The Creative Music Recording Magazine

Tom Werman
Poison, Mtley Cre, Cheap Trick
The War on Drugs
w/ Adam Granduciel
Catherine Marks
Foals, Flood, The Howling Bells
Al Schnier
moe. & more
Seth Kauffman
of Floating Action
Bill Cheney
of Spectra Sonics in Behind the Gear
Music Reviews
w/ Jimmy Page on Led Zeppelin
Gear Reviews
I s s u e N o . 1 0 2
J u l y / A u g 2 0 1 4
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Hello and
welcome to
12 Letters
14 Bill Cheney in Behind the Gear
18 Seth Kauffman
22 Catherine Marks
26 Tom Werman
34 The War on Drugs
36 Al Schnier & moe
46 Gear Reviews
64 Music Reviews
66 Johns End Rant
Online Bonus Content:
Bill Cheney
Al Schnier
Online Only Feature:
Brad Blackwood
p
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102!
#
Why is it these days that people
(especially mainstream media) constantly
refer to musicians being able to record at
home as if its a recent development?Home
recording has been happening nearly as long as any kind of sound
recording existed. In the 1940s Les Paul cut hit records in his garage.
Emitt Rhodes delivered pop masterpieces from his home studio in the
early 70s. I know computers are powerful and can do all sorts of
magical things, like recording more tracks than any home setup from
the past, or emulating analog hardware and real instruments. But
this doesnt mean people were not resourceful back in the day, or
that they didnt find ways to record under any budget. And it
certainly doesnt mean that music was any less valid, despite the
recording methods used. Viva home recording its been around a
long time and it will always exist!
Larry Crane, Editor
Tape Op
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The Creative Music Recording Magazine
Editor
Larry Crane
Publisher & Graphic Design
John Baccigaluppi
Online Publisher
Dave Middleton
Gear Reviews Editor
Andy Gear Geek Hong
Production Manager & Assistant Gear Reviews Editor
Scott McChane
Contributing Writers & Photographers
Cover art assembled by Scott and John. Thanks to Rainbow Electronics for the
loan of the vintage radio transmitter tube from a Japanese submarine.
<www.rainbowelectronics.net>, Ruben Reveles for shooting the photo
<Facebook.com/rubenrevelesphotography> and Kyle Field for the drawings.
<Littlewingsnow.com>
Ryan Barrington Cox, Tom Beaujour, Dave Hidek, Jacob Biba, Jay Blakesberg,
Garrett Haines, Geoff Stanfield, Allen Farmelo, Joseph Lemmer, Kirt Shearer, Steve
Silverstein, Scott Evans, Joel Hamilton, Chris Koltay, Adam Kagan and Jeff Slate.
www.tapeop.com
Dave Middleton and Hillary Johnson
Editorial and Office Assistants
Jenna Crane (proofreading), Thomas Danner (transcription),
Lance Jackman (accounting@tapeop.com)
Tape Op Book distribution
c/o www.halleonard.com
Disclaimer
TAPE OP magazine wants to make clear that the opinions expressed within reviews, letters and
articles are not necessarily the opinions of the publishers. Tape Op is intended as a forum to
advance the art of recording, and there are many choices made along that path.
Editorial Office
(for submissions, letters, CDs for review. CDs for review are also
reviewed in the Sacramento office, address below)
P.O. Box 86409, Portland, OR 97286 voicemail 503-208-4033
editor@tapeop.com
All unsolicited submissions and letters sent to us become the property of Tape Op.
Advertising
Pro Audio, Studios & Record Labels: John Baccigaluppi
(916) 444-5241, (john@tapeop.com)
Pro Audio & Ad Agencies:
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512-529-1032, (laura@tapeop.com)
Marsha Vdovin
415-420-7273, (marsha@tapeop.com)
Printing: Matt Saddler
@ Democrat Printing, Little Rock, AR
Subscriptions are free in the USA:
Subscribe online at tapeop.com
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Circulation, Subscription and Address Changes
will be accepted by email or mail only. Please do not telephone. We
have an online change of address form <tapeop.com> or you can email
<circulation@tapeop.com> or send snail mail to
PO Box 160995. Sacramento, CA 95816
See tapeop.com for Back Issue ordering info
Postmaster and all general inquiries to:
Tape Op Magazine, PO Box 160995, Sacramento, CA 95816
(916) 444-5241 | tapeop.com
Tape Op is published by Single Fin, Inc. (publishing services)
and Jackpot! Recording Studio, Inc. (editorial services)
10/Tape Op#102/Masthead
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/11
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Im not in the music industry, but my husband is.
Needless to say there is always a copy of Tape Op
around. Being a hairstylist, this should make me run in
the other direction (no fashion or beauty articles?) but
I have to tell you that I find it almost as interesting as
he does. I think a testament to good writing and
content is that it can be understood and enjoyed by
anyone. So I had to write, because who knew you had a
secret fanbase of non-industry insiders. Keep up the
good work; Ill be reading!
Janis Schoenemann <Janis@complete-usa.com>
I just wanted to say thank you for your magazine.
It is consistently my favorite. The articles are always
so well written and engaging, and I love researching
the advertisers for updating gear and keeping my wish
list well stocked.
Lee Crase <furiouspoet73@gmail.com>
In your articles, the interviewer (always well-
prepared and familiar with the interviewee) will ask
about certain songs/passages of music, to find out how
the engineer got a particular sound. Its a perfect way
to present a question because then the reader can listen
to the specific song/passage referred to in the question.
Perfect! But I am almost always unfamiliar with the
songs/music referred to, so I cant put the response in
context to fully understand it. I wish it was possible for
you folks to have a snippet of the music [indicated in
the articles] posted on your website (just enough for
reference), so that people like me could listen. What an
amazing educational benefit it would be!
K8ch <www.keithhaydon.com/Music.htm>
We do put links to YouTube videos in the online, or
bonus versions, of our articles. But were reticent to host
any music on our site due to probable copyright and
ownership issues. In this day and age isnt it fairly easy
to hear snippets of music via iTunes or Amazons stores?
And many songs seem to be up on YouTube, no matter
what copyright owners may wish. The music is out there;
enjoy the search! -LC
My name is Gerardo Montoya. Im from Mexicali, Baja
California. Mexico. Im writing to you because Id like to
thank you for every story Tape Op brings to us. Ive been
recording bands in my town as a profession since 2007.
I would like to share what I do with you. Thanks
for every story and honest advice
you write, or decide to publish.
Gerardo Montoya <kellaeq@gmail.com>
John La Grous article,
The Future of Audio
Engineering, [Tape Op
#100] was excellent, and
Id love to see more
forward-looking thought
pieces in Tape Op. In
my opinion,
the recording
community has a
tendency to fixate on the past.
This fixation borders on nostalgia, and it seems to pull
our interests, as well as the work of our technology
developers (who respond to our interests), in rather
conservative directions. Do we need yet another U 47 or
1073 knock-off? And, on the digital side, wouldnt it
make sense to build new processors, rather than to focus
on getting plug-ins to imitate vintage gear? It shouldnt
come as a surprise to us that, as John notes in his
article, the innovation in audio is not coming from the
audio community, but from the gaming, TV, and film
industries. All of these fields have stayed on the cutting
edge of technology and, not coincidentally, are thriving,
while the music industry continues to sink into an
unprecedented financial and artistic devaluation. Please
continue to bring us articles such as Johns, so that we
can collectively imagine, and help create, a future thats
as innovative and exciting as our past was.
Allen Farmelo <farmelorecording.com>
It feels like you have been a mysterious member of
my (and my familys) life for years. I have subscribed to
Tape Op off and on since 2000. Even my wife, who isnt
into recording, will skim through the new issue when it
arrives. Know that your work has been, and will
continue to be, appreciated. Thank You.
Jered Reynolds <owsleybros@gmail.com>
Hello, just wanted to write and give a quick thank
you for issue #101's producer interviews, in particular
the triple-whammy of Ryan Freeland, Colin Marston,
and Just Blaze. Reading those three back to back is as
admirable an introduction as I can think of for someone
asking the question, "Yes, but what IS a producer
really?" The answer of course is that there are as many
ways to produce as there are producers, and getting to
hear nuts and bolts of technique as well as philosophy
from three such diverse talents is a great illustration of
this. The best compliment I can give is that the
interviews inspired me to go listen to the productions
of all three, and I was as impressed with the end
products as I was with the thinking behind them.
Thanks for another great issue.
Casey Holford
I like reading your magazine, but it would be really nice
if you would edit out the cursing. It would keep people like
me from having to keep a sharpie on hand while Im
reading. The advice of the grandmother of a comedian,
whose name I dont remember, was to keep his material
clean. It will draw in the people who dont care if it is clean
or not, and it will also draw in the people who do care.
Thank you for your consideration, and for putting out a free
(emphasis on free) recording magazine. God bless.
Micah Gamble <uberguitarguy@yahoo.com>
I understand your sentiment, but it aint gonna
happen. Many times I feel the language used in
interviews reflects the tone of the interviewee. See the
interview I did with Snuff Garrett [Tape Op #73]. He
dropped an f-bomb every five words, and I edited out
many of them. But to edit out all of them would not
create the same feeling of hanging out with this cowboy
of a record producer. While there may be a couple of words
Im reticent to print, I plan to utilize language in the best
ways I can to get any points across. -LC
12/Tape Op#102/Letters/(Fin.)
Send Letters & Questions
to: editor@tapeop.com
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Bill Cheney and his partner Jim
Romney are the men responsible for
keeping the amazing legacy of Spectra
Sonics, a legendary, if criminally
unheralded, pro-audio company alive.
LC: The history of Spectra Sonics starts
with William G. Bill Dilley.
He was the chief test engineer for the ICBM
[intercontinental ballistic missile] during the early to
mid-1960s. He was basically involved with the
transition between tube and transistor technology in
HF/RF communication. At the time, he was a
constant contributor to AUDIO Magazine. He wrote
about recording technology; from portable, tube
based consoles to VCA-based compressor/limiters.
LC: Was that a passion of his, on the side?
Yeah, audio. Ive got the original tube preamp he built
in the late 50s, and then I think he saw the light
with transistors. It was an immediate thing, between
1962 and 1964. The first day I met him when I was
like 21 or 22 years old the first thing out of his
mouth was, Eliminate the cause; dont minimize the
effect. Later, I found this in his handwritten notes.
He would isolate each issue that caused a specific
circuit problem, and resolve it. This applied to peak
overload, solid state circuit noise and distortion, plus
overall amplifier stability. Rather than chasing things
with a bigger stick, he just eliminated the problem.
Thats how his designs worked.
LC: What year did the first Model 101 amp
modules come out?
In 1965. He originally just wanted to build modules,
power supplies, and equalizers. He sold to places like
Auditronics in Memphis. The problem was that
people couldnt deal with the grounding, which is
important with our stuff. There was also an issue
with console construction, which did not meet
Dilleys milspec mindset. In the end he was forced to
start building consoles.
JB: So all the early Auditronics consoles
had Spectra Sonics 101s inside?
Right. When I went up to the factory for the first time,
you had women with beehive hairdos, smoking
cigarettes while wiring looms, and youd have stacks
of consoles in rows. I recently found out that a
second production facility existed for Spectra Sonics
via Auditronics. He couldnt build them fast enough
in Ogden, Utah, so he built what was called Son of
36 Grand. It looked just like a Spectra Sonics console,
but they were building them in Memphis with Spectra
parts. But then they started going out the back door,
rather than being sent to Ogden to be shipped and
sold. So Bill said, Were not going to do that
anymore. And that was that.
LC: So there are some bootleg consoles
out there. How did you end up as part
of Spectra Sonics?
I was working for a professional audio dealer when I was
21 years old. I went to a seminar one day, and Bill
Dilleys personality was rather intimidating. I sat
there and listened to him, and when I went home I
told my mom that this guy had it figured out.
Everybody else at the seminar was pissed and
wouldnt go back the next day, so I was the only one
there. I made numerous trips to the factory over the
next few years. Bill always had time for me. One day,
I told Bill, Ill work for you for free. So I started
doing AES shows with him.
LC: What year was that?
It was 1975 or 76. Hed been going for over ten years.
When the company started, Bill was still an officer in
the USAF.
LC: My introduction to Spectra Sonics
was the 610 compressor. My friend
came by with one and told me to
turn everything all the way up. It
goes crazy.
A normal compressor is a peak-sensing level compressor.
Whatever the amplitude of the peak is however much
gain reduction you get. In fact, theyve taken the
definition so far, that anything over 9:1 compression
is peak limiting, which is backwards from what we
do. What we do is that the peak is separate from the
compression. So we eliminate the peak. The peak
limiter in the circuit is in and out of the circuit in 180
nanoseconds [ns]. Its eliminating the peak. So
everything else that passes through, theres no peak.
In a peak-limiting mode, you can take our
compressor and put it in front of a conventional
power amp and get another 10 dB out of that power
amp, but not hear it because its in and out. In the
analog world, peaks are bad. Peaks destroy the
character of the recorded signal.
LC: Its a fast transient peak that we
dont perceive.
Yeah. The peak is gone. Theres no musical content; its
purely voltage. So the peak limiter is separate from
the compressor. The compressor still attacks at 100
ns, so there is not a transition issue. The compressor
offers up to 20 dB of gain reduction. You can set
that slope wherever you want, and you can set that
release wherever you want. So youve got the peak
limiting mode, youve got peak limiting with
compression, and then youve got hard
compression, which is how most folks have used the
610 for decades.
LC: Yeah, absolutely.
Spectra Sonics gear is well known for a unique RMS
overload distortion. Its so well balanced that it
doesnt clip like a normal transistor circuit. I dont
think that was what Bill had in mind when the
circuits were designed, but thats what youre
hearing. For example, if you listen to early ZZ Top,
when they recorded lead guitars at Ardent, that was
a 101 driven into RMS overload.
JB: So what came first? The early cards
and consoles, or the 610 limiter?
You had the Model 101 in 1965. Then he built what was
called the Model 100, which was three 101s on a
board. The 610 limiter came out in 69. The first EQ
he came out with was the 500, in 1966, which was a
little 2-band, like Stax and Ardent had. Then the 502
came out in 69, which was the 3-band.
JB: And thats the Record Plant console?
Right.
JB: How many of those consoles got
built?
Id guess maybe 30 or 40 is all. The Stax console got
thrown in the dumpster. The sister console was at
Ardent, and at Muscle Shoals for a time.
JB: Wasnt there some connection with
the Flickinger products?
Well, Daniel Flickinger was a dealer of ours. He bought
101s for years and built consoles with our stuff. Then
he tried to copy our stuff. At first he just removed our
name and put his name on it. Then he started
building his own boards. People sent them into
Spectra Sonics for warranty repair and theyd literally
been on fire. It was a really crude attempt at a copy.
Sometime later Dilley realized Flickinger was trying to
build a 101. It comes down to having the stability in
certain stages, as well as the right parts. Flickinger
never figured it out, so he just added beefier end
stage outputs, with bigger transistors that would
handle the current and reduce the fire hazard.
LC: Ive been under the impression that
Spectra Sonics never ceased to
operate.
They didnt stop. Bills first love, the only reason that
Spectra Sonics existed, was because he was an Air
Force test pilot and loved to fly. He wrote the
operational manuals for the F-100 to the F-107. He
was a fighter pilot in WWII, and shot down Germans.
The only way he could get a personal airplane was to
create a company. The first year in business, in 64,
he did six figures, which was a lot of money back
then, so now he could afford his airplane. He had
hangars full of airplanes when he died. I separated
Behind The Gear
Bill Cheney
by Larry & John
This Issues Spectre of Sonics
14/Tape Op#102/Mr. Cheney/(continued on page 16)
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16/Tape Op#102/Mr. Cheney/(Fin.)
from the company in the late 80s, as I had my own business. With the backing of
Spectra Sonics, I started Applied Technology with my partner Jim. We evolved away
from audio and went to work for large corporate and government agencies, building
communication and weapons test facilities. Then in 07, we started to see what was
happening with the 610. On eBay, they were initially selling for $100 to $200. In 2006
the price had jumped to over a $1,200. I called Bills son, Greg Dilley, and said, Jim
and I want to buy the 610 production rights. He said, Just buy the whole company.
JB: So this was after Bill passed away?
Bill passed away in 03. Greg wanted to continue running Spectra Sonics Aviation, an FBO,
and had little time for the audio part of the family business.
LC: I remember sending my tech my 610, and he was like, I cant
figure it out. So we sent it to the factory to get refurbished in
the late 90s.
They were still fixing stuff. He was still supporting everything, still supporting consoles.
LC: Thats kind of unusual in this business.
Again, it was a moral thing with him. Theyd made their money, and they were really careful
with their money. Thats why the family wanted us to pick it up, because they knew
that we wouldnt butcher it. It took us two years to get our first product out because
we couldnt meet spec. We were working on the 610, and there were certain parts that
had to have really tight, high tolerance specs. People will try to copy it, but you cant
just put parts on a board with our stuff. During the process of producing the first 610s,
I called up Greg and asked, How are you selecting this, this, and this? Greg said, I
dont know. Then I get a call one day and Greg said, Ive just found Dads handwritten
notes. So we went back and reverse-engineered everything. It took us two years to
get the 610 to meet spec, and we would not sell them until they did. Theres a picture
of Tchad Blake on our website, and hes got a 610 from 1969 or 1970, and hes got a
2012 unit, and hes using them interchangeably. You cannot tell the difference.
JB: Youve done a good job of keeping the company intact.
Jim and I probably could have retired, but we are stubborn so we are going to keep this
up. Recently its been doing a lot better. Were fighting guys who have hundreds of
thousands of dollars in ad budget, with a lot of BS and momentum, and its just
difficult. But we are not going to stop.
JB: I was really impressed when you sent me a 502 to check out.
One of the first things I did was open it up. It had such solid and
beefy circuit board traces and transformers and inductors.
All of our products are designed and built the same way; to last forever.
JB: You just dont see much new gear thats built like this.
No. It goes back to the way that Bill Dilley would do things. He prided himself on all of
his consoles. Theyd snap together. There was a thousandth of an inch tolerance in all
the milling, so things would literally snap in, even though he still had screws to hold
it. The stuff was built like a tank. Thats just the way he did it. r
Visit <tapeop.com> for more from Bills interview.
<www.spectra-sonics.com>
http://tapeop.com/interviews/btg/102/bill-cheney-bonus/
bonus article:
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Songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Seth
Kauffman has been crafting exotic music for
over a decade. Whether hes recording albums
under the moniker, Floating Action, sitting in
on sessions with Dan Auerbach and Ray
LaMontagne, or producing albums for other
artists like Courtney Jaye, Seth brings a
distinctly laid-back vibe to each project. I
recently had the pleasure of chatting with him
at his home in Black Mountain, NC.
How did you get started recording? The
oldest thing I found was the Choosy
Beggars self-titled album from 2003.
My friend, Bryan Cates, who was the singer/songwriter,
did most of our recording. He did The Choosy Beggars
to ADAT. Then our friend, Thad Cockrell,
recommended Chris Stamey to mix it.
When did you start recording yourself?
After [The Choosy Beggars], I had a 4-track and was
messing around. Thats when I got into the idea of
doing everything myself. When I got married and
moved to Durham, [NC], I thought, Man, if I could
do more tracks, I could make real-sounding things!
For years after that, I used Cakewalk [Software]. Its
really cheap, like $35 at Best Buy.
Whats your setup now?
Ive got [PreSonus] Studio One. Bill Reynolds [of Band of
Horses] talked me into getting a better interface. I
couldnt get multiple tracks at the same time with
Cakewalk. I could only do left and right to get two
simultaneous [tracks]. Now I can get more, but I
dont really know how to use the program. [laughs] I
hit record and thats pretty much it. Ive still never
used any onboard effects. I always use Echoplex
delays, or spring reverb units, before it hits the
computer.
What sounds are you chasing?
I grew up in Greensboro [NC]. In the early 90s, we were
in high school figuring out music. That period was the
worst for popular music. It seems like every period is
the worst! [laughs] Every sound that was happening,
especially in Greensboro, was not cool, and we hated
that; but we didnt know how to articulate it. We liked
Robert Johnson, 60s Motown, and the Rolling
Stones. We [The Choosy Beggars] recorded this gospel
album called Bring it Back Alive, trying to get that old
sound. It was really a cool thing, but we just had our
local recording guy, so it was super cheesy and
sounds awful.
Whats your approach to recording your
songs?
I usually start with rhythms. Everything thats
happening is simple. Im not virtuosic at any
instrument. Im always trying to create some weird
polyrhythm to help the song. Whatever creates some
new groove.
Do you ever use a click?
Ive never used an actual click thats from the computer.
Ill use a [60s Ace Tone Rhythm Ace] drum machine
and record it for four and a half minutes. I then use
it like a click to play the drums to, and mute it after
that. There are some songs where its even left in.
Do you already have songs written
before recording?
Usually it is rhythm first. Thats what Im doing now. I
recently got this tabla drum machine. Ive been
tracking it to a [4-track cassette recorder], then
flipping the tape over and recording that to the
computer backwards. Theres this weird rhythm that
doesnt make sense forwards, but then backwards it
does. Then I figure out some hip-hop drumbeat and
see if I can make that work. Theres no go-to; I try to
do something different [every time].
