THE WORLD’S BEST RECORDING TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE 1985 — 2020

SOUND ON SOUND THE WORLD’S BEST RECORDING TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE

TM

MUSIC PRODUCTION TECHNIQUES / INDEPENDENT IN-DEPTH PRODUCT TESTS / ENGINEER & PRODUCER INTERVIEWS / LIVE SOUND

HOW TO
CHOOSE AN
AUDIO
SEPTEMBER 2020

INTERFACE
www.soundonsound.com

Studio One 5
PreSonus tempt the pros with massive update

Make your studio artist-friendly

Control modular synths from your DAW!
VOLUME 35 • ISSUE 11

SPITFIRE AUDIO INSTRUMENTS WORTH £1697 www.soundonsound.com

REVIEWS: APPLE / ARTURIA / LIQUIDSONICS / CRANBORNE AUDIO / RUPERT NEVE DESIGNS / IK / OUTPUT / AKG / DDMF / NOVATION / VSL
TECHNIQUE: MANAGING SIBILANCE / REMOTE REHEARSAL WITH JAMULUS / DAW WORKSHOPS September 2020 £5.99
 LEADER

CHOICES CHOICES
W
hy is Sound On Sound publishing a
major article about choosing an audio
interface? Many reasons. One is that
audio interfaces are now the most universal item
of studio equipment there is. It’s possible to
make music without a microphone, or without
loudspeakers, but who now does so without
a computer?
Another is that choosing an audio interface
is difficult. Simply identifying your own present
and future needs is hard enough; deciding which
product best meets them is even harder. There are
hundreds, possibly thousands of devices on the
market, and it’s not always obvious what
separates them.
Yet another reason is that buying an audio
interface is not like buying a guitar or a synthesizer.
It’s not only a difficult decision, but a boring one.
The device we use to get audio into and out of our
computer isn’t an inspirational one that can help
us reach new heights of creativity. Not many of
us want to be comparing spec sheets or counting
input connectors when we could be making music.
This is where Sound On Sound can bridge the
gap. It’s our job to know what musicians shouldn’t
have to learn in order to make music. And it’s our
mission to present that information in ways that
make difficult choices easier. We won’t pretend
there’s a simple answer to the question ‘What’s
the best audio interface for me?’, because that
would be silly. It’s a complex question, and like Sam Inglis
most complex questions, it’s best answered by Editor In Chief
breaking it down into smaller questions that
are more easily answered, as we’ve done in this
month’s cover feature. “In an increasingly
However, researching the feature also brought
home to me that choice can end up feeling like an
crowded market,
illusion. There are thousands of electric guitars on perhaps there
the market, but how many are not derived from a
60-year-old Fender or Gibson template? Likewise,
are still untapped
I can buy a 1U rackmounting interface with eight opportunities for
mic preamps, a couple of headphone amps and
an ADAT port for expansion from dozens of
manufacturers
manufacturers. But what if I want more than two to make their
headphone outputs? What if the ideal number
of preamps for me is 10, or 12? What if I own no
products stand out
other rackmount gear, and would prefer a desktop from the herd.”
unit? What if I want transformer-balanced preamps
that can be pushed for a bit of saturation and
colour? What if I’d like an audio interface that can
host 500-series modules, or one with an integrated
patchbay, or DAW transport controls, or one that
is optimised for driving modular synths?
In an increasingly crowded market, perhaps
there are still untapped opportunities for
manufacturers to make their products stand out
from the herd — and make choosing an audio
interface less boring?

A DM I N I S T R ATIO N EDIT O RIAL ADV ER TISIN G

admin@soundonsound.com
ALLIA BUSINESS CENTRE Managing Director/Chairman Ian Gilby
KING’S HEDGES ROAD Editorial Director Dave Lockwood
CAMBRIDGE
Marketing Director Paul Gilby
CB4 2HY
Finance Manager Keith Werthmann
T +44 (0)1223 851658
sos@soundonsound.com
www.soundonsound.com
P R ODUC T I ON
graphics@soundonsound.com
Production Manager Michael Groves
Head Of Design G
 eorge Nicholson Hart
Designer Alan Edwards
WORLDWI D E E D I T I O NS Designer Andy Baldwin
S UBS C R I P T I ON S
subscribe@soundonsound.com
www.soundonsound.com/subscribe
Circulation Manager Luci Harper
UK/WORLD NORTH AMERICA Administrator Nathalie Balzano
sos.feedback@soundonsound.com
Editorial Director Dave Lockwood
Executive Editor Paul White
Editor In Chief Sam Inglis
Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns
Reviews Editor David Glasper
Reviews Editor Matt Houghton
News & Reviews Editor Chris Korff
Production Editor Nell Glasper
O N LIN E
support@soundonsound.com
Digital Media Director Paul Gilby
Design Andy Baldwin
Web Editor Adam Bull
www.soundonsound.com
twitter.com/soundonsoundmag
facebook.com/soundonsoundmag
instagram.com/soundonsoundmag
adsales@soundonsound.com
Group Sales Manager Robert Cottee
MARK ETIN G
marketing@soundonsound.com
Business Development Manager
Nick Humbert
Printing Warners Midlands plc
Newstrade Distribution Warners Group
Distribution Ltd, The Maltings, Manor
Lane, Bourne, Lincolnshire
PE10 9PH, UK.
ISSN 0951‑6816
A Member of the
SOS Publications Group
The contents of this publication are subject to worldwide
copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part,
whether mechanical or electronic, is expressly forbidden
without the prior written consent of the Publisher. Great
care is taken to ensure accuracy in the preparation of this
publication but neither Sound On Sound Limited nor the
Editor can be held responsible for its contents. The views
expressed are those of the contributors and not
necessarily those of the Publisher or Editor. The Publisher
accepts no responsibility for the return of unsolicited
manuscripts, photographs, or artwork.
© Copyright 2020 Sound On Sound Limited.
Incorporating Music Software magazine, Recording
Musician magazine, Sound On Stage magazine, SPL
magazine, Sound Pro magazine and Performing Musician
magazine. All rights reserved.
All prices include VAT unless otherwise stated. SOS
recognises all trademarks.

4 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
 THE ORIGINAL RED KEYBOARDS
Handmade in Sweden by Clavia DMI AB NEW!

Our most versatile

Synthesizer ever

The Nord Wave 2 is a powerful 4-part performance

synthesizer combining Virtual Analog synthesis, Samples,
FM and Wavetable with an intuitive layer-focused interface.
Nord Wave 2
With 48 voice polyphony, innovative performance features
and hands-on controls, the Nord Wave 2 offers outstanding
sonic possibilities with advanced layering and tweaking on
the fly.
Follow nordkeyboards
Read more and listen to sounddemos:
Nord Audio Demo 00:00:19

www.nordkeyboards.com/wave2
Listen to the Nord Stage 2 at
www.nordkeyboards.com
#iseenord
Distributed in the UK & Ireland by Sound Technology Ltd | 01462 480000 | soundtech.co.uk | info@soundtech.co.uk
124 INSIDE TRACK

IN THIS ISSUE
September 2020 / issue 11 / volume 35
www.soundonsound.com

FEATURES WIN

30 Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith

SPITFIRE AUDIO
We talk to prolific producer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith about her
ambient compositions and love of Buchla synths.
INSTRUMENTS
WORTH £1697
48 Setting Up & Using Jamulus
The free and open-source Jamulus app lets you play along with
other musicians over the Internet in real time.

68 The Artist-friendly Studio

Ten tips to keep musicians ‘in the zone’.

82 Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs:

Recording Viscerals
The rules of heavy metal are well established, but for their
latest album, Pigsx7 guitarist and producer Sam Grant added
a few of his own.

90 Managing Sibilance PAGE 26

Prevent pesky ‘ess’ sounds from ruining your tracks.

96 How To Choose An Audio Interface

The audio interface is at the centre of every modern studio, but
how do you choose the right one for your studio?
104 Digital Mixers In The Studio
Many of the features that won live sound engineers over to
digital consoles also have huge potential in the studio. We
round up some of the best.
124 Inside Track: Ariel Rechtshaid
& Rostam Batmanglij
Haim’s latest album was made with a mix of old-school and
modern techniques and equipment.
158 Q&A
Your studio and recording questions answered.

112 Modular Interfacing 162 Why I Love... The JBL Control One
Everything you need to know to get your DAW talking to your Sound designer Helen Skiera explains her love for a small but
modular system via your audio interface. plucky loudspeaker.
 96 HOW TO CHOOSE AN AUDIO INTERFACE
ON TEST
8 IK Multimedia iRig Keys 2 Mini
Controller Keyboard
10 AKG Lyra
Multi-pattern USB Microphone
12 Yamaha THR10 II
Guitar Amplifier
14 Liquidsonics Cinematic Rooms
Reverb Plug-in
18 Cranborne Audio EC2
Dual-channel Mic Preamp
22 DDMF Magic Death Eye
Compressor Plug-ins
38 PreSonus Quantum 2626
Thunderbolt 3 Audio Interface
42 VSL Big Bang Orchestra
Sample Libraries
52 PreSonus Studio One 5
DAW Software
60 Plugin Boutique Scaler 2
Scale Detection &
Generation Plug-in
64 Rupert Neve Designs RMP-D8
Eight-channel Dante Mic Preamp
74 Yamaha CP88 & YC61
Stage Keyboards
88 Output Thermal
Parallel Distortion Processor
94 Plugin Alliance Brainworx
Amek EQ200
EQ Plug-in
116 Arturia AudioFuse Studio
USB Audio Interface
120 Novation Launchkey MkIII
Controller Keyboard
130 Apple Logic 10.5
DAW Software
140 Apogee Clearmountain’s
Spaces
Reverb Plug-in
140 Eventide Undulator
Modulated Tremolo plug-in
141 IK Multimedia Z-Tone Buffer
Boost & Z-Tone DI
Variable-impedance Guitar
Preamplifiers
142 Soundevice Digital
SubBass Doctor
Sub-bass Generator Plug-in
142 Neunaber Wet Reverberator
Reverb Plug-in
144 Sugar Bytes Looperator for iPad
Step-based Multi-effects Processor
146 Sample Libraries
Sample Logic Cinematic
Guitars Motion
Orchestral Tools Tableau Solo
Strings
Sonic Atoms Baltic Shimmers
Ergo Kukke Trails
WORKSHOPS
148 Digital Performer
152 Reason
154 Pro Tools
156 Cubase
 ON TEST
IK Multimedia
PAUL WHITE
E
ssentially a cut-down version of
iRig Keys 2 Mini
the three-octave iRig Keys 2, the
iRig Keys 2 Mini is, as it suggests,
a mini-key-format MIDI controller
keyboard designed for mobile use. It
features 25 velocity-sensitive keys, but
loses the pitch and mod wheels and the
external pedal input of its larger siblings.
In addition to offering laptop/desktop
computer USB compatibility, the iRig Keys
2 Mini can connect directly to iPhones,
iPads and many Android models. Its data
connection is via a mini-USB port on
the rear panel and the included adaptor
cables convert this to USB-A, Lightning or
Android connectors. Power comes from
the connected device, but it may also be
powered from a USB power supply or
USB battery pack.
There’s a TRS 3.5mm jack audio
output to connect speakers or
headphones, which is particularly
handy if you have one of the newer
Apple devices where the headphone
output jack has been omitted ‘for your
convenience’. There’s one five-pin MIDI
In/Out adaptor cable included that
connects to either the mini-jack MIDI In
or MIDI Out rear panel sockets, enabling
use as a standalone MIDI controller or
MIDI interface. Additional cables may be
purchased separately. As with the other
8 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Controller Keyboard
Need a flexible, on-the-go keyboard? Look no further...
models in the series, there are additional
panel controls — including volume
control, a data push/turn encoder, four
assignable knobs, program up/down and
octave switching.
Edit mode, entered by pressing both
Octave buttons, is where you assign the
controllers and other settings such as
MIDI channel and so on. When editing,
the keyboard keys are also brought into
use with their functions printed above
them. Other than the four Set LEDs and
the backlit buttons, there’s no display. Edit
changes can be saved as up to eight Sets
for later recall.
A selection of music-making apps is
bundled with the keyboard, comprising
SampleTank 4 SE with upwards of 2000
sounds, SampleTank Free for iPhone and
iPad, iGrand Piano Free for iPhone, iPad
and Android, and iLectric Piano Free
for Android.
While the three octave iRig Keys 2
would be my preferred choice purely
because it retains the mod/bend controls
and footswitch input, I can see the appeal
of the iRig Keys 2 Mini for use on holiday
or while travelling. It’s small enough to
fit into a backpack or briefcase, it works
with mobile devices as well as computers
and it covers all the essentials. IK’s
bundled software sweetens the deal
further, so if compact and functional is
what you need, the iRig Keys 2 Mini fits
the bill nicely.
summary
A practical and compact solution to portable
music-making, so long as the lack of those
facilities listed above is not a deal-breaker.
££ £105.99 including VAT.
WW www.ikmultimedia.com
 SM6

The SM6 Range

Wh atever your genre,

styl e o r s pace -
D el iver a mix worthy
o f your mu s ic.

Distributed in the UK & Ireland by SCV Distribution

03301 222500 | www.scvdistribution.co.uk
 ON TEST
AKG Lyra
Multi-pattern USB Microphone
This classy USB mic offers a useful
range of polar patterns.
PAUL WHITE
U
SB microphones are nothing
new but there’s a lot more to
the AKG Lyra than its gloriously
vintage look, which tips a nod towards
both vintage broadcast mics and AKG’s
own C414. While clearly of appeal
to podcasters and videocasters, the
microphone also has applications in
home or mobile music recording.
The Lyra sits atop a custom all-metal
desk stand, and the swivel section can
be separated by using a coin to unscrew
the threaded thumbscrew that secures
it to the base of the stand. The mic and
swivel section may then be mounted on
a standard mic stand, and an EU thread
adaptor is included. Built into the case
is a shockmount for the capsules and a
sound diffusor to help reduce plosive pops.
Power comes from the USB port into which
the mic is plugged; a suitable USB cable is
also included. For those who haven’t yet
decided on which DAW to go with, a copy
of Ableton’s Live 10 Lite is included.
Perhaps the most noticeable departure
from convention is that the Lyra actually
incorporates four back-electret capsules,
two angled slightly away from each other
and forward facing, plus two rear-facing
capsules angled the same way. AKG
call this their Adaptive Capsule Array.
A four‑way rotary switch then selects
between four pickup patterns depending
on the application. Position one is for
a single user sitting in front of the mic
and yields a cardioid polar pattern, while
position two accommodates a pair of
performers, one behind the mic and one in
front. This appears to be an omni pattern.
Position three picks up from the front of the
mic in a tight stereo pattern, while position
four picks up both front and rear in a wide
stereo pattern for occasions when more
ambience is needed.
A headphone amplifier with
zero‑latency source monitoring is built
into the microphone, the headphone
connection point being a 3.5mm stereo
10 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
jack at the base of the unit next to
the USB connector. Don’t forget to
mute the source audio monitoring
in your DAW though, or you’ll hear
both the latency-free signal and the
slightly delayed one that has done
the round trip to and from your
DAW. There’s a rotary headphone
level control on the front of the mic,
along with a mute button that kills
the mic without cutting off the DAW
playback. Four LEDs show which
mic pattern is selected. On the
rear panel, alongside the pattern
selection knob, there’s a control for
microphone gain.
Offering plug-and-play simplicity,
the class‑compliant Lyra operates
with 24-bit conversion and can run
at sample rates of up to 192kHz.
No drivers are needed for Mac OS
or Windows operation, and for iOS
use an Apple Camera Connection
Kit USB adaptor will do the trick.
AKG specify the frequency range of
the mic as 20Hz to 20kHz, though
this isn’t as informative as a proper options provide practical alternatives when it
frequency response (-3dB points) comes to recording music, dual voiceovers or
figure. The maximum SPL is 129dB, capturing a stereo source. Note though that the
so as long as you don’t use it for headphone volume control adjusts both the
close-miking kick drums or trumpets, DAW playback and the mic’s direct monitoring
you probably won’t run out of level, so if the balance isn’t to your liking, you’ll
headroom. I couldn’t find a noise need to adjust your DAW’s output level. Some
specification but ,in its intended use, other USB mics provide a DAW/Source balance
noise was never an issue. control, which does make life a little easier.
In use, I found the desk stand to This is a very flexible little microphone that
be very solid, and weighty enough goes well beyond the usual remit as a simple
at 900g to keep the mic in place. podcaster’s USB mic. The fact that it looks great
It also has a rubbery non-slip base doesn’t hurt either.  
to further prevent it sliding around.
The mic delivers a clean, relatively summary
uncoloured vocal sound but it also
proved itself perfectly capable The Lyra sounds clean and quiet, looks fantastic
and adds some useful functionality to the usual
when recording acoustic guitar
USB mic format.
and a wooden flute. The various
patterns are very useful, and
££ £139 including VAT.
although the first option (cardioid)
TT Sound Technology +44 (0)1462 480000
is the most obvious choice for EE info@soundtech.co.uk
podcasting or recording vocals, WW www.soundtech.co.uk
those stereo and double-sided WW www.akg.com
 POWER TO CREATE

[ TORAIZ SQUID ] [ T O R A I Z S P -16 ]

M U LT I T R A C K S E Q U E N C E R PROFESSIONAL SAMPLER

[ T O R A I Z A S -1 ]
ANALOG SYNTHESIZER

GEAR THAT CAN TAKE YOU FROM

PRODUCTION TO PERFORMANCE

AVA IL A BLE TODAY AT GE A R4M USIC WITH:

2 YE AR WARR ANT Y (6 YE ARS OP TIONAL) 30 DAY MONE Y BACK GUAR ANTEE

W W W.GE AR4MUSIC .COM

INFO @ GE AR4MUSIC .COM 0330 365 4 4 4 4
 ON TEST

Yamaha THR10 II
Guitar Amplifier
Though small and quiet,
this stereo combo is big on
possibilities...

you as long as the amp is connected to

of playing time, so if you fancy
trying your hand at busking or
playing at the bottom of the
PAUL WHITE
garden you’re good to go.)
a mains power supply, so you won’t need
to purchase a separate charger. All you
have to do is plug the Relay G10T into
the input jack, which causes it to sync
its transmission channel with that of the
receiver built into the amplifier. As it works

T
he THR10 II is the smallest in Yamaha’s II Although it’s not monstrously on the 2.4GHz wireless band, the Relay
series, measuring just 368 x 183 x 140 mm and loud, it still packs a hefty G10T requires no licence.
weighing only 3.2kg. Despite this, and looking punch if you crank it up, and The bottom, rear and sides of the
like a typical lunchbox amp head, it’s actually a tiny it could even be loud enough cabinet are made of thick, moulded
combo that caters not only for electric guitar but for a small pub duo gig if plastic, but the top panel and speaker
also for bass and acoustic guitar. What’s more, it has you don’t have to compete grille are fabricated from sheet metal,
stereo capability: as well as the digital modelling side with a drummer. For those giving the amp a robust, professional feel.
of things, it houses a pair of robust 3.1-inch speakers, who are new to the world Orange LEDs glow behind the grille, and
each driven from its own amp. of recording, both versions the power button has an LED ring that
Yamaha describe the two THR10 II amps (there’s come with a download code also lights orange when powered up.
a standard THR10 II and a ‘wireless’ THR10 IIW for a free copy of Steinberg’s When powered down but still plugged it
version, of which more later) as ‘third amplifiers’, Cubase AI (for Mac/Windows) turns green to indicate that the internal
for use on occasions when serious sound quality and Cubasis LE (for iOS) battery is charging.
is required but excessive volume isn’t. And judging DAW software. The THR10 II features some inbuilt
by the tests I’ve conducted, it could certainly earn The THR10 IIW wireless effects, a choice of amplifier type, and
its place either in a studio that’s stuck for space, version, which is otherwise the ability to play back external audio
or one in which there’s a need to keep a check on identical to the non-wireless in stereo, for when you get the urge
sound levels. version, caters for wireless to play along. There’s a USB port for
guitar playing using the connecting to the free editor app, which
Overview optional Line 6 Relay G10T comes in two versions: one for Mac/
While the name suggests this might be a 10W amp, it transmitter. It works only with Windows machines, and a mobile version
is in fact rated at 20W when powered by its included the G10T, not with older Line for both iOS and Android. Usefully, it’s
mains adaptor, or 15W when running off a its internal 6 Relay radio transmitters, also possible to record and play back
lithium battery. (The latter gives you around five hours and it charges the device for directly via USB; the amp appears as

12 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
a class-compliant interface. Another DI recording
option is the speaker-emulated headphones output
— you can connect this to your audio interface’s line
input, or feed it into a more powerful amplification
system if you need to. (The main speakers are muted
when phones are connected.) Should you be looking
for more, it’s worth mentioning that the larger THR30
II has a dedicated line output for this purpose.
The amp models are all based on Yamaha’s
established VCM component-level modelling, and
they are controlled using Gain, Treble, Middle and
Bass knobs, along with the amp’s Master volume
control. Two further controls adjust the overall levels
of the guitar amp sound and the external Aux stereo
mini-jack or Bluetooth source. Five buttons allow the
direct storing and recalling of presets.
From the front panel, you can access eight models,
including acoustic, bass and flat. But this range is
expanded considerably when the app is running,
because this provides a choice between Modern,
Boutique and Classic versions of the selected amp
type. The electric guitar amps are designated Clean, The companion app gives access to lots of
Crunch, Lead, Hi-Gain and Special. Two familiar ‘hair’ to take away the sterility additional functionality, including more cab models
‘segment’-style rotary controls are used for selecting makes for convincing chordal and more parameters for each effect.
and adjusting the modulation effects (Chorus, Flanger, tones. Its more rocky tones
Phaser, Tremolo) and the delay/reverb effects (Echo, also stack up well against can balance the contribution of each of
Echo/Reverb, Spring Reverb, Hall Reverb), and other good-quality modelling the two effects.
turning these fully anti-clockwise turns off the effects. products. The amp deals with The headphone output is very usable
A tap-tempo button, normally used to set delay times, bass very effectively at modest as a DI feed, complete with stereo effects,
activates a very accurate chromatic tuner if held down levels, yet it’s clean enough and that will be useful to some, but I found
for a second or two. and bright enough to work I still preferred the experience of putting
The app offers you greater control a mic in front of the amp.
over the effects, though, as well as It doesn’t have to be
providing a choice of four appropriate “The quality and range of sounds turned up loud to sound
cabinet emulations per amplifier good over a mic, and you
type. In addition it allows access to available from this little amp came can always add some
an internal gate and compressor as a pleasant surprise.” stereo ambience later or
and allows more alternative reverb use two mics if you want
types to be selected (Room, Hall, to capture some of the
Plate or Spring). The Plate sounds beautifully rich and with acoustic guitar using the stereo spread on the effects.
‘three-dimensional’. Other app features include setting Acc setting. So, all in all, the quality and sound is
the guitar DI mode as dry or with effects, choosing Yamaha also use their own impressive for an amp of this size, and
an EQ profile for the auxiliary audio input, and giving stereo enhancement system, the app and USB interfacing make it
an indication of the battery’s current charge level. called Extended Stereo, really versatile. The THR10 II may look
Any of the app-only options, including the three amp to create very spacious compact and cute, but it’s certainly no toy.
variants, can be stored as presets in the THR10 II, so effects and that’s particularly Whether you prefer the wireless model
you only need to revisit the app when creating new noticeable on the reverbs. The or the standard one depends on your
presets that require these deeper functions. general quality of the effects requirements and budget, of course. You’d
is excellent, as you’d expect still need to buy a Line 6 Relay G10T to go
The Sound of Yamaha. Editing them only wireless, but if you do need it, the wireless
Both the quality and range of sounds available from via the front panel limits your implementation is very elegant.
this little amp came as a pleasant surprise. Using the options a little, but the app
app to navigate the three flavours of each of the amp allows for more flexibility, summary
settings and try different cab models I could get close especially when using the
A surprisingly mature-sounding little combo
to just about any of the classic guitar tones. What’s reverb/delay setting. As well
that has serious studio applications as well as
more, you still get the sense of low-end punch that as adjusting the individual practice, live and mobile uses. The wireless
you’d expect from a larger combo, which is impressive effect settings in greater version is easy to use for those who need it.
from such small speakers. Those on-the-edge sounds depth (you get around the
that break up as you dig that bit harder into the strings same number of controls for ££ THR10 II £299.99. THR10 IIW (wireless
can be set up fairly easily using the Crunch Amp each effect as you would on version) £449.99. Prices include VAT.
setting, and dialling in a sound that has just a little a pedal of the same type), you WW uk.yamaha.com

