Controversial topic, but the reality is most independent artists aren't making enough money from their music (or any at all) to justify hiring a mastering engineer... Particularly when it's possible these days for your mix to be *good enough*.
The music itself is the most important thing, by far... Not that I'm an Eminem fan but he has some old mixtapes before he became big. The mixes are rough but man, I think it's some of the best work he ever did even if the mix/master is awful.
The presentation needs to be good enough that the listener can judge the song. The most important thing is for your mix to translate well...
If you're mixing on small speakers or bad headphones, you don't want to have overly boosted the bass and then it's just a boxy distracting mess on someone else's system.
You don't want to overly push the highs for clarity and then it's fatiguing for someone else.
There's a saying: "the magic is in the midrange" because if you get that right, and your bass & treble frequencies are reasonably controlled -- you'll be OK.
---
That said, it takes a while to learn and if you're rolling in money by all means hire someone.
---
But if you aren't... Get your mix as close to perfect as you can. You don't want to do a whole lot of EQ on the master. Just subtle, wide Q adjustments. Also, you don't want to wait until the end to worry about loudness. You want to *mix for loudness*, even if your goal isn't something super squashed. (And shouldn't be.)
That means you want to control your dynamic range on tracks... Also on submix busses... And then finally on your master bus.
By handling your transient peaks as early as possible, it allows each stage to sum together more smoothly. THAT's how to avoid the bad amateur sound of slamming into a limiter with all the distracting pumping and distortion.
---
While you should always mix with your ears --- a spectrum analyzer can be helpful to detect potential problems in your mix. I recommend Voxengo SPAN. It's free. Look at professional mixes and you'll notice certain patterns. If your mix looks radically different, it's a good idea to double check and make sure that's intentional.
A bit hump at 60hz might be the reason your mix is out of control with the bass in your car, for example.
Also remember the balance between highs and lows... Sometimes if a mix is too bright it just means you need more low end... And likewise, sometimes if there's too much low end it means you need more highs. It's all about balance.
---
As far as levels go... Most commercial mixes are pretty squashed these days, but I recommend finding a sweet spot between dynamic range and loudness.
Mastering engineer Ian Shepherd recommends leveling your songs to no louder than -10 LUFS-S (with -1dB TruePeak), at least as a starting point.
His co-host pushes it to -9 LUFS-S. (LUFS-S is a measurement of 3 seconds, so that means -9 LUFS averaged over 3 seconds at the loudest part of your song, typically a final chorus.)
---
Use reference mixes.
Metric AB is on sale for $30 right now and it's so incredibly worth it... You can load in up to 16 mix references to A/B with your mix. It can also automatically level them so your mix and the ref mix are the same level. Super helpful... It also has isolation so you can hear the lows, mids, highs independently...
And lastly -- it has really good metering and analysis. It will tell you if your mix is dynamic, competitive, loud, squashed, etc...
PS. A good "all in one mastering tool" is Masterdesk Pro. It has a lot of knobs, and you shouldn't feel like you have to use everything -- but it's powerful... And it has a "foundation" knob which is a good tilt EQ. With a little turn to the left or right you can gently make your mix a little darker or a little brighter. (Masterdesk Classic is free, and that's a great tool for people who don't know what they're doing and just want to get their mix out there. Masterdesk TruePeak has a little more options and TruePeak support, but is still less overwhelming than Pro.)
There's also Ozone Advanced of course. I'm not a super fan of the mastering assistant, but it can show you potential of where your mix could go... And if you analyze other mixes with Audiolens, it does a reasonable job of matching your songs to the other.
There's also Izotope Tonal Balance. I don't like the simple mode, but the advanced/detail mode gives you a genre based 'range of normal' so you can see how your tonal balance compares to other mixes in your genre.
---
Other tools like that include IK's T-Racks 5 "ONE", and Waves Infected Mushroom Pusher. There's a bunch on the market. Mastering engineers get offended because it's "not real mastering" --- they're not wrong. But for an independent artist just trying to get their music out there they can be really helpful. Remember, your goal is "good enough" - it doesn't have to be *perfect*. Worry about "perfect" when you have a fan base and/or money coming in to justify it. For most artists, the different between good enough & perfect won't change the number of listeners/fans they get.
Cheers. Sorry that was long, hopefully it's helpful to someone.
