Jay Maas is a producer, mixer, and engineer based just outside Boston. He started recording at 14, capturing the punk bands he was playing in, and never stopped — 22 years later he’s still doing it full-time, dedicated almost entirely to punk, hardcore, emo, and rock.

After studying at Berklee College of Music, Maas became a founding member of Defeater (Epitaph Records). He played guitar across the band’s four LPs and toured the world for the better part of a decade, producing or engineering most of those records himself — including Billboard-charting albums like Empty Days & Sleepless Nights and Letters Home. He came off the road in 2015 to focus on production full-time.

Two decades of credits span the labels that built modern punk and hardcore — Epitaph, Bridge Nine, Pure Noise, Run for Cover, Equal Vision, Rise, Deathwish, No Sleep, Topshelf, and Victory among them — and bands including Counterparts, Title Fight, Bane, Drug Church, State Champs, Citizen, Ceremony, Seaway, Silent Drive, Make Do and Mend, Somos, Verse, Have Heart, The Story So Far, Polar Bear Club, Beartooth, Dropkick Murphys, Being as an Ocean, and Piebald.

Maas brings a working-musician’s perspective to the studio. Years of writing and recording his own material with Defeater shaped how he approaches production — careful tracking, real performances, and an instinct for what serves the song. The records carry the unmistakable feel of someone who has spent serious time on both sides of the glass.