Is there anywhere to hear unmastered versions of current dance pop top 40?

[andonwego]

With the ongoing discussions of how mastering is affecting dynamics especially in this genre, I'm curious what unmastered mixes of recent radio material sound like.

Does anyone know a place on the Internet these things are, or might you have some personally and be willing to share?

[Crankitup]

having friends at studios that produce top 40 hits might do the trick...

[andonwego]

I do actually, I've asked them, they don't have any offhand they can show me. Anyone?

[sage691]

Ha Ha !

Good luck -- most would never let you hear their unmastered stuff in a million years.

Kind of like how old wrinkly, uppity rich hags who cake on tons of makeup would do this in front of you if they weren't wearing any !!!

[Karloff70]

If you expect to find much difference to the mastered versions I reckon you'd be mostly disappointed anyway.......and as far as makeup, that all goes on before....lol

[andonwego]

Yeah I hear ya.

All it's for really is to put the mastered/unmastered tracks side by side so I can develop some quick plugin settings for compression and limiting that get a ballpark sound.

Use it for checking my mix work, put those settings across my 2 bus and hear closer to how it might sound after mastering -- obviously not perfect but a way of hearing how levels and dynamics might alter.

[Karloff70]

That's what I mean. I wouldn't assume too much to be mastering other than limiting a bit for loudness. You can easily simulate that. The rest should be in the mix.

[andonwego]

True enough. Occasionally, I think, though, mastering might increase or decrease the sense of pumping in the mix -- mastering I'm suspecting often has a (relatively) significant effect on hearing/feeling the beat of the kick relative to the harmonic information in a mix. So it's not just limiting levels, it's attack/release times as well.