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 13
 ON TEST

Liquidsonics
Cinematic Rooms
SAM INGLIS
Reverb Plug-in
P We bask in the reflective glory of a rather
opular wisdom has it that
algorithmic and convolution
reverbs are polar opposites. The
one is endlessly flexible, but compromised
in authenticity; the other can be spookily
realistic but is essentially preset-based,
with limited potential for editing.
That might have been true a decade
ago, but since then, the boundaries have
become well and truly blurred. Impulse
responses have been appropriated to
bolster the realism of algorithmic plug-ins,
while convolution technology has become
ever more mutable in the hands of some
clever designers.
One of the clever designers at the
forefront of this process has been
Matthew Hill of Liquidsonics. His first
product, Reverberate, introduced novel
modulation possibilities into convolution,
special algorithmic reverb generator.
and he’s since developed his own
Fusion-IR technology to offer much of
the editing flexibility we take for granted
in algorithmic reverb. Highlights along
the way have included Seventh Heaven,
a semi-official recreation of the celebrated
Bricasti M7 hardware unit, and Lustrous
Plates, an open-ended and versatile plate
reverb simulation.
With Liquidsonics’ latest product, the
process has almost reached its logical
conclusion, because Cinematic Rooms
is very much an algorithmic reverb,
albeit one that still incorporates some
convolution elements. It also represents
a serious attempt to address the needs
of users working in surround, and if your
system is capable, multichannel formats
up to 7.1.6 are supported. (Pro Tools, for
example, only supports channel formats
up to 7.1.2, so a workaround is required
for 7.1.4 and 7.1.6.)
Cinematic Rooms is available for Mac
and Windows operating systems, in VST,
AU and AAX Native formats. Both the
basic and the more expensive Professional
edition support all the relevant surround
configurations, but the latter provides
more presets and, as we’ll see, more
options for tailoring your reverbs within
a surround mix. An iLok account is
required for authorisation. Being mostly

14 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
algorithmic, Cinematic Rooms also doesn’t
have an enormous IR library, so needs only
200MB drive space.
Known Unknowns
Much about Cinematic Rooms’ interface
will be familiar to anyone who’s ever used
a reasonably sophisticated algorithmic
reverb. As is often the case, early
reflections are controlled separately
from the reverb tail, and many of the
controls in both cases are standard. So,
for example, the early reflections section
includes controls for the Reflectivity of
the virtual space, along with the Diffusion
of the reflections that are generated
and the spacing between them (Size),
while the reverb tail parameters include
overall Reverb Time and Pre-delay.
High-frequency roll-off and modulation
within both early reflections and
reverb tail are also controllable in the
normal way, and there’s an entirely
conventional EQ section.
At the same time, though, you’ll also
notice a few more unusual parameters.
The early reflections section is notable
for a control labelled Proximity, offering
a variety of settings starting with Adjacent
at one end to Far and then Reverse
at the other. This idea is to offer more
realistic and nuanced control over the
apparent position of the source within the
virtual space than is obtainable with just
a pre-delay control, and the results fully
justify the means. The reverb tail section,
meanwhile, includes a parameter named
Bloom, which shapes the build-up or onset
of the reverb.
Plane Simple
One of the things that makes Cinematic
Rooms unique is a set of parameters
available only in the Professional version,
where both early reflections and reverb
tail feature an X-Feed section. The
controls found here determine the way
in which reverb from a source in one
channel propagates through the others.
The available parameters are Level,
Delay and Roll-off; the function of each is
self-explanatory, but their purpose might
not be. The point is to be able to specify
the extent to which reverb ‘belongs
to’ a source and reflects that source’s
position in the sound stage. The value of
this feature is arguably most important in
post-production, especially in surround
sound. Imagine, for example, a film scene
where something is moving towards the
viewer along a tunnel: the reverb from the
Decorrelation Coding
Perhaps the simplest way to create a sense
of space around a signal would be to send
it to two very short delay lines with slightly
different delay times, and pan those hard left
and right. If that’s all you did, it would probably
be reasonably effective — until someone
listened to it in mono. Because the left and
right channels in such a delay are identical
apart from a few milliseconds’ time difference,
collapsing them together will cause them
to interfere with each other and introduce
unpleasant comb filtering.
This is an extreme example of ‘correlation’,
where two signals have ongoing similarities
that bring about audible consequences when
they’re combined. There are various things that
can be done to reduce the level of correlation
between two related signals; in the example
above, the use of slightly different pitch-shift
settings on either side is a well-known trick.
In a well-designed reverb plug-in, every
channel’s output should be fully decorrelated
from that of every other channel and from
the source itself — whilst, of course, retaining
enough of the source’s sonic character to be
recognisable as reverberation from that source.
This is true of Cinematic Rooms and it’s one
tunnel would be very pronounced, but
also limited to the side from which the
source is approaching. At the other end
of the spectrum, completely decoupling
the reverb propagation from the source
position could also be an effective tool
in scenes where an actor is struggling to
locate the origin of a sound.
This brings us to the other main
distinction between the basic and
Professional versions of Cinematic Rooms,
which is a concept Liquidsonics call ‘reverb
planes’. As I’ve already mentioned, the
basic version supports all feasible surround
formats, but with the limitation that all
settings apply to all channels equally.
There are plenty of circumstances where
that would be more than adequate, and
anyone using Cinematic Rooms solely as
a stereo reverb will probably get by fine
without the Professional version. But if
you’re mixing for surround configurations
such as Dolby Atmos that offer precise
localisation in all three dimensions,
there are also circumstances where you
want things to behave in different ways
in different planes.
Consider, for instance, how sound
might behave in a long, thin hall with no
roof. Apart from a few early reflections
from the floor, there would be no
reverberation in the vertical plane, while
the left-right ambience might have
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
of the reasons why it still sounds very good
even when auditioned in mono. But what no
reverb can do is eliminate correlation between
the source signals that are being fed to it. In
other words, if you took those two delay lines
and sent both of them to the same reverb
plug-in, the resulting reverb would inevitably
sound comb filtered regardless of the quality
of the plug-in.
Cinematic Rooms Professional introduces
a novel way around this. If you want to apply
the same reverb setting to two or more sources
in your mix that are correlated, you can set up
multiple instances of the plug-in and choose
different ‘decorrelation coding’ patterns for
each. In the example above, you could apply
the same hall or chamber preset to each
of the delay lines, and as long as you used
different decorrelation coding settings and had
Cinematic Rooms 100-percent wet, you’d hear
no comb filtering.
In truth, I struggled to find a real-world
application for this feature — ultimately,
if your source tracks don’t combine
unproblematically in mono then you have
bigger problems than correlated reverb! — but
it’s a thoughtful provision.
a significantly different character from the
front-back reflections. And in Cinematic
Rooms Professional, this sort of effect can
be recreated. All parameters default to
global control, but they operate within
individual stereo ‘planes’: left-right, rear
left-right and so on. Any parameter for
any plane can be de-linked from the
global setting and varied: so, in the
example above, the horizontal planes
Liquidsonics
Cinematic Rooms
$199/$399
pros
• Sounds great.
• Unusually detailed control over
early reflections.
• The concept of ‘reverb planes’ will be an
asset to anyone working in surround,
especially in post-production.
cons
• If you want trashy reverbs, you won’t find
them here.
summary
Cinematic Rooms is a very high-class
algorithmic surround reverb, and although
some of its features are designed with
post-production users in mind, it works
extremely well in music mixing and in
stereo too.
15
 ON TEST
L I Q U I D S O N I C S C I N E M AT I C R O O M S

might have similar settings for things

like Reflectivity and Proximity, but varied
reverb times and balances between
early reflections and reverb tail, while
the vertical planes might be configured
very differently. The individual planes
are represented by discs that appear at
the top right of the user inferface, each
displaying a number representing the
number of controls that are unlinked
within that plane.
There are a few other features that
are available only in Cinematic Rooms
Professional. Perhaps the most significant
is that Professional users get more than
300 presets to the 80 or so in the basic
version, but there are also a number of
extra controls. The tail algorithm features
a built-in delay line and an intriguing
control labelled Undulation; the action of
this parameter is somewhat obscure, but
quite noticeable in long tails, where it can
create a subtle animation and movement
that’s very different from conventional
LFO-derived modulation.
The early reflections’ Diffusion is
augmented in the Professional version by
an additional Width parameter, and the
Proximity control is joined by a setting
labelled Pattern. This adds further
versatility to the options for spacing
the reflections, including an interesting
Nonlin U setting. In conjunction with the
various delay and Proximity settings,
Nonlin U permits the creation of reverbs
that behave in a ‘nonlinear’ fashion, with
reversed or flattened dynamic envelopes,
yet still sound plausibly natural. I’m not
sure I’ve ever come across another reverb
that can pull off this particular trick!
In Use
The concept of reverb planes is a deep one
and hugely powerful, but I think it’s fair to
say that it will be of most interest to those
working in high channel-count surround
formats such as Atmos or higher-order
Ambisonics. That probably doesn’t include
most people who are recording and mixing
music, so does that mean this plug-in isn’t
Alternatives
For stereo use, high-quality algorithmic
reverb plug-ins are available from the likes of
Lexicon, Relab, FabFilter, Sonnox and many
more developers. Surround reverbs are less
common; I’m not aware of any rivals that have
all the same features as Cinematic Rooms
but Flux’s IRCAM Verb v3 probably comes
the closest. Exponential Audio’s reverbs are
also surround-capable and rightly popular in
post-production circles.
Reverb planes in action: the dials at the top right of the screen indicate that three parameters in the front
plane have been delinked from the Master settings, two in the Rear plane and two in the Centre plane,
which is currently being edited.
relevant for music users? Absolutely not.
Cinematic Rooms is a hugely powerful
and great-sounding algorithmic reverb for
any sort of mixing, music included. Sound
quality is straight out of the top drawer,
and what’s really noticeable in use is the
attention that’s been paid to getting the
early reflections right.
Early reflections are the most important
auditory cues as to the size and shape
of a real space, and Cinematic Rooms
lets you dive unusually deeply into their
simulation without introducing millions
of parameters. One upshot of this is that
the plug-in especially shines at producing
ambiences and other short reverbs. Where
lesser plug-ins start to ‘bark’ or become
unnatural and metallic-sounding, Cinematic
Rooms just adds ever more delicate air or
richness to the source. If you like reverbs of
the “subtle enhancement that no-one will
notice it until it’s bypassed” variety, you’ll
be spoiled for choice here.
That’s not to say that Cinematic
Rooms can’t do more obvious reverb
too, of course. With a maximum reverb
time of 45 seconds, plus the ability to
do infinite reverbs if you want, it has
no problem recreating both plausible
concert spaces and epic Valhalla-like
halls. The Professional edition
includes a large number of realistic
post-production-oriented rooms and
other interiors, along with lots more
impressionistic smallish spaces for music
production. The Chambers category is
a particularly rich source of inspiration for
music mixes, and I’m sure very few real
reverb chambers ever sounded half as
sweet as presets like ‘Helios Chamber’.
Even settings that really ought not to
work, and almost certainly wouldn’t in
other plug-ins, deliver results that are
not only pleasant but useful. I would
never normally think to use a nonlinear
reverb on a lead vocal unless as a special
effect, but there are several here that
work beautifully. And as well as offering
levels of surround controllability rarely
encountered, Cinematic Rooms also
sounds great in mono, which is an
important quality in music mixing.
The only conceivable downside is that
its absolute refusal ever to sound bad
might not always be exactly what you
want in a reverb. Trashy, gritty, grainy,
metallic, ringing and obviously artificial
reverbs all have their place on occasion,
and I never managed to push Cinematic
Rooms into producing anything that could
be described in those terms. Settings
that ought to sound all wrong just, well,
don’t! If lo-fi is your thing, buy something
else; but if you want to experience
a reverb that can make any setting at
all sound hi-fi, Cinematic Rooms will
deliver every time.
££ Professional version $399;
standard version $199.
WW www.liquidsonics.com

16 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
 Aston Stealth
The most versatile mic in the world

“Aston Microphones has

already proved that not
only can a British team
design some of the best
microphones in the world,
but they can build them
in the UK and make them
affordable for everyone too.”

National Association of
Music Merchants (NAMM)

£299 inc. VAT

www.astonmics.com +44 (0) 845 500 2 500 astonfamily@astonmics.com

 ON TEST
Cranborne
Audio EC2
Dual-channel Mic Preamp
With added functionality and improved specs,
this great preamp just got better.
HUGH ROBJOHNS
W
hen it comes to choosing
mic preamps, some value
clean performance, while for
others ‘character’ is all. A couple of years
ago, the clever people at Cranborne Audio
came up with a way of delivering both in
one design, with a very clever, controllable
means of adding different characters that
they called ‘Mojo’. It was introduced in the
superb Camden 500 preamp (reviewed
in October 2018: go to https://sosm.ag/
cranborne-camden500 to read more),
which impressed the editors at SOS so
much it was Highly Commended in our
Gear Of The Year reviews.
Cranborne have recently built on
this preamp design to create a new 1U
rackmounting device, the EC2. The name
is not an expensive London postcode,
but rather it derives from ‘Expander
18 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Camden 2-channel’ and it is so described
because the EC2 combines a pair of
Camden preamps with two high-quality
headphone amps and Cranborne’s
Ethernet-based CAST interface system.
The CAST system and headphone amp
design were introduced in the company’s
500R8 500-series interface (reviewed
in September 2019: https://sosm.ag/
cranborne-500r8), and used in the
500ADAT (reviewed November 2019:
https://sosm.ag/cranborne-500ADAT). As
the EC2’s various individual elements have
already been covered in previous reviews,
I’ll focus here mostly on how the EC2
works as a complete package.
Preamp Overview
Although the preamps in the EC2 appear
much like the Camden 500 module turned
on their sides, and sound every bit as
good, the construction is very different.
All the electronics for both preamps, the
headphone amps, and the power supplies
sit on a large motherboard. Subsidiary
cards carry the front-panel controls and
rear-panel connectors. Surface-mount
components are used throughout, and
an elaborate DC-DC converter section
generates the internal power rails from
an external 24V DC line-lump PSU,
which connects via a locking ‘Power-DIN’
plug and has a standard IEC mains
inlet. Unusually, the mains safety earth
is also extended to the rack chassis via
the negative side of the DC supply,
and a marked screw on the rear panel
is also provided as a chassis grounding
terminal, if required.
An unplanned benefit of laying out the
Camden preamp circuitry for the EC2’s
much larger circuit board was slightly
improved intermodulation (IMD) and total
harmonic (THD) distortion figures, both

of which were already spectacularly
good! Another small improvement,
introduced in the Camden 500 module
after serial number 500 and carried
over into the EC2, improved the
rejection of RF interference.
Operationally, the preamp sections
have the same controls and layout
as the Camden 500: a switched gain
control, with 12 5.5dB steps, avoids
gain-bunching problems and allows
accurate matching of channels; there
are toggles for polarity inversion,
a high-pass filter (80Hz, first order),
phantom power (with status LED)
and input source (mic, line or DI). The
Mojo section has another toggle to
select its Cream or Thump modes and
a rotary control for the amount, with
a backstop switch to turn the facility
off. A single multicolour LED indicates
the signal level.
Cranborne’s clever Mojo circuit can transform this brilliantly clean,
quiet preamp into a wonderfully characterful colour machine.
On the rear, each preamp has a single
XLR for the mic input, with a toggle switch
to select the remote CAST input instead
(see below). On the front, a quarter-inch
TRS socket caters for balanced line and
unbalanced instrument DI connections. The
preamp outputs are presented on both
XLR and TRS sockets, and a ground-lift
toggle completely isolates pin 1 of the XLR
(but doesn’t affect the sleeve ground of the
TRS socket) when engaged. A brand‑new
facility for the EC2 is a TRS output socket
labelled ‘Link’, which provides an actively
buffered, impedance-balanced output
right after the input selector, and before
the gain stage and Mojo sections. This is
intended to feed an instrument amplifier
when using the instrument input, like a DI
box, but can also be used for re-amping
duties when using a line input. It’s a very
thoughtful, handy addition.
Headphone Amps
The EC2’s headphone amps are
reassuringly quiet and clean, and they’re
very powerful, being able to deliver over
0.5W into each earpiece for headphone
impedances between 32 and 220 Ω, the
power delivery being at a maximum for
headphones around 100Ω impedance,
reaching a chunky 1.21W. I could drive all
of my headphones (ranging from 32-250 Ω)
to painfully loud levels without difficulty.
Each headphone amp has a front-panel
quarter-inch TRS output, and the output
volume is adjusted with a slim rotary knob.
The other three knobs set the input source
levels, with one for each preamp channel
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
and one for an external stereo aux input.
The long, thin control knobs look and feel
good, but I’d have preferred some visual
distinction for the master level controls.
The external auxiliary input comes
either from a pair of rear-panel TRS
‘Aux’ sockets, or the ‘CAST Out’ return
signal. The Aux sockets take priority, and
plugging only into the left input provides
a dual-mono signal. By default, the two
preamp signals are fed to the headphones
in stereo, with preamp 1 in the left ear and
preamp 2 in the right, but a front-panel
Cranborne Audio EC2
£1099
pros
• A pair of superbly clean and quiet Camden
preamps in a 1U rack box.
• Mojo circuitry is astonishingly
characterful, versatile and controllable.
• Two independent, powerful headphone
amps with external cue inputs and full
mixing facilities.
• CAST interfaces for low-cost stagebox and
single-cable interconnection options.
• Very nicely engineered.
cons
• The line-lump PSU will disappoint some
potential customers.
summary
Cranborne have repackaged their brilliant
Camden preamps into a dual-channel
rackmount format, combined with a pair
of powerful independent headphone
amps to provide convenient and flexible
latency-free monitoring.
19
 ON TEST
CRANBORNE AUDIO EC2
As well as the expected inputs and outputs, the rear panel plays host to the CAST ports and a handy ‘Link’ socket,
which allows you to pass a ‘thru’ signal from the instrument input to your amp, or to re-amp mic/line signals.
switch allows auditioning in mono (both
preamps in both ears).
Not many two-channel mic preamps
include headphone amps, but it makes
a lot of sense for modern project-studio
workflows and practices. For example,
when working out the best position for
placing a mic relative to an acoustic
instrument it’s essential to be able to listen
as the mic is moved around; being able to
plug headphones straight into the preamp
to do that is remarkably convenient. But the
real raison-d’être is to provide convenient,
high-quality, latency-free, independent
monitoring for up to two performers while
recording. Each artist can listen directly to
their mic, with or without a contribution
from the second mic/instrument input
channel, and with a mono or stereo backing
track via the external inputs. The artist can
also balance the input source levels and
overall volume exactly as required from the
front panel. In a small project studio or on
location, these facilities make life so much
simpler and easier.
CAST
CAST is an abbreviation of ‘Cat5 Analogue
Signal Transport’ and is Cranborne’s
method for using low-cost shielded
Ethernet cabling instead of traditional
analogue multicore. The system uses
Alternatives
Audio interfaces aside, there aren’t many
dual-channel preamps with headphone
monitoring. The Neve 1073DPX and the
new Neumann V402 both have a single
headphone amp to monitor the preamp
outputs, but neither accept external cue mix
inputs. The only preamp that immediately
comes to mind with headphone monitoring
and a cue mix input is the Focusrite ISA One,
but that is only a single mic preamp with
a separate DI channel on the side.
20 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
the four twisted pairs and screen of an
Ethernet cable (of up to 100m) to convey
four balanced audio signals, two in each
direction. Although Cat5 is mentioned
in the name, shielded Cat5e, Cat6 or
Cat7 cables can be used, and individually
shielded Cat7 is preferred when working
with mic-level signals. It’s an entirely
passive system — in the breakout boxes
the RJ45 sockets are wired directly to
the XLR/jack sockets — so it’s a very
cost-effective and convenient way of
extending connections.
On the back of the EC2 are two CAST
sockets, one labelled ‘CAST In’ and one
‘CAST Out’, although both actually carry
two channels in each direction. The CAST
Out socket carries the analogue line
outputs from the two preamp channels,
while its return signals are routed to
the headphone amps, along with the
stereo auxiliary inputs.
A typical application for this would
be to connect an EC2 preamp directly to
a 500ADAT or 500USB rack, for example,
using just the one Ethernet cable, with
a monitor mix from the rack being sent
back to the EC2’s headphone amps.
On the input side, the CAST In socket
allows remote input connections to the
preamps, so an Ethernet cable can be used
to link the EC2 to a CAST breakout box
elsewhere in the room, serving as a snake
and stagebox. The two return signals
sent back down to the CAST breakout
box come from the headphone monitor
mixers of the two headphone amplifiers,
at line level.
The longest shielded Ethernet cable
I had to hand was only five metres, and the
interface seemed to work perfectly well
with line, instrument and mic-level sources
over that distance, with any crosstalk
between channels completely inaudible.
However, for longer runs, and especially
with mic-level signals, I’d probably want to
use a Cat7 cable.
Verdict
I was hugely impressed with the sound
quality, technical performance and
versatility of the Camden 500 preamp,
and the EC2 version is every bit as good;
it remains one of my all-time favourite
preamps. It boasts not only superbly
clean, quiet and dynamic performance as
a straight preamp, but also an extraordinary
ability, courtesy of the Mojo circuit, to
become the most versatile, characterful
preamp I know. The fact that the EC2
has slightly better technical specifications
than the Camden 500 is a pleasant bonus,
although I doubt anyone will hear the
improvements unless working in an area
with strong RF interference. The rackmount
format actually makes it more desirable
to me, and the inclusion of headphone
amps that match the high-quality standards
of the preamps opens a new world of
convenience and practicality. I could see
many more manufacturers following this
idea in the future.
Overall, I have to say that the EC2
is one of the most desirable, capable,
versatile and practical preamps I’ve used
in a very long time. Given its phenomenal
audio quality and flexibility, with two
excellent preamps, two headphone amps,
and the CAST interfacing options, it
represents exceptional value for money,
too. If you’re in the market for a serious
new preamp, you’d be mad not to put this
at the top of your shortlist.
££ £1099 including VAT.
EE info@soundtech.co.uk
WW www.soundtech.co.uk
WW www.cranborne-audio.com
 INTRODUCING THE NEW LIVETRAK L-8
With 6 XLR microphone inputs, 6 programmable
pads for sound effects, 4 headphone outputs and
an extra connection for a telephone for calls, the
new LiveTrak L-8 is the professional podcasting
mixer. And because the L-8 can also be powered
by batteries or an USB Powerbank, you can use the
L-8 almost anywhere.

www.zoom.co.jp

Exclusive distribution in D, A, CH, GB, PL, EE, LV, LT, BG, HU, BE, NL, L, GR : Sound Service European Music Distribution | www.sound-service.eu | info@sound-service.eu
 ON TEST
DDMF Magic
Death Eye
Compressor Plug-ins
These two plug-ins bring you the spirit of their
‘unobtainium’ hardware counterparts!
ERIC JAMES
I
first heard of the Magic Death
Eye analogue compressor from an
American mastering colleague who’d
just taken delivery of one. Intrigued,
I looked for more details but sadly soon
found a few good reasons for me not to
rush out and get one. First, designer/
builder Ian Sefchick can only produce
them when free from the demands of his
mastering career at Capitol Records, so
his output is both limited and irregular.
Second, even if one were to become
available, he doesn’t make them for
export outside the USA. Finally, the stereo
version costs $8,800! That’s actually not an
22 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
unreasonable amount to ask for a superbly
designed, hand-built vari-mu compressor,
but it is hardly chump change.
So when I learned that DDMF had
created a plug-in version, I quickly tried the
demo. It was good, and within a couple
of hours I’d bought it. Recently, DDMF
released another ‘stereo’ Magic Death Eye
plug-in. I bought that one immediately too
and both plug-ins now have a home in my
mastering workflow and have already been
used on several professional projects.
There are versions for the common
Mac OS (v10.8 or higher) and Windows
(32- and 64-bit, v7 or higher) plug-in
formats, and an AUv3 version for iOS.
Installation and activation on my Windows
10 and Sequoia 14 system was blessedly
simple: the license is provided in a ZIP
file, and you locate it when you first use
the plug-in. Sadly, I’ve no way to confirm
how close the sound of the plug-ins are to
the originals, so I’ve had to assume a very
close kinship and evaluate them on their
own terms.
It Takes Two
Despite the names, both Magic Death Eye
plug-ins are fully stereo in operation. One,
which I’ll refer to as MDE, is called ‘Mono’
because it is based on the mono version of
the hardware; the ‘Stereo’ version (MDEST)
is modelled after the stereo hardware unit.
There are enough differences between
the plug-ins to consider having both in
the toolbox, though their basic design is
similar and you’d be unlikely to use them in
the same chain.
Both have variable ‘switched’ input
and threshold level controls, six fixed
time-constant parameters (labelled 1 to
6, as on the Fairchilds that inspired the
hardware MDEs) and fixed-frequency,
switchable high-pass side-chain filters (set
at 150Hz for the MDE; and at 200Hz for
the MDEST). The MDEST has an additional
Master output level knob, whereas the
MDE’s is hidden, and the MDEST has
a ‘Threshold Link’ (which seems a bit
 SONTRONICS
S
O
N
T
R
O
N
I
C
S ® ®

PODCAST PRO
podcast • radio • voiceover • gaming • conference • streaming • video
confusing at first, as a single Threshold control applies to
both channels, but in practice it does tighten things a bit).
Both models also have a GUI which is a painstakingly
accurate representation of their respective hardware. The
screw adjusters of the analogue originals don’t all have a
corresponding digital function, but some, along with the
Magic Death Eye faceplate logo and the power lamp on the
MDEST, have hidden software-only features. On the MDE,
the logo switches in a ‘Punch’ mode (which changes the
compression characteristics and adds a new graphic to the
GR meter), and the screws between the input and threshold
controls adjust Output level (-20 to +12 dB) and wet-dry mix
(0 to 100 percent). For the MDEST, the MDE logo switches
the upsampling rate from normal (Black) to x2 (light blue)
to x4 (dark blue). The power lamp brings in the same Punch
mode (now known as ‘Laura’, and indicated by the L meter
label changing to the name). This time, the balance control
screws adjust the harmonic content from the normal 50
percent (status lights orange) to 0 percent (green) and 100
percent (red). At present there’s no wet/dry mix control
on the MDEST.
The most significant difference between the two versions
is that MDEST has a simple but interesting EQ section,
which operates within the compression circuit. This includes
a low-cut filter (off, 20 and 30 Hz), a switched LF boost (20,
40 and 100 Hz, with up to 5dB of boost in 1dB steps), and
a switched HF boost (5, 12, and 18 kHz, also with 5dB of
boost in 1dB steps). Right-clicking on the Low frequency
control changes the low end to an elliptical filter, mono’d
below the chosen frequency, and right-clicking on the High
frequency control switches the EQ path from stereo to ‘‘Incredible quality...
this is the new
Mid or Sides.

