How Nova Wolf finds humanity in loudness with Ozone

With Nomad Tapes: Africa, Nova Wolf turned mastering into a continuation of the storytelling process. The six-track release, shaped by travels across the African continent, captures more than sound. It captures energy, memory, and the pulse of collaboration.

Each track feels distinct in geography yet bound by tone and warmth. That unity came from both instinct and process, shaping intensity without losing the organic life inside the mix.

In this conversation, Nova Wolf reflects on the tools and mindset that kept his work grounded in emotion. From iZotope Ozone to the way he approaches field recordings and dynamics, his methods reveal a focus on human connection through sound rather than perfection through control.

Jump to these sections:

• Finding cohesion without losing rawness
• Balancing intensity and dynamics with Ozone
• Why Nova Wolf treats mixing and mastering as overlapping stages
• Blending acoustic and electronic worlds
• What mastering taught Nova Wolf about space, simplicity, and trust
• How tools like Ozone support feel, not perfection

Find out for yourself how mastering with Ozone can serve the feeling of your tracks without overpowering them.

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When you began mastering Nomad Tapes: Africa, what was the guiding principle that kept the record cohesive?

When I was mastering the EP, the goal was to make it feel unified but still raw. Every track came from a different place and moment, so the challenge was getting them to breathe the same air, to sound like they belonged to one journey. I pushed the Limiter and Maximizer harder than I normally would because that intensity felt right for the record. The cohesion came from tone and energy more than perfection, keeping the lows earthy, the highs crisp, and the emotion right in your face. It’s loud, but it feels alive.

From a technical standpoint, I usually use a lot of different modules inside Ozone when I’m mastering, depending on what the song needs. But for this EP, I tried to keep things more consistent. I love the Exciter module and usually play around with different types of saturation across frequency bands. This time, I kept it uniform so the color stayed cohesive across the tracks.

Sonically, I wanted the record to feel human and to have a soul. I didn’t want it to sound like a compilation of sounds from my travels, but like a love letter to all the experiences I had there. Even when I was working with electronic elements, I wanted them to carry that organic warmth. Similar reverbs and effects, a shared tonal palette, and the field recordings from my travels helped glue everything together. I wanted it to feel like one long sunset, with different shades but the same lighting.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: Trust yourself and develop your ears. Don’t master with your eyes. Start by chasing feel, tone, and energy. What feels right? Once it moves me, then I check the meters to make sure everything will translate.

How do you protect emotional tone when refining frequencies, loudness, and stereo image?

This was something I put a lot of thought and care into, especially because I was pushing for a really energetic master while working with such dynamic voices, like the Thanda Choir’s forty-person ensemble. Things still needed to breathe and carry emotional depth, even with that intensity.

For loudness on this EP, I leaned almost entirely on Ozone’s Dynamics and Maximizer with IRC 4 set to Modern. It keeps the emotional tone intact while still letting me push the energy. That balance of impact without losing the soul was the entire focus.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: I like loud masters. I pushed Nomad Tapes: Africa pretty hard. But the trick is to make the loudness feel alive. Parallel compression, subtle transient shaping, and Ozone’s IRC 4 on Modern mode let me push things without crushing the life out of them.

What role does Ozone play in your workflow from mix to master?

Ozone is my go-to mastering plugin. I’ve been using it since its first version back in 2001, and it’s incredible how far it’s come. I used to rely on it for rough masters before sending projects off, but now I master completely in the box.

Over the years, I’ve compared my Ozone masters against those from professional studios, and the results hold up.

Another thing I love is using Ozone during the mixing process. Instead of treating mixing and mastering as separate events, I see them as overlapping.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: I’ll throw Ozone on the master bus, toggle it on and off, and use the feedback to shape my mix decisions. It helps me anticipate how compression and limiting will react later, so by the time I reach mastering, I’m polishing rather than rescuing.

Nomad Tapes: Africa includes a wide range of acoustic and digital sources. What were the biggest challenges in keeping the expressive dynamics of acoustic instruments while still sounding modern and punchy?

The challenge was letting everything remain expressive while still having the density and drive of a modern mix. I used parallel and upward compression to enhance detail without sacrificing performance. That helped the acoustic layers breathe naturally alongside the electronic elements.

I wanted every sound – the percussion, the choirs, the field recordings – to live in the same environment. I used shared reverbs, subtle saturation, and matching effects chains to make sure it felt cohesive. The record had to sound like a single story rather than separate chapters.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: Don’t master when you’re tired. It’s the last stage, but it needs the freshest ears. If I feel even slightly fried, I stop. A break does more for clarity than any equalization curve ever could.

What did mastering Nomad Tapes: Africa teach you about restraint and patience in production?

In production, I move fast, trust my instincts, and stay creative. I know the clean-up will happen later. That keeps me in flow, and I joke that it’s “future me’s problem.” But mastering is where restraint really matters. It reminds you that space is finite – you can’t fit everything in.

The fewer elements you have, the more each one can breathe. That’s what makes older records feel massive. Simplicity creates power.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: Always check reference tracks. It’s too easy to get lost when listening to something over and over. And when I reference another track, I don’t just compare equalization curves. I compare how it makes me feel. If my song gives me the same energy and physiological reaction, then I know I’m in the zone.

Do you think modern mastering tools like Ozone have made the process more creative or more transparent?

Both. Ozone can be as transparent or as colorful as you need. It’s flexible enough to work for different aesthetics. What I love most is how quickly it helps me reach a sound that feels complete. The workflow is intuitive, and the results are consistent, which lets me focus more on feeling and less on second-guessing.

Pro tip from Nova Wolf: Don’t chase perfection. Perfection can feel sterile. The best music has a heartbeat, a little grit, a little imperfection. That’s what keeps it human.

Wrapping it all up

Nomad Tapes: Africa feels like a journey told through tone and rhythm.

Every sound carries a trace of its environment, and every mix decision honors the humanity behind it. Nova Wolf’s use of Ozone helped him build that bridge between power and sensitivity, letting the record breathe without losing its strength. The result is a project that feels honest, immediate, and connected to something larger than production, a reminder that music still lives in feeling first.

It’s also a statement about how far in-the-box tools have come, offering flexibility that supports creativity instead of limiting it. In the hands of someone with intention, raw emotion can be translated into sound while maintaining clarity and warmth. Nomad Tapes: Africa proves that the mastering stage can carry just as much heart as the writing itself, turning technical precision into an act of expression.

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