Interviews
Sonicraft
by David Weiss
If the good men and women of NASA who put the Hubble Telescope together were ever to visit Sonicraft in Freehold, New Jersey, they just may come away ashamed of the shoddy work they'd done. That's...
Interviews
Jace Lasek / Dave Smith
by Martin Horn
My first encounter with the sprawling collection of keyboards, pianos, British-made guitar amplifiers and homemade walls that is Breakglass Studios happened when I had the opportunity to sit in on...
Behind the Gear
Mike Castoro: Behind the Gear with Wunder Audio
by Mike Jasper
Mike Castoro, the 43-year-old owner and creator of Wunder Audio, lives quietly with his wife and two kids in the northern hills of Austin, Texas. Originally from upstate New York, he spent his...
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Joe Boyd: Nick Drake, Fairport Convention, R.E.M., more...
by Larry Crane
When Joe Boyd's book White Bicycles came out last year, I was excited. Not only could I finally read more about this amazing record producer/label owner/manager, but there might be a chance to...
Bob Power: Seminal NYC Hip-Hop engineer
by Allen Farmelo
Bob Power is one of those names you might know not from reading liner notes, but instead from listening to vocal ad-libs on records he's produced or engineered. In the mid-eighties, Power found...
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End Rant
Our Fantasy Gear Wish List
by John Baccigaluppi, Larry Crane, Andy Hong
Here's a list of things that would make our recording lives easier. Larry's List Pro Tools LE that would run on my laptop without a piece of hardware attached, even if it didn't record, so I could...
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Gear Reviews See more →
Solo6 Be active monitors
by Focal | reviewed by Allen Farmelo
The French company Focal has dominated the audiophile speaker market since its inception in the 1970s. Today, Focal helps to form what I consider to be a vanguard of studio monitor designers who are...
VMX tube mic
by Brauner | reviewed by Joel Hamilton
I have always been curious about the Brauner microphones. I have seen the name for a while now, and the fact that Klaus Heyne got involved with this company, when any company would probably be glad to...
TM-1 & TM-2 tube mics
by Pearlman Church | reviewed by Mark Warren
There are legends in microphone technology, and there are legends in microphone technology. Everyone has surely heard about the legendary U 47 microphone, but have you heard about the U 47 Church...
KikBrik
by Generator LLC | reviewed by Tony SanFilippo
Bass drums are a strange thing. They are big and can be unruly, or worse yet, tiny-sounding if packed with a bunch of crap. They have a lot of interior space that is reflective and rounded. And they...
SP1 large-diaphragm condenser mic
by MCA | reviewed by Terry Setter
You knew it. You knew that with all the microphones on the market, there had to be at least one cheapo Chinese mic that stands head and shoulders above the rest. You were right! Interestingly, this...
M 160 & M 130 ribbon mics
by Beyerdynamic | reviewed by Scott Craggs
Does the Beyer M 160 even need a review? Surely everyone knows by now that this is the mic Andy Johns used to record John Bonham's drums on "When The Levee Breaks". Does anything else need be said? I...
B:Assmaster distortion pedal
by Malekko | reviewed by Pete Weiss
Distortion aficionados, take note-Malekko has served up the indie-stompbox scene with a doozie. The B:Assmaster is a contemporary tribute to the exquisitely rare Maestro Bass Brassmaster, a '70s-era...
CL2 Pencil Condenser Mic
by Samson Audio | reviewed by Dana Gumbiner
Here's a couple of new and very affordable mics from Samson. First up, the CL2s are sold as a matched pair of small-diaphragm pencil-style condensers with high-pass filters and 10 dB pads. The mics...
VR88 Velocity Ribbon Mic
by Samson Audio | reviewed by Dana Gumbiner
Here's a couple of new and very affordable mics from Samson. First up, the CL2s are sold as a matched pair of small-diaphragm pencil-style condensers with high-pass filters and 10 dB pads. The mics...
NRV10 mixer/interface
by M-Audio | reviewed by Andy Hong
When I first saw the NRV10 at the NAMM show in January, I said out loud, "Duh! Why didn't anyone else think of doing this?" The sucker is an analog mixer and multichannel audio interface in one. It...
Ellipse 8 iDP studio monitor TS212 iDP subwoofer
by Tannoy | reviewed by Andy Hong
I love the Bag End M-6 Time-Align monitors (Tape Op #50) that I have in my living room for their accurate imaging; these were my first long-term experience with coaxial drivers featuring a tweeter...
Reveal 6D active nearfields
by Tannoy | reviewed by Josh Peck
When Andy first asked me to take a listen to the new Tannoy Reveal 6D studio monitors, I was eager to hear what improvements had been made from its predecessor the Reveal Active, a speaker that I...
Monitor ST
by Dangerous Music | reviewed by Larry Crane
Probably more than ever, recording studios have seen a need for monitoring different inputs and routing these signals to a variety of speakers. In my studio, we monitor the DAW, console LR, console...
R-1 ribbon mic
by SE Electronics | reviewed by Andy Hong
My guess is that a lot of people considering the purchase of the SE R-1 will wonder how it compares to the Royer R-121. Both feature a rectangular ribbon that's offset-mounted within the magnet...
RM-5C ribbon mic
by Telefunken | USA | reviewed by Barry Hufker
Students enrolled in the Audio Production program at Webster University, St. Louis and I had the great experience of evaluating the new Telefunken USA ribbon microphone, the RM-5C. The students...
TS-1 small-diaphragm condenser mic
by Chameleon Labs | reviewed by John Baccigaluppi
The sonic combination of a small-capsule microphone diaphragm with a tube amplifier can be a thoroughly pleasing one for many applications. The high-frequency definition and quick transient-response...
SLD Total 44.1 ReFill
by Sounds Like Drums | reviewed by Jeff Elbel
Michael Moushon and Glenn Forsythe are Boston-based musicians with lengthy studio tenures and expertise in development of music production tools. The pair undertook a major endeavor with Sounds Like...