Equalizers: Mastering Engineer Emily Lazar

Summary

Podcast Title: All Of It
Host: Alison Stewart (filled in by Koosha Navadar)
Episode: Equalizers: Mastering Engineer Emily Lazar
Release Date: March 25, 2025
Description: ALL OF IT is a show about culture and its consumers, aiming to engage thinkers, doers, makers, and creators about the what and why of their work.

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Introduction to Emily Lazar

In this episode of All Of It, host Koosha Navadar welcomes Emily Lazar, a renowned mastering engineer based in Greenwich Village. Emily is celebrated for her work with prominent artists such as Ringo Starr, Vampire Weekend, and Coldplay. Notably, she was the first female mastering engineer nominated for an Album of the Year Grammy for Foo Fighters' Wasting Light and later won a Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical.

Koosha Navadar introduces Emily by highlighting her impressive portfolio and groundbreaking achievements in the industry (00:38).

Emily's Career and Achievements

Emily Lazar has mastered thousands of albums, continually pushing the boundaries in a predominantly male industry. Her dedication not only earned her multiple Grammy nominations but also a historic win that set new standards for women in music production. Beyond her technical prowess, Emily founded the nonprofit We Are Moving the Needle, which supports women in the music industry, reflecting her commitment to fostering equity and diversity.

Introduction to Mastering Engineering

Emily shares her journey into mastering engineering, stemming from her early experiences as a singer-songwriter. She explains her fascination with the final sound of records and the artistry behind mastering:

"I was always obsessed with how records sounded and, you know, like, why does one song feel massive and another one just didn't." (04:00)

Her passion led her to deeply educate herself, eventually becoming a tonmeister and founding her own studio, the Lodge, in 1997.

Philosophy on Music and Mastering

Emily discusses her unique approach to mastering, influenced by her experience with synesthesia—a condition where she perceives sounds as colors. This sensory perspective allows her to visualize music, enhancing her ability to create vivid and emotionally resonant masters.

"I'm looking for a way to make the right colors come through, poke through at the right times and in the right way to always emote a feeling." (05:57)

She emphasizes the importance of storytelling in music, striving to ensure that each track conveys the intended emotion clearly and powerfully.

Starting the Lodge Studio

Motivated by a lack of female representation in the industry and a desire for a more artist-friendly environment, Emily founded the Lodge. She contrasts her studio with others, describing typical mastering facilities as sterile and uninviting:

"The other studios ... felt very like a dentist office to me with sterile, bunch of different rooms." (07:45)

At the Lodge, Emily created a space where artists feel comfortable and inspired, allowing creative processes to flourish. She shares anecdotes illustrating the studio's collaborative and flexible nature, ensuring artists can achieve their vision authentically.

The Role of Mastering in Music Production

Emily delves into the technical and artistic aspects of mastering, explaining it as the final polish that ensures a track translates well across all listening systems. She likens it to post-production in video, focusing on equalization, compression, and creating a signature sound for albums.

"It's that final process ... creating a signature sound for the album that makes it sound like a done fabulous piece of music that will translate on any system." (12:13)

She also highlights that excellent mastering can elevate a well-mixed track, although it cannot compensate for fundamental issues in songwriting or production.

Supporting Independent Artists and Nonprofit Efforts

Emily's passion for supporting independent artists led her to establish We Are Moving the Needle in 2021. The nonprofit focuses on bridging the gender gap in music production by providing scholarships and resources to aspiring producers and engineers.

"We empower people ... to drive equity for all the creators in the industry." (20:16)

Since its inception, the organization has awarded over $600,000 in scholarships to various premier audio programs and continues to expand its reach through partnerships and new funding opportunities.

Conclusion

Throughout the episode, Emily Lazar underscores the significance of mastering in the music industry and her role in shaping the sounds that resonate with audiences worldwide. Her dedication to both her craft and fostering a more inclusive industry landscape positions her as a pivotal figure in contemporary music production.

As the conversation wraps up, listeners are treated to a glimpse of Emily's work with Maggie Rogers, exemplifying her ability to blend fresh sounds with timeless quality.

"It's all about storytelling... if somebody listens to something and they got the story and they got the sense and the sensation, then I think it was... mastered." (19:35)

Emily Lazar leaves a lasting impression as an innovator and advocate, making significant strides in both the technical and social realms of music production.