Do you write song structures around the
beats, working with the fills and
fluctuations that are already there?
Thats why its fun to do it myself! I can get risky with
it because the fill is not in the right place. There are
happy accidents where Im like Whoa, I wouldve
never put [the fill] there, but it sounds cool!
You end up with an extra bar.
Right. In a lot of ways I let it write itself.
I like your arrangements. Theres
p l e nt y g o i ng o n, b ut e a c h
instrument has its own space.
Thats part of doing it all myself. Im real shy. In the studio
people are butting heads. Ill have an idea, but cant
defend it because I dont know where its going to lead,
and then it gets shot down. If its just me, I can spend
hours on it, even if it doesnt work. With each album,
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18/Tape Op#102/Mr. Kauffman/(continued on page 20)
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Ive gotten logistically better at doing it all myself.
Sometimes I sit down at the drum kit first and, in my
head, do the whole arrangement, and try to get all the
fills right. I enter this mental zone and get real intense.
My face turns red it gets crazy. Its a mad scientist world.
Is it easier to explore crazy ideas when
youre not wasting anybody elses
time?
Yeah, Im totally free to pursue ideas. I can make
everything complement each other; nothings fighting
each other.
On the new record [Body Questions, out in
Aug 2014], you recorded all the
instruments at home, and did the
vocals with Bill [Reynolds]. What was
that like?
Ive worked with Bill quite a bit. He produces a lot of
singers, and vocals are his forte. I hadnt sung the songs
before, so they were fresh. He was super patient. It was
in Ojai, California, north of L.A. Orange groves are a big
thing and there are all these meditation gardens. Its a
lot like Black Mountain, [NC]; a real small town. He had
this little house there; wed get up at 7 a.m., have
coffee, start singing, mix, and then go to bed at 10 p.m.
What gear did he use?
He had a big bass amp and he would send vocals [through
that], mic it, and send it back in as reverb. He had a
1/4-inch tape machine that he would set up for
slapback tape delay, but we also used a lot of plug-ins
too. They almost sound as good as the real thing. When
we got the final mixes, we would put that on tape and
it all got mastered from tape.
You also produce other artists records.
Was there a particular one that you
enjoyed?
The Courtney Jaye album [The Exotic Sounds of Courtney
Jaye] worked because Id never produced anyone else at
that point. She used to be on a major label, and it was
a big deal at the time. Id done my album, Research
[2007], and she wanted that sound; a lot of Hawaiian
percussion. Its a really good record. She sent me some
acoustic demos and I picked out the ones I thought
would be best. I was able to give it movement.
You play the roles of producer and artist
simultaneously.
I dont really see it as two roles. Im obsessed with trying
to make things that dont exist yet. Its no good if it
sounds like a generic rock song. At the same time, Im
creating it from the engineers standpoint. Ive got a
vision that itd be cool if it sounds like this. So Im
aware of that the whole time.
This is an era, or a style?
Yeah. Drum sounds. Maybe it doesnt matter if theyre
clean, or they need to be super fucked-up. The answer
is usually they need to be really fucked-up sounding!
[laughs]
Do you mean cranking gain knobs,
blowing them out?
I still dont know what Im doing. On my older albums I
knew even less. Sometimes I would crank the digital
distortion. For years I took shit for that.
Have you ever tried consciously to be lo-fi?
I cant do that anymore. Theres something about it, but
theres something more to what Noah [Georgeson] does.
I wouldnt really call it lo-fi; its more like rolling off top-
end, or using ribbon mics on tape. Its not lo-fi, but its
this organic warmth.
Youve started on another record. Whats
it like, so far?
I cant repeat myself. Ive gotta do something different, so
Im trying to delicately build some beats and sit with it
for a while. Im getting closer and closer. Theres some
migratory sense, where I can tell when its time to do it.
I didnt want to do it too soon and make it sound like
the last album. Im trying to gather all these things, get
to a new spot, and then do it. It needs to be different,
but it also needs to be good.
Do you feel like its infinite, how much
you can keep doing new things?
No, thats really scary to me! Everything has been done,
but I still think mankind will never write the perfect
song. The great songs of all time hit some percentage;
some aspect of perfection. r
<www.floatingaction.com>
Ryan Barrington Cox records music and builds useful things in
Asheville, NC. <ryanbarringtoncox.bandcamp.com>
Seths Role on Ray LaMontagnes
Supernova with Dan Auerbach Producer
Richard Swift was the drummer, even though he can play
everything. Dans got this guy, Leon [Michels], who plays
keys, mainly, but also plays horns part of the crew on
the Dr. John record [Locked Down]. He got Dave Roe, who
was Johnny Cashs bass player. Russ [Pahl] played pedal
steel and Kenny Vaughan played guitar. I didnt know
what Dan knew about me, or what he thought I was gonna
do. I guess he wanted me to be a rover. Richard Swift and
I did some doubled drums. I also did a lot of percussion,
some guitar, a little bit of keys, and I ended up singing a
lot of background vocals. Collin [Dupuis] is the secret
weapon of Dans. Hes the quintessential transparent
engineer guy; a mad scientist who runs around and gets
all the sounds. He knows a lot about the old gear. Dan
likes to do everything live with no click; just the idea of
in a room. There were seven dudes playing at once. It
was half older Nashville legends and half younger indie
dudes, or whatever [were called]. We did first takes,
knocking out one or two songs a day. We would get the
arrangement barely down, do a couple of takes, and no
overdubs. Ray played acoustic guitar and sang it all live.
Its happening, it sounds so good, and thats what comes
out on the record. Its unconventional and looser, with
more bleed tactics that are unacceptable to most
people. Dan gets a team; people with the right vibe. He is
a really good leader too; he keeps everybody together.
20/Tape Op#102/Mr. Kauffman/(Fin.)
T a pe O p i s made
p o s s i b l e b y o ur
a d v e r t i s e r s .
Please support them and tell them
you saw their ad in Tape Op.
www.tapeop.com
Bonus content online!!!
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An Australian architecture student bumps into famous producer/engineer Flood while
studying in Ireland, returns home to start playing in bands, and eventually moves to
London and becomes an in-demand engineer and producer? Sometimes the truth is
rather fantastic. I had to figure out Catherine Marks unusual career path, so we
met up over breakfast on a rainy London morning, off of Portobello Road.
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Youd studied classical piano when you
were younger?
Yeah, from like four to 15. Im not really that good
anymore, but I think it helps to be able to
communicate notes and chords, at the very least.
I heard that you studied architecture in
Melbourne.
When I did architecture at Melbourne uni, I had to do a
compulsory year at a firm before I went on to finish
my degree. For some reason, I thought it would be a
good idea to do it in Ireland, because my mums Irish.
Dublin was full of amazing musicians, at the time. I
started going to see bands, which Id never done
before. I met Flood maybe halfway through the year
of my time there. It was at a Nick Cave concert, and
we got along really well. Someone had mentioned
that he was a music producer. I dont think I
understood what that was, at that point. I think at
my going-away dinner I asked him if hed produce me,
and he said no. I think he was working on a U2 record
at the time. He said, I wont; but if you are really
serious about working in music, Ill help you. Go back,
finish your degree, and work out if you want to do
what I do. Its a big sacrifice.
Its overwhelming. So you went back to
Melbourne to finish your degree?
Yeah, I joined a couple of bands playing keyboards. The
first band I was in was called The Wreck. I would say
it was kind of ethereal indie-pop. Then The Wreck
broke up, and I joined this band called The Harlocks.
Was there kind of an open invitation to
come to London and work with Flood?
No. In his mind he thinks I pestered him, but in my
mind I think that he called me regularly to make sure
I was still coming. Either way, we had stayed in
contact over those four years. When I eventually
moved to London, I became the assistant to the
assistant engineer, Andy Savours. But I didnt know
what it was to work in a studio. Id never personally
recorded anything. I was not technically savvy, at all.
But I was so excited about making music, and being
involved in making music. Even the things that I
found difficult I was determined to figure out. Theres
a real dynamic in the studio, which I definitely know
now and its incredibly crucial, but I really didnt
understand it then. Id been working at an
architecture firm, and I had people who were working
underneath me.
How did you approach learning some of
the technical side?
I asked a lot of questions; probably annoyingly. I still
constantly apologize to Flood now for the way I was.
But Flood and Andy also had this thing they called
the war of attrition. Id ask a question when I
thought it was the appropriate time, but it obviously
wasnt. Theyd reveal a little bit of information, which
of course made no sense to me, at all, because it had
no context. Id ask, What does compression do?
Theyd go, Well, it does this but this is all were
going to tell you, for now. I still joke to Alan Moulder
that I think Ive finally worked out the difference
between attack and release. He knows that I know
things, but we dont have those kind of discussions.
He laughs at me because I dont profess to be overly
technical, but I do actually know all this stuff. The
technological side of things is, like, 25 percent of it.
How did you get up to speed though?
After three months of shadowing Andy, Flood gave me
the keys to this project studio up in Kilburn, which he
called The Boys Bedroom. It was a mess. All his mates
had been using it. I started sorting things out and re-
patching. I slowly started teaching myself all the
equipment. He just kept throwing me in the deep end.
Theres a session here, and the band wants to record
25 tracks, in six days. Things would break down; Id
just stay calm and work it out.
I agree that the technical is a small
percentage of what you have to do to
get a record done.
I say all this stuff, but recently I engineered the Foals
Holy Fire record for Flood and Alan. I was really
nervous about doing that, because youre working
with two of the greatest producers and engineers in
the world. It was an amazing opportunity, because
they rarely work together, and Foals is an incredibly
talented band. It was not only keeping the ship
running, but also managing the technical side of
things as well.
Its like the old-school studio system of
being the tea boy, the tape op, and
working your way up. Its amazing to
have landed in a place like Assault &
Battery, with two fantastic engineer-
producers.
Alan and Flood still take on a lot of people, and they
love it. They see Assault & Battery as a hive of
activity. There are great bands coming in. Theres
communication and collaboration. They love that
thats still happening. Alan said the other day that its
possibly more exciting than Trident Studios was. I
know its really rare now, so I do feel very lucky to be
a part of it. Even though Im now mixing on my own,
I still want to be a part of that team, in a way. I would
hope that making records is like a craft. There are so
many different ways of making records, but I hope
that craft will never get lost. I feel lucky to have been
able to learn from so many other awesome craftsmen.
Youre freelance now, but you still keep
in touch with them often?
Yeah, I did a project last year with Alan, which we co-
produced. Im mixing it at the moment. Its like
having your homework marked! Im much more
confident now, obviously. But I feel like in every band
that I work with, everyones learning, and adapting,
and growing together.
How did your career progress after The
Bedroom studio?
I was there, on and off, for maybe two years. Once Id
tidied up the studio and started feeling my way
around, there wasnt much I had to do during the day.
Id go and bother the girls who managed Flood and
these other producers. I was like, What can I do?
There was a job with Ben Hillier recording The
Futureheads in Scarborough, and they wanted
someone for two months. They were going to hire a
chef and an assistant. I was like, Pick me! They
couldnt find anyone else, so I was kind of the last
resort. On a Friday afternoon, when everybody was
leaving, they said, Okay. Can you cook?
Can you cook?
No, I couldnt cook at that time. Not for 11 people. It was
set up in this barn in the middle of nowhere, in the
countryside of north Yorkshire. It was beautiful and
amazing, but freezing cold. I had to get up in the
morning, set up the microphones, and turn the heaters
on in the barns. I didnt have to make peoples
breakfast, but I started making lunch, and then Id
make everyone tea. It was a big complex, and I was
rushing around everywhere. A bonus was, for maybe an
hour or two a day, I could sit in a studio that theyd
made out of this other barn. But usually I was sitting
and watching Ben Hillier work. He had a very lovely
engineer, Rick Morris, and I remember thinking how
little Rick gave away of his personality. Im quite open.
I am who I am. I thought that maybe I should be a
little more like he was. I tried, but it didnt really work.
To subvert your own personality?
Yeah. I think that was one of the other things that
Flood instilled really early on. Youve got to be
yourself, because people can tell if youre not.
Where did you end up after that
Futureheads session?
When Alan and Flood decided to take on the big recording
room at Assault & Battery, I moved in there with them
and became the assistant for that studio. This was more
of a challenge, because I suddenly had to really be on
it and know the studio. I then went on to assist for
Alan Moulder. After about a year of learning I started
being able to set up mixes and get vocal sounds for
him, as well as moving the mixes into the main room.
Then hed get projects that he loved, but maybe the
budgets would be quite small. I would do them to a
point, and he would take them in and spend half a day
to finish them off. After that he would do the singles,
and I would mix the rest of the record. I never imagined
myself being a mixer. Id done songwriting,
engineering, vocal production, and all these things.
Working with Alan made me realize that you have to
think about how the record is going to end up. When
youre producing, engineering, or even assisting,
thinking about how you actually want it to sound in
the end and come together is important.
Thats a good place to get some training.
What made you go freelance?
I think it happened organically. It never was me making
a decision to go out on my own. I just started on stuff
that Alan loved, but didnt necessarily have time to
do. I think that point where clients are saying, We
want you only just started to happen in the last six
months. Its incredible.
Youre doing a lot more mixing now.
Didnt you mix some albums on your
laptop?
Howd you know that? I have done a couple of albums,
several years ago. It was really through circumstances
where I couldnt get a studio. I wouldnt necessarily
choose to do it like that. I love mixing on a console,
but at the moment Im mixing The Howling Bells
this project I did with Alan on Pro Tools with a
Ms. Marks/(continued on page 24)/Tape Op#102/23
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Chandler [Mini Rack] Mixer, as well as a few bits of
outboard gear, running it through an EQ, and
compressor back in. I guess it is because budgets are
getting smaller. For us to be able to get paid at all,
we need to adapt. Its unfortunate, but I think were
making it work. Its something that I feel
comfortable with. But I also feel comfortable mixing
on a console as well.
Where is that mixing taking place?
Thats at a little room in Assault & Battery. It was an
old mastering room.
How much do you end up editing and
tuning material?
I dont think Im particularly fond of comping drums or
Auto-Tune. Im very reluctant. I dont think its out of
laziness, but its much easier to get them to play
again. It saves time. All that stuff is really time
consuming. But I know that everyone has a different
process. I was talking about it with a band yesterday
who was asking if I was going to comp the drums. I
said that Id like to not have to do that, unless they
want it to be a creative thing where theyd like things
to sound cut-up, or to sound like a drum machine.
They said that they worked with people before who
just did one drum take and then spent hours cutting
it up. I can understand that. Its a process that some
people might have to go through. When Im mixing,
the last thing that I do is draw out the esses on the
vocals; whether it really needs it or not. Its these
things that people do to make them feel like theyre
doing their job.
Youve gone back to Australia and
produced and engineered since
moving away. How did that come
about?
I think that people had heard of me; they heard about
this young Aussie chick whod gone to London. Id
gone back to Australia and asked my manager, Karen
[Ciccone], to organize some meetings. Because Ive
worked with Flood and Alan, that opened a lot of
doors. I would love to eventually make more records
in Australia, and to be close to mum and dad.
Through those meetings, I found people who had
particular things that I could do. I worked on a
Buchanan album. I worked with Paul Kelly, whos an
Aussie hero an incredible musician and songwriter.
Was that nice to be able to go home, visit
your parents, and get some work too?
Yeah. Here I have my life; I can come home and be in
my own flat at the end of the day. With mum and dad
its like, Why were you out so late last night? Well,
because I didnt finish the record until two oclock in
the morning!
So what has kept you at this career?
Your familys on the other side of the
world, you come to London and
youre sitting in sessions for 12
hours a day.
I think part of it is just determination. I think that a
lot of people thought that I wouldnt last very long,
that I was doing the wrong thing, or that it wasnt
what I wanted to do. But it turned out that it was.
Even though I found it difficult initially, just being an
invisible nobody, I slowly started to realize how
crucial that aspect was, and how you were suddenly
part of a team. I wanted to be part of making music,
and it didnt matter how.
What do you think you bring to a
session?
Im very organized. I think its all about seeing the big
picture. Everyones got this common goal. Its
thinking about what I can do to help everyone realize
what they want to achieve. I still feel like its not
about me and my vision. I think, in that way, Im
quite reactive. Its about the energies and the
excitement; all the emotion, or whatever that goes
on on that particular day, with those particular
people. Creatively, thats definitely the way I work.
What excites me at that time? Obviously Ive got a
plan of what we need to achieve; but musically, and
emotionally, its very experimental. Its the happy
accidents that color and shape the fundamentals of a
song. Thats definitely what excites me. I remember
asking Flood a stupid question like, What did you do
back then [on tape] if someone played out of time,
or sung out of tune? Hed say, Turn them up! I
know he was being flippant, or annoyed by my
question, but I took that to heart. You either make
the most of it, or find a way that you can work
around it.
What do you see in the future?
Im working so much at the moment that time is just
getting compressed, more and more, into ridiculous
schedules. I feel like Im now coming back to working
around the clock. I have a couple of weeks off
coming up, which Im really excited about. Im just
going to sleep. But I dont know whats next.
Hopefully I can maintain the interest there is, with
the people who want to work with me. Some of the
productions Ive been doing over the past few years
are coming out now, which is exciting. I dont get
offended if I dont get chosen for a job though. I
think its so much about personalities, and the
dynamic that you have with the band. Youre going
to be spending loads of time with them, so they need
to respect and trust you. r
<www.catherinejmarks.com>
Thanks to Rough Trade Records for allowing us to pop in
for a photo session!
24/Tape Op#102/Ms. Marks/(Fin.)
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You did not come up through the studio
system. Instead you got an MBA from
Columbia University. Did that
degree, or anything in your business
training, help you later when you
were making records?
The degree basically helped me get a job. I had a
concentration in marketing, and I did it mainly to stay
out of the Vietnam War, as well as to please my parents.
I went into advertising major league advertising and
I hated it. Music was always the main thing in my life.
I just couldnt ignore it, and I knew that I had the
capability for it in some way. I wrote a letter to Clive
Davis; the fact that I had an MBA made me appear more
serious. I presented myself as a musician who was a
student of rock n roll, who also had two degrees and a
job. Instead of saying, Give me a job. I need a job. I
said, Id much rather work in music because, honestly,
I dont like what Im doing. I think I saw three or four
other people and the last one said, I want you to see
Mr. Davis. Mr. Davis gave me a job and that was it.
When you were at Epic Records, one of
your responsibilities was editing
songs down to single length. Was the
actual edit that you did the one that
ended up on the radio, or did you do
an example and then somebody else
would recut it?
I had a tape machine and a splicing block in my office.
I really enjoyed editing. Theyd bring it to me and
theyd say, How do we do this? How do we get this
8 minute song down to 3:20 without butchering it?
Id figure out a way. Id just listen to it a few times.
I had the pop structure in mind intro, verse, chorus,
verse, chorus, bridge, solo, verse, chorus, out. Id
make notes. You had to make sure everything was the
same going into the splice, and out of the splice. I got
very good at hearing whether it would work or not. I
wasnt allowed to touch the master. We were a union
shop at CBS. So, Id take the model from my office,
walk it down to the studio, and give it to the
mastering engineer. Id say, Edit here; 1, 2, 3, bang,
and hed copy it exactly. I did some songs that had
seven or eight cuts in them. The OJays For the Love
of Money was so long [7:14]. It was great because it
was wide open it had a lot of space in it. Anything
from Philadelphia wasnt going to have much of a
tempo problem.
Tom Werman
No Power Without Order
by Tom Beaujour
Ted Nugent, REO Speedwagon, Poison, Mtley Cre, Molly Hatchet, Twisted Sister.
When pitching this article to Tape Op, it was not lost on me that many of the artists that Tom
Werman signed and/or produced in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s are probably exactly what drove
a good number of this magazines readers to create a scene, as well as methods of making and
recording music, that circumvented the commercial rock establishment. But I probably wasnt the
only kid running around the streets in 1987 with a Maxell XLII in his Walkman that had Poisons
Open Up and Say Ahh! on one side of the tape and Hsker Ds Flip Your Wig on the other. Even if I
was, its hard to argue that Cheap Tricks late 70s trifecta of In Color, Heaven Tonight, and Dream Police
all Werman productions werent the high water mark of American power pop. Werman, now
69, stopped making records almost completely in the mid 90s when the alternative rock
revolution resulted in him becoming essentially unemployable, due to his close association with
glam metal. He says, I was already 55 in 1990; time to hang it up, really. How many lifetime
producers work successfully beyond that? A handful. Tom Dowd, Jerry Wexler, George Martin,
and Phil Ramone. Not hard rock guys though. Rather than slog it out, Werman opened a luxury
bed and breakfast called Stonover Farm, located in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. The
establishment is still thriving, and thats where I visited him on a snowy winters day to discuss his
unusual career arc, unwaveringly pop aesthetic, and, most importantly, what it was like to make hit
records in an era where the budgets were even bigger than the snare reverbs.
26/Tape Op#102/Mr. Werman/(continued on page 28)
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The first artist you signed to Epic was Ted
Nugent.