Mastering Tests podcast standard!’’

Casey Cohen, Podcast/Video Producer
To my mind there are basically two kinds of mastering
processor: one has a complex but very flexible set of
parameters, which you have to think your way through;
the other, by reason of simplicity and lack of parameter

‘‘
information, you can only learn by listening. The MDE
plug-ins are analogue simple, so I approached evaluation of Smooth sound,
both in much the same way as the hardware Hendy Amps built to last… I really
Michelangelo I reviewed earlier this year (go to https://sosm.
ag/hendy-michaelangelo to read more). can’t fault it!’’
Chris Korff, Sound On Sound
I’ll start with the original MDE. As the ratio is not
separately adjustable, there are only really four parameters
which you can use to change the character of compression:
the input level, the threshold, the six preset time

DDMF Magic Death Eye Our new PODCAST PRO dynamic microphone
reproduces your voice with outstanding depth, clarity
and presence. Its superb side rejection allows you to
pros
record group podcasts and interview guests without
• Both sound great, and are pretty difficult to make sound bad! risk of spill, while its internal windshield helps reduce
• Useful ‘hidden’ functions. sibilance, plosives and unwanted noise. NED, DEV
• Discounted bundle pricing. IG
S

EL

If you want the ultimate sound for your podcast,

DE

OPED

cons radio station, voiceover studio or streaming,

& MA

• You might have to buy both! get your hands on a PODCAST PRO today!
D
K

EI U
N T E
summary
In attempting to model two of the very rare Magic Death Eye
SONTRONICS USERS INCLUDE: ED SHEERAN • ABBEY ROAD STUDIOS
compressors, DDMF have created some special plug-ins.
BLUR • PAUL WELLER • DAVE GROHL • FLOOD • AEROSMITH • MUSE
KINGS OF LEON • PJ HARVEY • GARY NUMAN • KT TUNSTALL
QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE • STEREOPHONICS • AND MORE…

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 23
www.sontronics.com
@sontronics @sontronics /sontronicsuk
 ON TEST
D D M F M A G I C D E AT H E Y E
Clicking the logo engages Punch mode, which
transforms the compressor behaviour in
a wonderful way.
parameters, and a choice of three additional
attack settings (fast, medium and slow).
Getting things right is a matter of listening
and tweaking, but on an attended jazz stem
mastering project, with a lumpy, bumpily
recorded acoustic bass and a female
vocalist with a nicely textured mezzo voice,
I found that I could achieve the desired
effects pretty quickly. It was interesting
to get the immediate responses of the
musicians: the bass player thought his tone
benefitted from a slight push on the input
levels, and for most of the songs a medium
attack and setting 3 or 4 seemed to do the
trick, producing an articulate snap when
needed and controlling any boom. The
vocalist also liked the medium attack, with
setting 3 sounding the most natural for
ballads, but Fast and setting 1 preferable
for up-tempo and scat singing.
When I started mastering stereo mixes,
it was quite easy to ‘over-control’ things,
even when using the classic combination
of a slow attack and a relatively fast release
(eg. setting 2). It seemed to grab just a bit
too much, pushing middle images to the
back a bit and dulling things down. Dialling
back on the threshold to the extent that the
gain reduction needles never even moved
was a revelation. With such a minimal
setting (and the compressor likely doing
a bit more than the GR needles indicated)
the MDE seemed to dance along with
certain kinds of music, adding a seductive
movement. I wasn’t always entirely happy
with the effect on the kick when mastering
certain styles of music, even with the 150Hz
side-chain high-pass filter engaged. But
Alternatives
There are many good modelled vari-mu
plug-ins available, including the Pulsar
Mu and the Kush Audio AR-1 and various
Fairchild emulations, but there are none that
offer quite the same character as DDMF’s
Magic Death Eyes.
24 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
then I discovered a ‘hidden’ feature, not
even mentioned in the early versions of the
manual: clicking on the Magic Death Eye
logo changes the background of the meter
to the kind of pin-up that used to feature
on the nose cones of American World War
II bombers, and does something quite
startling to the compression characteristic.
It’s called the Punch mode, and it is very
nice. It allows much more kick to come
through and overall gives the sound an
additional punch and push. (I used this on
a track for a forthcoming Faithless album
I was just finishing off at the time.)
MDEST is clearly of the same bloodline,
but it has been optimised for mastering.
The compression is much more gentle,
the high-pass filter has an extra 50Hz
setting, and then there’s the EQ. Putting
this plug-in in the processing chain for the
first time brought a very familiar change to
the music running through it. There wasn’t
much of a feeling of restraint, but there
was a very nice additional density. Glue
can become gloop very quickly with some
analogue vari-mu compressors I’ve used in
the past, though. So when pushing things
a little too hard and still liking the density
but not the darkness, the hidden feature
that allowed me to dial down some of
the tube characteristics worked very well.
The compressor action with the harmonic
distortion reduced to about 30 percent is
very seductive, and I’ve now used it on a lot
of mastering projects.
The EQ section can add some lovely
touches but needs a lot of careful listening.
Although the manual reports them as
a relatively steep 24dB/octave, the 20
and 30 Hz HP filters seemed to reach an
unexpectedly long way into the lows, so
sometimes I used the 20Hz one but I didn’t
use the 30Hz one much at all. I didn’t use
the low-boost, narrow bells at 20 and 40
much either, but that’s simply because
I had them just prior to an analogue chain,
which was often the wrong place to use
them. In a different setup, the 100Hz shelf
at 1dB can add some nice juiciness to
hard-sounding bass. The medium-wide
HF bell boost got rather more use (in
mastering, almost all at 1dB), as 12kHz was
occasionally really nice for adding a touch
of percussive clarity, especially when
used on the Sides signal only. This added
width without sounding like an artificial
enhancement, and the 18kHz added
enough gentle air that I sometimes used it
despite having a nice analogue EQ, since it
freed up an upper band on the latter.
At high input levels, it’s possible to
induce some controlled clipping, as
indicated by the GR meters starting to flash
red. Judging the amount is made easier
by the ability to link the input and output
controls (by ctrl-clicking one of them)
so that you get a relatively unchanging
monitoring level, though a higher input will
also need a more moderate threshold. All of
this allows some additional perceived level,
and it works pretty well for that.
The Eyes Have It!
Hopefully, this review makes it obvious
that I’m very taken with both versions of
DDMF’s Magic Death Eye. As a mastering
engineer, if I could really only have one
I’d choose the MDEST, whereas if wanting
something for use on the stereo bus
while mixing, I’d more likely choose the
MDE. That said, there are some things
in mastering that still seem to be to be
done better with the MDE, and here’s just
one example. In the latest update to the
MDEST, a Punch mode has been added.
I didn’t miss it previously, because I could
and always did use the MDE for that. But
even now, the two modes are not directly
comparable, and a lot of the time I prefer
the ‘bigger’ punch of the MDE. It’s just as
well, then, that there’s a discount available
that makes the prospect of buying both
plug-ins look rather more attractive!
££ MDE £79. MDEST £119. MDE Bundle
(both versions) £159. Prices include VAT.
WW https://ddmf.eu
 COMPETITION
Win!
Spitfire BBC Symphony
Orchestra Instruments
WORTH £1697
S
ince their founding in 2007, Spitfire Audio have earned
a place alongside the most venerable British pro audio
brands, having concocted some hugely ambitious sampled
instruments that have won favour with professional composers the
world over. Their newest orchestral instrument was born out of
a collaboration with another great British institution, the BBC, and its
in-house Symphony Orchestra.
Recorded at the legendary
Maida Vale Studios, Spitfire’s
To enter, please visit:
BBC Symphony Orchestra
samples the world-renowned
https://sosm.ag/spitfirecompsep20
99-strong orchestra in
exquisite detail. It provides a one-stop shop for orchestral
composition, offering 56 different instruments played both solo
and in ensembles, and covering a massive 435 playing techniques.
Producing this detailed library required no fewer than 84 different
recording sessions, and generated over a million(!) samples. In its
full Professional form, it provides composers with 680GB worth
of samples, but these have been condensed into a unified and
easy-to-use software front end that doesn’t get in the way of you
and your writing. For composers in a hurry, however, and who
26 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
perhaps don’t need access to all the individual microphone
signals, all of the meticulously captured performances can be
heard through a single, production-ready stereo mix, in the less
resource-intensive Core edition.
When Dave Stewart reviewed BBCSO back in SOS November
2019, he was wowed by the consistently outstanding performances,
and the breadth of sounds
and articulations on offer. You
can read that review at www.
soundonsound.com/reviews/
spitfire-audio-bbc-symphony-
orchestra.
For this month’s SOS competition, Spitfire are kindly giving you
the chance to win a copy of your own. One lucky entrant will win the
full Spitfire BBC Symphony Orchestra Professional edition, worth
£899, while two runners up will get a copy of BBCSO Core, worth
£399 each. To be in with a chance of winning one of these fantastic
prizes, simply follow the link shown and answer the questions there,
by Friday 2nd October. Good luck!
Prizes kindly donated by Spitfire Audio.
www.spitfireaudio.com
 Core
Complete Clarity

Core 7

Core 47 Core 59 Core Sub

HEAR EVERY SINGLE DETAIL

The Core Series are the most revealing reference monitors in
Dynaudio’s 40+ year history. With breath-taking accuracy, the
range uses our most advanced drivers ever. These include
all-new Dynaudio tweeters that feature the ingenious new
resonance-defeating Hexis inner dome.

Add in innovative custom DSP technology for even more power

and ease of use, extreme consistency between speakers and
intelligent, flexible cabinet designs, not to mention the best
amplifiers we have ever heard and you have a package that
really delivers - all without listening fatigue.

Bring the pinnacle of honesty, consistency and reliability to

your studio.

Distributed in the UK & Europe by:

Building Brands Together

sales@audiodistributiongroup.com www.dynaudio.com/professional-audio
 WING £ 2,555.00 Huge Behringer X-32
trade-in offer!
We take your old Behringer X-32 unit
as a trade-in for the folowing prices:
X-32 Rack: £ 450.00 ***
X-32 Producer: £ 630.00 ***
X-32 Compact: £ 720.00 ***
X-32: £ 900.00 ***

*** When purchasing a new Behringer Wing unit. The trade-in price for the old X32 unit applies only to units in good condition, second hand, without damage and/or defects.

TOPSELLER!! TOPSELLER!! TOPSELLER!!

£ 285.00 BEHRINGER K-2

With the K-2, Behringer presents an analog,
£ 279.00
BEHRINGER CAT semimodular synthesizer that is a clone of the

£ 679.00
Monophonic Analog Synthesizer famous Korg MS-20.
Code: SYN0007357-000 Code: SYN0007187-000

BEHRINGER POLY D
Behringer takes his successful Minimoog clone „Model
DEAL!! SEQUENTIAL PROPHET X
D“ to the next level and ennobles it as the paraphonic The Dave Smith Instruments Prophet X is
„Poly D“! This is an analog synthesizer with a 37- an advanced 61-note 8/16-voice sequential
key velocity-sensitive keyboard. This synth has been synthesizer with a semi-weighted keyboard
expanded with a fourth, equivalent oscillator, duo and extensive processing power.
split and paraphonic play modes, sequencer and the Code: SYN0006480-000

£ 2,759.00
analog effects chorus and distortion. A nice feature is,
like the original from the 70s, the adjustable control
panel; so you can always easily find the best control
position for you. Code: SYN0007317-000

DEAL!! NEW! TOPSELLER!!

£ 186.00 £ 119.00 PAIR!

FAME AUDIO PRO SERIES RPM 8
The Fame Pro Series RPM 8 monitors feature 8“ woofers
and 1“ tweeters, all housed in a high-quality bass-
reflex cabinet. The RPM 6 speakers are magnetically
shielded and feature two-way active switching with
complete channel separation. The 8“ drivers have a
glass fibre cone, while the soft-dome tweeter has a HF
Level Adjust control from -2dB to +1dB.
Code: REC0009510-000
£ 65.00
FLUID AUDIO
F4W NEAR-FIELD MONITOR FAME AUDIO
The Fluid Audio F4W Near-Field Monitor (Pair, DB 060
White) is an active 2-way near-field monitor with The Fame Audio DB 060 is a practical and elegant
rear bass reflex port. Featuring a 4“ woofer made monitor stand for your home and/or recording
of high-density paper and a 1“ silk cone tweeter, it studio. It offers space for 5“, 6.5“, 7“ and 8“
offers a frequency response of 69Hz-22kHz, while speakers, which won‘t slip thanks to the surface
the Class-AB power amp with external heat sink and with rubber pads, while a stable stand prevents the
auto-standby mode delivers 30W. fast tipping over.
Code: REC0014124-000 Code: REC0014402-000

BEST PRICES GUARANTEED

Our shop in Romford Shipping from our warehouse
 SET! LER!!
TOPSELFAME AUDIO PRO SERIES VT-67 TUBE MICROPHONE
Tube microphone with 9 directional characteristics

The VT-67 from Fame‘s Pro Series is a tube microphone with switchable polar patterns.
This studio microphone offers a choice of cardioid, octagonal, omnidirectional and
six intermediate stages, which can be adjusted via the power supply. This makes it an
excellent all-round microphone for recording vocals and instruments for project studios
and ambitious home recording.

The use of very high-quality components, such as Lundahl transformers and selected
EH6072A tubes, gives the microphone its very warm, characteristic, full sound with very
low self-noise. A sound that is very popular with musicians and sound engineers for a

£ 499.00
reason. The microphone itself has two switches that can be used to optionally activate a
-10db attenuation and a lowcut.
Code: REC0009827-000

WARM AUDIO WA12 MKII

+ WA-47JR - SET
Set contains
1x Warm Audio WA12 MKII
1x Warm Audio WA-47JR

£ 367.00
1x PPV Medien DVD Kompressor + Dynamics
Code: REC139

TOPSELLER!! TOPSELLER!! TOPSELLER!!

£ 227.00
ROLAND
GO:LIVECAST
The Roland GO:LIVECAST is the perfect all-in-

one solution for live streams on platforms like
Youtube or Facebook Live. It not only connects
your Smarphone with an external microphone
and line-level sources such as CD player or
keyboard, but also has a podcast-capable user
interface: At the bottom left of the Roland
GO:LIVECAST there are 6 freely assignable pads,
which can be used to play clips, pictures, free text
or music live after you have started recording
with the radio tower button.
Code: REC0014723-000
£ 98.00
RODE NT-USB-MINI
Designed for gamers, streamers, podcasters,
Twitchers, YouTubers, and more, the Rode NT-USB
Mini is a USB microphone that aims to give you a
professional, broadcast-quality sound in an easy-to-
use package. If you‘ve always wanted a dynamite
sound but find the concepts of studio-miking to be
baffling, this is the mic for you.
Code: REC0014790-000
£ 199.00
TASCAM DR-10L
The DR-10L features an incredibly low weight of only
63g, making this mobile recorder characterised by
a professional sound and high comfort in use. The
recording is done in 16-/24-bit resolution on Micro
SD or Micro SDHC cards up to 32GB storage capacity.
Code: REC0013251-000 black
Code: REC0013724-000 white

SET! TOPSELLER!!
TOPSELLER!!
RODE NT1-A
incl.STAND - SET

£ 199.00 £ 199.00
Set contains
KLARK TEKNIK 1x Rode NT1-A Complete
76-KT Vocal Recording SSL SOLID STATE LOGIC SSL2
The 1176-KT was designed as an homage to the Solution The British manufacturer Solid State Logic now
classic 1176LN D and E Versions. 1x MUSIC STORE offers for the first time with the SSL Solid State Logic
The completely discrete signal path was modernized Mic-8 stand(Black) SSL2 a small interface for home use. The traditional

£ 177.00
using hand-selected components and custom- Code: REC031 manufacturer has not spared at any end. Both
engineered MIDAS input and output transformers channels feature first-class microphone preamps and
– for an even better sonic performance. high-quality AKM converters with a sample rate of
Code: REC0012818-000 max. 192kHz/24bit. Code: PCM0016252-000

For latest prices check www.dv247.com

CALL US: 01708 771900

Chesham House | Chesham Close
Romford | RM7 7PJ
sales@dv247.com | dv247.com
Store Open: Mon - Sat: 10am to 6pm

www.dv247.com
 INTERVIEW

KAITLYN
AURELIA
SMITH

30 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

We talk to prolific
producer Kaitlyn Aurelia
Smith about her ambient
compositions and love
of Buchla synths.
TOM DOYLE
I
n the increasingly crowded field of
electronic ambient composers, Kaitlyn
Aurelia Smith stands out. Working
with modular synths — mainly Buchla
systems — Smith’s meditative, new
age-y music was initially inspired by ‘60s
minimalist pioneer Terry Riley, but has
developed since 2012 over eight albums,
resulting in the dreamy soundscapes of
her latest, The Mosaic Of Transformation.
Growing up on Orcas Island, off the
Pacific Northwest coast of America,
Smith was first motivated to make music
at the age of 15, after watching a friend
of her family playing piano during a visit
to their home. “I remember seeing the
joy that it brought them,” she recalls.
“I could feel what it felt like to play the
piano. After they’d left, I remember sitting
down at the piano and starting to try and
emulate what I saw in them. Of course,
it didn’t sound like what I heard for
a while [laughs]. But it sparked kind of like
a muscle memory in me that I didn’t know
was there.”
In her late teens, she turned to
classical guitar, going on to study
sound engineering, orchestration and
composition at Berklee College of Music
in Boston. On a visit home, she happened
to mention to a neighbour that she was
a Terry Riley fan. By chance, the neighbour
owned a ‘60s-built Buchla 100, which they
generously loaned to Smith for a year.
“That kind of reopened music for me
in this lovely pressure-free way,” she says.
“It was a really magical time in my life.
I felt like the Buchla was a perfect way to
explore sound in a really new way for me.
Because even though I’d just come from
music school, the aspect of zooming in
on what makes sound and how much can
be heard in one note I felt was not really
covered in music school. It’s one of those
topics that people just assume, if you’re
into music, it must be innate knowledge.
But there’s so much wisdom within that
basic foundation of sound.”
Initially, Smith experimented by
feeding her guitar through the Buchla
and treating its sound. Then, progressing
past making what she calls “bleepy
bloop” sounds, she’d work with two
oscillators and make incremental
changes. “Mostly just listening,” she
explains. “I would practise just making
really subtle adjustments and trying to
understand what was happening to the
sound. Trying to just really break into
how many things change when you make
a subtle adjustment. I had just come from
intensive study of building on sound,
and I kind of wanted to go the reverse
way of deducing how sound is affected.
So, it felt like this research project in
the beginning.
“Just in general, I’m always wanting to
find, I guess for lack of better language,
‘beautiful’ sounds in every instrument.
And for me beautiful sounds aren’t just
the pleasing sounds. It’s where two
extremes are meeting, or where two
things that don’t feel like they have
something in common are meeting.
So, I think that’s why it was really fun
for me to explore with the guitar and
the synthesizer. Trying to find how they
can connect through their capacity to,
like, move air.”
Easel Does It
Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith’s big discovery,
however, and one that was to help shape
her sound, was the Buchla Music Easel.
In 2013, Smith bought one of the new
Easels developed by BEMI and launched
only three years before Don Buchla’s
death in 2016.
“I bought my own,” she says,
“or I guess I did with the help of
a community. It was kind of a funny story
because my husband and I asked for
donations at our wedding for us to buy
a cow [laughs]. And then we ended up
moving to Bolinas, which is a small town
in West Marin, California, and we didn’t
have space for a cow there. So we used
that money for a Music Easel instead.
“This was one of the first remakes,”
she adds. “We were on a wait list before
they had really shared that they were
remaking the Easel. This was when Don
was still a part of the company. We were
number 15 on the wait list and then we
got an email that said that the first three
or four were ready, but they didn’t have
these certain nuts that screw onto the
switches. They asked if there was anyone
who wanted it, even if it didn’t have
those. And we were like, ‘Yeah, we want
it now.’ And so, we got bumped up.”
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Smith stresses that, like the original
Music Easels, the new models all have
their own individual characters. “I’ve
played, like, four or five of the newer
ones and they all are still very different,
even though they’re remade. Honestly,
all Buchla instruments are really different.
A lot of the original Buchla components
aren’t being made any more or are harder
to find. So, as technology progresses and
older components get discontinued, it
changes the sound and it changes the way
that it interacts.”
While she sometimes uses Moogs
in her recordings, Smith is very clearly
devoted to Buchla synthesizers. “Well,
they’re different kinds of synthesis,”
she points out. “Buchla synthesizers are
additive synthesis and Moog synthesizers
are subtractive, so they have different
approaches.” Smith’s third and fourth
albums, 2014’s Tides and 2015’s Euclid,
were made exclusively using the Music
Easel. “As far as the sound goes,” she
says, “for me there’s a certain resonance
in Buchla instruments that I really connect
to. To me, it has a more potent tone.”
Tools Of The Trade
In terms of DAWs, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith
tried out various ones before settling on
Ableton Live. “At school I had learned
Logic, DP and Pro Tools,” she says. “So,
Ableton was a really new world to me.
I learned it six, seven years ago. I just
like how seamless it is to go between
recording and the live performance.
It just seems like you can create this
environment in the software so that it can
easily translate to live. ‘Cause I really like
to be in control of mixing my own sound.
So, when I perform, I always use Ableton
so that I can set up my effects in it, third
party or not. I can keep my equipment
load pretty light for travelling and just
have the hardware be the synthesizers
and not worry about bringing a lot of
pedals and other things.”
On her fifth album, 2016’s Ears, Smith
broadened the range of the synths
she used, to include the EMS Synthi,
ARP 2600, OSC OSCar, Korg Mono/
Poly, EML ElectroComp 101 and Moog
Werkstatt-01. When it came to the
rarer, older or more expensive items of
gear, she travelled to various studios or
company HQs where the synths were in
residence and she could capture their
sounds on the fly.
“I started really learning about rare
vintage synthesizers,” she says. “I would
31
 INTERVIEW
K A I T LY N A U R E L I A S M I T H
The Buchla Easel is at the heart of all
of Smith’s live and studio productions.
find out where they still exist and visit
them and just record everything I did. So,
I would just have all these samples or lots
of sessions of recorded takes that I didn’t
know what I was gonna do with it yet.
“That kind of began a study process
for me of seeking out residencies in places
that have this equipment, rather than
trying to own it. ‘Cause it’s very expensive
and it’s a bigger responsibility. But they all
have really incredible aspects. I especially
appreciate the tactile interface of the EMS
that makes you feel like you’re playing
Battleship as you’re patching [laughs].”
Ears was the first album that Smith
made while consciously keeping in mind
the fact that she would have to tour
and perform the album live. “That one
I wrote just by figuring out what my live
set was and then recording it,” she says.
“I was practising a live set and then I just
pressed ‘record’, basically.”
32 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
In a 2016 ‘In The Studio’ video still
available on YouTube, Kaitlyn Aurelia
Smith can be seen showcasing some of
her techniques, utilising an impressive
setup involving both new and old modular
gear. In the Eurorack department, she
operates Make Noise’s Tempi six-channel
polyphonic module as a master clock to
trigger various units such as the MATHS
and RxMx synth modules and the 4ms
Spectral Multiband Resonator. In addition,
she uses the ‘70s-era Oberheim Two-Voice
Pro and the Studio Electronics Sensei
Hybrid System.
“I don’t actually own any of those,”
she laughs. “Those I was borrowing.
The way that I go about equipment in
general is either through residencies or
finding really kind people to lend me their
stuff. Honestly, I don’t have that much
experience with Eurorack besides the
Make Noise system which I used on the
album The Kid [2017], and some Jomox
modules. But that’s about as far as it
reaches out for me.
“In that video I was lent some Eurorack
gear, but it never really stuck for me.
I don’t have negative things to say about
it, but I just haven’t found a Eurorack
oscillator that feels the same to me as the
vintage oscillators.
“Sometimes I wish I had a set way
that I work,” she says. “But I really don’t.
It changes from song to song, from day
to day.”
Current Rig
These days, Smith’s current setup
comprises her trusty Music Easel, a Buchla
200e, a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5,
an EDP Wasp, a Roland SH-101, Moog
Grandmother and an Oberheim SEM.
Also, despite her mixed feelings in regard
to Eurorack gear, she does use a fair few
A 1:1 code port of
the EQ with no equal.
There’s a reason Weiss Engineering’s EQ1 has been at the top of the heap since
its release in 1996. The EQ1’s dazzling sonic qualities combined with its flexibility
have made it the must-have digital mastering equalizer.

