Category: Sync

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Sync Licensing Music Help – New Services!

how to get into sync licensing remix your music

Boost Your Sync Licensing Potential with Our Expert Services

TL;DR

  • “Sync licensing” = Lucrative opportunity to get your music in TV, films, games, ads, and more
  • High earning potential: £300 to £30,000+ per placement, even for unknown artists
  • Our new services help maximize your chances of landing sync deals

1. Sync Evaluation Service

  • Professional mix notes plus sync-specific advice for your song
  • Identify and avoid red flags in your tracks
  • Optimize arrangement and sound selection for sync use

2. Sync Editing Remix Service

  • Three options to suit your needs:
    a) Custom remix using stems: Tailored for sync, with strategic edits and arrangement
    b) Basic remix from stereo file: Effective edits to enhance sync potential
    c) Movie Trailer Remix: Completely transform your track to suit high-end trailers and promos, one of the most lucrative parts of the industry
  • Our services provided by an industry veteran with 10+ years of successful sync experience
  • Proven track record: Placements in major films, TV shows, and trailers

Don’t miss out on sync opportunities – let our expertise guide your music to success! Read more below.

In Detail

What is Sync Licensing? Getting your music used on TV, films, video games, adverts, movie trailers and sonic branding – and getting paid for it! Sounds great, but is sync licensing worth it? Yes! It is one of the few remaining ways to earn good money from your music, and best of all you don’t need to have a huge social media following, chart hits, or millions of streams.

How much does sync licensing pay? A wide range of fees. Decent syncs pay anywhere from £300 to £30,000+ for a relatively unknown artist depending on many factors – show budget, duration of use for the song, if it’s a background or feature use, title sequence or end credits use, length of time a campaign will be running, types of media it will be played on, territories…. so there is no magic number and every sync is different. Obviously £30,000+ is much rarer, but it can happen even for unknown artists with the right connections (we can also help with these connections, & have helped land numerous sync deals for our clients over the years). Often 1 sync license will pay as much as millions of Spotify streams, usually with ongoing back-end performance royalties too. This is why sync licensing is seen as the holy grail for musicians. All genres are used for sync licensing projects.

Sync Licensing 101 includes having a professional sounding mix and master. We’ve been helping with that for 18 years now. But there’s a lot more you can do to maximise the chances your song will be picked for a sync by a music supervisor – the person who chooses songs for the film, TV or advertising project).

What are sync licensing companies looking for? Other sync licensing requirements include good metadata organisation, no unlicensed samples, having accurate writer details, including Performing Rights Organisation (PRO) details for each writer (common PRO include PRS/ASCAP/SACEM etc. and differ for each country).

Probably the most important detail in sync licensing music is how sync-able is the song itself? There are certain considerations to consider for the arrangement and sound selection that music supervisors and editors look for all the time (and will reject a song if it doesn’t meet these specific needs). There are also some common timings that are key to make a song versatile for media. If you get these subtle aspects right, it will greatly improve your chances of landing a sync. It takes a lot of study to really drill down the subtleties of how to fine-tune your song to suit editors and music supervisors.

Breaking in to one of the most competitive areas of one of the most competitive industries can be daunting – how else can you increase your chances to be successful in sync licensing?

Here’s where our new services come in.

Two New Sync Services

Loz, our chief engineer has been active in the sync world for over 10 years. First going to Los Angeles in 2012 to hustle up some business, then making 5 more successful trips, plus regular networking sessions in London. Loz ran a 3rd party sync agency (Rinse The Sync) for a few years landing his artists over 40 placements, and is a composer for legendary LA based trailer music agency Pusher Music. He has been directly involved in placements for Star Wars: Rogue One (trailer), Underworld: Blood Wars (trailer + end credits track), Alien: Covenant (trailer), Antlers (trailer), Star Wars: The Book Of Boba Fett (trailer), and various placements with NBCUniversal, BBC, Canal+, Coca-Cola/Sprite and more. After deciding that running a music library would be more suited to his business goals, he set up Alternative Reality Music library, which is represented by an L.A. based sub-publisher, and has direct deals with 23 countries. He continues to compose for his own and other music libraries and agencies.

