This is the last step, the clear coat on the nail polish if you will      A mastering engineer’s job is to make a musical project sound better and to make it viable for commercial release. On the most basic level, the process involves balancing the many different qualities of any project — EQ, compression, volume, editing, flow, and even album sequence. All of those elements come into play when you’re working to create the bigger-picture. With so many different audio sources these days you want to make sure your music is represented correctly on all formats.