Yes that would be nice, but I also need something within my budget…
I gather you referring to CPF’s post above, Paul. Yeah, since they don’t publish their rates on their websites, my guess is that it would be pretty expensive. I’m happy to pay a reasonable amount, but I don’t have the budget of a major label!
Cool, thanks Eric.
Personally, I was pretty happy with Mango overall, especially considering that the ME never had my “faux master” as a reference. I auditioned the mixes on a number of different systems, and Mango seemed to translate best.
I’ve been in contact with the ME, and he said he’d be happy to do revisions without additional charge, should they be necessary… I still have the final mix to complete (and it’s a doozy), so we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.
Thanks Tensen…yeah, I really didn’t consider automated mastering, because basically, it doesn’t perform one of the other main things that I want from an ME, which is to get a second set of Un-biased ears to review and adjust.
Also vitally important to me is getting a group of songs to work together as a cohesive whole - to flow from one song to another in an album format.
Automated mastering by definition can’t do these things.
I’m not opposed to it per se, and no doubt it does provide value for some people - I just don’t see it working for me in this situation.
As far as getting the mix up to a good level, and getting it eq’d - which IS the domain of automated mastering - I think I can do (and have done) a reasonable job of that myself.
There are also otherthings the real ME will provide for me that are important to me, and often get overlooked in the mastering discussion. For example DDP CD authoring & ISRC encoding. Granted, I could do these things myself too, but it’s nice to not have to spend extra time researching and learning the ins and outs of something I’ll probably only ever do once in a blue moon.
Barry Diament charges $350 an hour with a standard album taking 12 hours to master so that’s $4,200. Singles are done much quicker, and he’s been known to offer discounts to indie artists if he likes the music. I don’t know about Ludwig.
I’ve worked with this company in the past, and I’m very impressed with what Dave does at what I feel is a reasonable price. He’s mastered stuff I’ve produced, tracked, mixed, and every time the stuff comes back it sounds incredible. I would talk to this guy first if I was sending him my own song, even if I had to pay for it myself.
it was a no brainer for my preference - I like Mango (much more glued and rock solid). As a hard rock/Rock n Roll fan, I appreciated that mix a lot more than other 2 mixes.
I do like the vocals from Pineapple (but that could be because of the way you have the space defined)
they have just a tad bit of modern day polish , Chris Daughtry style. In mango they are a bit more classic-ish
didnt care for dragonfuit much.
– edit–
just realized you published the results that was quick, but it was as I had suspected.
ResultsThis is actually a mastering test.
All the files are mastered from the same source mix file.
Pineapple: Slammed/Hyped/Compressed sample master from mastering engineer.
Dragonfruit: My original "Faux Master"
Mango: The more “open” less compressed sample master from the mastering engineer.
Lenient compression usually wins hearts for rock n roll Mastering - crunch, gritty low end roars, not too much processing. The key is how you put mix together, doesnt take much to glue a rock track and doesnt take much to unglue it all.
First off, fantastic sounding mixes overall. Really all sounded great on their own. Very impressive! Loved the song, too. Nice guitar playing and vocals.
To my ear, I pick:
Pineapple
Mango
then Dragonfruit.
The guitar in Dragonfruit lacked a bit of top end compared to the others.
For me, it is a very close call between Pineapple and Mango. The biggest difference i hear is in the low mids, which is definitely more prominent on Mango which I would normally tend to like, but it brings in just a hair too much thump and perhaps a teensy bit congested (I mean an infinitesimally small amount). If the emphasis was shifted slightly lower that might make a difference.
I love a big low end, too, so I would be agonizing on picking Pineapple over Mango, but I think Pineapple would be my pick overall.
Nice work, in any event. Looking forward to hearing more mixes.
Lenient compression usually wins hearts for rock n roll Mastering - crunch, gritty low end roars, not too much processing. The key is how you put mix together, doesnt take much to glue a rock track and doesnt take much to unglue it all.
Cool, thanks Michelle - always great to get more input. Totally agree with that last statement too.
Thanks Kevin - I really appreciate the careful listen and thoughtful comments. Should have another mix finished soon hopefully.
Hey Andrew, you need to run these tests a little longer so us slower folks have time to find them and give unbiased feedback. Also, you should name the different mixes “A”, “B”, “C” so as not to bias those with stronger fruit preferences.