Sync Evaluation Service

We have expanded our ever-popular Mix Evaluation Service to include a Sync Evaluation Service.

We will carefully evaluate your track in our mastering suite, and give highly specific mix notes including detailed instrument EQ adjustments and level adjustments (as in our classic Mix Evaluation). On top of this essential info we will give specific advice tailored to your track to make it as sync-able as possible.

Avoid any red-flags in your song, optimise the arrangement, get advice on any sounds that clash with the subtle requirements of sync, and receive suggestions to create alternative versions relevant to your track and goals.

ACTUAL MIX EVALUATION EXAMPLE POINTS TAKEN FROM PREVIOUS JOBS:

  • “I think the piano is slightly too overpowering. Just drop it down by -2dB & that should balance it nicely with the vocal & strings”
  • There’s some low-end resonance on the low synth bass/elec piano sound that’s making things a bit muddy. Try an EQ cut of -3dB @ 162Hz, Q of 0.67. This sound could also come down a further -0.5dB afterwards.
  • “I think the hi-hats coming in at 1 min are a little sharp & overpowering due to the sharp Q on a filter. Reduce the Q level to mellow it out while keeping the intention. Adding a second EQ afterwards in the chain will smooth it & keep the overall filtered effect. Try an EQ cut of -5dB at 8.8kHz, Q of 1 should ease back the volume & tone nicely. The high end can all be brought up together during mastering, which will restore a little brightness to the hats here but keep them balanced with the rest of that section. Only apply this EQ to the filtered hi-hat section 1:00-1:21, as the rest is fine”
  • “Love the intro. I wonder if the Ebow guitar & the harp conflict ever so slightly around the same frequencies. I suggest you approach this with EQ – Put an EQ cut of around -2.5 or -3 dB @ 500 Hz on the Ebow Guitar, Q of 1, thus letting the harp come through clearer.”
  • “The fast roll snare sample is a bit muffled. I suspect this is an artistic choice, so that’s cool. But maybe try it a little brighter & it would sound more natural. If it has a little snappy energy restored around the 2kHz mark that should cut through nicely.”
  • “The short cello solo line (1:18, 1:40 etc.) doesn’t sound integrated fully, kind of sits on top a little muddy. Could it be brighter & quieter? Try a dual EQ approach. Cut of -2.6dB @ 363Hz, Q of 0.7. Then do an EQ boost of +1dB @ 1911Hz, Q of 0.7. This should go a long way to making it sound more natural with the track. Also is it a little dry? What would it sound like with maybe 5% less dry balance on the reverb?”

Sync Editing Remix Service

If you want an expert approach to optimising your tracks for sync use, Loz can remix your tracks into various edits that are precisely tailored to hit the most commonly needed requirements of music supervisors and editors.

We offer 3 flavours of sync remix:

  • Sync remix using stems (£250) Loz will create a custom remix tailored specifically for sync use, crafting an arrangement that is versatile for editors, including (where appropriate for the genre) artfully placed stop-downs, filtering, fades and edits to craft a narrative arc to your song and deliver different edits that will increase your opportunities to land that elusive sync deal. Uses up to 6 supplied stems. Includes final Mastering.
  • Sync remix from stereo file (£140) A more basic set of edits, but still highly effective. Includes stop-downs, filtering, arrangement adjustment and building a narrative arc to suit sync use. Bear in mind we’ve been editing audio professionally for 18 years, so we can do a lot with just a stereo file! Includes final Mastering.
  • Movie Trailer Remix (£1500) A very specialist service that requires a distinct set of skills. Loz has honed these skills for years, and learned directly from the best in the business. He has personally landed his own music in the trailers for Star Wars: The Book Of Boba Fett, Alien: Covenant & Antlers, and crafted trailerized remixes of several Ludakris tracks for season 1 & 2 of the Netflix series Karma’s World, and numerous trailerized remixes of classic original songs for Universal Music. This service is done from stems only, and will open the door for you to the most lucrative market in the sync world. Trailers land the biggest fees due to coming from the marketing budge – not the production budget where music is usually a financial afterthought. Whatever your genre of music we can transform it into an epic production ready for high-end trailers and promos, including final Mastering. The service may seem expensive, but with trailer budgets around $20,000 – $50,000 even for unknown artists, this is a door that is worth opening if you are serious about making a living from music.

