Vlado Meller Rocks Again

[AJR]

I usually prefer to just stay off of this site.... but i had to mention today (not that anyone cares) that I love Vlado's work. He's giving his clients what they want, and they come back again and again, many for decades.
(regardless of all the negative flames on him that seem to fly around here.)
He had 21 records he mastered up for Grammys last year alone.
I've been very fortunate to have worked with many of the greats, Joe Gastwirt, Ted Jenson, Bernie Grundman, Dave Collins , Brian Gardner, Bob Ludwig, Bob St.John, Dave Locke, and Stephen Marcussen. These are all the go to guys because of their years of experience and the golden EARS. Vlado is at the top of his game. Passionate caring, and always paying strict attention to detail. His high end is so smooth and detailed, its black magic. The quiet sections of the songs stay quiet. All the guys i mentioned in this post are top notch,
and i'm sure there are many other greats i have not had a chance to hear. See you in
2010 and have a great 2009.

Its Pure Sonic Alchemy .

AJR

[24-96 Mastering]

Originally Posted by AJR

I usually prefer to just stay off of this site.... but i had to mention today (not that anyone cares) that I love Vlado's work. He's giving his clients what they want, and they come back again and again, many for decades.
(regardless of all the negative flames on him that seem to fly around here.)
He had 21 records he mastered up for Grammys last year alone.
I've been very fortunate to have worked with many of the greats, Joe Gastwirt, Ted Jenson, Bernie Grundman, Dave Collins , Brian Gardner, Bob Ludwig, Bob St.John, Dave Locke, and Stephen Marcussen. These are all the go to guys because of their years of experience and the golden EARS. Vlado is at the top of his game. Passionate caring, and always paying strict attention to detail. His high end is so smooth and detailed, its black magic. The quiet sections of the songs stay quiet. All the guys i mentioned in this post are top notch,
and i'm sure there are many other greats i have not had a chance to hear. See you in
2010 and have a great 2009.

Its Pure Sonic Alchemy .

AJR

Can I rent you to make me sound good too?

But seriously, I don't think anyone here in ANY WAY doubts Vlado Meller's abilities... or that he's is a great guy. He's just been involved in making some very loud discs, that's all that's ever been criticised, as far as I heard.

(edited)

[Cellotron]

Not only that but he can watch CNN and master at the same time! ->


His new room at Universal definitely looks nice:



Best regards,
Steve Berson

[shmasterer]

he's using old Sonic!

sh

[MattGray]

In that photo there is virtually no analog? Mostly Weiss & Z-Sys what gives?

[Alécio Costa]

A shame he does not have a 42" Full HD LCD to watch CNN.
This is not a top notch room

[MAzevedo]

Originally Posted by shmasterer

he's using old Sonic!

sh

Dang, things I never thought I'd see again. I dig soundBlade, but there were a few things that I used to do on a classic system that you can't in soundBlade or HD. That was a pretty great system for it's time. I wonder if he's still rocking CDR900's?

[phild]

Originally Posted by MattGray

In that photo there is virtually no analog? Mostly Weiss & Z-Sys what gives?

Gotta go digital if you want to sound like the big boys!

[Jerry Tubb]

Interesting

Perusing some of the other mastering suites at Universal I see lots of familiar gear:

Sontec EQ
Pro Tools
Sonic Studio/Solutions
Lavry Blue
Z-Sys
Bryston
Aeron
Apple Macs

These guys have good taste!

JT

[Waltz Mastering]

Originally Posted by MattGray

In that photo there is virtually no analog? Mostly Weiss & Z-Sys what gives?

That Vari Mu up top is pretty analog. I'm sure that get's a lot of use.

TW

[phild]

That's a Maselec compressor!

[jayfrigo]

Originally Posted by MAzevedo

Dang, things I never thought I'd see again. I dig soundBlade, but there were a few things that I used to do on a classic system that you can't in soundBlade or HD. That was a pretty great system for it's time. I wonder if he's still rocking CDR900's?

I still wax nostalgic for classic sometimes. It really was an absolutely amazing system at the time. Nothing could touch it. It was 24 bits when everything else was lucky to get 16 right. The machine control was fabulous for automated 1630 production. I loved that it could do three tasks at once, and the 4-point model had a couple more features. There were a couple things you could do back then that you can't really do today, anywhere. All that, and it ran like a champ on a 33 mHz Quadra 950.

