what do producers use to make tracks sound clean + clear

I am a newbie to this and I was wondering if anybody knew any mastering
techniques that top producers use. It seems is not as clear and crisp as stuff I hear on the radio. My stuff is mixed down in pro-tools what else do I need. i.e eq settings, pans, etc. thanks trackmaker

Personaly Im not a big fan of that radio sound that runs around the POP world at the moment and like my stuff nice and dirty..

The reasons I see for this clean sound is as follows.
1) record at 32bit and 96khz this will improve the final mixdown quality as your plugins such as eq and reverb will have a finner graunality.
2) Use high end digital gear these sound modules sound almost too clear.
3) compress everything very heavily. Group Drums, Vocals and Leads on seperate group tracks and apply more dynamics. Use multi-band compression on group tracks to highligh certain frequencies in the mix.
4) Use peak limiting +3db to bring the apparent loudness of you mix riht up.
5) Use high quality Reverb to make the mix breathe (cannot afford to do this myself so I use very little reverb)

Personally mastering is a very complex process, more often that not they use very expensive gear.. If you have a good track which you want to make a single you could take your whole pro-tools session to a professional mastering studio and let them master it.

However a good track will be recognised by someone or such and its only usually these commercial releases that get the heavy mastering touch.

JUST WONDERING THE COST FOR ME TO BRING IN A FINAL PRO TOOLS SESSION TO A STUDIO AND HAVE THEM MASTER THE TRACK FOR ME...

ANY THOUGHTS ON HOW TO TAKE 10 OF THE BEST JOINTS I HAVE TO A STUDIO TO HAVE THEM MASTERED.... WHAT IS THE COST? THANKS

usually you would mix down and master seperately. if you do your own mix and get it right then only need it mastered that is like $35/hr at this really nice studio here that the dude has worked with destiney child and all kinds of people on big labels and really knows what he is doing. a protools mixdown session is probably more, i know when we looked at recording there it was going to be like $90/hr. my friend did his 3song demo there of his acoustic music and it came out alot better than the place we ended up doing our album (that is more like $30/hr) so it really just depends on how much you want to pay, and how good you want the end product to be. if you want something really really great sounding you need real mixdown sessions with a real engineer at a real studio and then need it mastered by a real mastering house. yes you can get decent results yourself and use t-racks or izotope, that is what i do, but it will probably sound alot better alot faster if you take it to someone that specializes in mastering and has a few decades of experience under their belt.

It can be very costly. Engineers usually need at least 2 hours to mix a song. A lot of times it can be like 5 hours and that doesn't count the feedback and such. They will often ask you a lot of questions on the overall mood. Also find a reference song, the engineer might be able to help on this one too.

When you get into those situations, make sure you know what you really want. You can easily start spending thousands of dollars.

Well first of all, you gotta start with good sounding tracks/samples. That is really where it all begins. Pay attention to your signal, and be aware of gain staging. This will help you maintain a decent sound until you get your music mixed by a professional (like myself). Unless you are skilled with studio knowledge, and your ears have years of critical listening experience, you will not come up with anything that sounds like a commercial record. You're also probably not gonna find an engineer who can make "radio" sounding mixes outside of LA, NY, or Nashville. Maybe ATL. In the big time, mixing sessions are 12 hours per song. That's the standard. It's called a lockout by the studios. I charge between $600 and $1500 per song to mix, depending on the artist and budget. Professional engineers work mainly within a specific genre, so there won't be much talking about what the vibe is supposed to be like, because they (we) already know what you want. That's why you hired me. The studio will typically get anywhere from $800 to $1800 per day. That's what you're looking at for a truly professional sounding product. You'll probably be running ProTools but you won't be mixing with it, except for a few plugins or doing cool tricks (like backwards reverb) with it. Actual mixing will be done on a SSL console or, if you like that "dirty" sound, a Neve may do the trick. Mastering will NOT make your music sound good - that's what mixing is for. It's supposed to make it better, but that's not always the case. 90% of my work has been mastered at Bernie Grundman's here in Hollywood. They mess up sometimes, too. It may be in your best interest to show up for the mastering process. It won't take that long if you show up with a well made product.

Just FYI, I don't know anybody here in LA that records 32 bit, or 96k for that matter. 24 bits is a necessity, and while it's true that 96k and up theoretically sounds better, everybody's still on 44.1 or 48k. I stated here before that Dr. Dre uses HD3, but still goes in at 24/44.1k.

