More Thoughts on Robo Mastering

It seems whenever the topic of auto mastering comes up, a fire gets lit. It's easy to forget that real people on all sides are working with a common goal in mind: to help people make better recordings with less effort and less out of pocket cost.

And I don't really have a beef with Auto Mastering programs. I just have rarely been happy with the results I've gotten from them. However, I have gotten results that I've kept and released, and AAMS in particular was one of the programs I used to get results on my most recent Album "The End of Silence". I also used EZ Mix 2 on one of the Masters and in the mixes for certain things that I wanted to hear, which my others plugins couldn't do.

The end result was that I used a combination of things, not just AAMS and EZ mix to get the results I wanted out of the final Masters. Most important of all, I used my ears and a monitoring system that I trust and know.

To this end, I want to point out something - getting truly great results out of your mixes takes at least these five things:

1) Recordings that are well done
2) Mixes that sound great and are well balanced
3) Mastering that fills in the gaps and tweaks the balance of the EQ curve.
4) A monitoring system you absolutely trust
5) Objective 'ears'

This is much harder than it looks, so I encourage you to learn as much as you can from sources that are reputable. I love recording forums, but many times the advice I've gotten on them has led me astray.

For The End of Silence, I had mixes I was happy with overall, but there were also problems due to some bad sampling software that introduced a ton of aliasing into the Mix. Because I couldn't afford to just go out and get new sampling software, I had to fix the aliasing in the mix using EQ. This was no small task. I also did some early takes where I had done a sloppy job at recording the instruments. I re-tracked and re-mixed lot of the material this past year to get things up to a standard I was happy with. I would say that I'm overall pleased with the results, but I also think I can do better. That's perhaps a perfectionist tenancy I have, but it also propels me into more learning.

I found that I was also able to use some Mid/side processing techniques to fix more of the aliasing during mastering. The final masters cleaned up nicely and are 100% better than the original mixes. Many of those tracks were run through AAMS, but it also took me making decisions about what I liked and didn't like each time I ran a track through the program. And those decisions did not come until I had listened meticulously to each master on several playback systems that I trust. Some of the masters lacked punch, others lacked clarity while others had some combination of both.

So what I ended up doing was subduing the loudness maximizing from AAMS, then I ran my final mixes through the program until I found something I was happy with. I then imported the 32-bit masters from AAMS into REAPER, and completed some final EQ adjustments, compression, and limiting to get what I chose as the final versions.

On one song, "Our Father", the results I got from AAMS were pretty well exactly what I was looking for. I only took out a bit of harshness in the mid and sides, and did the final loudness maximizing. It was done very quickly.

On another song, "Disappear", I ran it through LANDR and wasn't at all happy with the results. Then I ran it through AAMS and wasn't happy with the results. Then I ran it through Mastering Box and generally liked what I heard, except there was an insane amount of bass distortion and the mids were too scooped. So, what I decided to do with that one was loudness match each with the original and make manual adjustments until I had something I liked better than the other automated masters.

This begs the question: Is auto mastering worthwhile? I think the answer is yes and no. It is not an either/or situation.

I think it's important to test the automated waters and see if the results are better than what you are able to do on your own. If you can afford it (sometimes we will do it for free), get a mastering engineer to master a song and then compare the pro or semi-pro master with the automated masters. Whichever one you like best, go with it! Because this is really about your music and what will make you the most comfortable releasing your art into the public sphere.

How Not to Screw up a Mix

I learn a lot through trial and error. But that also means a get frustrated often. Another way of putting it is that I learn what not to do by doing it, sometimes over and over until my brain finally catches on that "doing x,yz will not give you the results you want"!

Here are a couple of the biggest lessons I've had to learn:

1. recording everything hot will give you a "cooked, smeared, un-detailed" sound, 
2. gain stage your plugins. Clipping one plugin can sound bad. Multiply that by a channel with 5 plugins and compressors, and you'll have a real problem! The compressor (not to mention compression and limiting during mastering) will make the clipped sounds nice and loud. 
3. Follow an established protocol for your work flow.  I have created my own, and you should too. Maybe I'll post mine up if there's any interest. 
4. Regarding #3, don't just have a protocol or work flow that you don't ever look at. Study it, know it.
5. Don't bite off more than you can chew. Sometimes you don't realize you've done this until it's too late ... and that's OK. But do your work in chunks and take regular breaks. this will help your brain, your ears, your eyes and your relationships.
6. Follow through on your promises/release dates etc. I had been working on an album for 8 years. That's insane. I set a release date for August 2016. I stuck to it and I'm glad I did! now I have 6 more songs percolating. 
7. Always reference your mix to a *good* pro mix in the *same style* as your music.
8. Always loudness match the reference tracks to your track. This means turning down the reference do it has the same RMS loudness as your song. This is incredibly important.
9. Always reference each mix on a variety of playback systems,  but especially in a vehicle. Vehicle sound systems have an uncanny way of exposing mix issues. I recently listened to a remix/remaster of Pearl Jam's first album. It sounded fine enough on headphones, but the whole album totally fell apart in the vehicle. I much prefer the original mixes, despite all the reverb (it was the 90s). The remixes are tinny, way overcooked and terribly honky.
10. Use an AB plugin like TB Pro Audio's AB_LM (freee) or Ian Shepard's Perception plugin ($149) to loudness match before and after your FX chain.

