Interviews
By Mr. Bonzai
S. Husky Höskulds is a very gifted engineer, mixer and sound designer. Born in Iceland, he studied audio engineering at the University of California in Los Angeles, and worked as an assistant engineer at several top L.A. studios. For a number of years, he assisted the producer/engineer team...
Interviews
Discovered by the Dutch on Easter Sunday, 1722, the aptly named Easter Island (Isla De Pascua) is considered to be one of the most ...
Interviews
Chris Butler, a Cleveland native living in Hoboken, New Jersey, is known as the pen and the guitar behind The Waitresses' eight...
Interviews
Interviews
The name Aspen Pittman is synonymous with vacuum tubes. But it's one thing to hawk a product, and another to understand the physics behind its performance. While working as a salesman in the first Guitar Center store, Pittman noticed that players (and techs) didn't really know why there were wide sonic differences between identical tube amps. He suspected the tubes, but there was little known then about matching power tube pairs or selecting prime preamp tubes for replacement. His curiosity eventually led to inventing a whole new standard for matching guitar amp tubes — one that works. Today, you'll hardly find a professional guitarist who doesn't have a set of Groove Tubes in his amp. Likewise, Pittman's Groove Tube uniquely designed pro audio products are found in world-class facilities around the globe. We caught up with Aspen Pittman at this year's TapeOpCon. We wanted to know about a little more behind the gear...
The interview with Luis Lahav was scheduled for a Wednesday evening. I arrived at his home studio in Herzliya, north of Tel Aviv and got my laptop ready to record. I was just about to ask some questions when he asked me to have a listen to a couple of songs from a young artist he's currently working with. It was 8 pm... six hours later he was still showing me production alternatives, describing his latest piano recording technique and even asking me to lay down some Wurlitzer parts! This is a perfect example of Luis' passion. With his name on so many records considered Israeli classics, he still has the energy of a kid who just got his first 4-track recorder, doing his first gig. In his case, it has been more than thirty-five years since he actually did that first gig, and the artist was none other than The Boss himself, Bruce Springsteen. So I had to come back another day. Luckily this time, his DAW was being maintained and he had no other choice but to sit down for a chat!
The Blow is the power of cocaine, sex and fistfights delivered by the gentle exhale from a mouth onto your skin. A blow can be hard, as in a punch to the gut, or soft like the breath of your lover. Khaela Maricich and Jona Bechtolt's whole damn world is "Invisible Ink" multilevel meaning. They tell stories about crushes, desire and heartbreak in such an original way that you are forced to realize you've been listening in a desert- you needed them. You just didn't know it yet. The music sounds like dance music, or electro-pop delivered by people who had something different to say. The shows are a performance, but still solid and musical. Their new album, Paper Television, is out on K Records.
All I want is a stereo mic adapter that's solid, flexible, and reliable. There are some expensive ones out there, but I want one I can count on for live work or rowdy punk bands. I was going through the Shure catalog when I stumbled upon the A27M. Most retailers don't even know it exists, so I...
This DVD pretty much saved my ass on a recent Pro Tools project that required way more editing than actual mixing. Let's start by saying that I'm not really a fan of PT, despite being an ex-employee of Digidesign. As I've mentioned in the past, I think the interface is archaic and forces you into a...
This is one of those "why didn't they think of this sooner?" devices. If you use any type of DB25 connections-analog or digital-in your studio, you need to check out the BOB-32. Personally, I hate DB25 to fan snakes. They never spread enough to connect to my gear. I end up patching to the snake...
If gear design were a sport, I'd be calling for steroid testing of Wade Goeke, as he seems to hit a home run every time he's at bat. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say his Germanium Tone Control is the most innovative new EQ design I've seen. It has germanium transistors instead of silicon...
This latest entry into the portable recording market tries to be all things to all people. The H4 is first and foremost a lightweight, field stereo recorder. Its built-in electret condenser mics are positioned in an X/Y stereo pattern and deliver good sound quality. An included foam windscreen will...
Let me start this rant of a review by saying that endeavors like this one warm my recording heart. I love it when I meet someone that loves recording as much as I do, and in this case, the expression is through the modifying and "re-engineering" of Oktava microphones. I have always had a soft spot...
This past summer, I helped mix Nedelle's latest home-recorded album at JB's Hangar Studios through his Neve broadcast console onto tape. On the morning of the first day, John strapped a Thermionic Culture Phoenix stereo tube compressor across the stereo drums coming out of Pro Tools. It sounded...
Lately, legendary audio innovator Bob Heil has become more well-known for his institutional sound reinforcement and broadcast products than for creations such as the Heil Talk Box and Grateful Dead-optimized PA systems. But I recently checked out a couple of Heil microphones courtesy of TransAudio...
While appearing on a couple of radio shows at two different studios, I found myself amazed by the sound of my voice through two well-known broadcast mics: the Shure SM7 and Sennheiser MD 421. I'm a male baritone, and both mics sounded full and rich on my voice, without a hint of boominess. I was...
I've learned to really respect John Peluso-designed microphones. John Peluso too. He's taken the plunge into ribbons with his brand new R14. He's not new to ribbon technology however. He's been repairing ribbon mics for years. He repaired his first ribbon, an RCA 77DX, back in 1967 and has been...
When I first pulled the R92 out of the box, I was shocked at how light it was. In fact, my first reaction was disappointment because I have such a strong association with heavy being better. Once I learned what this mic is all about, I realized its light weight is a feature and part of its...
For my next project on the RADAR V, I recorded local artist Backseat Radio at 192 kHz. We multitracked "Throat", a guitar-driven pop tune with Wurlitzer, Syndrums, additional guitars, and vocals overdubbed on top of drums, bass, and rhythm guitar. Like in previous mix sessions, I was amazed by how...
Subtitled The Studio Equipment and Techniques Used to Create Their Classic Albums, this 540-page hardbound book arrives in a pseudo EMI tape box and is heavier than a 2" reel of tape. It has three sections: I -covering Abbey Road and the people involved; II -the equipment used there; III -effects,...
Here's something that all of us could use-acoustic treatment that's portable, adjustable, affordable, and extremely easy to set up and use. The Reflexion is an arc-shaped acoustic filter that surrounds the back side of a mic. An integrated mount allows you to attach it to a mic stand (or any thin...
Phillip Victor Bova, along with his wife Janet Kirby and their son, Philip Shaw Bova, have a recording studio called Bova Sound in Ottawa, Canada, and their company Sage Electronics makes wonderful audio products, sold directly. Already familiar with them through the purchase of my indispensable...
Love 'em or hate 'em, digital guitar amp simulators and modeler plug-ins have become a big part of our lives. While we all love the convenience and versatility of amp simulators, none of us feel totally satisfied with the realism or sonic quality of such devices. Sterile, crispy, thin,...
Elsewhere in this issue is my review of the Groove Tubes MS encoder, which was designed to be an M/S to L/R encoder for recording with Mid/Side microphones. The Sonic Orbit accomplishes the same task, but unlike the rackmount encoder from GT, Peter Engh's is 100% passive and is enclosed in a...
I've been a computer geek for 27 years now! Yikes! And during that time, I've gone through many computer keyboards... from IBM mainframe terminals to fold-outs for Pocket PCs... and everything in between. Honestly, I've probably owned three or four dozen keyboards or computers by now. My current...
In last issue's "Gear Geeking" column, I mentioned how producer and Tape Op contributor Thom Monahan (Devendra, Vetiver, The Pernice Brothers, The Capital Years, etc.) turned me on to the plug-ins developed by Wave Arts, an acoustics and audio technology company founded by a fellow graduate of the...