I'll mix your stuff if you got some cheese $$$...Hit me up.

You're also probably not gonna find an engineer who can make "radio" sounding mixes outside of LA, NY, or Nashville. Maybe ATL.

I couldnt disagree more. sugar hill studios (one of the studios i was referring to earlier) here in Houston, TX has Dan 'the man' Workman who has worked with tons of people on major labels, on commercial releases that were on the radio. people like jeff buckley and destiny's child. his studio here has big bas ass old school automated consoles like you are talking about. also has protools and racks of mastering gear. sure labels fly him out to LA to do sessions all the time, but my band went and met with him about doing our cd and he is based here soooo. Besides i dont think you had seattle on your list and if you dont count people like Terry Date as a good engineer/producer (like yourself..... right) then you are just out of your mind, or talkin mess cause you dont know what you talkin about.

Here we go again...

Dude, you should do some research before you start runnin your chops. Dan Workman, who is a well known COUNTRY/COUNTRY ROCK producer/engineer, has NOT one single mainstream RAP MIXING credit to his discography. If you haven't noticed, this website is populated mainly by lovers of urban music. Destiny's Child doesn't count, boss. Plus, I seriously doubt if he mixed that stuff in Houston. AND he's not a mastering engineer, either. So what are you talking about when you say "racks of mastering gear"? It's called outboard gear, and it's used for MIXING. Understand that? Probably not. Any real engineer can tell amateurs that he does mastering. That's just to get your money, because WE know that you don't know any better. There is ONE guy in Houston that knows his stuff, as far as urban music producing/mixing, and that's Mike Dean. He has a million dollar SSL studio there (by far the best), but he made his money here in LOS ANGELES working with Tupac and other Death Row artists. He does the majority of Scarface's stuff now. Almost every producer/engineer who makes a lot of money in the music cities will eventually move back to where they came from. LA sucks. The labels know how to get in touch with them. But that doesn't mean that you have access to them...

Also, SSL and Neve are still in business, making state of the art consoles. I never said anything about "old school". Terry Date isn't based out of Seattle, either. Although he's from there and occasionally works there, his main spot is Larrabee West here in LOS ANGELES. I have all of his Pantera records, three Deftone records, and even the Metal Church record (tape) that got him started. Yep, that's right. I even worked on something he produced, the band Cold, about 5 years ago (that was right BEFORE I became the personal engineer for the most famous rapper in the WORLD). He recorded them in Texas, but it got MIXED in Los Angeles.
If your city doesn't have an SSL equipped facility, then you are not gonna hear that "radio" sound.

So why didn't your band work with Dan the Man? I think that I know why. That goes back to my point that you PROBABLY ain't gonna find a truly professional MIXER outside of the music cities. Tom Lord-Alge lives in Miami, but he works out of Encore in LA. If you live in Miami, and you have $5000 per song to pay him, he might do your stuff for you there. You know what I'm sayin' playah? I'm only sayin what's real boss, you should listen when knowledge is being kicked down to you, instead of being confrontational. It's a gift.

I'm gonna leave out the negative stuff that I was gonna say since I am just trying to spit game. Unless you got plaques on the wall, don't try to argue with me. I'm not here to argue.

who's the most famous rapper in the world?

like i said you are ignorant if you think you can only get an "engineer who can make "radio" sounding mixes outside of LA, NY, or Nashville. Maybe ATL." your last post just proves my point. you are the one arguing.

you got plaques on the wall?

we didnt work with dan because we chose to spend more time at the studio we had used for years, as the owner there trusts me and my guitarist enough to let us engineer it ourselves and get a much better hourly rate on nights he didnt already have sessions booked. we got to go in and just take our time and record most of it for free pretty much as he didnt have to be there and could concentrate on other stuff. it was pretty much do 3 songs with dan for three times the money that we did 9 for. yes you get what you pay for and the 3 songs would have been HOT!. oh and its funny cause date recorded all 4 deftones(including the new one out next month, and the team sleep record) in seattle. but you will probably argue about that one, since you know everything as you are in cali and have all this engineering experience. you are obviously narrow minded and full of shit.....who is the rapper you are the personal dicksucker for? what is your full name, lets see you on the album credits and i will give you a call based on that.

besides you are trying to move the subject to who is the best engineer and where and the most exclusive that the poster wouldnt even be able to begin to afford to get in touch with.

if you really knew your stuff you would have simply explained that the radio sounds so hot and overcompressed because it is. it is compressed to the point of having no dynamics left at all, and then compressed some more as it is broadcasted and that all has to do with fcc regulations and signal strength and being able to get the most (loudest clearest) broadcast out to peoples radios through some very very heavy limiting.

like i said who is the rapper and what is your full name? and what album of his are you credited with? and are you in the cold credits?