The Weiss EQ1 plug-in crystallizes that legacy—in software form. A line-by-line
code port of the original, the EQ1 plug-in is the latest addition to Softube’s
successful partnership with Weiss Engineering, proving that Swiss and Swedish
engineering make a stellar pair.
 INTERVIEW
K A I T LY N A U R E L I A S M I T H
modules, including Make Noise’s Pressure
Points touchplate controller, Mannequins’
Just Friends tone generator and ALM
Busy Circuits Akemie’s Taiko drum voice
FM synth.
“I feel very fulfilled and like I can
make lots of music with all of that,” she
says. “And when I feel like I don’t have
anything that is within a palette that I’m
trying to communicate, then I have a list
of residencies to go to.”
In terms of sequencers, Smith’s
workhorse is her Buchla’s 252e Polyphonic
Rhythm Generator, visually distinctive
for the interface’s 11 concentric rings
displaying the generated patterns. The
252e helps her create the complex
polyrhythms that are a central feature of
her sound and which come back to her
love of Terry Riley.
“I’ve always had an appreciation for
polyrhythms,” she says. “That’s always felt
like the most natural expression of rhythm
for me. I love the way that Terry Riley’s
melodies and his rhythms kind of float
over each other in this very expansive way,
34 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
where it doesn’t feel like it’s repetitive.
It felt like there was always variation
happening in the way that it lined up.
“That really spoke to me. Even
though, to some people, they think that’s
really repetitive. Like, I know a lot of
people think minimalistic music is really
repetitive. But it’s those subtle rhythmic
adjustments that have always been really
exciting to me.
“So, I’m using the 252 and then I do
a lot of looping. Looping is oftentimes
the way I go about sequencing things.
Sometimes I use sequencers, like I have
some MIDI controllers that are extensions
that have sequencers. But, again, it really
depends on what I’m doing.”
Performing
From Ears on, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith has
always remained conscious when making
records of how she’ll perform her modular
music live. “I do have one thing that is
like a constant in my workflow,” she says,
“which is when I make an album and
I know I’m going to perform with it, then
Smith’s Eurorack setup.
I have a [different] setup for that. I practise
for usually, like, a year to a year and a half,
and I don’t change that live setup for the
whole album cycle. ‘Cause it takes me so
long to figure out a live setup.”
Nowadays, the centre of her live
show is her Buchla 200e. “The 200e has
a preset manager,” she says, “so I spent
the first four months just programming
all of the sequences or all of the presets,
‘cause it takes a really long time to do
that. I programmed, like, 17 presets that
I’m using in my live set. Then I usually
go through a memory process after
I programme something, where I just
test my memory and my muscle memory.
Like, I make a list of how many things
can go wrong in the live set [laughs].
And then I come up with a solution for
all of them. I practise quickly solving all
of those, and I practise unpatching and
patching the modular within a certain
time period. Then I go through a muscle
memory for tuning, where if one of the
oscillators were to go out of tune slightly,
I have it memorised what fundamental it’s
 Powerful, reliable & comprehensive AVB & MADI solutions developed by RME Audio

Next Generation
Network Audio Devices

12Mic

AVB Tool

The perfect Companion for any

professional Recording
Following RME’s concept of maximum versatility and connectivity,
the 12Mic & AVB Tool combines up to128 channels of MADI and AVB-based audio network
channel I/O for both large and small-scale, as well as traditional audio setups.

Featuring highly flexible devices with straight-forward user experience, remote controllable
microphone preamplifier, no-compromise A/D conversion, instrument or line level inputs
and a headphone output for monitoring all signals.

Valuable multitools for various applications, designed for professional audio engineers
looking to expand their recording options with a high-end,
compact and future-proof solution.

Worldwide Distribution: Audio AG, +49 8133 9181-0, www.audioag.com • UK Distribution: Synthax UK, +44 1727 821870, www.synthax.co.uk
www.rme-audio.com
 INTERVIEW
K A I T LY N A U R E L I A S M I T H

supposed to go back to. And then I start

to get into the more granular process of
going through the parts on each song and
break down the parts and just practise
those for a long time.”

Inner Ear
On a perhaps more esoteric level, the
meditative qualities of Kaitlyn Aurelia
Smith’s music, particularly on The Mosaic
Of Transformation, are for her directly
linked to tuning into what she calls her
“inner ear”. During lockdown, Smith has
been doing online consultation sessions
teaching others how to make music and
clear their creative blockages through
what is essentially a meditation process.
“These songs all were made in kind
of like this process of internal listening,”
she says. “‘Cause I’ve always had
a relationship with my inner ear and,
y’know, writing music through closing
my eyes and listening. But this album
in particular was the most I’d used that.
I would do sessions of just listening for
music inside and then try and create it
with the synthesizers.”
That sounds quite, er, hard? “I think it’s
only hard in the beginning when you can’t
hear the music,” she reasons. “Honestly,
I think the hardest part is in the beginning,
learning what are the fundamentals that
make up sound. But then once you start
to practise, like, how many sounds make
up the sound of a door opening, then it
gets easier to break down each sound
that you hear. To be like, ‘OK, it’s really six Despite being a Buchla devotee, other instruments make regular appearances in Smith’s work. Pictured
sounds layered and they’re staggered in are her Moog Grandmother, EDP Wasp, Roland SH-101 and, below, a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5.
this way.’”
Which begs the question: how close one is really nice for performing live. The numbers. “I have eight different vocal mics
does she get to realising the sounds in MOTU ones, you can send CV out. So, and I just have my own names for them,”
her head on her recordings? “It takes me they all have just different functions.” she laughs. “I don’t have a set vocal chain.
a long time,” she laughs. “And I rewrote Monitors-wise, Smith has Genelec It depends on the song. I used all eight on
this new album, like, 12 different times M040s and a 7360A subwoofer. “Yeah, ‘The Steady Heart’ and I heard that way
because it just wasn’t there yet. But I really like those a lot. They’re great. of layering in my ears and I just sang it.
what I’ve shared now was what I heard I haven’t changed actually since I got There’s no processing. It’s just dry voice.”
internally. And so, I just keep going until those. They’ve just been really seamless In contrast, live, particularly going back
it’s there, and take a lot of breaks.” in the mixing process. When I get a song two or three years, Smith’s vocals were
sounding really good on those and then much more processed than they are on
Home Studio I go and listen on headphones or in the her current album. Initially, she struggled
In her studio at home, Kaitlyn Aurelia car or on my laptop, it feels like a pretty to find a harmoniser that could create
Smith, given her complex system seamless transition.” the modal harmonies she was after. Her
of synths, uses various interfaces in While many of Smith’s tracks are solution was to create 27 microtonal
conjunction with Ableton. “I have four instrumental, a handful feature her vocals. pitch-shifted tracks within Ableton and
different interfaces that I use,” she On The Mosaic Of Transformation, one use a Novation Launchpad to control her
explains. “I use the [Universal Audio] song in particular, ‘The Steady Heart’, vocal input by playing chord-like shapes
Apollo, I use a Native Instruments one, stands out with its choral layering of her to manipulate the harmonies. “It’s just
and I use two different types of MOTU voice. Smith name-checks her Peluso me in real time changing the pitch of my
interfaces. Just for different sections in microphone specifically, but as with the voice,” she says. “I like using the Novation
the studio. I use the Apollo for the UAD rest of her collection, she isn’t particularly Launchpad and how you can map it to
plug-ins. Then the Native Instruments interested in mic manufacturers or model whatever you want. I made all those

36 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

microtonal harmonies that I would play as
I was singing and then I go through the
Music Easel.”
Of course, having only one Music Easel
at her disposal when performing live,
Smith compensated for the layering of
the Buchla that features on her albums by
sampling its output live into a Teenage
Engineering OP-1. “Most of the time,
whenever I’m using anything live, it’s as
an extension to the Buchla,” she stresses.
“So, I’m just finding ways to create more
versions of the Buchla.
“And then also for live,” she adds,
“because you can create in Ableton your
own version of unity [gain-staging] on each
fader, you can fully mix how you want all
of your tracks to be. I tend to have a lot
of dry tracks and then I’ll have a lot of
record-enabled tracks for the Buchla that
have different processors on them. Then
I set how I want [the processors] to be
mixed and I make each of those faders
the new version of unity, so then when
I map it to my hardware faders, it’s at the
spot it’s supposed to be mixed at.”
Mixing
Back in the studio, when it comes to
mixing, Smith chooses to zone in fully
on one sound element at a time before
stepping back to look at the bigger
picture. “I mostly do mixing as I’m
going,” she says. “To me, mixing is a very
important part of the composition and
each sound has its own way of being
mixed that communicates something. So,
I’ll fully mix one sound and then work on
the next one.
“I’m really sensitive to the way that
other people mix sounds, because
it’s such an important part of the
composition. Any time when I’ve had
someone else mix, it changes the
communication of the song. So, I tend to
be the one who mixes it.”
When it comes to mix EQ plug-ins,
Smith moves between the stock Ableton
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
ones and Waves and UAD plug-ins. “I really
don’t have a set system. It’s a process of
I think about what I’m gonna do and if
I need an EQ, then I try lots of different
EQs until I find the right one. I think about,
‘Which kind of EQ do I need? Do I need
a parametric EQ?’ And then I do research
on what are all the possible ones out there.
So, sometimes it’s just the Ableton ones,
sometimes it’s the UAD ones, sometimes
it’s Waves. It really depends.”
Speaking of plug-ins, has Smith tried
Arturia’s software version of the Buchla
Easel? “Yeah, I have tried it,” she says.
“To me, none of the emulators sound like
it. They have qualities that I can see are
inspired by it. But it definitely doesn’t
sound like it to me.”
Collaboration
In 2016, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith
collaborated with ground-breaking
Buchla artist Suzanne Ciani — who has
been making records since 1970 — on
the album Sunergy, firmly underlining
her place in the lineage of exploratory
modular synthesists.
“That was an enjoyable process and
she’s such a wonderful person,” says
Smith. “It was a really neat experience
to collaborate with another Buchla
synthesist, cause that was the first time
I had tried working with another Buchla
player. I think I learned just how fun it is to
play two Buchlas at once.”
Looking to the future, are there any
areas in particular that Smith would like
to move into sonically? “That’s still being
born for me,” she says, “‘cause I feel
like I’m still in the process of sharing
this album. And because I haven’t really
shared this album live yet, that space
hasn’t really opened up for me.
“Usually in the beginning of a project,
I start to collect adjectives and textures
for the next one. And so, I’m in that
process right now where I’m starting to
get textures. But they’re not in a language
form yet. When I hear a sound in the
world, it’ll pique my interest, but I won’t
know why yet.”
So, finally then, any specific tech
purchases that she still wants to make?
“Not at this time in the current economic
state,” she laughs.
In other words, like many of the rest
of us, she is working with what she’s got.
Given the amount of gear she has at her
disposal, though, we can expect from
Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith many intriguing
sonic adventures to come.  
37
 ON TEST
PreSonus Quantum 2626
Thunderbolt 3 Audio Interface
The newest addition to the Quantum range
offers a plethora of I/O and excellent latency
performance for a very reasonable price.
CHRIS KORFF
W PreSonus Quantum
hen it comes to audio
interfaces, PreSonus have
a long history of adopting
new protocols. They were among the
first few companies to make a Firewire
interface (the 2003 FireStation, which was
also the first to make use of Yamaha’s
mLAN protocol), and more recently
they’ve been keen early proponents of
both USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt. Their
first interface to use the latter was the
PreSonus Quantum, which took full
advantage of Thunderbolt’s data transfer
speed to provide remarkably low latency.
You can read our glowing review of it in
the September 2017 issue. The Quantum
is still available, but is now part of a range
of Quanta that includes the Quantum
4848 (a no-frills but high-I/O-count
38 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
you record — you just patch the Quantum
straight into your DAW channels and do
all your routing and monitor mixing in
there. No more Alt+tabbing to tweak your
monitor mix, or loading up DSP mixer
scenes that may or may not work with your
device designed to work with analogue
consoles) and the subject of this review,
the Quantum 2626.
Quantum Mechanics 2626 €599
One thing that sets the Quanta apart in pros
a very crowded market is that they all • Excellent latency performance.
dispense with DSP. PreSonus reasoned • Well built.
• Plentiful I/O.
that if they can get latency low enough, • DC-coupled outputs.
there’s no need to include a DSP mixer • Insert points for channels 1 and 2.
in the interface itself, since the DAWs • Great price for what’s on offer.
we all use have far more powerful mixers
cons
of their own. It’s an attractive prospect:
• Headphone output doesn’t quite go
rather than plugging into the interface, fully off.
routing the physical input to a DSP mixer • No Thunderbolt cable included.
channel, piping that into your DAW while
also sending it back to a DSP foldback bus, summary
The PreSonus Quantum 2626 offers
and routing your DAW back into the DSP
excellent latency performance and
mixer, via the foldback bus and thence to a generous amount of I/O for a very
a physical output — all so you can hear reasonable price.
yourself and your backing tracks while

current DAW project. Routing, headphone
mixes, monitor outputs and levels: all are
recalled perfectly the moment you open
a DAW project.
The remarkable latency performance
of the original Quantum made the above
a practical reality but, at its £1000-plus
price tag, it was competing with
manufacturers who’d turned DSP into an
artform. Universal Audio, in particular,
have spent years considerably sweetening
the DSP deal with some outstanding
plug-ins, and their powerful low-latency
Console DSP mixer exemplifies the
opposite approach.
Announced earlier this year, the
Quantum 2626 promised all of the blissful
simplicity of the original Quantum but at
just over half the price. What’s the catch?
Ins & Outs
Despite not having any internal routing or
signal processing, the original Quantum
still boasted some neat digital extras,
many of which have been lost on the
2626. So the digital control of preamp
gains and assignable monitor controller
are gone, the latter meaning you can’t
perform surround-sound monitor control
without getting a separate monitor
controller. Also absent are the talkback
section, the eight-segment LED metering,
the individual phantom power switching,
and the separate D-A converters for
the headphone amps — the two on the
2626 always follow the main outputs.
The all-important I/O, however, remains
intact: the Quantum 2626 features eight
of PreSonus’ XMAX preamps, all of
which are accessed via combi inputs on
the front panel. The first two can accept
high-impedance instrument signals,
and also have balanced, pre-conversion
insert points on the rear. Also round the
back are eight line outs, with outputs
1+2 mirrored on dedicated monitor
Thunderbolt 2 Vs 3
The original Quantum was a Thunderbolt
2 device, and sported two mini-DisplayPort
sockets, allowing you to daisy-chain other
Thunderbolt devices (including additional
Quanta) off it. The 2626 uses Thunderbolt 3
via the newer reversible USB-C-type socket,
but it has only one port. You can use it as part
of a multi-Quanta setup, but it must be at the
end of the chain.
The 2015 iMac I used for this review
only has Thunderbolt 2 mini-DP ports,
but the 2626 manual says you can use it on
TB2, provided you use the official Apple
Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) to Thunderbolt
2 adaptor. That adaptor is bidirectional, so
while Apple chiefly describe it as allowing
you to plug older devices into TB3 ports, it
also does the job of letting you use the 2626
on TB2-equipped Macs. I researched all of
this quite carefully before buying the official
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Bundled Software
The Quantum 2626 ships with a licence
for Studio One Artist, as well as the 2020
Studio Magic bundle, which includes
Lite versions of Ableton Live and Arturia
Analog Lab, plus a good selection of
plug-ins from Brainworx, iZotope,
Cherry Audio, Lexicon, Mäag, Native
Instruments, SPL and more.
outputs and controlled by the front-panel
attenuator. In terms of digital connectivity,
you’ve got stereo S/PDIF I/O, two pairs
of ADAT ports, word clock I/O, a pair of
proper five-pin MIDI sockets (In and Out),
and one Thunderbolt 3 port (see box).
The ADAT ports can either provide eight
I/O at higher sample rates (ie. in S/MUX
mode), or be used in independent pairs to
add 16 extra I/O at base sample rates.
Given the desire to bring the cost
down, I think the omissions have been
very well chosen. I rarely need a talkback
mic or surround monitoring, and I’d
venture that’s the case for most home/
project-studio owners. I have a nice big
screen in front of me that can tell me
more about my recording levels than an
LED meter ever could, and the 2626’s two
banks of phantom power switching, rather
than the Quantum’s individual phantom
switches, are fine by me. I also don’t mind
the lack of digital control over the preamp
gains: the analogue knobs on the front
panel are sturdy, and work smoothly and
predictably. I had no trouble matching
gains for stereo miking, for example. If
digital gain control is important to you,
Apple adaptor because it costs nearly £50.
And given that PreSonus, in common with
other Thunderbolt interface manufacturers,
don’t provide a Thunderbolt cable with the
2626, I was down 80-odd quid by the time I’d
also bought an official Apple Thunderbolt
USB-C-type cable.
What the manual doesn’t make clear is
whether there’s any performance or latency
penalty incurred by using the TB2 adaptor,
so I asked PreSonus. Happily, they told me
that performance is identical whether you’re
using TB2 or TB3, because their bus speeds
are the same. (Thunderbolt 3 has higher
data throughput, but audio isn’t particularly
demanding data-wise so TB2’s bandwidth
is perfectly adequate). Apparently there is
a small increase in latency when using the
2626 via Thunderbolt 1, but I didn’t have
a TB1-equipped computer on hand to test that.
39
 ON TEST
PRESONUS QUANTUM 2626
For a ‘cut-down’ interface the Quantum 2626 enjoys a generous provision of I/O.
though, I should mention that the 2626
can be paired with a PreSonus DigiMax
DP88 ADAT expander (or two), which
does have software-controlled preamps.
Firing Up
Setting up the Quantum 2626 was
a painless affair. You need to register it
with PreSonus, after which you can log in
to the PreSonus website and download
Universal Control, which is a simple app
that takes charge of such exciting things
as firmware updates, sample rate and
sync options (internal, ADAT, S/PDIF
or word clock). This is also where you
can control your DigiMax DP88s, if you
have any (if you’re a Studio One user,
you can even control them from your
DAW). You hook up the external PSU
(which has a twist-locking connector),
plug into a spare Thunderbolt port (via
any necessary adaptors),
and the light on the front
panel changes from red “Since using the 2626, I’ve actually come
to blue to show that
sync has been achieved.
to enjoy using my DAW more.”
In my case, UC then
told me that the Quantum 2626 was
due a firmware update, which was again
a simple process, taking all of about
20 seconds.
The absence of a routing matrix, DSP
mixer, built-in effects and so on make
using the Quantum 2626 refreshingly
simple. You select your sample rate, open
your DAW of choice, set your buffer size
(I used the lowest option of 32 samples),
and you’re set. Everything behaved
exactly as expected, with the one
exception being that the headphone outs
never quite went fully off; even at ‘zero’
there was still a very low-level signal. In
terms of sound quality, though, there
DC Universe
All Quantum-series interfaces have
DC-coupled outputs, meaning that, with
the right software plug-ins, you can send
control voltage signals to analogue and
modular synths. I didn’t get a chance to
try this out myself, but there’s an excellent
feature about it elsewhere in this issue.
40 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
was nothing to fault. Indeed, the noise
and distortion specs appear completely
unchanged across the board compared
with the original Quantum, and they are
certainly more than good enough to not
impose themselves. All types of signal
I tried it with — mic, line and instrument
— were handled perfectly well. I tend to
really dig in when I’m playing bass, for
example, and can easily overload lesser
instrument inputs and DI boxes, but that
wasn’t the case here. I even had to turn
the gain up a bit on the 2626, which made
a nice change from having to turn my bass
down or find a device with a pad to put
between me and the input.
As important as the sound, however
— and especially with an interface bereft
of any internal routing — is latency.
Guitarists, bassists and keyboardists
can generally live with a bit of latency
quite happily because they’re used to
being a few feet away from their amps
(each foot adding a millisecond or so
of delay), and for virtual instruments
the round-trip latency is pretty much
halved because there’s no input latency
to deal with. Vocals, on the other hand,
are more of a challenge. We’re so used
to hearing our voices through our own
skulls that even a handful of milliseconds
can be remarkably distracting when
you’re trying to sing. So for my first
test of the 2626’s latency I got a small
analogue mixer, plugged a mic into it,
sent it to the Quantum 2626, and routed
the direct analogue signal to one bus
and the interface return to the other.
I sang into the mic, alternately PFL’ing
the direct signal and the DAW return
busses. And once I’d matched the levels,
I was hard‑pressed to tell the difference.
I make no claims to be a good singer,
but if I ever felt compelled to commit my
crooning to WAV, I’d have no qualms at all
about monitoring from my DAW. And the
enormous convenience of not having to
set up a separate foldback mix would be
the icing on the cake.
Next, I repeated the latency test that
Sam Inglis did in his review of the original
Quantum, and came up with identical
results: 0.9ms input latency and 1.0ms
output latency at a 32-sample buffer size,
according to both Reaper and a loop-back
test. Which goes to show that, in the
2626, PreSonus really have left all the
important parts of the Quantum intact.
Get DSP Hence
Ever since I’ve had a home studio, I’ve
flip-flopped between deciding that I do
and don’t need a mixer more times
than I care to count. I’ve had a number
of analogue and digital consoles, and
I’ve had some enormously complicated
DSP soundcards (I’m looking at you,
Creamware), and they have all come
with their own joys and
frustrations. But other
than the ‘niceness’ of
having real faders and
knobs to tweak, the main
reason I’ve kept going
back to mixers is the lack of latency.
About half a year ago, I decided that
mixers were good again, and rejigged
and rewired my ever-changing lab to
accommodate one. Since using the 2626,
however, I’ve actually come to enjoy using
my DAW more: having only one place
to record, to monitor, to add effects and
to noodle around has made me more
focused and, I think, more productive. For
one thing, opening projects has become
more of a pleasure than a chore, now that
I no longer have to remember how my
mixer was set up whenever I saved ‘piano
& bass sketch v43’. And with studio time
in ever scarcer supply, that has real value.
In terms of workflow, the Quantum 2626
has been perhaps the least imposing bit
of equipment to ever grace my rack, and
certainly the simplest multichannel interface
I’ve used. It could well be the interface that
makes me flip-flop for the final time.  
££ €599 including VAT.
WW www.presonus.com
 HEAR
HERE
Your monitoring system is possibly the most
important part of your recording setup, with
every change to your mix based on what you
hear through your speakers.

