16 - Mastering Overview

We're continuing part 2 of the viewer questions in this week's episode. We'll be covering the file formats for mastering, how we approach recording a band and recommendations for microphones for vocals. This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni  Download our free bands foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/ FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/ IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords  IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/  Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/ YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio

Are you an aspiring musician, music producer or sound engineer looking for answers to your burning questions? Look no further! This week and next week, we've dedicated our time to answering production-related questions that we've received from our community on social media, via email, and through other channels. We'll be diving into a variety of topics, including sound cards for mixing, recommendations for getting started in the industry, and even our thoughts on the infamous Simon Cowell. But that's not all - we'll also be providing recommendations for websites where you can download multitrack files to practice your mixing skills . If you're passionate about music production or just curious to learn more, then you won't want to miss this! Join us on our Production Workshop April 11-13th 2023 http://www.sessionrecall.com/leedersvale  for more details Download our free band foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/ This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni Download our free band foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist  Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/ Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/ FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/ IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine  Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/ YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio  

If you're new to the session Recall podcast, these are a few of the highlights we've had over the first 16 episodes. We have stories from recording sessions, advice for musicians and engineers and insight into the music business.

We're focusing on mastering this week and our approaches to it, why we still use external mastering engineers when possible and Nick recounts on his stories from his time with Teenage Fanclub and getting their record mastering by Greg Calbi. Join us on our production workshop HTTP://www.sessionrecall.com/leedersvale  This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni  Download our free band foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist  Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/community  Leeders Vale Studio - http://www.leedersvale.com  Greg Calbi -https://sterling-sound.com/grammy/greg-calbi/   Pete Maher - HTTP://www.petemaher.com  Abbey Road Mastering - https://www.abbeyroad.com/online-mastering Studio Orbita Senora - https://orbitasonora.com/ Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/ FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/ IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords  IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/ Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/ YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio  

In this episode Nick and Jon dive into the world of Mixing, we discuss approaches to mixing, in the box, hardware, hybrid mixing and  how approaches change when working on work we've produced ourselves as opposed to working on other peoples work and our experience of working with higher tier mix engineers. Join our music production workshop at Leeders Vale http://www.sessionrecall.com/leedersvale Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/ FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/ IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprec... IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/ Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/  YT -     / jonconstudio   Chapters 00:00 - Intro // Small talk 00:50 - What's your approach to mixing? 07:00 - ITB, Recalls and Edits 8:12 - Sending Files to Pro Mixers 9:58 - Do you miss hardware? 13:05 - Piling on the plugins 15:57 - The difference between plugins and outboard 17:55 - What top level mixers bring to the table 19:20 - How we like to receive files 22:40 - Mix Changes 24:54 - Templates 27:51 - Leeders Vale Workshop

This episode came about from our discussion of the roles a producer may be responsible for but isn't often get talked in the recording education space or often overlooked. Nick discusses his experience of working in house at Rockfield Studios, working for Rick Rubin on a Donovan record with Nigel Kennedy that was effectively a remote session way before remote sessions were a thing. We also discuss how education has changed and looking at the work experience position and how some institutes used to fall down due to teaching a topic or record production with limited or no experience. Join us on our 3day music production workshop April http://www.sessionrecall.com/leedersvale  This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni  Download our free bands foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/   Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall  Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall  IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/  FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled  Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/  IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/  Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/ YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio Chapters 00:00 - Small Talk, Vocalzones 0:52 - Are there different roles and types of producers? 6:05 - Has the role of a producer changed? Educations approach and redefining the terms 10:15 - Where degrees can fall down 11:52 - Rick Rubin 16:20 - The transition from Tape to Pro Tools 18:38 - Owen Morris and Noel Gallaghers relation producing Oasis 20:30 - Making decisions and committing to them 24:00 - Leeders Vale Workshop

