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Are you confused about what mastering really is? Are you tempted to skip this important step in the process of preparing your music for distribution? Aaron Sefchick and Joe McMurray bring in the esteemed Chris Graham of Chris Graham Mastering and the Six Figure Home Studio Podcast to talk about the final polish in the process of preparing your music for release. According to Chris, mastering is “optimizing a music track for goosebumps for the most people on the maximum number of listening devices.”
Chris tells the guys his story of how he became a musician, started producing music, and fell in love with mastering. When he started his mastering business, he had the idea to put raw vs. mastered samples on his website and provide free mastering samples to new potential clients.
The guys talk about business books including The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferris. Then they discuss the podcasting world, how podcasts are making it possible for niche shows to thrive, and how podcasts provide people with the opportunity to better themselves by learning while they drive or perform other life-tasks. Then they dive into the topic of higher education and whether it pays off.
Aaron and Joe get to ask Chris lots of questions about mastering. Chris tells them that it involves compression, equalization, limiting, and much more in order to make the tracks sound consistently better, more cohesive (on an album), and often louder on as many different listening devices as possible. The guys ask Chris about his thoughts on having your tracks mixed and mastered by the same person. Chris recommends doing a “mastering contest,” in which you go to multiple different mastering engineers and ask for a free mastered song from each. Then compare the tracks and choose your favorite.
Finally, Chris, Aaron, and Joe talk about the “Loudness Wars.”
You can find Chris at:
Website: http://www.fretbuzzthepodcast.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fret_buzz_podcast/