Q&A with David Glenn: Mastering

A response to a subscriber question:

Wazzup Mr. Glenn!

Looking forward to the podcast! I really enjoyed the interview you did over at the HRW show, very inspiring how you've arrived where you're at and the way you manage to make music professionally (in a home studio environment).

My Questions:

I know that you do your mastering on the master fader in you mix sessions, I was curious how you handle an Album or an EP for mastering. Do you still master the same way? And if so, how do you make the tracks cohesive and balanced (against each other) when/if you master each track in isolation?

I know that you check your mixes on different speakers, but — seeing as you are mixing primarily on headphones — i was curious whether you ever do a part of your mixflow while listening in mono? I'd like to think that my mixing improved when i started mixing in mono, but I've also noticed a discrepancy between the home studio tutors and the big name professionals that intrigues me. The home studio teachers often swear by mono mixing, while guys like Andrew Schepps, CLA and Dave Pensado state quite clearly that they don't give a rats ass about mono.... I mean what's up with that!? 0_o

Thanks for what probably will be a good show! :)

[KernRamsdell]

Thank you so very much David. Your kindness is humbling and it speaks volumes about your character. Great info as per usual.  

[GustavoTrebien]

Thanks a lot for sharing one more great video! btw you're helping a newbie from Brazil here haha! Cheers!

[DesperadoStudios]

Hey Glenn! I figured i'd thank you here in youtube land as well, very cool and interesting to hear your take on this! Thx :)

[HSSLNG]

Man, I've had experience with applying a high pass filter (EQ'ing off at approx 25 Hz maybe) and hence increasing the over all volume too!
I'm glad I'm not the only one puzzled with this odd development...

[JohnnyVenekas]

The mastering engeners need headroom only because they use external gear and they have to set the hole chain balanced. They can do it also with a simple normalize but anyway.

When you put a low cut with this kind of Q there is some phase isues because of the EQ. Thats why the fabfilter that you use, have the option to set it in linear phase with more latency. Do the same with your fabfilter set to linear mode.

[_mark]

The harsher the curve the more phase shifting occurs. You can avoid this by switching the phase mode on the eq. Note that this will increase the latency.

[spreadwinner]

When I put a master limiter on my hip hop mixes my kick drums makes my car doors rattle but when I put in professional songs my car doors don't rattle. The funny thing is the pro songs kick drums hit way harder than mine without rattling my cars interior.I tried different kicks and different master limiters like L1 and ozone master limiter. I had this problem for years and I cant figure it out. 

[PatrickPleau]

Also depends if you use or not the new Pro Q 2 feature AutoGain.... but mainly its phase distortion :)

[zwirleinsoundworks]

Great vid. I've noticed the hi pass thing too. Steep curves have increased resonance at the cutoff point?

[PeteWojMusic]

Cool chat thread. I had no idea what phase distortion was either, Ha. Good stuff ;-)

[erkamau]

the explanation of boosting after the low cut EQ can be, for me, seen only in terms of PHASE. .The mix must have great problems in phase so that some sounds take away energy of other sounds that have, in their spectrum, relevant amount of energy in the low frequency (not for the first harmonic of course..). A good mix does'nt have phase problems.

[darioceliz]

Do yo think that it's because you had phase problems in the 20hrz or lower?like ghost frequencys, and with the cut you free them... :/