Mastering your own tracks in your home studio can be a difficult task.

A lot of the information you find online is more confusing than helping, showing you a bunch of fancy plugins that supposedly work magics on any track.

In one of my previous posts I talked about what is mastering all about.

I tried my best to explain what is mastering, what it can do to your mix, and what it can't do to it.

If you're new to mastering, I highly recommend you to go read it.

But still, I know that one general article is not enough. That's why today I want to share with you some mastering tips.

More specifically, tips that will help you make sure your mastering process doesn't end up hurting your tracks.

Tip #1: Don't Over Do It It's so easy to over do the mastering stage, and completely ruin your mix.

I said it before and I'll say it again, mastering is a subtle process, it's not a magic trick that will turn your bad mix into a good one.

If you have a bad mix, go improve it, don't expect mastering to make it better. If you have a good mix, don't over process it in mastering, subtle moves will make the big difference.

The reason for that is that every processing you do, affects the entire mix.

So keep that in mind.

Keep your EQ and compression move subtle, they will all add up together to create the sound you're looking for.

Tip #2: Don't Push It Too Loud We all want our songs to be loud, but we have to remember that we also want our songs to be dynamic.

It's very tempting to grab a limiter plugin and crank it all the way.

Yes it will make your song louder, but for a heavy cost.

If you "push" your mix too much, you'll reduce its dynamic range, basically killing the dynamics of the song. Reducing the dynamic range too much can ruin the arrangement of your song and make it boring.

Without enough dynamics, all of the sections of the song sound kind of the same.

Your first verse will be as big as your last chorus.

There won't be any progression or build up going on in the song.

But most importantly, you'll make your song ear fatiguing.

No one will want to listen to your song from start to finish, because it's so exhausting to our ears and brain to listen to a song that's "too loud all the time".

Tip #3: Use Reference Tracks

Using reference tracks is so important that I wrote an entire post about it.

If you're not already using reference tracks when you're mixing or mastering, I suggest you to read this post and learn why you should start using them.

When it comes to mastering, reference tracks are the best way to know how to master your track.

They serve as guidelines for your processing.

It's even better to use a few reference tracks instead of just one.

All you have to do is listen to your track and to an appropriate reference track (similar genre and instrumentation), and compare them.

Is your track noticeably brighter?

Does the reference track has more low end?

Does your mix has a lot more midrange?

Is the reference track much more dynamic?

Ask yourself these kind of questions, and process your mix accordingly.

You don't have to copy the sound of the reference track, rather it's a direction to aim your track towards.

Tip #4: Don't Mess With Phase Too Much

Some people are obsessed with stereo wideners and other similar plugins.

They use it on every mix, and they use too much of it, to the point that it's ruining their mix.

The reason that these type of processing can hurt your mix, is because they use phase manipulation and mid/side channels to create the desired effect.

When you use too much of it, everything starts to sound weird. So make sure that your mix really need this type of processing before you use it.

Don't insert a plugin just because you heard somewhere that you need to, or because you saw someone else do it. And if you do use it, make it subtle.

Tip #5: Listen On Different Sound Systems A couple of months ago I wrote an article called 7 Ways To Make Sure Your Mix Sounds Good Everywhere.

One of the ways I recommended and wrote about was to check your mix on as many sound systems as you can. This is a good thing to do both in mixing stage and mastering stage.

The idea is to take your mix out of your studio and listen to it on different rooms and monitors.

You can use everyday systems, like your car, your living room stereo, some earbuds, etc. Listen for any problem that comes up, then go back to your studio and fix it.

This whole method is a great way to help your mix translate better to other sound systems.

Hopefully these tips will help you get better at your mastering journey.

Don't forget to put them to practice!

Do you master tracks in your home studio?

Do you have any tips of your own?

Share your experience with us in the comments below!