Howie Weinberg got his start in the Masterdisk mailroom, believe it or not. As a huge fan of music, Howie sought a purpose to support his passion, and he had always dreamed of working in the field of audio engineering. Attracted by Masterdisk's reputation as the home of some of the finest mastering engineers in the world, Howie apprenticed at the facility, starting in 1977, determined to become one of them and to work with the most creative and unique artists from all over the world. His persistence paid off. Weinberg learned and perfected his craft there, and built a discography that includes artists such as The Clash, Beastie Boys, U2, Nirvana, The Ramones, Smashing Pumpkins and Public Enemy.
Taking a break from mastering the latest album by Elvis Costello, Howie Weinberg spoke at length, providing insight into the murky process of mastering and the precarious route taken in becoming one of the more famous men behind the mastering console.
Unlike the processes of recording and mixing, which are both rather straightforward, many people are unsure of what takes place during mastering.
Though you could describe the process a few different ways, mastering is basically the last opportunity to do anything creative on the record, along with being the first stage of the manufacturing process. I've always thought of mastering as taking a piece of work, something that's been written, practiced, recorded and mixed down to two tracks, and fine- tuning the texture of the recording. It could be filtering or adding more bottom to the mix or changing the compression. It's very important to be familiar with the client. A lot of times the artist is very happy with the way the recording has been mixed and it's just a matter of me adding a little more spice — adding some salt and pepper. Try to think of mastering as 2-track mixing. I receive the mixed recording in all different formats — 1/4" or 1/2" tape running at either 15 or 30 inches per second, or maybe DAT or Pro Tools, usually recorded in 16 or 24 bit resolution. The analog formats tend to have more coloring along with the sound that people are most familiar with hearing. Analog has the punchy bottom and the warmer top. The 16 or 24 bit high-resolution, digital recordings have the least amount of coloring and sound closer to what was originally played in the studio. Sometimes the digital format sounds almost too clean or too perfect. With analog everything is in your face and sounds tight and powerful. I receive the 2-track mix on whichever format and then make sure that each sound is consistent with the way the musician originally intended. I tweak the mix so that the recording sounds smooth and the levels stay even. It's a very slow and exact process that requires great attention to detail.
Could you describe the differences between analog and digital recording? Specifically the disparity between 15 and 30 ips analog and 16, 20, and 24 bit digital?
Ips or, inches per second, is a term that applies to analog recording. Ips describes the speed that the tape is moving and the amount of music being recorded per inch of tape. The higher the ips speed, the deeper the resolution of the recording. It is similar to EP and SP in relation to VHS. The video recorded in EP isn't as sharp as the same image recorded in SP. 16, 20 and 24 bit resolution applies to digital recording. Like inches per second, the bit rate determines the resolution or clarity of the recording. The higher the bit rate, the more data. 15 ips was the standard speed at the beginning of professional recording. It wasn't until the late 1970s that a faster tape speed was adopted. And it wasn't until more recently that people started recording digitally. The general characteristic of 15 ips recordings is that classic "wall of sound" feel, music with a big build up of bottom and less clarity on the top end. Like everything in art and specifically, music, preferences are entirely subjective. You could record a piece of music in both 15 and 30 ips, play them both back and decide that the piece recorded at 30 ips sounds better. Or vice versa. With recording there are so many variables and every little alteration changes the overall sound. Ideally, the way to go about recording is to try each format to see which is most suited for your recording. Of course this is rather expensive and most artists trust the engineer to decide which speed, ips or bits, is most appropriate. During the mastering of the most recent Pantera album, the band came into the studio with recordings in 16, 20 and 24 bit and in the end the 20 bit sounded best. It ended up being the happy medium between the two. In fact, few artists still work with 20 bit. It seems that 16 and 24 bit are the most prevalent these days. There is a lot of attention focused on recreating the live sound as played in the studio. The 24 bit recordings tend to capture this sound best. These days I generally deal with mastering to CD, a digital format that plays back at 16 bit. The newly developed DVD audio format plays back at 24 bit.