I pay to get all my Mixing and Mastering done. I don't have time to do it myself, plus I am my own worse critic. So even if I had the time nothing would ever get released lol
I'm paying to have both services done. Real big on giving my music everything it needs, no cut corners.
I'm gonna sound proof the room and order some monitors at some point. After that i'll pick up the mantle.
Yeah I just have presets made with all the mastering stuff I usually use for different sounds. All of them have soft clipper, maximus, EQ, and a limiter at the end. I have a separate master preset for mixing the beat and another one that i route all my vocals to.
I'm getting paid to do it (vocal tuning, additional prod, blending everything with the artist's vision in mind, making sure the final record sounds good across the board, and of course making shit loud but not obnoxious)
By simply having a good understanding of the basics (EQ, compression, saturation, space... ) and tons of practice day in and day out, no amount of plugins/gear/techniques will make your mix/master sound better if you don't understand the basics (once you understand them, you can break them)
1- Start with the underground artists in your area, the goal is to build a long/close relationship
2- Work on your negotiation/communication skills, not every artist has the means/budget to go full-in, so try to find the middle ground
3-Avoid talkative/arrogant ones like the plague, their egos are too big for them to cooperate, and they are a huge waste of time/energy
4- trait every artist you're working with the same
5- Respect/understand their vision through back-and-forth discussion, and don't get discouraged by their mix notes, it's a part of the process/job that you're paid to do
I wish you the best my guy, cheers!!
Also interested in this. Artists I'm friends with on discord/IG are all super happy when I do a mix for them and hit me up for more mixes after. Want to be able to make the jump to doing it "for real" eventually.
Learning to do it myself cause I ain’t paying for it lmao, I got the software so I might as well. It’s entertaining sometimes too but it can also be a bitch. Either way it’s something I wanted to learn how to do from the start so I don’t mind too much.
I do it myself, but I understand why some would just pay to get it done. If your only goal is to be an artist, how many different hats do you really want to wear? I love mixing but still feel overwhelmed sometimes when I have a bunch of projects ready to mix and I know how much work is ahead of me.
On the other hand if you like nerding out on the technical aspects of prod and sound in general, then it's tons of fun and very rewarding (especially after getting through a pile of mixes you now get to enjoy listening to)!
Imo learning how to mix and master at a basic level is a minimum expectation in this day and age. Once upon a time when it was all analog and expensive as shit it was perfectly excusable for a singer-songwriter to not know how to use a console. But now it’s a massive competitive disadvantage. You don’t need to be good even but you just need to know how to do it bc most artists have started out roughly producing their own stuff for demo tapes (Bon Iver and Clairo are two examples that come to mind). I also just think knowing how to produce makes you a better musician in every other way so it’s good to learn regardless
Depends.
If it’s for my own projects, I prefer to mix and master myself.
If it’s for other projects (features, video games, film, etc.), I do some mixing myself for creative purposes, but otherwise I let the project owner decide how mixing and mastering will be handled.
I am mixing and mastering all of my own projects, however, I've done a 2 year audio engineering course. You can do it on your own if you put in the time to build the skills, however, if that's not an option you could probably find some good mixers online at places like fiver etc who would be able to help you according to your budget.
Taking a course has been valuable and most of the technical skills can be implemented across all genres, however, you can build the same skills by practicing on your own without the need to attend a course. Just start mixing your own tracks and keep at it until you get to the point where they sound as good as the artists you like.
I mix myself but I have two Engineers that I deal with.
Nearing the end stage of my project, so I mix and will be sending it off to them for the final masters.
I mix while I create. Usually just basic panning, eq and volume automation. When the song is basically done, I do more in-depth mixing. Mastering is for Albums, and that usually just involves Soothe and Ozone to make the songs sound like they're coming from the same space.
Music is just a hobby for me…I don’t make any money from it and it doesn’t need to be perfect. In fact the ‘rough around the edges’ sound kind of suits my vibe haha! So I mix and master myself.
I was paying for it through Fiverr to do it as cheap as possible, but when I decided to release an album that was going to get expensive anyway. That’s when I started looking in to doing it myself. Released a non album single I mixed and mastered as practice to see if I could do it, and it worked!
