Which commercial CD do you recommend to A/B mix/mastering?

tomperson · Post by **tomperson** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 3:23 pm

Hi all
I wonder, which commercial CD do you recommend to A/B with my project-studio produced mixes/masters? I'm into house, particularly the deep "flavors" like dubby house, minimal, and tech.

I'm looking for delicate production here, not "floor-shaking-hands-in-the air" thingie. I'd love to know what records you think have a really good production/mixing/mastering work, as in electronica you can find everything from subtle, beautiful mixes to those heavily clipped, distorted shit some DJs love so much.

Thanks guys!

olafmol · Post by **olafmol** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 3:56 pm

jazzanova and needs stuff is always very nicely mixed and mastered imho

montrealbreaks · Post by **montrealbreaks** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 5:16 pm

I read somewhere that a lot of mastering engineers have kind of decided on a Steely Dan record as the "baseline" for mastering. That is to say, they can describe a monitoring system to each other by discussing the cymbals on track three for instance (my example, not theirs). It's also used for A/Bing with a lot of acoustic music.

Now if I could only remember what album that WAS, I'm sure that would be a lot more help.

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 7:14 pm

I think I remember that as well M-brakes. For some reason Aja comes to mind. At any rate no matter what you think of their tunes they did have the mix down pat. A lot of the L.A. produced mixes of that time are highly produced.

Things seemed to be mixed a lot differently these days. Has anyone looked at a wave file of a pop or rock song lately? I often see things compressed and smashed to the ceiling so much that there is no dynamics left.

I personally try to find something that is mixed very dynamically. So far I haven't found anything mixed much better than Simon Posford's stuff. Especially Shpongle. Both he and Ott have the mixing thing down so tight it just never ceases to amaze me. I'll put something by them on to sort of feel out the dynamics of my sound. I tend to make things a bit more bass heavy so I do take that into consideration.

futureproof · Post by **futureproof** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 7:25 pm

for up to date sounding mixes I agree the Jazzanova stuff sounds great.

Something else I'd recommend is "Chove Chuva" by Brasil '66. It just sounds perfect to me.... really warm, clear, and detailed. It was semi-recently re-released on the "sounds from the Verve hi-fi" compilation.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/de ... c&n=507846

thump · Post by **thump** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 8:18 pm

kennerb wrote:So far I haven't found anything mixed much better than Simon Posford's stuff. Especially Shpongle. Both he and Ott have the mixing thing down so tight it just never ceases to amaze me.

hear, hear. and a fellow oregonian, to boot...here in eugene his stuff tends to be pretty enthusiastically received, and not just by the psytrance/psybient set, either.

have you heard his new-ish "celtic cross" stuff? very noice.

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Thu Jun 23, 2005 11:55 pm

Alright! yeah I'm in the same town. I've heard a bit of it and like it a lot. The new Shpongle is OK too. This is a great environment for all that stuff

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 12:02 am

thump wrote:
kennerb wrote:So far I haven't found anything mixed much better than Simon Posford's stuff. Especially Shpongle. Both he and Ott have the mixing thing down so tight it just never ceases to amaze me.
hear, hear. and a fellow oregonian, to boot...here in eugene his stuff tends to be pretty enthusiastically received, and not just by the psytrance/psybient set, either.

have you heard his new-ish "celtic cross" stuff? very noice.

Oh and BTW speaking of all that stuff, are you going to the Shulman. Bluetech, PhuturePrimitive show this weekend. It will be a very cool event.

http://www.thecenterring.org/

pacoz · Post by **pacoz** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 1:14 am

Some of my favorite sounding electronica albums are:

Dead Cities - Future Sound of London
Dots and Loops - Stereolab
Tri Repetae - Autechre

Good Luck!

olafmol · Post by **olafmol** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 7:29 am

i also like a lot of the stuff herbert did

Olaf

tomperson · Post by **tomperson** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 1:04 pm

montrealbreaks wrote:I read somewhere that a lot of mastering engineers have kind of decided on a Steely Dan record as the "baseline" for mastering. That is to say, they can describe a monitoring system to each other by discussing the cymbals on track three for instance (my example, not theirs). It's also used for A/Bing with a lot of acoustic music.

Now if I could only remember what album that WAS, I'm sure that would be a lot more help.

Errr...I guess Steely Dan is not electronica, right? And mixing an electronica production is quite different from mixing "conventional" music. Basses go waaaay down lower than you would get from most rock/pop/whatever style. Not to mention the bass drum...Anyway, it would be cool to know what is the name of the album you mention, just in case I have to do an instrumental mix...not anytime soon, but who knows...

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 4:13 pm

tomperson wrote:
montrealbreaks wrote:I read somewhere that a lot of mastering engineers have kind of decided on a Steely Dan record as the "baseline" for mastering. That is to say, they can describe a monitoring system to each other by discussing the cymbals on track three for instance (my example, not theirs). It's also used for A/Bing with a lot of acoustic music.

Now if I could only remember what album that WAS, I'm sure that would be a lot more help.
Errr...I guess Steely Dan is not electronica, right? And mixing an electronica production is quite different from mixing "conventional" music. Basses go waaaay down lower than you would get from most rock/pop/whatever style. Not to mention the bass drum...Anyway, it would be cool to know what is the name of the album you mention, just in case I have to do an instrumental mix...not anytime soon, but who knows...

After looking at it again I am sure he's talking about Aja.

tomperson · Post by **tomperson** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 6:38 pm

"Aja"? Is that the name of the album he mentions?

Cool.

And...What albums for superb electronica production?

Angstrom · Post by **Angstrom** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 8:03 pm

Steely Dan !?!?

I thought the idea was to A/B against similar music .. not something completely different. Different types of music suit different spectral and dynamic emphases. EG: I cant see how comparing a dub track or a 'nuggets' style track to Steely Dan is going to work.

For an example there is an album by Scientist called "Scientist Rids The World Of The Evil Curse Of The Vampires" where the amount of bass is incredible. I could never figure how they fit it in a vinyl groove and still made the mix sound good.

I bet If some mastering engineer tried to make that album sound like Steely Dan it would ruin it!

they probably will one day.

ct43 · Post by **ct43** » Fri Jun 24, 2005 11:19 pm

olafmol wrote:jazzanova and needs stuff is always very nicely mixed and mastered imho

agree 100% pretty much flawless production and amazing music!