By Joe Vickrey
As the co-founder of mastering.com, the head of Black Fox Mastering, and a frequent sponsor of Velour’s Battle of the Bands, Caleb Loveless may very well be the busiest person in all of Provo, but he was kind enough to chat with me about his journey in music as well as how local artists could benefit from learning more about the recording, mixing, and mastering processes.
I met Caleb when we were judging at Velour’s Battle of the Bands, and I initially asked him about Black Fox Mastering. He kindly explained, “I’m pretty busy with Mastering.com, but I love to keep up my production, mixing, and mastering chops by continuing to take on clients. I get to work with people from all over the world, but I also love working with local artists as well.”
While I was a bit embarrassed that I didn’t realize his main gig was being the dude who teaches world renowned masterclasses on audio engineering, he had a very kind, down-to-earth vibe about him that piqued my curiosity, and I thought it would be fun to pick his brain a bit while I could!
Caleb shared that his love of the technical side of making music began in the early days of digital recording where he found himself endlessly tinkering with his songs. He explained, “I was experimenting constantly. Recording ideas, layering sounds, bouncing tracks, listening back obsessively, and trying to understand why some versions felt better than others. Even then, I wasn’t satisfied with just writing songs. I really wanted to get into production and study how to shape sound.”
Just as his band, VanLadyLove, began gaining traction, their creative visions began to splinter in different directions – ultimately ending the group. “That experience was painful, but clarifying.”
Caleb added, “I realized I was never deeply attached to the idea of being on stage… What consistently pulled me in was the studio. While others were out celebrating after shows, I was staying behind, watching engineers work, asking questions, and trying to understand how records were actually built.”
As the dust of his band’s divide was still settling, Caleb sold his tour van to fund a studio and began to “eat, drink, and sleep all things music production.” Continuing his journey, Caleb began to study under a Grammy-winning mastering engineer. “It exposed gaps in my understanding and forced me to listen in a completely new way.” Apparently he thrives under pressure. His mentor eventually asked him to help assist in mentoring others in his own program.
“Over the next several years, I mentored thousands of mastering engineers from all over the world. That experience revealed a consistent pattern. No matter the genre or background, people were struggling with the same core issues. They weren’t short on passion or plugins. They just didn’t have a clear way of seeing their own gaps.”
Caleb continued, “It’s not about quick tips and tricks, but about the foundation. I realized mastering is unique… It teaches people the high level left-brained part that is often skipped over, and it gives people a unique end-in-mind perspective on the music creation process.”
This is where the premise for Mastering.com began. “The goal was to build an education platform that actually changed how people think and hear. Developing the courses took time. Everything was tested, refined, and rebuilt repeatedly to make sure it led to independence rather than dependency.”
Now, I recognize that we have readers who are both musicians and just enjoyers of music, so I asked Caleb to give us his definitions on mixing and mastering before we get too deep into it. Caleb defined the following:
Mixing is the process of balancing and shaping individual elements within a song. Technically, this includes setting relative levels, panning, EQ, compression, saturation, automation, and effects on individual tracks and subgroups. The goal is to make all the parts work together musically and sonically, creating clarity, depth, and impact inside the stereo field. Mixing operates at the track and bus level and is focused on relationships between sounds.
Mastering is the process of optimizing the final stereo mix (or stems) as a single cohesive signal. Technically, this involves subtle EQ, compression, limiting, stereo imaging control, sequencing, loudness optimization, and format preparation. The goal is consistency, translation, and technical readiness across playback systems and distribution platforms. Mastering operates at the full-mix level and focuses on overall tonal balance, dynamics, and playback compatibility rather than individual elements.
With those terms clarified, it’ll make more sense to explain that Mastering.com’s course, The Reverse Engineer, takes a different approach to recording, mixing, and mastering. “Instead of starting with creation and hoping things work out later, we start with mastering.”
Caleb continued, “There are a few reasons for that. Mastering forces you to confront technical fundamentals that a lot of people unintentionally skip. While training mastering engineers from all over the world, I kept hearing the same thing: learning mastering didn’t just improve their mastering, it unexpectedly filled in gaps that made them better mixers and producers. It gave context to decisions they had been making for years without fully understanding the consequences.”
Curious for myself, I checked out Mastering.com before conversing with Caleb. I was shocked to find they had a whopping twelve hours of free courses available outside of their paid courses.
Diving in, I was immediately impressed with the depth of knowledge presented so simply. For anyone who may be interested in expanding their recording knowledge, and for those of us with no shortage of passion or plugins – rejoice. There’s finally a resource to fill in the gaps.
Mastering.com also offers a free monthly live event to those who are on their email list, and Caleb mentioned during our conversation that he offers a discounted rate for mixing and mastering to local artists. For anyone interested in Caleb’s skills, he asked that you shoot an email to info@mastering.com.
Make sure to follow Caleb Loveless on Instagram and listen to “Cold War” by Foreign Figures – which Caleb mastered – below!