Music Video: Filmed!… and about audio mastering…

Hiya!
The music video for “Thank You” has been filmed and it’s almost done being edited.
Like I said in my video blog:

Here’s some photos of the shoot:

 

The album is done being mixed, reviewed and adjusted….

And Now! here’s something interesting…

Audio Mastering.
If you’re not a musician you probably heard of “remastered” versions of some old records that’s often done for new media or to adapt the old stuff to the new ears a little bit…
Although I’m all for keeping it authentic and how it was done at the time, sometimes it is good to do that for old vinyl records so they sound good on CDs or mp3s too.
Well I’m now in the process of getting this record mastered, last step before duplication, and well if you want to do it right it’s not something where you pick anyone- it’s done-that’s it. Plus you can’t really pick the place in advance cos it all depends on how your songs mixes came out, and how it comes to your ears once it’s at that step.
For my past records I must say it all went smoothly and I had never really paid attention to it, for “a taste of departure” with Phizzy Lager Troy had taken it to a studio in Canton and all I remembered was that when we heard it it sounded 10 times bigger and shinier than the mixes. For Hate Dies Hard, Bill Korecky had mastered it directly after the mixes and I had noticed the compression on the songs but it sounded great. For the EP, Mr. Urselli had done the same thing and I hadn’t really noticed much difference with the pre-masters. And for “Will you hate the rest of the world or will you renew your life?”, Sean B. did it all digitally out of his A New Deal Studio and it sounded good.
From what I’m learning now about audio mastering from reading and hanging out in mastering studios with engineers, it’s not just about adding brightness, and volume or clarity, you can really give a shape to your songs and there’s quite an amount of additional depth you can give to it, especially when the album has different tones in it. There’s also the risk of “taking away from the mixes” and you don’t want that. I surprised myself when I realized I could hear “that stuff”, seriously! It would be easier if I didn’t hear these things and just forget about it and sleep well at night and release this record in 3 days, but hey no it needs that special treat, my crazy ears got it so here I am. The funny thing is that I explained and showed what I was hearing to other musicians and non musicians and they sorta “Feel it”, so there, if I hear it anyone can and that’s always the most important thing. And by the way big thanks to co-writer Sam Scozzari for lending his ears and reading my crazy text messages at 1 in the morning. (We got another song together on this album)… and Big big hugs to Steve Blankenship for his support and sharing his experience, advice and wisdom with me. I missed having a band during this time and it was nice to hear “I’m not completely crazy”.

How I review masters?
I listen to it on Bose stereo speakers from my laptop, then in the living-room stereo, then simple Altec computer speakers, burn a CD and walk to my car take a listen there (that’s the BEST!), make neighbors think I’m crazy cos I’m in the car for half an hour but not leaving (lol), then import the song into iTunes, throw it onto my iPod Nano, listen to it at home…. and now the best stuff: listen to it on the train, walking on the street in Manhattan with the crazy city hum, and of course compare it to other artists on the iPod. When I say “compare it”, I mean I look for volume differences and whether treble mids and lows are balanced.
Now I could get REALLY crazy and compare it on different Apple devices since they have different sound chips but hey I’m not THAT nuts…
Anyways a great master should sound good EVERYWHERE. End of the story.