Screenshot From A Sync Remix Job

Showing precise arrangement optimisation, filtering, FX, fades, stop-downs etc. in a Sync Remix from Stems. Perfectly tailored for editors. Each remix is crafted bespoke to suit the best sync-fit for your song and goals.

Lanyards from various Sync Conferences and events Loz has attended in LA & London.
LA Sync mission outside Capitol Records, Los Angeles
Loz networking at the centre of the sync industry, Los Angeles Capitol Records, 2015

Try Our New Sync Services Today!

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17 Years Of Fat As Funk Mixing & Mastering!

fat as funk mastering 17 years old

They say time flies when you’re having fun. Never truer than when spending the last 17 years working on amazing music.

I don’t really talk about myself much at all (ever really), but 17 years is quite a while to be doing a job, so this post is a little bit about my journey so far.

Firstly, It’s been an absolute pleasure and privilege to work on all your amazing tunes over the years. I appreciate every one of you, from those just starting out in the game, through to some of the biggest independent labels, artists, sync agents, music libraries and pressing plants in the industry. I’m very glad to have made some real friends along the way too.

Far too many to name in this post without excluding others, but you can check out my (probably very incomplete) client list.

The Journey So Far

Fat As Funk was one of the very first mastering companies to offer a free taster back in 2006. This approach combined with trips to numerous music conferences and networking parties got me a lot of clients quite fast, and off we went. 17 years later and I’m not quite sure where the time has gone!

It’s really satisfying to help a new producer get their first release sounding as good as their inspirations, and hearing just how thrilled they are – wonderful! Take that enthusiasm forward and blow up your scene! Likewise when a band like Bilk drops their debut e.p. and it exceeds all expectations it’s great to have been a small part of it.

Also very satisfying seeing some tracks I’ve worked on getting major radio and DJ support all over the world, including several times the number 1 slot on Spotify for their genre, or a couple of times Radio 1’s “Hottest Record In The World Right Now” (Tommy Farrow “Let’s Just” and Prospa’s “Prayer”). Recently I noticed my regular client Lau.Ra did her first BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix. As a huge fan of the series growing up, this made me smile.

Occasionally walking into a shop and hearing something on the radio, like the ubiquitous “Another Lifetime” by Luxxury & Scavenger Hunt and”Keep It Together” by Kraak & Smaak which I keep on hearing in unexpected places a couple of years after their release.

Hearing my work in an A-List Hollywood trailer or movie is a buzz (especially when I’ve also helped land the sync placement, but more on that later).

A few times, artists have sent me a reference track to emulate for their mastering, and I come back to them saying “I mastered that one” and we have an instant “Ayyyyyyy!” Bro moment 🙂

I lost track of exactly how many tracks I’ve worked on a while back, but it must be well over 14,000 now. I’ve worked on music from literally every continent, and feel lucky to hear what’s cooking in the underground in some of the most far-flung corners of the world.

“The Underwater Hunter” by the Industrial Battle Orchestra. Mixed and Mastered by Fat As Funk.

Music S.O.S.

I get a special warm fuzzy feeling from rescuing old treasured recordings, sometimes for the families of people who have died, or an old-timer wanting to get their legacy in order and sounding great for their grandkids. They are so overjoyed to hear these wonderful memories restored, it makes me emotional every time. These jobs don’t happen very often, but they are always special when they do. I am currently cleaning up and augmenting some folk songs by a guy in the US which were recorded “on a $25 tape machine many years ago” including a song he recorded for his wife who died. There wouldn’t be a dry eye in the house if you heard it.