Level Matching and "Robo Mastering"

I ran a poll recently on a couple of home recording forums where I asked people to identify the best sounding master out of 5 possible masters.

I used the following to "remaster" an old song called "Future"
AAMS
LANDR
Masteringbox
A Professional Mastering Engineer
A Master that I produced myself

If you want to do this blind test yourself, check out my web page:
http://www.levityproject.com/home-mastering/mastering/audio-mastering-shootout

Since was a blind test, no one knew which one was which. This made things interesting ... and the results surprised me (sort of). One of the auto services actually got more love than the rest, but the reason why might be more predictable than you would think. I'll explain in a later post.

To complete the test, you will need to download Reaper, which can be found at http://reaper.fm/download.php

There are two Reaper Files in the test. One is not level matched, and one contains masters that I have level matched so they are all the same perceived volume. Try out both and see which master you like best in each.

Once you made your choices, check the results page to see which master you chose! Leave a comment to let me know which you preferred.

Leave a comment here or on the facebook page about which master you chose. I'll explain why you may have chosen it in a future post, but I believe the results will be fairly consistent (as they were when I ran the tests in some audiophile forums).

Photo Source: Wikmedia

Microphone Hack - Make it Sound Like a Neumann!

This is one of my favorite hacks of all time. I have some decent condenser mics, but what I've really wanted was a Neumann u87. It's almost $4000US, and I can't afford to spend that kind of money on a microphone. 

Well, I found and impulse model that completely negated my desire for that mic! I attached the model so you can use it, too!  You will need either SIR or Reaverb to load the impulse model into your DAW.

I like Reaverb myself. Here's a video on how to use it!

Here's what to do

1. Record yourself using a large diaphram condenser or sm58. Stand 15cm/5in away from the grill. To tame sibilance, rotate the face of mic to the left or right slightly. 
2. Load up the Neumann U87 impulse on your take using sir or reaverb
3. Be amazed! The sound is awesome. It's not perfect, but it's really good!
4. Hack #2: if you are using an sm58, load up the impulse with -sm58 in the title. This negates the sound of the 58 and adds the character of the u87. Fantastic!!

Click here to download the Neumann u87 impulses

How to Write a Song - Part 2 - Poetry

Poetry can take many, many forms. Instead of listing and explaining them all here, I'm going to link you to a great resource on poetry and the mechanics of poetry.

But before I do that, take a minute to read this article about the key differences between straight poetry and song lyrics. The author contends that song lyrics are not true poetry, and to some extent he is right. Popular song lyrics have become overly simplistic and un-thought inspiring as the 21st century has rolled along. I am hoping this will change for the better (and sooner than later would be great!). To be fair, there are some fantastic singer-songwriters out there who are writing thoughtful, inspired lyrics. They just aren't in Spotify's Top 50, which is too bad.

https://bostonreview.net/forum/poetry-brink/difference-between-poetry-and-song-lyrics

Even if Poetry and Song lyrics aren't exactly the same thing, songwriters can learn a lot from understanding how poetry works. I will save you hours of looking around and researching and point you to one of the best websites I have found on poetry writing. The following resources come from www.powerpoetry.org. It's a great site, and a HUGE site. Take a day and explore it; take up the challenges presented in the articles. Write some poems! Who cares if they're "good". Part of the thing about writing is that you are going to need to get used to working through several crappy first drafts before you finally create an acceptable version you feel is worth publishing. I've left songs for years because I wasn't happy with them. But then in a sudden flash, I would change two words and presto! The song is done. 

Anyway, I digress. Here's the resource.

Getting started: http://www.powerpoetry.org/resource/how-to-create-poem

The Ballad: http://www.powerpoetry.org/content/tips-writing-ballad-poem

Free Verse:  http://www.powerpoetry.org/actions/5-tips-writing-free-verse-poem

Sonnets: http://www.powerpoetry.org/resources/write-sonnet-poetry

And so, so, so much more!

