[MLA] comment from a famous mix engineer

[Bob Katz]

Dear BL:

Our petition to the streamers is almost there! Finally: Diplomatic and 
kind but convincing. Within a few weeks we're going to put it up and 
publicize it. We have a new video that Matt Mayfield produced for us as 
he joined in with us. He introduces the issue on screen and then plays 
the original Mayfield video, then comes back to urge everyone to sign 
the petition! I sweetened the sound of Matt's on camera lavalier.

To me this is the last ditch battle in the forever war. I see no way out 
anymore other than consumer pressure for loudness normalization.

----------------------------------

Crackles and crispies! Ye gods....   clip the mix, why not  :-(

Yeah... I'm doing an incredible purist jazz album right now with a 
fabulous singer who I think could become the next Diana Krall. She has 
her own unique, hypnotic voice and character and she's drop dead gorgeous.

Fortunately the mix is very clean and actually too conservative! In fact 
I had to punch up the hot blues numbers to make them kick! That was fun 
and they love the results. What a nice turn of affairs from the usual 
squashed mixes that we have to try to open up.

However, naturally, the producer wants me to push the level of the album 
further. I'm going to find a way to do it with as little harm to the 
sound as possible, of course. Compared to your day, mine is going to be 
a pleasure.


Bob



On 2/22/16 7:12 AM, Robert Ludwig wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I just had to share this */confidentially/* with you.
> This is a note from a very famous mixing engineer to me:
>
> “The way people want to hear stuff these days, i had to try to make 
> these loud.  I used various things on "playback only" to inflate the 
> mixes but nothing was printed, and in the end the band was cool with 
> the hot level.  I just ended up having to push the desk and the 
> parallel processing to the limit.  On the songs that I felt might be 
> too hot, I lowered all the desk faders and sometimes the source 
> material and called the mix a "low level" version.
>
> Please DO NOT use these low level versions in their entirety. _Only_ 
> in the spots where u think u may need to get rid of some crackle or 
> whatever my mix chain is doing under duress and brought out later.  I 
> only did them in case you had to drastically fix some of these mixes 
> and it brings out the crackles and crispies. then the lower level 
> might allow u some room to cut a piece in or whatever....only where 
> needed if at all.”
>
> What a discouraging way to start the day!  This is so no-right.
>
> Best,
> Bob L.
>
>
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-- 

If you want good sound on your album, come to Bob Katz 407-831-0233 
DIGITAL DOMAIN MASTERING STUDIO Author: *Mastering Audio *Digital Domain 
Website <http://www.digido.com/> No trees were killed in the sending of 
this message. However a large number of electrons were terribly 
inconvenienced.*No more Plaxo, Linked-In, or any of the other 
time-suckers. Please contact me by regular email. Yes, we have a 
facebook page and a You-Tube site!*

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