I’ve slimmed down and made myself extremely mobile so I can travel anywhere to record, i.e. I’ll be in Vermont in February doing it “middle of nowhere” style (hence the need for the ARC, I thought).  I’m geared for 18 tracks live and can easily rent gear for 34+, all in 2 six space racks and a suitcase of microphones…  O and cables   My microphones are high-end acclaimed models, my cables are clean and solid, my mic preamps are beautiful and sought after models, my converters are the same ones used by world renouned producers and studios and my software is amazing.  Everything was carefully researched over the past 5-6 months, mostly trolling Gearslutz.com and other similar sites.  So, if any choices below confuse you just do a search like “BLA sparrow white site:gearslutz.com” on Google and poke at the results.

You may notice I’m in love with BLA, Oktavamod, Voxengo and a few others.  I thought about these things for months and just couldn’t deny the overwhelming love they received from the entire pro-audio community.  I’m so excited to find these small companies who are really creating some superfine products at a reasonable price.  Furthermore, to discover that well respected Grammy winners endorse their products as well makes me giddy.

So here is an updated gear list for y’all.
(soon to have it’s own page)

Mics:
Shure Sm 58, Sm 57, Sm Beta 52a, Sm 98 (not beta)
AKG D12e, Sennheiser MD421, 609 -  OKtava mk-012, Blue Blueberry (original)
OKtavamod Michael Joly Microphones:
-Apex 205 ribbon mod – coles 4038 -  -Rode nt1 mod – u87
-Apex 460 tube mod – u47 -  -MJ MXL 603 mod – km184

Microphones Pre-amps:
Api 512c, Avedis MA 5, Radial powerpre
Inward Connections Magnum, FiveFish x12
Black Lion Audio Auteur
Behringer ADA8000 BLA mod
Fireface UfX BLA mod

Converters:
Behringer ADA8000 BLA mod
Fireface UfX BLA mod
BLA Sparrow White

Clock:
BLA microclock Mk2o

Monitoring/summing:
IK Multimedia ARC
Radial Workhorse
Sony 7506
Alesis m1 active!!???

Software:
Pro tools 9 -  Logic 9 -  Ableton 8 suite
Voxengo -  DMG Audio -  Valhalla DSP -  MeldaProductions
Native Instruments Komplete -  KORG Legacy Collection
Modartt Productions Pianoteq -  XLN Audio Addictive Drums
AAS Tassman, LLizard, UAnalog – Arturia -  Mr.Alias

Guitar amps:
Fender Pro Junior  -  Orange Tiny Terror  -  Peavy Classic 30 (modded)
Gretch 6156 Playboy (original)  -  Tech21 Trademark 60

Instruments:
Telecasters  -  Stratocasters  -  Les Paul Standard
Martin  -  Sitar  -  Cümbüş  -  Ney  -  Kemenche
Darbuka  -  Conga  -  Violins  -  Viola

Keyboards/Controllers:
Casio Previa  -  Arturia The Laboratory 61
KORG Nanopiano, Nanopad

PA gear:
Presonus Live 16.4.2 (for sale)
JBL EQ
JBL PRX 512

I basically have all Canare or Mogami cable.
There’s is more that didn’t make the list yet and more to come, like the SM7b, the 414s, the name on the classical guitar I have but am too lazy to go look at right now, new gear pics, etc, etc.

Jeez man I neglect this site…

Not for much longer!  I’ve been posting epic replies in epic threads all over the internet in music and recording forums and just realized:  Why don’t I re-post what I write there here?  So this today is the first.  This is from a thread titled “how the fu** you achieve a great lows???” on the Gearslutz.com forums.  A new engineer wondering about kick drums and bass guitar.

I chimed in:

Tune your kick well so it rings long and low with nothing inside.

Put “some” padding in to control the low note ring but don’t kill it. Without a “note” you have nothing to work with.

When you mic inside the drum don’t put it too close to the beater or the attack will be too loud compared to the sustained lows that follow. I usually put the mic about 1/3 of the depth of the drum. Direct center doesn’t seem to work out, probably because internal phase cancellation but I may be making that up.

For a ton of low end use a mic in a front head hole. A difference of a centimeter in or out of will change the response dramatically and you’ll have to play with it. Or use the classic “speak as a mic” for a bass transducer, especially with an uncut front head. OR there’s some old school method where you use a roll of carpet up on the drum or in the hole and then mic the end of that for “sub woof”. Combining this with an inside mic for attack is a famous sound; the ole’ SM91 on the inside and M88 in the hole is a classic live soundguy thing and works well for recording rock/metal/dance.

Without any processing *at all* a correctly tuned and damped drum with the right mic in the right spot, into a decent pre should be a perfect start, if not exactly what you need.

Beyond all of that there is the standard EQ points to go for and some carefully squeezing compression will bring the ringing lows up on the tail. Then set a gate to trim the note to the style and do whatever you want to the attack. Also, distortion, O yes. I’ve re-amped snares through guitar amps and pushed kick drums through all kinds of distortion, bass amps… Even played a kick through a PA with a blown/rattling EAW 850 (and sub) and re-recorded a mic in the room.

This is just my approach, there are many ways to achieve a useable sound.

