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Author Topic: Is it my ears, or my brain?  (Read 9303 times)

Offline eders19

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #25 on: February 18, 2007, 01:39:01 PM »
@optiplex
again, big thanks for the links! they're a big help!

yeah i know what you guys mean about the urbandub album... when i heard "alert the armory" on MTV, i was already looking forward to it. i went to tower records and listened to it just to make sure about my purchase. i felt disappointed with recording to the point that i forgot to pay attention to great songwriting. yeah i know, to some parang mali yung pag-iisip na ganon, but for me, the production of an album is important coz it's what makes leave the CD in your player to listen over and over again. i mean in terms of local recording, i've heard others that were much better than this one. but don't get me wrong, i think urbandub is still a great band and they have excellent music, i just wish that the recording could've done justice to their material...

yung album ng sheila and the insects, where was it recorded? same ba with urbandub? coz for me i think the recording of their last album was pretty good kasi bagay sa tunog nila

that's just me...  :-D

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Offline skunkyfunk

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #26 on: February 18, 2007, 11:23:16 PM »
IMO Sheila and the Insects didn't have the best recording either.  The guitars seem processed as well, only that most were clean tone and crunch, so the nuances weren't that bad.  The drums also suffered the same unrealistic feel of triggered drums.  But what made that setup work for their music is that the band is post-new wave... 

Offline eders19

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #27 on: February 19, 2007, 03:31:09 PM »
IMO Sheila and the Insects didn't have the best recording either.  The guitars seem processed as well, only that most were clean tone and crunch, so the nuances weren't that bad.  The drums also suffered the same unrealistic feel of triggered drums.  But what made that setup work for their music is that the band is post-new wave... 

yup!  :-) going back to the topic, with regard to mastering, i just wanna know, is it true that there aren't any places here in the philippines that could actually do porper mastering? if there is where?
with or without you...

Offline optiplex

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #28 on: February 19, 2007, 03:52:23 PM »
Quote
any places here in the philippines that could actually do porper mastering? if there is where?

Zach Lucero at Tweak Mastering, Merville, Paranaque(drummer of Imago)

More links:

bob ludwig

http://emusician.com/tutorials/emusic_masters_mastering/

bob katz

http://www.digido.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=7

The topic has gone mainstream.

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1992325,00.html

Offline eders19

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #29 on: February 19, 2007, 03:58:07 PM »
yey! thanks!
with or without you...


Offline mikep

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #30 on: February 19, 2007, 04:49:55 PM »
We have a Mastering Room here at TRACKStudios.  We use SADiE to master, the same mastering equipment and software used by Bob Ludwig.  We have other softwares resident with SADiE and an outboard Finalizer by TC Electronics.

FWIW
www.facebook.com/TRACKSAcoustics/Studios
guitars: gretsch 6122-1962; rickenbacker 330; epi elite casinos; gibson les paul standards, tribute, faded, double cut; gibson sg standards, faded; fender strats MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; fender tele MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; etc

Offline skunkyfunk

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #31 on: February 19, 2007, 09:15:25 PM »
We have a Mastering Room here at TRACKStudios.  We use SADiE to master, the same mastering equipment and software used by Bob Ludwig.  We have other softwares resident with SADiE and an outboard Finalizer by TC Electronics.

FWIW

Sir how much do you charge for mastering?  And what formats do you accept?  Do you also require no compression/no peaking?

Offline mikep

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #32 on: February 19, 2007, 10:29:34 PM »
Call Angee Rozul or Aileen Francisco.  Depends on what you like - whether compressed or not, brickwall or not, whatever.

FWIW
www.facebook.com/TRACKSAcoustics/Studios
guitars: gretsch 6122-1962; rickenbacker 330; epi elite casinos; gibson les paul standards, tribute, faded, double cut; gibson sg standards, faded; fender strats MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; fender tele MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; etc

Offline xjepoyx

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #33 on: February 20, 2007, 12:17:55 AM »
@skunkyfunk

you can also try BALDO's Mastering. you can send your wav file thru his email or thru ym
good girls go to heaven. bad girls go to my room!  [/i]

Offline skunkyfunk

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #34 on: February 20, 2007, 12:20:06 AM »
@skunkyfunk

you can also try BALDO's Mastering. you can send your wav file thru his email or thru ym

Hmmm.  Does he have a Mastering house?  I mean, all the compressors, converters and monitors needed?