I didnt know what a producer did when I started; I was
a talent scout. Embarrassingly enough, I signed Ted
Nugent. Thats really hard to explain to people these
days, given his views and outspokenness. But
actually, hes a really good guy. He just got twisted at
some point. Ted had a production deal with this guy,
Lew Futterman, who would call the shots. He could be
the producer. I was kind of bummed by this because
I was thinking that maybe I would get a producer. I
actually asked Pete Townshends lawyer if he would
consider producing Ted Nugent, one day when we
were on a plane together. She laughed. But, to her
credit, later on she sent me a letter congratulating me
on the success of the record. I horned in. I went into
the studio a lot. I slowly, but surely, started making
suggestions. Lew was a reasonably creative guy, but
he didnt know much about rock n roll and he was
nice enough to give me co-production credit. There I
was a producer. I also remixed the whole record. He
mixed it; it was delivered and I didnt like it, so I
asked for $5,000 to remix. I took it back down to
Atlanta, where we had made it, and I mixed it with a
really great engineer named Tony Reale. Unfortunately
later he borrowed some money from me and
disappeared. It was a real disappointment to me
because I loved the guy.
What did you look for in the engineers
that you hired, and who were some of
your favorites?
A sense of humor first. The first engineer I ever
latched on to was Gary Ladinsky. When Cheap Trick
decided they wanted to record in L.A., I called the
Record Plant. I figured, Well, thats a well-known
studio. I spoke to the studio manager and I said,
Can you recommend some engineers? They had
some house engineers some guys that worked
there pretty exclusively, who had come up from tape
ops and assistant engineers. I interviewed three of
them on the phone, and Gary Ladinsky came off as
the best. He was low-key and easy going, and he
just sounded good to me.
You figured he had been screened.
Yeah, he was making records. He had made some
Moody Blues records. I liked his credits, I liked him,
and we decided to work together. We went out there
and we made Cheap Tricks In Color, which was
Rolling Stones Album of the Year. He had booked
Sound City for the tracking, I think. It was a pretty
interesting project, and I really enjoyed working
with him. We wound up making 16 records together,
almost every one of them at the Record Plant. It was
my home away from home just the best place on
Earth. It was a party house, as well as the most
professional recording facility I ever saw.
Does that mean the process is almost
invisible to you while making the
record? Like, nothing is breaking?
Their maintenance staff was unbelievable. We had the
same assistant engineer for three years. He went on
to win a Grammy. But no matter what kind of chaos
was going on in the studio in the control room, in
the halls you could always count on the fact that
your assistant engineer was on the case. Hed mark
everything, hed put everything away, and hed get it
back to the vault. Absolutely button down it was
like a SWAT team. Yet, they did everything that they
could to accommodate the rock n roll life. I mean
everything. It was great. I lived there.
While you were working with Gary and
making those 16 records, you were
really just there the whole time?
Pretty much. We did go to Orlando for Molly Hatchet. We
did one in Nassau at Compass Point. We did the rest
in Orlando at a tiny little studio called Bee Jay
[Recording Studios], because the bands manager
made a really good deal with them. It was just like Ted
Nugent in Atlanta at Sound Pit Studios. Futterman
made a really good deal for that studio. I mean, really
good. In the 70s we used to make some albums for
anywhere from $30,000 to $50,000. And then slowly,
by the mid 80s, we went up to $200,000.
Was the increase in budgets due to the
fact that you were spending more
time in the studio, or that the studios
got more expensive?
Spending more time, working with less talented
musicians, escalating studio costs, bigger rental fees,
more outboard gear, more drugs, more time wasted
it was just a lot of that stuff. I had the permission
the clout so that we could spend a little more
money. Honestly, for most of the records I was
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making, especially the second and third for any band,
I was almost positive that the record was going to
recoup so I really wasnt worried. I tried to save
money, but I didnt skimp. Id pay double scale for
some backing singers, and keyboard guys whod come
in by themselves. Wed spend two or three days and
theyd make a bundle. Wed work out the parts. I
couldnt write or read music, so I would sing to the
keyboard player or any studio musician that I used.
Did you use studio guys a lot on the
records you were making?
I never used a ringer, or anybody uncredited never. Id
have guests but never substitutes. One of the
stranger guests I had was Mickey Raphael, Willie
Nelsons harmonica player. He played on Poisons
Open Up and Say Ahh! on Nothing But a Good
Time and stuff like that. These guys would come in;
theyd get double scale and work overtime. Youd pay
what you had to.
Its so foreign now, that there was
money to spend.
Yeah. There was plenty of money to spend. On top of
that, theyd make a video for $100,000.
Without romanticizing anything, do
you feel like records lost anything in
that transition to being much more
laborious?
Well yeah, they got too perfect. They got a little
finished, they got corporate, and I was into that. I
was into perfection. I thought that you could not
have power without order in music. You had to be on
time, and in tune, in order to make really locomotive
rock n roll something that had a lot of forward
momentum and rhythm which was my thing. All of
a sudden, around the late 80s, everything that I knew
was wrong; everything that I worked for was
something that the new bands didnt want. There
were times when these new bands said, That sounds
too good. Its out of tune; its out of time like the
Rolling Stones, times ten. Not only were they
imprecise they were sloppy.
It really seems like the temptation would
have been there to bring in some
ringers with some of these bands.
Sure. Rikki Rockett playing drums for Poison You
know, that was tough. But I accepted the project by
seeing the band, evaluating them, and saying, Okay,
I can make a hit record with you. Not, I can make
a hit record, with two out of the four of you, and
bring in some ringers. It wouldnt be the bands
sound; it wouldnt be the bands vibe. I think its
always important to try to duplicate, or be faithful
to, the bands live sound even though one of the
things I was most criticized for was commercializing
the band, and making them too neat and too pop.
But thats just who I am. Musically, I gravitate
towards the strengths of the record and want to get
rid of the weaknesses. The hook and the main guitar
lick in all my work if there is a good guitar lick,
like Cat Scratch Fever, youre going to hear it. Its
going to be featured. Were not going to bury it.
Were not going to soft pedal it. I was very good at
comping vocals. Id do three tracks of vocals and Id
be able to pick out whatever was best about every
line, every word, and every phrase. Id say, Take 15
minutes, and wed put one together. Then wed do
two more and Id put that together. By the time we
were finished, the vocalist was thrilled. Theyd say, I
did that?
I was going to ask you about that, versus
having the guy just punching in.
Oh, yeah. No. I really wanted to shorten the process,
and keep him and his voice fresh. The same with lead
guitar. Id bring a guy into the control room and just
sit and work with him on the fills. A lot of guys would
have a solo, but they wouldnt know how to fill.
Theyd fill over the vocal, or they just wouldnt feel it.
I would sing to them. Id say, How about something
like this? I was really good at shortening their day
and getting the real meat out of them.
From the early 70s to 93, when you
stopped, would you say that the
quality of musicianship went down
consistently, for all bands, across
the board?
Well, no. I guess it started to go down for me. I started
to work with musicians who werent quite as good,
starting in the mid-80s. Everybody in Cheap Trick was
brilliant. Robin Zander was the best vocalist I ever
worked with, Bun E. Carlos was the best drummer,
and Tom Petersson was the best bass player. They
were great! We did those records just like that.
[snaps fingers]
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Because they were out in the Midwest
rehearsing, playing shows, and
getting good.
Same with REO Speedwagon. They were the first band I
signed. These are road-tested bands. Then you get to
people like Mtley Cre and Twisted Sister, who werent
bad and Poison but it took a lot. They could play their
instruments, but Lets just say that Nikki Sixx improved
quite a lot on the bass, from the first album I did with
them to the last. Tommy Lee was a great drummer the
second best drummer I ever worked with. Mick [Mars] was
a good guitar player too. Micks problem was that he
didnt know his equipment that well, and he didnt have
a good tech. When we finally got a good guitar tech
which was on Girls, Girls, Girls he started to sound really
good, as far as Im concerned.
Theres a certain consistency and
midrange to the guitars through the
Cheap Trick, Nugent, and Molly
Hatchet records. Did you have any
equipment that you travelled with
from session to session?
The only thing I brought with me from project to project
was a mic a Sennheiser vocal mic that I purchased for
Vince Neil because he sang through his nose. I rented
it to all the bands. Wed do a test by putting a
[Neumann U] 87, and something else, up against my
mic. Wed do a blind test, and my mic always won. I
dont remember the model but it was a $2000 mic that
I bought in 1985. In the beginning, I didnt understand
anything about the frequency spectrum, or how you had
to distribute the instruments over the whole frequency
range. I tended to try to fit everything into the
midrange. Everythings there vocals, guitars, and the
top of the bass it all fights for space. What I noticed
was that, with midrange build-up, you are going to get
a painful playback when you turn it up. If the whole
band is well distributed, you can turn that thing way up
and it will just fill the room. Its pleasant to listen to,
and so much more apparently loud.
Did you have a pretty rapid technical
learning curve, once you were in
studios all the time?
The only thing I really learned was what you could do with
outboard gear. Not how it was done, but just what was
available to modify sound. I had some favorites. When
I started producing, there were three things you could
do: a chamber echo/plate echo, tape slap, and a phaser.
But I was still making records when you could quantize
and pitch correct. That was the beginning of the end,
as far as really good music and really good recording, as
far as Im concerned. But, as I kept producing more and
more records, there definitely were routines that I found
that worked on records that I had done before. I never
recorded a rhythm guitar without doubling it and
spreading the two never! Id double it; it would
smooth it out, or average out the peaks, and I loved
that. I never made one record where you had trouble
hearing the rhythm guitar. Never.
Yeah, with your records its prominent,
but not harsh they are there, but
theyre not clawing at you. Were there
other routines?
Plenty. There are backing harmonies that bands would never
dream of having. For instance, Poison considered
themselves a hard rock band. Listen to the arrangement
on Every Rose Has Its Thorn; its pure schmaltz pure
chicken fat. I call it the kitchen sink approach. I put
everything in there: Oohs, ahhs, strings, and synth pads.
I did all the hand percussion for all my records. After we
were finished with the recording, Id go in one afternoon
and do all the percussion the tambourines, the hand
claps, the shakers. I always told the band if they didnt like
it we could hire somebody, but everybody liked it. That
was my last chance to influence the direction of the song.
I liked doing backwards things. I liked phasing. I loved the
Roland Jazz Chorus amp. What a great sound that is. I love
the Hammond B3 organ. I used it with power chords a lot.
There are very few Mtley Cre songs that dont have a B3.
Sometimes piano you could conceal them behind the
guitars. I used double cello on Cheap Tricks Auf
Wiedersehen. You cant hear it, but you can feel it, along
with the guitar, when everything is going, Duh duh duh
duh duh. It makes a real drive.
How would you pick which instrument was
going to produce the right texture? Was
it instinct, or trial and error?
Trial and error. Id say, Id like something like this. The
keyboard player would give me a sound. Id say, No,
more gnarly. Lets crank up the Leslie because its too
polite. Stuff like that. But I am a sucker for string pads
and constant pedal tones I always try to find the key
note that would go through the whole verse. Id use an
organ, or Id use a string synth pad. I made records to
please me. Producers are supposed to be neutral; they
are supposed to serve the band. But I found the music
that I enjoyed was music that people would buy. So,
why not?
Around 1983, when you transitioned to
hard rock bands, were you were
thinking, This is where Im going to
go, because this is where the new
guitar rock is. Did you identify this
sort of sea change?
No. It wasnt me. I stopped signing bands after I left CBS.
I got my projects by A&R guys calling me. They would
say, I have this band; I think you would be a good
producer for them. I would meet with them, I would
see them, Id listen to their demos, and then Id make
a decision. It was the industry that kind of decided
where I was going to go, and it didnt do me any favors.
With Twisted Sister, Doug Morris the head of Atlantic
Records called me and said, Youre the only guy who
can make a hit record with this band. So, I did it for
him, because you dont turn down the head of Atlantic
Records if he calls you. I was pigeonholed.
Thats sort of the way of the world We
need that guy. What do you think
your skill set was perceived as being?
Im quite sure that they said, What the hell are we going
to do with this band? Id made hits from not
unrecordable bands but challenging bands. I had this
string of hits remarkably, even to me. At one point,
when I moved to L.A., I remember I had three albums
that I did in the Billboard Top 40. Three different
albums, by three different groups. It was great.
When Nirvana came out did the phone
just stop ringing?
Yeah, it was pretty quick. Theres an old joke that I tell all
the time the four phases of any Hollywood career: 1.)
Whos Tom Werman? 2.) Get me Tom Werman. 3.)
Get me a young Tom Werman. 4.) Whos Tom
Werman?
Do you think that the whole industry
was relieved when they could get rid
of glam metal? Or were they just
moving on to the next thing, as they
are wont to do?
A&R people are lemmings. Theyll go wherever the wind
blows. They are generally very insecure. Publish or
perish a lot of pressure. If another A&R guy was
interested in a band, immediately you paid more
attention to that band, even if you didnt particularly
respect his taste. One of my favorite stories is when
Tom Zutaut, who signed Mtley Cre and hired me to
produce them, went to see Guns N Roses at the Roxy.
It was a showcase, and a lot of A&R people were there.
He told me that he made it very obvious that after hed
heard a few songs, maybe after the third song, he got
up and made sure everybody saw him walk out. The
next day he signed them. He didnt want anybody to
know that he really wanted them; he figured he would
throw them off. It was pretty cool. But no, I think
they were happy only because they were off to the
races it was a foxhunt. Blow the trumpet and get
them out of the bushes, because Seattle was loaded
with these guys.
How involved were you in mixing?
Typically I would let the engineer set up the mix and work
on it for maybe five or six hours, then Id walk in, hear
it, and give him a list. Id say, Make this a little louder.
Try more compression here. Try this; this is too shrill.
And Id let him work on the list. Then Id come back in
again, and Id do the same thing. Wed refine it, and
refine it, and Id know if I was going in the right
direction. For him, it would be a series of little
changes. For me it would be quite a difference between
this playback and the next playback. I never touched
the board until we went to tape. The only thing I did
then was really ride for levels, or maybe Id pan or
something. But I found that if you produced the record
well, it almost mixed itself. You could really pre-mix
the record during the recording by doing the right
thing getting the right sound, making the right part,
being aware of all the musical parts of the song.
Occasionally, when you didnt do such a good job
producing the record, you tried to fix it in the mix,
which really cant be done. I wasnt afraid to scrap a
mix. Wed work till midnight. Id come in during the day
and do that whole come-in-go-out thing, and then
after dinner wed try to bring it home. By midnight,
wed sit there and say, Fuck, we went right by it. We
over-mixed it. Then youd just go right back to zero
and come in the next day. Those were usually the songs
that just didnt turn out that well.
When things switched from being on
vinyl to being on CD, did you change
how you were mixing? Did it affect how
you were doing things?
30/Tape Op#102/Mr. Werman/(continued on page 32)
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Well, I guess I did a little bit. But each engineer has his own
signature. Geoff Workman, who did the first two Mtley
Cre and the Twisted Sister record that I did he had a
bigger bottom end than Ladinsky. Duane Baron, who did
the second and third Mtley Cre albums he had another
approach. More balanced, and a little more meticulous.
They really determined how it sounded, to a large degree. I
didnt say, Okay, were going to CD now, instead of vinyl,
so we have to do this. I remember listening to Ted
Nugents first album on FM stereo, in New York. Before I
would produce a record, I would listen on FM stereo, and I
would listen on earphones. I thought, This is good, this is
great. Id listen to the record and Id say, This is as good
as I can make it, but theres definitely something lacking.
It just doesnt sound like all those other records. I finally
heard one of the songs that I produced on WNEW FM with
their compressor and I said, Wow! Is that my record? God,
it sounds good. Compression! So, I had this one mastering
engineer, George Marino at Sterling Sound, and he did
everything that I ever did, basically. Up until the time when
I think he retired. I remember there would be a point in
every project, or every song, when hed give me the
compressor control. Id go way overboard; then Id go off
and Id find the middle.
You attended all of your mastering?
Oh, yeah. It was so important to me. I always saw it as a
process of peeling off a layer of wax over the linoleum floor
and revealing the linoleum. Youd go in there with a flat
tape and youd come out and A/B the two and be like, Oh
man, I just improved this record by 20 percent. This is so
much better than when I walked in the building. Thats a
great feeling. You just play it over, and over, and over, and
over. And youre hearing stuff that you didnt hear in the
mix that just came out. A creative mastering engineer can
just bring out the best stuff. I would approach mastering
like mixing. I would say, Well, this solo needs to be louder,
but this fill is a little too loud. So, hed actually map out
his moves. Hed roll off something on that fill, when he got
to that fill. Wed try to do whatever we could to make the
record the best it could be. I didnt just let it go. r
<stonoverfarm.com>
Tom Beaujour is the owner of Nuthouse Recording in Hoboken
New Jersey. He has worked with Nada Surf, Jennifer OConnor,
and Guided by Voices, among many others.
<www.nuthouserecording.com>
32/Tape Op#102/Mr. Werman/(Fin.)
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Talk about your roots as an engineer/
producer. Was there a particular point
where you thought, Hey, this is really
cool. I want to do this.
Probably around 2000. I got a BOSS BR-8 digital recorder
that ran off of Zip disks and mixed out on a MiniDisc.
Before that I was playing a song into a tape recorder and
then playing it back and recording to that, but not
overdubbing. But when I started to get into multitracking,
thats when I started to see my writing get exponentially
better. The obsession grew. Instead of just using a drum
machine, I was starting to get into situations like, I can
only use one track for drums, so where am I going to put
the [Shure SM]58? Put it right between the snare and
kick? [laughs] Through the BR-8 I was learning about
compression and at first I really didnt know what it
meant, so I just turned it all the way up; everything would
get louder and blown out. I was like, This is fucking
great! [laughs] Slowly I learned what it was doing. I had
that BR-8 for about seven years. Around 2007, when
Secretly Canadian [record label] committed to my first
record, I bought a [Tascam] MS-16 1-inch [tape deck] and
a Tascam 24-channel board. That was a new kind of way
of engineering for me. Learning about aux sends and
feeding shit back through them, slowing the tape down,
sampling off tape. It was a place where I had my own little
zone, with a few Memory Man pedals and pieces of gear.
By doing that all the time I started getting better at
recording guitars, and I started reading about engineering
and rock mythology. Like, Oh, on Born to Run they threw
a 12-string guitar into a dbx [compressor]. Lets do that!
Given the 80s rock influences in your
writing Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty
did you find yourself learning about the
making of all of those records?
Not really. Before I started this record, I was in a guitar store
outside of Philly called the Guitar Barn, and they had this
MXR Pitch Transposer. You can see pictures of Phil Collins
in the studio with a whole rack of these things, but I never
knew what they were. It came with the meter display,
which is pretty rare. I would usually start everything at
home on the 1-inch: drum machine, guitars usually
through my [Fender] Champ or my Traynor amps and
synths or Rhodes. Really anything I could do that would
set the mood of whatever idea I was working on. Jeff
Zeigler, my engineer, had the same 1-inch machine, so Id
give him all of the tapes to transfer into Pro Tools. But I
had this piano riff for this one song, and I was like, Lets
hook up that Pitch Transposer. We had its mono output
into a stereo [Vox] Time Machine delay, and all of a sudden
that became in some way the sound of the record.
I gathered that this record wasnt made in
the traditional sense of band goes into
a studio and knocks out ten songs over a
handful of weeks. It was more of a
long-term personal project. What was it
like making a record that way?
Adam Granduciel
The War on Drugs
by Dave Hidek
photo by Jacob Biba
With 2014s Lost in the Dream, The War on Drugs
peoples playlists. Frontman and producer extraord
was kind enough to take a break from touring to discu
the record, as well as some of his p
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The advantages include being able to take one little
idea and watch it expand, [as well as] taking things
away and putting things in constant revising.
Theres no sound in my head that Im trying to
capture; its the whole process that excites me, from
the first demo to mixing. In mixing youre like,
Mute all the drums, after hearing it all for a year,
and then youre like, Mute everything, except for
those synths. All of a sudden theres this Aha!
moment, but it still has all the elements that weve
added to in the past year. Disadvantages to this
process would be that without a deadline Im not
sure when Id get to the point of making those final
decisions, because that journey is so exciting to me.
Because there is no distinct sound chasing, the song
can always become something new.
Did you get to a point where you were
thinking, I dont know what Im
listening to anymore!
Yeah, definitely. Towards the end, there were a few songs
that I knew didnt feel right. There was one song, An
Ocean In Between the Waves wed spent eight
months working on a certain version of it. I started it
at home and it was really sweet, and then over the
course of nine months it started to get out of my hands.
We mixed it, and everyone loved it, but it just didnt feel
like me. It felt wrong. So we started over and re-
recorded it in two and a half days. I kept the drums that
we recorded at Echo Mountain Recording [Asheville,
NC], as well as a few original guitars from my first
recording, but other than that it was all redone. It was
really satisfying, and the song ended up being a lot of
peoples favorite song on the record. I feel good that I
made that decision, despite people saying, Youre
crazy. This sounds great!
When you were tracking, was there one
particular signal chain or piece of
gear that you kept coming back to?
