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Should I Master My Beats?

Mastering Chain - (Mastering Plugin Chain) 

Mastering may be a little more complicated than vocal chaining but the process is very similar. Here are some basics:

Gain – Before you start your mastering session you need to add a gain plugin so you can give yourself some “head room” which lowering the volume of your mix in case it’s already distorting. 

EQ – EQ can be really tedious but you want to put it at the beginning of the chain so you can get a nice balance before you move on to other processors.

Multi-band Compression – Multi-band compression is preferable to normal compression because you want to treat frequency ranges differently.

If you want to get a juicy and compressed drum sound and low-end you don’t want to take the vocals and high-end with you. You want to keep the lows tight while making the highs breathe. That’s what multi-band compression lets you do.

Limiting – Is when you bring up the overall volume of the mix without it clipping. 

Be mindful that before you enter a mastering session make sure your mix is not clipping and at a good level before you add your mastering chain. 

I usually master a bounced out .wav from my mix in a totally different Protools session. Also keep in mind that every one approaches plugin chaining different so just take your time, research, and experiment.

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What Plugins Do I Use On My Vocals First?

How Plugin Chaining Works

Plugin Chaining - The order of audio plugins used on a mix bus usually for vocals or mastering. 

Plugin chaining comes in very handy in mixing and mastering. If you don’t know what plugin chaining is, it’s the simple process of choosing the order of plugins usually on aux buses, vocal buses, and mastering buses. 

There are many different ways you can approach a plugin chain. There are thousands of mixing and mastering pros and their techniques vary. So here is a basic plugin chain for vocals i think that this guy made it really simple for beginners. 

Vocal Chain

1. EQ

– I filter unwanted frequencies and cut first. Then I add what I think the vocal needs. EQ both in solo and in the mix.

2. Compression – I have a bunch of different compressors that can all do great things for certain voices. I often use the Waves CLA-76 the most. It gives the voice thickness without sounding compressed.

3. Saturation – This could be anywhere in the vocal chain and doesn’t have to be after EQ or compression. There are bunch of  different saturation settings I go for to thicken up the low-end of the bass or add mild distortion to smoothing out the vocal with some tape emulation.

4. EQ – this is where I  re-balance the frequency response of an instrument. I usually put an EQ after all of these plugins to add some more high-end again.

5. De-esser - I usually top it off with a nice de-esser to get rid of those ess and sibilant sounds from the vocals. 

It doesn’t matter what plugins you use but as long as you have this basic formula; eq, compression, a little distortion(if you need it), another eq for correction and I would add a de-esser to this equation.

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What’s The Best Way To Organize My Instruments?

There is one aspect of mixing and mastering that is very essential to the process. Using aux buses. Using aux buses makes mixing so much easier because you can add effects to tracks in bulk. 

Mix Bus/Aux-send - (auxiliary send) is an electronic signal-routing output used on virtual mixing consoles in recording. 

The signal from the aux send is often routed through plugin effects like reverb, digital delay, compression, etc.) and then returned to the aux bus.This allows effects to be added to a track or multiple tracks.

Benefits of Using Buses 

Let’s say you’ve just recorded a really dope hook, which would in a lot of cases involve 3 or more individual tracks. 

You’d probably want to put some reverb or delay on it to see how it sounds. Well if you add a reverb plugin to each track this will most likely affect the cpu usage of your computer (which slows down your computer) and it’s always a hassle to configure the settings you want in that reverb plugin on each individual track. 

This is why we use aux sends or buses. You can set up an aux bus, load your reverb plugin onto that aux bus and set it up the way you want it to sound one time. 

After that you send it to each of the tracks in your hook and you can add as much reverb as you want on each track with just the twist of a knob.

This same formula can work with delays, compression, and any other type of effect you would like to experiment with. 

When I record I often set up my vocals through aux buses. I’d open an aux track and add all the basic vocal plugins I would want on my vocals like eq, compression, and a de-esser. 

After I decide what plugins I want on my “Vocal Aux Bus” I send the output of all my vocal tracks to it.

This just makes my recording process less complicated and better for my cpu usage which gives me some leverage If i need to add special efx like auto tune or pitch correction to individual tracks. 

When mixing I often use a “whole mix” aux bus. This is for when I am done with a mix and need to bring the overall volume of the mix down without touching any faders. 

