Ableton Forum

Hey y'all,


Ive been trying myself in mastering/mixing and all this fun stuff.. (bc as a student i cant pay anonye else to do it)

Here are my questions/problems:


1. The audio effect "Master EQ" seems amazing as it sounds like one effect is mastering my whole song. Is it meant to be only put on the Master-Stem or on every single stem?

2. I tried to put EQ,Compressor (&EQ Master) on every single stem that i have and I felt like it distorted the sound or "broke" the vocals or sth- it sounds weird now... is there such a thing that too many audio effects will impact the recording/distort it?

3.What are your main mixing mastering advices with ableton? How do i get my song to a competetive volume in digital streaming age?

4. When I like the sound of my mp3 and put it like that on Spotify. Will it sound differently on Spotify?

5. When I like the sound of my Mix digitally.. and press a CD.. will it sound on the CD just as good as it sounds on my headphones/computer?


Sorry for alle the probably "stupid" questions.. but really struggling here.... and I know I should pay a professional to Master.. but this student is on a budget.. and after all.. id love to learn more about it





Thank you so much for any help!!

1. The audio effect "Master EQ" seems amazing as it sounds like one effect is mastering my whole song. Is it meant to be only put on the Master-Stem or on every single stem?

>>>Usually anything labelled "master" is only meant to be on the master channel, but of course in music there are no rules so follow your ears if it sounds better another way. <<<

2. I tried to put EQ,Compressor (&EQ Master) on every single stem that i have and I felt like it distorted the sound or "broke" the vocals or sth- it sounds weird now... is there such a thing that too many audio effects will impact the recording/distort it?

>>> Yes, god yes. If you don't know what you are doing with compression it's VERY easy to over do it and make things sound worse. Never apply effects because you read you were supposed to, only apply them if you HEAR an actual need for them. <<<

3.What are your main mixing mastering advices with ableton? How do i get my song to a competetive volume in digital streaming age?

>>> Less is usually more, especially with mastering. A simple and well thought arrangement is one of the most critical things to achieving a loud master. Too much going on, or too much processing will usually just lead to mushy sounding songs. <<<

4. When I like the sound of my mp3 and put it like that on Spotify. Will it sound differently on Spotify?

>>> Don't upload MP3's to Spotify, use wav or aiff files. Will it sound differently? Too many factors to say for sure, a lot of it depends on if people have volume normalization turned on in their Spotify player, which you have no control over. In general I would say make your master sound as good as you can and don't worry about where it will be released. You'll see a lot of people advocating for -14LUFS for streaming platforms, which is great in theory, but no major labels or artists are actually doing that. Or very, very few are. (sadly) <<<

5. When I like the sound of my Mix digitally.. and press a CD.. will it sound on the CD just as good as it sounds on my headphones/computer?

>>> Yes, unless you messed something up in the process of burning it to CD. Hard to say without knowing your process or the tools you're using. <<<

Wow you are amazing thank you a lot