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Notable Quotes:

• Emily Lazar (05:57): "I'm looking for a way to make the right colors come through, poke through at the right times and in the right way to always emote a feeling."
• Koosha Navadar (14:55): "You've had such a big... impact on the music industry, but it goes. It spans all different kinds of artists."
• Emily Lazar (20:16): "We empower people... it's about everyone leaning into the idea of equity and radically reshaping the future of this industry."

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Resources Mentioned:

• We Are Moving the Needle: wearemovingtheneedle.org
• Scholarship Programs: Mix with the Masters, Los Angeles Academy for Artists and Music Producers, Point Blank Music School, Iowa Music Academy
• Featured Track: "Julie" by Magnet (10:51)
• Featured Single: "Relationships" by Chaim (16:33)

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Note: Timestamps correspond to the provided transcript segments.

Transcript

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[Koosha Navadar]

This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Koosha Navadar filling in for Alison Stewart, who is on vacation just in 2024. My next guest, Emily Lazar, was in charge of putting the finishing touches on releases from Ringo Starr, Brittany Howard, Maggie Rogers, the Offspring, Willie Nelson, Decemberists, and Vampire Weekend. Emily Lazar is a mastering engineer who runs the studio the Lodge here in Greenwich Village. She has mastered thousands of albums from music's biggest names. This year, she was nominated for Album of the Year for her work on Jacob Collier's Jessie Volume 4. In 2021, she was responsible for three Album of the Year nominees from Collier Haim and Coldplay. Years before, she had already set another record in that category as the first female mastering engineer to get a nomination for Foo Fighters Wasting Light. And if that wasn't enough, she was also the first female mastering engineer to win the Gramm for Best Engineered Album non classical. So she's busy and for good reason. And in addition to her work at the board, Emily Lazar is the founder of the nonprofit We Are Moving the Needle, which aims to support women in the music industry. And we've got her here with us to talk about her career. Emily Lazar, welcome to all of it.

[Emily Lazar]

Hey, thanks. How are you?

[Koosha Navadar]

Good. Thanks so much for joining us. Really excited to talk about all of the great work you've done over the years. You know, in a 2020 interview with Rolling Stone, you, you mentioned that the number of albums you'd engineered was somewhere around 4,000. Do you have any sense of where that number stands now?

[Emily Lazar]

Um, I don't. And I think maybe it would freak me out if I, if I counted. It's. It's getting crazy. Yeah.

[Koosha Navadar]

At some point, I need to ask you, what's your favorite pair of headphones? We don't have to talk about it now, but you must have a good sense of headphones that you like, right?

[Emily Lazar]

I do. And you know what's really interesting is I have the opportunity to. To have lots of headphones in my studio so that I can make sure that I can hear how everybody's hearing everything out there in the world. Everything from, you know, AirPods to, you know, $5,000.

[Koosha Navadar]

You know, the fancy cans.

[Emily Lazar]

Yeah, fancy cans, Fancy cans. Everything in between, too. It's kind of funny.

[Koosha Navadar]

I am a headphone nerd. So at some point, I need to talk to you about your preference. Oh, man. I could talk for days about headphones. But I want to talk about your introduction to engineering. Do you remember what got you started, what your first experience was?

[Emily Lazar]

I. I do. I mean, I was a singer songwriter before, and I was always obsessed with how records sounded and, you know, like, why does one song feel massive and another one just didn't? And when I was writing and recording, as I went down this rabbit hole from going from one side of the glass to the other, I realized that there was a real art to this and that it wasn't by accident and that some people actually had kind of a repeat performance on making things that sounded great to me, and. And I was addicted to figuring out what that was. So, also, I think I had in my head a very distinct idea of what something should sound like, and I still do, even with other people's music, obviously. So I. And I feel the need to kind of translate that into making it kind of come true and crystallize for people. So I was frustrated as an artist when I didn't have the tools. So I did this deep dive of getting educated and learning and apprenticing and getting my master's and becoming a tonemeister and all sorts of craziness. Yeah.

[Koosha Navadar]

It's so interesting that you bring up this idea of you have something specific in your mind about what the music should sound like. It sounds like almost a philosophy of music. Is there a way to describe that at all? Like, what is your philosophy as compared to maybe others? Or do you have a way that you could describe that?