When we were at Echo Mountain, they had a Sony C-37A
[microphone] that I used on Slave Ambient [TWODs
previous album], and I remember the chain was a C-37A
into an EMI sidecar and into a [Teletronix] LA-2A it
was so thick. I wanted to go back down there for that
mic to do vocals. We started to do a shootout. They
have a [vintage Telefunken Ela M] 251, and of course
Jeff was like, We have to try it! So I put it up, and it
was kinda bright. No one wants to say that it doesnt
sound good. [laughs] Is there a cable shorting out?
But I was like, Lets just try that C-37A. We put it up,
and all of a sudden it was great. Jeff was using the C-
37A into a [Neve] 1073, into a Manley Vari-Mu, into an
SSL. Once we had that chain, we used it for all of the
songs. For mixing, Nicolas [Vernhes, Tape Op #20] had
a Universal Audio 175 [compressor], and that was great.
After tracking, did you go back to your
studio or Jeffs for comping and editing?
Yeah, wed do a lot of comping at Jeffs, as well as a lot of
editing of guitars and keyboards. There were only a few
instances where I was taking the hard drive home. I
wanted to have those moments were I could sit with a
rough mix in my room, play along through my [Fender]
Champ, and come up with little leads or work on lyrics.
One weekend I got super inspired and I brought all my
amps and all of my rack gear up to my bedroom, and I
recorded for about four or five days straight. I rented a
Royer 121, and my Champ sounded awesome. I did all of
these guitars; it was super productive.
In your comping/writing process, how do
you determine whats working and
what needs to go?
If I did ten takes of guitar, Id think, Just let me do one
more. Even if the sixth one was better, wed always keep
the last one I did for the rough. Like, Well comp them
later, and you never end up comping. [laughs] In the
moment I feel, I can do better, but theres something
about the sixth one that was cool, and theres something
about the tenth one thats cool. Its really just about
building it up, adding sweet tones, or using a pedal and
getting some cool sounds out of it. I think part of it is
always listening to rough mixes. The song is always
there, but with different guitar sounds and textures.
Lead guitars start to reveal themselves and become
hooks. Its trusting your instincts and trusting the people
that you choose to work with. We spent four or five
months working on a piano part. And then one night at
Mitch Easters [Tape Op #21] it was 2 a.m. and my pianist
Robbie [Bennett] was playing the [Yamaha] C3 baby
grand. I could tell he was having a good time. I said,
Lets do the piano part for Eyes To The Wind right now.
He did a third take and I said, Thats the one. Wed
done 20 takes over five months, but that was the one.
You cant always have someone playing your song and
immediately have them playing what you want.
Theyre not you.
Yeah, and sometimes you dont even really know what it
is. Theres no way to explain music, really it just feels
like, That was the one. It may have been because wed
all had a big dinner and some wine.
One great thing about Lost in the Dreamis
that theres this tight, punchy rhythm
section, and then all of this space for
vocals, reverbs, synths, and guitars. Was
that something that came up in
mixing, or was that something that you
kept in mind throughout tracking?
That was something that Nicolas Vernhes did in mixing. He
wasnt familiar with the band at all, but he wanted to
make the best illusion possible that it was a band
playing in a room. Even though we didnt play any of
these songs live, and everything was done to a [Roland
TR-]707, he was able to focus the rhythm section into
that tight sound of a band for a lot of these songs. It
was great. It wasnt something that I had thought
about, but you get caught up in the arrangement.
Should I have the drum machine in there and then fade
to the real drums? Nicolas was good at putting those
things lower, letting them be subtle, and creating that
illusion of bringing the vocals up a little closer, as well
as hearing performances in the bass or the drums. I knew
it was all there, but in the moment I just didnt know
how all of these songs were going to connect together.
If you were to go back to the outset of this
record, or even past records, whats
one thing you would tell yourself?
At the end of the day its really about what comes out of
the amp or the piano, instead of what its going into.
Im going to buy a C-37A, but it doesnt really matter.
Capture that moment where youre the most confident
in a song: when the idea is the most pure, and youre
really excited about the song you have, or the sound
youre working on. That magic comes through if its a
[Shure SM]58 plugged into an Mbox, or a 251 into an
EMI channel. Its those tiny things that make the song
special. Following through on the idea, hearing it, and
knowing its right. You dont have to know what youre
going for, but its helpful to know what you like.
Sometimes its fun to spend an hour on a guitar sound
and put a [Shure SM]57 up, just to get the initial idea.
I think working quickly is nice, and theres no right or
wrong; its just confidence and believing in the art of
recording. Why are you recording? Its to capture sound,
but also to capture a moment. And that is just as
important as the sound. r
<www.thewarondrugs.net>
s have made it onto most
dinaire Adam Granduciel
uss the unique making of
production philosophies.
Mr. Granduciel/(Fin.)/Tape Op#102/35
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The band moe. has been going strong since
forming in Buffalo, NY, over 20 years ago.
Guitarist/vocalist Al Schnier joined up in 1991; the
band has been busy on the road, as well as releasing
albums, ever since, even putting on the excellent
moe.down festival (The fifteenth year is happening
in Turin, NY, August 29-31, this summer). I dropped
Al a line as moe. were wrapping up their 11th album,
No Guts, No Glory!, to discuss the bands studio
history, his home studio, and thoughts on recording
guitars.
You guys are working on a new record?
Yup. Weve finished all the tracking at this point. We
were working at the Carriage House Studios in
Stamford, Connecticut. Wed been there once before,
around 2000, working on our album, Dither, with John
Siket. It was one of those places where we had a really
good experience and good memory of it. Originally we
had planned to be on the West Coast to do the
recording, but for personal reasons we had to do it in
the Northeast. It was good to be back there.
What is it that you like about Carriage
House?
There are a couple of things. Weve spent enough time
in a lot of different recording studios, and a lot of
different residential situations. Weve even gone so far
as to rent a house on one of our records, as well as
move in all of our own gear to build a makeshift
studio setup. We want a space thats conducive to
getting the work done. It has to be comfortable, but
you also want the right gear. You want everything to
work. Carriage House has the right combination of
those things. You have a great collection of gear, but
also a comfortable place to work. In this day and age,
the personal customer service part of it really goes a
long way. Its the easiest record weve ever made. We
never felt like we were on the clock, or in somebody
elses space. They helped us get our job done. If we
needed anything, they were there to help out.
That should be the situation most of the
time.
Well, it should be; but a lot of times you get into a
studio where you might be dealing with some
complacency, or maybe some gear thats not quite in
shape that hasnt been cleaned in a while. You spend
time putting out fires and checking the gear yourself,
when you should be recording.
When you set up a house as a recording
studio did you find yourselves pretty
distracted with equipment?
Not so much. I have a really good friend named Mark
Cochi who has his own recording company called RDR
Location. Hes got a 48-track HD rig with [iZ
Technology] RADAR, a Sony digital desk [DMX-R100],
48 channels of API preamps and outboard
compressors, and $100,000 worth of microphones. We
werent wanting for any gear. The only distraction was
that several of us were geeking out over the gear
while we were doing the recording.
Ive gathered that you have a propensity
for that, when it comes to recording
equipment and guitars.
Yeah. Wed be recording a guitar part and say, Why
dont we do a mic shootout first to see which mic will
be best? An hour and a half would pass by, until one
of the guys in the band would finally say, Hey! Are
you guys done? Can we record this guitar part?
You want to understand what those
options are.
Right, exactly. Its cool because everybody in the band
has been working for so long, so were all pretty
particular about the sounds were going after, as well as
what were trying to produce and create. Some of us are
more involved on the technical side of things. I
personally have to be careful not to get bogged down
in that, because I could spend days in the studio having
my way with the equipment, more than the songs
themselves. I could spend an hour trying to create a
sound like I have in my head. I want to build sounds
from scratch. Those are fun days in the studio for me.
What was the first experience that you
had going into the studio with moe.?
moe. had actually recorded some demos before I
started playing with them. Theres this great vintage
guitar shop in Buffalo called Top Shelf Music. One of
the luthiers there, Andrew Buscher, was also a guitar
tech with the Goo Goo Dolls. He lived above the
guitar shop and had a studio in his apartment with a
16-track, 1-inch machine. There was probably a
Soundcraft board and a few random pieces of
outboard gear. We made our first two albums there,
but hed gotten a better tape machine by the time we
did the second album. We were working at night, after
the guitar shop closed. Wed go in at six or seven at
night, and work until two in the morning. Some of the
guys were still in school at that point, and we had
neighbors and things to contend with, but it was a
great process.
Thats pretty awesome.
It was good that we were in his hands, because he had
a certain appreciation, not only for the recording
process, but also for the gear. I remember sitting
down with him and comparing our Les Pauls at one
point. He was explaining why the 68 Goldtop that he
had was different from the 72 Goldtop that I had. He
was a big fan of The Who, so everything was informed
by their musical vocabulary. It was good to have him
reinterpret what we were doing through that
vernacular.
You mentioned having a month at
Carriage House and not feeling so
on the clock. Has that been a goal?
Absolutely. Every time we try and create these situations
in which we can get the work done. On one of the
records we did, we tracked in a theater in Portland,
Maine. We knew the theater was going to be empty
for a couple weeks. We had a really good relationship
with those people, so we asked them if we could
move in for a couple of weeks. Its nice for us to work
when were left alone that way. Were all fat and old
at this point, but we still worked 12-hour days for a
month straight. Once we get into the process of
making a record, were pretty dedicated to it. Its nice
to be able to do it that way, rather than have to be
on the clock, work around a schedule, bounce around
to different locations, or move in and out of a studio.
When you go to a nice, quiet town in Connecticut, the
only thing to do is make the record.
How much pre-production do you guys
do? Do you take songs out on the road
for a bit and come into the studio to
rethink them, or vice versa?
Al Schnier of moe.
by Larry Crane
photos by Jay Blakesberg
36/Tape Op#102/Mr. Schnier/(continued on page 38)
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/37
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Guitar Sounds
in the Studio
I used to play through a Hiwatt half stack. Its a
great sounding amp. Theres nothing that sounds as
balanced to me, in terms of full-spectrum guitar tone.
But I found, in the context of a mix, it wasnt really
doing the job it needed to do, because I dont need to
be covering that much of the tonal spectrum. I need to
be playing guitar in guitar-friendly frequencies. So I
moved over to a [Vox] AC30. Its right in those really
great midrange guitar friendly frequencies. Theres that
peak, right around 3 kHz, thats great for guitar. It sits
in the mix. Those are things you need to learn the hard
way. You need to go through that process. Its difficult
when youre making electric music, because you can
put anything, anywhere you want. Step on a pedal, and
it could be something else.
38/Tape Op#102/Mr. Schnier/(continued on page 40)
L to R: bassist Rob Derhak, guitarist Chuck Garvey, and Al Schnier
percussionist jim loughlin
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/39
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40/Tape Op#102/Mr. Schnier/(continued on page 42)
producer dave aron
drummer vinnie amico
photos by Jay Blakesberg
at Carriage House Studios,
Stamford, CT.
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/41
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Both. Weve worked out a song on the road for two years
before bringing it into the studio really putting it
through its paces. A typical soundcheck for us is
about an hour and a half. A lot of it are songs that
weve been playing for ten years, but were constantly
evolving the songs. Somebody might have a new idea.
Were always tweaking the arrangements. The newer
songs get more attention and work until everybody
settles into their parts. The changes have the right
feel. But weve also done the exact opposite. Weve
written songs in the studio and kept the third takes
thats the one thats on the record. This new album
has both. We have brand new songs, where we
literally walked in with demos that we recorded on an
iPhone like one of us with an acoustic guitar. We
had to flesh out the band versions.
Do you find that sometimes that a song
comes out on the album, but then
you take it on the road and it morphs
again?
Yeah, absolutely. Especially with a band like us, because
were a live improvisational band. Even when were
writing a song, we get to a particular section and
know that its going to be great to mine later live. We
might not explore that to the full extent in the studio,
because listening to a studio album is a different
experience than being at a live show.
Is moe. a band that pretty much
produces themselves?
Yeah, weve been self-producing for a long time. Its a
combination of that and co-producing with our
engineer of choice, who, in many cases, was John
Siket. John has always been an asset, and a great
partner in crime when it comes to being a gear
monkey. At the time we did our first recordings with
him, he had this Helios desk. He was so over the
moon about this thing. When theres that much
passion about the tools being used, it makes the
process that much more enjoyable.
What other producers have you used?
We worked with Bill Emmons a few times. Our last record
we did with John Travis. We didnt want to co-produce
we wanted himto produce it. It was a really liberating
experience for us, because we didnt get bogged down
in the diplomacy of what parts, or whose songs, were
worthy. We could defer to this third party; he could be
more objective about things and make the call. It made
the work a lot easier for us. This album was the same
thing. We worked with Dave Aron [known for his work
with Snoop Dogg, Tupac Shakur, and Dr. Dre]. Hes
actually an old friend of ours, and an unlikely partner,
in terms of producer choices, but hes someone we like
to hang out with. It actually turned out to be the
easiest record weve ever made.
Thats a good sign!
It was great. We deferred to him on a lot of those
decision-making things like, Which song has the
good vocal? And, Does the solo stay or go? In
many cases he went with the flow. More so than ever
before, after we recorded a couple of takes of
something, we were ready to leave it, be done, and go
on to the next thing. He wasnt about to have us start
moving things around, or trying to get things perfect.
He was all about having the right vibe, even if it was
a bit crooked. I loved it. Im so glad we finally had
someone who gave us the freedom to do that.
In the pop realm things are very
controlled. I tend to wonder whats
going to happen with the future of
recording.
I had a really interesting job come up recently, in which
I had to re-record a Bruno Mars song for a TV ad.
Somebody I know works in production and asked if it
was something I could do. I had to go through the
process of analyzing a Bruno Mars song. Its one of
these great pop songs. Im blown away by the
production and the meticulous work that they do. Its
a totally different school of recording than I come
from. I walked away with this whole new level of
appreciation for the artist, the song, and the crack
team of scientists involved.
I think the problem is when someone
tries to apply that ethic on something
where its not really going to help.
Yeah. It would never work with moe.!
Have you had situations in the studio
where you were getting the wrong
input or feedback about how to
capture moe.?
Not really, which is why we worked with John Siket or
Bill Emmons when we did. We never really found
ourselves in that situation. But, by the same token,
we were co-producing a lot of that stuff and doing it
ourselves, so we were driving a lot of that. We never
really wound up in a situation where its like, Whos
this guy, and whys he putting us into a corner?
Weve been an independent band for the majority of
our career, so it hasnt really been an issue for us.
Have you personally produced other
peoples records as well?
Yeah, a few. My wife, Diane Schnier, is a musician, and
shes put out five records. Being married to her, I get
to make all of those. Then there are a few other bands
whose records Ive worked on. Some of them were my
projects. Ive put out three solo records that I produced
and engineered, and then there are a few other bands
Ive also produced and engineered. I have a pretty
ridiculous studio in my house, which Ive tapered back
on a little bit over the last couple of years. For a home
studio it was getting excessive, in terms of the
collection of outboard gear and mics that I had.
Is your studio, Basemental Studios, part
of your house?
Our house is like a contemporary ranch style, so it has 20-
foot ceilings upstairs, with a finished basement. Thats
where the control room is. The control room is big
enough that I have a bunch of amps, as well as a drum
kit, plus ten keyboards. You could track a full band if you
needed to, but thats primarily what we use for mixing
and overdubs. The whole house is wired. We actually
have patchbays in the living room, as well as several
other rooms in the house that all terminate to the studio.
Its good you married a musician! That
sounds like it could get out of hand.
Yeah. Its funny how much its evolved over the years,
because the first recording that I did here started
with me working on a folding table down in the
basement. I had a laptop and my first MOTU 828. I
needed a space to work, and this was before the
basement was finished.
When youre working on a moe. record,
do you ever bring home tracks to do
overdubs?
Oh, yeah. I mean, not intentionally. Like I said, we try
to finish our work while were there, but sometimes it
happens. Its nice that were able to do that. If I need
to finish a vocal, or add a guitar part, I can always do
that. Ive mixed a couple of moe. tracks here too that
were bonus tracks, or different things we did for
alternate releases. Its nice to have the option. r
<www.moe.org/band/al-schnier>
Visit <tapeop.com> for more from Als interview.
42/Tape Op#102/Mr. Schnier/(Fin.)
http://tapep.com/interviews/102/al-schnier-bonus/
bonus article:
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Brainworx
bx_refinement
harshness control plug-in
Sometimes a plug-in comes out that I totally adore, but I get
worried that its subtlety and usefulness will get lost in the
shuffle of whiz bang over-the-top effects and emulations of
vintage gear. The new bx_refinement, developed by Gebre
Waddell of Stonebridge Mastering, is one such item, and it also
might be the first plug-in simultaneously released for UAD-2,
AAX DSP, AAX Native, RTAS, AU, and VST formats. Over the last
five years, I have taken on hundreds of mix projects from outside
sources, and many of these have been tracked under less than
ideal circumstances. A recent project had drums tracked in a
bedroom on Monoprice mics through an entry-level TASCAM
interface. I think one of the characteristics that accumulates in
a situation like this is harshness the buildup of edgy transient
top-end material and prominent midrange peaks that assault the
listener. In Pro Tools, I placed bx_refinement plug-ins (via
UAD-2) on all the tracks (and polarity correction, EQ, and
compression where appropriate), and the results were excellent.
When wed turn off all the instances of bx_refinement, wed
notice an overall drop in sonic quality; the recordings sounded
rougher and cheaper. Ive always wanted a plug-in like this. In
the past, I have abused de-essers, dropping them into the 2 kHz
range. Ive duplicated tracks and band-passed and recombined
them. Ive struggled with confusing multiband compressors. Now
Ive found a tool I can use easily and effectively, that gives me
the results I want. As Ive mostly used bx_refinement on mono
sources while mixing, I dropped my favorite mastering engineer
Garrett Haines a line to see what he thought. LC
I dont know if its due to the voicing in some affordable
monitors or inappropriate acoustic treatment in some rooms,
but I get a lot of mixes that are harsh. Attacking the problem
with an EQ can dull the whole song, while brittle transients
continue to poke through. A traditional multi-band compressor
works well in these situations, provided you take the time to
tweak the parameters. The neat thing about bx_refinement is
you can apply the processing from zero to 100%, address only
mid or side, and solo and hear the content being removed.
Taking a light-handed approach can make all the difference at
the mastering stage. Starting with a preset with mild settings,
Ill listen to a bar then bypass the effect. If I need more
processing, Ill increase the setting. Ill flip back and forth until
I have the balance between softening and taking too much
original signal away. This can be done in a few minutes. I feel
that bx_refinement gives me more control while getting results
faster. Thats an unusual pairing, but one that makes good sense
when time is money. Ive been happy with the results; and I
only use half of the features in this plug-in.
($199 direct; www.plugin-alliance.com, www.uaudio.com)
Garrett Haines <www.treelady.com>
Louder Than Liftoff
Chop Shop 500-series EQ
I couldnt possibly count the number of times Ive used an
outboard preamp and thought, I wish this had a two-band
EQ. Perhaps the floor tom or the bass is a tad too muddy, or
the bottom of the snare is a bit too crispy, or some boominess
in the electric guitar is making its compressor behave oddly;
all of these problems dont necessarily warrant using an EQ
that Id normally reserve for high-priority sounds, so theyre
often relegated to the back-burner, and bug me for the
remainder of the session. For that matter, I also couldnt count
the number of times that Ive thought, I wish this EQ had
filters. Theres always that tinge of guilt when you use an
entire band of a boutique EQ to cut a single dB at 16 kHz,
when its services could be better used elsewhere.
Enter the Chop Shop, a 500-series EQ thats most likely very
different from other filter-type EQs that youve used. There are
the basic high and lowcut knobs that youd expect, but with
a few musical tweaks. The high-cut extends down to 500 Hz and
rolls off high frequencies at a gentle 6 dB/octave slope
which is great in that youre not slicing and dicing, but rather
slowly darkening the top end. A 0.5 switch doubles the slope
to 12 dB/octave and halves the selected frequency, dramatically
increasing cutting power while retaining apparent brightness
with a little added resonance at the corner frequency. Should
you not want said resonance, you can pull a jumper from the
rpinted circuit board, a nice touch by Louder than Liftoff.
Similarly, the low-cut removes low end at 12 dB/octave, with
the option of a printed circuit boardselectable Lo Rider mode.
Enabling that flips your filter response and allows you to cut
everything above 30530 Hz. The Bump knob controls low-cut
resonance at the corner frequency, varying from a Bessel curve,
to a Butterworth, and finally to a slightly resonant mode as
you sweep from left to right. Its an interaction that youll
need to try for yourself to understand the implications of such
a design, but it really allows you to be creative in your
sculpting should you so choose. It can also be used in
combination with Lo Rider mode to really draw some tone out
of a floppy bass drum or nasal bass guitar. And I cant forget
about the More button, which boosts the aforementioned low-
end resonance if, you know, you need some more, because
why not? I found this to be handy for that floor tom thats
never as beefy as it sounds in the room.
