Reflecting on my Grammy Nomination for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
It is coming up on a year since my Grammy nomination for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical for mixing and mastering Baynk’s Adolescence. When it happened, I was attending the Audio Developers Conference in London on November 12th, 2022.
The Honor of Working in Music
You never know whether a record you are working on is going to be a hit or not. I have tried to predict it and sometimes I was right, but most of the time I had no idea what was going to catch the attention of the world. Honestly, when you start working on a record that turns out to be a hit, it doesn’t feel very different than what you have done before.
Mixing & Mastering in Headphones
Mixing and mastering records for a living means that you will be working long hours, and those hours often bleed into your personal life…
01) Introducing GOLD CLIP PACK: More Than a Clipper
GOLD CLIP is much more than just another clipper.
Gold Clip Pack is a family of plugins designed to bring loudness, saturation, and energy to your mixes and masters. It includes both a Mastering Clipper and a Track Clipper, powered by the same advanced internal technology. With unique features like Boxtone, the digital tape-style dynamic processor Alchemy, a parallel mixer, and anti-overshoot oversampling, these tools help you craft mixes and masters with loudness and impact.
02) Get Quick Results with Gold Clip Pack
This is a simple, straightforward way to use GOLD CLIP for mixing and mastering in any genre.
03) Gain Staging in Gold Clip Pack
Don't be intimidated. While the internal gain staging of GOLD CLIP is complex, the functionality on the interface is very simple. Once you understand it, you'll be ready to use the plugin in any scenario.
04) Discover the Power of GOLD
The namesake of GOLD CLIP, this feature is fundamentally different than a traditional compressor. Instead of an attack and release time, Gold performs a sample-by-sample analysis of the input and applies a non-linear gain to the signal.
05) Alchemy 2: Smooth, Tape-Inspired Sound
In medieval times, people believed in "alchemy": a fictional process that could supposedly transform mundane materials into precious gold. Sadly, it doesn't exist...
But in GOLD CLIP, it does :)
06) Three Clippers and a Secret Mode
You probably already have seen that GOLD CLIP has three unique clipper algorithms: Modern, Classic, and Hard.
07) Monitor Your Clipping with Clip Clock
Clip Clock is very simple idea, but a powerful tool that is unique to Gold Clip. It does two things.
08) Refining High Frequencies with Box Tone
Box Tone is one of the more subtle processors on GOLD CLIP, but I often find it helpful when I want to smooth out the top end of digital recordings. In effect, Box Tone is a hyper-sonic low-pass filter that cleans up some of the digital ugliness on the very top of a mix.
09) Unlocking True Parallel Processing
In my mixing I use a lot of parallel processing. Parallel compression, distortion, modulation, and obviously time-based effects. The benefit of using parallel processing is …
10) Zooming In: Master Metering with Gold Clip
Did you know that GOLD CLIP's meters and waveform display scaling can be magnified?
The default scaling is +6 dBFS -> -36 dBFS, but if you double-click the scale …
11) Sophisticated Oversampling, Simplified
Oversampling is a passionate subject for a lot of people, but I believe many spend far too much time thinking about it.
Activating & Downloading Schwabe Digital Plugins
Open the iLok app, click your account name at the top left.
Select "Available" at the top and then locate the Schwabe Digital iLok asset.
Activate the asset by dragging it to your iLok key or computer. Or, Right-click on the asset and select activate.