Still, it would be hard to use today. The 96k support was barely coming around at the end, and wasn't really solid until HD. There's no CD-text. You can't export wav files. You can't use firewire drives, or easily move files from the dedicated Sonic SCSI drive to any other drive. None of its CD recorders are supported anymore so you need to output DDP or jam and burn elsewhere. I wouldn't want to use a system that old anymore, though if Vlado is just doing 44.1k capture (or 48k for DVD), and letting the production department add CD-Text and cut parts with something newer, then I'm sure it works just fine.

[inlinenl]

that is a lot off bryston amps ... nice to switch them on all at once ...

[Jerry Tubb]

Originally Posted by phild

That's a Maselec compressor!

and a set of Lavry Blues just below!

JT

[Waltz Mastering]

Originally Posted by phild

That's a Maselec compressor!

You're right. I didn't look close enough. My bad.

TW

[switch1]

Vlado is a great mastering engineer. What you get is YOUR mixes sounding kickass, it is amazing. No hype, no mix element alteration, the only mastering engineer that I've worked with that respects so much the mixes.

It is a shame that everyone thinks Vlado = Californication, I've heard masters sounding that bad or even worse (!!) from most of the big-name guys, usually the client is always right so if Rick Rubin or anyone wants more volume, that is what he gets. Vlado would never cut a master that loud from the begining, I've sent him 4 projects so far and his first masters were always spot-on and not too loud, actually I am usually pushing him for a bit more volume (we are talking about -10 to -9db's RMS, very sane for todays insane standards and sounding GREAT!)

I really enjoy good sounding music and I really believe that Vlado is one of the best out there, a great guy too and really caring for his clients.

[Alécio Costa]

-9db RMS is already pretty loud to me.

[Cellotron]

Originally Posted by Alécio Costa

-9db RMS is already pretty loud to me.

That's usually a level that sounds pretty badly crushed to me as well. Maybe he's reading it with something like Wavelab's non-standard RMS settings where what says -9dB RMS is really -12dB RMS?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[switch1]

Originally Posted by Cellotron

That's usually a level that sounds pretty badly crushed to me as well. Maybe he's reading it with something like Wavelab's non-standard RMS settings where what says -9dB RMS is really -12dB RMS?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

Yes, that is correct! So is Wavelab's RMS not the 'real' RMS???

[Cellotron]

Originally Posted by switch1

Yes, that is correct! So is Wavelab's RMS not the 'real' RMS???

0

With Wavelab 6 if you go to Options / Preferences / General and choose "Use AES17 standard for RMS values" - you'll get the generally accepted measurement system for RMS.

Otherwise I believe I actually had it reversed in my prior post in that it reads 3dB under where other RMS meters do!! So you must be liking some really crushed stuff!

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[Cellotron]

Originally Posted by MattGray

In that photo there is virtually no analog? Mostly Weiss & Z-Sys what gives?

His room at the now closed Sony Studios his desk prominently featured an SPL PQ. I don't know whether he currently uses other analog stuff that isn't visible in the photo of his current room or if he just decided to stick more towards digital tools.

Best regards,
Steve Berson

[switch1]

Originally Posted by Cellotron

0

With Wavelab 6 if you go to Options / Preferences / General and choose "Use AES17 standard for RMS values" - you'll get the generally accepted measurement system for RMS.

Otherwise I believe I actually had it reversed in my prior post in that it reads 3dB under where other RMS meters do!! So you must be liking some really crushed stuff!

Best regards,
Steve Berson

I don't have any great knowledge on mastering metering, I am using an old Wavelab 5 here just to get watch some RMS values. I've asked a friend who is mastering stuff to show me how to measure RMS and he mentioned the Roger Nichols stuff. So yesterday at his place Vlado's stuff (the albums he did for me) measure -12 to -9 at the loudest sections. We both agreed that this is an acceptable level for a pop-rock cd, not audiophile but definitely acceptable (for our tastes) Some of the first mastering takes from other engineers measure way louder and FEEL squashed and harsh, Vlado's waveforms are clipped but the transients look healthy (hahaha), lots of transient information here!