The final feature on the Chop Shop is Focus, a knob
that... focuses the sonic energy of your source on the bass
or treble ranges of the sound by simultaneously boosting
bass and cutting treble when turned to the left, or boosting
treble and cutting bass when turned to the right. Its
essentially a quick and simple way to make things brighter
or darker, while maintaining apparent loudness. This is
important for A/B comparison, and it includes a shift
button if youd like to change the turnover frequency,
should the original not be to your liking.
With the Chop Shop, the name of the game is sculpting,
not just filtering. Louder than Liftoff has introduced
something that might seem like a toy to the uninformed, but
is really powerful once you start using it. Pick up a pair to
augment your outboard preamps or EQs, and youll be glad
that you did. (Standard white $419 direct, limited-edition Void
Corp in black $449; www.louderthanliftoff.com)
Dave Hidek <dave@treelady.com>
Great River
PWM-501 compressor (500-series)
Writing about audio gear is an interesting exercise in trying
to capture the emotional impact of an inanimate object. I think
that it is less important how something works than how
something makes you feel. When a piece of gear allows you to
transfer a performance to a fixed format with emotion intact, it
is a piece of gear worth owning. Plus, I love it when a metal box
with knobs and wires pulls me out of complacency and makes
me engage with the task at hand.
The new offering from Great River Electronics is a pulse-width
modulation compressor in a 500-series form factor. As explained
by Great River: Pulse Width Modulation is a unique all analog
circuit but operates in the time domain by turning the audio on
and off very quickly to achieve gain reduction. This fast
switching controls the signal power and allows the compressor
to be very fast and transparent. Some PWM compressors you
may know are the EMT 156, the Crane Song STC-8, and the
legendary PYE compressor.
Out of the box, the Great River Electronics PWM-501 feels
high in quality and carries substantial weight. In my API
lunchbox, it looks very much the companion to the Great River
500-series Harrison 32EQ [Tape Op #89]. Its red, grey, and blue
knobs feel precise, have a nice high-quality resistance, and are
consistent from one to the next. Its faceplate is a classic matte
black, and overall, the design and aesthetic are unlikely to go
out of style.
The feature set is much like what you would expect to find
on a well-appointed compressor: output, threshold, ratio, attack,
and release knobs; switchable LED metering; and a hard-wire
bypass. It also has some useful extras: an adjustable high-pass
filter for the detector, and a knob for feed-forward and feedback
detector modes. As is the case with many 500-series designs,
there are a lot of features packed into a very small space. I have
sausages for fingers, and although the knobs are relatively easy
to access, the high-pass and stereo-link switches are in tight
spots and a tad tough to get to.
The threshold, ratio, attack, and release controls operate
similarly to traditional compressors but certainly have a
unique twist. Every function on the PWM-501 seems to audibly
affect the other, making this compressor capable of achieving
an endless variety of options when it comes to dynamics
control. More importantly, it forces true engagement and
critical listening.
When my pair of PWM-501 modules arrived, I was in the
middle of an unattended mix with no hard deadline, and I took
advantage of this unsupervised time to creatively investigate
these compressors. After becoming reasonably acquainted with
the PWM-501 via the recommended starting points, I went down
the rabbit hole, playing with its nuanced control set and ended
up with some great new sounds and ideas as a result.
I started out with the recommended settings on an acoustic
guitar track. This got me in the ballpark, but once I started
fiddling with the controls, I began to see the power and
versatility of the unit. Fine-tuning the controls got the guitar
moving and breathing in a really nice way. It complemented the
guitar nicely, helping it sit well in the mix, with a touch of extra
warmth and nice sparkle around the edges. It maintained a nice
shimmer without being overly bright. I know that sounds more
like an EQ critique, but a compressor will certainly affect tone,
and great compressors do it beautifully. I was also able to get
the same sort of motion from the PWM-501 on a snare played
with brushes. Instead of a hi-hat opening on the upbeat, we slid
the brush across the head of the snare as a tonal shading and
groove element. Again, a nice gentle compression was all that
46/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/
www.tapeop.com
Bonus content online!!!
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was needed to blend the snare nicely while still maintaining its
slingshot propulsion.
I almost wish I had never put the PWM-501s on the drum
overheads, because once they were there, it pained me to think
of having to use them elsewhere. They added such a great life,
warmth, and punch to the kit sound. Several times, I caught
myself going too far with the amount of audible compression,
because it sounded so good in that squishy-squashy way, and it
was fun to see how far I could push the unit. I found the
smallest of moves made the difference in determining the sweet
spot, and in this way, the tonal possibilities of this unit remind
me of a color wheel with fine gradations across the spectrum.
A nice feature on the PWM-501 is the high-pass filter on the
detector circuit, and it is useful when you want to fine-tune how
the compressor is influenced by low-frequency content. This, like
all the other controls, can get very specific in terms of shaping
the sound. I used it with great results on everything from parallel
compression of the drums to acoustic guitar, and I found it played
a part in helping to generate the desired amount of motion.
As a workaround to only having a pair of PWM-501s at my
disposal, I went ahead and printed a stereo drum mix and then
was able to use the units elsewhere. Their versatility lets them
shine on both individual instruments and on stereo subgroups of
guitars, vocals, loops, etc.
I used the PWM-501 following a Burl B1D preamp to record a
Telecaster through an AC30. Before patching the compressor into
the chain, I was fighting a small battle trying to determine the
right amount of the amps Brilliant channel shimmer while still
having the guitar sit down in the track. With the PWM-501, I was
able to shape and saturate the top end in a pleasing way without
sacrificing its clarity or punch. It performed in a way I wish the
amps Cut control would have.
Using the PWM-501 as a peak limiter in a roughly 10:1 ratio
while recording vocals was also useful not hitting it too hard,
but just knocking off the peaks. I quote the manufacturer: The
threshold control is unique in this design in that at low settings
(050) it has the unit looking at the whole signal and acting
more as a compressor, where as in higher settings (50100) the
detector looks for peaks and acts more as a limiter. It did just
what I was looking for very transparently, leaving room for
compression at mix-down.
The feed-forward / feedback feature is a variable control that
lets you decide whether you want the input (feed-forward) or the
output (feedback) as the source for the detector (sidechain)
signal. Uniquely, the PWM-501 lets you choose one or the other,
or blend the two if so desired in any amounts.
Feed-forward results in a more aggressive and in-your-face
sound. This mode in conjunction with more extreme settings is
capable of creating some not-so-nice sounds; so use your ears,
and know that a little goes a long way in some applications. For
example, feed-forward can bring grit and spit to a vocal. It is
certainly nice to control dynamics with the option of not having
it smooth out. I found it especially fun on drums. Going the
other way to full feedback mode produces a noticeably rounder
and subtly softer compression sound useful when I wanted
elements to be smoother or mellow out just a touch. I am not
sure if the name influenced this feeling, but I did feel as though
the difference between the two modes was like leaning forward
or lying back in a chair. Finding some middle ground and then
making smaller adjustments of a little more of one or the other
provides yet another powerful tool for shading and influencing
the feel of whats being compressed and where it sits among the
other instruments in the mix.
The PWM-501 is a very versatile tool. In many ways, it
reminds me of my much-loved, always-employed, Empirical Labs
Distressor [Tape Op #32]. Although the two devices are capable
of creating their own unique sonics, both are versatile and
perform reliably at tasks ranging from very gentle and
transparent compression to extreme audio destruction. Most
importantly, they both do it musically. Everything I run through
the PWM-501 feels as though it is being outlined in a pleasing
way. Depending on the settings, the outline varies from a fine
point to a substantial Sharpie.
In the hands of a knowledgeable engineer, the PWM-501 is
going to deliver some impressive results. Conversely, a novice to
compression may have a bit of a learning curve. If this is your
first dance with a device of this depth and power, I would
suggest starting with the settings recommended in the provided
literature. Turn knobs, and try to understand the correlation
between what you are hearing and what the meters are telling
you. Use your ears, and start to understand what the attack and
release settings are doing to your transients. Shape and position
with feedback and feed-forward. Activate compression in the
sweet spot with the high-pass filter. Slam it hard, or
transparently control dynamics. You will not outgrow this device.
In fact, it will help you grow as an engineer, and you may have
to trade up for a bigger bag of tricks, because the PWM-501 is
going to add significantly to your arsenal.
($835 street; www.greweb.com)
Geoff Stanfield <www.geoffstanfield.com>
TASCAM
DA-3000 Master Recorder
The DA-3000 is a high-quality, stereo, digital master recorder
capable of both PCM (up to 24-bit, 192 kHz) and DSD (2.8 and
5.6 MHz) operation, and it can also function as a standalone A/D
and D/A converter. It is an elegant 1RU-height unit with an
intuitive, even enjoyable, interface that makes it easy to record
to SD and CompactFlash cards, as well as USB drives. You can
plug in a USB keyboard to facilitate typing in track names, but
even without it, the unit is easy to get around. LED metering on
the front panel is clear and very useful.
I was interested in this recorder because I am now recording,
mixing, capturing, and archiving at higher sample-rates in
anticipation of the need to deliver these formats for market in
the near future. The DA-3000 is a great unit for anyone who
wants to record at any sample-rate without any detectable audio
degradation and with very neutral conversion which makes it
a versatile machine within our newly-shifting digital landscape.
The more I experiment with higher sample-rates, the more
Im learning that different converters simply perform differently
at different sample-rates, and as might be expected some
begin to falter audibly up at 192 kHz. In my experience, the
newer the design and the higher the price of a converter, the
better it tends to perform at higher sample-rates. Given this
discrepancy between converters, I was suspicious of the
DA-3000 because it only costs $999. However, at all sample-
rates and in both PCM and DSD modes, the DA-3000 sounds very
neutral; what goes in comes back out relatively unchanged. I
conducted my tests printing mixes directly from my consoles
output, and also while doing direct conversions to digital from
1/2 master tapes. Set for 192 kHz PCM operation or at either
of its DSD bit-rates, the DA-3000 is almost undetectable from
the analog source. I cant stress enough how faithful to source
the DA-3000 is, especially in DSD mode where I could not
discern it from the analog source at all when listening to very
familiar source material.
Also, over long stretches of time listening to the DA-3000, I
didnt develop any annoyances or distastes, as I sometimes do
once Ive allowed myself deeper, more passive immersion in the
sound of a piece of equipment. The DA-3000 is consistently
neutral and easy on the ears.
Routing with the DA-3000 is exceptionally flexible. Analog
I/O is available on balanced (+4 dBu) XLR connectors and
unbalanced (10 dBV) RCA. PCM digital I/O is on XLR for
AES/EBU and RCA for S/PDIF. DSD is on BNC for SDIF-3. BNC
connectors are also used for word clock in and thru/out.
Multiple DA-3000s can be cascaded together for synchronized
multitrack use.
Once you have your routing sorted out, setting up the
DA-3000 is simply a matter of choosing your format, sample-rate,
and bit-depth (in PCM modes); and setting your input reference
level. Menu-accessible reference levels are extremely handy for
calibrating the unit to work with the rest of your chain instantly,
without fussy calibration screws and time-consuming twiddling.
Reference levels are 20, 18, 16, 14, and 9 dB, which
should cover most standard modern studio calibrations. Once
your reference level is set, you can then tweak the individual
input levels for left and right channels independently in 0.1 dB
increments very handy for subtle adjustments to stereo
recording levels where other parts of the chain might be less
than perfectly calibrated.
Once those settings are done, you just hit Record and off you
go. When you press Stop, the file is stored on whichever memory
option youve selected (SD, CompactFlash, or USB drive). Then
you can take the file and do whatever you like with it,
manipulating and renaming it in the DA-3000, or elsewhere. File
management is all much simpler than I thought it would be,
largely due to the portable memory cards eliminating the need
to interface any computer with the DA-3000 directly.
The DA-3000 can also operate as a standalone ADDA
converter. By simply entering this mode via the menu system,
the unit bypasses its recording function. Selecting the analog
inputs and digital inputs via the menu sets the routing up, and
one can work in either PCM or DSD mode as needed. It was
simple to get the DA-3000 into ADDA mode, set reference level,
and start working with it via AES I/O in Pro Tools HD. Clocking
the DA-3000 to my Crane Song HEDD [Tape Op #26] (which is the
master clock in my studio) was easy enough, and once locked,
it was rock solid. Sound-wise, again, the DA-3000 is very neutral
and sounds great. It sounded slightly different clocked to my
HEDD, and very well suited as a companion to my other
converters.
The DA-3000 also has an onboard audio oscillator, which is
handy in any number of situations, especially if you need to
calibrate and align tape machines and/or other converters, but
dont have a dedicated oscillator on hand. For now, the DA-3000
provides 10 kHz, 1 kHz, and 440 Hz tones, but TASCAM may
consider adding 100 Hz and other tones for tape calibration
purposes in future firmware upgrades.
Theres an excellent sounding headphone amp on the front
with an independent volume control on the front panel. If you
consider the routing options and that you can set the DA-3000
to monitor input with near-zero latency, its easy to see that this
unit can stand in as a very useful headphone amp when needed.
There are so many uses for a small, affordable, excellent-
sounding stereo master recorder that I wont even bother
speculating on how folks might use this device, but I do want to
address again my belief that the demand for masters delivered
at higher sample-rates will continue to grow as we go forward.
Among those who want to future proof their work, the
DA-3000 provides an easy and affordable way to capture your
work at the highest sample-rates in both PCM and DSD formats
without any undesirable artifacts, and with sound nearly
indistinguishable from the original master source, which if
were lucky may be just what people are looking for when
they buy music in the future! ($999 street; www.tascam.com)
Allen Farmelo <www.farmelorecording.com>
Gear Reviews/(continued on page 50)/Tape Op#102/47
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Eventide
MixingLink preamp w/ effects loop
Eventide bills its MixingLink as a Mic Pre with FX Loop. It is so much more than that! I tried
to sum it up technically:
Its a mic/line preamp. Its an instrument preamp/DI. Its a headphone amp. It has a balanced
effects loop. It has a smartphone/tablet loop via 1/8 TRRS (4-conductor). It has an output to
drive an instrument amp. The main output is switchable (via a recessed switch on the bottom)
between line and miclevel. Its in the shape of a guitar pedal. The effects loop is engaged with
a foot-switch.
But I gave up on writing a list. The practical applications are endless!
The MixingLinks mic preamp is excellent in terms of transparency, and its worth the asking
price on its own. A hi-fi channel strip that costs me three times more beat it slightly for noise
floor and extended frequency response. Admirably, the MixingLinks frequency response is less
than 0.5 dB down at 20 Hz and about 0.6 dB down at 20 kHz and only about 2.5 dB down
at 10 Hz and 40 kHz (the latter being about 0.2 dB down from my measuring interface). It has
phantom power if plugged into the wall with the included mini-wart, but if you dont need
phantom, it can run from a 9V battery. There is no separate battery door though; you have to
remove four screws and the bottom plate to access the battery compartment. The lack of a
battery door is a shame, because the MixingLink would make a great field preamp, but screws
are easy to lose in the field. I did not try battery operation for the review, because I installed
the included rubber feet over the screw holes as soon as unboxed the unit, before realizing Id
need to undo the screws a tip for the bottom-label designers.
The instrument input is equally good and did not affect the tone of passive-pickup
instruments. If anything, a guitar plugged into the MixingLink with pedals in the effects loop
seemed to sound a little better than the guitar straight into the pedal board, but I did not do
any empirical testing in this regard. In general, if you are not relying on current-starving for the
tone, then current-buffering is usually a good thing. The unit does not soft saturate but sounds
pretty good when completely overdriven. One obvious bonus to using the MixingLinks effects
loop is you can enable many processors at once by leaving them on and using the foot-switch
on the MixingLink.
The MixingLink will connect to recording and/or live-processing software in any device
equipped with an 1/8 TRRS jack (stereo out and mono mic/line in) using a single cable. In
theory, a quality smartphone/tablet audio interface that connects to the smart device digitally
would sound better than using the built-in I/O of the device, but in practice, I was impressed
and did not hesitate to use the MixingLink this way. The sound I got from a tablet was at least
as good as the pedals I compared it to, probably better. The simplicity of the one-cable analog
hookup was a welcome trade-off too. The number of sound manipulation apps that you can get
for a few dollars each is staggering, and if you check the reviews, a lot of them are well liked. I
had to search a bit online before I found a male-to-male 1/8 TRRS cable worth buying. The
cable cost me $11, but assembling one myself would have cost more, and I gave up on finding
the appropriate raw cable. Since these cables are not common (and the feature is so cool),
including one in the box would have been a nice touch.
The mic and instrument amp are live at the same time, but theres only one level setting. A
clean-boost pedal for instruments is a good workaround. Tricks like singing along with guitar
lines through an amp were loads of fun. The effects loop and smart-device loop are also
simultaneously active, with a similar limitation in setting levels. Speaking of levels, the
MixingLink handled +4 dBu outboard processors as well as basic guitar pedals quite well. The
effects send level results from the input gain, and I always had some kind output gain control
on the processors in the loop, so in practice, this scheme worked fine. There are three modes for
the effects loop, controlled by a toggle: fixed dry signal with effects gain setting, wet/dry ratio
control, and effects only. The only issue I ran into was when using the MixingLink with a line-
level signal from a DAW interface; with the input gain at minimum, and the Hi/Lo gain button
on Lo, I was still clipping the inputs of guitar pedals which had no input gain control. I was
forced to digitally attenuate the DAC a few decibels, which my OCD would prefer me to never do,
but it sounded fine anyway.
My only complaints are with the labeling. Much of the text is black-on-grey or white-on-grey.
This is exactly mediocre contrast. My bedroom studio is brighter than every commercial studio
Ive been in, but I was using a flashlight to read most of the labels until locations of everything
were imprinted in my memory. The pots are detented throughout the whole turn, but there are
no markings around them, so to repeat settings, youd have to count clicks. Maybe the designers
only meant for the knobs to be harder to knock out of a setting, since it is a pedal, but I found
the knobs easy to turn with my feet anyway, and why not throw in some hash marks at least?
Regardless, this is the ultimate audio signal interface. It never failed to hook up anything to
anything else, always sounding clean and good. The headphone amp is even stereo, and music
piped in through the smart-device loop is stereo. So, with proper cabling, you really could use
48/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/
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this as another headphone amp channel too. As if it didnt do enough already! Id love to see a
dual-mono rackmount version with separate control of all I/O levels, especially effects
send/return, as well as separate levels for mic/line and instrument inputs, but I think the
compromises in the current design are well thought out (other than the minor gripes I pointed
out). I was ready to buy this when I heard that it could be used for sending line-level signals
safely to guitar amps, and it had a mic preamp. For the price, that combination already seemed
like a good deal. Why has this box not come along sooner? Theres no reason these features
couldnt be on mixing consoles and DAW interfaces. Why didnt I think of that?!?! Absolutely
anyone that records could use this box, but new recordists especially should look at this for their
first preamp upgrade. You start with the MixingLinks great preamp, and then you can go hunting
for cheap, used pedals and you end up with an inexpensive creative palette for anything you
record. Or use a smartphone or tablet, or both, at once, and... and... and. The various individual
things this unit does are each worth the asking price, but it integrates many such things in the
space of a pedal. I love it so much, I wrote it a haiku:
little metal box
creative recording now
Tape Op bunny sketch
($299 street; www.eventide.com)
Joseph Lemmer <jlemmer@siriusmedia.com>
Earthworks
PM40 PianoMic System
I like gear that makes a statement. The long, narrow aluminum briefcase of the PM40
PianoMic System certainly makes one. That of, Ive got an upscale rifle here an
impression that can come in handy at times. But back to recording...
People have been micing acoustic grand pianos in much the same way for decades. If
youre recording in a studio and have no issues with acoustic bleed from nearby
instruments, then many traditional approaches are just fine. Close or midmicing with
condenser or ribbon mics can be a great way to go. However, in the studio or on the stage,
things can get much more complicated when acoustic isolation becomes a requirement.
Closing the piano lid can minimize bleed, but that is impossible, or at best problematic, if
you are using traditional micing techniques. Front-address mics wont always allow the lid
to close, and the sonic coloration resulting from closing the lid is a liability even with side-
address mics. Some people have addressed this issue by using either pickups mounted on
the soundboard or a boundary mic (like a PZM) inside the lid. In my opinion, both of those
options can be rather hideous, sonically. Often, a huge amount of EQ is required to make
the sound barely passible. To me, that tradeoff is not acceptable. So, Earthworks has
attempted to create a system that delivers the best of both worlds: acoustic isolation, and
excellent sound quality.
The Earthworks PM40 PianoMic System utilizes a pair of high-quality omnidirectional
condenser mics mounted to a telescoping bar using miniature goosenecks. The bar fits
across the case of the piano and allows the lid to be completely closed. However, there is
a little more to it than that. The mics have a very wide frequency response (9 Hz 40 kHz!)
and are a type called random-incidence. Now, I must admit, I was not previously familiar
with this type of mic. After doing some research, I learned that a random-incidence mic is
designed to have a flatter frequency response in situations where the sound is arriving from
many different directions simultaneously. This supposedly helps the mic smoothly cover
the entire range of the piano. Another impressive specification is the ability to handle
sound levels up to 148 dB SPL.