It’s also a very personal choice, and at KMR Audio

we understand that the only way to be certain
you are selecting the best model is to listen for
yourself. That’s why we keep the widest range of
high-end monitors available to demo in Europe.

Contact us today to arrange an audition.

KMR
w e k n o w p r o a u d io
020 8445 2446 • sales@kmraudio.com • www.kmraudio.com • 1375 high road, whetstone, london N20 9LN
 ON TEST
VSL Big Bang
Orchestra
Sample Libraries
The Viennese maestros go intergalactic
with their full-scale orchestra range.
VSL Big Bang Orchestra
pros
• The first four titles feature a 70-piece
orchestra recorded with all musicians
playing together.
• Dorado and Eridanus put the ‘bang’ in ‘big
bang’, while Fornax offers unique tuned
percussion colours.
• Ganymede adds a flexible SATB choir of
48 singers.
• The libraries collectively cover
a comprehensive range of articulations,
textures, effects and phrases.
• Everything was recorded from multiple mic
positions in a state-of-the-art soundstage.
cons
• Fails to answer the question, ‘What was
there before the Big Bang?’
summary
Vienna Big Bang Orchestra pushes the
boat out with a massive 70-piece orchestra,
a choir and six percussionists letting rip in
a series of themed libraries. Recorded in
a historic soundstage from 10 mic positions,
this extensive range of ready-to-play,
pre-orchestrated performances and
textures takes the strain out of creating
dramatic scores. Practical and affordable
for beginners, BBO also has plenty to offer
pro users.
42 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
DAVE STEWART
T
aking advantage of the large
scoring stage which lies at the
heart of their creative operation,
Vienna Symphonic Library have pulled
out all the stops for their latest project.
The Big Bang Orchestra series features
a massive 70-piece orchestra, six
percussionists and 48 singers performing
effects, textures, hits, chords, clusters,
arpeggios, runs, riffs, rhythmic patterns
and single-note multisamples, all recorded
from multiple mic positions in VSL’s
historic Synchron Stage. Designed for
maximum impact with minimal effort,
these pre-orchestrated starter editions
are available at entry-level prices, an
incentive for new users to embark on
a personal exploration of the Vienna
musical universe.
It’s one thing to record an orchestra
in separate sections, quite another
to capture the whole shooting match
in one pass. With the latter approach
you experience the sonic shock wave
of a large musical ensemble letting rip
in the same space, which can rival the
noise of a jet engine — strings, brass
and woodwinds interacting in a complex,
intense and sometimes overpowering
live mix. This uproarious racket can be
heard in full effect in BBO: hence the
series’ name, and its marketing slogan,
‘Have a Blast!’
The libraries’ musical content was
composed and orchestrated by Johannes
Vogel and performed by the Synchron
Stage Orchestra, an elite squad of
instrumentalists and singers hand picked
from world-class Viennese orchestras. At
the time of writing the series comprises
eight themed collections, with more to
come: all run exclusively on VSL’s free
Synchron Player, but are not compatible
with the company’s older Vienna
Instruments player. In this review we’ll
take a look at each BBO library with
a view to giving an overview of the series.
BBO Free Basics
BBO Free Basics (1.5GB) contains
classic articulations played live by all
70 orchestral players. Instruments are
blended across a playing range of
A#1-D6, but since all notes incorporate
multiple octaves you actually hear the
orchestra’s full seven-octave span, from
Capricorn provides
ready-to-play, energetic
orchestral phrases played
at three tempos. A built-in
time-stretching feature lets
you change the tempo to fit
your arrangement.

a thunderous low A#0

up to a tinnitus-inducing
D7. The low end is
positively stentorian:
on hearing the rasping
bass trombones and
low strings rattling my
music room windows,
my partner remarked, “It
sounds like ready-made
film music — really
big, as if something
amazingly momentous
is about to happen.”
I guess that means
these samples tick the
requisite ‘cinematic’ box.
A smallish menu
of presets includes
three dynamic looped sustains and
dramatic short-note stabs, which double
as an optional marcato attack layer. The
long notes are surprisingly versatile:
a great timbre for loud, majestic fanfares,
they also sound beautifully solemn
and sonorous when played quietly and
sparsely in the mid-range. In addition,
there are tremendous swells and fast
chromatic octave runs to a short accented
target note, performed in six keys. All
good riotous fun, delivered with gusto
and attitude.
This library would be a good first step
for anyone wanting to start a collection
of full-orchestra performance samples.
Though available as a free download,
a ViennaKey USB protection device (which
can be used to store all your VSL licenses)
is also required.
BBO Andromeda Essentials
Named after the nearest major galaxy
to the Milky Way, Andromeda (11GB)
expands the menu of essential styles
and adds close mic positions. New
articulations include climactic crescendo
swells (played longer than those in Free
Basics), trills (which sound like a swarm of
gigantic locusts when played by a whole
orchestra), and earth-shaking massed
tremolos. In a similar agitated vein are
fast note repetitions played in a choice of
three tempos, which generate a sense of
hectic rhythmic excitement despite their
lack of a pronounced pulse.
If you need a scary motif of the ‘shark
approaching!’ variety, there are some
terrific semitone falls — classic Jaws
fodder when played in the bass, and
decidedly psychotic at the high end. For
less troubling scenarios, Andromeda
offers its own freshly recorded set of long
and short notes, very nicely played and
well tuned. The shorts work well in rhythm
passages, while the stately sustains
combine instant gravitas with some
volcanic tutti bass notes.
This library provides optional marcato
attacks and a separate piccolo layer for all
artics. I’m glad the piccolo is an optional
extra as its piercing, ultra-high-pitched
shriek gets tiresome quite quickly!
Long-time VSL users will be pleased to
see the company’s trademark sforzato
and sforzatissimo attacks included in the
artics menu, along with expressive ‘soft
low brass’ and ‘soft swell’ performances.
All styles are performed by the entire
orchestra and available within a single
preset via an elaborate keyswitch system.
BBO Black Eye Phrases & FX
Were it not for the series’ galactic theme,
one might assume Black Eye owed its
name to the enormous punch of some
of its contents, in particular its grandiose
orchestral hits. These offer some unusual
variations on a familiar theme: built-in
octave shifts spread the impact of the
‘flam hits’, while the ‘delayed’ style has
the lower register parts sounding slightly
later than the high instruments. But if
you simply want the no-nonsense wallop
of a straight orchestra hit, the ‘graced’
version provided here does the trick.
The phrase samples include a nicely
voiced set of staccato chord stabs and
some fantastic tutti octave runs. Brilliantly
played in a choice of major and melodic
minor scales, the runs are performed
across the entire A#1-D5 range, so in
most cases the same scale can be played
in four different octaves. ‘Rips’, a quick
triplet run up or down to a sustained
target note, are also excellent, and have
both mystery and comedy potential.
Standout effects phrases include the
massive sforzando attack of ‘echoes’
and the chaotic swirling of the octave
trills, the latter exciting in the high
register. The slow ‘microtuning’ patch
also sounds fantastically menacing in the
low end, especially when smeared over
a fistful of adjacent semitones. ‘Seagull
arpeggios’ (a valiant attempt to double
spooky harmonic-series string arpeggios
with wind instruments) are arguably less
successful, but I daresay imaginative
composers will find a use for them.
As ever, atonal clusters are a great
horror-film sonority. I liked the ‘cluster to

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 43
 ON TEST
VSL BIG BANG ORCHESTRA
The BBO Free Basics library features the
70-piece Synchron Stage Orchestra playing
a set of essential articulations.
root’ artic, in which a discordant pile of
pitches collapses satisfyingly into a single
note sustain, and admired the marcato
‘Clusters B’ sample mapped on D#5.
This blaring, screaming voicing would be
a fitting end to the bonkers symphonies
you’ve all no doubt been cooking up
in the lockdown period. All in all, this
substantial 11GB collection is a great
source of inspirational orchestral textures.
BBO Capricorn
Symphonic Riffs
By far the largest BBO library, Capricorn
(42.6GB) brings you ready-to-play four-bar
orchestral phrases, enabling users to
unleash full-scale symphonic riffs with one
key press. A grand total of 24 phrases are
divided into main, low and high patches,
selectable on the fly via keyswitches.
Played in a choice of three tempos at
two dynamics and chromatically mapped
for use in all keys, these looped ostinato
44 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
patterns repeat seamlessly for as long as
you hold down a key, and sync accurately
to a click.
The riffs centre on the key note
and often feature simple minor-key
phrases. Highlights include ‘Main riff 1’
(pumping, repeated single eighth notes
played with a 3+2+3 accent pattern)
and ‘Low riff 1’, the same idea played as
3+3+2. ‘Main riff 5’ is another powerful
eighth-note ostinato with a vaguely Arabic
flavour, the galloping ‘Main riff 6’ has
a historical-drama vibe (think jousting
Vienna Synchron Player
Designed to handle surround-sound formats up
to 9.1, VSL’s Synchron Player takes over where
the stereo Vienna Instruments player software
leaves off. The latter’s matrix switching system
has been replaced by the ‘Dimension Tree’,
a series of switches arranged in columns. Each
column contains a number of colour-coded slots
displaying the name of a musical ‘dimension’ (ie.
playing style or patch name): the same colours
are shown on the interface’s keyboard, making it
easy to learn keyswitch layouts.
matches, Battle of Agincourt and Robin
Hood: Men In Tights), while ‘High riff 3’
is a stirring, triumphal fanfare-like triplet
motif for all occasions.
A comprehensive keyswitch system
allows you to select tempo, release
type (one of which adds an automatic
final note to the riff), and eight variants
each of the main, low and high riffs.
The uppermost C6-C7 zone plays
a combination of the selected low and
high riffs, either of which can be muted
with a ‘tacet’ keyswitch.
Patches can be layered or crossfaded by
clicking on the ‘stack’ icon at the top right of
the dimension column. Other facilities include
a resizable screen, a great collection of built-in
effects (including an algorithmic reverb), and
a non-destructive time-stretching feature,
which lets you automatically sync riffs to
your host tempo.
In other good news, the software now works
standalone on your desktop as well as a plug-in
in your DAW. What’s not to like?
 ON TEST
VSL BIG BANG ORCHESTRA
The Vienna Synchron Player’s ‘Dimension Tree’
is a flexible switching system which shows all
the available playing styles for an instrument.
Coloured keys on the GUI keyboard correspond
to the colour-coded ‘dimension’ slots. Note that
the currently selected keyswitches (in this case,
A0 and C1) are displayed with a darker colour.
These energetic patterns have great
propulsive feel and a distinct rock
sensibility. Most would make good action
and adventure cues, while some have
a dramatic classical vibe. I was pleased to
see a full score of the contents provided
in the user account ‘Tutorials’ section,
which is a great educational aid for
students of orchestration.
BBO Dorado
Percussion Ensembles
Composers looking for the ultimate ‘big
bang’ will likely head for BBO’s percussion
section. To that end, Dorado (13.7GB)
provides a six-player percussion ensemble
performing essential articulations. The
Alternatives
Of all the mega-sized orchestral collections out
there, I’ve yet to find one (present company
excepted) that provides a full symphonic
contingent of strings, brass and woodwinds
playing together live. That makes the Big Bang
Orchestra’s Free Basics, Andromeda, Black Eye
and Capricorn collections unique, and given
the scale of the project, it’s remarkable that
VSL are giving away the first title and selling
the others at affordable prices.
Concentrating on titles in the lower price
range, an alternative to BBO Dorado would
be Red Room Audio’s Saga Acoustic Trailer
Percussion, recorded from two mic positions.
For standalone orchestral percussion patterns,
Cinesamples Deep Percussion Beds 1 has
a similar stylistic slant to BBO Eridanus and
offers more phrases, but only one stereo
miking. No other sound library matches the
pianos-plus-perc instrumentation of BBO
Fornax, but affordable alternatives to the
BBO Ganymede choir exist in the shape
of Soniccouture’s All Saints Choir and
Soundiron’s Requiem Light.
46 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
group was recorded live with pairs
of players in spaced left, centre and
right positions, creating a panoramic
soundscape; all performances were
played at five dynamics with hard and soft
beaters in a generous range of techniques
displayed in an on-screen ‘key info’ chart.
A mouth-watering collection of
instruments was trotted out for this project:
the battling ‘Monster Drums’ combines
two large taikos, two orchestral bass drums
and two surdos, ‘Thunder Toms’ raises the
roof with six differently sized concert toms,
while three sets of piatti cymbals make an
enormous splash in the ‘Super Crashes’
patch. Add a crisp snare ensemble,
suspended cymbal crescendo rolls and
the ominous, hellish clang of tam tam
gongs, plate bells and anvil, and you have
all the ingredients for the big, combative
‘cinematic’ percussion sound beloved of
today’s media composers.
It’s not all epic: Indian mridangam, log
drum and temple block create a more The Synchron Player’s large suite of effects
intimate world-music atmosphere in includes a convolution reverb based on VSL’s
‘Special Drums’, and ‘Small Metal’ features MIR Pro technology, delay, rotary speaker,
a child-friendly mix of triangles, jingle distortion, low- and high-pass filters and
a powerful compressor. Shown here are the
rings and cymbals. Quiet hits reveal some
multiband EQ section (top) and the mixer ‘power
wonderful subtle, resonant sonorities pan’ control, which allows you to adjust stereo
which would shine in more delicate width as well as L-R balance.
musical settings. The library also features
some transformative processed mixes: large taikos, bass drum and concert toms,
‘voltage shot’ brings to mind the classic while the high riffs (played in a choice
1980s gated snare effect, ‘low boom’ and of sticks and brushes) feature an unusual,
‘low explosions’ are ideal low-frequency exotic-sounding blend of small tom,
signals for the surround ‘sub’ channel, cymbals, snare drum, congas and bongos.
and when applied to crash cymbals, Single hits are also provided so you can
‘phaser shot’ sounds like the opening of add an emphatic ‘bonk’ to a pattern
a psychedelic concept album. at any point!
Imbued with a classy hall acoustic, these Layering ‘Main riff 3’ with the
big, resonant hits sound like orchestral corresponding Capricorn phrase produces
percussion should, a welcome alternative instant film music: a triplet-based
to the controlled studio sound of VSL’s orchestral figure reminiscent of Ravel’s
earlier libraries. ‘Bolero’, underpinned by big, booming
drums played with a 12/8 feel (think John
BBO Eridanus Williams’ Superman theme). Contrasting
Percussion Riffs with the low drums’ warlike thunder is the
If you fancy adding percussion parts to less identifiable hand-drum-like timbre
Capricorn’s symphonic riffs, Eridanus of the high riffs. Played with impressive
provides a ready-made solution. precision, their tight, urgent performances
Composed by the versatile Johannes include some great brush patterns.
Vogel, these driving patterns exactly
match the rhythms of the Capricorn set,
BBO Fornax Pitched
and can also be used alone to energise Percussion
any arrangement that requires propulsive Burning bright in BBO’s night sky, Fornax
orchestral percussion. contains a unique set of sounds created
Featuring the combined force of up by blending tuned percussion with three
to six percussionists playing together, grand pianos. These instruments (a
the 6.4GB phrase library replicates the Steinway D-274, Bösendorfer Imperial
playing positions and tempos used in and Yamaha CFX) are not the sort you
Dorado. Main and low riffs are played on might find in the back room of a pub:
 BBO’s 70 musicians perform live in the
historic Vienna Synchron Stage.
they’re collectively worth more than most
people’s houses, so getting all three
for less than a hundred quid could be
considered quite a bargain!
The ‘Drums and Pianos’ preset pits
these expensive concert grands against
a large taiko drum, timpani and a 36-inch
bass drum to deliver thumping, dimly
clangourous straight notes, dramatic
crescendo rolls and some devastating,
enormous-sounding cluster hits. For
more subtle settings, the ‘Big Timpani’
soft beater performances add a gentle
percussive kick, while the bass notes of
‘Low Bells and Pianos’ (which mixes the
chimes of tubular and plate bells with the
pianos’ grumbling low octaves) would
work a treat in a film music cue.
Though its tuned gongs hail from
Burma, ‘High Gongs’ evokes the jingling
timbre of Balinese gamelan by adding
triangles and a suspended cymbal. I found
that muting the cymbal’s spot mics
creates a lighter, more delicate and pretty
sound. ‘High Bells’ is also very pleasant,
an ear-catching chime which adds Eastern
spice to the formal tones of European
tuned percussion. You could use this
patch to trace an orchestral top line, or
even add to a pop chorus.
While this 17.4GB library’s distinctive
character stems largely from its
high‑range instruments, the heavier
drums and timpani presets should appeal
to those operating within ‘cinematic’
norms. For that style, the ‘Spooky
Melodies’ and ‘Doomsday’ mixer presets
add explosive aggression to the large
drums, while some lovely ethereal effects
are also available if you want to sprinkle
fairy dust on the bell chimes.
BBO Ganymede Choirs
The first leg of VSL’s alphabetical stroll
through the cosmos fetches up on
Jupiter’s largest moon. The first BBO
library to contain true legato recordings
(the brilliant interval-specific technique
invented by VSL back in the day, now an
industry standard), Ganymede features
a mixed-voice choir of 48 singers divided
equally into sopranos, altos, tenors and
basses. The four sections were recorded
individually and also together in real-time
‘tutti’ performances.
I had a great time playing the ‘stacked’
patches, which seamlessly map the
sections over a full C2-D6 range suitable
for two-handed playing. The looped
three-dynamic sustains are blessed with
immaculate tuning and sung in a plain
style free of operatic ‘wobble’, so you
can use them for any kind of music
without fear of culture clashes. I also
liked the graceful dynamic rise and fall
of the ‘espressivo’ performances; by
contrast, the loud, emphatic attack of the
sforzato articulation is ideally suited to
epic, big-screen productions.
This being an entry-level title, there’s
no ‘word-building’ feature. Latin phrases
are also mercifully absent (I think if
I hear another sampled choir piously
intoning ‘Sanctus’, I’ll go crazy — wake
me up when they start including rude
football chants). On the vowel front,
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
these guys simply sing ‘ah’, a lyric
few could take issue with.
The tutti effects contain some
great material: dense, atonal clusters
corresponding to those in Black Eye,
cluster chords which slowly build up
from low to high voices and vice versa,
histrionic glissando slides and dynamic
‘hah’ and ‘hooh’ shouts performed from
a sinister whisper to an exhilarating roar.
This excellent 7.8GB library also includes
sustained tutti major and minor chords
in a full two-octave voicing, creating
a triumphal and majestic effect.
Space Race
As I write, news comes down the wire that
Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit rocket
has failed on its debut flight. Ho hum.
The report adds, “The history of rocketry
shows that maiden outings very often
encounter technical problems.” Over in
mainland Europe, some space explorers
are enjoying better fortune. As SOS’s
newly appointed rocket correspondent,
I’m pleased to report that VSL’s debut
venture into the far reaches of the
musical cosmos has so far succeeded
admirably, and looks set to give its
buyers an exciting and fruitful voyage.
Commencing countdown...
££ BBO Andromeda €130, BBO Black Eye
€110, BBO Capricorn €95, BBO Dorado
€95, BBO Eridanus €75, BBO Fornax
€95, BBO Ganymede €160. Prices
include VAT.
WW www.vsl.co.at
47
 TECHNIQUE

Setting Up & Using Jamulus

The free and open-source Jamulus app lets you play
along with other musicians over the Internet in real time.
We guide you through it.

CHRIS TIMSON decent computer from the last few years Networking: You need a fast Internet
should do fine. For Jamulus, Windows, connection. Jamulus specify a minimum

L
atency. Anyone concerned with Mac and Linux are all good. Tablets and of 1Mbps both up and downstream, but
trying to create live music over phones, unfortunately, are right out! faster is better and a low ping time is
the internet will have become very A separate audio interface is a necessity essential. Jamulus recommend the ping
familiar with that word. As I explain in in order to provide a low‑latency time to the Jamulus server (see below)
my article ‘How to Make Zoom Work for connection to the computer. In our own should be no more than 40ms, and the
Music’ (SOS June 2020), latency is like usage, UAD’s Apollo hardware worked lower the (very much!) better.
death and taxes; you can minimise it but well, while a Blue Icicle XLR-USB adaptor All of these applications make the
you can’t avoid it completely and normally wasn’t so effective, adding pops and clicks. same recommendation with regard to
it defeats attempts to play live together. For Windows, Jamulus recommend an Wi-Fi, and that is simply not to use it. You
As anyone who has tried it with the audio interface with a native ASIO driver. must set up a wired Ethernet connection
various video conferencing applications Decent microphones to plug into the between your router and computer.
like Zoom and Teams will know it results in interface give the best sound, obviously, They don’t mention Homeplug and
everyone being out of time with everyone and are well worth having. other powerline solutions but I would be
else, with consequent inclined to avoid them too
cacophony! So you may if you possibly can.
be as surprised as I was
to learn there are a small Distance: That is,
number of applications geographical distance
where the developers between the participants.
refuse to admit defeat on More on this below, but
this and are determined it is very important to
to allow musicians to play be as close as possible,
together live across the geographically speaking.
net. Among these are Headphones: You need
JamKazam, Soundjack them. Jamulus doesn’t
and the subject of this screen out sound from
article, Jamulus. your mic the way that,
say, Zoom does, so your
Environment speakers must be off or
Screen 1: What you’ll see when you first open the Jamulus client.
The first thing to note otherwise you’re heading
about these applications for feedback big time.
is that they all demand Much of this would
a lot of your environment simply not be available to
in order to ensure the the average person, but
only source of latency is likely meat-and-drink
they have to deal with to the readers of this
is the Internet itself. You esteemed magazine.
have to watch out for the
following factors:
Free & Easy
And so to the application
Hardware: A powerful itself. Jamulus is an
computer is always nice to open‑source product
have, but these apps don’t developed under the
put too much demand GNU General Public
on the host machine. Any Screen 2: The settings page, where you tell Jamulus which audio inputs to use. Licence and, as befits

48 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Screen 3: After you hit the Connect button, you’ll see a list of
public servers in order of ping time.

such software, you don’t need to create an account with MicPre Opto-Compressor Equaliser
anybody to use it! The way they achieve this is ingenious.
The application has two parts: a server and a client. In
order to work, a client has to attach to a server. It sends
sound to the server and plays the sound it receives back
from it. A server is a very simple beast in that any sound
received by it from any attached client is bounced out to
all attached clients.
Of course there’s a little bit more to it than that and
we’ll talk about mixing the server performs later, but
you’ll see immediately that with a public server the idea of
a private session is not possible. So connecting to a public
server is fine if you’re looking for a jam session to join in
with and you like the idea of jamming with strangers, and
indeed a lot of people use Jamulus for exactly that. But if
what you want is to have a quiet little rehearsal with the
rest of your band then it’s not going to cut the mustard.
The solution Jamulus have come up with is quite elegant
and is known as the ‘private server’. How this is achieved
is another thing we’ll be looking at later.