Drumagog and whatever time-aligning/sound replacers are a crutch and you’ll just end up sounding like everyone else who uses them, IMO. I avoid them completely, if I can. If you have a perfect take except for one snare hit in the middle of the track it’s no reason to apply the tool across the whole thing, just fix the one spot. It’s just as bad as keeping auto-tune on automatic for an entire song. You’ll kill the life of the performance and then spend hours/days/weeks bringing life back to it in the editing.

So, that’s that for now.

Be good and don’t let a little rain kill your productivity!

post can be found here – #54

Sekanjabin is officially a “project” and not a band, at least for now.  Gülin Çiloğlu has returned to Istanbul (at least for the time being) and it seems is impossible to replace.  Lots of people ask me “when are you playing agagin” but sadly all of the musicians involved are either busy with other projects, have moved away or they haven’t asked me anything at all.  That doesn’t mean I’m not working on recording what we did to those classics though, it’s just on the back-burner.  In the meantime, thank you to the following people for making it awesome as it went: Nick DePalma, Daniel Eggers, Matt Royes, DJ Vasciannie, Tim Allen, Laura Wilson, Scott Waters, AnnMarie Tedeschi, Deborah Gillespie, Chris McWilliams, Greg Frisina, Mark Reynolds and of course Gülin Çiloğlu.

I am now the bass player for Los Prostetos!  Or at least for now.  It’s awesome actually.  I’ve never played bass “in the band” before, only on recordings.  I have owned a bass since 1988 or so though (old fart).  It’s been great BUT we could use another melody instrument.  So I think we’re going to replace me on bass and I’ll go back to fiddle OR we’ll get some horn player.  Either way it will be awesome, I think.

I’ve been working with DominoKOI.  Fresh kid, pure artist, random factor, complete kook.  Actually a young techno-industrial fan with great vocal control.  We’ll be working on pasting together his old material into a quick-n-easy record and then shaping up a new EP for him.

2012 will be a next-level year.  I’ll have the live recording/10,000 watt sound rig, for starters and will be “for hire” as a sound company…  Writing a new focused record, then writing another record.  -Will also be doing FAWM again.  Producing some locals, AS SOON AS I FIND A SPACE, GRRRRR.  Dave Chapman and I have some ideas for the area that MUST HAPPEN.

Los Prostetos is playing October 8th and 28th at Bacchus and October 31st at Oasis, both in New Paltz.  I’m also playing solo with friends tonight at Oasis, like I do most last Mondays of each month.

Also, note the shiny PayPal Donate button in the upper right corner.  Give me money so I can continue my quest or go to http://manysounds.bandcamp.com and acquire some music for the low price of “pay what you like”

I have been busy busy busy.

I got a new recording/live rig.  It’s basically a Presonus Live 12.4.2 with some JBL PRX.

I’ve been playing with Los Prostetos, a latin band.

Endlessly working with Sekanjabin.  Here’s some links to some live recordings:
Snugs-5.12

Oasis-5.13

Oasis-6.10

Stay tuned!

Laughing Meat

This was a whirlwind of fun.  Done in 4 hours, 5 hours tops.  Buncha people jammed in a room, making it go.  O yeah, the singing is a little off but, hey, it’s got a good bounce.

We explored the topics of stage fright vs. making an ass of oneself, Frank Zappa’s guitar tone and we’re so vulgar the FCC calls the Fire Department on us and they shut the building down for 15 minutes.

A direct link to an archive of the show can be found HERE

Wish me luck as I begin a website overhaul.

MANY MORE SOUNDS COMING SOON

14 tracks in 28 days.  All of them are different like whoah!

Go here: http://manysounds.bandcamp.com to listen and but

Go here: http://fawm.org and do search for “manysounds”  (yep, I’m making you do it!)

SO much good musicating on FAWM.org this month.  It’s been a pleasure!

I can’t chit chat right now, I gotta go play Oasis tonight!

Here’s my proof:  http://manysounds.bandcamp.com/track/rollamonkee

Secondly, I’ve discovered that lyrics are hard enough but even harder when you’re trying to write blues-rock in 9/8

Here’s the proof of that   http://manysounds.bandcamp.com/track/put-myself-in-space

It ain’t easy to write and record 14 songs in 28 days.  I knew it would be hard BUT get behind one day and…

follow along: http://fawm.org/fawmers/manysounds/

Now that that is out of the way…

I decided to go for it this year and do FAWM.  So far I’ve been letting it come out of me as it wants and not forcing anything specific sound or instrumentality on the any part of the project.  It does have a theme though.  What started as a goof of an idea to write a bunch of love songs for Galaxy News Radio has expanded beyond the Fallout universe in more of a “Original Heavy Metal Movie” kind of way.

The songs aren’t going to be posted in the order they manifest originally simply because I have things to add to some of the recordings that I need to schedule.   Collaborators and specific events…  Mmmmmysery

The first one  is  going up now and is titled “Living at the Edge of the World” and is ROCK AND ROLL

Here is taste!  Have enjoy!

http://manysounds.bandcamp.com/track/living-at-the-edge-of-the-world

There are already 5 more songs in the pipeline and will be coming out fast.  Only have to write and record… 14 by the 28th!  Yipe!

You can follow the madness at http://fawm.org/fawmers/manysounds/