Brian 'Big Bass' Gardner drop a question if u have 1

#1
I'm going to be interviewing him, he's mastered everyone of Tupac's albums ever since the THUG LIFE album hes a very important man in pacs history.. already asked him some questions

did you work hands on with Tupac on all of the albums you mastered? His appearance at the mastering sessions was very rare. I got the tapes after everything was mixed and ready for me to do my thing. One of my most memorable occasions was when I was EQing the "Me Against The World" album and 'So Many Tears' came up. The solidity and power of his music again became evident to me with just the 'Feel' of that song. Kind of enveloped me and I thought " Woe!!" I to this day Love his rap style in that his vocals were another instrument and was always 'right in the groove' often injecting counter rhythms and 8th note and 16th note stuff.

were you at any of the many album sessions or was your work done after all the tracks had been laid down? No not at the sessions but heard about them from Dre and others. When Dr. Dre brought in 'California Love' I just had to stop the machine and ask him "how in the world do you do that?" So many many incidents like that happened where Pac was involved.
 
#2
CD Mastering

Mastering is the final step in the 'production' process of a recording. The mastering house is the last place that you can make any adjustments, or 'fixes' to the material before it begins replication. The recording being mastered will be set to an appropriate volume level, to make it comparable with other commercial recordings of it's genre. The songs will be sequenced in the order they will appear on the CD, and the disc will be written with all the proper coding and information needed by the pressing plant.

Why does your record need mastering? If you plan on releasing your recorded material on CD, you will probably need to have it mastered. For some styles of music, all that will be needed is a level adjustment and sequencing for the final CD. Other material may require compression, equalization, reverb, and perhaps some editing. A good mastering house will be able to determine what kind of treatment the material may need, and have the equipment to apply that treatment, without damaging the quality of the sound. The most critical aspect in our eyes, is to insure that material will sound good when listened to through various playback systems, such as in the car, on the radio, off a boom box, and through a high quality speaker system.
 
#3
Look forward to the interview Stephen
Question: Did u end up interviewing the OG of most of Loyal To The Game? i forget the name. I have rarely been on net in last year so i'm curious.
 
#4
Stephen said:
I'm going to be interviewing him, he's mastered everyone of Tupac's albums ever since the THUG LIFE album hes a very important man in pacs history.. already asked him some questions

did you work hands on with Tupac on all of the albums you mastered? His appearance at the mastering sessions was very rare. I got the tapes after everything was mixed and ready for me to do my thing. One of my most memorable occasions was when I was EQing the "Me Against The World" album and 'So Many Tears' came up. The solidity and power of his music again became evident to me with just the 'Feel' of that song. Kind of enveloped me and I thought " Woe!!" I to this day Love his rap style in that his vocals were another instrument and was always 'right in the groove' often injecting counter rhythms and 8th note and 16th note stuff.

were you at any of the many album sessions or was your work done after all the tracks had been laid down? No not at the sessions but heard about them from Dre and others. When Dr. Dre brought in 'California Love' I just had to stop the machine and ask him "how in the world do you do that?" So many many incidents like that happened where Pac was involved.
cool shit man,something new and fresh to the board.
could you ask him:

what was it like mastering makaveli,and did he have to do alot of editing to it?

also

how was the makaveli album unmastered compared to the mastered version?was it more raw?
 

Preach

Well-Known Member
#5
^^
mastering engineers don't edit albums. the mastering process is somewhat the last step of the creative process, but only because the mastering engineer uses his ears. there is nothing added or taken away during mastering, it's all about setting the stereo image right and normalization.

you are thinking about the first draft as opposed to the final draft. mixing and mastering have nothing to do with creating or removing.

it is, however, possible that tupac was there for some of the mastering sessions. he said rarely, but rarely is not never. ask him if he has any memories from meeting with pac.

also, ask him what stuff is in his mastering setup, what other labels he has mastered for, and what made him go into mastering.
 

Preach

Well-Known Member
#8
^^
his mastering is nothing short of sick. makes tracks sound so crisp. aeom for instance. dk7. omg, his skeels make me dr00l.
 
#9
Rizzle said:
^^
mastering engineers don't edit albums. the mastering process is somewhat the last step of the creative process, but only because the mastering engineer uses his ears. there is nothing added or taken away during mastering, it's all about setting the stereo image right and normalization.

you are thinking about the first draft as opposed to the final draft. mixing and mastering have nothing to do with creating or removing.

it is, however, possible that tupac was there for some of the mastering sessions. he said rarely, but rarely is not never. ask him if he has any memories from meeting with pac.

also, ask him what stuff is in his mastering setup, what other labels he has mastered for, and what made him go into mastering.
Why does your record need mastering? If you plan on releasing your recorded material on CD, you will probably need to have it mastered. For some styles of music, all that will be needed is a level adjustment and sequencing for the final CD. Other material may require compression, equalization, reverb, and perhaps some editing.
 