[Emily Lazar]

Well, it's interesting. I mean, I started talking about this in terms with clients and friends, and actually, as an artist, it is a philosophy, but it's also a very oddly visual experience for me. And while I have not been medically diagnosed with synesthesia, I definitely have synesthesia, and I've been talking about it my whole life. And it's kind of been a really interesting thing because I've found that lots of other people in my space, both on the technical side, but also on the artistic side, also have synesthesia and see colors as a very big part of how they translate sound. And so it's visual for me in a lot of ways, too. So marrying those two together, it's kind of. I can give you a better example when you think about finger painting as a kid. Sometimes if you keep adding all those colors, you know, eventually you keep mushing it around and it turns brown.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah.

[Emily Lazar]

So that also happens in music. You keep adding all these frequencies together and sounds together, and you want them to be super vivid, like a Jackson Pollock, for example, but they all of a sudden are brown mush. And you can't, you know, can't distinguish one from the other. And that happens a lot for people who don't know how to handle audio and frequencies properly. They haven't created the space for those colors to kind of shine. And so that's kind of how it is for me when I'm working. I'm kind of looking for a way to make the right colors come through, poke through at the right times and in the right way to always emote a feeling. You know, it's always about telling a story at the end of the day.

[Koosha Navadar]

And sensory. Right. Like, you are able to take in the sensory that most people are listening through their headphones or live and see it in a totally new way. That's such a lovely way of describing it, with the finger painting of, like, what separates somebody who can make a song sound some way versus just muddled.

[Emily Lazar]

Yeah. I think, you know, it's like that thing. Like, it's a visceral thing. Right. It can give you shivers in the back of your neck or make the hair stand up on your arms, like. And it's music, and it's. You're just hearing it. And it can be both, you know, beautiful, shocking, scary, gritty. All these, you know, various feelings, all of the feelings of being a human being, really. And it's amazing to me, it never. It never gets lost on me that how cool it is that you can actually translate emotion this way, even without words, you know, just in an instrumental can make people cry.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah. You went to NYU and received a master's in 96, and then you started your studio, the Lodge, in 1997. How did that come about? How did the opportunity to start your own studio arise?

[Emily Lazar]

It. It came out of necessity. I worked at other studios. There were very few women in the industry, if any, say, very few to be polite about it. But I was really like an island out there. And I think I also had a very different philosophy about how to do it. So some of these bigger places that existed, and there were very few mastering facilities, because I really went on a deep dive into this specific part of making an album across the finish line before it hits a consumer. And it was, like, called the Dark art or very mysterious to people, like what actually happens in mastering. And I was, you know, really intent on figuring that out. And so when I, I wanted to build my studio to be, as I told you, I was an artist, so it needed to feel like artists hung out there. It needed to feel like a place where art happened and it didn't. The, for the most part, the other studios that existed that did mastering, one of which that I had worked in, felt very like, Like a dentist office to me with sterile, bunch of different rooms and, you know, some leather couches that you didn't really want to sit on. And, and, and just like a kind of ho hum approach to, you know, making this really important piece of our cultural history, you know, and it didn't feel right to me, so I set it up to be a very different kind of environment. And the, and this still remains true that the Lodge has always been a place where whatever needs to happen happens. For example, I remember, you know, Third Eye Blind was in and Stephen Jenkins was not happy yet with a song. And so we threw up a, you know, a U67 microphone and he sang background vocals, and we flew them in to the track that was already mixed, already done, because he was not ready and it was not, it was not right for him. And really, it's really about the artist and the artist getting an opportunity to tell their story the way they want to tell it and have it impact the way they want it to impact.

[Koosha Navadar]

You know, we have. Sorry, we have a clip of a track from an album you mastered in the Lodge's first year. That's according to AllMusic, at least. You know Magnet Julie by magnet, from their 1997 album Don't Be a Penguin. Do you remember that?

[Emily Lazar]

Yes, yes. This is one of the first, first albums I did out on my own. And Mark Goodman was the producer gate who brought this to me. And actually, that project, I think started while I was working at the other studio and I think it came out and, you know, I was going in on weekends and nights and using any time that I could get and. Yeah, well, let's hear, let's hear Mo Tucker. Mo Tucker is the drummer on that.

[Koosha Navadar]

Oh, really?

[Emily Lazar]

In the Velvet Underground.

[Koosha Navadar]

Let's hear some of it.

[Emily Lazar]

Here's Jay. And by the way, I don't know that I've heard this in a really long time.

[Koosha Navadar]

Well, we're gonna hear it together. Here we go.

[Emily Lazar]

It stands the test of time, I'm sure.