In order to keep a low profile and allow the lid to easily close, both channels of audio
are carried over one rather thin cable that exits one end of the bar. This cable is plugged
into an aluminum breakout box. The output of the box is a pair of standard XLR connectors.
Installing the system takes moments, not even minutes. Telescope the bar to span the
width of the piano, and tighten down the fittings to lock the bar at that width. Run the
cable out of the side of the piano, and plug it into the breakout box. Thats it. There are
a few choices and adjustments that are possible. Since the support bar can adjust to the
width, it is possible to move it to vary its distance from the front of the piano. Earthworks
suggests positioning the mics 23 away from the dampers as an initial starting point.
Also, although the mics are locked at a spacing of 16 between the capsules, you can slide
the pair left or right as needed to favor a lower or higher string emphasis. The short
goosenecks also allow some alterations of mic positioning.
My first experience with the mics was a rather clinical setting, rather than a practical
one. We set up a listening session with solo piano, just to get an idea of the overall
system performance. The piano used was a Steinway Model B. I set up the PianoMic
Systemalong with other conventional micing approaches. These included AGK C 414 XLII,
Neumann U 87 Ai, and Earthworks QTC40 mics. The QTC40 is an omni mic with similar
Gear Reviews/(continued on page 50)/Tape Op#102/49
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specs to the PianoMic, but are not random-incidence
mics. However, I wanted to see how they would perform
compared to the PM40 mics. All were fed into Millennia
HV-3R preamp channels.
We first started with the other mics closer to the
soundboard than I normally would place them, because
the PianoMic System positions the mics pretty close. For
this first listen, the mics were set in similar spacing to the
16 PianoMic System. The 414s and U 87s were about 12
above the soundboard. However, the QTC40s were placed
right next to the PianoMic capsules to see how they
performed with a similar placement.
When listening back to the recorded files, all of the
results were not entirely compelling. While they werent
bad, it was obvious some position changes would be
required. The best results in this initial setup came from
the U 87s. They exhibited the best overall image and tonal
balance. The 414s werent bad, although they lacked the
definition in the midrange that I heard from the U 87s.
The PianoMic system had great response in the low-
frequency range of the piano, but it lagged slightly behind
the U 87s in detail and imaging. The Earthworks QTC40s
came in last initially, but remember that we placed them
very close to the soundboard, right next to the capsules
in the PianoMic System. This is not how the QTC40s were
intended to be used, but we were experimenting.
We then repositioned all of the mics, backing them off
a bit into a more traditional placement. As for the
PianoMic System, we slid the bar a bit farther away from
the hammers and adjusted the goosenecks to position the
capsule a little higher. We heard a huge difference in all
of the mics.
Listening back, it was obvious that we had found the
sweet spot for the PianoMic System. They now slightly
surpassed the U 87s in terms of detail and clarity, as well
as body. While the U 87s imaging was still slightly wider,
the PianoMic Systems was in no way narrow. It was
coherent and balanced. The 414s had more top end
sparkle, but sounded a bit less natural in the midrange by
comparison. Now positioned towards the edge of the
piano case, the QTC40s were similar to the PianoMic
Systemin terms of clarity, but lacked the slightest amount
of body in comparison.
With these mic positions, it might be a toss-up as to
whether your preference would be the U 87s or the
PianoMic System. But that is assuming that we are talking
about a situation that allows the lid to remain open.
Obviously you cant close the lid on a pair of U 87s.
I was able to test the performance of the system with
a closed lid in a live setting. We miced a 9 ft Kawai EX
concert grand for a jazz performance, splitting the mic
lines and feeding both the FOH console and a Pro Tools
rig. The stage was fairly well occupied with musicians in
close proximity, including a drum kit and amplified bass.
The approach in the past had been to use a pair of 414s
while putting the lid on the short stick. This was far from
ideal, as it still allowed a good amount of bleed from the
drums and created some nasty issues with the back
capsule being so close to the bottom of the lid. After
positioning the PianoMic System, we were able to close
the lid fully. This greatly reduced the unwanted stage
bleed, and the design of the PianoMic System meant that
the interaction with the closed lid was minimized. Now,
Im not going to say that the closed lid made no
difference at all sonically because it did but we had
nowhere near the issues that arise in that scenario from a
closed lid with traditional mics. Although there was a
definite boxiness to the midrange stemming from the
closed lid, it was very manageable. A slight bit of EQ
cleaned things up very well. One thing I should mention:
I was using the PM40 studio version of the PianoMic
System in this live concert setting. There is a PM40T
touring version available that is specifically designed for
live use; its hinged in the middle to allow it to collapse
into a package thats more easily transported... and less
likely to be mistaken for a rifle.
So is this system worth the investment? I think it
depends upon your individual needs. If you are fortunate
enough to possess an arsenal of fantastic mics already,
and you never have the need to acoustically isolate a
grand piano, then this may not interest you. However, if
youve been searching for a piano micing approach that
works for you, especially in a closed lid situation, then
this kit is certainly worth looking at. The PianoMic System
provides excellent sonic character in an easy to set up
package that can yield repeatable results. Once you
determine the best position for your piano and desired
sound, it is very quick and easy to recreate that setup and
sound on any session. If you need to minimize bleed from
adjacent instruments, this is the best system Ive seen for
recording piano with the lid closed.
($2,999 street; www.earthworksaudio.com)
Kirt Shearer <kirt@kirtshearerproductions.com>
Little Labs
VOG Analog Bass Resonance Tool
No matter how many amazing equalizers that I buy, I
find that I never have enough great outboard EQs for
everything I need. In my opinion, the biggest advantage
of expensive EQs is their ability to boost and manage
treble, but I have often found myself using one (or even
two) on kick drum to shape the lows, even as it feels like
overkill. Before I encountered the Little Labs VOG (Voice
of God) processor, I never would have imagined using a
resonant high-pass filter to shape low-end on a kick, but
its proven to do a remarkable job. Whether I need a
punchier kick or a more pillowy one, the sound improves
significantly after I find the right frequency with the VOG.
I almost always still need board EQ to notch around
400 Hz and boost the beater (typically around 2 kHz), and
then the results sound great and sit perfectly in a mix.
While the VOG theoretically feels like it would also work
great on bass guitar, I generally dont find myself reaching
for it the equalizer that Im using to shape the mids
and articulation usually handles the sub-frequencies fine
as well. The VOG has also done an amazing job of adding
punch to low-frequency synth parts, reminding me of the
impact of Girlfriend Is Better by Talking Heads. Little
Labs takes pride in the build quality of the VOG, and the
sound is definitely as clean as advertised. The interface
confused me at first because its unlike most other filters
Ive used (such as the classic Moog-type HPF). Now that
Im accustomed to it, I find it very quick and easy to dial
in the sound that I want. Much like my Little Labs IBP
Junior, which I also often use on kick drum, the VOG is a
product that I never would have known would help, but I
now am attached to. The VOG is available as a 500-series
module or as the I-VOG standalone unit and even as a
UAD plug-in. Visit the Little Labs website to watch a video
showing examples of the VOG in use. (VOG $420 street,
I-VOG $500, UAD plug-in $99; www.littlelabs.com)
Steve Silverstein <ssilverstein@earthlink.net>
50/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/
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Burl Audio
B26 Orca monitor controller
Lets start this conversation off by stating the obvious. You cannot properly record or mix
music if you cannot accurately hear what you are recording or mixing. If music is more than
a hobby, and you are working with low to midlevel monitoring with your computer and DAW,
your next purchases should be a high-quality monitor controller and a good set of reference
speakers. Compressors, EQs, and effects are sexy. They do something, and may look stellar
in your rack. But if you cant hear what any of them are actually doing, you are doing yourself
and your clients a disservice.
Once you can hear what is actually going on with your recordings and mixes (and you may
be shocked at what you are missing), you can and will make smarter choices in regard to
matching preamps and mics to sources; positioning mics; and using compression and EQ more
effectively (and sparingly) and less as corrective devices. You will also get to where you are
going more quickly and with fewer detours.
The B26 Orca is an all analog, 2RU-height monitor manager, designed to let you route
your choice of input to choice of output. In back, XLR connectors in stereo pairs provide three
mix inputs, two return inputs, two speaker outputs, and an output for driving external meters.
Theres also a single XLR input for a talkback mic. Additionally, a pair of RCAs is employed for
a consumer-level (10 dBV) stereo input.
Up front, the unit is essentially divided into two halves. The left side, labeled Studio,
serves the artist, while the right side, labeled Control Room, serves the engineer. Each side
has the same source-selection switches (Mix A/B/C, 2 Track A/B, and RCA) and a pair of LEDs
that change color (green, yellow, orange, red) depending on signal level. The control room
level is set with a big knob turning a stepped attenuator, which utilizes audiophile-grade,
0.1% matched resistors, while the artist side gets separate studio volume and headphone level
potentiometers. Each side also gets a headphone jack (Studio Phones and CR Phones). In the
middle of the unit is a button and level knob for talkback, as well as buttons for speaker
selection, monitoring in mono, and choosing studio or control room for the meter output.
Anyone that has had their hands on a Burl Audio product knows that everything about the
construction is top notch, and the Burl B26 Orca is no different. The front panel is well laid
out and provides plenty of options for routing signal. The knobs all have a high-quality feel.
The switches are latching Studer-type buttons, as found on the Burl B32 Vancouver Mix Bus
[Tape Op #99]. They operate with a satisfying click, and when engaged, a small strip of color
is visible, letting you know that the selected feature is enabled. Importantly, the unit boasts
a direct-coupled, discrete, Class A, capacitor-free signal path.
I chose to connect two versions of my stereo mix, summed externally in my Burl B32
Vancouver from Pro Tools stems. Mix A has bus compression and EQ, and Mix B is straight out
of the summing box. It is nice to switch between the two to really hear what the bus
processing is doing to the mix. Unfortunately, the B26 Orca does not have onboard facilities
for calibrating input levels, so level-matching between sources has to be done at the sources
or through other means. This becomes even more challenging if you have two sources that
are at 10 dBV, like a CD player and an Apple Airport Express, since the B26 Orca provides
only a single unbalanced stereo input. (I use an Airport Express for wireless streaming of
tracks from clients phones and computers.)
While mixing, I had to use the Studio Phones jack to monitor the control room source
because the CR Phones jack does not have its own volume knob separate from the main
control room level. BURL felt that adding a potentiometer here would have reduced
performance of the headphone output, particularly in the case of left/right tracking at low
volumes, and adding a second precision stepped attenuator would have been cost-prohibitive.
The downside of BURL's approach is that if you use the CR Phones jack, you may have to turn
up or down the volume as you switch between speakers and headphones.
The talkback feature is straightforward. I wired a Beta 57 to the talkback input, and it
worked as expected and had plenty of level.
I believe it was Theodore Roosevelt who said, Comparison is the thief of joy, and it
certainly rings true in this case when comparing my old monitor controller to the B26 Orca.
When audio first passed through the B26 Orca, I felt like I had a new pair of monitors. My
PMC nearfields, which have always sounded great, sounded renewed. The depth of field and
tonal balance were just fantastic. The bass was full of body, clear, and tight. Center image was
very well defined, and at every volume level, the tone and image remained constant, and there
was never harshness even at more extreme levels. Also impressive was how constant the
stereo image and tone remained as the levels were decreased. Mixing at different levels is
essential for perspective, but on lesser monitor controllers, low-level monitoring does not
always paint an accurate picture of frequency and stereo-field balance. The B26 Orca
performed nicely is this regard. The feeling of this unit is immersive; even at these low levels,
I felt the music was all around me, and it made the sweet spot wider.
Gear Reviews/(continued on page 52)/Tape Op#102/51
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I had swapped out my old monitor controller for the
Burl mid-project, during a few days off. To my surprise,
with the B26 Orca in play, I was made aware of a subtle
high-frequency phase issue that was occurring between
my drum overheads and a guitar subgroup that was
patched to a pair of outboard EQs. This slight latency in
the return was creating an issue, and I had not heard it
clearly with my previous setup. It was at this point I
started to wonder what I had missed before.
I also listened to some previous mixes (both mastered
and unmastered) as well as a collection of some well-
known (to me) references. Listening through the B26
Orca revealed the good, the bad, and the ugly, across the
board. The point being, if something was well done, it
sounded great. If it was something that fell short, it was
obvious. I guess Im the sorta guy who would prefer to
have a friend tell me I missed a spot in back when I was
giving myself a buzz cut, so I can fix it and get on with
my day. Burl = friend.
For subwoofer integration, I used a standard setup of
connecting my mains to the sub, and the sub to a pair
of speaker outs on the B26 Orca. The bass sounded tight
and well defined, making low-end level choices much
easier. There was a dramatic difference in this regard
when comparing my mid-level monitor controller to the
B26 Orca, with the Burl coming up aces.
After mixing a couple different artists of different
genres using the B26 Orca, I feel comfortable
issuing an opinion. And it is a no brainer. My B26
Orca mixes are better. The low end was right the
first time, and everything was where it needed to
be the reason being that there was no guesswork
involved. I heard what was right and what needed
work. I made level, EQ, compression, and effects
choices based on clear information.
The B26 Orca is very hi-fi, and it is obvious that the
folks at Burl take tone very seriously. It provides for a
very clear and open image both side-to-side and front-
to-back. It is very easy on the ears for long mixing
sessions, and it added accuracy to my already accurate
monitors. So where do you go from here? Definitely
not back to a compromised listening situation. If you
are looking for a well-featured and beautiful-sounding
monitor controller that is built like a tank, the Burl
B26 Orca is certainly worth a look.
($2,499 street; www.burlaudio.com)
Geoff Stanfield <www.geoffstanfield.com>
Vintage Audio
MSL stereo VCA bus compressor
Located in Caldwell, Idaho, Revive Audio offers
hardware, custom builds, modifications, and repairs. I first
encountered Revive Audio a few years ago. They were
selling rackmount gear reclaimed from decommissioned
consoles. From the workmanship, it was obvious to me that
this group was capable of bigger things. I wrote the owner
asking when they were going to release their own designs.
Well, the time has come.
Sold under Revives Vintage Audio line, the MSL is a quad-
VCA stereo bus compressor that relies on two VCAs per
channel. The unit comes in four variants transformerless,
transformers on inputs only, transformers on outputs only, or
transformers on both with transformers sourced from
CineMag. Now, as a card-carrying CineMag-fanatic, I wanted
to try the loaded unit. However, the manufacturer really
wanted me to try the transformerless box, which uses high-
performance Burr-Brown input and output stages for a clean
path. It turns out having a more transparent sound ended
up being more useful across projects. But Im getting ahead
of myself.
The front panel is fashioned from 4 mm thick aluminum,
anodized forest green. All lettering is engraved rather than
silk-screened. Rotary controls are stepped, except for
threshold and gain. Illuminated stereo VU meters display
gain reduction, input, or output. There are illuminated
buttons for power and true bypass, while two toggle
switches allow bypass of compression (but not I/O stages)
and one of the detector stages.
Inside, the unit looks as if you contracted an experienced
tech to hand-build a compressor. Wiring is top-grade Canare;
capacitors are Panasonic, WIMA, and Vishay audiophile-
grade; and connectors are Neutrik the whole nine-yards.
The VCA functions are provided by THAT Corporation
integrated circuits. While these may not exhibit the same
test specifications of hand-built discrete VCA circuits, they
are, without exaggeration, a fraction of the price and nearly
all of the performance. In fact, the number of professional
units that rely on THAT ICs represents a respectable market
share. The true bypass is just that, a relay that bridges the
signal path from wire in to wire out. The power supply
features extra filtering to effectively lower the internal noise
floor. This is a very quiet unit in terms of self-noise.
One of my favorite things about the MSL is the detectors
sidechain facility. You can bypass the sidechain, patch in an
external equalizer (or other processor), or set the built-in
high-pass filter from a selection of frequencies 60, 90,
150, 240, or 440 Hz. Anyone who has tracked instruments
such as grand piano will immediately appreciate how high
this sidechains HPF goes. Moreover, trying to use a bus
compressor without a filtered sidechain can be a mess. Every
bass transient can pump the entire mix. I often settled at
the 240 Hz selection on mixes for this reason.
In use, the MSL could be classified loosely in the general
style of an SSL bus compressor, but its not an outright
clone. Most of the time, I used it to catch transients
kind of giving a haircut to the audio on the way into my
mastering chain. When I work on products that were mixed
in home studios, a transparent analog compressor can
really clean things up before I get to work. I really
appreciate the MSLs dual-VCA detectors; and even though
the controls are ganged, there is a true dual-mono path
inside. This means stereo width is not sacrificed when using
this box. There are several compressors that I choose not
to employ because they tighten everything at the expense
of the stereo field. Since I didnt opt for the CineMags, the
compression bypass (the switch that doesnt remove the
I/O stages from the signal chain) was not much use. Thats
fine. The detector bypass button is another story. Engaging
it removes one of the RMS sidechain circuits. This results in
a more aggressive sound. In my tests, it was spectacular on
drum room mics, and I have to say, I wonder how much
better it would be with the transformer option. But most
of the time, I used the standard dual-VCA mode. The attack
and release switches provide a good bit of control, with
auto-release working well on many test tracks. The only
time I coaxed a bad sound out of the unit was when I tried
to use the gain knob fully open. The mix seemed to build
up a lot of 6 kHz nastiness. Of course, I was purposefully
trying to abuse the unit. I doubt real-world applications
would call for overuse of the makeup gain unless a
particular effect was desired.
52/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/(continued on page 54)
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/53
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I honestly dont know how long Vintage Audio can sell gear this
well-built at the asking price. Investigate the cost of a discrete
quad-VCA compressor, then check out the MSL. Not only is the MSL
insanely good for its price, but its also very flexible, since it can
be used on individual tracks, stems, or the mix bus. I recommend
you purchase one while its still available at an introductory price.
I would still be using mine if one of the engineers here hadnt
borrowed it for his own work!
($1199 introductory price; www.reviveaudio.com)
Garrett Haines <www.treelady.com>
sE Electronics
X1R ribbon mic
Isolation Pack shockmount
The X1R is a ribbon mic with a few design twists. Its housed in
the same body as sEs X1 large-diaphragm condenser and is
designed to produce more high end, and more output level, than
the average ribbon. sE sent me a pair of these mics to test.
I was tracking an album at my studio with Doralice, who are a
fantastic San Francisco violin and acoustic guitar duo. On violin, I
placed the X1R next to two great vintage mics: an AKG C 414 EB,
and a Bang & Olufsen BM 5 ribbon. Guitarist Yates was playing
some beautiful instruments, including a 1922 Martin parlor guitar
and a Santa Cruz D/PW dreadnought. I set up the second X1R next
to a Lucas CS-1 and a vintage Reslo Pencil Ribbon. On both sources,
the X1R held its own. It was much brighter than either of the other
ribbons and sounded quite nice by itself. I rarely use ribbons
without a second brighter mic, but the X1R would have done fine
as a single mic, particularly in a busy mix. These quiet sources (the
parlor guitar was crazy quiet conversational level at best) also
provided good output level and noise floor tests. I ran both vintage
ribbons through my Cloudlifter CL-2, but the sE mics went straight
to my preamps (API 3124, Sytek MPX-4A). The preamp gain
settings ended up the same for the Cloudlifter-fed vintage ribbons
and the straight-in X1Rs! Thats a healthy output level for a ribbon.
The X1Rs exhibited some low-end noise, but the other ribbons had
a ton of wideband hiss not surprising given the amount of gain
I was running.
Next I had Steve Brooks at my studio to track guitar solos for a
new Torche LP. He played a Telecaster into a Yamaha T50 with tons
of gain through an old Mesa cabinet. The X1R had no problems with
the high SPL, and here it behaved more like a traditional ribbon
darker and funkier than a dynamic (in this case, a nice Shure 546),
but awesome when blended with the dynamic. With a 10 kHz
boost, the X1R opened up nicely on its own and provided a
different tone altogether from the other two mics.
Finally, for fun, I tried the X1R on bass while doing reamps for
Sie lieben Maschinen, an old-school noise rock project from Josh
Newton (Every Time I Die, Shiner) and Steve Tulipana (Season to
Risk). I ran Joshs Electrical Guitar Company bass into a Fuzzrocious
Rat Tail and a cranked Bassman for tons of grind. And the X1R ruled
on bass! It produced huge low end, solid articulate highs, and not
much in the mids but it sounded cool. (The proximity effect was
pretty dramatic, but the net result was scoopage.) My Sennheiser
MD 441 sounded downright small next to the X1R, but was perfect
for filling in the X1Rs scooped mids; so depending on the
arrangement, I had lots of good options in those two faders.
The X1R feels solid overall. Its grille is a little flimsy; I had to
be careful not to push against the mesh while I crammed a Neutrik
XLR connector into the mic. (Like many mics, the X1R doesnt love
the rubber gasket on those Neutrik jacks.)
sE also sent two Isolation Packs thats a $49 combination
shockmount and pop filter that fits the X1 series and a handful of
other sE mics. The shockmount is made mostly of plastic
(intentionally for weight savings, sE tells me), with elastic-band
shock-absorption. They feel a little cheap, but what shockmount
doesnt? I used them for all my tracking, and I was glad to have
them, especially on quiet sources with the preamp cranked. The
large thumbscrew on the bottom makes mounting and adjusting
mics quick and easy, and the all-metal pop filter slides pretty easily
into a slot on the front of the shockmount easier and faster to
set up than your typical gooseneck pop filter. With the integrated
pop filter protecting the ribbon element from blasts of air, I didnt
think twice about using the mic on bass cabinet or loud guitar amp.