Jamulus Client
First we’ll talk about the client and how you install and set
it up. An installer can be downloaded from the Jamulus
website. On Windows it will install both Jamulus client and
Jamulus server; on the Mac you’re offered a choice. You
will always need the client but the server is only for if you
are intending to run one. After installation, start the client
and you’ll see Screen 1.
This is pretty spartan, so you need to click on the
Settings button on the lower left‑hand side. This then
gives you the Settings screen where lots of interesting
stuff lives (Screen 2).
You can see I’ve set this up to use with my UAD Apollo.
This is on a Mac, but if you’re setting up on a Windows
machine then you’ll need to specify the ASIO driver — as
mentioned earlier, a native ASIO driver is preferable.
Jamulus permits two mic inputs per client, but as I’m using FIND
FIND AN
AN OFFICIAL
OFFICIAL UK
UK CHANDLER
CHANDLER LIMITED DEALER @ WWW.NOVA-DISTRIBUTION.CO.UK
GETIN
GET INTOUCH
TOUCHTO
TOARRANGE
ARRANGE AA DEMONSTRATION
DEMONSTRATION - 0203
020 3589 2530 // sales@nova-distribution.co.uk
150 4446 sales@nova-distribution.co.uk

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 49
 TECHNIQUE
JAMULUS

on your own network then it will be inside

your router’s firewall. This means anybody
outside your firewall (like your bandmates)
won’t be able to access the server. You
need to open a port in your firewall; that’s
not nearly as bad as it sounds, but it does
need careful explaining.
To most people the idea of opening
a port in the firewall feels tantamount
to opening the front door of your house
and posting a sign saying ‘Come in and
help yourself!’ It’s nothing like as bad as
that. An open port is not a risk as such,
indeed there are quite a few ports open
already in every firewall. There have to
be, otherwise the Internet simply would
not work. Port 25 is open for email
transmission, for instance, and port 80 for
Hypertext Transfer Protocol, which is what
Screen 4: Upon joining a server, the mixer controls will become active.
makes the World Wide Web work.
only one mic I’ve set both channels to it. potential for the streams to get out of The Bad Guys are interested in open
I set the outputs appropriately, and that’s step. Now you can start playing! ports because whatever process of yours is
just about all the setup I did. All the other running on the inside of the port receiving
settings I left at default. There’s a Profile
Pass The Port data through it (‘listening’, as they say)
page tucked away in the menus that you So you’ve had a good jam session but may have bugs or otherwise be vulnerable
can use to provide a name for yourself now you want a rehearsal with your band. to attack. If there is no process running on
and add the instrument(s) you play, which Obviously you can’t use a public server the inside to receive data, the operating
is useful for ID purposes, but by no means for this because anybody could gate crash system simply throws away any incoming
mandatory. Incidentally, Jamulus requires your rehearsal. The answer is for one packets (including any sent by a hacker).
that you turn direct monitoring off for the member of the band to install a private That is, an open port is not like an open
live mics in your audio interface. server. Running a private server is trivially window. You can’t just peer through. I only
To make Jamulus actually do anything easy, you just click on it and away it run the Jamulus server as a foreground
you must connect to a server, so click goes... Except for one thing: if you’ve application, and close it down when
on the Connect button and you’ll see started the server running on a computer playing has finished, so it’s not listening for
something like Screen 3. very long and nothing else
This is a list of public servers, uses that port.
organised by latency with As a private server,
respect to you. You can Jamulus listens on UDP
see that at the time I was port 21224. On your
connecting (a Sunday router you need to open
morning) there weren’t too that port and set it to
many musicians around but forward to the IP address
a couple of servers had of your computer on
people waiting for others your own network. If
to play with. Once you’ve that changes from time
connected to a server, the to time (such as if you’re
appearance of the client using DHCP), just set it to
suddenly gets richer (Screen forward to all. Each router
4). There’s a fader for each is different in how it lets
participant, including you, so you do this. Screen 5 is
that you can mix a balance taken from the Jamulus
for yourself to hear in your website, and it shows the
headphones. Note that the task being performed on
mix is actually performed by a Linksys router, where it’s
the server, which sends the called Port Forwarding.
resulting stereo mix down
the line to you. Were the
mix to be made at the client
Screen 5: In order to set up
end then each client stream a private server, you’ll need
would need to be sent to you, to open up port 22124 in
requiring lots more data and your router.

50 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
 Once you’ve got your private server
running then you need to inform your
bandmates of your public IP address on
the Internet. (If you need to find this out
then use the website http://ip4.me. It’s
quick, free and ad-free). When you and
your bandmates start their Jamulus clients
and click on Connect, you all ignore
the list of public servers and, in the box
down the bottom labelled Server Name/
Address, you type that public IP address
and click on Connect. Everything else
being equal you will hear your bandmates
in your headphones and you can get on
with your rehearsal.
Geography
In our own band rehearsals, two of us are
in the same building and the third is just
10 miles away. We do have a little latency
(just enough to notice, like a very, very
short delay and the odd pop or click),
but in the main we are able to practice
our songs quite successfully. To get
some idea of the impact of distance on
latency I arranged a Jamulus session with
friend and studio owner Bob Bickerton
in New Zealand (10am here in the UK,
9pm there). Bob had no problems setting
up the Jamulus client or connecting to
my private server. However, his latency
was of the order of 300-400 ms. I don’t
know if you’ve ever tried talking with
your voice sounding in your headphones
delayed by one-third of a second, but
it’s next to impossible. So then we tried
connecting to a public server that was
geographically almost exactly midway
between us (in Japan). Here we both
had latency of getting on for 200ms.
Conversation was just possible but playing
music wouldn’t have been, so we didn’t
try. One slightly strange effect we noticed
was that any changes we made to the mix
were also delayed by latency, so that on
the high‑latency servers, changes were
delayed in a quite disorientating manner
until we realised what was going on. This
is due to the fact that the Personal Mix
faders affect the mix at the server rather
than at the client end.
Interestingly, a couple of times while
we were connected, other people
connected and then disconnected in a few
seconds. Clearly people connect to public
servers, and then if what they hear isn’t
what they’re looking for they drop out
quickly. This sounds like good etiquette.
So playing sessions with friends on
the other side of the planet isn’t quite
here — yet.
Conclusion
Jamulus strikes me as a well-thought‑out
tool for making music across the Internet,
but the great beast latency is not totally
defeated, and there is a definite element
of luck in whether it works out for you.
Having said that, if you can put your
hands on the hardware necessary then do
give it a go.
I have not covered all the settings
available for tweaking (see the Jamulus
documentation for more information on
that). It’s hedged around with significant
requirements and geographical
restrictions, but with a little bit of luck
and a following wind, and provided you
stay fairly local, you really can play music
in real time with other musicians across
the Internet.

goldenageproject.com goldenagepremier.com
«Vintage character for «Handmade high end pro audio
modern ideas» for a lot less than you would expect»
GA-47 & GA-251
«These GAP microphones have a world-class sound and though they’re not
bargain-basement products, they offer astonishingly good bang for buck.»
«Superb replicas of two wonderful vintage valve microphones, offering au-
thentic sound and excellent value for money.»
John Pickford, MusicTech , March 2019

«I used my new GA-47 mic in the studio

all week. It really was very crisp on vocals
and even as a room mic.
This mic showcases the versatility, and
the company’s commitment to making a
great product at an affordable price.»
FC 1 MKII FC 3 TC 1 R 1 MKII R 1 Active MKIII R 1 Tube Active David Bendeth
Users and reviewers love our PRE-73 preamps!
“I’ve been using the Pre-73 MKIII for 2 years now and I
am blown away. I love it on overdriven electric guitars, GA-47 EXTENDED
hard rock vocals, and even as a straight funk DI guitar The GA-47 Extended has a removable capsule head in the same format as
sound. It’s fat, the EQ makes it versatile, and it can break the vintage U-47, It also has the polar pattern switch on the front of the mic
up like a standalone overdrive unit.”
FC 4 ST Weston Wellman, recording engineer, Nashville and an aviation style mic cable socket. And it sounds absolutely amazing!

«The GAP PRE-73 and EQ-73

have become a staple in my stu-
dio. The colouration and sonic
possibilities are very musical
and stack extremely well.
Excellent gear at any price,
highly recommended!.»
«Fantastic gear! I’ve been
tracking a little over the last few
days, awesome.» w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 51
Malcolm Bruce
 ON TEST
PreSonus Studio One 5
Digital Audio Workstation
Studio One continues to battle the big hitters with
a broad range of enhancements and new features.
ROBIN VINCENT
I
t’s been 10 years since Studio One
first appeared as a spunky little DAW
with ambitious hopes of poaching
users from the long-toothed platforms of
Cubase, Logic and Pro Tools. Where some
52 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
DAWs have a definitive focus, Studio One
would like to be all things to all people,
and so with version 5 it has something
for everyone. We have mixer scenes and
a listening bus in the console for the
studio people, we have score writing
and MPE editing for the composers, we
have a whole new Show Page for live
performers and a new way of paying for it
in the PreSonus Sphere.
Look & Feel
When you open up this fresh new
version you’re greeted with the
comfortingly familiar sight of exactly
the same interface. There’s a tiny bit of
rejigging in the Inspector channel strip
and the addition of the Show button,
but otherwise there are no discernible
changes. I guess they felt they nailed it

The main GUI is unchanged but some of the
plug-ins have had a facelift.
with version 4 so why waste development
time trying to improve upon perfection?
Moving along then.
Arrange View
There’s been a very welcome change to
how the gain of clips is handled. With
version 4 each clip had a gain handle that
you could pull up and down and fade
handles at the top corners for creating
a basic volume envelope. With version 5
you can go to town with creating what
PreSonus call Clip Gain Envelopes, using
any of the transform tools from lines to
sine waves to freehand. The waveform
display follows along nicely, giving you
a graphical view of any changes. It’s
perfect for taking out glitches, smoothing
peaks or evening things out without
having to get into automating the track
volume and there’s plenty of room for
exploring avenues of
amplitude modulation.
Staying with clips for the moment,
PreSonus have added an option to
the Advanced Options menu that says
‘No overlap when editing events’. This
removes the strange greying of clips that
happens if you place a clip over the top
of another clip where the previous clip
still exists underneath. Instead, with this
option ticked the material behind the clip
is deleted and the overlapping clip takes
its place. I find this a lot less confusing.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
PreSonus Studio One 5
£344
pros
• Mixer scenes will change your workflow.
• Aux Channels.
• Listen bus.
• Love the new-look Analog Delay.
• Decent MPE Editing.
• Score view.
• Show Page is fabulous.
• Sphere all-in bundle is great value.
cons
• No printing in Score view.
• No audio capture in Show Page.
• No new instruments, sounds, content
or plug-ins.
• No included MPE‑compatible
instruments.
summary
Version 5 is a meaty update that broadens
the appeal, improves the workflow and takes
it forward. You have whole new ways to play,
produce, edit and perform your music and
it shows how the term DAW is becoming
increasingly inadequate.
The Marker Track gets its own Inspector
panel with a simple list of the markers
which you can jump to or rename. You
can also right-click in the Inspector space
and select ‘Create Arranger Sections
From Markers’ to push the markers into
the Arranger Track, which is an obvious
shortcut now that you think about it.
We also get a new Timestretch
option. After years of working to perfect
the ability to separate time and pitch
PreSonus brings back the old-fashion way
of changing the speed of playback with
the ‘Tape — Resampler’ mode. With this
option selected on a track any tempo
changes will be reflected in the slowing
down or speeding up of the audio in
a tape-based style. If you want to do
a tape-stop effect then this will pull that
off perfectly. And it’s also great for other
effects and doing interestingly wobbly
things with audio.
Mixer View
Although the console looks and acts
the same, there’s one new feature that’s
potentially revolutionary: Mixer Scenes. In
a nutshell it’s the ability to save snapshots
of the mixer with all the plug-ins, sends,
panning, levels and routing as a Scene.
Perhaps in the past you would have put
together a basic mix and then saved a new
version of your project so that you had
a safe place to go back to if it all went
53
 ON TEST
PRESONUS STUDIO ONE 5
You can make all sorts of adjustments with Clip Gain Envelopes.
wrong. Now you can simply save it as
a Mixer Scene and come back to it with
a single click. You can use it to compare
mixes or perhaps try three different
plug-in chains on the vocals. It’s great for
storing points of progression in a mix or
trying out new ideas without getting lost
in lengthy Undo histories.
It doesn’t have to be everything all at
once. You can have it recall just the visibility
of tracks so you can hide a group or two to
focus on a specific collection of channels.
You could create scenes based on Mutes
for instantly just picking up the vocal tracks,
or the drums, the guitars, etc. It’s useful for
diving into some ideas and then being able
to come back to those same tracks later on
as if nothing happened. It’s so ridiculously
useful that you’ll wonder why it hasn’t
always been there. I’ve already allocated
it a keyboard shortcut and it’s dropped
invisibly into my workflow.
Listen Bus
Under the Spanner icon on the mixer
you’ll find a new feature called the Listen
54 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Bus. This is primarily aimed at users
running a studio situation where you
don’t want the musicians monitoring
on headphones to be bothered by your
messing about with soloing tracks in
the control room. With the Listen Bus
enabled and routed to your main speakers
the soloing of a track will only happen
on the Listen Bus and not on the Main
output that’s feeding the vocal booth,
headphones and live-room monitors.
This is one of those catch-up features
that studio users have been after for
some time now and it’s great to see it
implemented. Same goes for MTC/MMC
synchronisation, which is something you
probably assumed was already present
like it is in every other DAW, but we’re
there now, so happy days.
Aux Channels
An option has opened up in the mixer to
create Aux Channels. These are channels
in the mixer that are designed for the
play‑through and monitoring of external
audio signals without allocating them
a track for recording. So,
perhaps you have an external
synthesizer and want to be
able to hear its output through
Studio One. Previously you
would create a MIDI track to
run the synth and an audio
track to hear it. This works
fine but can rather clog up
your Arrange View with empty
audio tracks. The Aux Channel
bypasses the Arrange View and
gives you a fader in the mixer
set to whatever input the synth
is connected to.
You can make it even
more elegant by getting
You can save various
attributes in a Mixer Scene.
into External Instruments, which is
making something useful out of the New
Instrument setup in External Devices.
You can create an External Instrument
in the Browser for each of your external
synths and sound modules and then drag
them into your project like any virtual
instrument. This automatically creates
an Instrument Track routed to your synth
and an Aux Channel in the mixer ready
to receive the play-through. This greatly
improves the ease of connection between
Studio One and your external gear.
Score
For composers and arrangers the arrival of
a Score View and editor into Studio One
could be what tempts them over from
established DAWs like Cubase and Logic.
The Score View exists in the same
editor window as the piano roll and drum
editor. It’s just another view of your MIDI
data available on a click and it is beautifully
done. Each track is available as a single
or Grand Staff for two-handed pieces and
you can toggle each track on or off so you
can see it as individual instruments or as
a conductor’s score. There’s also a rather
lovely option to flip the look to white notes
on a dark background.
Studio One will have a decent stab at
interpreting your playing into some kind
of coherent score, but inevitably some
editing will be required. Nearly all of
the editing tools and features available
in the piano roll editor are absent from
the Score View. None of the Musical
Functions you’d find on the right-click or
from the Action menu exist. Your toolset
is reduced to an arrow and a pen, which
may be all you need and certainly keeps
the Score view uncluttered and focused
on the task of notation.
The arrow tool lets you change the
pitch of individual notes and chords
but not the duration or placement. You
can, however, copy notes and paste

them about the place by moving the
song marker. You can also change pitch
with the arrow keys and move forwards
and backwards from note-to-note like
you can in the MIDI editor, except in
the Score editor it selects whole chords
together and lets you transpose them.
There doesn’t seem to be a shortcut to
deleting notes; no modifier that changes
the mouse pointer to an eraser and so you
have to select the note and press Delete.
To change the duration of a note you use
the Pen tool and select the type of note
"SurferEQ has become an indispensable tool
for me. When it comes to balancing a kick drum
against a sub heavy 808, It allows me to easily
have them coexist without sacrificing the
integrity of either. I won’t mix without it!"
- CELEBRATING
Just Blaze
Multi-Platinum Producer (Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Eminem)
Plug-ins
All the included plug-ins have had the
makeover they deserve, as many had a ‘version 3’
feel. The Scope plug-in has finally been dragged
out of its adorable Windows 98-style interface.
The Analog Delay and Chorus have been
reskinned into vintage-style effects reminiscent
of Roland Space Delay and Chorus Echo. The
Rotor rotary speaker gets a wooden cabinet
and animated speaker cone visible through
a grill. The Tricomp also gets a cool paint job.
These are engaging changes that makes them
very noticeable in the thumbnailed browser list.
The delay gets an exponential volume curve
and dedicated Width and Ping Pong controls
and all dynamics plug-ins now have side-chain
inputs, but otherwise the changes are largely
cosmetic except for the noticeable spread of
PreSonus’ State Space amp modelling.
from the toolbar, or press 3 to 9 on the
keyboard, and click on top of whatever
note you wish to change. The score will
adapt to accommodate it. If you put more
notes into a bar than the time-signature
allows they will appear as red and will be
ignored on playback.
w w w. s o u n d o n s o u n d .c o m
Wherever there is ‘Drive’ you’ll find the
State Space logo declaring that their hi-tech
virtual modelling has been used to replicate an
authentic drive circuit response. This was first
found in the Console Shaper and Fat Channel
XT and more recently made it into the
reworking of Ampire last year, but now it’s in
the Delay, the Rotor and the Tricomp, bringing
some extra character.
The Pro EQ has been updated to a new
version and now includes a phase linear
low-cut EQ with fixed values and a variable
slope. The spectrum display now has
a 12th-octave mode and it has a dedicated
input meter with adjustable range and
peak hold.
I should mention that you now get
Melodyne Essentials version 5 included.
You can start with a fresh score and
pick up the pen tool to start writing.
Choose your note and click it into the
empty bars. You can add rests and
articulations like ties, trills and glissandos
and they all express themselves over
MIDI on playback. One neat feature is the
10 YEARS OF
AUDIO INNOVATION
/ September 2020 55
SOUNDRADIX.COM
 ON TEST
PRESONUS STUDIO ONE 5
The new Score view is very handsome and can be seen alongside the MIDI editor and clip.
single command under the Action menu
which is ‘Fill with rests’ and will fill in any
unused space in the score.
The mouse isn’t the only way to add
notes. You can enable step-mode and then
enter notes of the selected duration with
a MIDI keyboard or with your QWERTY
keyboard which can be a very fast method
of note entry once you get the hang of it.
The Score View is a good addition to
the editing and composing toolbox and
Key Switches
One small but useful enhancement to the
MIDI Editor is the introduction of a Key
Switch lane. Key Switching allows a sampled
instrument, like those in the Presence XT, to
switch between alternative articulations of the
same instrument by hitting certain low-octave
MIDI notes. You could be playing a legato
stringed instrument and then tap C0 on your
keyboard controller to switch to staccato
sounds. These switch commands are present
in the MIDI Editor as MIDI notes but they
are often hidden from view because the actual
note action is happening in higher octaves.
The Key Switch lane makes them visible the
whole time in a similar style to the Chord or
Arrange Tracks but beneath the MIDI Editor.
56 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
will be welcomed by the many people
who enjoy working with music in this
way. It is basic when compared to more
comprehensive score-editing software but
it’s easy to use and does the job. You can
also detach the editor window, pin it and
open the MIDI editor alongside to use
them together. You might find it quicker,
for instance, to do some quantising in the
piano roll rather than tidy up notes by
hand in the Score view.
The Key Switch options are available and
named automatically when using Presence
XT and selectable from a drop-down list. For
other instruments like Kontakt you have to
create a little Key Switch preset to denote the
keys and naming.
Studio One also takes the trouble to
exclude the Key Switch notes from MIDI
processing, so when you apply functions in
the MIDI editor or when using MIDI effects
such as the Arpeggiator or the Chord Track
they don’t get in the way.
The Key Switch lane gives you a more
elegant way of experimenting with and
applying articulations that makes this sort of
orchestral workflow so much simpler.
I’m untroubled by the lack of editing
features and the note processing you
get in the MIDI editor, but there are
a couple of things that are noticeable
by their absence. You can’t add chord
symbols or text that you think could be
easily transferred from the Chord and
Arrange track. You can’t view it as a sheet
of paper or export it as anything that
would be helpful outside of Studio One.
This leads you to the realisation that you
can’t print it. I guess for that functionality
PreSonus are hoping you’ll upgrade to
Notion. So, the Score view is really only
for those people who would prefer it over
the MIDI editor, and that narrows the
field rather. However, if you own Notion
scoring software or the PreSonus Sphere
subscription that includes it (see box) then
you can export to it directly from Studio
One for professional score printing.
Note Controller
Hidden away in the automation lanes and
next to the Key Switch editor (see box) is
the Note Controller, which is Studio One’s
foray into MIDI Polyphonic Expression or
MPE. It lets you edit the alarming amount
of data produced by an MPE-compatible
controller for individual notes.
Select a note and be as
expressive as you like
with MPE‑compatible
instruments.

It takes a little bit

of setting up and had
me going round in
circles for a while. First
of all your controller
and instrument needs
to be MPE compatible
and then you have
to enable MPE in the
setup for the controller
and for the External
Instrument or Virtual
Instrument that you’re
hoping to express
yourself with. None
of the PreSonus instruments appear to be MPE enabled, live instruments, effects and backing tracks. You could already do
so I installed the ROLI Studio Player, which is full of MPE this by creating virtual instrument channels and audio channels in
sounds, but sadly Studio One doesn’t show you the regular Studio One and then add effects in the console and save it
‘Enable MPE’ option in the place where you are supposed as a project. But that’s not very efficient and it takes time to load
to enable it. After putting the issue to PreSonus they different projects for different setups for different songs. Show Page
said that currently only VST2 instruments are supported streamlines all of that into a focused, gig-ready, song-management live
for MPE whereas I was using VST3. A future update performance environment.
will correct this. I found that Kontakt does give you
the option to enable MPE, but I’m not aware of having
any compatible content for it. So stumped for virtual
instruments I dug out the little Modal Skulpt synthesizer
which has recently become MPE compatible and, once
enabled, in the ModalApp it worked perfectly.
Within the Note Controller lane you can edit Pitch,
Pressure and Timbre for each individual note. After
a typical squeezing of the ROLI Seaboard the editor is
covered with multiple graphs of overlapping expression
and PreSonus haven’t done anything particularly
innovative here to make it any less daunting. You can
choose an individual pitch from a drop-down menu and
then draw in the three controllers and they will have an
effect any time that note sounds. Or you can select the
note itself in the MIDI editor and make your adjustments
that way. One annoying workflow quirk was that when
you have the paint tool selected to edit the controller
data and move the mouse up to select the next note it
auto-switches to the eraser tool and deletes it. On the
other hand, one great workflow attribute is that you
can use all of the useful automation lane paint tools, so
you can draw sawtooth modulation on individual filter
expressions or sine waves for polyphonic vibrato and
transform the data all over the place.
It works well enough if you’re prepared to put in the
time and it’s certainly very welcome with the potential of
MIDI 2.0 looming.

Show Page center supported transformerless

The Show Page is a lot like Mainstage, Cantabile or
side-address active balanced
GigPerformer. It offers a way to set up a live performance cardioid condenser
rig so that everything is managed and connected
through Studio One in terms of virtual instruments, KMR Audio Available now Studiocare Professional Audio
sales@kmraudio.com from sales@studiocare.com

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 57
 ON TEST
PRESONUS STUDIO ONE 5

The Show Page has your gig mapped

out and managed. as the timeline travels from one song settings you need to pull it off on the night.
to another it automatically calls up the The mixer controller can be configured with
You’ve got to think of it in terms of presets, effects and mixer settings. It’s 16 knobs, faders or pads or eight of each.
a gig. So first you add Players, of which quick, smooth and completely brilliant You can then map those to any parameter
there are three types: Backing Tracks, — your whole gig mapped out and there’s in the Show Page, whether that’s mixer
which are essentially audio tracks; Real none of that frantically trying to find the elements, effects or virtual instrument
Instruments, which are set up as an AUX right preset in the dark business. parameters. And these are Macro controls
track for your guitars, vocals and synths, so you can layer up a whole load of
etc; and Virtual Instruments, which are
Perform parameters to a single knob or fader. And
for PreSonus instruments and VSTis. Next At this point you’re thinking that the Show if you have a touchscreen-enabled laptop
you add a setlist of the songs you’re Page has nailed it, but it’s not done yet. then the whole thing is multitouchable, or
going to be performing and these then There’s a provocative button called Perform you can map the controls to an external
appear in the timeline as big blocks of that when clicked throws up a minimalist MIDI controller.
stuff. You can set various attributes like black screen with a simple mixer controller, You’ve then got your setlist, your
the length, tempo, key-signature and master level meters and the setlist: patches, timeline, macro controllers and
what happens when you get to the end it’s initially a bit mystifying. The idea is level metering all on one simple screen
of that song. You might want to plough to provide you with a distraction-free that stands out a mile in a darkened
straight on with the next song or you environment for when you are actually room. And you can control the whole
might want to pause for applause before performing, with only the information and thing from the faders on your MIDI
continuing. You can put in a set pause or
only advance when you’re ready. You can
also loop songs back to the start, which
opens up the possibility of breaking them
up into verses and chorus and deciding
on the number of repeats on the night.
Once your setlist timings are mapped
out you can then start setting up
the sounds. Each track has a ‘patch’
system which saves the inputs/outputs,
loaded instrument preset (if it’s a virtual
instrument track) and any effects and
mixer settings. The Studio One console
is available within the Show Page and the
patch system incorporates a similar idea
to Mixer Scenes. You can have a different
patch for each song in the setlist and The Perform view gives you an overview and macro controls over the entire show.

