Unpopular opinion: that mastering plugin everyone hypes was a total waste for me

I spent $200 on the Ozone 11 Advanced suite last month because every forum swore it was a game changer. But for my style of making minimal tech house beats in San Salvador, it just made everything sound weirdly compressed and flat. My mixes actually sounded better when I stuck to my old free TDR Nova and some light saturation from my DAW. Maybe it works for pop or rock producers, but for electronic stuff coming out of a bedroom studio like mine, I think you're better off learning proper gain staging first. Anyone else drop big money on a 'pro' plugin and regret it?

2 comments

2 Comments

henry_palmer2419d ago

Dropped $250 on the Gullfoss plugin thinking it would magically fix my low end. Nope. Just made my kicks sound hollow and weird. Went back to my stock EQ and some sidechain compression and got way better results. Ozone is definitely overkill for minimal tech house. You really just need a clean channel strip and good ears.

xenarobinson18d ago

Buddy of mine dropped cash on some fancy AI mastering tool and spent two weeks blaming his monitors. Turned out his room had a massive null at 80Hz he never treated. After fixing that, his cheap interface EQs started sounding like a million bucks.