At $199 apiece, why wouldnt you try one of these mics? Theyre
rad. (X1R $199 street, Isolation Pack $49; www.seelectronics.com)
Scott Evans <www.antisleep.com>
Telefunken
M80 & M82 dynamic mics
We all know that the Shure SM57 and AKG D 112 are pretty
ubiquitous on snare and kick on countless recordings, right? Why?
Because they are affordable and sound pretty damn good! Many an
engineer, myself included, have tried other mics, but come back to
the 57/112 combo because it works. But we still want to find a set
of mics that works better and helps differentiate our recordings a
bit from all the others that use the 57/112 and makes us feel
like we're trying a little harder to not follow the herd. Well, I think
I've found those mics.
I've always been a big fan of Telefunken, so when the M82 was
introduced as a kick drum mic, I was eager to check it out. Well,
guess what, it sounds great! It has a low-mid tuck tailored for kick
that gets it much closer to record-ready than the D 112. I've had
similar success with the Earthworks KickPad inline pad/EQ [Tape Op
#45], but the M82's kick-friendly tuning is built into the mic, which
I appreciate. All I can say is, I've used the M82 for every drum
session I've done for the past six months, and I've been really
pleased with it. I've also used the mic for bass cabinets and the
bottom end of a Leslie with good results.
Robert "Bob" Cheek is a Seattle-based engineer who works in my
Panoramic House and Dock studios. He was pretty stoked when the
M82 showed up. He'd been using one alongside the M80 at Matt
Bayles' Red Room Recording and was really digging both of them.
"You gotta' check out the M80, it's like the Heil but even better."
The Heil that Bob was referring to is the Heil PR 20 [#40], which
has been our go-to snare mic at The Hangar (and now Panoramic)
for years in lieu of the SM57.
I've only used the M80 a few times (with great results), but here's
what Bob had to say about it: "I've been using the M80 in Seattle
and at Panoramic quite a bit. I love it on both top and bottom snare
the main reason being that it seems to require very little EQ
compared to an SM57, especially in the top end. The M82 is also
great and requires less EQ than a D 112. I also A/B'ed it with a
couple mics on bass cab, and it won the shoot out by far. I used
both mics on recent sessions at Panoramic for Band of Horses and
The Tumbleweeds Band."
Bob asked Matt to chime in on the mics: "I find the M80
indispensable now that I have it. I love it on snare less muck
through the low mids and snappier in the upper frequencies as well.
The M82 has some versatility to it. It can be just as snappy but less
"modern" (scooped) than a D 112, which is a good thing, but can
also be set for a flatter sound without feeling dull and thuddy like a
D 112. I also have a pair of M81s, the mellower version of the M80,
and use them on guitar even bass sometimes where I might try an
MD 421 or PR 40 [#56] to combine with an LDC like the Bock iFet."
Thanks Matt! Thanks Bob! Thanks Telefunken! Both mics include
a nice leather bag, a well-designed mount, and a Telefunken mic
cable with a 90-degree female connector for easier placement on
drums. (M80 $249 street, M82 $399; www.t funk.com)JB
54/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/(continued on page 56)
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/55
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GAS Audio
Sigma 500 summing box
& 500-series frame
The Sigma 500 provides a unique twist on the
implementation of an analog summing mixer. The unit
contains two 500-series slots to insert preamps of your choice
to serve as the final gain stage for the stereo mix. Moreover,
when not being used to sum, the Sigma 500 has an Alt mode
that transforms the unit into a standard two-channel 500-
series rack. I really liked this dual-natured feature, because I
occasionally record voiceover artists, and having a rack on
hand for a couple high-quality preamps is nice. Out of the
shipping carton, the Sigma 500 slots accept single-width
modules, but double-width devices can be installed by
removing the included blank plates. With the function toggle
switched from Alt to Sum, the Sigma 500 assumes its main
identity, and the installed preamps become the final gain
stage. A third configuration is available when the unit is
powered down. This is called passive mode, which isolates the
summing circuitry, permitting use of external preamps rather
than those installed in the Sigma 500. Very neat. There are no
pan pots, faders, or switches. Input signal is via two DB25
connectors per channel (with standard TASCAM pinout).
Recently, Ive done considerable testing with summing
mixers. Employing real-world projects and listening with
trusted speakers reveals what a summing mixer can and
cannot do. Most mastering houses would have little use for
these devices. However, some of my clients record and mix
themselves. My preference is to work with a mixing engineer,
but this is not always possible or economically feasible. In
these cases, I can master from stem mixes as an option [see
What Is Stem Mixing? in Tape Op #87], using a summing
mixer to feed my mastering chain.
My tests revealed that a summing mixer can sound better to
me than mixing in the box, but results depend on several
factors. First, high-quality D/A converters must feed the
summing mixer. Each A/D or D/A comes at a price, both
financially and in terms of sound quality. Using entry-level
converters tends to offset any advantage of external summing.
Second, not all DAWs calculate sums with the same result.
Some are better than others, and there can be differences even
between versions of the same DAW. (E.g., I think the summing
in Pro Tools 10 sounds more spacious than in PT 7.) Finally, you
may achieve additional improvements in sound quality and in
workflow by adding external gear. In short, summing mixers are
only one part of the equation in which they live. Without all of
the pieces in place, you may experience few noticeable
benefits, or even reduced sound quality. So dont expect to buy
a summing mixer and magically have it do all the work.
From a coloration standpoint, summing boxes tend to fall
into two camps: transparent or vintage-inspired. Colored boxes
impart the sound of transformers or op-amps consistent with
their heritage, while transparent models can be more flexible.
With the Sigma 500, you can choose the flavor through the
preamps. From the high-headroom clarity of a Grace Design
M501, to the girth of a LaChapell Audio 583s, the choices are
vast. For my testing, I tried several preamps, ultimately resting
on two finalists. For high-headroom, transient-rich sounds, I
liked Hairball Audio Lola preamps [Tape Op #93] loaded with
John Hardy 990 op-amps. For a colored approach, I used a set
of custom Eisen Audio preamps that were built in the tradition
of vintage Neves. For this review, GAS also lent me an A-10 line
attenuator [#96]. I fed the Sigma 500 with either a Lynx
Aurora 16-VT [#73] or an SSL Alpha-Link MX 16-4.
For the first project, I broke out the stems for drums, bass,
lead vocal, backing vocals, keys, guitars, lead guitars, and
effects. Although the Sigma 500 can accept up to 32 input
channels, I limited myself to 16, because I figured most
people would be happy with 8 stereo stems. Level-matching
as best as I could, I printed a master using the internal
summing of Pro Tools and a master using the Sigma 500 with
the Lola modules. I sent the test files to my client, a praise
and worship leader at a large Oklahoma church. He listened to
both versions and solicited the advice of his colleagues and
band members. In the blind test, they chose the Sigma 500
version by a vote of 7 to 1. For Fault Lines, a punky garage-
pop four-piece, I loaded the Sigma 500 with the Eisen Audio
modules, drove them pretty hard, and attenuated the output
through the A-10. I also summed a mix in Sequoia 10. The
band chose the GAS-powered version. This version glued Jedi
Emily Seabrokes bass line better than all the multiband
compressors and all the plug-in exciters could. (I know this
was not a scientific comparison. I should have played the
Sequoia version through the preamps as well, but in the real
world, I would not patch gear that way unless I had the GAS
installed.) In a third set of tests, I added more outboard gear,
running each stem through a bus compressor before it hit the
Sigma 500. This workflow can be facilitated by a patchbay
with normals from your converters to the Sigma 500, allowing
you to insert gear when desired between the DAC and the
summing circuit. If you choose a summing box setup, consider
adding such patching to your installation. These masters
resulted in the most significant sonic differences, coming
much closer to the feel of a large-console mix.
So, the broader question is: If you have the converters
and the time, is analog summing better than in the box?
Yes? Garrett said so. His clients said so even in blind
tests. But what does better mean? To be honest, better is
not the correct term. Analog summing sounds different.
Furthermore, some styles of music may sound better mixed
in the box. Plus, ITB recalls are a dream. But when I want to
maintain the illusion of hearing the artist perform right in
front of me, I prefer properly implemented analog summing.
Flipping back-and-forth does reveal a wider soundstage with
the Sigma 500 not a vast difference, but noticeable.
However, the major differences were in two areas. First,
elements like vocals, guitar solos, and snare drums tend to
sit in the mix with an uncanny this is exactly where I
belong vibe. You need less processing to blend elements.
Once I was out of comparison testing, I found I was
removing plug-ins from various channels because they were
no longer needed. Second, analog summing seems to place
a big sonic blanket around the mix. Things start to sound
like a record faster and easier than when working within
the world of endless possibilities in a DAW.
Within the world of summing mixers, the GAS Sigma 500
has many advantages. It has lots of inputs. It doubles as a
two-channel 500-series rack. Its got passive mode. And its
construction is sturdy. Of course, you must provide your own
preamps for the final gain stage, but thats part of the allure
of this unit. And if you have access to multiple preamps, an
array of sonic signatures can be readily at your disposal. All
you have to do is pull four screws. But one last piece of advice:
Dont go too far trying to find the perfect preamps, because at
some point, you have to make records.
($750 direct; www.recordingwithgas.com)
Garrett Haines <www.treelady.com>
56/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/
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12 Gauge Microphones
Red12, Green12, Black212 mics
A shotgun shell an actual shotgun shell, from a 12 gauge
shotgun turned into a microphone. I liked the idea
immediately. Lets use these shells for creating, rather than
destroying, something.
I ordered a pair of the original, red-colored Red12
omnidirectional mics very early on in the manufacturers life,
and I immediately fell in love with the form factor. Its a small
mic, about 4 long. I put one up as a heart mic on the drum
kit (in the middle of the kit, between the snare and the floor
tom, above the batter-side of the kick). It immediately reminded
me of the Stapes omni mics [Tape Op #30] that predated the
very nice Avenson ones. The capsule is sourced by 12 Gauge, and
I dont know who makes it, but it sounds great and I dont
care whats inside when something like this works so well. The
capsule sounds fast and open, and it seems to work no matter
what you put it in, as evidenced by it showing up here in a piece
of ammunition. The Red12 is really a snappy little mic with a
great, neutral frequency response. It works really well for pretty
much anything you would expect an omni to capture. But it is
especially great up-close on drums.
When the Green12 cardioid version came out, I got a pair
right away. Side ports are cut into the brass of the shotgun shell
to implement the cardioid polar pattern. These are also really
good for overheads, or as a spaced pair for room ambience.
Or perhaps even on toms which I will have to try.
Out of nowhere, the company then made a stereo condenser
mic, still in a single shotgun shell the Black212. I liked this
one right away. A very small, phase-perfect stereo mic that
sounds killer, and is very inexpensive? Awesome. I brought one
to a live Puss n Boots (Norah Jones, Sasha Dobson, Catherine
Popper) recording I was producing and engineering. It was my
primary ambience mic for that recording, and it ruled. Low
noise, great sound, killer image of the performance it was
really great. I have since used that mic on a ton of stuff. It was
the primary room mic in our new B room at Studio G Brooklyn
when Dub Trio and I did a collaborative thing with Meshell
Ndegeocello. The B room is a bit more live than our A room, and
the little Black212 just grabbed exactly what we wanted to hear.
It was totally great with a little squeeze from the 33314
compressors in our Neve console.
A bunch of pals and peers have grabbed pairs of the 12 Gauge
mics since I first started ranting about them, and I feel strongly
that any studio, no matter how vast its mic collection, will find
these mics useful. The mics are totally inexpensive, built with
care by a great person, and have worked really, really well on
anything I have put them on. I have no doubt that you would
get way more than your moneys worth out of these, for years to
come. In a microphone market flooded with weird, cheap, not-
so-cool things, the 12 Gauge Microphones line serves as a
refreshing, inexpensive option for real working studios.
(Individual mics $35$85 direct, box set $215;
www.12gaugemicrophones.com)
Joel Hamilton <www.joelhamiltonrecording.com>
Gear Reviews/(continued on page 58)/Tape Op#102/57
T a pe O p i s made
p o s s i b l e b y o ur
a d v e r t i s e r s .
Please support them and tell them
you saw their ad in Tape Op.
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Rascal Audio
Two-V dual mic preamp (500-series)
The Two-V is a double-wide, two-channel preamp module for the
500-series format. It comes painted battleship grey with minimal
markings denoting the usual features: polarity, high-pass filter, phantom
power, and input impedance. The front panel seems a bit austere at
first deceptively so! The build quality of the Two-V also resembles a
battleship. I like that some 500-series modules feel cheap in the hand;
the combination of market saturation and the necessity to have a
presence in said market has actually made it much easier to tell when
someone gives a crap. Joel Cameron of Rascal Audio is just such a chap.
The Two-V is a classic example of someone designing something that is
great, and then going the extra mile to make it stellar.
The gain-staging took some getting used to mostly because its so
simple. As engineers, we arent really used to three separate gain
knobs! Once I figured out the input knob functions as a pad between
the mic input transformer and the first active gain stage, and the
output knob is the master fader, it all made sense. Both the input and
output fully attenuate at zero. Add to that a 6 dBstepped gain
switch that goes from 4070 dB, and a 300/1200 impedance
switch, and you have a ton of tonal flexibility! A good starting point
for me is setting gain at 40 dB, with the input all the way down and
output all the way up. I then gradually turn up the input to where I
want it, adjusting in larger blocks of 6 dB as needed.
Apparently, Joel spent considerable time picking out the custom
transformers for the Two-V, and it really shows! The circuit has a
legitimate heft without being too colorful. This character becomes
exaggerated in a very pleasant way when pushed! On first use of the
Rascal, I wanted to get a good idea of the clean tone before I went
harmonic crazy, so I started with some familiar sources and mics, and
then moved into uncharted territory.
Frontier Ruckus are a band in transition. I love doing records like
theirs. They made a name writing extremely well crafted, emotive,
densely-fricative folk music, with a pension for the geography of
South Central Michigan. When they came to me to make a rock
record, I jumped at the chance. We first used the Two-V with an AKG
D 12 on the kick and a Lombardi LM2060 on the snare, per the usual
here for a 70s vibe. With some adjustment to gain and impedance, I
was able to dial in a variety of different tones for the few songs we
tracked that day. Fred Thomas the drummer is dynamic, to say the
least! The Two-V was well suited for this type of recording. As Fred
played louder, the Two-V saturated just a touch. The tones were at
once familiar and totally unique. The harmonic character changed
greatly or slightly with gain adjustments, but the overall tone
remained consistent. It wasnt until mixing that I realized the big
advantage to how the drums sat in the mix. Using the gain and
impedance controls really affects how your tracks sit later. I like to
make as many decisions as early as I can, if the project allows, and in
a way, we premixed the kick and snare sounds during tracking!
Next up, we tracked some acoustic guitar. Matt Melia has a super
nice 1976 Epiphone large-body acoustic guitar that sounds great but
has some tonal idiosyncrasies. We set up a Korby convertible mic with
a KAT 47 cardioid capsule [Tape Op #38] square with the 12th fret,
and a Josephson C42 [#34] very close but behind the Korby pointed
at the sound hole. This configuration tends to eliminate some
charming fret buzz the instrument has. Panned left/right, we got
the perfect image dual-mono with a slight spread. Total Street
Fighting Man vibe. Again, adjusting the gain, and therefore dialing
in the amount of transformer saturation, proved super useful. The
impedance switch did something super cool at higher gain settings;
it seemed to increase or decrease the space around the guitar. Not
necessarily room sound just a really nice space around the
instrument. This is something I began to notice happening on all
tracking with this box. Its not unlike the Forward/Back switch on the
AwTAC Awesome Channel Amplifier [#93].
The next task at hand was a smattering of overdubs. Davey Jones
(yes, thats his real name) is a savant on banjo and a Telecaster/banjo
hybrid called Scruggsteen. Using the now classic AEA R84 [Tape Op
#38] and the stunning AEA N22 [see this issue] on the acoustic banjo
and the Fender Deluxe amp proved more than satisfying. Again, the
premixing and spatial effect was evident, capturing some very real-
world sounds that needed only fader adjustments at mix. Zach Nichols
is a beyond-talented instrumentalist who plays anything you can
throw at him. Sensing I was on a roll with the AEA mics feeding the
Two-V, we put down piano, trumpet, saw, and some amplified synth
tracks for the next few hours. I dont normally use a single preamp for
5 or 6 hours straight, on almost everything in a mix, due to issues
with buildup. In fact, I havent done this since I bought a second
preamp in 1995! With simple gain adjustments, impedance
manipulation, high-pass filtering, my ears, and a little forethought, I
was not only able to use the Two-V for the entire day, but fully inclined
to do so. We even laid down some scratch vocals for Matt that he liked
the sound of so much that we kept a large chunk of them as final
vocals! Theres a certain transformer hotness you can get from the
Two-V that allows a vocal to be super present in a mix without it being
loud in comparison. But when going for a cleaner vocal later in the
record, it was again easy to dial in a cleaner sound that was still huge
without being over-present.
Frontier Ruckus like to work fast, moving from instrument to
instrument to vocal, and song to song full-band tracking to
overdubs back to full tracking even in one day. The simplicity and
sheer fidelity and musicality of the Two-V made this possible. Plus, the
ability to sculpt the sound on the way in saved me and the band
hours of automating at mix time. Priceless!
The Two-V shares some DNA with classic Neve Class A designs, but
it is by no means a clone! Ive used various Neves in the past, and
I know their sound; at this point, with the amount of cloning
happening, most of us do! After using the Two-V for a few weeks, I
called Joel Cameron and was remarking at the units flexibility and
how classic it sounded, but said I wouldnt describe it as Nevey per
se. I was ignorant to it sharing any similarities in terms of the circuit
design. I learned a lot that day! Joel explained that, while Neves
were an inspiration, he found certain aspects frustrating. He went
on to explain that the Two-V has a unique gain structure that not
only allows more gain shaping, but offers it in a continuously-
variable nature, instead of 5 dB chunks. Apparently, the classic Neve
design has a gain switch that does multiple things within various
parts of the circuit; its not a simple increase in active gain in 5 dB
steps. In actuality, its changing various pads within the circuit,
altering active gain with one preamp stage, and routing between
various stages. Therefore, its tonality changes alongside changes in
gain! The lowest active gain setting on a Class A Neve is 40 dB. The
lower positions are achieved through a switched pad network
between the input transformer and first gain stage. The Two-V
replaces this switched pad network with a separate, continuously-
variable input control. This input control can be used at any gain
setting. (Neves permanently switch out the pad network at 40 dB!)
This means you can drive the gain stages harder or softer in the
Two-V, and adjust the input for a way wider variety of options in
terms of transients and harmonics! Ive often been frustrated with
the Neve design; I get something dialed tone-wise and wish for a
hair more gain one 5 dB click up and the tone changes alongside
the jump in level. This is not a problem with the Rascal.
The Two-V has fast become a go-to for me. I love it when Im
patching for a session, and Im like, I know, Ill use it on kick and
snare! No wait, guitar! No, vocals! At less than $650 per channel,
youd be losing money not buying this thing. At least thats what Im
telling myself! ($1289 street; www.rascalaudio.net)
Chris Koltay <www.highbiasrecordings.com>
58/Tape Op#102/Gear Reviews/(continued on page 65) More Reviews on Page 65>>>
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Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/59
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60/Tape Op#102/Gear Geeking/
Gear Geeking w/ Andy
I was amazed when I first witnessed radio-controlled
airplane models flying through the air. But the complexity
and maintenance requirements of fuel-based engines and
analog radio systems scared me off from venturing into that
hobby. Decades later, someone showed me how simple,
affordable, and fun it was to build and fly electric-powered
RC aircraft, and thats when I dove right in. Looking back, the
path I followed into RC parallels the route I took into music
recording a key person showed me how simple, affordable,
and fun it was to use a TASCAM Portastudio to make music.
Im sure for a lot of you, the story is similar. A 4-track
cassette got you going, and now youre building out a studio.
Which brings me to the topic of power tools and perhaps
youre wondering why I brought up RC to begin with.
Advances in lithium battery chemistry and brushless motor
systems made it possible for electric RC planes to outfly their
fuel-powered counterparts, and that same technology has
slowly made its way into power tools. First off, if youre
planning on any cordless tool purchases, youll want to
choose one or possibly two lines so that you can reuse your
batteries and chargers across multiple tools. Moreover, a
combo set of several tools with a shared battery/charger
system will save you a ton of money. With that said, if youre
a studio DIYer, your first purchase should be a cordless drill
for racking gear, hanging drywall, mounting acoustic
treatment, and other jobs that require drilling holes or
turning fasteners. A jigsaw, reciprocating saw, or worklight
might be your next. 18V lithium-ion batteries (which some
manufacturers market as 20V) give you the biggest range of
choice, and my bang-for-buck recommendation is to go with
RIDGID or Ryobi ONE+. Both brands are owned by TTI and
are available in North America at Home Depot (Home
Cheapo). Both also offer a huge selection of affordable tools
that work with their respective battery systems.
