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[Eliott James]

When you master a song, will it sound good on a "typical" home stereo, a boom box, in most cars, etc?

I know there are tremendous variations in how consumers set their eq and the level of quality of playback systems, but...

How do your songs translate?

thanks

[TotalSonic]

The definition of a good master is one that translates to the widest range of playback systems possible.  The reason mastering studios put enormous effort and expense into their monitoring systems and rooms in order to make them flat and accurate as possible, and the reason mastering engineers spend an enormous amount of time listening to a huge variery of sources in order to "learn" their monitor chain is to achieve this exact goal.  In nearly all cases a professionally mastered CD will certainly translate better than one that has not been mastered.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Thomas W. Bethel]

But you still get people who want to take the freshly mastered CD into their car or play it on their boom box, where they have the bass and treble controls all the way to max, the compressor on and the bass boost on and wonder why it doesn't sound good. Or the person who has a  hearing loss at certain frequencies due to age, occupation or injury and can't understand why the music doesn't sound good to them when played on certain equipment. Or the person who listens to all their music at 135 dBSPL and claims that the Master doesn't sound good at that level.

When a client leaves here the master I have provided him or her sounds good on most "normal" equipment. What the client has in the way of equipment or his listening habits might effect the way he is hearing the music on the CD. There is NO WAY to Guarantee that  the master will sound the same on ALL playback equipment. It just is not possible with the current technology.

MTCW

[davidc]

Thomas W. Bethel wrote on Thu, 06 October 2005 22:23

But you still get people who want to take the freshly mastered CD into their car or play it on their boom box, where they have the bass and treble controls all the way to max, the compressor on and the bass boost on and wonder why it doesn't sound good. Or the person who has a  hearing loss at certain frequencies due to age, occupation or injury and can't understand why the music doesn't sound good to them when played on certain equipment. Or the person who listens to all their music at 135 dBSPL and claims that the Master doesn't sound good at that level. When a client leaves here the master I have provided him or her sounds good on most "normal" equipment. What the client has in the way of equipment or his listening habits might effect the way he is hearing the music on the CD. There is NO WAY to Guarantee that  the master will sound the same on ALL playback equipment. It just is not possible with the current technology. MTCW

What you say is true Tom,

But the Client should be aware what their car stereo does. They have probably set it that way cause they like it. If the Master sounds "bad" on their listening station, whilst 99% of comparable commercial material "rocks", then the Master is obviously nor right.

If you listen to Classical or Acoustic music too loud then it will obviously fall apart, but a lot of modern music should still sound good loud.

[TotalSonic]

Well - the ability to measure translation has to assume that the listener has something they can consider a "reference" playback which has the equalization and level set so that they can actually compare different sources on a level ground.  This could range anything from audiophile quality monitors with as near flat response as possible system - or even include a boom box or a car system with the loudness controls on and turned to near full blast if they want - as long as the majority of sources sound "good" to that particular listener under those settings and as long as the listener is intimately familiar with how a lot of different sources sound in those settings.  One key then in whether something "translates" for that particular listener is whether they feel oblidged to alter their volume or tone control settings from their normal "standard" settings.    Some people's "reference systems" and "standards" are indeed incredibly skewed - which means that what they especially like might not translate onto as many other systems - but it is indeed is what a master has to be judged on for that particular person.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[TotalSonic]

davidc wrote on Thu, 06 October 2005 22:52

If you listen to Classical or Acoustic music too loud then it will obviously fall apart, but a lot of modern music should still sound good loud.

Good point.  For a lot of genres I think it's important to have a few minutes during the session playing it cranked (i.e. 100dB spl or over) so that you get a better sense as to whether the upper mids or the highs are going to offend at that levels.  I think  a lot of hip-hop and rock is played at 95dB or over on average by the end listener - so its crucial to make sure that the spectrum remains reasonably balanced at these higher playback levels.

I think one of the reasons that a lot of DJ's still prefer vinyl for playing club music is that the ultra-high freqs are more rolled off in comparison to digital sources so that you can really crank it without getting fatigued.

Best regards,
Steve Berson