At Engine Room, Christensen uses a combination, including the Apogee PSX-100 with special edition chip, Crane Song HEDD, as well as the converters inside his WAVES L2 Ultramaximizer 48/96. "There's nothing that sounds like Apogee - they just sound amazing," he says. "I'm using Apogee as a final conversion before the Genelecs and they're very present, very rock and roll. The Crane Songs tend to be a little less strident. I don't want to say warm, but they're warm."

Grundman employs dB Technologies boxes, with a few modifications. "First we picked what we felt was best sounding on the market, then we rep!aced the power supplies," says Grundman. "The dB's sound more natural, with less of that mechanical edge. We want something that sounds musical."

Tweaking the Frequencies

When it comes time for EQ, every engineer was passionate about what he put his hands on. "I dig the Manley Massive Passive," Christensen says. "I think it's unbelievable. It's semi-Pultec design gives you some bizarre shelving curves and weird shapes that you don't get with other EQs."

"For analog work I use the George Massenburg labs 9500 mastering EQ, as well as a Sontec 430, which is hurting because it's about 20 years old," says Steve Hall. "When the Sontecs are working right, nothing sounds better, you can't turn a knob without making some improvement. Digitally, I'm using the Weiss EQ1-MK1, which, with its sonic transparency and flexibility, is the most amazing EQ I've heard."

Lambert has Sontec, Manley Massive Passive, Avalon AD-2077 and Z-Systems z-Q6 EQs at his disposal. "If I'm looking for presence, the Sontec and Avalon are great," he says. "To me, the Sontec is very precise and the Avalon feels more like a color."

The Main Squeeze

To get an artist's work truly radio-ready, a mastering engineer's relationship with their compressor can often be the magic bullet. "We use Prism and the Manley VariableMu," Classic Sound's Lambert says. "The Prism is very subtle sounding. You can do some fairly aggression compression and it has a very natural - not so much of a sound - but you hear what it's doing. The Manley has a very specific feel to me. Hitting the input is like hitting the input of a half-inch machine. You can really tell the difference on how hard you hit the transformers on the input. It does a great job of gluing a song together."

At Engine Room, Christensen mainly puts on the squeeze via his Tube-Tech SMC 2A multi-band compressor. "It's one of those pieces where, even if all functions are turned off, the Class A tube circuitry makes it a great-sounding piece," he says. "In my opinion it's the best multi-band compressor out there. I also have the Manley LA-2A type Electro Optical-leveling amplifier if I really need to squash the crap out of something - if people want to hear it pumping, it's good for that."

"Digitally, I'm using the Weiss DS1MK2," says Steve Hall. "It's quite remarkable: It's a compressor, expander and limiter. I can do a good amount of my EQ-ing and textural coloration with that box by changing attack and release times, as well as ratios. It's my number one weapon of choice."

In his search for the perfect compressor, Grundman chose to manufacture his own. "We're not looking for an effect in mastering," he points out, "we're working on a complex signal. It's hard to get an effect in mastering without destroying something else, so we're looking for something transparent that will give us the kind of levels that the competition demands."