When you are writing poems that will be put to music, remember that you can completely mess with the style of poetry you are choosing to write. You may write a sonnet that only conforms to some of the rules, or a ballad that has an extra line. In the end, just aim to do what works.

Next, we will talk about rhyming.

Why I Don't Sing at Church Very Often

I love to sing. And I love to make music. But I don't always love to sing at church, and I don't particularly enjoy making music for church. More to the point, I often feel frustrated and annoyed by Church music.

As a musician, I think that Music needs to be authentic and real. There are plenty of Christian musicians who have made it to the big times and are recording formulaic music that sells millions of copies. They sound great, they ARE fantastic musicians, and they are writing songs that are hugely popular. And that's ok. But we live in a time where writing and recording music is easier than ever, and the sound systems in the vast majority of evangelical churches is more than adequate to support a creative community of musical and technical artists. And yet - it doesn't. Instead, we in the Evangelical community of faith settle for homogeneous cover bands and a haphazard approach to media creation and sound design, because 'it works'.

And to a great extent, it's awesome to cover songs of those who are tapping into universals of the human experience when it comes to music - including universal worship experiences. And it's great to allow any johnny or sally to run the sound board. But at the same time, every church has it's own unique and important experiences to bring to the table regarding worship, and striving for excellence in the area of worship can seriously add some weight to the collective experience of the local church. We all experience God in unique ways, and each church has a unique "Kingdom of God" finger print.

Why aren't we allowing our artists, poets and musicians to actively bring that to the table? Why aren't we creating space for the rebels, the doubters and the non-conformists to speak life into our worship services?

A lot of modern worship music has grown on me ... but ... we're at the over-saturation point. to paraphrase Marshal McLhuan, any time you over-extend media the opposite of it's intended effect will unfold. With music, there is a threshold - it's hard to nail down but it's there regardless of the style - where before the threshold you still love the songs and the sounds, but once you cross the threshold you are over-saturated and the love turns to mild disdain and eventually to "I can't stand to hear this anymore". The intended effects wears off and you are left with the opposite of what was intended.

I've reached this point with Christian worship music. It all sounds the same - it's all mid-tempo - it  talks about the same things (there seems to be minimal poetic risk taken), and there is thus little to grab onto. I feel basically the same way about radio pop music. There's only so much of "Oh baby I want your body" type of poetry that one can handle. I can handle exactly zero of it. So at least Worship music isn't alone.

Church music therefore tends to throw a wet blanket on me, no matter how enthusiastically I want to press in. Occasionally, I will stumble across a worship team that is so utterly committed to the songs they are singing that I can't help but be drawn in. This is the exception, and from my experience it's a rare exception.

In summary:

1) Church music most often isn't a reflection of the actual church community, but rather a reflection of top 40 church/pop music, which is just what is popular. It fails to honor the uniqueness of each church body.

2) The music is homogeneous, and often focuses on one of three themes -- that God is great, that I used to be caught in sin but now am set free, or the fact that we are worshiping God right now.

3) There is no room for doubt, pain, suffering or loss in modern worship. In a medium that by nature could help us experience the entire range of human emotions in connection with God, we only allow it to basically focus on two: joy and conviction.

By: Ryan McGuire

This article originally appeared at https://thinktheos.blogspot.ca/2016/09/why-i-dont-sing-at-church-very-often.html 

How to Write a Song - Part 1 - Getting Started

One of the under-mentioned parts of the business of self-producing music is the tricky area of how to write a song. More importantly, how to write a good song.

There are several things that go into making a song "good". We can start by asking some basic questions.

1. What style of music do you want to write? Here is a list from Wikipedia
2. Do you know anything about songwriting? If the answer is "Heck, No" - don't worry. We'll dig into that later on.

That's it! Once you have picked a style, listen to some bands from that style to get a feel for what kind of music you are going to be writing. Of course, don't copy their stuff! But keep the "feel" of the style of music in mind. notice the drum beats, the sound and types of instruments being used, and the kind of singing you hear (rhaspy, growling, whiney, whispery, commanding etc).

Choose what you want your song to be. Do you want to scream, rap, whisper-sing? Pick one, and then after you've written a few lines, do some experimenting!

But that's not really it. I knew you knew that, because you are smart!

Good

The thing I will say is that "good" is highly subjective, but there are some objective facts that we can nail down to make sure your song is as good as it can be. So I will amend my title from "how to write a song" to "How to write a song you are happy with!". After all, that's the whole point of songwriting (unless you are making big money - in which case, you should be writing this blog not reading it!).

