Recommendations for Paying Someone to Master an Album

Guybrush Threepwood

Hi, I'm looking for someone to master my album and am just looking for recommendations and advice.

The album has 12 songs, each one with about 10 tracks on it.

Can anyone tell me what I should expect to pay (per track or per song?). Should I be submitting the tracks separately or a basic mix for them to work off of?

Ideally I'd like someone in Ireland who I can contact easily and work with but am open to other options (was looking at the mastering service with cdbaby.com - anyone any expereince?)

I would really appreciate it if anyone has any recommendations of people they've worked with.

pinksoir

I was trying to come up with a monkey island style puzzle for you...

I highly recommend Richard at Wav Mastering in Limerick. Expect to pay around 100 quid a track, though it could be less. I know he recently moved to new premises so dunno if he's back up and running yet, but he's by far the best in the country and has very reasonable rates. You can email him a wav. I'd say contact him, his details are online. Dont go near cdbaby or any of that crap, you get what you pay for with mastering. Except with Richard you get way beyond what you pay for.

pinksoir

Hang on a sec... Sounds like you want someone to mix your album? What exactly do you have tight now?

peter05

What you are searching for is stem mastering. It will cost you a bit more than a regular master.

if6was9

Sounds to me like you want someone to MIX not MASTER.
Mix is to take all the individually recorded tracks/channels and combine them to 1 track.

Master is the final step before going to print where the volume between songs are balanced and final EQing is done on the already mixed songs.
That's a very simplified way of putting it but you get the idea.
They are very different and the cost is much different. A high end mastering engineer could do a 12 track album for 600-1200 euro. A mix engineer might look for anything between 200 -2000 euro a song. A mastering engineer would master your album in a day, it would most likely take a mix engineer 2-3 weeks.

Guybrush Threepwood

Thanks for the replys
I think Peter hit the nail on the head - it is stem mastering we'd ideally like done.

We have a mix (completed on Adobe Audition) but we're not happy with it - we want a more professional sound (and a few kinks sorted)

peter05

What are the kinks? are you in a rush?

fitz

Guybrush Threepwood wrote: »

Thanks for the replys
I think Peter hit the nail on the head - it is stem mastering we'd ideally like done.

We have a mix (completed on Adobe Audition) but we're not happy with it - we want a more professional sound (and a few kinks sorted)

That's not something you want to try to fix with mastering.
Sounds to me (particularly given this is being done in Audition, which is more an editing tool tbh) like you need the material properly mixed.

if6was9

Obviously the choice is up to you but you should really only get it mastered once you're happy with the mix. Have the mastering add that extra few percent of quality, you shouldn't ever be sending something out to mastering that needs to be fixed.

peter05

Whoever does the master also does the mix. That is a stem, all individual tracking are supplied minus compression and limiting.

It's not a case of supplying a 2 track and hoping it can be fixed.

If you have serious problems with your tracking your M.E will send it back. They will most likely want to check the mix first.

As the old saying goes "you can't polish a turd"

EDIT: to answer your original question, a stem can cost 100€ to 300€ per master. Some may charge per stem track.