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If you are attempting to master the project or “pre-master” (this
year’s hot, new audio buzzword) yourself, here are some suggestions.
Take a week off after mixing, then listen to the mixes on as many
different systems as you can, friend’s homes, cars, boom boxes,
headphones, etc. and make notes. With an eye on those notes, adjust.
Now check it out on some of those systems again, before you send
it out. 80% of mastering is ensuring quality and confidence through
expertise, 20% is knob turning and then it is “which knobs, how little
(as opposed to much) and when”. On the other hand, it is only two
tracks and probably you only intend to do a minor touch-up and you
are sure it will help. It may not be as good as it gets but it is a valid
improvement and you are not doing anything radical or stupid,
so..........go for it!
Miscellaneous Techniques:
Rather than stress out trying to make one EQ solve every problem,
try a combination of two different EQs or one for recording and a
different one in mixing that track. It's like an old engineer’s trick.
Rather than look suspect with an EQ boosted 12 dB, he would use
three different EQs, each with 4 dB. It looked way better, very “pro”
and seriously into gear. Ever have producer looking over your
shoulder, checking out your "curves"?.... Nuff said.
Also it is worth experimenting with the order of processors especially
when compression, limiting and clipping is involved. We get asked
whether it is best to EQ then compress or the other way around.
People do it both ways and each has advantages depending on the
situation. If you compress first, then you should be able to boost EQ
more without clipping. If you compress after EQ, then you smooth
the track based on the new tone, which may be more leveled or
“even” sounding . De-essing, if needed, is best and easiest as a final
or next to final stage. Limiting should be the last step and should be
done gently (a few dB) because more rarely sounds better.
EQing a sub-group saves using a lot of EQ on individual tracks and
tends to blend and mesh the tracks into a cohesive group and usually
makes it easier to mix them. Lots of us group, EQ and compress the
drums or backing vocals. You should start off with the group EQ,
then the individual channel EQs should fall into place easier. Of
course, your console needs to be capable of this.
And for the opposite approach....Some guys “split” a track (or
“mult” it or copy it) and EQ one channel lightly and one heavily, then
mix them. The advantage is that you can easily change the tone by
changing the mix in automation. It also gives twice as many options
for adding reverbs and delays now that there are two channels but
expect the fader moves to affect the effect sends and balances.
You probably thought of this one - Chaining one channel of the Mini
Massive into the next one so that you have a 4 band EQ. Here is the
cool trick - put a distortion device or heavy compressor in that chain
between the EQs. This way you have incredible control of the
distortion character or dynamic depth. For example, you can boost
highs before the distortion, which tends to reduce out the tendency
to mostly distort the low mids, then remove some highs after the
distortion which removes some of the buzzy edge. This is leaning
towards simulating analog tape and guitar amps.....
The first, last and only real rule about EQ is “if it sounds good, do
it”. Feel free to experiment. Enjoy and please let us know what
adventures you are having with the Mini Massive.
The Circuit
The Mini Massive is a not a particularly complicated circuit. The
audio comes in, is converted from balanced to unbalanced and DC
servo'd and given enough power (a few watts) to drive the EQ. This
stage uses one half of a potted module called a "Rapture Amp". It
was developed in an exercise in R&D to find the most transparent
and inaudible gain stage for a digital converter.It has enough drive
and power to feed the first part of the passive EQ circuits.
How did that name happen? Listening to the circuit with some of
our all time favorite recordings, we were simply enraptured. It was
almost like hearing the recordings right for the first time. What can
I say, we laughed, we cried, and we couldn’t peel ourselves away
from the listening position except to change disks. We were in
slack-jawed rapture listening. Miriam Webster’s Unabridged
Dictionary suggests a few definitions: 1 a : a state or experience of
being carried away by overwhelming emotion b : a mystical
experience in which the spirit is exalted to a knowledge of divine
things, 2 : an expression or manifestation of ecstasy or passion. We
are aware that some of you may have some other definition, but our
use of the word is based on definition #1.
The passive EQ introduces significant signal losses and requires
make-up gain. While one might expect a single gain stage would be
ideal, in practice best performance is achieved by spreading the
amplification over a few stages. In the Mini Massive, all the
amplification and line drive is handled by extremely clean Rapture
Amps. The first recieves balanced inputs and acts as a small power
amp to drive the lowish impedance EQ section. The second stage (in
the same block) provides imtermediate gain and keeps the signal
level up thus reducing noise. The last two stages provide a little
make-up gain but primarily work in counter-phase and are used for
the robust line drivers.
Most of the parts in the Mini Massive are capacitors and inductors
used for frequency shaping but with all the choices of frequencies,
boost or cut, and bell or shelf the sheer number of passive components
is significant. The 11 position two deck Greyhill switches just select
the combinations of C's & L's. Closest to the front is shelf selection.
The only slightly complex part is the around the toggle switches. In
"bell mode" they have to switch each EQ section from the boost
circuit into the cut circuit. In "shelf mode" the components for shelf
get switched and the bell components get switched into the opposite
section. Each band needs a relay board with 4 DPDT relays to handle
the complex switching. "Bandwidth" control is just variable series
resistance, just like a Pultec.
The power supply also accounts for an appreciable number of
components. A doubly shielded custom toroid transformer feeds
snubbed and filtered bridge rectifiers. The direct current is separated
into left and right channels then regulated with conventional 3
terminal devices, then further filtered and shunt regulated to provide
very quiet and stable supply rails (including quiet grounds). The
goals were reduction of AC power line noise and RF and low Z noise
of regulators from corrupting grounds and power rails.
Unlike many products, almost the entire internal area of the Mini
Massive is stuffed with respectably expensive and physically chunky
components. However, part of the secret of the sound, is that the
signal is only flowing through a few transparent gain stages and a
few premium passive parts that are practically in parallel and share
the load
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