There are two parts to recording that many engineers are either super concerned with or completely oblivious to and that’s placement of the room mics when tracking and phase. In my experience, phase is something that you have to be aware of, but sometimes spending gobs of time on trying to get things just right […]
Continue reading
There’s a lot of controversy over the sound of what many think is the ultimate stringed instrument – the Stradivarius. To some, it can never sound any better, while others feel that much hype surrounds the name and that a new instrument achieves the same results in a blind A/B test. Whatever the case, the […]
Continue reading
If you weren’t able to attend the 2019 Winter NAMM this year, undoubtedly you’re going to read a number of reviews that will be long on new gear. As usual I’m not going to give you much of that because it’s been covered to death and probably in much better depth than what I could […]
Continue reading
My guest on the podcast today is Andrew Peters, who started as popular radio personality and eventually transitioned to television as the host of Australian music shows like Rock Arena, Trax, Simulrock, the Live Aid broadcast, and interviewer for the MTV special Australian Made. After 20 years on radio and television he’s become one of the top voice actors in SouthEast Asia, Australia and […]
Continue reading
Mixers are frequently presented with 2 dilemmas when it comes to background vocals – make just a few tracks sound like a lot more, and how to deal with a huge number of tracks. In this video, musician/producer Devin Townsend explains how he turns a few of his vocals into a massive wall of sound, […]
Continue reading
I’ve posted this before a few years ago, but I’ve been getting so many questions on acoustic treatment lately that I thought it was time for a refresher. While soundproofing the space where you have your recording gear set up can be an expensive and time consuming proposition, treating the acoustics of your room luckily […]
Continue reading
It seems like if we have a data set on just about anything, we can turn it into music. Weather is a little different though in that it’s very organic and changes frequently, sometimes to the extreme, making for an interesting output. Hydrodynamics scientist Graeme Smart for New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric […]
Continue reading
Have you ever had a great music idea but either didn’t have your gear available, or it took too long to get it set up before the idea disappeared? Yeah, me too. That’s a big part of modern recording technology in that there’s a lot involved with actually getting to the point where you’re recording. […]
Continue reading
My guest on the podcast today is Denny Seiwell, who went from being one of the top session drummers in New York City to become a founding member of Paul McCartney’s post-Beatles band Wings, to playing on television and film scores in Los Angeles. Besides McCartney, Denny has worked with artists like Billy Joel, Joe Cocker, James Brown, and Denice Williams, among many others. […]
Continue reading
This one slipped under the radar for a while, but according to The Tennessean, the Universal Music Group (UMG) purchased the House of Blues studio complex in Nashville back in November for $4.3 million. The purchase now gives the label noted studio facilities in London (Abbey Road Studios), Los Angeles (Capitol Records Studio), and now […]
Continue reading
It’s the dream of many musicians to get a gig with the touring band of a major artist, but getting the audition is a lot easier than getting the gig. Here’s an excerpt from my Touring Musician’s Handbook that provides some great audition tips from some of the top touring musicians. “Depending on how you look at […]
Continue reading
I’ve posted here a lot in the past about music made by various robots. Some of it was pretty good, some of it was marginal, but all of it was amazing in terms of the programming required. Same goes for artificial intelligence – there are some results that are totally acceptable in certain situations and […]
Continue reading
I know many hitmaker mixers who refrain from using reverb on a mix, preferring delay instead to provide all the ambience they need for the track. As a result, they’re always using a wide variety of delay plugins to achieve different effects. That all may be possible now with just a single plugin – the […]
Continue reading
My guest on the podcast today is Tim Pierce, who’s one of the most widely used and respected session guitar players in Los Angeles today. Tim has a client list a mile long that includes superstars like Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Rod Stewart, Don Henley, Faith Hill, Dave Mathews Band, Mylie Cyrus, and many more. Simply put, he’s the […]
Continue reading
One of the big announcements at CES so far is the introduction of Sony’s new immersive audio format called 360 Reality Audio. As in past efforts to launch a new format, numerous companies have signed on such as Warner Music Group, Sony Music, Deezer, nugs.net, Qobuz, and TIDAL, and LiveNation, among others. The technical details […]
Continue reading