Unfortunately, the batteries are not swappable between
brands, although some of the tool parts are. For several years
now, Ive owned a Ryobi ONE+ drill, impact driver, jigsaw, and
worklight and none of them have failed me. But a major
advantage of going with RIDGID is its warranty, service, and
battery-replacement policy. Although these Li-On tools are
lighter than the NiCd and NiMHbased tools of the past, they
can still be unwieldy for delicate tasks, like turning the tiny
fasteners in a 500-series rack. This past winter, I splurged on
a Bosch 12V MAX PS22 brushless 1/4 hex driver. At half the
size and weight of my non-brushless Ryobi drill, its much
easier to finesse but surprisingly, it has as much torque.
At its highest clutch settings, it will easily snap a stuck
drywall screw or a #10 wood screw. Moreover, because of its
non-fatiguing weight, the PS22 is perfect for hanging drywall
(or other materials that require lots of screws) over your
head. Ive since purchased its sibling PS32 brushless 3/8 drill
and a couple other tools in the Bosch 12V line. If the allure
of extra power, longer runtime, and lower maintenance of
brushless motors is intriguing you, Milwaukee (also a TTI
brand) has the largest selection of brushless tools, and I see
more professionals with Milwaukee than any other brand.
But all these brushless tools are expensive, so you might
want to wait for prices to fall when brushless becomes the
norm, as it has in the RC world. Years ago, I paid $90 for my
first brushless RC motor. Recently, I bought equivalent
motors for $15 each! AH
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Introducing the Single Fin Studio Group; four recording
studios designed, built, and operated by engineer/producers.
All these studios share the common goal of helping working
musicians create great recordings with quality equipment and
excellent rooms while keeping rates affordable. Each one of
these places is unique, but they all follow the same
philosophy of hosting comfortable and creative spaces in
which to make excellent records.
An open studio hidden away in NYC where you'll find a custom API/Tree
Console, lots of Craviotto drums, tape, computers, huge mic selection and
select outboard. Sounds beautifully melt together in a room where musicians
are meant to play side by side. You'll be back in your favorite treehouse.
www.mavericksrecording.com/ blurry55@gmail.com
Jackpot! Recording Studio in Portland, OR, has been in operation since 1997.
The studio features a comfortable working environment, a versatile live room,
and an incredible gear selection, with 2" tape, Pro Tools, a Rupert Neve
Designs 5088 console and an over-the-top outboard gear and mic selection.
Jackpot!'s affordable $300 day rates are designed with freelance engineers in
mind. Artists love this space, and engineers enjoy working here.
www.jackpotrecording.com 503-239-5389
The Dock in the General Produce Building is a 1500 square foot historic brick
building and the studio is built to track rock bands quickly and efficiently.
Producer/engineer Chris Woodhouse (Oh Sees, Ty Segall, Wild Flag) calls this analog
centered studio home base and specd it with an eye to speed and an ear to rock.
Studer A-80 16 track 2 tape, Pro Tools HD, a Trdent Series 65 and Daking
A-Range console in a great sounding space are the key elements in this room.
Rates start @ $200 a day.
www.thedockstudio.com john@onefinmanagement.com
916-444-5241
The Panoramic House is the ultimate VRBO for musicians. A live-in residential
studio overlooking the Pacific Ocean with an API/Neve console, 2 tape,
Pro Tools HD, and an echo chamber. Each room of the house is filled with
musical instruments except for the gourmet kitchen with a wood burning oven
and Wolf range. Plenty of room and solitude to get into a creative space but
only 30 minutes from San Francisco.
Rates start at $350 a day.
www.vrbo.com/505782 john@onefinmanagement.com
916-444-5241
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JACKPOT! RECORDING MAVERICKS STUDIOS
THE DOCK in The General Produce Building PANORAMIC HOUSE in Marin County
studio group
singlefinstudiogroup.com
facebook.com/SingleFinStudioGroup
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Single Fin Remote Rig now available!
Record your next album anywhere... we come to you!
16 channel UA Apollo Converter 10 channel vintage Spectra Sonics console 4 channel vintage RCA tube console
mics, pres, etc. We can set up for you to record yourself, or provide an engineer.
Email john@onefinmanagement.com for more info
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Mastering
& Recording
Services:
All of these studios
support the
Tape Op Community &
would welcome the
opportunity to talk to
you about mastering
your next project. Go
to www.tapeop.com/
mediakit/
to find out about
putting your
studio on these pages.
62/Tape Op#102/Please Support Our Advertisers/
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The Warmenfat Pure Tube
Class A Micro Amplifier!
Standard instrument input: Lead or bass guitar, keyboardsYou name it!
26 dB input: Low sensitivity input. Perfect for that snare drum.
Transformer speaker output: Use as a guitar amplifier.
Transformer balanced output: Perfect DI. (Max output level over +25 dBm.)
Transformerless unbalanced output: Ideal for re-amplifying or inserting into an effects loop.
Direct output (before gain controls): Boost classic guitar amp independently of DI output.
High Gain switch: Selects between triode and beam tetrode tube operation.
Pre and Post Gain controls: Adjust from clean to crunchy.
Custom output transformer: Allows any speaker to be used as a microphone
(for kick drum or guitar cabinets) while simultaneously providing a balanced output.
$499
direct!
Manufactured by Rainbow Electronics - specialists in audio repairs since 1963
www.warmenfat.com 916-334-7277
Please Support Our Advertisers/Tape Op#102/63
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Led Zeppelin
I, II, III 2014 remasters
Its been over 20 years since the original CDs were issued. Since
then the technology has improved, and there are all these new
digital formats out there, so it made sense to revisit the studio
albums, Jimmy Page told me when he visited New York to promote
the newly remastered CD, LP, and digital versions of Led Zeppelins
first three groundbreaking albums. But thats not unique. Everybodys
doing that. So I wanted to make these new versions into something quite
sexy.
In fact, the recent history of Led Zeppelins catalog is a pretty tangled affair, so
simply hearing that John Davis, of Metropolis Studios in London, has tackled not just the first
three Zeppelin albums, but the entire catalog, is welcome news to any fan of the band. Audiophiles can
debate the original 1980s CD versions, created by Barry Diament from vinyl master tapes, versus the
1990s versions, approved by Page and mastered by George Marino (not to mention the abysmal,
brickwalled late-00s Mothership versions). However, these new CD masters, and spectacular heavyweight
LP reissues, will certainly be the gold standard for a long time to come.
Ive done really, really high-resolution files for whatever system comes next, but Im not even going
to tell you the details of that, Page hinted, with a twinkle in his eye. Were prepared for anything
thats to come, which is even higher resolution.
Project consultant Robin Hurley confirmed to me, however, that 96 kHz/24-bit files will be accessible,
via download cards, in each of the deluxe edition box sets of Led Zeppelin and also via HDTracks.com,
over the next 18 months.
Even better, that something quite sexy that Page was referring to are the companion discs of
previously unheard tracks, as well as works-in-progress versions of what amount to alternate versions of
each album (with the exception of Led Zeppelin I, for which there were no outtakes to speak of. This
forced Page to use a live show from October 1969, at the Olympia Theater in Paris. He told me he first
heard it in a bootleg shop in Japan).
I wanted to make sure that whats on the bootlegs that are out there, as best as possible, wasnt
going to appear on our stuff, Page told me proudly of the project. I didnt want it to be anything you
recognized. I wanted to get it right. Heres the thing: Ive purposely laced it, where it gives you the
insight of what was going on in making these albums. These arent subtle differences, because if youre
going to have a companion to the original track, its got to be sufficiently interesting. And, also, the
albums got to hold up on its own.
The companion discs are indeed fantastic; though fans of Zeppelin bootlegs, like Studio Magik, will
surely clamor for more after hearing the pristine sounding, albeit brief, single bonus discs included with
each deluxe set. They are revelatory though, and also keep with Pages idea to give a portal into the
making of the album, without being overly redundant.
As for the sound, the mastering is top-notch. Theres great definition and roundness to the bass, as
well as more clarity in the top end. Cymbals sound clear and far less edgy than the 90s Marino versions.
In particular, the acoustic guitar on Thank You sounds nicely rendered, with more definition and space
around it. Ambience and reverb seem to be more natural throughout, a result of the new transfer with
the better, current analog to digital converters.
Finally, while the Super Deluxe Edition Box Sets are nice, and include books strewn with Zeppelin
artifacts, like Robert Plants handwritten lyrics, the real gems here are the new LP versions. At about a
third the cost of the deluxe boxes (in which the LPs are also included, along with the CD versions), they
may be the way to go for all but the most die-hard fan.
-Jeff Slate <jeffslate.com>
tapeop.com
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64/Tape Op#102/Music Reviews/(continued on page 65)
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Voodoo Doughnut Recordings
Various Seven-Inch Singles
Over the last few years, my town of Portland has become a travelers destination for food
(as well as beer, coffee, comedy, books, and music). Many come to sample the delights of
world-renowned restaurants like Pok Pok, and many of these food tourists end up in line at
Voodoo Doughnuts (Their slogan: The Magic is in the Hole). Voodoo is co-owned by Tres
Shannon, who used to run the famous X-Ray Caf back in the early 90s and led the
unstoppable Kurtz Project band. Now he runs a doughnut empire, and hes dabbling in
releasing records under the Voodoo Doughnut Recordings banner (The Sweetest Cuts from
the Original Dough Nuts). Their plan is to release one 7-inch single every month, on
colored vinyl, in limited runs of 1000, and all with some sort of relation to global
doughnut awareness. They offer a Doughnut-Record-of-the-Month-Club for $99 a year;
of course an annual bonus release bumps the offering up to a bakers dozen.
What really got me thinking of writing about this series of singles is the connections that
exist between people in Portland working in music. A large number of artists on these
singles have recorded at my studio, Jackpot!, and though none of these recordings are from
my place (one almost was, but I was too busy) the rest are helmed by people Ive known
for years.
The first single features It Aint No Cupcake (Workin at Voodoo Doughnut) by The
Doughnut Boys as sung by our very own one-time nude janitor. The flip side, Cheap
Bastard by Pink Boxxes, is classic PDX punk. Both tracks feature guitarist Dan Eccles,
whom Ive worked with many times (he was also once in a band with Andy Ricker of Pok
Pok fame; see? Connections!). These songs were recorded by the fabulous Jake Hall (briefly
a Jackpot! intern way back) at Audible Alchemy, Steve Lobdells fine studio on happening
Mississippi Street in North Portland.
Next the Deep Fried Boogie Band gets their own single for Doughnut Make My Brown
Eyes Blue and (Return of the) Tokyo Cowboy, featuring Portland music staples Sam
Coomes (Quasi [Tape Op #2]), Chris Slusarenko (Eyelids and GBV), Brian Mumford (Dragging
An Ox Through Water), and Paulie Pulvirenti (Eyelids, No. 2, The Geodes, and Nervous
Christians). Its some crazy home-recorded rock n roll, tracked onto a Roland VS 880EX
through a Peavey 4-channel mixer in Paulies basement and mixed in Sams basement!
Whew, now we know how to capture some grit. And guess what, weve seen most of these
guys in sessions at Jackpot! and have even played music with some.
Audios Amigos are my new favorite guitar instrumental/surf-ish band in Portland, and
not just for the punny name. For their 7-inch they offer up Aint That a Peach and Rip
City Medley (which features snippets of classic Portland songs by Dead Moon, Wipers, and
Poison Idea). This was recorded by my friend, Pat Kearns, at PermaPress Recording in
Portland, who has also worked at Jackpot! many times over the years. (Check out the new
self-titled album by Pats band, Blue Skies for Black Hearts, as well.)
Speaking of Poison Idea, they get the next single with Triple Chocolate Penetration
and Hypnoptic. Recorded by Portlands legendary guru of rock and noise, Mike Lastra at
his Smegma Studios, and mixed by Justin Phelps (another Jackpot! alumn) at Cloud City
Studio, its a solid sonic punk blast that PI are known for. Jerry A screaming about
doughnuts (or sex? or chocolate?) is pretty awesome.
As Portland has also become a hotbed of comedy, the most recent 7-inch, as of this
writing, is a single, split between comedians Ian Karmel and Nathan Brannon. Ians side
was recorded live at Little Joy in L.A., and my guess is that it was captured on an iPhone!
Kinda rough. Nathans side was tracked by the staff at Helium Comedy Club in Portland and
is much clearer, though it still sounds like an audience recording. Both these pieces made
me think, Why didnt someone multitrack a direct mic signal, as well as a pair of room
mics? At least the jokes are funny as shit! Ive seen both these guys doing standup a lot
recently, and they kill it.
The most recent 7-inch, as of this writing, features Le Onde del Cielo. Vocalist
Max Usata, multi-instrumentalist Igor Stepniewski of Puts Marie, and percussionist
Lou Caramella of Palko!Muski put together an Italian-language electronic offering
from the underground Swiss music scene. This was recorded in September 2013 in
Portland and mixed by Jeff Saltzman (another Jackpot! alumni!). Its a fun listen!
Package design and layout are by noted graphic artist Mike King, and all the singles share
the same awesome die cut sleeves. I have to admit my studio walls are covered with Mikes
fine show posters, including his cover art for Elliott Smiths New Moon.
All these singles were digitally mastered by New York punk-recording legend, Don Fury.
The releases come with download codes, and if you miss the first 1000 copies they are
also available digitally from CD Baby, iTunes, Bandcamp, and ReverbNation. Upcoming
releases promise to be as varied and interesting, and not all from Portland. Grab a
doughnut, put on some vinyl, and enjoy.
<voodoodoughnut.com/recordings> -LC
AEA
N22 ribbon mic
When I think of AEA, I think of vintage-styled, classic ribbon mics. The AEA R-series harks back
to RCA ribbon mics in both looks and tonal qualities, while AEAs modern manufacturing approach
includes innovations in internal shockmounting and adding active electronics for higher output levels
and less sensitivity to preamp input impedance. The N22, in contrast, represents the first microphone
in AEAs Nuvo series the new generation of modern mics from AEA. The N22, built in Pasadena,
California, sports a distinctive look, with a sleek, 1.5 diameter cylindrical body, satin nickel finish,
and AEAs familiar cloth screening. Inside, the N22 sports AEAs trademark Big Ribbon technology
and clean JFET active circuitry. Phantom power is therefore required, and care was taken to ensure
that a typical USB audio interface could easily power the mic. Even as their entry-level microphone,
the N22 sports the fit and finish of a much higher priced studio mic. No corners were cut on the
build quality and finish, and the included shockmount provides a solid grip with a unique, low-profile
configuration.
AEAs design goal for the N22 was to bridge the gap between traditional ribbon mics, with their
classic, but sometimes mellow tone, and modern condensers, with their forward high-mids and
rolled-off bottom. On paper and in use, the N22 exhibits a slightly-hyped upper midrange, between
2 kHz and 6 kHz, and a bottom end that rolls off gently, starting at around 800 Hz. The top end also
falls off quickly, dropping about 10 dB from 5 kHz to 15 kHz. The overall frequency response is not
that different from a typical studio dynamic microphone, like a Shure SM57. The N22s ribbon motor,
however, brings a smoother flavor and a bidirectional figure-8 pattern, which provides a bit more
natural ambience to the recordings. High frequencies above 10 kHz are extremely attenuated, so the
N22 will never sound harsh or strident. Fabric screening protects the sensitive ribbon element, and
the N22 begs to be used up close, even for vocal and drum recording. As with all ribbon mics, care
should be taken to avoid direct windblasts towards the capsule, but high SPL sources can easily be
handled by this mic. A simple pop filter would protect the mic while recording vocals or kick drums.
I had the opportunity to put up the N22 in many sessions, using preamps from API, Chandler,
Focusrite, Manley, and Warm Audio, to capture acoustic guitar, electric guitar amps, male and female
vocals, drums, and piano. My first impression of the N22 was that it felt a bit thin and midrange
focused almost too narrow a frequency response for my taste. However, after playing around with
placement on various sources, I found that I could (and needed to) place the mic very close to most
sources. The N22s proximity boost in the low end is mitigated by its inherent frequency response,
so even acoustic guitars and vocals can be close-miced without fear of picking up too much low-
end mud, or overdriving the capsule. The slightly-boosted upper midrange coupled with the ribbons
smoothness brought a nice size and color to snare drums, vocals, acoustic guitar, and piano. I would
characterize the flavor as modern, but folksy, in that sources sound natural, but still present.
Overdubbing and recording multiple instruments on the same production all with the N22 resulted
in a coherent blend of sounds that didnt build up in any particular frequency range.
A pair of N22s would provide a great way to record a singer who also plays guitar. Simply position
each mic so that its null point (the side of the figure-8) rejects either the voice or the guitar, and
there should be a good deal of isolation for each source. The off-axis bleed and rear pickup of room
reflections actually add useful ambience and depth to the tracks. The N22 produced a useful and
unique sonic character for almost all the sources I tried it on. Im not sure I would want this as my
only mic, but the N22 paired with a fuller-range mic would be a very capable combo for almost any
recording setting. This mic does not compete with AEAs superb A840 [Tape Op #94] or R92 [#56]
mics, but the N22 definitely fills a void in the affordable all-around studio mic category. I would
compare the N22s usefulness (but not necessarily its sound) to the AKG C 414 and Shure KSM series.
The combination of its ribbon qualities and nicely-shaped frequency response makes the N22 a
winner in its category. ($899 street with case, shockmount, cover; www.ribbonmics.com)
Adam Kagan <www.TemptressThePlugin.com>
<<< Reviews from Page 58
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I am sure Im not alone in this. Ill bet there are
lots of audio professionals that would happily pay
for simple, stable tools. As a business model, a
company wouldnt be constantly reselling the same
basic product on a yearly basis, but their research
and development costs would be much lower and
theyd have a customer base of devoted users. At
the various trade shows we attend, I often hear a
piece of software or hardware described as a
Swiss Army Knife. Folks, the Swiss Army Knife is
a survival tool. Does anybody really
want to build a house or cook a
meal with a Swiss Army Knife?
Nope! I have a really nice Wusthof chefs knife I
use every night when I cook dinner, and Im
never tempted to upgrade or replace it. I simply
keep it sharp and it does its job.
Ive focused a bit more on the problem of
software here, but hardware designers, please
take note as well. There is a reason the
Teletronix LA-2A and Fairchild 660 limiters are
such popular tools. They sound great and
theyre very easy to use, with minimal knobs
and adjustments. Some current companies
understand this, but others are making their
version of Swiss Army Knives. Ive owned
some of these pieces of gear; but they never
see much action and I eventually sell them off
on eBay.
Give Me a Hammer
It was at a recent trade show, after a major
DAW manufacturer cancelled our meeting,
that I realized I was relieved to be off the
hook. I always enjoy meeting with this
person, and I use and like their products. But
I was relieved to not hear about some new
software/hardware improvement, one that I would
eventually be forced to purchase and painfully install. In most cases, I never look forward
to these software upgrades. The word upgrade is a bit of an oxymoron. We get a batch
of new features, but they are usually ones I dont care about. Everything on my computer
begins to run slower and gets a bit more buggy. Great. I usually have to update my OS, and
then other applications that previously worked fine suddenly seem to need to be changed
as well. To be fair, every second or third major update of my current DAW seems worthwhile.
I would rather pay my DAW provider a yearly fee to keep my current version working well
on my system, rather than constantly dealing with this. Sure, there are a few features that
seem nice, but in the end Id rather keep working with the tools I have rather than learn
new ones. Of course theres also the issue of all the purchased plug-ins that stop working.
Can I at least get those to keep working? I know it takes a ton of work and man-hours to
keep updating code to work with new operating systems, as well as other changes, and that
work has a very real cost attached to it. Nonetheless, as I was getting a demo of the latest
iZ Technology RADAR system at the same trade show, I couldnt help but be
attracted to its simplicity and single purpose utilitarianism.
Software companies and gear manufacturers please take note: I believe there is a market
for simpler, more stable, recording tools. Ive spent so much more money on (now obsolete)
digital recording software and hardware than I ever did on tape machine maintenance and
tape head relapping. I really like working on DAWs, but I wish my tools performed their
functions well and didnt require constant updates.
Lets take carpentry as an analogy. Ive been getting into woodworking again, several
decades after my last high school wood shop class. One of the primary tools for any carpenter
is a hammer. Once you find a hammer you like, the more you use it, the more you learn its
nuances and how to use it efficiently. After a year or so of using the same hammer, its like
an extension of your arm. I have a spokeshave of which I feel that way about. (This is a
carving tool that shaves thin slivers of wood.) It takes a bit to get the hang of it at first,
but now I know intimately how it will interact with a piece of wood, and with the grain
of the wood. I cant really say that about any audio software, as interfacing with it is a
constantly moving target. It would be like showing up to your carpentry job and being
given a slightly different hammer and spokeshave to work with every day.
Follow Johns wooden surfboard building adventures at <woodisgood4waves.tumblr.com>
by John Baccigaluppi
Just give me a
hammer.
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