Offline xjepoyx

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #35 on: February 20, 2007, 12:23:19 AM »
@skunkyfunk

you can also try BALDO's Mastering. you can send your wav file thru his email or thru ym

Hmmm.  Does he have a Mastering house?  I mean, all the compressors, converters and monitors needed?

as far as i know he has the equipments. btw he's located in NY,USA thats why i said you can only send file thru the net.
good girls go to heaven. bad girls go to my room!  [/i]

Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #36 on: February 20, 2007, 10:24:35 AM »
BALDO's mastering? hahahaha natawa ako dun ah.. ala akong mastering house pero meron akong alam sa NYC, i can even hand it over to them.. pero it will cost you an arm and a leg and maybe more.. 300$ a song pag ayos..pag hindi 100$/hr minimum 4 hrs.  8-).. so if its within your budget , just tell so i can send it to them.  8-)
pero kung hindi pasok sa budget, sa akin sige libre na first song kung gusto mo hehehe..
Music is art in sound...

Offline abyssinianson

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #37 on: February 20, 2007, 10:32:07 AM »
i've worked with Trutone in NYC in the past for some work with Subliminal Records. Great people.
ako si mimordz. 友だちからよろしくです!

Offline skunkyfunk

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #38 on: February 20, 2007, 10:33:28 AM »
BALDO's mastering? hahahaha natawa ako dun ah.. ala akong mastering house pero meron akong alam sa NYC, i can even hand it over to them.. pero it will cost you an arm and a leg and maybe more.. 300$ a song pag ayos..pag hindi 100$/hr minimum 4 hrs.  8-).. so if its within your budget , just tell so i can send it to them.  8-)
pero kung hindi pasok sa budget, sa akin sige libre na first song kung gusto mo hehehe..

New York?  Baka naman si George Marino of Sterling Sound yan...  O mas mahal pa?

Sir, may I ask?  What compressors do you have?  Do you also have Pultecs?  What are your D/A and A/D converters?  What different set of monitors do you have?  I also look forward to some Multi-band compression and probably a nice reverb unit for mastering.  Also don't forget the harmonic exciters.  Because if you have these, maybe we can transact...

Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #39 on: February 20, 2007, 10:44:35 AM »
SIR i am still building my studio piece by piece..so far what i have are MOTU HD192 a/d d/a converters,  symetrix 525 and  a UA 2 1176, UA 2 610, Grace 201, focusrite ISA 428, Lexicon Reverb LXP 15,  NS 10 and Event  20/20 monitors , soundforge / wavelab plus  the plain plugins WAVES and a good set of ears.  8-)... I will be working on Bamf, Jepoy and kitC 's  project as soon as they finish their tracking / mixing so you can just ask them. good enough?
« Last Edit: February 20, 2007, 11:20:57 AM by BALDO »
Music is art in sound...

Offline bindoy

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #40 on: February 20, 2007, 11:20:23 AM »
SIR i am still building my studio piece by piece..so far what i have are MOTU HD192 a/d d/a converters,  symetrix 525 and  a UA 2 1176, NS 10 and Event  20/20 monitors , just the plain plugins WAVES and a good set of ears.  8-)
peace sir baldo!

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Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #41 on: February 20, 2007, 11:26:23 AM »
well kung me tutulong SANA sa akin e UAD cards sana magkaroon ako para naman makuha ko yang Pultec sound na yan saka mga guitar efx at compressors at reverbs. i have been looking at that catalog of UA for quite some time now.  8-)
Music is art in sound...

Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #42 on: February 20, 2007, 11:33:54 AM »
PS
also i usually listen to several speakers so i can safely say it sounds good on MOST speakers you can play it on.. i listen on bose 901, bose 802, bose surround 5.1 , a boom box, computer spkrs, car radios x 2 and a walkman.
Music is art in sound...

Offline abyssinianson

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #43 on: February 20, 2007, 11:56:27 AM »
well kung me tutulong SANA sa akin e UAD cards sana magkaroon ako para naman makuha ko yang Pultec sound na yan saka mga guitar efx at compressors at reverbs. i have been looking at that catalog of UA for quite some time now.  8-)

Baldo, just so you know, the UAD-1 has PCIe versions out now. I've since traded in my 2 PCI cards for the PCIe models and UA threw in some credit vouchers that I used towards the Neve plugin suite that they have out with some left over for other things in the future. Nice plugs and a great value. UAD-1s are a really good investment.
ako si mimordz. 友だちからよろしくです!

Offline abyssinianson

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #44 on: February 20, 2007, 01:36:20 PM »
BALDO's mastering? hahahaha natawa ako dun ah.. ala akong mastering house pero meron akong alam sa NYC, i can even hand it over to them.. pero it will cost you an arm and a leg and maybe more.. 300$ a song pag ayos..pag hindi 100$/hr minimum 4 hrs.  8-).. so if its within your budget , just tell so i can send it to them.  8-)
pero kung hindi pasok sa budget, sa akin sige libre na first song kung gusto mo hehehe..

New York?  Baka naman si George Marino of Sterling Sound yan...  O mas mahal pa?

Sir, may I ask?  What compressors do you have?  Do you also have Pultecs?  What are your D/A and A/D converters?  What different set of monitors do you have?  I also look forward to some Multi-band compression and probably a nice reverb unit for mastering.  Also don't forget the harmonic exciters.  Because if you have these, maybe we can transact...

I would like to address something if I may just so others may know a bit of info about the recording-mastering chain of processing.

Whether you have outboard compressors like Pultecs, Fairchilds, Tubetechs, Manleys or APIs, the most important element of the mastering process is to have a good song foundation to process. The promise of a good master starts with the recording itself - at the mic, at the mixer, in the hands of the recording engineer. This being said, the usage of high end AD converters from the likes of Sytek or Apogee does not matter when you have something that was originally recorded poorly with less than enough headroom, or quality, for a mastering engineer to manipulate. Remember, an AD converter only converts the information in the original song into digital information so an ACCURATE representation is presented to the audio interface pathway and, ultimately, the house monitors. An AD converter does NOT - and I can't stres this enough - make something sound better than it really is, in fact, a good AD converter will expose every fault and blemish in your original recording. This is why you pay out the nose for the converters in PT HD, Apogee, RME ADI, Benchmark, or Sytek, to name a few; you WANT to see every bad thing in your mix and fix it before it goes to the mastering house.

I would just like to throw this out there so other fellow recording enthusiasts know that there is no such thing as "fixing something later on." If anything, it is a bad habit that I have always been taught to avoid. Your main task is to get as good a recording as possible so the mastering engineer and mixing personnel have ample material to improve your work.
ako si mimordz. 友だちからよろしくです!

Offline mikep

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #45 on: February 20, 2007, 04:48:54 PM »
Well said, Abyss.
www.facebook.com/TRACKSAcoustics/Studios
guitars: gretsch 6122-1962; rickenbacker 330; epi elite casinos; gibson les paul standards, tribute, faded, double cut; gibson sg standards, faded; fender strats MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; fender tele MIAs, MIJs, MIMs; etc

Offline abyssinianson

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #46 on: February 20, 2007, 06:20:02 PM »
Well said, Abyss.

