Alan Ratcliffe wrote
Mastering is essential for airplay
Unfortunately, todays super loud masters are actually impacting broadcast in a negative way (actually, visa versa), especially for music that was recorded acoustically, as opposed to music that was sampled and sequenced. This, among other related issues, has been a constant topic of discussion amongst my colleagues and I'd like to outline some things that may be helpful to know when it comes to getting your stuff broadcast.
Firstly, this is a list of the average set of processing steps you will find at any given commercial radio station (in no particular order):
1. Phase rotation
2. AGC (Automatic Gain Compensation)
3. Stereo Enhancement
4. EQ
5. Multiband Compression AND Limiting
6. Pre-emphasis and HF Limiting
7. Clipping (yes, clipping)
There's more information on this here:
http://www.masterdigital.com/24bit/mastering/radio.htm
So, you can imagine after smashing the snot out of your master how it stands up to this type of further processing. Most fall apart, even commercial releases mastered by top names. I've heard it. So, the question is, is it really necessary these days to have a super loud master if your goal is to broadcast it on radio at some point? You'll most likely be better off giving them a master that is more dynamic and less squashed because it is just going to get squashed again on radio. However, there's one problem...
The play-listing department.
Unfortunately if you give them a quieter master with more dynamic range, these dimwits will probably take it as "unprofessional" or "amateur" because they are victims of the loudness war and will be comparing your song with commercially mastered material. They don't even know it, either. The trick, I believe is, is to somehow get them to listen to the loud master in their meetings, and then if it gets play-listed, to get the program director the quieter master because by then, the decision has already been made and the loudness discrepancy will be negligible in practice. You just gotta do it without them knowing somehow.
One more thing:
FM radio is pre-emphasized at 50 microseconds or 75 microseconds, depending on the country in which the transmission occurs. Pre-emphasis is a 6dB/octave high frequency boost that's 3dB up at 2.1kHz (75µs) or 3.2kHz (50µs). With 75µs pre-emphasis, 15kHz is up 17dB!
Depending on the processor's manufacturer, pre-emphasis may be applied before or after the multiband compressor/limiter. The important thing for mixers and mastering engineers to understand is that putting lots of energy above 5kHz creates significant problems for any broadcast processor because the pre-emphasis will greatly increase this energy.
Watch out for those high frequencies if you plan on broadcasting your material.
Cheers ?