Do you generally work with producers and engineers more so than bands?
Oh no. I work with the artists, the producers, the engineers, it could be the record company A&R guy, it could be the manager — everyone can be involved.
When you sit down to master how much time is usually involved?
It depends on the project. I'd usually say two days. Some people can't afford the second day and we'll have to squeeze it all in during one. I know the clients I can give breaks to and the ones I don't have to, the guys with labels and money in their budget for additional days. The project itself dictates the length of time. Sometimes, when the budget calls for it, I've taken five or six hours to master a record and still have it sound great.
Do you work in the studio alone?
I prefer to have some kind of direction, either a producer, engineer or artist sitting in. Sometimes they'll get in the way by talking while I'm trying to concentrate. Other times they can be really helpful by showing me exactly what they would like to have corrected or which sounds should be brought out in the mix. In the studio I have lots of different speakers and monitors. I've got huge ones, big ones, medium-small ones, even speakers that you'd find in a boom box. I'm from the school of thought that likes to hear a wide variety of playbacks. You could take a finished recording and play it back on five different systems and get five different sounds, each without altering any equalization or anything like that. With my master I try to maintain an overall sound quality consistent with the different types of speakers, as much as that is possible.
Which speakers do you believe give the most realistic playback?
I don't know if any system sounds truer to life than another, think it's a matter of familiarity, of which system you've heard 1,000 records on. My main system has 24" subs and 15" woofers with ribbon tweeters.
Is there a particular speaker brand that you prefer?
I use original KRKs, I think the 6000, which I really like. I have them set up in a listening area that has become rather famous. If you sit in-between the speakers it's as if you're listening with headphones. Once you start the session you become used to listening to the music in that area. A lot of big artists have used the room and are generally drawn to that spot. I also have little Yamaha NS 10s and along with powered Advents to give the listener a boom box sound. I initially listen to the music on the main speakers to get a feel for it and then work my way down to the KRKs. If the music still sounds really good on the Advents, then I know we're rockin'.
Do you prefer to master on analog or digital equipment?
The setup I use is basically the best there is of each. It's a hybrid of some very old vintage analog equipment coupled with some new digital components. Most of the time it's the vintage analog stuff that best captures the sound that people want. You turn the knobs and actually hear a response. Though I definitely prefer to master from analog as opposed to digital, I've come to the conclusion that I don't think the format is all that important anymore. I've heard great mixes recorded in analog, as well as in digital. I do believe that analog does have a warmer, richer sound, but it also has a certain coloration and a lack of overall width and wideness in stereo. While digital is a little less punchy, it can sometimes almost feel more exciting. I have racks of old '60s valve equalizers — Neves and Pultecs — and each piece has it's own uniqueness. Those are really last resorts. Sometimes you'll have a tape that just needs a certain sound or coloration and when you use one of those equalizers something really amazing happens. Of course the opposite can also be true, so I use them very sparingly. I have a lot of really old stuff as well as all the latest — stuff that's new but sounds old. The great thing about mastering is that sometimes you have to use every component, while other times you'll have to use none, depending on what the recording warrants. Just because you have access to tons of equipment doesn't mean you have to use it all — that's something out of Recording 101. [laughs] You use what you need.
How did you come to work in mastering in the first place?
When Masterdisk first started in the late '70s I was the first messenger that they hired. Doug Levine, the president of the company, worked in that position until he grew tired of it and hired me.
How were you able to parlay that position into working in the studio?