[Koosha Navadar]

Well, we'll talk about that on the other side of it. Here's let's hear some music. Here's Julie by Magnet.

[Unknown]

Of Nature.

[Koosha Navadar]

That was Julie by Magnet. Listeners, we're talking with Emily Lazar for our series Equalizers, Women in music production. She is a Grammy winning mastering engineer and runs the studio, the Lodge here in Manhattan. Emily, how did it sound listening to that?

[Emily Lazar]

Truth be told, it's a little difficult to hear over, over, over the. The speakers through our connection.

[Koosha Navadar]

Oh, fair enough.

[Emily Lazar]

Yeah, I'm sure it was amazing.

[Koosha Navadar]

So can you tell us? I was listening to that. It sounds like a lovely piece of music. Definitely stands the test of time. Can you help me understand what exactly is mastering? Where did you come in in that piece?

[Emily Lazar]

Yeah. So in that particular piece the track was already mixed and it was brought to me for the kind of follow final polish. The way you would maybe think about post production in video is a similar kind of thing with mastering. So it's that final process that where you get to manipulate equalization, compression level, any digital editing that may need to happen and kind of creating a signature sound for the album that makes it sound like a done fabulous piece of music that will translate on any system. So you know, sometimes at the mix stage people will hear their mix back in the car on their headphones and their AirPods, whatever. Be like, it just doesn't sound done, it doesn't sound finished. So it's that step between that mix to the master which is the thing that gets sent out to everybody.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah, you get it across the finish line.

[Emily Lazar]

Exactly.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah.

[Emily Lazar]

There's a lot to do at that point. My favorite days as a mastering engineer is when there's very little to do and the mixer has been incredible. And it does happen. It's rare, but it happens.

[Koosha Navadar]

What makes a good mastering engineer? Like how are the skills different from a good mixing engineer or monitor engineer or producer or something else?

[Emily Lazar]

I think there's one similar thing that you need for all careers in the arts, which is patience, empathy, some interest in psychology and understanding how people work and how to help them be their best selves. So the technical stuff I think you can always learn, refine and work on. It's really the interpersonal stuff that creates those special moments and environments that helps people do their best.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah, we have a text here that I think you'll enjoy from a listener, it says, wow, I know Emily, she mastered my album. While she works with huge names, she also supports and works with independent artists and I'm so grateful, listener, thank you so much for sending that text. If you're willing, text us back Your name. So maybe we can share it with Emily, isn't it. It's really wonderful, Emily. You've had such a big, I mean, obviously biggest understatement impact on the music industry, but it goes. It spans all different kinds of artists. I'm sure that's really meaningful for you.

[Emily Lazar]

It is really meaningful and it really. The impetus for starting the Lodge in the first place was that I was an indie artist myself. And when I saw the kind of treatment or lack of treatment or lack of ability to even get into some of the better studios to work with some of the more, you know, the bigger names, they really just didn't get the attention that they deserved. And the truth is independent artists sometimes need more help than the majors because they're coming from a place with no budget and no support and they're making albums on their own. And so in order to make those compete with the things that have budget, they need a little special love and attention. So it's always my pleasure and takes me back to my roots on every indie artist. And we will always cater to have the door open for everybody.

[Koosha Navadar]

I want to play some more music. You mastered the latest single from Chaim. It's called Relationships. Can you give us a little.

[Emily Lazar]

It's a banger. It's a banger.

[Koosha Navadar]

We're going to listen to a little bit of it. Anything we should listen for in this track?

[Emily Lazar]

Well, not sure which section of the song you're going to play, but it's all this. The entire track is really, really well done. I think the sonics of it are outstanding. Worked with Rostam, Batman Glitch, who is a co producer with Danielle Haim, and there are a lot of other really great people that contributed to the Buddy Ross and others along the way.

[Koosha Navadar]

We're going to listen to the beginning of it, if that makes a difference.

[Emily Lazar]

Um, it's. I think it's. Well, I mean, I don't even know that it needs an introduction. It's great. And they're back and it's amazing. And I think. I think everyone will enjoy it. I haven't. I haven't had anybody say anything, you know, negative upon hearing it. Everyone's always like, oh, this is a banger.

[Koosha Navadar]

Let's take a listen to it. Here's relationships.

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And if we are, what we gonna do?

[Unknown]

Relationships. What's all this talk about relationships? It feels like everyone's caught a thing. Oh, just you wait. You must be nervous. You gotta look on your face like a cotton.

