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I'm trying to wrap my head around something. My understanding of the mystical mastering process is that is is essentially a clinical optimization of frequencies / EQ and volume levels. Song "aesthetic" is essentially not part of the mastering calculation. Everything in terms of "aesthetic" rests in the domain of Mixing. That's my understanding.

However, more and more, I see / hear (alledged) producers and engineers talking about "Mastering for a genre". For example, getting a "pumping master" for an EDM track. In my mind, the pumping feel would come from all the side-chaining and automations in the Mixing stage. By the time the song gets to the mastering stage, it should already have all that side-chaining / track specific limiting / compression / etc. The Mastering stage is just optimizing it for mass production.

One of the plugins I'm learning to use, Izotope 8, has "Genre-Specific Mastering" presets, These presets are very cool and will often noticably color the texture of the song. But again, to me that feels like something that would be part of the Mixing domain.

So either my understanding of Mastering is naive, rudimentary, and outdated or the lines between Mixing and Mastering are getting blurred. Before all these tools were available to plebeians like myself, I believe you had to send your music to a Mastering house and they would send you the final output. So I imagine you probably had minimal input on how you wanted the master to sound because it was just sent out to get optimized and not "texttured" or "colored".

I'll refrain from calling myself a "Mastering Engineer".

Cheers

The term mastering has evolved. It's now essentially anything that can be done to the final stereo, or surround mix. Mastering for vinyl is/was a special skill set for example. Albums and the order and transitioning of songs. Analog mastering equipment usually has detents on the knobs, so that the levels are re-creatable... software you have saved presets. When I think of a professional mastering facility, I'm thinking very expensive, hand built limited edition,specialized analog gear.

Unstar wrote:...... is that is is essentially a clinical optimization of frequencies / EQ and volume levels. Song "aesthetic" is essentially not part of the mastering calculation. Everything in terms of "aesthetic" rests in the domain of Mixing. That's my understanding....

If that was truly the case then services like LANDR would have solved the problem for everyone doing any kind of music.

That hasn't happened.

One reason could be that some people mix clean and some people mix into compressors and / or limiters (or other effects). Its not cut and dried.

......presets.......are starting points. Most plugin manufacturers have presets that are REALLY intense so that you can switch through and easily hear a lot of different treatments. You easily hear what fast release limiting sounds like. What a low mid cut sounds like.

The various processes afforded in something like Ozone have to be tweaked and massaged so that they give enough of what you need without going to far and giving you a poor result = an overcooked master.

Len911 wrote:The term mastering has evolved. It's now essentially anything that can be done to the final stereo, or surround mix. Mastering for vinyl is/was a special skill set for example. Albums and the order and transitioning of songs. Analog mastering equipment usually has detents on the knobs, so that the levels are re-creatable... software you have saved presets. When I think of a professional mastering facility, I'm thinking very expensive, hand built limited edition,specialized analog gear.

I like that definition "anything that can be done to the final stereo, or surround mix". It's pretty consistent with what I'm seeing.

andygabrys wrote:

Unstar wrote:...... is that is is essentially a clinical optimization of frequencies / EQ and volume levels. Song "aesthetic" is essentially not part of the mastering calculation. Everything in terms of "aesthetic" rests in the domain of Mixing. That's my understanding....

If that was truly the case then services like LANDR would have solved the problem for everyone doing any kind of music.

That hasn't happened.

One reason could be that some people mix clean and some people mix into compressors and / or limiters (or other effects). Its not cut and dried.

......presets.......are starting points. Most plugin manufacturers have presets that are REALLY intense so that you can switch through and easily hear a lot of different treatments. You easily hear what fast release limiting sounds like. What a low mid cut sounds like.

The various processes afforded in something like Ozone have to be tweaked and massaged so that they give enough of what you need without going to far and giving you a poor result = an overcooked master.

I'm definitely tweaking the Ozone presets quite a bit -- but you're right, they are definitely useful starting points.