58 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
controller, or by touch, or by the Studio
One Remote app that’s been updated for
the Show Page. That’s phenomenal.
What’s missing from the Show Page
is any way to capture your performance.
Being able to record your gig, even
as just a mixed stereo file, feels like
a no-brainer and multitrack recording
can’t be hard for what is ostensibly
a DAW. I asked PreSonus about it and
the official line is that their solution for
live recording is the Capture software,
but unfortunately that only works with
their Live desks. Their assumption is that
not everything will necessarily be running
through the Show Page which is true
enough, although I’d argue that they
are underestimating its appeal.
There’s another aspect that occurs
to me. If I could record everything
going through the Show Page then it
could evolve from being just about live
performance to being about capturing
live jams as well. You could have your
modular synthesizer rig wired through it
sequencer. It’s the sort of feature request
that might get a lot of traction.
Conclusion
PreSonus have paid attention to their
diverse user base and brought in a superb
range of new features. I think the effect
of the Mixer Scenes on your workflow
will be huge, while the plug-in tweaks are
nice and the Aux channels are useful. The
MPE editing is a timely and important
development, although some included
MPE-compatible instruments would be
good. While the Score view is beautiful
and competent I feel it lacks the one thing
that would make it appeal to the broadest
range of users. The Show Page is excellent.
It’s well thought out, sophisticated and
could spell the end for other gigging
software, but it could be more ambitious in
capturing those moments that only a live
situation can produce. The majority of my
criticism is about things I feel PreSonus
could have done, whereas if I focus on
what they have achieved then there’s
a huge amount to be pleased about. It’s
a tremendous update and the other things
may come along in time.
££ £344 including VAT.
WW www.presonus.com

Z E N T OU R
and take advantage of software effects
and mixing and record a mix of what
you’re doing while remaining essentially
DAW-less. You could store MIDI SYNERGY CORE
patch changes on your synthesizers
for different songs you’re working
on without dipping into the internal

PreSonus Sphere
We all enjoy a new way of paying for
our software and PreSonus does this
with their ‘everything bundle’ they
are calling PreSonus Sphere. You get
all their software, all the premium
plug-ins and all the extra content.
You also get access to their new online
collaboration tools and 30GB of
storage for shared projects. Studio
One lets you export stems and mixes
directly to ‘Workspaces’ you create in
your Sphere account which can then
be shared with other users. They throw
in some exclusive content, member
exchanges, videos and training and
even give you a direct chat line to the
experts for support.
How much? It’s £12.14 per month Craft Album-Ready Recordings
or £133.92 a year. Compare that to
Pro Tools at £25 a month or even on Your Desktop
something like Adobe Creative, which
for around the same monthly fee only
gets you Photoshop and Lightroom.
The pricing is impressive, achievable,
realistic and it keeps you in the upgrade
loop. The full version of just Studio 18 × 26 DESKTOP
One Professional to buy and keep is THUNDERBOLT™ 3 & USB 2.0
£344.40 and you’d have to pay for any AUDIO INTERFACE
versions upgrades that come along. WITH SYNERGY CORE
FX PROCESSING

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 59
 ON TEST

Plugin Boutique Scaler 2

Scale Detection & Generation Plug-in

Scaler 2 will look familiar to existing users,

Scaler 2 is just the be on the significant new features and
refinements. However, a brief overview
but there are lots of new features to be found
in the GUI.
thing to get you out might be helpful.
Scaler is built around an extensive
of a songwriting rut. knowledge base of chords, scales and Plugin Boutique
harmony. The UI provides access to Scaler 2 £44
JOHN WALDEN this via three broad zones: the upper
pros
‘detection’ zone shows chords that are

A
little music theory can be really
useful in the compositional
stage of a project, and those
who have not passed Music Theory 101
might find a bit of software assistance to
be invaluable!
I reviewed the original version
of Scaler in SOS December 2018
— www.soundonsound.com/reviews/
plugin-boutique-scaler — and, as the
core features and much of the UI remain
intact in v2, my main focus here will
identified in incoming MIDI; the middle
zone shows either the scale/chord
combinations that best match those
detected above, or a scale/chord
combination from one of Scaler’s many
presets; and the lower zone lets you
experiment with chord sequences.
For auditioning, you can trigger even
complex chords with a single MIDI key,
monitoring via a very usable selection of
internal sounds or any virtual instrument
in your DAW. Some MIDI keys are
• A music-theory assistant in a plug-in.
• Excellent new performance and key
modulation options.
• New audio-detection facility.
• Cracking value for money.
cons
• None.
summary
This highly impressive update to Scaler
boasts some excellent performance options
and expanded music-theory support for
composers. It’s also an absolute bargain.

60 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

mapped to specific chords, but the
rest of the note range can be used for
melody creation alongside your triggered
chords, and the notes can be constrained
to fit the selected key/scale (ensuring
no duff notes). Whether just as simple
block chords, or as a ‘performance’ you
create from the mapped chords and
scale-corrected melodic key range, the
Pad mode allows you to
keyswitch between multiple
Patterns (chord sequences) to
experiment with your overall
song structure.
multiple plug-in
versions to cater for
the routing options of
different DAWs and
plug-in formats, but an
impressive new version
caters for a new audio
detection feature. Yes,
Scaler can now attempt
to detect chords/scales
from audio, not just
MIDI. On the whole, this
MIDI can be copied to a DAW track for works pretty well when used with a single
any further manipulation and playback via instrument (keys or guitar, for example).
a virtual instrument of your choice. It’s perhaps not as foolproof as the MIDI
detection process, which is no surprise,
Chord Explorer but it’s a great addition nonetheless.
So, what new features does v2 bring There are some extensive additions to
to bear on your exploration of which the Songs and Artists chord-set presets,
chords might or might not work in your too. These were always a good source of
composition? Scaler v1 already installed inspiration for new musical ideas, and the
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 61
 ON TEST
PLUGIN BOUTIQUE SCALER 2
extra options have plenty to offer for both
songwriting and media music applications.
Also useful are the improvements
in the lower zone, where it’s now much
easier to create multiple chord Patterns
(sequences) in a single Scaler instance.
This allows you, for example, to develop
full intro, verse, bridge, chorus and
outro sections. This section of the UI
can now be expanded to a ‘pad’ view,
showing your multiple Patterns in a single
screen. When in this mode, you can
switch between Patterns via keyswitches,
making it easy to experiment with
different song/composition structures
without leaving Scaler.
That’s The Way
When it comes to ‘performing’ with
your chosen chords/scale combination,
Scaler 2 is much improved in a number
of ways. For example, there are now
additional chord voicing and chord
variation options in the central section
of the interface, providing you with
a range of different flavours and/or
chord-substitution suggestions.
The highlight, though, is the new
Perform panel. There are lots of useful
features, including a substantial collection
of performances, phrases and rhythms.
In essence, when you trigger a chord
via a MIDI key, the performance presets
provide unique playback patterns — for
example, arpeggios or rhythmic triggering
of the full chord. The panel includes
humanise options for velocity and timing,
and a voice-grouping feature, which
essentially provides various chord-voicing
options. For example, the ‘dynamic’
option provides you with a bass note
and automatically identifies inversions of
each chord, to keep their fingering close
to the scale tonic. Other options provide
‘grouping’ to force chord playback into
particular octave/note ranges, which is
useful when composing for instruments
with a limited note range (some orchestral
instruments, for example).
Wonderfully, if you engage the Edit
mode in the lower ‘Pattern’ section, the
performance options can be specified
on a per-chord basis. You have control
over the octave, timing and performance
details that will be applied when you
trigger that chord. When you then hit the
MIDI Capture button, all these details
are included in MIDI data that can be
dragged to a DAW track.
Finally, Scaler’s Key-Lock options,
which allow you to play harmonically
62 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
correct melodies in the upper
regions of the MIDI note range,
has two new choices: Chord
Notes and Chord Extensions.
These map just the chord tones,
or the chord tones and some
additional notes, to the upper
section of the keyboard and
provide further, ‘duff-note-free’
melody possibilities.
Version 2 improves the
options for saving Scaler
presets to, making it easier to
copy a complete configuration
to other instances of the
plug-in, and to other projects.
Even better are the new ‘sync’
options, that allow selected
settings to be synchronised
between different instances.
For instance, you might have
three instances of Scaler
controlling piano, strings and brass The Perform panel brings a whole new
dimension to triggering your selected chords.
instruments, all configured with different
performance settings for the same
underlying chord sequence. However, if suggest some really interesting chord
you edit the chord sequence for a specific changes/sequences that those without
pattern (ie. song section) in one instance, a music theory PhD might not find by
rather than have to make the same edits semi-random experimentation alone. It’s
in all instances, you can ‘sync’ the changes very clever stuff.
between the various plug-in instances; it
makes for a much slicker workflow.
Scaling Up?
Scaler was already an extremely useful
Mods & Modes utility plug-in, but Scaler 2 takes the
Another highlight is the modulation experience to another level. The audio
system, which I’ve found very impressive. detection is certainly a useful addition
Accessed via the Modulation button in the but, for me, the absolute highlights
central section, this allows you to explore are the new performance options and
all sorts of possibilities for modulating the impressive modulation system. The
between keys, and offers advice on which first of these gives Scaler a touch of the
chords might form a good pathway to ‘performer’ element found in Toontrack’s
do that. Modulation can be achieved EZkeys. Not only do you get help with
in a number of different modes. For your chord selections and melody writing,
example, starting from your current key but you now also get some interesting
in the default Progression mode, you can and expressive performances of them.
select a destination key via the Circle The modulation options might be
Of Fifths graphic. Scaler will show your something that really only interest the
current chord progression transposed more musically adventurous songwriter or
to the new key, and provide a series of composer, but they can also encourage
chords (sometimes with multiple options) those with a somewhat sketchy grasp of
that provide a pathway from one key music theory to explore what’s possible.
to the other. Scaler 2 is a bit of a triumph, and
Progression mode is great for simple at this price, whether you’re buying
key changes when you’re songwriting, new or upgrading, it’s an absolute
but the other modulation modes are steal for those wanting to expand their
well worth exploring in other situations. compositional toolkit.
For example, the Mediants option could
be very cool for media/film composers.
££ Scaler 2 £43.73; upgrade from Scaler 1
It encourages you to explore creative
£16.96. Prices include VAT.
routes between chords that lie outside WW www.pluginboutique.com
the currently selected key and can
 The power to
push limits
With Intel i9-based audio workstations from 3XS

Scan Recommends Microsoft Windows

Complete your ideal studio with a 3XS system solution

scan.co.uk/proaudio . 01204 47 47 47
 ON TEST
Rupert Neve
Designs RMP-D8
Eight-channel Dante Mic Preamp
This remote-controllable preamp boasts
some unusual features aimed largely at the
live-sound market.
HUGH ROBJOHNS
A
udio-over-IP (AoIP) continues
to gain popularity, particularly
in live-sound and broadcast
applications, and Rupert Neve Designs
have recently joined the network-audio
crowd, with the release of the RMP-D8.
This eight-channel, remote-controllable
microphone preamp incorporates the
almost ubiquitous Dante AoIP interface,
and although aimed primarily at live-sound
applications, it offers exemplary audio
quality and simplicity of use for any
Dante-equipped installation, so should
also find welcoming homes in the
64 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
broadcast, education, studio-complex and
location-recording sectors.
Controls & Construction
The RMP-D8 looks nothing like any other
RND product I’ve seen. With its sturdy 2U
rackmounting steel chassis and control
panel, both finished in plain matt black,
it’s far more industrial-looking than the
Portico or Shelford ranges. Ten vertical
slots milled into the substantial front
panel reveal eight digital bar-graph
meters and two LED arrays of status
indicators. User controls comprise 15
illuminated buttons for channel access
and configuration, a big red indented
rotary encoder, a black power button,
and a small colour OLED display.
All the usual preamp facilities
are provided for each channel, with
individually switchable 48V phantom
power, polarity inversion, a 10dB pad, an
80Hz (12dB/octave) high-pass filter, and
gain that’s adjustable between 0 and +60
dB in 1dB increments. If the line input is
selected, the gain range is restricted to
a maximum of +30dB, phantom power
is automatically disabled, and the pad
is engaged. A Reset button restores all
channels to their default settings.
When one of the channel buttons
under the meters is pressed, that channel’s
settings are shown on the OLED screen.
The preamp’s gain is displayed in large
numbers, along with the status of the
phantom power, high-pass filter, pad and
polarity options. Also shown is whether gain
compensation (GC) is active (more on that
later), and whether the front-panel
controls have been locked. Additional
menu screens show system information
like the current firmware version, PSU
voltages and temperature, the Dante
connection IP/Mac addresses, Dante
software and ID details, and the device
ID for use with remote control from
Yamaha CL, QL or PM consoles.
The preamp functionality is obvious
and efficient, making routine setups
and operations straightforward, but
the 20-page manual is necessary
reading if you’re to understand the
more involved Dante configuration
functionality. The only thing I felt was
missing was an instant overview of
all channel settings; the assignable
nature of the controls means that the
unit’s front panel can’t provide that
overview, so I’d very much like to see
an overview display page added to the
OLED screen in a firmware update.
The RMP-D8 features true mains
power redundancy: there are two
separate universal voltage (100-240
V AC) power modules, each fed from
separate mains supplies, with their
outputs switched automatically if
one supply (or PSU) fails. The two
provided mains cords are fitted with
locking IEC plugs, too, so there’s
zero risk of the cables falling out after
being bounced around in a wheeled
rack or an OB truck. These provisions
are important for applications where the
equipment serves in ‘mission critical’ or
arduous roles. There’s a cooling fan, but it’s
temperature-controlled and quiet: on the
occasions it decided to run I could barely
hear it, even when right beside me on
the desk.
The eight mic/line inputs are connected
via a single row of combi XLR/jack sockets
on the back panel, and phantom power is
never present on the TRS connections. I was
surprised at the omission of a multichannel
input connector; there’s plenty of space for
a couple of AES59 D-sub connectors for
separate mic and line inputs, for example.
Another surprise was that there are no
analogue outputs: no line-level preamp
outputs, and no headphone socket for
local monitoring, which would have been
useful for checking connections and settings
during rigging, or when fault-finding. There
are four male XLRs carrying AES3 digital
outputs from all eight channels, although
I’m struggling to imagine what these would
typically be used for. Also on the rear panel
is a USB-A socket for firmware updates, and
a pair of RJ45 sockets providing primary
and secondary Dante network connections.
Signal Path
As you’d expect of a Rupert Neve Designs
product, the analogue circuitry is described
as Class-A and each channel features
a custom-designed transformer. These are
not the mic input transformers you might
have expected, though; the front end is
actually electronically balanced with an
‘instrumentation amplifier’ circuit topology.
Instead, the transformers reside in the
channel output stages feeding the A-D
converters, and are credited for delivering
the ‘larger than life’ tone so often
associated with Rupert Neve’s preamps.
Apparently a lot of attention has been
paid to the RMP-D8’s digital clocking and
jitter-reduction arrangements, and its 24-bit
converters support all the standard sample
rates between 44.1 and 192 kHz. Unusually,
the four common pull-up/pull-down
sample-rate modifiers required for some
film/TV shoots are also provided (±0.1, -4
and +4.1667 percent). As a pure Dante
interface, the desired sample frequency can
only be adjusted via the Dante Controller
application; there’s no provision to adjust
the sample rate locally.
Dante & GC Outputs
Although an eight-channel preamp, the
RMP-D8 actually presents 16 outputs to
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
the Dante network. The main outputs are
labelled channels 1 to 8, as you’d expect,
while channels 9-16 can either be straight
duplicates (mirrors) of the first eight
channels, or ‘gain compensated’ (GC)
versions, selectable on individual channels.
This ‘GC’ refers to a feature whereby
the channel gain can be adjusted for the
output without affecting the previously
set gain structure. For example, if Channel
1’s gain is turned up, the GC output has
its gain turned down automatically to
compensate, thus maintaining a consistent
level at that output. The GC outputs
always start with 6dB less gain than the
main outputs, to build in some working
headroom, and the automatic gain
compensation only works over a ±12dB
range, and within the limits of the preamp’s
0-60 dB overall gain range.
Why is this facility provided? Well, in
a typical live-sound setting the main (1-8)
outputs would typically be routed to the
FOH console and the GC (9-16) outputs
to a stage monitor console. During the
soundcheck, let’s say channel 1’s gain of
+36dB is stored as the initial setting, and
the gain to the GC output will therefore
be +30dB. During the show, the FOH
engineer wants a bit more level and tweaks
the gain up to +40dB, the GC output to
the monitor desk will still have 30dB of
overall gain, so the artists’ monitoring
feeds don’t change either.
While the FOH engineer could use the
front-panel encoder to change channel
gains, the RMP-D8 can also be controlled
Rupert Neve Designs
RMP-D8 £5499
pros
• Dual redundant mains supplies.
• Classic larger-than-life sound character.
• Very solid technical performance with
generous headroom.
• Remote-controllable and compatible with
Yamaha’s RIO system.
• Provided with locking IEC cables.
cons
• No display overview of all channel settings.
• Fixed-speed encoder makes setting high
gains tedious from the front panel.
• No analogue outputs or local
headphone monitoring.
summary
Optimised for professional live-sound
AoIP installations, the RMP-D8
provides a high-quality eight-channel,
remote-controllable preamp with full
Dante connectivity.
65
 ON TEST
RUPERT NEVE DESIGNS RMP-D8
Two separate power supplies, each with its own IEC inlet, provide true mains power redundancy.
remotely over the Dante network; RND
provide free Mac/Windows remote-control
applications that run alongside the Dante
Controller and it’s possible to control the
preamp channels directly from any Yamaha
CL, QL or PM digital console (the RMP-D8
appears as a native Yamaha RIO preamp,
allowing control of gain, phantom power
and high-pass filter settings).
RND’s remote control app provides
a graphical representation of the eight
channels, with gains being adjusted
either via on-screen knobs or by typing in
numerical values, and switch functions are
toggled by clicking the on-screen buttons.
Setting up this interface is a bit ‘geeky’,
but it works well. Although the app version
I used during the review could only control
one physical RMP-D8, RND were already
beta-testing an updated version which
can address eight units simultaneously,
and that should be available by the
time you read this.
Performance
As you might expect, the RMP-D8 boasts
some very solid technical specifications,
all of which I confirmed with an Audio
Precision test system. The mic preamp
EIN figure (150Ω source, 60dB gain,
20Hz-22kHz bandwidth) measured the
equivalent of -127dBu (-92.5dBFS at the
AES3 output), and the system noise floor
at unity gain was -100dBFS. The AES17
Alternatives
There are now several octal Dante mic
preamps, and some of them share a Rupert
Neve heritage. These include Neve’s new
1073OPX and Focusrite’s older ISA828
MkII (which can be equipped with a Dante
interface, but it isn’t remote-controllable).
Focusrite’s Rednet MPR8 is
remote-controllable, though, and also has
dual-redundant power supplies. Other
remote-controllable eight-channel Dante
preamps include Glensound’s DARK8MAI,
Grace Design’s m802 and Millennia’s HV-3R.
66 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
dynamic range figure measured a tad
over 115dB (A-wtd), putting it on a par
with the Audient ASP880 and Antelope
Orion. The THD figure was 0.007 percent
with an output level of -0.5dBFS, showing
a slight emphasis of odd harmonics over
the even ones, thanks presumably to
the output transformer.
The frequency response is easily
within ±0.25dB from about 30Hz up to
just below the Nyquist frequency, and
I measured the low-frequency -3dB
turnover point at 10Hz, rising to 80Hz with
the second-order high-pass filter engaged.
The input impedance is a Neve-classic
5.3kΩ for both mic and line modes and,
unusually, it doesn’t change if the input
pad is activated. The unloaded phantom
power voltage was fractionally low, but
comfortably within spec at 46.9V, and it
delivered 10.8V at the microphone when
providing the maximum 10mA current,
which is also safely within spec.
The maximum input level corresponding
to 0dBFS (digital clipping) is +25.5dBu,
while the SMPTE specification calls
for +24dBu, so RND have effectively
built 1.5dB of extra headroom into the
conversion. (While this is potentially
useful in a live-sound situation, it means
a standard +4dBu analogue reference
doesn’t generate the expected -20dBFS
digital output. Thankfully, only engineering
geeks like me would fret about
such trivial anomalies!)
In Use
Once the RMP-D8 is integrated into
a Dante network, it’s very easy to use both
from the front panel and remotely. The
bar-graph meters show -60 to -9 dBFS
across five green LEDs, with two oranges
for -6dBFS and -3dBFS followed by
a (helpfully pessimistic) red overload LED.
(I like a little more warning of high peaks,
and would have preferred the -9dBFS
LED to be orange.) Unfortunately, setting
high gains from the front panel can be
rather tedious, because the encoder isn’t
speed-sensitive — a lot of revolutions are
needed to reach +60dB. The controller
app is a lot faster in that respect. I also
couldn’t find a way to pair channels for
convenient stereo operation.
Although the RMP-D8 is intended to
be used with a Dante network connection,
it can be used as a standalone preamp/
converter under certain circumstances.
The unit retains in memory its
Dante-programmed clocking configuration
and restores that setting when the power
is cycled. So if the unit is connected to
a computer running the Dante Controller
and programmed to use it’s internal
clock, it retains that capability afterwards,
allowing use as a free-standing preamp
with AES3 outputs. It’s not particularly
convenient, but it works!
Sound-wise the RMP-D8 is great, being
quiet and generally clean, with more
than enough gain for most live-sound
applications. The standard facilities
are effective and working with normal
headroom margins delivers a sound which
is full-bodied and does have a slightly
larger-than-life character associated with
well-engineered mic preamps. It’s not
obviously coloured, but intentionally driving
signals into the red results (initially) in
a progressively saturated distortion rather
than the more typical hard aliased clipping.
Although I feel there are a few areas
where some minor firmware updates
would be beneficial, overall this is
a good Dante preamp and should do
well in the AoIP live-sound market
for which its unusual feature set has
clearly been focused.
££ £5499 including VAT.
TT Rupert Neve Designs UK & Europe
+44 (0)208 191 0058
EE info@rupertneve.com
WW https://rupertneve.com
eaturing eight legendary 1073® remote-controlled preamps with Marinair® transformers, digital/analogue monitor signal path
nd optional USB and Dante digital connectivity for the modern studio environment.

Neve

The modern analogue console for today’s connected workflows -

Legendary 80-series Neve® sound, 4 Groups, 24 Channel faders

Connect. Compose. Create.

DESIGNED & CRAFTED IN ENGLAND BY NEVE ENGINEERS

Neve
w w w. a m s - n e v e . c o m
Further product information available by scanning the QR code (left) or visiting ams-neve.com. Neve® & the Neve logo are
registered trademarks of AMS Neve Limited. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
 TECHNIQUE

Tips For Keeping Musicians ‘In The Zone’

NEIL ROGERS

A
t some indefinable point in the
past, I completed my transition
from drummer to engineer, and
while I still lay down parts when clients
need them, I stopped thinking of myself
as ‘a musician’ long ago. But last year
I was invited by a client (who I’d played
drums for on one track) to drum on their
latest album. It was a useful experience:
being in a different studio (StudiOwz
in Pembrokeshire), with someone else
engineering, reminded me what it is
about recording sessions that helps
or hinders performers. With that
experience in mind, here are 10 ways
I think engineers and studio owners can
ensure the studio works as well for the
musicians as it does for themselves.
Time & Place
Recording sessions can be long. If working
with a band you might not need all the artists
there simultaneously, and they might or
might not want to hang around while you’re
recording their bandmates. You can’t plan
a session down to the last minute — recording
doesn’t work that way — but if you know you’ll
be setting up the drum sound all morning and
the guitarist and vocalist are free to do what
they want until early afternoon, let them know
that, and tell them when they need to be back.