Likewise when the itch to scratch some vinyl comes around, but artists only have their masters pushed hard for digital use, and without access to the unmastered files we step in to solve the problem. Although people do sometimes risk pressing super-pushed masters on to vinyl, it is not recommended as they will often not translate brilliantly, and can even run the risk of making the needle jump if there are low frequencies out of phase. I have done a tonne of pre-vinyl rescue work over the years including for superstar Sophie Ellis Bextor and recently the controversial but critically acclaimed UK rapper Potter Payper.

We can optimise any tracks for the best vinyl results. Vinyl is so expensive to get pressed, there’s no point taking a risk at the last stage.

It’s a pleasure to make people so happy with their music. You can read some testimonials to see some nice things people have said.

Moving In Sync

I have also been working in the sync world for a while, visiting Los Angeles 6 times to hustle up direct connections in Hollywood and setting up a 3rd party licensing agency Rinse The Sync. This went pretty well, getting my artists music placed on many shows and films like Royal Pains (NBCUni), The Driver (BBC), A Hundred Streets, Spotless, The Five, Underworld:Blood Wars (trailer and movie) – all Fat As Funk mastering clients.

I have since moved away from 3rd party representation, and instead have set up a sync-focused music library Alternative Reality Music which has been picking up speed. It’s still fairly new, but I have a great sub-publisher based in LA, and we are starting to get placements on Netflix and other platforms. More of a slow burn, but also more sustainable.

I am looking to sign material in all genres for the library, and have signed up lots of tracks from Fat As Funk’s roster already for the catalogue. There is more chance of your music being noticed and pitched from a smaller library like ours than one of the huge ones with 6 million tracks. I am also gathering tracks for a different flavour library with a grittier, harder electronic edge. If you are interested, send me an email for more details (but use a different email address to the mastering one please: publishing (at) rinsethesync (dot) com )

I’m lucky to have had some of my own music placed too. Most notably landed some music and sound design in the international trailers for Alien:Covenant, Antlers, a Sprite advert, The Driver, had some of my sound design in the Logan trailer and music in The Book Of Boba Fett promo with a track I composed 50/50 with a buddy.

Some TV and Podcast Work

I came to the rescue for two series of wellness programmes on Sky TV “Feel Good Factor” on recommendation. The producers were having a nightmare as the sound recordist had ended the relationship on bad terms and left them with a load of extremely messy audio. Some of which was horrifically recorded, and they could not re-record the interviews due to Covid. I came in around part way though the first season and made the audio broadcast quality.

I have done various other TV mixing and post production, including remixing Ludacris’s tracks for the cool Netflix kids show Karma’s World for seasons 1 and 2. The same agency commissioned me to edit the music for a pilot cartoon show with Ronaldo and Messi called GOAT, which I don’t think ever came of anything, but was a fun job anyway.

I’ve recently been working on some spoken word audio including the excellent “Pitch Masters” podcast which is nominated for the MR2023 Podcast award. As a complete contrast, late last year I edited some rather fruity “adult” voiceover for the female-centered erotic story company Emjoy. Never done that before, but it was great fun! Never a dull day in the studio.

Final Thoughts

What I am most thankful for is the vast majority of my clients are regulars who come back time & time again, and most new clients come from their recommendations.

This means I have not needed to advertise at all for many years, and it also buffers against my rubbish social media presence haha (phew!). As I say every year… I must do better on the socials haha. Maybe this year will be the one…. Now that I mention it, If you would follow/like/share and all that stuff it would be appreciated. I often send out exclusive discounts on services to my email subscribers too.

As a lover of the countryside, I haven’t been tempted to move to London (although I do love visiting it), so have been able to keep my overheads low, and my prices extremely competitive. I truly feel Fat As Funk offers the best value:quality ratio in the business, and I’m very proud of that.

