what’s actually meant when an album is re-released as “remastered”
In: Technology
It means that the original mix has literally been mastered again hence ‘remastered’. Once a band, artist and producer have finished a track or mix (usually a mono or stereo recording of their work) it is then mastered, a process that is carried out in a specialist studio that prepares the mix for its various mediums and broadcasting (CD’s, records and mp3s all have different sonic specifications) volume levels are optimised and tonal flaws are carefully tweaked out. This then becomes the ‘master’ that all duplicates are copied from. Remasters often involve going back to the original tape mix and re-optimising them for or with today’s technology. Some would argue that original masters are often more dynamic and nuanced due to the ‘loudness war’ going on in the music industry (tracks being competitively heavily compressed to make the quieter parts louder and their loud part louder creating a consistently loud, heavily saturated, Un-dynamic mix that will play well out of cheap small speakers and headphones like phones and laptops).
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