Even if your songs never go anywhere, you need to be proud of your accomplishment and like it enough to want to release it to the world, which is what I am currently doing with my own music. If I didn't like it, I wouldn't release it. In fact, I have several songs that I don't like enough to want to release ... so I am keeping them hidden for the time being. I will pick away at them until I like what I'm hearing, then I'll release them. There are also some songs that I will never release.

Where to start?

The truth is it doesn't really matter where you start with songwriting. Some people write poetry, then put it to music later. Others start with the music and then try to fit words into the music. Either way, do what works for you, and experiment!

For our purposes here, we will start with poetry. Now, I've got to tell you that there is a lot of nonsense on the internet about how to write lyrics for a song. There is talk about buzzing like bees and "you make me feel so fine" type of silliness. Depending on the song you are writing, those lines might actually work by the way! But what I'm interested in is empowering songwriters to write excellent poetry which they will then put to music.

Poetry

Poetry seem to be nearly every high school kid's least favorite subject. However, it's vital to be at least a decent poet in order to write a good song. Being good at poetry doesn't just mean you can rhyme words. It means you have learned to say a lot using few words. It also means you have learned to describe things using imagery, metaphors, similes and other figurative language. If you paid half attention in your junior and senior English classes, you will already know this. 

As you start to write your song lyrics, there are a couple of  important things to consider.

1. Are you primarily left-brained or right-brained? You can take a little test to see: http://testyourself.psychtests.com/testid/3178

If you are more right-brained, try things like writing in a coffee shop where there is some background noise, or out in nature. The noise in the background might become white noise and can help you focus. Or it won't. Experiment to see what works! If you are left-brained, chances are you will want to have whatever writing space you use as neat and tidy as possible before you start. If you are very left-brained, you might be tempted to clean the house first - in which case, try heading out to your favourite quiet spot in nature, out to the back deck or to a nice park and put on some noise cancelling headphones - just for the silence they provide. Again, experiment and see what works. I lean toward the right-side of my brain, and when I write I like things to be neat and tidy and quiet (unless I'm writing music and lyrics simultaneously). But I love the sound of the computer fan, which creates white noise.

2. Hopefully you have found a place where you feel comfortable enough to start pouring out your soul. The next thing to consider is what your song will be about. The trick here is to focus on an event, an emotion or a snapshot in time. That's the general rule, but rules can and often should be broken. For example, you can write about 5 years ago and then bring the audience back to the future of today. It's all fair and legal. The key things are to focus on describing instead of telling, and storytelling instead of fact-giving. Most people aren't going to be interested in a series of facts put to music - but then again, some people are interested in that very thing - so ... it's all fair and legal! But if you are wanting your songs to be commercially viable on a wide scale, start by steering your songwriting toward things that are universal of the human experience like love, death, feelings, and especially dilemmas and the dramatic. For comedy writers, zeroing in on the ironic, silly or witty are staples. (think: "If I had a Million Dollars" by Bare Naked Ladies, or "Lunch Lady Land" by Adam Sandler).

Next up, we will talk all things poetry.

Album Launch - notes from the Studio

Here are a few big lessons I've learned recording, mixing, producing and mastering "The End of Silence".

1. You can do it! If you play an instrument or sing and have any amount of ability to use a computer, with a little bit of training you can be well on your way to creating recordings you can be proud to release.

2. Recording: It doesn't really matter what you use. What matters more is how you use it. The big lesson I learned is to aim to get things right at the recording stage, because as much as it's a pain to try to 'fix' a bad sounding acoustic guitar in the mix (I had to do that), it's an impossibly un-gratifying pain to try to deal with it in the mastering stage (I also had to do that .. but ultimately I re-recorded it so that it sounded good right off the bat).

3. Mixing: You don't have to compress everything. It's ok to let some things slide into the background and provide a nice wash for the main instruments to rest on. I did this with acoustic guitars in a few songs, and I think it turned out rather nicely.

4. Mastering: There is more to it than EQ, compression and limiting. For example, making sure you encode mp3s properly. I sent one song out that had an accidental easter egg of being 18 minutes long. You could fast forward all the way to minute 18, and parts of the song would still be playing. But if you let it play from start to finish, it was just the regular 3 minutes and change. :) However, for the audio sweetening part of mastering, I'll let you in on my method. In the end, what worked for me was a hybrid of modern auto mastering and traditional manual mastering. I used a program called AAMS and played around with the profiles until I found roughly the sound I was looking for. I processed each track through that and left enough room to do more work. Then I did all of the final compression, limiting and extra EQ tweaks manually using level matched reference tracks). And I mastered as best I could to DR8. The results are that each track is plenty loud and clean.