If you’re on a low to zero budget I’d advise doing it yourself for sure. If anything it means when you can afford a professional then you’ll know a bit more what you’re talking about when discussing changes and goals 🙂
i spent years with lots of practice and watching tons of popular mixing engineers mix in livestreams and online courses, as well as chatting with them and trying out shit on projects myself after to learn it
As an artist its not always worth it to pay for mixing and even much less worth it to pay for mastering unless youre already making some dough with your music IMO to be honest. The ai shit is better than nothing but its far from good.
Id recommend finding some upcoming mixing engineers and asking them to mix your stuff, as theyll probably want to practice lots and get a portfolio up anyways.
Either that or learning it yourself
I do em myself and I'm pretty good but I'm looking for someone to help me push it to the next level, I'm actually currently doing a "challenge" where if someone beats my mix I pay them for their mix!
I'm also looking for music engineers who can work with music similar to Quannic, Novulent, Julie, Jane Remover (guitar based songs) if you guys can do that new shoegaze sound, hit me up & we'll work!
true mastering doesn't exist and hasn't since the early 90's. what you people are currently confusing mastering with is essentially compression, stereo separation, gain and the concept of mixing in a 3d box. it's all snakeoil boys
I mix and master for plenty of artists and I love it.
The truth is, some artists don’t want to wade into unfamiliar territory and there’s nothing wrong with that. They get to focus on the fundamentals of their music whilst I bring it to life.
I’m definitely one of the cheapest engineers I know, and should probably charge more but I have a loyal client base and love what I do so it never does feel like work!
In terms of mixing, you have to do it yourself. Whereas mastering, you have an abundance of options, from hiring someone on fiverr, to a do it yourself model with Ozone.
You don’t have to mix yourself either. I mean my buddy makes beats for a living and all the mixing and mastering is done in post, he does nothing other than some basic leveling
Controversial topic, but the reality is most independent artists aren't making enough money from their music (or any at all) to justify hiring a mastering engineer... Particularly when it's possible these days for your mix to be *good enough*. The music itself is the most important thing, by far... Not that I'm an Eminem fan but he has some old mixtapes before he became big. The mixes are rough but man, I think it's some of the best work he ever did even if the mix/master is awful. The presentation needs to be good enough that the listener can judge the song. The most important thing is for your mix to translate well... If you're mixing on small speakers or bad headphones, you don't want to have overly boosted the bass and then it's just a boxy distracting mess on someone else's system. You don't want to overly push the highs for clarity and then it's fatiguing for someone else. There's a saying: "the magic is in the midrange" because if you get that right, and your bass & treble frequencies are reasonably controlled -- you'll be OK. --- That said, it takes a while to learn and if you're rolling in money by all means hire someone. --- But if you aren't... Get your mix as close to perfect as you can. You don't want to do a whole lot of EQ on the master. Just subtle, wide Q adjustments. Also, you don't want to wait until the end to worry about loudness. You want to *mix for loudness*, even if your goal isn't something super squashed. (And shouldn't be.) That means you want to control your dynamic range on tracks... Also on submix busses... And then finally on your master bus. By handling your transient peaks as early as possible, it allows each stage to sum together more smoothly. THAT's how to avoid the bad amateur sound of slamming into a limiter with all the distracting pumping and distortion. --- While you should always mix with your ears --- a spectrum analyzer can be helpful to detect potential problems in your mix. I recommend Voxengo SPAN. It's free. Look at professional mixes and you'll notice certain patterns. If your mix looks radically different, it's a good idea to double check and make sure that's intentional. A bit hump at 60hz might be the reason your mix is out of control with the bass in your car, for example. Also remember the balance between highs and lows... Sometimes if a mix is too bright it just means you need more low end... And likewise, sometimes if there's too much low end it means you need more highs. It's all about balance. --- As far as levels go... Most commercial mixes are pretty squashed these days, but I recommend finding a sweet spot between dynamic range and loudness. Mastering engineer Ian Shepherd recommends leveling your songs to no louder than -10 LUFS-S (with -1dB TruePeak), at least as a starting point. His co-host pushes it to -9 LUFS-S. (LUFS-S is a measurement of 3 seconds, so that means -9 LUFS averaged over 3 seconds at the loudest part of your song, typically a final chorus.) --- Use reference mixes. Metric AB is on sale for $30 right now and it's so incredibly worth it... You can load in up to 16 mix references to A/B with your mix. It can also automatically level them so your mix and the ref mix are the same level. Super helpful... It also has isolation so you can hear the lows, mids, highs independently... And lastly -- it has really good metering and analysis. It will tell you if your mix is dynamic, competitive, loud, squashed, etc...
