THE MEANS CONTRIBUTE TO THE END. USUALLY.
During the last couple years, the 500-series format has developed into an industry standard among audio manufacturers, but over and over, I’ve found myself reading online that Neve clones would never be compatible due to voltage and current restrictions. The first time I read this supposed fact,...
Are you completely happy with all of your mixes and see no reason to attempt to learn more or get better at this craft? Then read no more — you might not need this book. Foreword: I’ve been getting a lot of mix work lately. I guess it’s a combination of finally owning a decent analog console and...
Usually when I get a microphone sent to me from a manufacturer, I’m allowed to keep it for a ridiculously long time, sometimes two months or more. Normally I return the mic within three or four weeks, since I don’t like to take advantage of the situation. The process is simple. I get the mic, I...
Black Lion is a small company best known for tearing apart and upgrading off-the-shelf gear. They also manufacture pro audio items. One of their offerings is the Micro Clock Mk2, a small footprint, barebones, external master clock. If you are the owner of a Pro Tools HD rig with legacy Digidesign...
As far as I know, these are the first custom-molded, in-ear monitors developed for pro audio engineers. As these are custom-molded to fit your ears, I first had to go get my ears molded by an audiologist — always a weird sensory deprivation experience. A few weeks later, my monitors arrived and I...
I’m a huge fan of Arturia and their virtual synth designs. They are, I feel, one of the best software synth developers around. I love using their “V” synths (Tape Op #41, 57, 67) in various DAW sequencers for sound design and general nerdlery. So I was excited to get my mitts on their hardware...
A console review can be rather involved, so let me just say up front that I think the SSL AWS consoles are absolutely excellent. The sound is enormous, clear and strong; the functionality offers up what is without a doubt the most sophisticated, yet intuitive, way to work in a hybrid digital-...
Few pieces of gear prove themselves indispensable to every session — something you’d pick to put first in your bag when you travel, that you can truly call “must-have”. The Passive Link, “made in an Australian shed” by Broadcast Pro Audio, is essentially a passive re-amp box, allowing you to...
Universal Audio just keeps on coming up with great products for both the pro and home studio. Their latest entry is the 4-710d microphone preamp. It’s basically four channels of UA’s 710 preamp, which allows you to blend between tube and transistor–based circuitry, in a 2U-height chassis with the...
Less than half the size of my iPod Touch 3G,Mikey 2Gis the generation-2 model of Blue'sMikeyexternal coincident stereo microphone. It works with most iPod models as well as iPhone 3GS and earlier. The product ships with a too-small black cloth pouch and a bilingual French/English printed...
Ah compressors… those wonderful helpers that make our lives easier. It seems like the more you learn how to use compression to your advantage, the more you want different types and flavors to use in tracking and mixing. As some of you may know, we at WaveLab have been using a pair of Daking FET...
This is a review of the Line 6DT50guitar amplifier, but, like most people in Hollywood, instead of telling you about the topic at hand, I'm gonna tell you about me. What can theDT50do for me? How can it make me look good? In this case, I'm gonna review this amp from my perspective as an...
The first time I came across theLittle Chopperwas at Assault and Battery 2 in NW London, whilst tracking instruments for a movie project. Session guitarist Tim Maple came in to lay down both clean and distorted electric guitars for a few songs. We had discussed using the studio's amplifiers...
I don't need to spell out the fact that countless recordists who work on digital systems are on the quest to get a warmer sound. Nor do I need to delve into the 10,000 tools, tricks, and techniques employing transformers, tapes, and tubes to help warm things up. The problem is abundantly...
Somebody likes thePortico II. I had to wait a week for RND to cook up a fresh batch when the review unit they were supposed to send was bought instead of returned. It arrived welcomed, if late. Coming out of the box it looked gorgeous - like a piece of sculpture. The front panel is a textured...
For over seven years, Carl Tatz, studio designer and former owner of Recording Arts in Nashville, Tennessee, has installed his proprietary PhantomFocus monitoring systems in studios around the world – either in conjunction with a room design or implemented in previously existing rooms. These...
Doubtless the most famous microphone preamplifier in history, the Neve 1073 has spawned countless imitations — from cheap knockoffs to component-precise replicas. The sincerest flattery has been repeatedly bestowed upon the venerable classic since its inception over 40 years ago. If you need a...
There are many jobs for which hardware still rules the music roost. But there are some that software does better - synths, for example. Though no software will replace my analog Minimoog, many hardware synths are nothing more than specialized computers running software. Sampling and FM synthesis...
There’s a brief segment in this instructional video series presented by Alan Parsons (which shall henceforth be called ASSR) in which the legendary engineer, while describing his approach to recording electric guitar, moves a mic around the front of an amp from the center of the speaker cone out...
Retro Instruments made a splash about five years ago with its replica of the classic Gates Sta-Level compressor (Tape Op #55), and then again in recent years with products based on the Universal Audio 176 variable-mu compressor (#66) and the Pultec EQP-1A3 passive/tube EQ (#79). This time around,...