All I do is send the output of each track in my mix to the “Whole Mix” Aux and I am able to bring my overall volume down to give the mastering engineer some “head room”. This also helps to keep your mix from distorting. 

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How Do I Make My Beats Louder?

Limiters

The limiter is often used in mastering to bring up the volume of a mix or to make it appear louder. 

This is how you get your mix (which should be a good mix) louder without clipping (which is audio distortion).

It is also used on singular instruments and vocals and especially guitars. 

A limiter can “catch” those unwanted or loud frequencies before they distort.

Limiter - is a tool used in audio production that allows signals below a chosen input power or level to pass unaffected while lowering the peaks of louder signals that exceed this threshold.

In most DAWs you can always find a “starter” limiter to practice on. In Logic Pro X I often use the Adaptive Limiter on my instruments and drums to keep them from distorting. 

In Pro Tools i use the Dynamic 3 Compressor/Limiter for the same function. If you’re starting don’t worry because most virtual limiters come with already dialed and easy to use presets. 

All it takes is a little imagination and experimentation.

How To Use A Limiter:

For mastering you can use a limiter to bring up the overall signal or volume of your mix without distorting. 

Remember before you add a limiter to your master bus you must always bring down the volume of the mix in your session. And how I do this is send every track (vocals and instruments) to an aux channel and here is where I control the volume of the entire song (all tracks together). 

I make sure my mix is not clipping or i bring the volume on the aux track down to -5 decibels. Then I experiment with the threshold until I receive my desired loudness. I use limiters on drum tracks as well to prevent distortion.

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How Do I Make My Beats Hit Hard!

Compression is another one of those elements that are very important to hip hop kicks, snares, and especially vocals. 

When a rapper is spittin’ a verse in double time (like Twista or the Migos) there will be parts in that verse that will be too loud or too low. Therefore, it’s always good to use compression to bring up those low parts and squeeze those peaks in the rapper’s voice. 

This works the same way with instruments. When I use 808s and slide them from one note to the next, this often creates a lower volume on the notes that slide so I use compression to bring them up with the rest of the bass. 

A Compressor - is an audio processing operation that reduces the volume of loud sounds or amplifies quiet sounds thus reducing or compressing an audio signals dynamic range. 

Types Of Compression 

Downward Compression - Limiter - reduces loud sounds over a certain threshold while quiet sounds remain unaffected

Upward Compression - Ex-pander - increases the dynamic range of the audio signal making quiet sounds louder. 

Controls

Threshold - how loud the signal has to be before compression is applied. Threshold timing behavior is subject to attack and release.

Ratio - The amount of gain reduction is determined by ratio: a ratio of 4:1 means that if input level is 4 dB over the threshold, the output signal level is reduced to 1 dB over the threshold. The gain and output level has been reduced by 3 dB.

Attack and Release - Attack - how quickly the compressor starts to work. Release - how soon after the signal dips below the threshold the compressor stops.

Soft and Hard Knees - “sets how the compressor reacts to signals once the threshold is passed. Hard Knee settings mean it clamps the signal straight away, and Soft Knee means the compression kicks in more gently as the signal goes further past the threshold.

    Stereo Linking - A compressor in stereo linking mode applies the same amount of gain reduction to both the left and right channels. This is done to prevent image shifting that can occur if each channel is compressed individually

Make-up gain - allows you to boost the compressed signal. as compression often attenuates the signal significantly.

Look-Ahead - The look-ahead function is designed to overcome the problem of being forced to compromise between slow attack rates that produce smooth-sounding gain changes, and fast attack rates capable of catching transients.

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How Do I EQ My Beats!

Equalization is like the holy grail of the music industry. Everything you hear in a song from the hi-hat to the producers tag has probably been EQ’ed! 

We use eq on 808 drums or bass guitar to filter the super low frequencies that don’t really matter. We use eq to make that snare more crispy and stand out in the mix. 

We use eq to make that lead vocal sit in the mix the way its suppose to. 

Remember when drake first came out and he would rap over those beats that sounded like they were under water? That was his producer 40 filtering out all of the high frequencies in the track. 

Music is not possible with some kind of eq! Let’s 

Equalization - “to reduce or increase specific frequencies of a particular sound in order to build to it, or make it sit clearer in a mix. These frequencies are often split into three or five bands; lows, mids and highs, or bass, mid-range and treble.”

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