Sir Mike,

Many thanks. The mastering-recording misconception is quite common, even among experienced hobbyists. I often found many fellow musicians learning - often painfully - how important it is to really get your levels and mixing in check before shipping out to the mastering places. Lately, this fact was experienced by a friend of mine who is a DJ and produces Techno at his project studio. While his mix sounded "bangin'" on his setup at home, as soon as I ran it through my setup, I could immediately tell that he was running everything way too close to the red, to the point of clipping. At first, I thought I had my monitors set too high and even checked it on my two recording platforms just to see if there was something amiss. It turns out that he didnt anticipate that his monitors were turned up louder than he should have and that his levels left virtually no space for any processing, much less ANY limiting, for the mastering guy to do his work. The piece was supposed to go to press and eventually to vinyl but the resulting file was so unusable that he had to remix everything before doing a revised mastering copy.


ako si mimordz. 友だちからよろしくです!

Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #47 on: February 20, 2007, 06:43:12 PM »
 ABBYS -"the usage of high end AD converters from the likes of Sytek or Apogee does not matter when you have something that was originally recorded poorly with less than enough headroom, or quality, for a mastering engineer to manipulate".  AMEN!
kahit na pinagsama pang bob katz o george marino ang kunin mo kung nde ok recording wala din hehehe although WALA ako sa kalingkingan nila..  :-D
« Last Edit: February 20, 2007, 06:52:13 PM by BALDO »
Music is art in sound...

Offline BALDO

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #48 on: February 20, 2007, 06:50:04 PM »
UAD in PCIE?? hmmm *drools* Abbys lalo mong pinaparami yung  "wish list ko" hehehehe.. hindi pa nga tapos yung bills ko sa sam ash at guitar center.. hmmm 15 months pa naman yun..teka..U87 plus Distressor ( which one do think will work better with a U87 - a distressor or an LA2A?)
and LAST na siguro yang UAD card.. tapos ...TAPOS NA ayaw ko na hehehehe  :-D
Music is art in sound...

Offline abyssinianson

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Re: Is it my ears, or my brain?
« Reply #49 on: February 20, 2007, 09:22:28 PM »
UAD in PCIE?? hmmm *drools* Abbys lalo mong pinaparami yung  "wish list ko" hehehehe.. hindi pa nga tapos yung bills ko sa sam ash at guitar center.. hmmm 15 months pa naman yun..teka..U87 plus Distressor ( which one do think will work better with a U87 - a distressor or an LA2A?)
and LAST na siguro yang UAD card.. tapos ...TAPOS NA ayaw ko na hehehehe  :-D

an LA-2A or an 1176 would work better with the U87. I got my Distressor 2 months ago and I've never really used it on vocals although it sounds good and plump. Think the vocals on a Norah Jones Record - smoky, round sounding with a vintage-y vibe while maintaining transparency. The unit does wonders on drums too and that is what I am using it on. The unit sits in the drum recording rack to add dimension and punch to my maple and birch kit. I just like the sheen that an LA-2A puts on tracks a tad bit more, thats all, plus it is more versatile in the long run. A word of caution though, you might be better off getting the matched LA-2A in one rack. Single LA-2A units like mine are not matched by nature so you can really only run them in dual mono. The differences are not huge but they are there.

yeah, if anything, the UAD is a really good investment - even better than the Distressor or an LA-2A because it is a swiss army knife of sorts. Hazel would probably back me up on this:) And, yes, there is a PCIe version out now. I don't know if it is selling in stores yet but I got mine straight from UAD to avail of the promotional vouchers they were sending out with the units. One PCIe will work well if you just wanna get one for now because of the better bandwidth but, just a warning, the new Neve compressors are a bit more CPU hungry than the other plugs, I notice, so you can't run very many instances without noticing a small lag in the other bigger plugs like the Fairchild or the Roland Space Echo.

In the long run, getting 2 PCIe units was a "just-in-case" measure for me since I tend to run effects in busses. If you don't do that then one will be more than enough.

Gusto mo pa ang additional GAS? Kumuha ka ng Apogee 800 or yung Symphony X if you have a Mac:) You'll love it. Hearing the Rosetta (for me) was like getting a BBE Maximizer back in the day.
« Last Edit: February 20, 2007, 09:31:59 PM by abyssinianson »
ako si mimordz. 友だちからよろしくです!