How to Master Your Music: A Step By Step Guide

enjoy watching a random guy act like he knows what he's doing. but a lot of you have asked me how i master my music. so this is a nice insight into my process. HOW I MASTER MY MUSIC: 10 STEPS 1. CONSOLIDATE THE LAYERS bounce everything into group stems (bass, guitar, kick, main vocals, etc.) to visualize the layers better and reduce CPU usage. consolidating also forces you to commit to what you have and stops you from making thousands of small mix adjustments. 2. LIMITING + SOFT CLIPPING TRANSIENTS by limiting the sharp transients and peaks on individual layers, you reduce the overall mix volume, allowing you to push the master's maximizer harder later on. be careful not to overdo it though, or you'll kill the song's punchiness. 3. REMOVING VOCAL FREQUENCIES IN THE INSTRUMENTAL if your song has vocals, they should be treated as the most important layer in the project, so don't let the instrumental drown them out. i throw Soothe onto the instrumental group and side-chain it to the main vocal track. a simple side-chain compressor works too! 4. SIDE-CHAINING INSTRUMENTS TO THE KICK help the kick cut through the mix by side-chaining everything else to it. by ducking everything under the kick, your low end hits harder and your drops sound way cleaner. this also carves out more headroom, allowing for a louder master volume. 5. CREATING A REAR BUS send every layer except the drums (and sometimes the bass) to a separate bus with an 1176-style compressor to glue instruments and vocals together. 6. PARALLEL COMPRESSION parallel compression increases the perceived loudness of the entire mix while keeping the dynamics of the dry signal. i usually use a fast attack and medium release on the compressor for more of a balanced sound. 7. COMPARE MASTER FREQUENCIES WITH OTHER SONGS go download some of your favorite popular songs and study those masters closely. references go a long way. go back and forth between your song and some popular songs in your genre to check their frequency balance, study the LUFs, and listen to the dynamics. 8. MULTI-BAND COMPRESSION multi-band compression splits your audio signal into separate frequency bands, allowing independent control of the dynamics in each range instead of squashing the whole mix. it will create a more consistent presence across your frequencies. 9. BOOST STEREO FIELD i like to throw on an imager to widen my master. i don't touch any frequencies below 150Hz because we need to keep those mono. above 150Hz, i add a slight boost to the width, and then i boost the width a bit more aggressively above 3kHz. 10. FINAL MAXIMIZATION TO AROUND -10LUFs i try to get the master as loud as i can without completely destroying the mix. my masters are usually around -10LUFs with a True Peak level of -1LUF. read a more in-depth explanation on my website 📝 https://keepmakingmusic.net/blogs/lat... THE PLUGINS I USED IN THIS VIDEO (affiliate) 👍 iZotope Ozone (best mastering plugin): https://izotope.pxf.io/m4jzXq TIMESTAMPS 00:00 - intro 02:10 - STEP 2: soft clipping! 04:42 - STEP 3: vocal space! 06:25 - STEP 4: side-chain! 07:55 - STEP 5: rear buss! 11:30 - STEP 6: parallel compression! 12:15 - STEP 7: using a reference! 13:55 - STEP 9: multi-band compression! 14:31 - STEP 10: stereo field! 15:00 - STEP 11: maximization! want me to mix your next song? shoot me a message and let's talk! - https://keepmakingmusic.net/products/... watch me make the whole song on my main channel 🎧    • Making a Song from Scratch in Ableton Live   listen to the full song 💿 https://fanlink.tv/scgiveitback keep making music 🌱 ______________________________________________ SUPPOT MY WORK ON PATREON ☆ song breakdowns, unreleased music, exclusive content, royalty-free stems, and music feedback. your support helps me keep making music →   / xole   MY ORIGINAL MUSIC ♬ listen to xole, coleman payne, park rangers, cole still, still coleman, and nowadays → https://solo.to/xolesongs JOIN THE XOLEMATES DISCORD ♡ join a community of like-minded creatives → http://bit.ly/xolediscord CHECK OUT MY STORE ✧ check out my sound packs, vocal templates, and merch → https://keepmakingmusic.net MY MUSIC AND CAMERA GEAR (affiliate) ♬ the gear i use to make music and videos → https://a.co/d/051Z113d MY FAVORITE VST PLUGINS (affiliate) ♬ iZotope Ozone (best mastering plugin): https://izotope.pxf.io/m4jzXq iZotope RX (best denoiser): https://izotope.pxf.io/vDQyZO BUSINESS INQUIRIES ❐ [email protected] in this video, i show you how i master my music and get it loud without completely squashing the life out of it. i hope it helps. love you xolemates. ✧ tags (ignore) ✧ xole, xole ableton, how to master music, mastering music, mastering a song, how to master, how to master song, how to master a song, master song, master music, master engineer, make master louder