My interest in getting a job at Masterdisk wasn't so that I could work in the mail room and deliver packages. Masterdisk used to do all the work for Mercury records and I guess you could say that I got my start making tape dubs. I would deliver packages during the day, while at night I would make dubs. We also did all the tape work for Polygram. I think they mastered someplace else, but they would send us copies of everything and I would have to make duplicates to send to the production plants. This was before digital replication. I would make 15 ips Dolby analog copies. I still remember the time I worked all night making the tape duplicates for Saturday Night Fever. [laughs] That experience served as a good introduction to sound. I would hear different types of recordings and different production techniques used on the albums. Since we made dupes of albums that were not mastered at our facility, I was exposed to different types of mastering. I listened to lots of records. Original masters, remastered albums, etc. It was very fascinating to compare all the different qualities of sound.
So you eventually worked your way out of the mailroom?
I was the new kid and I was really hungry to learn. Masterdisk had been in the 57th Street location until 1981, after which we moved to a new location on 61st Street, which was when I got my first mastering room. That was a wide-open time in the record business. There weren't that many mastering engineers to begin with, and with all the new formats of music coming out, from hip-hop and rap to heavy metal, a lot of the older guys weren't that receptive. I would master it all. From 1980 until 1985 I mastered everything from the hardest rap bands to the heaviest rock bands. It was mind-blowing! After '85 I started to focus on rock which is really what I love. I began mastering around when hip-hop was getting started so somehow I ended up doing the first couple of really big ones from Run-DMC, LL Cool J, Grand Master Flash and all the other legends of hip-hop. To a lot of those guys, I became the guy to master their type of record. During the first five or six years of hip-hop, I probably worked on something like 75-80 percent of all those releases. The first records from the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy — all that stuff.
Was that the first time you worked with mixer Andy Wallace [Tape Op #25]?
Yeah, Andy is a good friend of mine. He's a real good guy. He mixed a lot of those early hip-hop records that I ended up mastering. We did a lot of the same work, which was great training. Hip-hop records, back then, were really inventive. You'd come across albums without samples, hip-hop that was centered around live drummers or full bands. It's hard for me to get into the hip-hop that's popular now — it just doesn't seem special. Hip-hop back then was totally new and inventive. LL Cool J, Public Enemy, those records made a certain statement. Maybe it's gotten to the point where there's not much more to say. Nowadays you have to make very polished, very clean sounding recordings — back then the records could sound raw and powerful. Back then I was working with guys like Bob Ludwig [Tape Op #105], who specialized in old- time mastering which doesn't really exist anymore. Bob was kind of my dad in the business. Back then he was doing a lot of classical. He really showed me the ropes. And yelled at me a lot too — but hey, that's how you learn. [laughs] Basically the point of mastering back in that era was to get really good sounding music onto a piece of really shitty vinyl. Vinyl cutting isn't that different from how it is today, but back then that was all there was.
Could you explain the process of mastering to vinyl?
Back before digital mastering, at the end of the session, the tape had to be in sequence. Either it would come to me in the final running order or I would have to splice the album together. Mastering to lacquer had to be done at one time. You couldn't master one track and then edit on the next, everything had to be done in real time. There was incredible training involved. Each cut sounded different and in-between each track you would have to program the next equalization. You would carve the actual music into the lacquer mold using a cutting lathe. That lacquer would then be used to press the vinyl. Mastering each side of the record was equivalent to doing a 20 minute remix without fault or variation.
Is vinyl mastering something that you still do?
Yeah, although it's a little different than how it was back then. Now everything is sourced from digital tapes no matter what. In those days the recording was mastered from the original analog tape. A vinyl record back then was 100 percent analog, while today it's something like 50 percent.
Have you had people come to you and say, "Help me save this"?
All of the time. I can't really put any names down, but on U2's album, Pop, we spent almost two weeks mastering. That was kind of a save record, though they knew that they had a lot of work to do at the time. We took the extra time to make it sound great.
Do you have any advice to aspiring mastering engineers?
I would say to listen to records done in the early '80s and compare them to what's done now and try to realize that mastering hasn't changed all that much. It's important not to place too much emphasis on equipment, that everyone can make great-sounding records. Equipment is so good and so cheap these days. When it comes down to it, it's always going to be about what is in-between your ears.
