Releasing your own music on your own label.

PaulBrewer

Best of Luck to Frob and Fitz ...

johnnylakes

Would it be rude to ask how much it costs to master at Abbey Road? And is there a long waiting list?

fitz

If I remember correctly it's about £175/hour.
A couple of weeks notice seems to be enough to book, depends on the dates and who you're getting to do the work. No additional charge to attend, which is cool.

PaulBrewer

Won't matter a damn where it's mastered if it;'s shyte, What?:cool:

frobisher

PaulBrewer wrote: »

Won't matter a damn where it's mastered if it;'s shyte, What?:cool:

Typical Brewer statement! What if it's not shyte, have you considered that option?!

PaulBrewer

frobisher wrote: »

Typical Brewer statement! What if it's not shyte, have you considered that option?!

Come on! The law of averages says if you say Everything's Shyte you're right 90% of the time!!

... and yes you're right it is a typical Brewer statement!

judas101

hope it turn out for you Fro, some change from the armchair producers that spend all their time posting on forums instead of getting up and doing something.

between you and jsuited there might be a music forum sucess story.

Aridstarling

Hey, just read through this whole (very informative) thread. Sounds like its all coming together for you, its great to see! I hope to do the same myself at the end of the summer, a different type of project but the same aims. I will hopefully be in Whelans on the 30th to witness something special!

frobisher

I took a wee trip away from the music to bruise my arse on the slopes of Andorra. Back to the grind now.

Abbey Road was a wonderful experience. Steve Rook was the very model of friendly professionalism. The studio was smaller than I thought it would be but I wasn't going to ask for a discount because of it. Although I'll admit that I did push for one before I got there. they politely declined :-) the guts of the process was done through an old EMI vinyl transfer desk from the late 60's. He was happy enough with the mixes saying that he didn't face any of the difficulties that he often dealt with. He was very surprised when I told him we didn't record in a studio but a converted garage and a spare room. Karl Odlum can deservedly take the credit for that. He mostly gave it a 1 db lift on a shelf EQ which started as low as about 700hz. I was surprised that he was starting so low but he said it was fairly common to do so.

One song suffered a little from this as it seemed to nudge the vocals into sibilance territory. He used a program made for getting rid of drum clicks to pull the sibilance down in the offending places so that he could still use the shelf boost. On another song he went for a 2db lift with the shelf but started it considerably higher as he reckoned there was a lot of information going on in the low mids that were right where they needed to be and didn't want to boost them. Only one song needed pulling back on the low end and it was only 1/2 a db and that was actually a song were we ended up humming the bassline so wanted to make it slightly more prominent.

It was great to do it all and I've listened to the material on many systems and am happy with how it's translating. I intend on having more releases mastered there through the year. Although I'll possibly be doing the B-sides myself.

So the first single is now out for purchase by SMS and the launch night is on Friday in Whelans. Playing Croke Park is just around the corner :-) Feel free to spend a €1 of your heard earneds and have a listen! Text MUSIC 2274 to 57501 Yes, that is a shamless plug but I'm worth it :-)

PaulBrewer

frobisher wrote: »

I took a wee trip away from the music to bruise my arse on the slopes of Andorra. Back to the grind now.

Abbey Road was a wonderful experience. Steve Rook was the very model of friendly professionalism. The studio was smaller than I thought it would be but I wasn't going to ask for a discount because of it. Although I'll admit that I did push for one before I got there. they politely declined :-) the guts of the process was done through an old EMI vinyl transfer desk from the late 60's. He was happy enough with the mixes saying that he didn't face any of the difficulties that he often dealt with. He was very surprised when I told him we didn't record in a studio but a converted garage and a spare room. Karl Odlum can deservedly take the credit for that. He mostly gave it a 1 db lift on a shelf EQ which started as low as about 700hz. I was surprised that he was starting so low but he said it was fairly common to do so.

