What do you guys do to make your track LOUDER

michaeldaro

Freelance Engineer
I know that the dynamic range of a song is important, but in todays music, louder is better apparently. I use a series of compressors and limiters each doing a little at a time. Im curious to what others have been doing to get their mixes louder.
 
Sort the mix perfectly then just cram into a single transparent limiter as much as I want.
I don't normally go for very very loud though
 
There is not that one magical thing that you can do to make your music louder... It's just something you learn during the process. The most crucial element is your mixdown. There should be no unnecessary peaks in your audio, because those will clip your limiter later on. After you get your mix clean, you can start boosting the volume on your masterchannel. My masterchannel typically looks like this: EQ (just some small touches and a highpass filter around 30Hz so you got more space to boost overall volume), then a multiband compressor to tame the dynamics and finally a maximizer, which is basically similar to a limiter
 
Compression can be important but most importantly write a track with simple defined elements in the mix, eg not too many elements taking up the same frequency ranges at the same time.
Sometimes slight saturation on a bunch of different elements helps, eg Decapitator.
Throw a limiter on the master bus at the end of the project I use Izotope Ozone or Fab Filter Limiter.
 
ozone will helps lots, for sure, but before you use ozone make sure you've done some EQing between your tracks, it makes a huge difference once you throw the ozone on. I've used Ableton's limiter after an Ozone mastering to push it that bit farther and finally get close to modern loudness. If you hear it get muddy and distorted in some areas when you increase the limiter and peak less than -6 do some more EQing.

That's what I do but take it with a grain of salt, I have 0 professional training or anything.
 
I usually use a multiband compressor to glue the layered sections together first (synths) and maybe the kick and bass (be careful not to compress too too much or you may lose some low-end & have to much attack), this i do on the relative channels/buses used depending on your DAW...I also make sure my EQ'ing is in check leaving enough room for the sounds to cut through the mix..i feel this is super important to help make sure nothing is clashing because any clashing fequencies will give a lower perceived volume to sometimes you will just turn the volume up and then not leave any headroom for the mastering process which you can then get more volume etc....so bottom-line for me personally is if the EQ'ing not great then you will battle to get a clear, tight mix which when made "louder" will just make any issue more apparent. Finally on the master channel I use a limiter and expander (granted, i may not get the mix super loud but loud enough without clipping where compared to pro tracks, fair decently). hope I made sense here :-)
 
Yeah as said already, you can't got wrong with ozone on the master channel. But as also already said, a decent mix down goes along way as well to helping you get what you want.
 
If you can obtain perceived loudness without destroying your dynamic range then your mixes will stand above the rest. The problem is however that although there are tools to help you achieve this, there is no single magic bullet. There are many techniques that come into play over the period of your entire mixing and mastering process that will help you accumulate a "LOUD" track without squashing it and taking the life out of it. Let multiple compressors, clippers etc share the work during the mixing process on individual tracks and busses. With that said here are a couple of my favorite plugs that I use on and off the master buss to earn that "LOUD" sound

FF ProL
KClip
Oxford Inflator
Kramer Tape
 
Like most of the people already said it is very helpful to make small steps and not to kill your mix by extreme limiting.
In my opinion you will be able to gain more loudness by clearing your mix, EQ-ing bad freq. out and leaving enough space for the low end. Also lots of songs seem to be louder than others just because every sound/instrument is placed at the right spot (not only freq.-wise, also in the stereo field).
Here is an additional tipp: Try to EQ your mid / side signal separately, sometimes your master will sound louder if you just boost the high frequencies of the side-signal (just slightly, maybe above 8kh).

There are lots of different techniques - hit me up if you like to have some Youtube-links of good mastering tutorials or interviews with mastering engineers. :)

Greetings from Germany,
Concave
 
most times the problem behind not having a loud track is the the mix and not in the mastering, izotope is a great plugin for mastering but if you dont have a well mixed unmastered track it would probable not get as loud as you want, or it will sound overcompressed
 
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