Mastering for Electronic Music

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: I got my first Cubase when i was 14, now its almost 3 decades later and i'm on Logic Pro haha I had one of my bands signed to a major label when i was a student, was pretty disappointed by the business side right after and decided to do everything myself, so now i run several labels myself, have several aliases and a studio.

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: Propably anyone i enjoy listening to because they have a really unique sound, pretty much from Nils Frahm to Run the Jewels to Mark Broom or Josh Homme.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Don't think too much about where something goes / needs to go in the phase of developing an idea / track. Good and original things come from a flow and a mood,not from a chalkboard, its a creative process, its art, not a business plan.

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: I have 4 producer aliases at the moment, one for Techno / House, one for bass music, one for experimental electronica and one for kinda pop. I need to be able to switch between different moods / genres at the studio so i can make the music that fits my mood at the specific day.

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: Propably that i can adjust to almost any genre or style i like (which are a LOT) being not only a musician but also a huge music fan since i was a kid and by sucking in new music like a sponge for 3 decades now my knowledge of genre specific aesthetics and trademarks is pretty broad and im not the typical one-style producer / engineer.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: I think i can quickly spot strengths and weaknesses in tracks and mixdowns and give valuable feedback for improvement as well as offering solutions to problems.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: Usually I'm a very analytic person when it comes to other peoples work but go with a very non-analytic 'just do things and surprise myself what it becomes' approach when it comes to my own music. So it really depends on if i'm working for someone or if i'm having fun with my own stuff in the studio.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I was lucky enough to get Martin Eyerers old studio in Stuttgart when he moved to Berlin to create Riverside studios, so i got a perfectly treated and measured room from the get go. I'm a big fan of Dynaudios Air series in monitoring and use the Air 6 plus Yamahas for A/B and Phonon headphones. I'm a big fan of UAD and a control freak when it comes to recalls or automations in my tracks, so i work mostly in the box adding a few outboard analog spices where needed. Regarding outboard i go through Apogee D/A converters into a mackie desk and have a few Moog, Roland and Dave Smith synths plus a few instruments to record.

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: Musically I'm into various genres from electronic to organic and from hard to chill but generally I'm propably leaning towards the weirder stuff in any of these. I grew up on early Mo Wax, Ninja Tune releases and got deeper down the rabbit hole of club music year by year starting to produce Drum & Bass as a teen, playing in bands, then doing several electronic solo projects from Electro to House and Techno. I get mostly inspired by stuff or people that give me a radical new approach to a style or a production technique, so it basically changes a lot and changes fast. But of course some producers shaped and inspired me longterm and at early age: Dj Shadow for showing me that electronic music can have as much soul as "traditional" handmade music, Justice for showing me punk attitude works on a much broader scale than guitar music, Rhythm & Sound for how an minimalistic approach with 4 sounds can be much more exciting and creative than throwing in 40 sounds.

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: Mastering is propably over 60% of the jobs i do for clients, most of these are electronic music: Techno, House, EDM, etc. The rest of the work is mostly either mixdowns or sound design / music for ads and movies and recording speech for ads etc.