This episode is a solo episode from Jon that's focusing on advice for musicians who might be recording or mixing themselves and will also be appropriate to new engineers and producers who want some advice on areas to help their career when starting out as a producer within the music industry. Order of the day  You don’t need to buy that expensive upgrade,  A lot of the consumer technology today is pretty amazing, you don’t need to sped 2 grand on a new sound card and 1,000 on a microphone. As your career develops this can be useful  Welsh clwb work experience - learn to work with what you’ve got Try put off buying the thing you want for another another week, another month.  Audient ID range mic preamps have been lifted directly from their consoles and its a great preamp which we use all the time, in fact their8 channel preamp can be bought for amazing value second hand. We use this all the time in the studio  Musicians won’t care about the gear you’re using, they’re more interested in the sound you get.  Try working with what you have, a good monitoring environment and a decent set of speakers don’t have to break the bank.   Your room is more important When mixing or recording, the room you’re recording in will have the biggest impact on the overall sound of the recording. In the mixing sense sometimes it can colour your mix, a small room when recording drums buyt there are tools that can help you  here. The investment into your room will provide the biggest response.  Acoustic filters - When these first came out, I used to use it all the time thinking it was helping with my room. We’ve recently seen townsend labs bringing out modelling mics that let you compensate for using these…. Long story short, I’ve stopped using it. The reason being was it was more effective to put panels behind  the person recording than it was implementing it.  Acoustic treatment - try to avoid the foam stuff panels if you cna help it,DIY and self made panels are great and a company like GIK acoustics will make your room sound a lot better. There are usually room packs  Room correction software, this can  be great on its own but even better when combined with treating your room. The idea behind the technology is it will measure the acoustic response of your room by sending a frequency sweep of some kind to a measurement microphone and allow you to compensate for peaks or troughs in your room and blend .  Mixing - Turn it down So we’ve started with the room and equipment now let's jump into the mixing your tracks. This is the most common issue I see when helping students in the past.  The most common issue I see all the time is mixes in Logic hitting a +10 on the master bus. Most of the time people have done this because they’re listening on laptop speakers or the monitoring environment isn’t loud enough. Everything sounds exciting but this will get rejected by a mastering engineer or DSPs if we’re uploading them to Spotify/CD Baby.  As you’re mixing, keep an eye on the master bus, and try to make sure you’re not clipping, there are a couple of tricks we can do to automate this in a mix and keep the balances set which we may come back to in another podcast.  Do the opposite of what you want to do  The final part of this episode links back to previous point and is recommended whether your in the studio or in live sound and that is doing the opposite of what you want to do If the drums are too quiet, turn the guitars down If you want to turn the vocals up, perhaps have all the instruments group together and bring them down.  If you want to brighten the overall sound of an instrument, try cutting the opposite areas and managing the tone this way What we’re trying to do here here is to stop ourselves ending back in the positing of everything being louder than everything else and ended back in the last point where the master bus is back at that +10.  Everything sounds like a smush and sounds worse than when we started.    Final bonus point - Mixing As you change one element of the mix, it’s going to impact another area of your mix, if you bring the vocals up in the mix, it could bury the drums or guitars. If the bass becomes louder, it could overpower the kick drum or you lose some of the body of the guitars. This is okay. Knowing when the mix is finished is difficult, for me its usually when I find myself dancing or bobbing along to the track that I’ll record the mix/bounce it out and go and check it. Sometimes just taking a break and coming back to your track with a fresh perspective can help you.  Summary  You don’t need that extra bit of gear Spend that money on the room instead When mixing, everything doesn’t need to be louder than everything else Try doing the opposite of what you want to do  And be okay with the fact that mixing is cyclical.  Let me know what you guys think, are there any bits of advice you stick to when mixing or approaching your sessions. Have you held off from buying gear, leave me a comment below or send us an email on podcast at session recall Nick and I will be back next week, we’re in the process of arranging interviews for the podcast which we’ll hopefully be able to start rolling out in the coming months.  Thanks again, I hope you enjoyed this episode and my only ask today is that if you think this episode would benefit someone please share it with them. See you all soon.     

This week we're exploring the role of the assistant from the perspective of a producer, engineer and studio owner and some of the roles or repsonsibilities linked to this job. Nick recounts his stories in the early days of Rockfield where Ann told him he was slacking and how that experience shaped his outlook when running Leeders Farm Studios we discuss what makes a good assistant or intern and relive some stories around when things go wrong...... Nada Surf - @nadasurf This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni Download our free bands foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/community Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall  Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall  IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/  FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled  Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/  IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords  IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/  Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/  YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio  #careerdevelopment #musicbusinesspodcast #musiccareer #musicbusiness #musicadvice #musiccareer

In this episode of Session Recall Podcast, Jon will be discussing essential advice for musicians and bands in the early stages of their careers. From social media strategies to band member roles, and setting your vision and goals, this video will provide a comprehensive guide to help you kickstart your music journey. We're really talking about the Band foundations checklist in this Episode of the Session Recall Podcast, basically a free guide for new bands. If you're a musician, songwriter, studio engineer, producer, or just passionate about music, this video is perfect for you! Discover the key elements of a successful band and learn how to set yourself up for success, how to approach networking for your band or business and some of the pitfalls we've seen with new bands starting out.   Get your copy of the guide by visiting sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist and start your journey to musical success today! Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/ FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/ IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/ Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/ YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio Chapters 00:00 - Intro 1:58 - Sections of the Guide 3:18 - Socials and Branding 9:43 - Band member roles 13:00 - Your plan, vision and goals 18:00 - Following you idols and content 20:39 - Networking for musicians 28:03 - The Session Recall Community   #musicbusinesspodcast #musicindustryadvice #careerdevelopment #networkingformusicians #networking #socialmediaforcreators #socialmediaforbands

In this episode we're talking about our plans for 2023 and opening the business to customers. We talk a little bit more about Session Recall, Nicks future plans for FLipFLop Records and some of the things we want to acheive in 2023.   This podcast was recorded using Riverside - https://bit.ly/3pcRvni Download our free bands foundations checklist - http://www.sessionrecall.com/bandchecklist Join the Session Recall Community - http://www.sessionrecall.com/  Follow us Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@sessionrecall  Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/sessionrecall  IG: - https://www.instagram.com/sessionrecall/  FB - https://www.facebook.com/sessionrecalled  Nick Flipflop Records - https://www.flipfloprecords.com/  IG - https://www.instagram.com/flipfloprecords  IG - https://www.instagram.com/nickbrine/  Jon IG - https://www.instagram.com/joncon.studio/  YT - https://www.youtube.com/jonconstudio