Up until now I’ve just focused on accomplishing a live recording where all the instruments and vocals are mixed at what I think are good levels and the overall mix is normalized – that is, as loud as it can get without any part being distorted. All of this has been done using the controls on my multi-track recorder, and the only thing I’ve done on the computer is bring the final stereo mix in, trim any silence off the beginning, and fade out the end.

But in listening to a couple songs last night, I realized I’m ending up with an overall volume level that is lower than what it should be, or at least what I’d prefer. The problem is that there are volume peaks, usually in the vocals, since that’s often what I’m pushing the most, and the bulk of a song can’t get a volume increase without causing those peaks to be distorted.

So over the next few days I’m going to take the song I just completed, “So My Spirit Flies,” and remaster it completely. I plan to export the individual tracks from the recorder to the computer, and then lower the volume on any peaks, thus enabling me to increase the volume of the mix. It’s work I’ve done before, so it won’t be a problem to accomplish – I’ve just been hoping to not have to do it and to complete everything on the recorder.

My avoidance of this has mostly been a time issue – not wanting to spend – and often not having – hours of time to sit in front of the computer massaging sound files. But I’m not going to be satisfied with the results unless I put this effort in, so it’s time to suck it up and get the work done.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 at 10:28 am and is filed under Updates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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