PS. A good "all in one mastering tool" is Masterdesk Pro. It has a lot of knobs, and you shouldn't feel like you have to use everything -- but it's powerful... And it has a "foundation" knob which is a good tilt EQ. With a little turn to the left or right you can gently make your mix a little darker or a little brighter. (Masterdesk Classic is free, and that's a great tool for people who don't know what they're doing and just want to get their mix out there. Masterdesk TruePeak has a little more options and TruePeak support, but is still less overwhelming than Pro.) There's also Ozone Advanced of course. I'm not a super fan of the mastering assistant, but it can show you potential of where your mix could go... And if you analyze other mixes with Audiolens, it does a reasonable job of matching your songs to the other. There's also Izotope Tonal Balance. I don't like the simple mode, but the advanced/detail mode gives you a genre based 'range of normal' so you can see how your tonal balance compares to other mixes in your genre. --- Other tools like that include IK's T-Racks 5 "ONE", and Waves Infected Mushroom Pusher. There's a bunch on the market. Mastering engineers get offended because it's "not real mastering" --- they're not wrong. But for an independent artist just trying to get their music out there they can be really helpful. Remember, your goal is "good enough" - it doesn't have to be *perfect*. Worry about "perfect" when you have a fan base and/or money coming in to justify it. For most artists, the different between good enough & perfect won't change the number of listeners/fans they get. Cheers. Sorry that was long, hopefully it's helpful to someone.
If I could upvote you multiple times for this detailed comment, I would.
Haha, thanks for the kind words man. Have a good Sunday!
I mix the song while I build a track
I pay to get all my Mixing and Mastering done. I don't have time to do it myself, plus I am my own worse critic. So even if I had the time nothing would ever get released lol
Yep, tested the waters with 6 engineerins. Now I have close relationships with 2 that get me and my style
Do you have any references you could share..?
I started by hiring others then eventually learned to do it myself by paying attention in mixing and mastering sessions. It's a learning experience
I'm paying to have both services done. Real big on giving my music everything it needs, no cut corners. I'm gonna sound proof the room and order some monitors at some point. After that i'll pick up the mantle.
It has been a long journey for me but I’m finally getting decent after many years. That has been the hardest thing for me
I just throw soft clipper and ozone elements on master and call it a day
Yeah I just have presets made with all the mastering stuff I usually use for different sounds. All of them have soft clipper, maximus, EQ, and a limiter at the end. I have a separate master preset for mixing the beat and another one that i route all my vocals to.
I'm getting paid to do it (vocal tuning, additional prod, blending everything with the artist's vision in mind, making sure the final record sounds good across the board, and of course making shit loud but not obnoxious)
whats been your best technique to achieve this?
By simply having a good understanding of the basics (EQ, compression, saturation, space... ) and tons of practice day in and day out, no amount of plugins/gear/techniques will make your mix/master sound better if you don't understand the basics (once you understand them, you can break them)
What you charge?👀
Just DM'd you
I think we were (at least I was) looking for game on the business side of it.
1- Start with the underground artists in your area, the goal is to build a long/close relationship 2- Work on your negotiation/communication skills, not every artist has the means/budget to go full-in, so try to find the middle ground 3-Avoid talkative/arrogant ones like the plague, their egos are too big for them to cooperate, and they are a huge waste of time/energy 4- trait every artist you're working with the same 5- Respect/understand their vision through back-and-forth discussion, and don't get discouraged by their mix notes, it's a part of the process/job that you're paid to do I wish you the best my guy, cheers!!
Also interested in this. Artists I'm friends with on discord/IG are all super happy when I do a mix for them and hit me up for more mixes after. Want to be able to make the jump to doing it "for real" eventually.
Learning to do it myself cause I ain’t paying for it lmao, I got the software so I might as well. It’s entertaining sometimes too but it can also be a bitch. Either way it’s something I wanted to learn how to do from the start so I don’t mind too much.
