Category Archives for "Gear"
- in Gear , Production , Recording by Bobby Owsinski
3 Critical Compressor Tweaks You Might Be Overlooking
Everybody loves compression. It’s not only the sound of modern music, but music in general, even orchestral these days. Compression beefs up the sound, brings up the quiet parts, and controls the transients, if you use it right. That said, there are 3 compressor tweaks that are critical to optimizing the processor’s setup in order […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Eventide Elevate Mastering Plugin
Today’s mastering tools are better and better, but can also be much more complicated than the average engineer wants to deal with. That’s why some plugins are becoming smarter in how they operate thanks to incorporating artificial intelligence, and a perfect example is the Elevate mastering plugin developed by Newfangled Audio and distributed by Eventide. […]
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Metallica And Their Guitar Amp Emulators
Let me make a bold statement. Guitar amp emulators are now so good that long-time tube amp users are switching over, at least for live playing on-stage. If you think that statement is blasphemy (and I can’t believe I’m making it myself), then you should watch this behind-the-scenes video of the live guitar rig setups […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Unfiltered Audio SpecOps Spectral Effects Plugin
While many software developers concentrate on reproducing the sound of old analog favorite outboard pieces, there are others that prefer to explore the digital boundaries of what hasn’t been heard or done yet. Such is the case with Unfiltered Audio and their new SpecOps plugin. It’s hard to place SpecOps into a category, but something […]
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YuMi The Robot Shows How To Conduct An Orchestra
If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, then you know that I post a fair amount about musical robots. I don’t know if it’s because of admiration or fear, but how they’re used in music is worth being aware of. As anyone who’s ever used a drum machine or software app knows, […]
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Yes, It’s Easy To Build Your Own Condenser Microphone
We’re in a golden age of audio gear kits, with more manufacturers than ever offering DIY kits to build high-quality gear. Need a preamp, EQ or compressor? If you can wield a soldering iron, there are many kits to choose from. Need a condenser or ribbon microphone? There are multiple kits available there as well. […]
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New Music Gear Monday: ZYLIA ZM-1 Multitrack Microphone
As anyone who’s ever played in a band before knows, there are times when you play a song and its just magic. Everyone plays their parts with precision, and the feel is undeniable. The problem for many bands (even some of the great ones) is that they can never seem to capture that same feel […]
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The ScrubBoard: Scratch Live In Real Time
You may or may not be interested in scratching, but you have to love the ingenuity of Jeremy Bell. In the video below you’ll see how he built a really unique tape-based scratching machine he calls the ScrubBoard pretty much from (excuse the unintended pun) scratch. The ScrubBoard is comprised of a fully functioning home-made […]
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The Making Of McIntosh Amplifiers
There are certain products that are iconic and remain that way over time, regardless of the trends of the industry that they’re in. This describes McIntosh hi-fi products, especially the amplifiers to a T. McIntosh have also been thought of as the Rolls-Royce of power amps, noted for their high power and extremely low distortion, […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Royer Labs R-10 Ribbon Microphone
Royer Labs has almost single-handedly reintroduced the ribbon microphone back into modern recording, and it’s products (especially the R-121) have become staples in most commercial studio’s mic cabinets. The only problem is that ribbon microphone manufacturing is fairly time-consuming to get it right and still maintain quality, so a Royer ribbon mic has been just […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Blackmagic Design DaVinci Resolve 14 Workstation
There are so many digital audio workstation choices at all different price ranges and they’re all, at worst, pretty good. So why would anyone even consider a new one? For one thing, when it’s pedigree is Fairlight, and secondly, when it’s actually an all-in-one video editor as well. That’s what you get with the new […]
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New Music Gear Monday: PSP Nexcellence Necklace-Style Reverb Plugin
We’re all familiar with the sound of spring reverbs, but most of the plugins available are based on units with taught springs like the ones found in Fender reverb tanks or the old AKG BX-10 and 20. There was another type of spring reverb though, known as a necklace reverb, found mostly in Hammond organs […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Mastering The Mix Reference Plugin
A critical and often overlooked step in mixing (especially when you’re first starting out) is listening to a great sounding reference track to compare your mixes to. That’s easier said then done though, with level matching and instant switching between your mix and the ref track usually taking long for an accurate comparison in a […]
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New Music Gear Monday: Fiedler Audio Stage Stereo Toolkit Plugin
We’re at the evolutionary point in audio software where it’s not enough to be just another me-too plugin. If you’re going to launch a new product, it better have a new twist that goes beyond refinement of an old standard. That’s the case with the new Fiedler Audio Stage Stereo Toolkit, a new sound stage […]
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A Look Inside A Google Data Center
With so much of our information now being contained in the cloud, we’ll soon be getting to the point where local storage won’t be as necessary as it once was. That said, the “cloud” seems so faceless, and few of us have any idea of what it really is. To give you a look inside […]
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