[Koosha Navadar]

Emily. How can the average listener tell when an album has been mastered. Well.

[Emily Lazar]

That'S a really good question. I guess I'm not an average listener, actually. I don't actually know how to answer that because my listening is obviously different. So I'm not sure. But maybe. Maybe it does those. Those visceral. Maybe you get those visceral reactions that I talked about before, you know, sonically speaking.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah.

[Emily Lazar]

That. One of. What I. What I love about that track is that it sounds so fresh and so current, and yet it has a very retro, round, you know, lush sonic picture. So it feels really timeless. Yeah. And that, I think, is a good. That's a really good. Maybe when somebody thinks something sounds timeless. But, I mean, there's all sorts of different kinds of. Of mastering and different kinds of songs. Like, something that I would do. I'm so lucky. Right. I get to work with, you know, Willie Nelson and, you know, Romy, like, couldn't think of things that are more different. And the way that I approach it for different artists and different sounds and different genres is totally different. And made this record with Bastille that I absolutely love, which is a kind of a departure from some of his older, more electronic stuff. And it has very organic sound to it. And, you know, the way you would approach it is just different. And what is. For me, as a. As a. As working on it, I'm always trying to look for, like, what is this supposed to do? At the end of the day? What is this person trying to say? It's all about storytelling, really. And so if an. If somebody listens to something and they got the story and they got the sense and the sensation, then I think it was, you know, produced, performed, mixed, written, mastered. Well, all of those things have to kind of come together.

[Koosha Navadar]

You know it when you. When you hear it kind of.

[Emily Lazar]

Yeah, Well, I mean, I think you can't. Look, you can master a really great. Do an amazing mastering job of a terrible song. It's still a terrible song.

[Koosha Navadar]

Yeah.

[Emily Lazar]

And you can have a terrible song that's not recorded well and not mastered well and not mixed well. And you can be like, oh, it's kind of a shame. Such a great song. And it just doesn't sound good. So it's getting them all of those pieces to fall in line.

[Koosha Navadar]

I want to make sure we got a chance to talk about your work when you're not producing, but helping other people in the industry. You founded the nonprofit. We are moving the needle around 2021. Talk to me about the motivation for starting the organization. What were its goals?

[Emily Lazar]

Well, the goals were basically to just mend the gap. The gap is tremendous. And there are like no women. And, and there are women, though I don't want to say there are no women. There are women. There aren't enough and there aren't enough women that know that these careers exist. And so we empower people, all kinds of people. It's an, it's an organization for everyone, men too, not about just women. This is about everyone leaning into the idea of equity and radically reshaping the future of this industry. So the recording industry so that we have more really amazing stories to tell. You know, it's more interesting. Music is more interesting. The more angles, the more people you have involved. And so I think the creative process is fueled by having more and not less. So that's really what it's about to just try to drive equity for all the creators in the industry. Since 2021, We Are Moving the Needle has awarded over $600,000 in scholarships to producers and engineers to attend workshops and programs around the globe. And We've awarded over 140 individual scholarships to the premier audio programs such as Mix with the Masters and the Los Angeles Academy for Artists and Music Producers, Point Blank Music School and Iowa Music Academy. And this March, we launched some amazing new scholarship opportunities for students who are pursuing four year degrees at universities and colleges in music production and audio engineering. Like there's one fund that's called the Sophie Scholarship in honor of the, of Sophie provided by her family. And then the Brandy Carlisle scholarship fund which is powered by the Looking out foundation which is her nonprofit. We have 15 college and university chapter partnerships so far across the country, which is fantastic. And it, you know, there's so much.

[Koosha Navadar]

Work that you're doing. Yeah. If people want to find out more work work, they could, they find the organization.

[Emily Lazar]

We are movingtheneedle.org we're also on all the socials. We created a micro grant for the wildfires in California to support everyone. People can donate just to the org or for that particular disaster.

[Koosha Navadar]

That's wonderful. I'm looking at the clock. We got to stop it here. Unfortunately. There's so much more we could talk about. But I've been talking to Emily Lazar for our series Equalizers, Women in music production. I want to throw to another song you worked on and I'm going to say goodbye to you here it's Alaska by Maggie Rogers. Before we go there. Emily, thank you so much for joining us.

[Emily Lazar]

Thank you.

[Koosha Navadar]

Here it is, Alaska by Maggie Rogers.

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