Mixing Hacks Roundup #1 - EQ

I love "best of the best" roundups.

What I'm about to show you here is a round up of the best videos I've come across for how to use EQ in mixing. I'll come back with another one for mastering.

First - here's a great hack called "The Sweep". The trick to this hack is to listen for what you don't like, find it by boosting until you hear what you didn't like clearly, then do a cut. In this video, Joe cuts some thump out of an acoustic guitar. The reason this is what he doesn't like is that it will interfere with the kick drum and bass guitar in the mix. There are other far more offensive frequencies that he boosts, but he explains why he leaves them alone. If It were me, I would have treated one of them. But it's not me, so ... enjoy!

And you've got to love the internet. Here's a different take on the Sweep. This is more of a mastering level video, but the principal is transferable to individual tracks.

And here is a couple of Hacks in action.

Now I will say that before you even get to EQ, you should have a rough balance done of your mix. Do this in MONO. Then use subtractive EQ on each track in the context of the other tracks to fix problems like muddiness, or notch our honkiness and squeakiness etc.

What is Subtractive EQ? Glad you asked

Something you need to know about is Resonant Frequencies. Removing those will really clean up your mixes!

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Home Recording Production Advice

Home recording can be challenging. As a DIY musician, I understand! So, I've compiled a page of some of the best free advice out there for getting the most out of your home recording gear.

Take a look!

http://www.audio-mastering.net/p/blog-page.html

Audio Production Podcasts: My Top 4 Favourite

I can't count the number of times I've seen lists of 20 or 50 *recommended* podcasts for listening.

Who has time for that?

As an educator myself, I hate unnecessary fluff.  Large lists of podcasts are just that. It's impossible to keep up with more than 4 or 5 podcasts at a time, unless you are a long distance runner, drive a semi for a living, or have nothing better to do than listen for hours on end to podcasts in your spare time.

Another factor I go for is brevity. If it takes you two hours to say what could have taken 20 minutes, I'm out. Keep it simple and keep it short. I think that'll be my new motto.

I've whittled the list down to my top 4. To make it on this list, the podcast needs to be educational in nature and generally interesting to listen to.

1. The Mastering Show - http://themasteringshow.com/
I love, love, LOVE this podcast! Ian Sheppard is a mastering engineer and a natural educator. He is able to distill complicated concepts down to simple anecdotes that are not only easy to understand but also highly actionable. This is almost a master class in Mastering. If you are into mastering, or just want it demystified, I can't recommend this podcast enough! Ian has several products that I highly recommend as well.

2. Recording Revolution's Youtube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/user/recordingrevolution
This guy is prolific. And an excellent educator as well. Highly, highly recommended. Grahm's vlogs and products completely changed how I approached recording and mixing, for the better!

3. Recording Studio Rock Stars - http://recordingstudiorockstars.com
I'm only a couple of episodes into this interview style podcast produced by Lij Shaw, but I've found the information already to be invaluable.

4. CD Baby Podcast - http://cdbabypodcast.com/
This podcast is a bit long winded, but they deal with a lot of music industry business stuff, which is important. CD baby is an important part of my own journey as an independent artist.

There you have it, my 4 podcasts faves!
enjoy!

Metering Plugin (and Free Mastering Offer!)

There is a new metering standard called LUFS, which is quickly becoming a standard loudness measurement unit for mastering. Here is everything you never wanted to know about LUFS: https://tech.ebu.ch/loudness

Hoffa 4U makes a nice LUFS meter that packs a bunch more features, including some Mid/Side processing and panning.  It's called HOFA 4U Meter, Fader & MS-Pan.


https://hofa-plugins.de/en/plugins/4u/

Feeding a good limiter so that you get just enough gain reduction where it's not distorting and a reading of about 10-13 LUFS on the 4U meter will make any rock, pop or EDM song plenty, plenty loud while retaining clarity and punch.

I use this along with the TT Dynamic Range Meter to measure the peak-to-loudness ratio of the music I am mixing and mastering. It's well worth the price (free!).

If you are interested in having me master a song for you - for free - head over to www.levityproject.com/mastering and fill in the mastering form.

Here's to your music!
Ryan

Dynamic Range (and Bit Depth Part 2)

Ah the boring technical aspects of audio production. I love it!

So before I talk about Bit Depth, I want to talk briefly about dynamic range.  Dynamic range is essentially the difference in volume from the loudest to quietest portion of audio in a waveform at any given moment. This is also call this the crest factor.

