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Hello,

We're doing a 4 songs demo-CD (french songs, jazz, bossa...) and we did a little bit of mastering ourselves, though we don't know much about it. We consider asking a professional engineer to do it but I'm not sure to what extent it will bring an added value compared to what we have today.

You can listen to the songs here: http://myspace.com/ondeerogene, please tell me what you think.

Thanks !
Jerome

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Cucco Tue, 03/11/2008 - 10:38

Hey Jerome -

First, let me say that I only listened over Yamaha computer speakers.

Second, let me say that I enjoyed listening to the music on your MySpace page - very 70s, retro, easy-listening jazz feel. Quite kitchy in a Barry Manilow kind of way.

My first thought was that I wanted to hear the un-mastered versions to compare. However, the biggest thing that jumps out is that there's not that much dynamic range. I'm guessing a brickwall limiter was used to get the volume up.

The reality is, I don't think that these songs would need much in the way of limiting - maybe at best, just a little compression. (Again, no way to tell without hearing the original version).

The singer is great - quite enjoyable to listen to.

What I would think that mastering would bring to this project would be a slightly more cohesive sound from track to track (where one sounds a little dull or rolled-off where another sounds plenty bright).

Also, with the type of tempo changes and style changes, proper spacing between tracks is crucial, including some lead time in each track. For example, La Chasse starts right in as soon as you click on it. I would like to have heard either a slight delay in the start or maybe a short to medium length fade (probably just the 1-2 second lead in of silence would suffice.)

I'm not sure how much I've helped you here, but my advice would be to undo the psuedo mastering which has already been done here and repost the tracks and let us hear the raw material.

Cheers-
J

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