Interviews
By Dawn Landes, Aya Muto
Linda Perry had her first hit with "What's Up?" in 1993, as lead singer and songwriter for 4 Non Blondes. Since then, she's worked as a producer and songwriter for numerous artists, helping shape the sounds of P!nk, Christina Aguilera, Alicia Keys, Adele, and Dolly Parton, to name...
Interviews
In the alternate reality where everyone still reads recording credits off of their album sleeves as the record spins, we would see th...
Interviews
Interviews
Interviews
One of electronic music's prevailing visionaries; Amon Tobin began producing in the south coastal town of Brighton, England, debuting with the album Bricolage in 1997 – a seamless union of downtempo jazz/jungle fusions. It was the beginning of a career defined by a past-meets-future aesthetic, deliberating on the nature of composition itself. Pioneering albums such as Out from Out Where, Foley Room and ISAM were prime examples of Tobin decontextualising the listener's preconceived ideas of how electronic music is made – building sound sculptures to both confound and inspire. Tobin's latest album, released under the moniker Figueroa, is no exception. Following his recent rock-oriented Only Child Tyrant project, the Brazilian-born protagonist ghosts reality once more, building acoustic architectures entirely from electronic foundations. An astonishingly seamless emulation of psychedelic folk, The World as We Know It is another of Tobin's mischievous deceptions, where the familiar and non-familiar are indivisible, leaving the listener perplexed yet engaged.
In 2010 on St. Patrick's day, my friend, Patrick Sansone (of Wilco), took me to watch Liam Hayes perform at Lincoln Hall in Chicago. We were introduced after the show. I had no idea at the time how expansive Liam's career in music had been, or what a prolific songwriter he was. Later, he would hand me a pile of burned CDs with over 100 home demos of unrecorded songs, which started a musical collaboration between us. The albums that Liam has released under the moniker Plush are legendary. Liam has been a good friend to me throughout the years, and I was excited to sit down and talk with him about his approach to record making and songwriting.
A drummer can make or break a session, and I have always loved getting their perspectives on the recording process as well as the variety of roles they play in the studio. After several solo records and appearances on records by Dave Holland, Brittany Howard, The Fearless Flyers, Chris Potter, Norah Jones, and Paul Simon – to name a few – drummer and composer Nate Smith certainly has perspective to offer and some great stories to tell.
Well-known as a pianist, vocalist, and songwriter, Harry Connick Jr. found himself with a cancelled tour, left at home seeking "comfort, peace, and truth throughout the process of making music." He played all the instruments and recorded himself at his home studio and then mixed it with longtime producer/engineer Tracey Freeman. The resulting album, Alone With My Faith, comes across like a healing balm for these times. As Harry says, "Recording was what was necessary… to help guide me through the uncharted odyssey in which we all unexpectedly found ourselves."
KRK’s 10S powered subwoofer is the company’s latest innovation aimed at enhancing their ROKIT G4 [Tape Op #137] and V-Series [#118] monitoring systems. Built on KRK’s legacy for sonic accuracy and performance, this powerful but compact subwoofer utilizes a custom-voiced, glass-aramid woofer,...
I bought my first large-diaphragm condenser mic in 2004 for about $100: an Apex 420 that (along with many inexpensive mics of that era) was built on the same circuit as the MXL 2001. These accessible FET and real transformer-based condensers included a smaller-sized (32 mm) version of the K67 (34...
With the era of analog tape slipping ever further into the past, growing numbers of newer-generation music recordists have had precious little experience with actual tape. Analog tape, though still available, is becoming a mythical, magical audio cure-all from the olden days. Ask someone to...
Engineers use large-diaphragm condenser mics to make their records sound alive. There are all sorts of high-end and vintage models that are known for producing a certain vibrance, silkiness, or edge. But sometimes you simply need something that will get the job done. MXL mics are awesome in that...
When I purchased an unloaded API 1608 [Tape Op #81] console last year, I immediately began searching for a 500 Series EQ that was versatile and affordable, with exceptional sonics. Enter Trident Audio Developments’ 80B 500 Series EQ: a modern replica of the reknowned Trident Series 80B console’s...
Acon Digital's Acoustica (not to be confused with the company Acustica Audio) is a powerful audio editing, podcast creation, mastering, and audio restoration editor. The company also offers excellent plug-ins (that can run as VST, VST3, AAX, AU, or within Acoustica). Invariably an Acoustica...
Ah, vintage recording equipment. Where did this world come from? In the late-‘60s and into the ‘70s, cheaper electronics and manufacturing filled the market of pro audio. As the ‘70s rolled along, people like Dan Alexander and Allen Sides [Tape Op #106] sought out the best of the previous...
Reverb can be a divisive and personal issue among engineers and musicians. Everyone has a favorite, and people are absurdly particular and become oddly attached to what works for them, myself included. One of the many advantages of coming up at the venerable Ultrasuede Studios was that we had an...