When people talk about the dynamics of a song, they tend to be talking about how loud or squashed sounding a song is. Songs with wide dynamics tend to sound open and airy. Songs with limited dynamics sound punchy and hyped in the best case to squished and crunchy in the worst of cases.

An example of hyped and punchy is Pearl Jam's Dissident. It has a dynamic rage of 8, which is about the minimum level of dynamic rage. Higher numbers are even better in this day and age of volume normalization and web streaming.

An example of squished and crunchy  is none other than Metallica's Death Magnetic. If you look it up on youtube, fans remastered the album from guitar hero stems and it sounds way better than the PRO master! The below video shows the difference between the retail version and the less squished guitar hero version. The difference is stark!!

It pains me so see a lot of Christian recording artists and Worship artists becoming victims of the loudness wars. At work, we sometimes put on Praise 101 and I can stand it for about 30 seconds. Everything is hyper squashed and distorted. Ugh!

All recordings have a dynamic range before mastering, and it's the job of the mastering engineer to decide if the dynamic range is well suited for the song and the album, or if the dynamic range needs to be increased (made quieter) or reduced (made louder). Mastering Engineers can do both. Reducing the dynamic range is quite a bit more difficult than increasing it, FYI.

So when someone talks about "squashing the dynamic range" or "over limiting" or "over compression", what does it mean?What we are really talking about is taking the dynamic range that a track already has and reducing it too much. As a rule of thumb, around 8db-10db of dynamic range is plenty good.

Here's to your music!
Ryan

Bit Depth (And Sample Rate Part 2)

This is part 2 of my previous post on sample rate. 

 The video below shows a full 16-bit Game sound sample. The difference from the previous samples is insane. You have vocals, guitars, drum kits. But notice ... it's just a little bit ... washy sounding.  

OK that was a trick ... if you have the quality set to 480p, the washiness should go away, mostly. But now that you are aware of it, listening to youtube music on low fi settings will now dive you mad. Sorry!

OK still with me? Here's the thing. Bit depth makes a huge difference. And 32-bit is even better than 24-bit ... 4 billion values of depth is nothing short of overkill, but it has it's advantages (more on that some other time).

But what about sample rate? I talked about it in my previous post, but I didn't get into the nitty gritty other than to show you that recording at 192khz can be redundant. (although up-sampling during mixing and mastering can be helpful).

Sample rate is essentially the number of times a sound is captured by the sound card each second (bit-depth is a combination of the lowest Digital loudness value that can be written, and the sheer number of depth values that can be written). It stands to reason that at 44.1khz (which is 44,100 hertz), a bit depth of 16-bit is fine since you can write a little over 20 thousand more values than the samples available. 44,100 samples available, 65,000 levels of depth available. The math works.There is a lot of buzz about recording at 24-bit, and I do record, mix and master at 24-bit. But I mostly do it for posterity and for the fact that even small volume changes can introduce many more bits to the audio signal. The cold hard fact is that I have fans, guitar amps and room ambiance in my recordings which create a noise floor that is above 16-bit.

But I've been using 24-bit for so long that I'm going to just keep doing it. Besides, 2-bit is the new standard for HQ audio, so if even for that I will continue to use it.  It doesn't seem to take up that much more processing power ayhow. On the other hand, upping the sample rate makes every plugin work harder because it has to process millions of more values every second.

Make sense? Hope so, cause I'm moving on!

The more times a sound card (Audio interface I mean ...) captures a sound, the more crisp  the sound will be to the human ear, to a point. Sample rate (just like human hearing) It's measured in something called Kilohertz (abbreviated KHz). A CD has a sample rate of 44.1 Khz, which is a little over twice the 'sampling rate' of the human ear, which tops out at 20 KHz. 

Now the first bizarre thing about digital sample-rate is that the very top frequency produced will be roughly half the value of the sample rate. So a 44.1khz sample rate has an absolute top value of around 22khz, which means you can do EQ adjustments up to 22khz but no more using the 44.1khz sample rate. A 48khz sample rate lets you do adjustments all the way up to 24Khz - and that's obviously not really necessary.

BUT

The second bizarre thing about digital sample rate is a thing called "aliasing".

Here is an awesome video that shows exactly how aliasing works. See my last post for a test to see whether your sound card/audio interface deals properly with aliasing and inter-modulation distortion.

So where the rubber meets the road on sample rates is that while a 44.1khz sample rate is good, if the anti-aliasing filter used by your RECORDING INTERFACE is poorly designed, you will hear this nasty aliasing in your recorded music! Ouch!

