From
http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/T...ct_session=163
Howie Weinberg: »I mean, there was no such thing as digital. First of all, digital (makes a cutting motion) never existed, ok? Digital was something that someone said: ”Yeah, that may happen in ten years. Maybe! Or five years. Maybe we’ll hear something called ’digital.’ But in 1980, basically everything was quarter inch, 15 IPS, either Dolby, or no Dolby. And Dolby was a system for noise reduction, and everyone had Dolby on their cassettes, right? The Dolby A was a little bit better version of the Dolby on your cassettes. And they would hand me the tape. And I’ll be honest with you, at the time, you would just try to... Mastering is not only just making that lacquer, it’s making sense. Making the client’s tape, whatever they give you, on quarter inch, whatever the music is, you’re listening back and you’re thinking: ’I can make this sound better than this.’ So you EQ a little more high end, a little more bottom, compressing a little more, trying to tighten it up a little more, just trying to make: At this point in my career I just want to make my client love me. So he’ll just bring me all his records forever. In any way possible, I would have this client [satisfied], he would walk out of that room going: ”I like this guy, when I have more records I want him to do ‚em.” Bla bla bla.«
RBMA: »You said something: you said compression. Now, I mean, collecting Funk records from the 60’s and 70’s, that were sent off to be pressed without being mastered: I can definitely tell you I’ve heard records that weren’t compressed. Can you tell these people what compression does? «
Howie Weinberg: »Well, it’s the same thing, as dynamic limiting, or... (waves his arms to show a width in the air) I’m not even that familiar with it either. It’s more like, ah... (strokes his chin). All I know is that I push the button, (mimes pushing a big button) you turn it this way, it sounds ‚Yeahhh’...a little more this way, a little more that way – yeah (makes a thumbs-up sign)!«
RBMA: »Does it make it sound louder, quieter?«
Howie Weinberg: »You can make a lot of quiet things sound a lot louder; it can make something that sounds soggy tighter; it can make something that sounds a little harsh, a little smoother. I mean compression is like a really grey area in a lot of recording, because if you overuse it, you make everything sound smaller. And nobody wants small sounding records, put it that way. Everybody wants big, huge sounding records. And if you use compression in the right way, which I use, and a lot of mixing guys and recording guys use in the complete way, you can make something sound huge. Without having it sound small. You know, you put your record on: some records you put on and you go: ”Hmm, it sounds ok.“ You put some others on and they just (throws his hands out) leap in your face. Well, a lot of that has to do with compression. Not all of it! But a lot of it has to do with program compression. But that’s another grey area.«
