Need mastering advice on my mix, MELODIC HARDCORE

[chrisadvocate]

I had another thread going for this song but I wanted to start a new one for mastering. I feel like i finally achieved a decent mix that I'm happy with but I honestly know next to nothing about mastering. I play it side by side some other stuff and it's like half the volume.
Here's what I'm running on my master bus, the multipressor presets are from my friend, and the rest I kinda just tinkered with.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8879741/Screen shot 2011-04-29 at 3.29.01 AM.png

And here is the actual mix, mastered to the best of my ability, but still not loud enough.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8879741/red n white needs mastering.mp3

So my question is, what can I do to correctly master the track? I've searched the forums to no avail : / And if there's anything mix wise that seems out of whack, of course let me know. Thanks so much everyone!

 

[Backe]

well, It all depends on the track, even within a project you might have to change the mastering chain between the songs. I thought I'd found my favorite masterbus chain, but then I just did the most un-orthodox I could think of and ended up with the best damn master I've ever done. so the only rule is: if it sounds good, do it!

 

[austinhue]

Try putting an adaptive limiter last and backing off the compression with the multipressor. Just adjust the input level knob until it doesn't sound smashed but it does sound loud...

 

[chrisadvocate]

Thanks for the tips, both of you. I first just added a bitcrusher with gain turned up using it as a clipper, but after i let off the low end compression and added a limiter it sounded even bigger, and it brought back in some of the low end i was missing. I used a bitcrusher on top for some added volume/clipping as well. Thanks guys.

 

[oroinvictus]

Definitely mess around with the multipressor until it doesn't sound so compressed. A program for mastering you may want to check out is izotope ozone 4, it's a really neat mastering program with a lot of cool features.