Why is Mastering Necessary?

Mastering is to a mix, what lacquer is to paint. The mix is where the creative vision is brought to fruition, where the story is told. Mastering seals this work of art, so that its ready to be seen by the world. It makes all the colours pop, deepens textures and forms a strong final product. Before your track is released to the world, Centric Mastering ensures that your record:
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• is aligned with the highest industry standards.
• is commercially viable and competitive for sync licensing, streaming, physical mediums, etc...
• has a well-honed sound that fits or defies genre boundaries, dependant on your song, creative vision and feedback.

Precise & Tangible Maximisation of Detail.

My initial intention when approaching any track is to explore the characteristics that make it engaging, and are signature to the artist. Then decide if I need to adjust, preserve, or support them.

Mastering has become my primary focus because of its unique fulcrum-point between technicality and creativity. My specific interests, under the broad tree of music, feel most connected to the practice of mastering.

Observing and understanding various metering types to gain information. Mastering being the last stage of the creative process means quality control is imperative.

Understanding how every move I make will change the listener's emotional response to the track. And finding the best combination of processing units to achieve the most profound emotional response from the listener.

Ensuring every element of the track can be heard clearly and in balance, through any playback system is a difficult challenge, but one I rise to with every job. Translatability is key.

Loudness

While almost any loudness can be achieved nowadays, it is not my main priority - unless it is made clear to me that its a priority for you. It is becoming increasingly known that most streaming platorms now have fairly complex backends, that are pimarily designed for loudness management accross all tracks on their platform. I translate this into my practice, as having more freedom to make the track sound as good rather than as loud as possible.