You told me you started out on the Tascam 144. What was next?
I went to a 4-track reel-to-reel, a Tascam 3440 1/4", with the accompanying board. I was recording demos for bands to present to producers and label people, but the bug, the bite, was so severe by then. I remember getting the first ADAT and being so bummed out because the analog 1/4" sounded so much better.
When was this?
Late '80s. The digital age had come upon us. But I was using drum machines to write songs and stuff, and it still was a bit of a cocoon of home recording. I think that when people start to make a room happen and record real drums and stuff like that, it's such a baptism by fire. People don't realize it's a lot harder to make it all fit together when you're a novice. You might have the right mics and a room that sounds decent — but if you don't understand phase relationships or overlapping instrument frequencies they can really create a dangerous overload of certain frequency ranges, if you don't sculpt them properly. I remember being very daunted by that.
So you got the ADAT. What was your next purchase?
After that I found this combination rehearsal space and recording studio up on the top floor of this building, where these guys had built a sort of control room. It was just a glorified rehearsal space, one room, but I found places where I could hide amps in between wall structures and stuff. That was my first foray into recording other people. And that was with the quintessential Mackie and a pair of ADATS. Again, apologies to all my guinea pig clients. Sometimes it just clicked and sometimes it just didn't. But I felt so at home. I got to work with bands, and after a while some of the records I was doing started to come out, like the Freeze and Gang Green. I was like, 'Wow, you can make a big noise!' I remember this guy Mark Cutler, the genius of Providence, who writes 200 songs a year and they're all good. I got to do a record with him and it was just so much fun.
Do you have any pieces of gear or mics that you can't live without?
I have a pair of Neve 1064s that are just so trustworthy. And I have to say that in this world, Manley makes new gear that really works. I bought a Massive Passive, and holy shit! I bought an SE C-2 compressor, it's a one rack space, kind of like the electronics of two 1176s crammed into one. It's a stereo compressor with Neve output trans- formers, so you get kind of a Neve line out thing going on.
What about your board and tape machines?
I got the best I could afford, a Neotek Elite. It's clean, flexible, very dependable, the EQ is damn good, as well as the preamps. I still try to print on analog first most times. It's an MTR-90 Otari, it's a workhorse. When I work just in the analog domain, it never fails to be like, "Wow, this sounds so nice!" And I'm a latecomer to the digital world, but I have to say, with Pro Tools and the automation — it is nice to work on a mix and sit back and listen to the mix when it's going down instead of a physical obstacle course with different people manning mutes and fader levels and sends.
And you mix down to 1/2"?
Half-inch, yeah. That's another one of my favorite pieces of gear. It's an Ampex 102 1/2", it's the flagship of 1/2" mastering decks out there.
How do you like to record drums?
I wish I had the absolute fearless commitment to say, "You know what, let's make these drums three tracks and a couple stereo." But I tend to over-record for the safety net factor. I will commit three mics to one kick. Inside an ATM-25 is my favorite. Outside, away from the blast hole, I'll try a Royer 121. And the NS-10 speaker as a microphone combined does really work — it's really hefty on the sub-octave shit. After that it's pretty standard — Beta 57 on the top of the snare, AKG-451 underneath the snare. I love 451s for overheads. Although a stereo Royer SF-12 for overheads for the right kind of drummer can't be beat. I love the Stapes mics, too. They're omnis, and small, and they rock on room sounds, guitars — they're just uncanny. They're a little fizzy, but that's kind of what you want on cymbals and stuff. At $200 for a matching pair you can't go wrong with them. And I try not to compress much to tape. But room sounds I'm not afraid to let a stereo 1176 situation make the room mics kind of spice it up a little going to tape. There're a lot of old school applications that I still feel comfortable with. If it means putting a t-shirt over a snare drum for a song, or the guy barely hits a cymbal, ever, so when he does you're allowed to compress it so much it goes, "Bwhooooshhhhh!" I still feel like there's so many old school records that have that stuff that still sound so modern and juicy.
Like the drum sounds on Led Zeppelin records!