To my ears my mastered tracks sound far from crushed, actually it feels like it enhanced the punchiness and impact and the work he does with the eq is amazing.

[24-96 Mastering]

Originally Posted by Cellotron

That's usually a level that sounds pretty badly crushed to me as well. Maybe he's reading it with something like Wavelab's non-standard RMS settings where what says -9dB RMS is really -12dB RMS?

Best regards,
Steve Berson

If he read it with Wavelab, then I believe the quoted -9dB RMS would actually translate to -6dB RMS AES17, not -12.

I'm thinking most people monitor with non-AES-standard RMS. A list of which applications use which by defaut would be quite interesting.

[Bob Olhsson]

The two or three CDs I have of Vlado's jazz stuff are absolutely amazing.

[Alécio Costa]

My RMS read-outs are done with Digidesign Gain plug-in from Digirack 7.3.1cs7.

Of course depends om musical style but -9 is "acceptable" for Linking Park and hyper commercial crushed stuff.

[Trippynet]

Originally Posted by AJR

I usually prefer to just stay off of this site.... but i had to mention today (not that anyone cares) that I love Vlado's work. He's giving his clients what they want, and they come back again and again, many for decades.
(regardless of all the negative flames on him that seem to fly around here.)
He had 21 records he mastered up for Grammys last year alone.
I've been very fortunate to have worked with many of the greats, Joe Gastwirt, Ted Jenson, Bernie Grundman, Dave Collins , Brian Gardner, Bob Ludwig, Bob St.John, Dave Locke, and Stephen Marcussen. These are all the go to guys because of their years of experience and the golden EARS. Vlado is at the top of his game. Passionate caring, and always paying strict attention to detail. His high end is so smooth and detailed, its black magic. The quiet sections of the songs stay quiet. All the guys i mentioned in this post are top notch,
and i'm sure there are many other greats i have not had a chance to hear. See you in
2010 and have a great 2009.

Its Pure Sonic Alchemy .

AJR

With all respects, I have to disagree. I've heard many, many examples of how to master an album to be very loud, but whilst retaining some degree of punch and clarity in the resulting files. However, there's been just too many times when I've heard an album, thought "This sounds frankly awful!", then checked the CD inlay to see that Vlado Mellor was once again the mastering engineer for it.

Regardless of how nice a guy he is and all the rest of it, he's responsible for butchering so many potentially great albums beyond recognition that I just cannot subscribe to the feeling that he is anything other than hopelessly incompetent when it comes to producing hot and good sounding masters. For Vlado, it always seems to be one or the other. And by that, I mean usually hot and loud, but appalling quality.

Do note that I'm not just basing this on Californication or indeed the simlarly badly sounding By The Way or Stadium Arcadium either. There's been plenty of other dreadful sounding masters that unfortunately carry Vlado's name as the mastering engineer.

[engmix]

They don't call him Vlad the Impaler for nothing.

i just wonder how many of the so called bad mastering is due to over zealous use of 2 bus limiting prior to mastering. this is the defacto "mo" for many mix engineers these days.

i have a buddy who had his record mastered by Vlado, and i must admit it was pretty crushed, to the point of where the drums were completely faded sounding. the mix engineer is a well known guy as well. i'm going to try and get the before mixes and see where the truth lies.

[Storyville]

Vlado did all the System of A Down albums over time. As their albums progress, the overall RMS starts to go down. I'm just going to guess, but I'm sure like most who do any mastering to any degree - whether it be mastering engineers, or mix engineers with clients who want a "mix master" - he basically responds to his clients' wishes.

That being said, I considered him for mastering my latest project and decided against it because I didn't want him to anticipate my desires for loudness.

[lucey]

Originally Posted by Storyville

That being said, I considered him for mastering my latest project and decided against it because I didn't want him to anticipate my desires for loudness.

"Anticipate" to the loud side? That's so easy to solve with a word of communication.

[Kayo]

Originally Posted by Bob Olhsson

The two or three CDs I have of Vlado's jazz stuff are absolutely amazing.

Hi Bob,

Vlado is known for his loud ravishing volumes.. (as a generalization only)
What was the wonderous difference in his Jazz masters.. Can you brief us a little further?
And what CD’s were they, would like to get my hands on’em..

Thanks Bob,
FD