One song suffered a little from this as it seemed to nudge the vocals into sibilance territory. He used a program made for getting rid of drum clicks to pull the sibilance down in the offending places so that he could still use the shelf boost. On another song he went for a 2db lift with the shelf but started it considerably higher as he reckoned there was a lot of information going on in the low mids that were right where they needed to be and didn't want to boost them. Only one song needed pulling back on the low end and it was only 1/2 a db and that was actually a song were we ended up humming the bassline so wanted to make it slightly more prominent.

It was great to do it all and I've listened to the material on many systems and am happy with how it's translating. I intend on having more releases mastered there through the year. Although I'll possibly be doing the B-sides myself.

So the first single is now out for purchase by SMS and the launch night is on Friday in Whelans. Playing Croke Park is just around the corner :-) Feel free to spend a €1 of your heard earneds and have a listen! Text MUSIC 2274 to 57501 Yes, that is a shamless plug but I'm worth it :-)

1/2 a dB , yea? Big windows in the front of the place was there?;)

Seriously though, what about compression and limiting? There must have been some of that?

Did they have NS10s?

PaulBrewer

Horse! Yer number 4 in the Charts ...

frobisher

PaulBrewer wrote: »

Horse! Yer number 4 in the Charts ...

But I ain't no. 1. Yet :-)

PaulBrewer

frobisher wrote: »

But I ain't no. 1. Yet :-)

Well I did me bit ...

fitz

So, I was in Abbey Road last Friday getting an album mastered by Geoff Pesche. Geoff's suite is a the back corner of the building on the top floor, so it's the biggest mastering suite in the place.

You can see some photos here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=61769&l=a2417&id=734031938

Geoff was a consummate pro, extremely friendly, and immediately put us at ease. My mixing engineer was with me and Geoff was extremely receptive to any requests or comments from him also. The adjustments made were mostly minor, and driven by getting a consistent frequency make-up rather than addressing any deficiencies with the mixes. Mostly making minor EQ cuts/boosts. There were a couple of tracks where the very subtle use of a really high quality de-esser softened out some minor vocal sibilance.

Geoff was extremely complimentary of the mixes, even so far as to comment during one of the songs that it sounded like we'd tracked it to tape. His approach was not get in the way of the mixes, just to do what was needed to make them sound as best they could...he was very quick to decide what needed to be done, and very quick to do it. It's a 10 track album, and he was done in 4 hours, but the process never felt rushed. With the session being charged by the hour, Geoff's level of efficiency is a god-send.

During the session Geoff played us some of his recent work, so we could get a sense of context for how other music sounded in the room. He played a track of the new Lily Allen album, and Wire to Wire by Razorlight. While the mixes were very different, my stuff sounded comparable. As with Fro, this is testament to my mixing engineer, who did a wonderful job on the material I'd recorded.

I would strongly recommend Geoff for any work anyone wants done, and would also recommend attending any session you do have there. I've had stuff mastered at Sterling in the past, and wouldn't go back at this stage. The approach over there was much more meticulous and time consuming, and seemed more clinical, though that may have been a result of the mixes being used, which were not done by the Greek wunderkind that did this album. All my material in future will be going to Geoff.

Brewer, compression and limiting is done, but seems to take more of a backseat to the EQ side of things. Now, having said that, someone else might go in with a mix that needs more compression than mine did...so really, I couldn't tell you much more about that.

Moral of the story: get your stuff mastered at Abbey Road. Personally, I'd recommend Geoff Pesche because of his approach, his effeciency, his easy going and friendly nature, and because of his proven results across different genres. The guy's done stuff for Kylie, Gorillaz, Razorlight, Lily Allen, Coldplay, and is working on a Live album for Glasvegas, the current flavour of the month. He's got great ears. Book him, you won't be disappointed.

PaulBrewer

It's great you both got on so well.

I've always found the lads at the pointy end of the Biz to be very easy to relate to especially if you have definite goals in mind one can articulate.

As Frob said, his decision wasn't entirely a business one and part of the Attraction was the whole Abbey Road experience, which I love.

Never stop being a Fan!!

i57dwun4yb1pt8

WELL DONE GENTLEMEN !

great to see people working away on their art and doing it properly !

hope it gos well for you .

jtsuited

thanks for sharing the mastering stories tony and fro.

looking forward to hearing the finished product.