Interviews
By Daniel Keller
There used to be a television show called What's My Line, wherein panelists interviewed a contestant and had to guess his or her occupation. Michael Beinhorn would have been an ideal contestant. The producer behind some of rock music's heaviest artists could easily pass as a college literature...
Article
I've been a fan of the husband and wife group VIVA VOCE since I first heard their second album, Lovers, Lead the Way, in 2003. ...
Interviews
Roll Music Systems has been slowly bringing out pro audio products since 2003. Starting as a small recor...
Interviews
Interviews
Early in 2010 I got to work with Bob Clearmountain while he mixed the recent Bryan Ferry album, Olympia, with producer Rhett Davies at (my long-time mentor) Hugh Padgham's Sofa Sound studio in West London. One of the world's most successful mix engineers, Bob invented the concept of the specialist hit mix engineer — having mixed anyone who's anyone from the '70s to the present day, there would be plenty to talk about! Unfortunately, by the time we all had a good handle on the session itself, there wasn't time to put together the landmark interview that I was hoping for. Consider this more like studio gossip with Bob. These were topics that came up in conversation that we're printing with his permission. Bob is one of the nicest people I have ever had the pleasure to work with, and I hope that we will be able to give him more thorough coverage in the near future.
Twenty years after his entry into the Minneapolis music scene, national success with his band Polara, opening his Flowers Studio and mid-wifing countless projects ranging from local demos to national-release works by luminaries such as The Replacements, Golden Smog, and Brian Setzer, Ed Ackerson is releasing his first solo album. The impressive Ed Ackerson contains twelve songs ranging stylistically, but all featuring Ackerson production trademarks: clear vocals, shimmering guitars, and enough tricks in the background to keep your interest.
Roll Music Systems has been slowly bringing out pro audio products since 2003. Starting as a small recording studio in Minneapolis, this company (Justin Ulysses Morse and John Sommer, aka Johnny Smokes) has some unique and excellent gear.
For ADD readers: Yes, you can build your own 1176 clone. No, Universal Audio won’t sue you. Yes, it sounds good. No, it doesn’t sound like the current UA 1176LN. No, it isn’t easy. Yes, it’s incredibly rewarding. Yes, I would do it again, but you’re not me, and I’m not you. So please read the...
Bock AudioSo many microphones... I once had a friend tell me, “Every mic, no matter what kind or what condition, will be better than every other mic on at least one thing. Your job is to figure out and to know what that one thing is.” Sage wisdom. A large part of our daily work comes down to a...
Joel Hamilton and Allen Farmelo each spent extended time working with the AnaMod AM670, a solid-state recreation of the Fairchild 670 Limiter, one of the most revered audio components ever produced. For the review, the two sat down together and discussed their experiences with the unit. Here is an...
People used to find excitement in planning new gear additions for their racks. Now people get even more excited about acquiring new plug-ins for their computers. Strangely enough, the plug-ins that create the most excitement seem to be the ones that emulate actual analog rack gear. I’ve seen just...
There seems to be a new trend developing in audio converter design. Up until recently, engineers considered converters to be part of the digital or computer side of their rig as opposed to the analog side. Concurrently, just like the computers they're directly connected to, converters become...
Inward Connections from Los Angeles has been quietly producing ultra-high-end tube and solid-state mic preamps, compressors, EQs, and summing amps for about 20 years. The now legendary Vac Rac modular processing system and the TSL-3 stereo tube limiter grace the racks of top engineers and studios...
Miktek, located in Nashville, TN, is relatively new on the scene, but their microphones are making a big impression. The C7 is their large-diaphragm FET condenser mic, which is aimed at the very crowded studio vocal microphone market. Looking like the typical studio vocal mic, the C7 houses a dual,...
I love this mic. There - I did it. I didn't bury the lead under my normal lengthy preamble. In fact, I'm going to do the review backwards. The Advanced Audio CM-28 is an amazing deal. It provides wonderful versatility, great balance and detail, and is one of the few SDC tube mics that comes with a...
WaveMachine LabsDrum replacement software can seem like so much digital voodoo, adding to the “Photoshop-ification” of music production, but really it’s just an extension of drum enhancement techniques that stretch back to the introduction of multitrack. Drum re-amping and overdubbing have been...
Shockmounts suck. Right after headphones, they are the bane of any studio owner’s existence. Every time I walk back into the studio, I find broken headphones and at least one shockmount that has broken or fallen apart. The classic Neumann basket types are the worst. They constantly fall apart, and...
Sometimes a very simple basic product that does a mundane but necessary function is a much more satisfying purchase than the latest compressor or plug-in that everybody’s raving about. The JZ PF is one such product — the best, most well-designed, and well-built pop filter I’ve ever used. I saw this...
My relationship to pitch-correction software is complicated, as it probably is for many of our readers. On one hand, it’s just a tool, like any of the other behind-the-curtain, smoke-and-mirror tools we employ on a daily basis. On the other hand, pitch correction is the Devil’s work, since it...
Like it or not, Pro Tools is the closest thing to a standard in the world of DAWs; most every commercial studio needs to run Pro Tools, and if you’re working at a certain level, you need Pro Tools|HD. So, about 7 years ago, I upgraded my Digi 002 (Tape Op #33) and Apogee Rosetta (#40) system...
Long before the 500-series format craze, Seventh Circle Audio (SCA) was helping ambitious engineers build phenomenal preamps (Tape Op #54). Continuing my DIY quest, I was very excited to learn of the recently introduced SCA T15 preamp, a transformerless, IC-based design. It is a commonly held...
Okay, since I’m complaining about shockmounts and headphones in this issue, I’m going to go all the way and complain about tuners. Every time I need to use our studio tuner, some asshole has pulled the battery out of it for one of their damn guitar pedals! But now I have a backup plan — the TC-1S....
Praise for the original TS-1 (Tape Op #60) was generally universal across print journals and web discussion boards. What did Chameleon Labs do to improve this well-received device? The new TS-1 MK II comes in a hard case filled with accessories that will be appreciated by all ranges of engineer. In...