Plus, it will screw up your monitoring!! It would be all in all a very unfortunate thing. But it's a thing that I experienced with two pieces of gear. Not to knock M-audio (I did email them many times and got no response ... so hey, you get what's coming). The Firewire 18/14 and the Fast Track pro. When I recorded at 88.2khz, the sounds would be crisp and detailed. But when I recorded with the same microphones, the same instruments, the same settings and a minute later at 44.1khz, the aliasing would be unbearable (and shows up all over the place in my first album!). Since I had low computing power, my only solution was to record at 88.2khz, then down-sample the material myself. I did that with two songs that didn't appear on my first album, but that are slated for release on my second album. I used the original parts, so I'll be sure to load them up and do a breakdown once it's released!

So the lesson here is simply this: record at 44.1khz only if you are sure that your gear has a good anti-aliasing filter and no inter-modulation distortion at lower sample rates. I would like to assume that most modern gear deals well with these issues, but you never know! If you can afford the extra processing, make 48khz your go-to for recording, mixing and mastering. After all, 48khz is standard for DVD, and mastered for Itunes recommends sample rates of at least 44.1khz, but higher seems to be preferred. Also, if you release on vinyl, it's good to have masters that are 48khz. 

I would also do a little research and use audio interfaces known for their quality. You don't have to break the bank, either. I love my tiny but powerful Focusrite Scarlett 2i2. If you need the bells and whistles, M-audio makes sturdy gear, but you might have to play with it to make sure you aren't introducing nasty artifacts into your recordings if you work at sample rates below 88.2khz.

Here's to your music!

Ryan

Sample Rate

At the precipice of the home recording revolution, there was one sample rate: 44.1khz. And there was essentially one bit depth: 16-bit. Before that, there was 8-bit, and very low sample rates (less than 44.1khz). Now days, audio semi-pros and home studio folks are being pushed the line to record at the highest possible sample rates. 

Before you reach for your settings and crank up your sample rate to 192khz,There are some things you should know about sample rate

This website gives a good overview of sampling theory. http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

 

Pay special attention to the inter-modulation section of the website:

 

If you're curious about the performance of your own system, the following samples contain a 30kHz and a 33kHz tone in a 24/96 WAV file, a longer version in a FLAC, some tri-tone warbles, and a normal song clip shifted up by 24kHz so that it's entirely in the ultrasonic range from 24kHz to 46kHz:

• Intermod Tests:
  
  • 30kHz tone + 33kHz tone (24 bit / 96kHz) [5 second WAV] [30 second FLAC]
  • 26kHz - 48kHz warbling tones (24 bit / 96kHz) [10 second WAV]
  • 26kHz - 96kHz warbling tones (24 bit / 192kHz) [10 second WAV]
  • Song clip shifted up by 24kHz (24 bit / 96kHz WAV) [10 second WAV]
        (original version of above clip) (16 bit / 44.1kHz WAV)

 Assuming your system is actually capable of full 96kHz playback [6], the above files should be completely silent with no audible noises, tones, whistles, clicks, or other sounds. If you hear anything, your system has a nonlinearity causing audible intermodulation of the ultrasonics. Be careful when increasing volume; running into digital or analog clipping, even soft clipping, will suddenly cause loud intermodulation tones.

Source: http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

In my own system, 44.1khz, 48khz and 96khz have no inter-modulation artifacts. This means that I can realistically work at 48khz or even 44.1khz and still have just as good clarity and quality as 96khz, which is great because it means I can worry less about CPU load!

 

Here's a video of 8-bit music. One of the problems with early digital audio was that it utilized poor down-sampling filters, and probably wasn't dithered, which is why it sounds so washy and awful at times.

 

Here is 8-bit with high sample rates (at least 44.1khz). The difference is pretty stark.

Here's an interesting video that explains in more detail how that Low-fi music worked.

Do Recording Levels Matter? Yes!

I could almost leave this post as-is, but there are too many questions left unanswered.

The first one is: what about 16-bit? Don't I need to push my levels way up in order to minimize noise? 

Answer: Yes, unfortunately. But try to be reasonable. Boost the levels until there is no clipping but the signal is healthy enough that you can't hear low level noise. Compressing on the input before the recording interface can really help with this. If you know how to use a compressor and are still forced to record at 16-bit, I would say it's a necessity to compress the signal before committing it to the hard disk. If you record at 24-bit, it's not nearly as much of an issue.

This stuff can be really dry and boring for people, but I think important to understand what's happening behind the scenes so that you know why you need to make certain decisions later on.