Dude, if you read the "posters" first question, it asks what "top producers" do to make their music sound the way that it does. I'm only answering that question. He didn't say "How can I get my music to sound like radio without years of experience and no money?", did he? You can't do it without AT LEAST one of those.

What a dork you are boss. Who's talking about recording? I already said that you can RECORD anywhere, but MIXING is done mainly in the music cities. I know Terry Date RECORDED the Deftones in Seattle, but he MIXES in Los Angeles. Mixing is where the professional sound really comes into play. As a matter of fact, during the "Around the Fur" sessions, a band that I was producing went to Seattle, Stone Gossard's studio if I remember correctly, on an invite from the 'Tones to hang with them while it was goin' down...

Your last paragraph about what radio does to music doesn't make any sense. Try to write so we can understand you, please. Radio compression has nothing to do with it. I think that most people that do music know that radio squashes the piss out of everything. And just because they compress everything doesn't mean that it's gonna sound good. Listen to Nelly's "Air Force One" as an example of that.

The problem here is that you THINK that you know what you're talking about, but nothing could be further from the truth. You ain't gonna get nowhere with that attitude. You'll still be in Houston, wishing that you could work with guys like me.

A few months back, some other cat tried to challenge me about some bull-ish like you. When I sent him a personal message and told him who I was, he wrote back in all CAPS sayin, "I'm sorry!" I'm not gonna give you that pleasure, because that guy didn't try to get nasty about it and try to insult me like you did. If you think hard enough about who's the most famous rapper, you can go to his website and get a link to mine.

What are "cold credits"? Never heard of that. If that's the artist's special thanx list, then I'm on there. Ususally the first one mentioned after family shout-outs. If it's for individual song credits, then I'm on there, too. Recorded by AND Mixed by. Well, on that Santana album that won 10 Grammys, I'm only on the song credits...

My previous post only proves that I know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. I think that this thread is finished.

did you claim to work on the cold cd with Date??? that is cold credits? like i said 3 TIMES IN A ROW....
1. What is your Full Name (as it is credited on the releases you are credited on)
2. Who is this Rapper???
3. What plaques you got on your wall chief???
still waitin.....

oh and just to confirm if you ever come through with this info im gonna look it up in the credits and give you a call based on that and see if the person listed on the albums has any idea who the **** 'freq' on mpc-tutor .com is. you come through and check out and i will admit that you arent completely full of shit, but right now i think you are a punk liar.

freq wrote: There is ONE guy in Houston that knows his stuff, as far as urban music producing/mixing, and that's Mike Dean. He has a million dollar SSL studio there (by far the best), but he made his money here in LOS ANGELES working with Tupac and other Death Row artists. He does the majority of Scarface's stuff now. Almost every producer/engineer who makes a lot of money in the music cities will eventually move back to where they came from. LA sucks. The labels know how to get in touch with them. But that doesn't mean that you have access to them...

.

mike dean is the man....not only is he a producer,mixer,recording engineer and a mastering engineer...he is a real musician...his specialty is classical music but he bangs out songs like any of the good producers out there.....he mastered and mixed the scarface album "the fix" on def jam along with numerous rap a lot albums he co produced, mixed and mastered D.PG. "dillinger and young gotti".....and there is a cd i heard that was messed at bernie grundman's mastering and this album is dj quik "under the influence" i really think quik should have this album remastered and get those damn hi's fixed....i doubt it was quiks fault because i have always heard good mixes from quik and his whole album sound dull.......but bernie grundman's mastering has mastered a ton of album that came out good like all of death rows albums, michael jackson albums, quincy jones albums, dr. dre's albums, and dj quik's other albums, so messing with him will cost you doe

Hey look at that! There's peeps in here that know and respect G A M E!!!

I haven't heard Quik's latest, but you're right about his stuff usually sounding tight as hell. I usually tell people that I have 2 studio mentors - Gerry Brown (R. Saddiq/Vanessa Williams) and DJ Quik. Without working with them, I'd still be one of those guys who thinks that they know more than they do. Quik taught me how to use an Ampex 2-track machine!!! Trip out on that! I haven't seen him in a couple of years, though. He's so dope...