Some non-technical questions

[Jeff MacdonaldModerator]

Hi Adam,

First, thank you so much for taking the time to do this and answer our questions.

How did you begin your journey to become a mastering engineer? While you were attending school was mastering your end goal, or did that change after you were hired by Gateway?

Do you have a favourite record you have worked on, or favourite genre that you absolutely love working on?

Finally, How do you find being based in Portland, ME versus a more traditional 'music city' such as Nashville or LA? I assume with the name you have made for yourself this does not have any effect on people wanting to work with you, but do you ever find yourself wishing you were in one of those cities? Personally, I love Portland and try to visit at least once a year. Do you ever do studio tours for interested members of the public?

Cheers,

Jeff

[Adam AyanParticipant]

Hi Jeff,

Thank you for the great questions!

I discovered mastering as the thing I might want to do when I was a senior at UMass Lowell. I was the president of our AES student chapter at the time, and had asked Bob Ludwig to come and speak for us. He graciously accepted, and I spent a bunch of time researching just what mastering was, and started to think it might be for me. I was working at a multitrack studio as an engineer at the time, and eventually went on to intern at a mastering studio in Boston, which also hired me after the internship was completed. So, I was doing multitrack work and working at a mastering lab when I realized mastering was what I wanted to do full time. A position as a production engineer opened up at Gateway, I applied, and ended up getting it. Shortly after that Bob wanted a direct assistant, and I pursued that. In a short period of time it became apparent to both of us that I had the aptitude for mastering, and I began developing my own clientele. That was about 2001, and I haven't looked back since!

In terms of favorite records - I'm very fortunate in that I love many of the records I've worked on! My favorites as of late are Lana Del Rey's "Honeymoon", Mavis Staple's "Livin' On A High Note", and all 3 of the Trevor Hall records that Warren Huart and I have worked on together in the past few years. I am a rock guy at heart, and was a musician first so I guess I would say that records with great musicianship and rock aesthetic are often favorites. It's an honor to work on so much great music!

As for living in Portland, ME. I do love it here. I came here to work at Gateway, and it ended up being a really happy accident for me that it's such a great place to live. Sometimes I think I'd like to be in a bigger city or one of the music hubs, but I really wouldn't trade Portland for them any day. It can be difficult at times to network and get engaged with the record business as a whole being here, but I manage to stay involved with NARAS and the AES and get as much as I can in.

Unfortunately, we do not offer tours to the public. As you can imagine we do get a lot of requests!

Best,
Adam

[Jeff MacdonaldModerator]

Thank you very much for your responses!

Congrats on your success and I look forward to continuing to enjoy your work.

Perhaps maybe one technical question that has been irking me lately. What are your thoughts on Low pass filtering across the majority of tracks? I, like I suspect many folks in the home recording world, don't have a super monitoring environment and can't really get the sub-frequencies to reproduce with great accuracy. Do you think it harms a production to say cut off guitar tracks below 60hz or a vocal down in that range, and systematically cut off tracks to essentially lop off anything that is outside of a reasonable range to save playback systems from having to recreate this stuff that really isn't adding much? I have read lots of opinions that advocate cutting all tracks, cutting some tracks and leaving it all unfiltered unless an effect is desired. I would really love to hear your opinion on this and if doing this in the mix stage that will allow for a better master.

Cheers,

Jeff

[Adam AyanParticipant]

Hi Jeff,

Great question - and I do have an opinion on it.

I bet it is super helpful in a mix to hi pass/low cut (you said low pass, but I think you meant low cut or hi pass?) many tracks in a multitrack that have low frequency energy that is otherwise meaningless in the mix. In doing so you are clearing up muddiness/cloudiness that is only serving to bog your mix down. I think you'll be surprised at how much that helps your mix. So, I say go for it!

Best,
Adam

[Jeff MacdonaldModerator]

That was correct, I did mean high pass - I guess my coffee hadn't quite kicked in yet - haha. Thanks again for your input, I really appreciate it!

Cheers,

Jeff

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