Let's begin by talking about some of your current projects. How much of the tracking did you do for the most recent Tortoise and The Sea & Cake records at your new studio [Soma]?
All of the recording and mixing for both records was done there, with the exception of a few little bits of Tortoise material that came from tapes we had made over the last couple of years. And Sam's [Prekop, The Sea & Cake] vocals, which he did at home. Other than that, all of the tracking and mixing was done at the new studio.
So, it's not like the big trend nowadays to buy your overdub studio, then record your drums at a bigger studio. These records weren't done like that?
No. Tortoise, in particular, has grown into this process where we are essentially writing and arranging in the studio. We tend to work better when we have immediate feedback from the recording environment. Even though I find that to be the case, we were a bit more prepared than usual this time around and had several ideas that were already pretty well formed when we went in. But I would have to say that two thirds of it was actually written in the studio.
How about The Sea & Cake record?
Musically, it was much more prepared, pretty much ready to go. By the time we started recording, all of the basic tracks and arrangements were written.
I imagine that's what inspired you to build your new studio, the need to record your own bands. Were there other issues involved?
Well, that was part of it, obviously. But above and beyond that, I wanted to put together a studio that would be accessible and useful for a lot of people, and that would have a wide appeal in terms of equipment and facilities.
What are you speaking of in particular? What formats are you using there?
Primarily 2-inch, 24- (and 16-track) along with Pro Tools 24 MixPlus. Those formats seem to the best solutions for most people's projects. For people who don't want to do a project here from start to finish, I think it functions very well on either end of the process. For example, the live room is quite nice, so you could record your drums, etc. here and take them home to work with. Conversely, we have interesting signal processing and mixing facilities, so you could bring in tracks that were generated elsewhere to take advantage of the mixdown situation here. I think making these options available to people is very important, and I'm quite pleased with the way everything has worked out so far. Another thing about the studio is that the whole design is very modular, so it allows you to configure the signal flow depending on which platform you're working with. Above and beyond that, we have a very unique collection of instruments: just about every kind of acoustic, electric, and electronic keyboard, a robust selection of modular analog synthesizers, heaps of other instruments, and a fine arsenal of outboard. I think that having all these things available, coupled with the modular design of the studio, makes it very easy to get in, get comfortable, and produce interesting work.
So, in building your studio, were there any lessons you learned through mistakes you'd want to correct if you had a second chance?
There were no major snags, though it took far longer to finish than I could have ever imagined. In a roundabout way, we had some of the experience of other people to build upon... specifically, one of the people who helped me [Bill Skibbe] worked over at Electrical [Audio, Steve Albini's studio]. He helped build that studio from the ground up, and had been through a lot of these issues already. He knew what to avoid, what to do from the outset, and it was extremely helpful. So in the end, I feel I was really lucky. Everything turned out great.
That's really good. I'm in the process of building right now, so this is a particularly important question that I'm asking everyone who has built a studio.
I obsessed about every little detail for a year and a half before any construction began. So by the time it got to putting everything in place, it all went very smoothly.
As far as the space goes, was it a space that you had previously picked out or did you move in there with the studio?
It was presented to me as an option in '98, which I decided upon almost immediately. It's in a neighborhood where a lot of us have lived for a long time. It's a building that's owned by a friend, and the space was just a vacant storefront, basically, forever and ever. So there was a lot of demolition involved, getting all of the old drop ceilings and wood paneling and all kinds of crap out of there. But from the beginning I knew it would be the location. Funnily enough, it was the first place Tortoise ever rehearsed, back in '91.
What neighborhood is that?
The neighborhood is usually called Wicker Park, though technically we're in the Ukrainian Village.
What's the story of Soma?
It's not really much of a story. It started out as something not very serious at all, and evolved into something a bit more serious through the years. I guess in the beginning, around '94, it was an Otari MX-5050 1/2" 8-track and a Mackie 1604 set up in a far from ideal space. The next major step equipment-wise was the Pro Tools III system.
So you were using a 16-bit system there?
Yeah, that was back in '96, and right around then I got the control room a bit more together. This was when I was working at the loft space. It was very gradual, putting the whole thing together.
Since you have used Pro Tools for a number of years, how do you handle backing up data for clients?
We do all of the backups onto DDS-3 4mm data tapes.
Could you explain that format?
It's basically just a tape that is optimized for data, even though it is in the same enclosure as a DAT.
Is it similar to AIT? I use those and that's all I'm really familiar with.
I believe the technology is pretty much the same, but there are several different flavors of DDS, and the 3 gives you about 18 GB on one tape, and transfers are typically 60 MB/minute, which isn't too bad.
Yeah, that's very good actually.
It's no problem to run a backup or restore at the end of the day, though it wouldn't be good for immediate restoration of large files.
Are you using something like Mezzo to keep track of everything?
Retrospect.
Are you satisfied with Retrospect?
Very. I've never encountered Mezzo but I've used Retrospect since the beginning and I think it's wonderful.
When you mix in Pro Tools are you sending out to a console or are you mixing solely in Pro Tools?
99.9% of the time the signal goes through the console.
That's the technique I find best as well. I often do the same.
It's so much easier to have an EQ in front of you. It's nice to have the tactile sense of working on the console, where everything is easy to see. And in general, I do prefer using analog signal processing, but they are certain things you can do in DSP that can't be done any other way.
Indeed, the Digidesign BNR plug in is just great. I've also found the Waves L-1 plug in to be a very valuable tool.
As far as effects go, I'm a big fan of Ina-GRM's GRM Tools.
What do they do?
There are several different modules, all slightly esoteric: A linear phase equalizer, a Doppler effect, and a "shuffler", which is essentially granular synthesis. There's also a real nice granular stand- alone called MacPod. Very simple, but it sounds great, and is perfect for processing single files.
What's some of your favorite gear that other people might not know about?
Something I picked up recently that I've been very fond of is this box called the Roland Dimension D.
What exactly does it do for you?
I suppose they marketed it as a "chorus," though it's clearly much more than that. It does funny things with phase, so I like it because of the way it changes the stereo image of the input. It's very useful if you're trying to get something to have it's own place in a mix without resorting to time based solutions, but it has artifacts that are really bad on certain things. For instance, you can't use it on guitars at all. But for strings and vocals, it's amazing.
Any other pieces of gear?
Well, I love all mechanical reverbs: Plates, springs, and chambers.
Do you have a plate at Soma?
Yes, three full size E.M.T. 140s.
I think people are going to start to seeing this as a Chicago thing: You have Bob Weston [#18] and Steve Albini [#87], who are some of the biggest proponents of ambience record- ing. There's Jim O'Rourke, who in a previous issue stated how he hates digital reverb. Are you also not a fan of the digital reverb?
No, I do like it sometimes. It can work really well on certain things. It's all about placement. For instance, I really like the Lexicon PCM60. Older, low sample rate/low bit depth digital reverb sounds great to me. Lots of coloration.
As far as old Lexicons go, I don't think there's been a better delay made since the PCM42.
I concur. The same is true of its little sister, the PCM41.
Now, you're known as someone who's very into old synths and drum machines. Has anything caught your eye that's come out in recent years?
Several things. In particular, there's a new modular system called Wiard made by Grant Richter up in Milwaukee. He plays in a band called F/i, and he is an electrical engineer by trade. His facility with analog circuit design is just amazing.
Is this a modular analog synthesizer?
