Whenever an engineer has trouble dialing in the EQ on a track, chances are its because of one or more of the 6 often-overlooked trouble frequencies. These are areas where too much or too little can cause your track to either stick out like a sore thumb, or disappear into the mix completely. Let’s take […]
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Does the type of music we listen to provide clues to our personality? Empirically you’d say yes, but there’s a study that confirms that the music genre that we prefer goes a long way in outlining what we’re like in our daily lives. For better or worse, this is what the study found. Blues fans have […]
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In an episode that you won’t want to miss, Producer/engineer/musician John Kurzweg is my guest on this week’s Inner Circle podcast. If you’ve listened to rock radio, you’re certainly familiar with John’s work, as he’s produced 12 #1 singles and another 8 top 10’s for bands like Creed, Puddle of Mud, Godsmack and many others. […]
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We all love great room sounds and one of the most famous rooms ever recorded was on David Bowie’s “Heroes” by Tony Visconti. Visconti set up three microphones in the hall of Berlin’s Hansa Studios; the first for Bowie to sing directly into, a second positioned about 15 feet away and the third further back in […]
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The band Toto has some of the most acclaimed studio musicians as members, which is why it’s always a pleasure to listen inside one of their songs. Today we’ll take a listen to the isolated drums, keyboards and horns from the Grammy-winning song “Rosanna.” This one’s a real treat! Here’s what to listen for: 1. […]
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In what could become one of the more entertaining court battles in music history, Led Zeppelin is being sued for stealing parts of “Stairway To Heaven” from a song by the 60s band Spirit called “Taurus” more than 45 years after the song was written. The estate of Spirit guitarist and “Taurus” songwriter Randy California filed the lawsuit, […]
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I’ve received a lot of questions lately about my opinion on some very inexpensive vintage microphone clones. I love finding a great cheap mic as much as the next guy, but there are some things to watch out for before buying. I thought it might be helpful to repost the following from 3 or 4 […]
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There are signs that Gibson’s move to diversify isn’t working out as planned. Moody’s Investor Service has downgraded Gibson Brands (formerly Gibson Guitar Corporation) credit to junk status, and according to reports, the company has put up two of its Nashville warehouses for sale as a result. Moody’s gave 3 reasons for the downgrade: 1. […]
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Radial Engineering makes a grand variety of useful direct boxes, and just about the time you think they’ve thought of everything, they come up with something new. One of the company’s more unique DIs is the new BT-Pro, a unique Bluetooth direct box that converts a wireless audio signal into an analog stereo balanced line. This […]
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Paul McCartney is one of the most influential bass players ever, and it’s always very cool to be able to listen to his isolated bass tracks. Today we’ll take a listen to The Beatles “Drive My Car” from the Rubber Soul album. Here’s what to listen for. 1. Listen to the pickup notes at the […]
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We’ve all been at an airport or train station, or even a concert, where there’s an announcement and we can’t quite make out what it was over the noise. Those days may soon be over thanks to a new speech enhancement technology from Fraunhofer called ADAPT DRC. Researchers at the Project Group Hearing, Speech and […]
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Many times the ear candy of an overdub session can really make or break a song, but sometimes it’s not easy to create to capture that magic. Here’s an excerpt from the upcoming second edition of my Music Producer’s Handbook that can act as either an outline or as a reminder to check a number […]
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Kevin Killen is a great engineer with a host of big time credits (U2, Elvis Costello and Peter Gabriel, for instance) and he’s been much in demand as a mixer for a long time. When I wrote the first edition of The Mixing Engineer’s Handbook, Kevin was one of the mixers I most wanted to […]
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Regardless of your age, you’ve no doubt heard much of Rumors over the years, the great Fleetwood Mac album from 70s. The songs from that record are still heard everywhere today, and a tribute to the contributions to the project (as well as 3 others by Fleetwood Mac) by my guest on this week’s podcast […]
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It doesn’t matter what microphone you like to use on toms, because chances are that it’s going to pick up a lot of the cymbals as well. This is pretty typical because most of the mics that end up on toms have a cardioid pattern. The problem is that there aren’t too many true hypercardioid […]
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