Recording level means different things depending on what kind of recording we are talking about.

Analogue recording uses a different scale to measure peak level than digital recording. Confused? Don't worry.

In analogue gear, the level of signal can be measured with something called a VU meter like this one ...  (if you remember from a previous post, audio signal going through cables is just very low voltage electrical impulses) ...

With the VU Meter above, going above 0dB will not produce that hard noise, because 0dB is not a hard limit in analogue gear (in fact, it's the sweet spot). "Wait, wait that makes no sense!" you say. The key to unlocking the mystery is that the digital DB scale and the analogue dB scales are completely different scales! The digital scale is annotated dBFS, while the analogue scale is annotated dBu or dBvu. So any time you see dBu, you are dealing with analogue audio levels, and any time you see dBFS, you are dealing with digital audio levels. Also, most FS meters are peak meters, while the dBu scale is used for judging average analogue levels (and it needs to be calibrated to your gear! VU Meter calibration is VITAL).

This is a completely different Beast than a Digital Full Scale Meter.

 The Digital meter to the left has a hard upper limit of 0dB. Anything above that limit will register as awful, loud, crunching, grating noise because there are no bits above the first bit. Make sense? If not, read this post again, then this one

Did you know: almost every piece of analoge gear has a different absolute upper limit!!? For example, in my Focusrite 2i2, the clip level of the analog microphone inputs is +4dbu, but the clip level for the analogue line inputs is +20dBu! And the clip level for the analogue outputs is +10dBu. How confusing is that?!?!

This means that a signal from a microphone that registers more than 4dBu above 0dBu is going to hard clip the microphone preamp. Analogue Hard clipping just means that significant distortion will be added to the sound, sort of like a digital clipping sound but just a hair more pleasing to the ear. As a side note, it is possible to soft clip analogue gear which gives harmonics and saturation. This can be pleasing to the ear, but you want to be careful soft clipping your monitor outputs because it will smear the frequency spectrum!!

In my Focusrite 2i2, the outputs have more headroom than the inputs. Headroom is a term to describe the amount a signal can be turned up before clipping (it works for both digital and analogue). So in Focusrite 2i2, a digital signal of 0dBFS translates into an analogue output signal of +10dbu

Check it out on the Focusrite Website

So, here is where the rubber meets the road. The absolute best level to record your music at (assuming 24-bit), is line level, which is always 0dbu.

On the mic input, we have 4dbu of headroom before clipping. This means that going in through a microphone, +4dbu will translate to 0dBFS. We want to stay WELL below that level. At least 4dBu below so as not to clip the preamp, but at least 10dBu below so as not to clip the outputs.

The best bet? Record at the lowest acceptable volume for the input and output stage. Let's start by using the outputs as our guide for recording something with a microphone, since doing so will keep us well under the clip range of the microphone preamps.

Here's the math: 

if +10dBu = 0dBFS,  then

     0dBu = -10dBFS.

Just subtract the maximum analogue level from both sides of the equation and voila, you have a good peak level to watch on the digital audio scale as you record. This formula works with any recording interface by the way as long as you know what the maximum dBu level is!

What if you are recording something on the 2i2 using the line input? Well, since the line input has way more headroom, the math changes a bit (but not much). With the line level input, +20dBu = 0dBFS. so ....

if +20dBu = 0dBFS, then

       0dBu = -20dBFS

To keep things simple, I record, mix, and master at average level of below -15dBFS. I use an RMS meter to judge this, but you can also just watch the digital peak levels bounce in a DAW and eyeball what the average level might be. This means that as I add more elements to a mix and the levels start to push above -15dBFS, I either select all the faders and pull them all down in unison until I'm back in the sweet spot. Or I just pull the master fader down.

Why is it important to record this way? The reason is simple: because 0dBu is the sweet spot for all analogue gear, including the analogue inputs and outputs of every digital recording interface ever made!! It's also the sweet spot for MANY plugins!!

Its just that figuring out what 0dBu means in terms of the Digital scale can be tricky, but hopefully now you have a better understanding of  how to do that and what's going on behind the scenes. And just like gear, plugins have their own maximum levels, sometimes expressed as dBu. It's insane, but it's worth figuring this stuff out so that you can keep as clean a signal path throughout your recording as possible. The results on each track can be subtle, but across an entire mix it makes a huge difference.

Here's to your recordings!

Ryan

Disclaimer: I do not work for focusrite nor am I advertising for them. I just like the gear of theirs that I've tried. It's great bang for your buck and is very high quality IMHO.

All Images via Wikipedia