Top mastering engineers views on monitors

Studios use so much equipment that is abhored by the hifi fraternity (EQ being just one of them) that the only true reason I can find for many of the polarised opinions is snobbery.

The goals seem to be the same - low distortion & good sound. If we are talking about speakers, then there are good studio monitors and bad ones, just as there are so called hifi ones. But I have to say a lot of good hifi speakers just happen to be respected pro monitors as well, whereas I see less cross fertilisation the other way. Admittedly it would be unusual to find leather and walnut or birds Eye maple in a studio.

 

Or blue leds, or brushed aluminum, or champagne...

I do use some pro gear, but the kind that is out of sight, powers and cables...

 

Actually if you get the chance to visit a studio you should - you'll find lots of those things- particularly the latter (it goes so well with coke)

 

The main object is to sell the product, this means a song has to stand out from the others around it on the radio, TV, in the club etc. This is the overwhelming priority. Whether a track works on a ridiculously expensive stereo is largely irrelevant from a commercial perspective as the vast majority of music punters do not own such equipment.

There is a massive misconception in audiophile circles as to what studio monitors are for – the huge great things like ATC100s etc are mainly used at the recording stage as they are very transparent and clear, so you can really identify errors such as hum, poor mic position, clipping etc. No engineer in their right mind would do a final mix on them, that's what the NS10s are for as they are pretty typical of a crappy home stereo / TV / Walkman etc.

It is all to easy to do a mix on large accurate and full range flat monitors that simply won't work on bandwidth limited domestic or car audio equipment, the normal error being that the bass disappears as it is lower in frequency than a small speakers goes! The goal is to get a mix to work on both, but an engineer must never loose sight of the fact that the lowest common denominator is the most important factor - the object is after all to sell the music. This is also why compression is so widely used on pop/rock – it enables the mean level to be higher, and therefore the track sounds louder and more punchy on MTV etc. It is all about shifting units!

Classical music is a different kettle of fish as most buyers have a higher grade of replay equipment, plus there is a genuine 'reality' to be truthful to that doesn't exist in pop/rock.

There are as many kinds of “accuracy†in studio monitors as in quality domestic kit – ATC, Harbeth, Dynaudio, Genlec, Yamaha, Tannoy, JBL etc all sound very different to one another! There is no 'right', it's all a personal taste thing as ever.

Tony.

 

THE END!


Succinctly put Tony. Good post.

AK

 

tony,
very nicely put however i fear that your comments will be a boeing 747 at 50,000ft whilst bub's on an underground train going under the thames.
cheers


julian

 

But at least the clickity clack's as the tube went over the points would be accurate if a little 'hard edged'

 

There is such a thing as 'right', distinguishes things like oboes from clarinets, makes a piano sound real, etc.

The room obviously plays its part.

 

Bub NO THERE IS NOT!

wel at least not universally, you see we all hear and perceive sound differently, what sounds "right" to one person, won't sound "right" to the other. Even with the recording of your live band, they were in a different portion of the room than your speakers, with no bay window to add reflections and no sound absorbing stuff in front, so unless you moved your speakers to the position of the band then they are onto a loser right away, also you have to add in accoustic memory, can you remember exactly what the band really sounded like, was the tape machine adding or substracting anything, did you use it on **** to record and to play back.

james we know you like your setup, and those that have heard it are impressed, but it is a sound that you feel is accurate, maybe you have flat hearing, I on the other hand am probably deaf, so my system would need to perform differently to sound accurate for me.

No one moans because you suggest **** and ATC to someone as a solution, it's the way you suggest that it is the universal panacea, to all things audio, when to the rest of us there is no such thing.

I think the main psost and Tony's post answered a lot of the arguments you put accross, we are happy that you have found your ideal setup, and respect your views, but james you are not correct, when you say that accuracy and lack of vibrations is the most accurate, for you and even others, but not for us all.

Paul

 

I generally agree with Tony and I'm not surprised about what WM wrote about the kits in the recording studios.

I think this is one of the main points.
Music reproduction is not only done by one factor like flat responce frequencies. They are many other which were also discussed in other threads in this forums. What about distortion along the frequency range, the attack response or also the phase response on all instruments, just to mention other important factors?
We mostly talk and concentrate on one point and forget all the rest.

