SH Spotlight What is the difference between a multi-track tape, a "mixdown" and a master tape?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Steve Hoffman, Nov 30, 2006.

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  1. Mal

    Mal Phorum Physicist

    I know - the point I'm making is that these tapes specifically made for use in multi-track recording have the word "Master" on them.

    It is not uncommon for people to refer to them as multi-track masters either.

    Right and wrong doesn't make a difference if people use the word.

    As long as we all know what we mean then that's the best we can hope for.

    :)
     
  2. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    No, the mix is the master. A further copy would be just that, a tape copy. For best results always use the first generation master for an album. Of course there were issues. A Greatest Hits album would often dissamble the orignal album side master or use a tape copy. Unfortunately, many in the business used to consider a professional tape copy virtually identical to the original master. Further, many labels didn't want to dissamble and reassemble their master tapes for fear of damaging them. Another solution for Greatest Hits compilations was to use multiple A/B machines during mastering and use the various masters without the dissasembly.
     
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  3. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC

    But they don't specifically call it mastering tape even though the word master is in the brand name. Lots of 1/4" tape was specifically called mastering tape. It's all a silly semantic argument though. :D
     
  4. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    I know you asked Steve, but I believe your answer is no. If that mixdown is ready for duplication to CD, tape LP or whatever else media you have, it is indeed your master. What irks people is that people call the multitracks a master.

    Where I think it gets a bit murky is when you have a finished mix that is used in an album master reel, maybe with crossfades or butt edits. Obviously, that mixdown tape, looses a generation when it goes to an album master. But, that comped tape becomes the master. but, it seems that the finished mix would also be a master of that one song. Think of "A Day In The Life" by the Beatles. The master tape of that song has a clean start, but the Sgt. Pepper side it appears on as crossfaded is the LP master.
     
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  5. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    They distinguish what master the song came from.
     
  6. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    yes. The process involves a lot of attentiveness, and speed. One would run a tape being fed by two other tape machines. The engineer would cue up the first tape and let it roll. then, while that's playing, the engineer would thread up and cue the next song in sequence to go after the first one was finished playing, and then repeat the steps for the rest of the songs on the "side". It's much like a DJ recording his own performance with a recorder running in the background. Thank God for digital assembly!
     
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  7. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    Well one can do a crossfade or butt edit during mastering and still keep everything first generation. It requires using two machines for mastering and obviously having the individual masters separate. Of course, this turns the mastering engineer into a producer of sorts. :D
     
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  8. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    Yes, but the mastering engineer should be a pro and should be able to handle this. :D

    In fact, mastering consoles usually have what they call A/B sections with different volume sets just for this purpose. As you said, it's not much different than what a DJ does.
     
  9. Mal

    Mal Phorum Physicist

    :agree:

    :D
     
  10. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    But, if you are preparing an album master on tape in this fashion, you are indeed creating another generation of those individual tapes, are you not? The LP master will be first generation, but the individual songs will not. And, as we know, digital mastering changes all of this...IF you believe that digital doesn't degrade as it's copied.:p

    Yes, the mastering engineer IS a producer of sorts, as he/she puts the final touches on a project, and can control everything from fades to gaps. Even doing a lowly needle drop turns the person doing one into a producer.
     
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  11. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    Yes! people love titles and labels.:p
     
  12. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    Not really, unless you consider the lacquer a generation. In this case you will not have an LP master, since the tracks that would have been on it have been kept separated. They individual tracks are the masters regrardless of how they are assembled. If you run a tape copy of the mastering 'performance' than you will have a second generation safety copy of the album with all the proper crossfades and edits.

    Remember that an album is rarely mixed all at once. Songs are mixed one at a time and each one results in a master. An album is generally assembled by splicing all the individual masters together to form a side of an album master.

    Once again this is rarely done this way, since the crossfades and edits are usually considered artistic and as much a part of the production as anything. But they surely can be done this way to save a generation.

    Another trick sometimes uses second generation crossfades and edits and splices them to the masters. This of course requires great care, but it can results in first generation mixes for the majority of the project. Having a second generation tape for just a few seconds during a fade can go virtually undetected if it's done right.

    I know that in some cases where there is damage to the master, short splices from a copy can be inserted into the right places and for the most part nobody will know. I've done this before on some of my projects and I'm pretty sure Steve has done it as well.
     
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  13. Studio_Two

    Studio_Two Forum Resident

    Hello,

    I'm now clear that my "best mix" (from multi-track onto two track) is called the "master".

    However, if i want to do anything useful with it, don't I have make a copy?

    I'm guessing here, but don't I then splice that copy together with other recordings to make my album master?

    I will then a have a single piece of tape containing my album (with my original "mix tape" still intact). This will be my "Album Master", but it will be generation away from what is actually my "Master".

    When I see that a CD has been created from the master tapes, have they gone back to my "mix tape" (master) or just to the "album master".

