Interviews

Steve Hoffman: Mastering The Beach Boys, Miles Davis, & More

As a mastering engineer, Steve Hoffman has worked on many classic recordings, but very few of them would be considered standard CD or LP releases. After working at MCA on reissue CDs from Buddy Holly and The Who (among others), he entered the audiophile world. He is currently a free agent, working on SACDs for Audio Fidelity and LPs for S&P Records. He made his name as the mastering engineer for DCC Compact Classics. Throughout the '90s, DCC specialized in producing 24-karat gold compact discs. They released gold disc versions of albums by The Doors, Paul McCartney, The Beach Boys, Miles Davis and many others. Even non-audiophiles feel that these discs are the definitive versions. Indeed, the first time I heard his work on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited, I felt as though I was hearing what Dylan heard in the control room during playback. Steve's trademark is what he refers to as the "breath of life" — recordings that are dynamic and natural sounding. You don't have to have a $50,000 system to hear the difference.

On your website, you specify your title as "audiophile music restoration specialist" instead of, say, "mastering engineer." Can you tell me what you think the difference is, and what you feel your job is?

I always like to use the word "audiophile" in there because nowadays a "mastering engineer" is someone who mangles the sound to the lowest common denominator. In other words, so that their CD is just as loud as everybody else's out there. Sort of the old "my radio station is louder than your radio station" thing. My personal opinion is that there has to be a bastion of good sound out there and many of my jobs entail much more than mastering. There are all different kinds of restoration, from old records to old tapes to this and that. I didn't want to be lumped in with the mass of guys out there who just follow orders now and compress the hell out of everything.

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