Vance Powell is one of the many engineers who has transitioned from mixing live sound to working in the confines of a studio. He’s worked both as monitor engineer (the toughest job in show business) and front of house for legend Tammy Wynette and Jars of Clay. But as a producer/engineer Vance has really shined, […]
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It doesn’t matter how large or small your studio is, you have a mix of both analog and digital gear, and if you want to be able to access everything quickly and efficiently, then you need some sort of patchbay. Designing the signal flow and wiring of a patchbay takes some thought for sure, but […]
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Sylvia Massy has an incredible resume that covers Queens Of The Stone Age, Black Crowes, Smashing Pumpkins, Johnny Cash, Prince, Tool, Lenny Kravitz, and many more. But what’s so cool about Sylvia is that she’s absolutely fearless when it comes to experimenting in the studio (check out her “pickle filter” video from a recent post). […]
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You may have been here before. You’re producing a band but the song just isn’t coming together. If you’re experienced you probably know exactly what to do, but even after a couple of steps you might hit a dead end. This excerpt from my Music Producer’s Handbook provides 10 questions to ask in order to troubleshoot a […]
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This is one of the best drum miking walk-throughs I’ve ever seen. In the video below, Neil Dorfsman (Dire Straits, Sting, Paul McCartney, Def Leopard, Bruce Springsteen to name just a few credits) covers how he mikes a drum kit, and he has several unique approaches that I’ve rarely heard before. Actually I’ve heard of most of […]
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I’ve been using coaxial monitors as part of my regular studio setup for a long time. As far as I’m concerned, there’s something about their “single-point source” nature that sounds right to me, and it’s something that other speakers with separated drivers just can’t seem to deliver, at least to my ears. Don’t get me wrong, […]
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Bill Smith got a chance to do what most of us just dream about, and that’s assist for some of the engineering luminaries during his days as an assistant at Capitol Studios in Hollywood. But it gets better. For many years Bill was the personal assistant to the great Al Schmitt. There’s nothing like learning […]
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Let’s face it – when we have a choice between a windowless studio and one with bright sunlight we’ll take the one with windows all day long. The problem is that even though we can get some good isolation with some standard double pane glass and a third piece of plexiglass on top, it’s often […]
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Room mics bring an overall finish to the drum sound and help to glue it all together. In many cases, they’ll fill in the sonic holes in the drum mix and make all the individual drums sound more like a complete drum set. That said, many times they are positioned rather randomly without much thought. […]
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Let’s face it, loudspeaker transducer technology hasn’t had a real breakthrough in over a hundred years. Every improvement (and there have been many) has been an evolution and not a revolution. That could change soon thanks to some groundbreaking research from the University of Exeter that uses graphene as a transducer. “What’s so groundbreaking about […]
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If you’ve ever used the Bricasti M7 reverb, you know how spectacular it sounds, so much so that it’s spoiled many an engineer when it comes to using anything else. While there are some excellent sounding reverb plugins available, if you’re a fan of the hardware M7 then you know that they don’t quite cop the exact […]
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Studio management is an art unto itself and every studio owner knows how difficult it is to find a good one. Candace Stewart is one of the best there is, having spent over 20 years in some of the best facilities in Los Angeles. She’s now the manager of the famous EastWest Studios in Hollywood […]
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Everyone has their own version of the perfect sonic environment in which they’re the most creative. For me, it’s silence, since music distracts me as I groove with it, then begin to analyze the production. Some people need a certain kind of music for them to maximize their productivity, while for others, they can have […]
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I posted this few years ago on my other blog, but the question keeps popping up so here’s an updated version. Where do you find acoustic panel materials (like Owens Corning 703) so you can build your own panels? At one time, most of the excellent acoustic panel materials weren’t found at your local Home Depot, but […]
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Producer/engineer Sylvia Massy is fearless when it comes to trying things in the studio, especially if it involves guitars. Guitar players are usually willing subjects for experimentation since the search for the perfect sound continues seemingly forever, but how many players have ever considered a big fat dill pickle to use as a filter? Sylvia (who will […]
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