I don't think it's delusional to present your music as professionally as possible, unless you're expecting that to translate into pop stardom.
There are many ways of getting recognition and appreciation, and I would say if you have the money, why wouldn't you have you recordings mastered?
It doesn't have to cost the earth either. If your local college runs a music tech course, get in touch with the students. Research your local recording studios. Go to your local music events - you'll meet lots of people; some of them will know budding producers/ techies who may jump at the chance to test their skills on your music. If you don't like the outcome, don't use their masters.
If I ever finish my current round of recordings, I'm definitely outsourcing mixing and mastering.
It's definitely a great idea to outsource mixing and mastering if only for the extra pair of unbiased ears.
I didnt outsource the mixing of our EP for a few reasons. We dont have anywhere near the budget to call a well respected mixing guy who we knew would do a good job so of course turned to local studios. Local studios is a hit and miss scene which we've had bad experiences with in recording and tracking. The main reason being that because of the 'digital revolution' recording is accessible to just about anyone and therefore, just about anyone can set up a studio and charge people. There are no controls on the quality of material you might get from anyone and many/most local studios have no experience/dubious experience. If you look at the 'pro' guys, they have worked their way up from being assistants to the technician of the engineer of a producer and/or mixing engineer to get to where they are: I.E they have had a solid education and heard and seen a number of professional albums being recorded and mixed before they have even had a chance to mix.
So how to you find a good guy in local studio land? It's hard. Have a listen to their work, but chances are the work you will hear is their absolute best work - the few times they have managed to pull something off, or, if they are really sneaky they've paid a top engineer to mix their recording so they can put it on their site as 'their' work. Technically, it is their work, but if you are going to hire them to mix your song based on that, you are in for a rude surprise.
The moment that pushed me to mix it all myself was when we asked a local studio to mix a song. I got impressed by all the BS the guy was telling me about how long he has been doing this and his successes. He complimented us on a good job recording and said he would get a killer mix. So, we waited a while (he occasionally updated us with more BS emails saying stuff like 'I'm shaping the early reflections') and eventually it came back. It sounded god awful. Whats worse was the bill he expected (around £300 !!! ). I sent him an email pointing out everything that was wrong with his mix. It was so bad that I could even keep it very non-subjective and quite specific (stuff about the stereo image and width of different sections of the song, compression causing pumping artefacts, breaths and 'esses' being enhanced rather than reduced..).
What was more upsetting was that the guy clearly had no idea what I was talking about for most of the points. For an hour I was depressed that I knew and could hear way more than a guy that I was going to have to pay a stupid amount for doing something he couldn't do. Thankfully, I noticed a little point on his terms and conditions on his website which stated '...If you still don't like it, don't pay!'. PHEW! Now I knew that if ever felt like taking me to court, I was safe. I told him I wasnt paying and reminded him of that point.
But that was lucky. Many guys wouldnt have such a guarantee and then you have just paid for something you will never use. So, at least with mixing, you've got to be careful. Make sure the guy you are going to pay to do this can really do a better job than you. Insist on visiting his studio, ask to hear what he is currently working on. And always try to attend the mixing session if possible (and instantly walk away from guys who do
not want you to attend). Fix a price before the session (do not pay
hourly for mixing!).
Now, with mastering, I think it's slightly different as long as you stick with dedicated mastering houses/mastering engineers and/or you know what equipment they will be using.
Mastering is such a technical job, concerned with a fair amount of boring stuff - removing clicks, pops, noise, correcting a hundred other little niggly issues, tightening up bass, removing harshness in the high end, whatever, preparing everything for specific formats - that it's really only something a dedicated/serious engineer is going to do. It doesn't involve any creativity or actually making music or whatever it is that causes people to give up school/work and become an 'engineer'. I've never heard of a teenager desperate to become a mastering engineer.
But, you could still get ripped off. Again, it can be a local studio thing. I think a normal misunderstanding of the mastering process causes local studios to advertise 'mastering' services for £15 a song or whatever. What they really mean is they offer a 'We will make your song louder' service. And what this usually entails is just slapping a limiter on the track. You can do that yourself in whatever DAW you use. Get hold of Waves L1 or PSP's Xenon plugins (or whatever limiter you like) and put that on the stereo master channel. Keep the output level just below 0.0 and turn up the input. Hey presto! Loudness without clipping/distortion.
The difference between paying for mixing and paying for mastering is that when you start going to a dedicated mastering place, you know you are going to get proper mastering. Sure you can pay more and more and get supposedly more and more mastering, but there seems to be a 'base' level of professionalism which you dont get when paying people to mix. Who knows what you will get with that!