Headphones, headphones, headphones – I’ve got ‘em hanging from the walls, equipment racks, and underneath desks. I’ve tried in-ears, planars, open-backs, and closed-backs… you name it, but I’m a loudspeaker dude through and through. I can remember not too long ago when mixing in the box was taboo...
Low end management is the bane of every mixer’s existence. Too much low end can eat up all the space in your mix, and too little makes a mix sound thin and amateur. Depending on your mixing environment and your speakers’ frequency response, managing low end can feel like guesswork. Do I know what...
In case you’ve missed it, Redco is making two inexpensive tools that will turn some blank space in your DB-25 patchbay into something you can actually use. First: a 4x2 mult in a DB-25 backshell for $30 – plug this into the back of a D-sub based patchbay and you have instant mult points. Infinitely...
Pocket-sized synthesizers and drum machines have become popular in recent years. Mixing several of these portable instruments together is fun and can spark creativity. If you are looking for a budget-friendly mixer with a small footprint for your pocket electronics, you may be interested in the...
Yes, the Electron Fuzz Custom Studio will melt your face off. No, it is not just an average fuzz box. Yes, it is badass. No, I don’t want to give this one back. I was introduced to Retro Mechanical Labs via the world of Eurorack, and, to be honest, the eye candy of their boxes made me swoon. Based...
Once there was an audio software company – now also making studio furniture – that decided to develop a coaxial monitor with a Barefoot wizard named Thomas. If you’re going to make fun of people for dreaming, let me stop you right there: Output’s virtual instruments and effects rule, everyone I...
Inspired Acoustics might not be a household name in the music industry, but they have been producing minutely detailed, pipe organ sample libraries since 2005 (used by top tier composers), and are part of an acoustic design and consulting company, so they are quite familiar with how sound works in...
Live 11 is here, with an abundance of new features and enhancements that distinguish Ableton’s DAW and production environment as indispensably unique, even as it deploys elements such as take comping and linked-track editing that brings it into parity with Avid’s Pro Tools [Tape Op #126] and other...
This is such an interesting time to be making records. Not only has the business changed entirely under our feet, but the broader iterations in technology we’ve witnessed in the last 20 years have also continued to inform and enable the process in ways the celebrated forbearers of analog audio...
Nothing captures the boom of a kick drum’s resonant head or the growl of a bass cab quite like a Neumann U 47fet [Tape Op #108]. A well-placed dynamic mic will capture the attack and the mids, but the low and high frequencies usually suffer. Whenever I work in a studio with a deep mic collection,...
The opportunity to play with this one-of-a-kind microphone from Scope Labs has been an absolute pleasure. Their introductory product, the Periscope, stands in a category of its own because of its unique look, build, sound, and impact on recordings. This Finland-based company has already found a...
These days it’s hard to put in perspective how revolutionary the Fairlight CMI (Computer Music Instrument) was as a musical instrument when it was introduced in the early 1980s. A brief history lesson: The CMI was the first commercially available additive digital synthesizer and sampler famously...
Focusrite has expanded their Pro series of audio interfaces with the new Red 8Line; because of its name, you’d be forgiven for thinking the Red 8Line was a simple 8-channel line level interface. Nothing could be further from the truth! Yes, there are 8 channels of analog line level inputs and...
My recording world began via the cassette tape format. I had saved money to buy a cheap home stereo cassette tape recorder, and I’d borrow my dad’s deck for recording my sound-on-sound experiments back in the late-‘70s and early-‘80s. In the mid-‘80s, my parents and friends conspired to buy me a...
As a longtime electric guitarist, studio operator, and fan of well-done coffee table books, I must admit to having a somewhat embarrassingly sprawling collection of the latter. There’s no shortage of comprehensive, attractive books on ear-and-eye candy-like guitars, keyboards, amps, and yes,...
Apogee Digital has released a simple, stellar-sounding channel strip plug-in. I’m guessing that ECS stands for Equalizer, Compressor, and Saturator, as those are the tools equipped in this channel strip. The EQ is a 3-band affair, with Lo Shelf, High Shelf, a sweepable midrange with a tight or wide...
When I find a microphone I enjoy, I tend to stick with it for a long time – especially in a specific application. So something I have not done in a few years is audition a new close source, dynamic microphone. But being familiar with the quality of beyerdynamic mics, I saw the TG I51 and thought it...
Thomas Kristiansson has been producing audio gear in Sweden for the past 20 years under the Vintagedesign and TK Audio brands. In recent years, the TK Audio line has defined itself with builds that offer up some unique features in otherwise familiar-feeling interfaces. The T-Komp is available as a...
I’ve written about vocoders in previous issues of Tape Op, so I won’t go into a lot of theory here, but check this review for more of the basic operational theory of vocoding. Arturia has recently released two new vocoders to their line. The first is a software plug-in vocoder modeled after the...
Competition has skyrocketed in desktop interfacing, with multiple manufacturers developing proprietary DSP-powered plug-in technology while simultaneously pushing better quality into smaller, feature-laden boxes. These companies are scrambling to not only meet demand, but also to edge out rivals...