

Why we mostly ignore the numbers, despite all this !

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-74

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Let’s face it, LUFS don’t work.

No-one understands them, when you set a load of different songs to -14 LUFS they all sound a different loudness, and they weren’t even developed using music. RMS is just better, right ?

These are just some of the objections we’ve been hearing about LUFS recently, and in this episode we investigate them. Is there any truth to these claims and statements ? (Hint - Yes !)

Along the way we also cover:

* Why loudness is like the weather

* How EQ affects loudness, and how we hear it

* Loudness on the radio

* The ideal podcast loudness

* What’s up with Spotify’s loudness recommendation

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-73

Mentioned in this episode:

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

This is so good it just needed it’s own episode.

It’s a groundbreaking, unique new way to make music online - and everyone should try it out ! It’s not just bleeps and beats, either - there are plenty of people using it to make fantastic acoustic and sample-based live-looping music as well.

I’m talking about Endlesss, the new live-looping-jam-with-friends-online iOS app developed by musician Tim Exile that I mentioned at the end of the last episode - and now it’s going to be available on Mac & PC !

I loved chatting to Tim for this episode, and there’s a ton of interesting ideas here even if you’re not that interested in the idea of Endlesss. We talk about:

* The problem of perfectionism in music production, and why it’s a mastering engineer’s super-power

* The best way to develop a new musical instrument

* How to fit 40kg of music tech in an iPhone - and why it’s worth it

* How not-live can feel live and how THAT can overcome anxiety and imposter syndrome

* And how Endlesss got Ian back into creating music after a 20-year break as a result

Full show notes on our website

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-72

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Real-time remote audio work IS possible - with surprising quality and flexibility ! In this show I’ll describe techniques and strategies to help you mix, master, teach and even record remotely - and even suggest some ways to jam live. Kind of. Amongst other things I’ll describe how to:

Stream lossless, low-latency audio to any DAW or browser, for up to 40 people

Combine this audio stream with multi-user video chat

Screenshare in sync for easier collaboration during mixing, mastering and even recording

Take control of someone else’s screen for teaching or training purposes

Use other people’s analogue gear in your project

“Jam” virtually online - on an iPhone !

Thanks to Ian Stewart and Lij Shaw for help with ideas and testing for this episode.

Check out the website for full links and show notes

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-71

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Our guest this episode is LA mastering engineer John Greenham who just won a Grammy for his work on Billie Eilish’s album. We talk to him about how he came to work with Billie, and dig into his work on the album in depth, discussing topics including:

* John’s mastering chain and philosophy

* Whether “Xanny” is the loudest song ever

* How to get RMS levels above zero (!)

* Loudness, confidence and client relations

* Are loud mixes a problem for mastering engineers ?

* What it’s like to win a Grammy

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-70/

Mentioned in this episode:

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

We talk on this show about making a master sound great all the time - but what does that mean ? How can you tell the difference between a good or a great master, or whether you’re doing great work yourself, or not ? In this episode we discuss all these questions, plus:

* Is it even possible to tell a good or a great master ? If not, why not ?

* Is it about great sound, or great work ?

* Why “great” doesn’t have to mean “perfect”

* What about great re-masters ?

* How to know if you’re doing great work

* The only person who can really decide

Full show notes and links on our website

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-69

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

I often get asked if it’s possible to restore dynamics to a heavily limited, clipped or compressed source, to achieve a more dynamic master. The answer is… it’s complicated ! So in this episode we do our best to answer the question. Topics include:

Why you shouldn’t do this

When you might have to do this

When doing this is a bad idea

How to do it (the simple way, the complicated way and the really messy way)

How compression can sometimes add dynamics

What these techniques can never do

Full links and shownotes on our website:

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-86

Mentioned in this episode:

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

People are talking about minus 14 LUFS loudness more and more these days, but why ? What does this number mean, where does it come from, and why should you care ?

In this episode we answer all these questions and more, including:

* Which streaming services are using -14 LUFS

* Why Spotify aren’t using -14 LUFS, and why it matters

* Why you shouldn’t use minus 14 LUFS as a target (or any number) but

* Why it’s still important and useful to know about anyway

* Will mastering to -14 LUFS make your music sound bad ?!?

Full links and show notes on the website

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-67

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Leapwing

Find out more about Leapwing's plugins

Hello

The bad news is there is no regular podcast for you this week.

There will not be a new episode until Ian's voice improves but in the meantime we'd like to let you know about two excellent podcast episodes where Ian was a guest for Twenty Thousand Hertz. (that's the good news)

The [COMPRESSED] History of Mastering

https://www.20k.org/episodes/historyofmastering

The Loudness Wars

https://www.20k.org/episodes/loudnesswars

Dallas from 20K was our guest on episode 63

http://themasteringshow.com/episode-63/

If you're a fan of The Mastering Show we're sure you'll also love these episodes.

Mentioned in this episode:

Learn to master !

Click HERE to see Ian's courses and mastering resources

Mastering

Click HERE to work with Ian