Music Production Tips – The Stereo Bus Blog

This article isn’t about mastering a CD so that the songs are all at the same perceived volume, it’s about getting your music collection to play back at reasonable volumes relative to each other.  It’s also about providing this feature to your digital distribution customers.

I’m sure you’ve at some point put your music collection into shuffle play only to find that the transition from Rachmanninof’s Symphony #2 into Marilyn Manson’s Mechanical Animals is enough to make you piss your pants.  You aren’t alone.  The audio geekery community has come up with a solution to the problem of CDs having drastically different volumes: ReplayGain.  Apple has their own solution they call Sound Check, although by most accounts it seems to be less sophisticated.

Read the rest of this entry »

So you want to add a subwoofer to your monitor setup? Studio subwoofers can be tricky things that require a little bit of audio soul searching, auditioning, and planning to pull off well. But, a well integrated sub can make a world of difference in the right circumstances.

I, for example, just added a Mackie HRS-120 sub to my HR824 speakers and am quite happy with it after some tweaking.

Since pro audio subs tend to be expensive and add complexity, there are a lot of important questions that one should ask one’s self before investing in a quality sub.

• Why do I want to add a subwoofer?
• What kind of music do I tend to work on?
• Do I even like the sound of subwoofers? Is my room suited for subwoofers?
• What are the options that make sense for my existing speakers?

Read the rest of this entry »