    TIA,
    Stephen
     
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  14. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    I don't know what you mean by anything useful. Yes, the album master is usually all the individual tracks spliced together. The term album master is a bit confusing. Often a tape copy is made of all the individual masters after they are assembled, but this is definitely a tape copy. It's advantage are that there is no danger to the masters, the splices can't fall apart, and it can be replaced. It's disadvantage is that it is a tape copy with all that goes along with that. Many, many records were made from tape copies of assembled masters. This is in part what makes remastering so interesting. Going back to the real masters can offer a big improvement if a tape copy was originally used for album mastering. As good as Steve (or anybody) can be in the studio, I think finding the real master tapes is by far the most important facet in this.

    I should point out that my whole discussion in this thread is relating to vinyl mastering. I have no experience with CD mastering and as Grant pointed out things can be done differently once we're in the digital domain.
     
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  15. Studio_Two

    Studio_Two Forum Resident

    Oh dear. Please fogive me, as I'm REALLY confused now! :help:

    I'm OK with the idea that my mix tape is the "master". However, wouldn't that 2-track tape contain other attempts at mixing the same track (or indeed other tracks)?

    When i said "if i want to do anything useful with it", i was getting at the fact that somehow I need to "divorce" my "master" from all the other tracks on the same tape.

    Are you saying that the "master" is physically "cut out" of that original piece of tape in order to be spliced into the album master? My gut instinct is that it will not happen that way.

    Wouldn't my master be copied onto another tape and it is that copy that will be spliced into an album master?

    Am I anywhere near?
    Stephen
     
  16. Doug Sclar

    Doug Sclar Forum Legend

    Location:
    The OC
    Correct. The master is physically cut out of mix reel. I can't say it's always done this way, but in my experience it generally has been.
     
  17. Studio_Two

    Studio_Two Forum Resident

    Aha!

    Thank you Doug, the fog has lifted ... :edthumbs:
     
  18. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    So, do we understand now?

    Let's ignore the use of the word "master" when it pertains to an OKed vocal take or o/d on the multi-track. That's nothing we'd ever discuss here.

    I just want to be sure we are all on the same page as to what a true master is and most importantly, what it is NOT.

    If you are still not sure or don't understand how a master LP reel is built up, etc. just ask!
     
  19. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    Yup. If you go through the outtake/session reels you'll inevitably find reels marked with tracks that have been marked "OTM" or "PTM", which means "out to master" or "pulled to master". The track so-marked has been physically cut out of the tape and spliced into the master reel. Sometimes you'll find a reel where every track is marked as OTM, in which case all you'll find on the reel is blank tape and leader...!

    Kwad
     
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  20. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    Korrect, Kwadguy.

    Some times a ditsy secretary (oops, administrative assistant) will enter song titles from a reel of tape into a computer list WITHOUT mentioning the OTM after a song. When the reel is pulled from storage---SURPRISE, IT'S BLANK with just the countoffs! I hate that.
     
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  21. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    Well, I wasn't talking about the laquer stage, but the assembled LP master.

    I know that!
    Right. But, I get the feeling we are misunderstanding each other.

    yeah, sounds like an awful lot of work! It's a good thing we have DAWs now.:agree:

    yeah, i've even done it. One commercial CD, "A Star Is Born" with Barbra Striesand and Kris Kristofferson has this on the last track "Just One More Look At You/Watch Closely Now". Someone actually spliced a piece of the song from a vinyl source. It's noticable, but not too distracting.
     
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  22. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    OK, I have a question: How many times can a track be physically spliced from a reel to another...and pasted back again without a lot of damage to the tape or the music? No matter how skilled the person doing the editing and pasting is, damage is likely to happen at some point. And, how much blank space before that music starts is eaten up when doing all this splicing?
     
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  23. Ed Bishop

    Ed Bishop Incredibly, I'm still here

    I don't understand spit...and if we all did, we wouldn't get future fun threads like this from Professor Tonmeister...:wave:

    :ed:
     
  24. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host Thread Starter

    Could be hundreds of times. An engineer skilled in analog (a dying breed; most mastering engineers I know have never seen a reel of tape before) can remove splicing tape without any struggle. There is a trick to doing it. To be safe though, I always intercut in the leader (if there is any). That way the tape is never actually touched. See?
     
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  25. SiriusB

    SiriusB New Member

    Location:
    New York

    While he may not have used the words 'virtually identical', I believe Mr. Hoffman himself has said that a 1st gen tape copy of the original master can be very good indeed.

    Also, this whole thread makes me think of *remastering* in a more concrete way. The master take is derived from the multitrack...and the master tape is a compilation of master takes.
    A *remaster* derives from...the master tape. Seems to me a fundamentally different process. It brings us back again and again to the question of 'flat transfers' versus 'tweaked transfers'.
     
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