Rock | Mastering Engineer

Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?

A: People have a hard time understanding what mastering really is. There's this idea that it's just some commercial process to do with volume, or even worse, that it's something which can be done with a single plugin or 'ai' processor. Most people aren't familiar with the discipline, don't understand its (fascinating) history rooted in vinyl cutting, and don't know what modern mastering entails, or what it can bring to a mix.

Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A: To get the absolute best out of any engineer, you need 2 things. You need to be communicative, and you need to have decent-quality recordings and arrangements before you hire them!

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: I've been working as an engineer for the last 5 years, during which I also studied my postgrad, and played in a few bands. In the past, I've also run a pro-bono mixing project for smaller & aspiring artists. Currently I work primarily in mastering, while also running a business designing & building pro audio electronics.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: The first stage of my work is a detailed conversation with the client. As a working sound designer, I'm passionate about the emotional and aesthetic power of not only music, but all sound. Consequently, the first thing I like to know when a client comes to me with a project, is why they made the art in the first place, what they want listeners to feel when absorbing their work, and what influences they considered when the made the tracks. The mixing process involves using a range of software tools & analog equipment in a hybrid workflow to crystallise the client's (and my own) goal for the project. I am always keen to make edits/revisions to mixes, so only move onto mastering when both myself and the client are as happy as possible. Mastering is an entirely different discipline to mixing, and I take care to keep the two jobs separate. The majority of my mastering is done via hardware, but also commonly includes appropriate digital processes like M/S en/decoding, multiband stereo imaging, oversampling, upward compression, etc.

Q: What's your 'promise' to your clients?

A: I won't produce beats for your rap songs.

Q: What do you like most about your job?

A: Saying no to people who want me to produce beats for their rap songs.

Q: What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A: Q: Can you produce beats for my rap song? A: no.

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: What was your recording setup like? What is your creative vision for the project? How do you want to make an audience feel? Why did you make the project/what was important to you? Which (if any) of your influences should I consider when working? Are there any planned release dates we need to aim for?

Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?

A: A chicken, a water filter, a fire starter, a decent knife, and the SPL BiG 500-Series.

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: To work with: relaxed but efficient. Sonically: dreamrock (psy-rock + classic + alt + indie + shoegaze).

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: Mazzy star for the vibes (RIP David Roback).

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: There is a lot of very useful general advice out there already, so I'll go with a specific one instead: Send instruments which occupy similar areas of the frequency spectrum to individual busses (e.g. guitars & vocals to a 'mids' bus, shells & bass to a 'lows' bus, etc), and a use parallel processing on these busses to bring out the best characteristics of your composition. This gives you efficient & powerful top-down processing over the tonality of your entire song, while adding glue and detail throughout. (bonus tip: you can automate the instrument sends to these busses to make things hit even harder at more impactful points in your song).

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: I work on pretty much any guitar-based music!

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: Specialising in stem & mix-bus processing, my strongest skill is squeezing character & detail from my clients' recordings.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: My studio is set up for a hybrid workflow. On the virtual/software side, I primarily use Logic, but also work in ProTools & Reaper for more sound-design-based work. On the hardware side of things, I use primarily mix bus & stem-focused gear to help add a more unique studio flavour to all my clients' recordings.

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: My fixation with audio engineering started with The Stone Roses. The grainy, faded psychedelia & true rock spirit just melded together so beautifully. I've spent years trying to capture that energy and put it into my work.

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: I mainly work on stem mastering, occasionally mixing finalised arrangements. Typically, an artist/band will come to me with an arranged and recorded song. I take all the stems & recordings (as well as a demo mix for reference), and get to work. Other times, bands/artists will come to me with recorded demos, and I'll take a more central role in the production/co-production of the track(s), helping write & record instrument parts, and hammering-out the arrangement.