If I can help with mix evaluations, mixing, mastering, sync advice, vinyl optimisation, podcasts or anything along those lines, feel free to get in touch.

Likewise, if you have some excellent back-catalogue sitting around gathering dust consider sending it over for consideration into the library. Or you could write us something fresh!

So once again, thank you for being such awesome people. Keep the music coming! We’ll make it Fat As Funk together.

All the best,

Loz.

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Instrumental Masters for Sync – Why So Important?

why do you need instrumental masters for sync
  • What is music sync licensing?
  • What are Instrumental mixes?
  • Why are instrumentals so important for Sync?
  • What can I do if I don’t have instrumental mixes of my songs?
  • Special discount until the end of August 2022!

What is Sync Licensing?

How do artists make money from their music in 2022? Getting your music on TV or in movies, games or advertising is one of the most lucrative ways for musicians to earn serious money. This process is called “Sync Licensing”.

“Sync” is short for synchronisation. In music industry terms this simply means using music synched up to visuals in a project – almost every advert, TV show, movie or video game uses music synched up alongside the visuals. The process of a company licensing a track from an artist or agency to use in this way is known as Sync Licensing.

It is still common to land deals worth several thousand pounds, even for emerging artists (Fat As Funk works closely with various sync agencies in the UK and USA and has helped land artists many sync deals).

LA Sync mission outside Capitol Records, Los Angeles
Loz from Fat As Funk at Capitol Records in Los Angeles, as part of a Sync Industry conference.

What are Instrumentals?

An instrumental is simply a version of your song with the lyrics or vocal tones silenced. Even slight vocal effects or “oohs / aahs” need to be muted for an instrumental version, but the underlying track tone and arrangement is identical to the main version. It is standard professional practice to get instrumental masters done at the same time as getting your main mixes mastered.

Why are instrumental versions so essential for sync licensing?

Often a music supervisor (the person responsible for choosing the music for a visual project) loves a track, but the project requires music with no vocals.

This could be for many reasons, including having a spoken voiceover which song lyrics would mask – and for the client, their message is the most important thing, and ultimately what they are paying to convey.

Some videos just work better with instrumental music! Lyrics could distract from the visuals, or dilute the message.

Often a TV show or movie will use both the vocal version and instrumental mix! Editors can use a vocal song where the lyrics help the scene, then cut seamlessly into the instrumental when the characters are speaking, so their dialogue comes through clearly. This flexibility is golden to editors, and music supervisors expect this flexibility.

Is it possible to get instrumental versions from vocal mixes, if I don’t have the project any more?

YES! We can remove the vocals from your mix as if by magic! Results are usually super-clean and often sound identical in quality as if you made an instrumental mix from the original project file.

Occasionally the process can leave slight vocal artefacts behind with some tracks, but it will be good enough to supply to a music supervisor with your main mix, and even worse-case will certainly be good enough to use behind dialogue.

Having an instrumental version is the difference between a music supervisor choosing your track over someone else’s. It is an essential part of the modern music industry, and even if you are not yet in the position to have music supervisors listening to your tracks, it is a no-brainer to get instrumental masters done at the same time as your regular mastering job.

We can also magically separate your track into its component parts (“Stems“) which can be even more useful for music supervisors. Check out our Magic Stem Creation Service too!

Getting Your Instrumental Versions Mastered

To get a hugely discounted rate on instrumental mastering, you should order the alternative instrumental versions at the same time as getting your regular masters done.

Just upload your main mixes and instrumentals to us (or order our magic instrumental creation service if you don’t have them already), then order Stereo Mastering (for the main masters) AND Alternative Version (for the discounted instrumental mastering).

We are offering a HALF PRICE deal on Instrumental Mastering until the end of August 2022. Just order as usual and enter the code: SUMMER22ALT at checkout!

To be extra-clear, if your track is only an instrumental anyway, you only need to book the main Stereo Mastering. If you are using our magic instrumental mix creation service, you still need to purchase the Alternative Version too, as these are separate services.

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