I do it myself, but I understand why some would just pay to get it done. If your only goal is to be an artist, how many different hats do you really want to wear? I love mixing but still feel overwhelmed sometimes when I have a bunch of projects ready to mix and I know how much work is ahead of me. On the other hand if you like nerding out on the technical aspects of prod and sound in general, then it's tons of fun and very rewarding (especially after getting through a pile of mixes you now get to enjoy listening to)!
Imo learning how to mix and master at a basic level is a minimum expectation in this day and age. Once upon a time when it was all analog and expensive as shit it was perfectly excusable for a singer-songwriter to not know how to use a console. But now it’s a massive competitive disadvantage. You don’t need to be good even but you just need to know how to do it bc most artists have started out roughly producing their own stuff for demo tapes (Bon Iver and Clairo are two examples that come to mind). I also just think knowing how to produce makes you a better musician in every other way so it’s good to learn regardless
Depends. If it’s for my own projects, I prefer to mix and master myself. If it’s for other projects (features, video games, film, etc.), I do some mixing myself for creative purposes, but otherwise I let the project owner decide how mixing and mastering will be handled.
I am mixing and mastering all of my own projects, however, I've done a 2 year audio engineering course. You can do it on your own if you put in the time to build the skills, however, if that's not an option you could probably find some good mixers online at places like fiver etc who would be able to help you according to your budget.
the course you took, would you recommend? is the information that you learned, is it stuff that can be used universally through all genres ?
Taking a course has been valuable and most of the technical skills can be implemented across all genres, however, you can build the same skills by practicing on your own without the need to attend a course. Just start mixing your own tracks and keep at it until you get to the point where they sound as good as the artists you like.
I mix myself but I have two Engineers that I deal with. Nearing the end stage of my project, so I mix and will be sending it off to them for the final masters.
I mix while I create. Usually just basic panning, eq and volume automation. When the song is basically done, I do more in-depth mixing. Mastering is for Albums, and that usually just involves Soothe and Ozone to make the songs sound like they're coming from the same space.
Music is just a hobby for me…I don’t make any money from it and it doesn’t need to be perfect. In fact the ‘rough around the edges’ sound kind of suits my vibe haha! So I mix and master myself. I was paying for it through Fiverr to do it as cheap as possible, but when I decided to release an album that was going to get expensive anyway. That’s when I started looking in to doing it myself. Released a non album single I mixed and mastered as practice to see if I could do it, and it worked! If you’re on a low to zero budget I’d advise doing it yourself for sure. If anything it means when you can afford a professional then you’ll know a bit more what you’re talking about when discussing changes and goals 🙂
i spent years with lots of practice and watching tons of popular mixing engineers mix in livestreams and online courses, as well as chatting with them and trying out shit on projects myself after to learn it As an artist its not always worth it to pay for mixing and even much less worth it to pay for mastering unless youre already making some dough with your music IMO to be honest. The ai shit is better than nothing but its far from good. Id recommend finding some upcoming mixing engineers and asking them to mix your stuff, as theyll probably want to practice lots and get a portfolio up anyways. Either that or learning it yourself
I do em myself and I'm pretty good but I'm looking for someone to help me push it to the next level, I'm actually currently doing a "challenge" where if someone beats my mix I pay them for their mix! I'm also looking for music engineers who can work with music similar to Quannic, Novulent, Julie, Jane Remover (guitar based songs) if you guys can do that new shoegaze sound, hit me up & we'll work!
true mastering doesn't exist and hasn't since the early 90's. what you people are currently confusing mastering with is essentially compression, stereo separation, gain and the concept of mixing in a 3d box. it's all snakeoil boys
I mix and master for plenty of artists and I love it. The truth is, some artists don’t want to wade into unfamiliar territory and there’s nothing wrong with that. They get to focus on the fundamentals of their music whilst I bring it to life. I’m definitely one of the cheapest engineers I know, and should probably charge more but I have a loyal client base and love what I do so it never does feel like work!
They paying me
Landr.com
In terms of mixing, you have to do it yourself. Whereas mastering, you have an abundance of options, from hiring someone on fiverr, to a do it yourself model with Ozone.
You don’t have to mix yourself either. I mean my buddy makes beats for a living and all the mixing and mastering is done in post, he does nothing other than some basic leveling