ABSTRACT
The engineering and recording side of music production demands technical knowledge of the equipment involved. But just as critically—especially for the style of production—it requires listening skills, and musical understanding of the sounds and performances. To help highlight the requirement for control, it is useful to briefly consider the production aesthetics of other music genres. In contrast, contemporary heavy music production is less concerned with true-to-life performance environment aesthetics, and more concerned with providing maximum sonic impact, with the kind of exaggerated detail that creates something “larger than life.” Recording a digital signal too hot immediately, and increasingly, results in the destruction of transient detail. This leads to a duller recording, and one that is impacted by “unmusical” digital clipping—a source of distortion that is far from pleasing. As with compression, professional metal producers sometimes apply post-mic EQ at the recording stage.