Preach

Well-Known Member
#10
^^
depends on who's mastering. i doubt brian ever did any editing but what do i know. for the most part, you deliver a fully mixed product for mastering, meaning wavs, a cd or a dat. compression and limiting is applied, it is made sure that nothing will "disappear" if you play the audio through a mono outlet (like a radio for instance), which is the case with a lot of stereo effects, and after each track is mastered the whole album is normalized so the volume is consistent throughout.

no matter what certain hobby-masterers and mastering studios might offer, editing is not a part of the mastering process per definition.
 
#13
DontheMakaveli said:
This should be your first question to him. What is edited on "This Ain't Livin" and why?
A DEATHROW REFERENCE, BECAUSE JOHNNY J PRODUCED THE TRACK, EVERY TRACK HE PRODUCED FOR THE ALBUM, HE CUT OUT THE DEATHROW REFERENCES BECAUSE HIM AND DEATHROW ARE NOT PALS ANYMORE.
 

Butt Rubber

More arrogant than SicC
#14
KAMIKAZI said:
A DEATHROW REFERENCE, BECAUSE JOHNNY J PRODUCED THE TRACK, EVERY TRACK HE PRODUCED FOR THE ALBUM, HE CUT OUT THE DEATHROW REFERENCES BECAUSE HIM AND DEATHROW ARE NOT PALS ANYMORE.
try hitting caps lock before you post kami
 
#17
Rizzle said:
^^
mastering engineers don't edit albums. the mastering process is somewhat the last step of the creative process, but only because the mastering engineer uses his ears. there is nothing added or taken away during mastering, it's all about setting the stereo image right and normalization.

you are thinking about the first draft as opposed to the final draft. mixing and mastering have nothing to do with creating or removing.


I wouldn’t say that at all. The mixing engineer is the second highest paid person next to the producer, and the really good mixers make more + points on the record. The amount of “creative” power a mixing engineer exercises over a track can turn a great song into an amazing one and a good song into a horrible one. The mixing engineer is the one who gets handed dozens of takes for every single track and chooses the ones that sound best and cuts the ones who don’t. They add all the instrument and vocal effects and do all the stereo phasing. These guys are usually working directly with the artist and/or producer for good reason because there is no question that the song really takes from during mixing.

The primary jobs of the mastering engineer is to do some minimal work with the EQ to get everything just right, add compression, determine when the song starts and when it fades out, keep the volume consistent throughout, dither all the tracks and run integrity tests on the everything for proof if there is any problems. Also the mastering engineers are responsible if there is anything technically wrong with the final product. If a mastering engineer misses something and sends everything off to be pressed and there is a problem he’s gotta buy back that batch of CD’s.

The mastering engineer’s credo is to preserve what he’s been given and not to take away from or add to in such a way that it deviates from the artists vision of the song. But the mixing engineer is one of the most creative people in the whole process.

I doubt 2pac ever gave a shit about who was mastering his music he wasn’t a perfectionist like that. He would rather write and record more songs than run around sitting with mastering engineers all day who listen for the smallest nuances that your average person couldn’t even hear. I remember reading several interviews with Brian Gardner and he said very rarely do the artists take part in the mastering process. And the few times when people like do doubt and dr dre come in it’s a real surprise. The masters are sent to them where every they are located (usually their home) and they do the work there and send everything back when they’re done. It would be really cool to hear some interviews with the mixing engineers though, I bet the stuff they did and the interactions they had with Pac and the producers would be really interesting. I spoke to Dave Aron a few years ago and also Tommy Daugherty’s management. I still have their contact info around somewhere if Stephen wants it to hook something up id be happy to.
 
#18
KAMIKAZI said:
A DEATHROW REFERENCE, BECAUSE JOHNNY J PRODUCED THE TRACK, EVERY TRACK HE PRODUCED FOR THE ALBUM, HE CUT OUT THE DEATHROW REFERENCES BECAUSE HIM AND DEATHROW ARE NOT PALS ANYMORE.
We all know that, but we want to know exactly what was said.
 
#19
Ask Big Bass Brian what he thinks about DJ QUICK and if he ever had people ask him that they heard his named shouted out on any of Quick's Albums?
 

Latest posts

Donate

Any donations will be used to help pay for the site costs, and anything donated above will be donated to C-Dub's son on behalf of this community.

Members online

No members online now.
Top