 

see

 

Its interesting (to me at least!!) that some studio's dont shy away from equipment that measures poorly because it sounds good.

Valve mic's, EAR valve amps (like in London Estoria (hope I spelled that correctly) etc!



I do love me valves and vinyl

 

Chris,

Thats an interesting responce there, a good friend of mine (bigwig in large record company) uses valve's pre's when he does any mixing, simply because of the reason you stated above. It sounds good, not just to him but the guys he works for too. Mind you they aint any old valve pre's

 

Are there perhaps two distinct purposes for a "monitor" in the recording business?

On the one hand, at the recording stage, for the utmost "accuracy" and detail - to know that what's captured is captured well.
And, at the mixdown stage, to make an end-product that "sounds good" on typical consumer hardware.

Which may lead to some quite different speakers being called "monitor" because they happen to be used in a professional environment.

I remember the Videotone Minimax being very popular for the second reason many years ago. But it was rarely the only speaker available to the recording engineer...

 

Valves seem to be used in studios to produce an effect that the engineers might want on a particular recording.

Have a look at products from TL Audio and Summit Audio to name just two. These guys produce all manner of Valve EQ & Compression units designed to add warmth to the native recording. Interesting stuff, although some would now argue that they can replicate these products with a simple plug in these days.

Tony got it spot on - most recordings are mastered to sound good on the most popular playback systems. I am reliably informed it is far from unusual to find a ghettoblaster and iPod placed on top of the mixing desk for "monitoring"

 

Yes there is. As an example: I can spot John Coltrane's sax tone within a few notes. Some speakers reproduce these differences better than others; in that respect they are more accurate.

Whether somebody likes the result is an entirely different question, of course.

I'm with the view that says the most accurate system (given that we haven't, generally, heard the master tape) is the one that reveals the differences between recordings. Some systems tend to make everything sound sweet and lovely, others emphasise rhythm over everything else, and so on. They tend to impart their own sonic signature on the source material. These systems may be enjoyable to a listener, but they're not faithful to the source, which is what hi-fi is supposed to be about.

I agree that whether or not something is used in a studio isn't really the issue, plenty of studio monitors sound awful. But I would tend to trust speaker designers who emphasise neutrality over euphony, and these designers, as was said earlier, often have a foot in both the pro audio and domestic hi-fi camps, for reasons that are not accidental. It's because the ATCs, Harbeths, JBLs, B&Ws etc of this world tend to know what they're doing rather more than those hi-fi manufacturers who simply put OEM drivers in a nice cabinet and charge an arm and a leg for the result.

-- Ian

 

What a coincidence, Merlin!

I just received on Friday an order of LPs and Cds from TACET.

I heard the L074 (074 in LP) recorded exclusively with tubes.
I have never ever heard such a definition, seperation between instruments and air in any recording I heard up to now. There was though a colouration wich disturbed me quite a lot. The main problem I think is that it was recorded in a large room with tiled floor and there is, if not an echoe, at least a long 'tail' in every note or if you want the whole room is ringing.
L017, instead, is a revival of the different microphones during the last century. This recording is absolutely great and is very interesting how the usage of different microphones make such a difference. During the next days I'll be hearing the rest.

 

And not olny studios, one or 2 pa companys are using valve pre amps, compressors and eq in conjunction with the latst all singing all dancing digital mixers

 

One of the funniest things about Bub's endless accuracy litany are the sources he uses. Fun they may be, but a CDS2 and an LP12 with a retipped Troika are hardly the last words in accuracy.

 

Sorry Ian but, I don't think you read my post correctly, just as we all see colours differently, then we all perceive sounds differently, we all assume that our hearing is the same, which it isn't, some people may have a dip a certain frequencies, so what sounds accurate to you would need a little lift somewhere for others.

Take your example, on some kit you may be able to tell Coltrane from others, you would call that accurate, someone else would need a system that makes him sound accurate to them, the kit would be different.

That's before you take taste into account as you have mentioned.

So one mans accurate is anothers innacurate.
It is all subjective based on each individual's perception and hearing. There is NO universal "right" only what sounds right to each individual.

AK