68 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

Manage The Pace
Just because you can do things fast doesn’t
mean you should. You certainly don’t want
to move so fast all the time that the session
feels hurried. A good engineer should know
when to suggest a little break, how much
time to spend indulging an artist’s new idea,
and when to slow or quicken the pace more
generally. It’s about finding the rhythm for
a particular artist or session that helps get
the performance in the bag. So learn your
tools and prepare in advance: that way, you
can choose when to work quickly and when
to back off the pace. You’ll be in control, and
you’ll also be seen to be in control, which will
boost everyone’s confidence.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Communication Mics
You’ll have a talkback mic in the control room,
but how will the artist talk to you? It’s easy
enough with a vocalist (use the vocal mic),
but you don’t want other performers to have
to keep repeating things because their voice
is faint, or to shout, or stretch to reach a mic
(potentially moving things as they do!). So
have a listen mic or two set up in the room
which can pick up what the artists are saying.
An instrument or room mic might double up
for this purpose, but with a dedicated mic you
can add a compressor to make it easier to pick
up artists from further across the room. Just
be sure not to feed this signal accidentally into
the cue mix! Record it, and as a bonus you’ll
have a record of their reaction after each take.
An Inspiring Cue Mix
What an artist hears in their headphones has
an impact, and engineers should strive to
make what the performer hears inspire them
to deliver a great performance. Modern tools
make it easy to set up decent monitor mixes,
so take the time to learn that side of things
like the back of your hand. But also try to
understand what sounds and effects in the
headphones will really help. For the StudiOwz
drum session, I was playing a great-sounding
kit (so great I bought it!) in a great-sounding
room. Though you can hear drums while
playing, they always sound different at the
playing position to out in the room. The
engineer made a point of feeding some of
the room mics into my cans. Knowing that my
performance sounded good in the room gave
me a real boost, but these mics also gave me
a better sense of the internal balance and the
depth and power of the kit, which helped me
to avoid overplaying.
This advice isn’t unique to drums. A lot of
guitarists seem more comfortable recording
in the live room with their amp and effects
than playing to speakers in the control room.
Committing to sounds created with pedals
or outboard equipment can terrify new
engineers, I know, but recording isn’t just
about capturing neat and tidy files that you
can create something with at the mix stage, so
it can be worth taking the ‘risk’, and you can
always capture a dry insurance signal. When it
comes to vocals, having a few obvious effect
options to hand for the monitor mix can be
useful. A slap delay and a short reverb can
often help a singer get into things.
69
 TECHNIQUE
T H E A R T I S T- F R I E N D LY S T U D I O

Artist-operated Cue Mix

Some musicians like to have control over their monitor mix. I certainly do. The
most basic requirement is to be able to set the volume in my headphones, but
ideally I’d have a simple, clearly labelled headphone mixer that allows me to
balance just three signals: my own performance, all the music and the click track.
That way, I can set a comfortable balance without having to discuss every detail
with the engineer. With some musicians, there’s only so much back and forth
you can do before they start to feel uncomfortable asking for yet another small
change. Sadly, headphone amplification is one of the corners most often cut
when setting up a studio. There are a few ways to set up multichannel monitoring
systems, ranging from bodge-jobs with small mixers, to smartphone-controlled
systems and dedicated multichannel monitoring systems, such as those by Hear
Technologies and Aviom. Whatever you can afford, make an effort to ensure your
headphone monitoring setup is as good as possible.

Photo: Andrew Stawarz

The Environment
Anything that contributes to a relaxed atmosphere and a good ‘vibe’
will have a much bigger impact on most clients than your collection
of mic preamps. Some studios will benefit from being in a stunning
location or amazing building, but I reckon any studio can be made
inspiring and welcoming in its own way. My studio is in a warehouse
on an industrial estate, so the approach will never be awe-inspiring,
but I’ve put time and thought into making it feel nice, comfortable
and welcoming inside. Lighting, artwork, seating, refreshments,
somewhere to hang your coat... This stuff is really important!

70 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
 Work smarter not harder

Explore the EVO Interface Range

EVO Mic Pres, High Performance Converters, Smartgain, Audio Loop-back, JFET
Instrument Input, Speaker & Headphone Outputs, Ultra-Low Latency & more...
 TECHNIQUE
T H E A R T I S T- F R I E N D LY S T U D I O

The Need For Speed Timely Feedback

Modern DAW software leaves us with no
excuse for being unable to hit record when
needed, and as a performer, it’s really
frustrating having to wait for an engineer
to cue up a section for a drop-in, or while
they create a new playlist. So prep your
DAW sessions. Use templates. Learn
the shortcuts for creating playlists. Make
notes. Insert markers in your arrangement
window and assign them shortcuts. Also,
make sure you have a lyric sheet handy:
a lot of artists like to use lyrics to indicate
which part of the song they want to punch
in from. (It will also help you spot mistakes!)
What you say to a performer after they’ve finished a take can have a huge effect on their
mood. Here’s a great piece of advice I received early on: whatever you have to say, say
it as soon as the take has finished, because if a musician has poured their heart into
a performance but has any doubts about it, being greeted with silence can be really
disheartening. What you say depends so much on your personality and how well you
know the artist in question but you don’t have to be George Martin, or say anything deeply
profound. As a minimum, make sure the performer has the sense that you’re interested and
positive, and understand what they’re going for. I often like to try and distract a performer by
asking some questions about themselves; people generally like others taking an interest in
them and it can help them relax. It can also help a player mentally ‘reset’ if they’re becoming
stuck. Something else I noticed in my drumming session was that I couldn’t be seen from the
control room. I quite liked that, as I felt free to do whatever I wanted to get myself ‘feeling’
what I was doing, but this arrangement makes communication over headphones even
more important.

72 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Keep Playing
Increasingly, the type of production projects
I work on tend to be less about simply recording
a band, and more about helping an individual or
a smaller group of people develop and capture
their sound. Often, this means getting ideas
down quickly. And if you, the engineer, can also
jump behind a drum kit, play a bass line, or lay
down some keys or backing vocals, that’s really
helpful. So when you have a bit of downtime,
sharpen up your old playing skills or learn some
new ones. It will make you a better engineer,
and you’ll end up getting better performances
down ‘on tape’.
Keep The Buzz Alive
Making musicians wait while you fiddle can ruin a session. With my engineering hat on,
I could happily spend hours fine-tuning the kit and placing mics, but if the drummer has
come into the studio feeling pumped about recording their latest track, hours spent
hitting individual drums and playing the same loop will really take the edge off. So do as
much of the setting up and fiddling as you can before you invite the musicians in to play.
For drums, the engineering side can be particularly time-consuming, so if the drummer’s
bringing their own kit, have a plan for when they should bring it and set it up. If you have
an assistant, you can cut out a decent chunk of the buzz-killing soundcheck by getting
them, not the drummer, to hit individual drums. The same applies to other performers:
the less they have to help you, the more ready they’ll be to deliver when you hit record.
Make sure you have enough mic options to hand for a vocalist. If using multiple mics
on a cab, get them in phase and in a great place to start tweaking. Test your cables
regularly so you don’t waste time fault-tracing and swapping them out.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 73
 ON TEST
Yamaha CP88 & YC61
Stage Keyboards
Yamaha look to reclaim their stage keyboard
crown with two world-class live instruments.
ROBIN BIGWOOD
Y
amaha’s stage keyboard heritage
goes back more than half
a century, and in the 1970s their
CP-series electro-acoustic pianos and YC
combo organs were amongst the most
useful and desirable instruments available
to gigging keyboard players.
After a long hiatus the CP-series was
revived a decade ago, and the CP4 Stage
(which I reviewed in the February 2015
issue of SOS) is often cited as an ideal
stage piano of the modern era: musical,
practical, versatile and musician-friendly.
It’s not entirely clear yet whether the
CP88 on test here is a complement to
the CP4 or a replacement, but either
way it’s a new interpretation of the stage
keyboard concept for Yamaha.
74 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
And now the YC series makes
a storming comeback too. Well, we
already had a sniff of it in the form of the
little mini-key Reface YC of 2015, but
the new YC61 is a different and bigger
beast altogether.
Red Or Dead?
We’ll dig into the detail of each individual
keyboard in a moment, but let’s first
consider what unites them.
To start with I’ll just come out and say
it: these Yamahas are really Nord-like! If
you’ve even a passing interest in stage
pianos and Hammond emulators you’ll
know that the Nord Stage, Piano and
Electro are huge players in this field.
The Swedish way has always been to
make most aspects of sound selection
and control knobby, tactile, direct and
responsive, which is a far cry from some
Japanese stage keyboard designs of the
last two decades (not least the CP4) which
have voluminous hidden feature sets in
the depths of menu systems.
A Nord-like directness is exactly what
we see here. Although both keyboards
rely on 128x64 dot LCDs and a menu
system for many tasks, all the individual
sound-generating sections are equipped
with chunky knobs, rocker switches,
encoders (with LED surrounds) and
two-digit displays. Particularly distinctive
are the retro silver metal switches near
the keyboard: these toggle a section’s
on/off status when you momentarily
push them up. The overall design gives
the impression of interacting with lots of
single-task discrete devices, very much
in keeping with the current vogue for all
things analogue and/or modular.
Another leaf out of the Nord book:
these new keyboards are chips off the
same block, clearly part of the same
wider family. Casework is all metal, high

quality, and really confidence-inspiring.
The heavy-duty vibe extends out the
back too, with sockets nutted firmly to
the casework and proper 3-pin IEC mains
inlets. The CP88 weighs 18.6kg and the
YC61 7.1kg.
There are big overlaps in
sound-generating technologies and
soundsets too. Yamaha say an Advanced
Wave Memory AWM2 engine is used
for everything but the YC61’s organ
sounds, but the pianos have the seamless
velocity response behaviour of an acoustic
modelling system, and there’s plenty of
FM knocking about too. Seamless sound
switching is evident, allowing presets to
be dialled in without silencing anything
already sounding. The implementation
looks robust except for an edge case
where the YC61 VCM (Virtual Circuit
Modeling) organ section changes mode,
and that is perhaps why Yamaha don’t
trumpet this ability in its marketing blurb.
So this is all a bold and interesting
design departure for Yamaha. Let’s see
how it plays out in practice.
YC61
Although smaller than the CP88, and at
first glance simpler, the YC61 is arguably
the more sophisticated of the two models
on test here. It’s cheaper than the big
hammer-action board, but not by much.
Centre-stage goes to a fully featured
organ emulator, which is supplemented
by a broad base of gigging sounds
with simple editing features. The
61 semi-weighted velocity-sensitive
waterfall-action keys are fast in action and
perfect for slippery organ playing, palm
glisses and fall-offs. Yamaha employ its
slightly narrower 160mm octave width
here, which I personally don’t notice, and
should concern only a small subset of
players very sensitive to it.
There are in fact three separate,
independent sound generators on
board: the VCM/FM Organ, plus two
identically equipped ‘Keys’ sections,
A and B. Tied to these are no fewer
than nine effects processors of one type
or another. The Organ has a dedicated
preamp drive, and each of the Keys its
own pair of multi-effects in series. An
additional multi-effect is on hand to
be applied to a single section of your
choice and a Speaker/Amp simulator
naturally fulfils Leslie speaker duties, but
can just as easily dirty up your electric
pianos. A simple Reverb is shared by
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Yamaha CP88 & YC61
£1729 & £1599
pros
• The YC61’s Hammonds are state of the art.
• The CP88’s rich piano complement
is perfectly matched by a refined and
renowned hammer action.
• The knobby interfaces invite
experimentation.
• Great-sounding effects and lots of them.
• Sophisticated configuration options and
good memory management.
• Looks like they’d survive a nuclear war.
cons
• The CP88’s non-piano sound provision
is sparse.
• YC61 transistor organs are far from being
faithful recreations.
• Panel controls are not always as
intuitive or powerful as you’d wish for,
and menu-diving is still required for
many tasks.
• No aftertouch.
summary
A pair of pro-level gigging keyboards
that represent a significant departure
from typical Japanese stage piano design,
combining strong piano and tonewheel
organ capabilities with an inviting knobby
and somewhat retro user interface.
all three sound generators in a send/
return arrangement, and finally there’s
a master-level EQ.
Organic Reach
The YC61’s organ section is really versatile.
On the Hammond front you have the
choice between a ‘standard’ model called
H1, a more aggressive midrange-driven
and electrically aged H2, or H3 with its
very pronounced percussion. Beyond this
there are three FM-based organs: a clean
sine-wave model and emulations of British
and Italian (presumably Vox and Farfisa)
transistor designs. The other characterful
originals from the Reface YC — the
Acetone and a ’70s YC — are sadly missing.
All of the organ models will work as
two organs in parallel, with separate
registrations for a notional Lower and
Upper manual that can be played from
either side of a keyboard split, or from the
YC61’s own keyboard in conjunction with
an external keyboard controller feeding
the MIDI In socket.
The Hammond sounds, allied with the
Rotary speaker effect, can be staggeringly
good. Other manufacturers also get great
results these days of course: the best
Nord, Roland and Kurzweil tonewheel
75
 ON TEST
YA M A H A C P 8 8 & Y C 6 1
The YC61’s rear panel is a tick list of everything
you want to see on the back of a keyboard. IEC
power supply: check. Full-size MIDI ports:
check. Full provision of quarter-inch pedal inputs
and audio I/O: check.
sounds are also hugely convincing. But
the sense of realism and responsiveness
here is uncanny, and it really can feel
like you’re in the company of a large,
loud mechanical presence! At full tilt the
organs snarl and growl as does a B3 and
a cranked Leslie cabinet. All manner of
remarkable side-band hums and hisses
spill out, in a realistically unpredictable
manner, aided by a menu-adjustable
inter-tonewheel leakage level. The YC61
will subtly purr and throb away just as
readily though, all the while retaining the
sense of presence and weight. Vibrato/
Chorus and Percussion behaviour is
sophisticated and convincing: I loved the
Vibrato 3 setting particularly, which comes
with all sorts of electrical degradation,
and there’s a menu option to unlink
the 1’ drawbar from its default role in
percussion generation and liberate it as
an independent footage. There’s also an
option for an attached expression pedal
to affect only organ volume or Leslie
drive as well.
The physical drawbars have a good
level of clicky resistance over their
movement. They also get LED backdrops
(of user-selectable colour) that indicate
registration when presets are loaded
and the physical drawbar positions are
(inevitably) wrong. Each has a nifty little
transparent section that lets underlying
LEDs show through, which is an ideal
compromise in marrying physical drawbar
feel with preset recall, and arguably an
improvement on any methods currently
employed by other manufacturers.
Matching physical drawbars to saved
registrations can be done in a couple of
ways familiar from the hardware synth
world, with options for an immediate
value Jump or a more benign Catch.
76 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
‘Half-moon’ controls for rotor speed
and brake are on the left-hand side of the
panel next to the drawbars, and by default
the sprung left-right pitch stick duplicates
the slow-fast control. These are in fact
merely triggers for the processing taking
place in the Speaker/Amp effect section
further to the right. There you’ll also find
the alternative ‘Rtr B’ Leslie cabinet which
is capable of frankly unsettling amounts of
throaty transistor distortion, and a further
four non-rotary guitar amps whose
overdrive and distortion characteristics
can be well suited to the combo organs
and electric pianos. A Tone knob dials in
a ‘smile’ EQ curve with boosted treble and
bass to the right and a drier mid-range
balance to the left.
Now for the FM organs. They’re
useful to have... but rather curious.
Least contentious of the three is the FM
sine organ. As well as some beguiling
clean, glassy textures it soon roughens
up into a more generic electric sound
with the application of drive and
speaker simulation.
F2 and F3, notionally the Vox and
Farfisa, are quirky. F2 has only one
drawbar, the 4’, which generates
a distinctive square/pulse wave tone,
while all others are still sine/FM-like.
F3 has an 8’ transistor tone on the 16’
drawbar, a 16’ tone on the 5+1/3’, and
a 4’ on the 1+1/3’. Other drawbars are at
similarly unpredictable footages and offer
very muted transistor sounds alongside
tonewheel-like sines. Both these models
abruptly lose their buzzy footages above
note B5 and also can’t access the Vibrato/
Chorus and Percussion sections, which is
both hugely disappointing and (with the
majority of Farfisa Compact models in
mind) inaccurate. A generic vibrato can be
achieved by pushing up the modulation
lever, but it’s a weak affair.
Essentially, if you’re after spot-on
transistor emulations, these are not they.
Sounds and registrations are off, and
selecting them by Hammond drawbars
is all wrong anyway. I didn’t have one on
hand to directly compare, but everything
I’ve heard of the little Reface YC’s
transistor emulations seems to trounce
what’s here. However, in practice, and
especially when distorted through some
of the onboard amp/speaker simulations,
the musical effect can still be extremely
potent and persuasive, and various Doors/
Who/Floyd timbres can be teased out
that’ll fool most people most of the time.
So they’re not bad organs: they’re just not
particularly authentic.
Key Skills
Turning to the YC61’s Keys section, this
consists of two identical general‑purpose
sound generators which can be
played solo or layered and split in any
combination with each other, and the
organ section.
I found the panel layout confusing to
begin with. With one set of controls for
both it’s not abundantly clear at first that
there even are two independent sections,
and the black-grey graphics that separate
generators and effects are subtle to the
point of invisibility.
With use and experimentation things
make perfect sense. Keys A and B each
draw from the same set of 139 sounds,
which are selected using a combination of
four-way category knob and bi-directional
rocker switch. In the section they’re only
identified by category and number, but in
the LCD you get a full sound name. This
is not a prodigious soundset, it must be
said, but quality is there when you need
it to be.
Grand pianos include a fully featured
Yamaha CFX, the flagship sound of the
CP4, as well as a focused S700 and
a rather warm, intimate and likeable C7.
There’s also a U1 upright, brimming with
character and inharmonicity, two CP80
electroacoustics and some ready-rolled
CFX pad layers.
In the E.Piano category can be found
five Rhodes (or should that be ‘Rhodeses’?)

of different vintages, quite varied in
character, as well as three variations on
a Wurlitzer, two Clavinet tones, a single
harpsichord, and seven DX pianos.
With all the pianos, the velocity
response is beautifully implemented, even
if it’s not always easy to control from the
YC61’s light waterfall keys. There’s no
sympathetic resonance behaviour, but
a pedal-triggered damper resonance can
be inserted in one of the effects slots;
not the most naturalistic implementation
I’ve heard, but effective enough, and with
the potential to be creatively tweaked to
a reverb-like extreme. Acoustic pianos
are capable of partial-damping and
half-pedalling effects, responding well to
continuous-type sustain pedals.
In the Synth category you get all
kinds of pads, stabs, leads and a few
basses and bells. Many attractive fizzy
Oberheim and Jupiter textures are here,
nicely warm and lively, along with typical
D50/M1 layers and juicy synth brasses.
Some Moog leads would benefit from
more brightness in the upper octaves,
and whilst all lead sounds can be made
monophonic via a menu option (and
indeed are almost always presented
this way in the factory Live Sets) some
subtle envelope retriggering is audible
with legato playing that you don’t get on
a real monosynth, even when portamento
(another menu option) is employed.
As for synth-like parameter editing:
there’s some, but it’s very limited. Aside
from another smile-EQ Tone control
there’s just a single knob, switchable
between EG (Envelope Generator)
and Filter. In Filter mode it tweaks
the cutoff of a low-pass filter, against
some predetermined resonance curves
(selectable in menus, or using a nifty key
shortcut). In EG mode the knob adjusts
combinations of Attack, Decay and
Release at once (ditto).
Many factory Live Sets load up with
useful knob responses preconfigured,
and a lot can be achieved in a couple of
finger twists. Pad sounds, for example,
often have the EG knob simultaneously
lengthening both attack and release
time, to make them ‘slower’ and
more languid.
Precise and direct control with
this macro-based system is full of
inconsistencies, though. Though many
sounds do what you expect, the envelope
phases of others steadfastly refuse to
change very much (or even at all) in any
of the 11 EG modes. At this juncture
it’s worth comparing Nord’s equivalent
envelope system on recent Electros, that
uses a two-knob combo to intuitively and
reliably serve up almost all useful shapes.
But then an Electro has no equivalent of
the YC61’s static filter cutoff knob, so you
win some and you lose some...
Sounds grouped into the ‘Other’
category include section and solo strings,
guitars and other plucked instruments,
classical and soul/pop brass, a few
flutes (including a Mellotron), five useful
basses, various mallet instruments, and
a couple of squeezeboxes. The quality
of nearly all these is very high: they’re
clean, energetic and dynamic. Actually
none is particularly sophisticated, from
a programming perspective, with sample
zone transitions clearly audible if you go
looking for them and very little velocity
switching is employed. There’s certainly
no fancy articulation switches or legato
transitions. But the fundamental quality is
high, and various string, sax sections and
even a solo trumpet sound superb, and
are very playable.
Effects
I mentioned there are two multi-effects
processors for each of the keys sections,
and the quality of these is in keeping with
that of the soundset. What a difference
it makes too, to have effect parameters
under knob control, even just the two per
effect here, rather than buried in menus.
Multiple chorus, flanger and phaser
algorithms (all great-sounding, and
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Exits & Entries
In keeping with all the under-the-hood
niceties, these new Yamahas are well
equipped to meet the outside world.
Alongside the stereo quarter-inch line out
sockets the CP88 gets line-level balanced
XLR outs. Both have a stereo pair of
line ins too — often very handy — with
adjustable gain. You can attach four pedals:
two switches (including a continuous-type
damper pedal) and two expression pedals.
MIDI connections are via DIN in and out,
and a B-type USB socket.
In fact MIDI is a strong point here.
All controls can generate and respond to
controller messages, and (on the YC61 at
least) controller numbers are shown in the
LCD as you work. There’s also full-blown
master keyboard functionality, with up
to four independent keyboard zones,
working alongside internal sounds or
separate from them, and with the option
to broadcast bank and patch changes,
volume, pan and other information on the
recall of a Live Set.
Lastly, computers see these keyboards
as two-channel in/out audio interfaces.
Computer audio can appear at the output
jacks (balanced with a menu USB audio
volume parameter), but whilst internal
sounds can be recorded to a DAW, signals
arriving at the input jacks never get into
the USB feed. So this is a useful additional
feature, but not one that’ll let you record
your vocals.
some referencing hardware originals)
complement fine amp/speaker
simulations, compression, and three
varieties of wah, the last of which is easily
driven by an expression pedal. There are
also digital and analogue-style delays,
some respectable reverbs, a lo-fi digital
degrader and a resonant low-pass filter
which, though not integrated at voice
level, is arguably as useful as the EG knob
for many jobs.
The master multi-effect (which is
notably available to the organ section
too) is equipped with all the same
algorithms except for damper resonance.
But it has a couple of its own too: a clean
digital-style Tempo Delay, which makes
sense of the Tap [tempo] button, and an
intriguing Looper Delay. The idea there
is to capture riffs (and so on) in real time
from any internal sound generator, which
you can then solo over using any other.
It works in principle, but the maximum
loop time of less than 1.5 seconds is just
measly, and unlike a dedicated looper
there’s no way to define in and out points.
It’s a nice idea, but not ready for serious
use in this implementation.
77
 ON TEST
YA M A H A C P 8 8 & Y C 6 1

That leaves us with the master

level Reverb and EQ. The reverb is
a good-sounding fixed hall with about
a three‑second decay, and its lack
of flexibility would be a problem if it
weren’t for the more versatile reverbs
available in the multi-effects sections.
EQ is a three-band with sweepable mid,
working at a truly global level, quite
independent of Live Set presets.

CP88
Before I got my hands on the CP88
I’d assumed it to be a Nord Stage
competitor. Actually, despite the control
panel positively bristling with knobs
and switches it’s far closer in scope to
a Nord Piano, because it doesn’t have
a dedicated organ section.
What you do get are dedicated
sections for Piano, E Piano and a ‘Sub’
general soundset. Like on the YC61, they
can be combined flexibly in split and layer
combinations via buttons in each section.
I initially questioned the separation
of acoustic and electric pianos, because
normally you want one or the other,
rather than a split or a layer of the two.
However, it makes a bit more sense when
you spot that each section has its own
special repertoire of dedicated effects.
Acoustic pianos get dedicated Damper
Resonance and a choice of Compression,
Distortion, Drive or Chorus. The E
Piano section has no fewer than three
processors in series: a straightforward
Drive, feeding a first multi-effect with
various modulation-type effects and wah,
Later Live
Both the CP and YC store patches as
what’s termed a Live Set. This is basically
a snapshot of all parameters, and there’s
room for 160 of them. Over half are
occupied by factory presets on both
models, but all slots are user-writable.
Eight dedicated buttons give direct access
to pages of eight at a time, or you can use
the big clickable encoder next to the LCD
to select one from a long list. Loading is
pretty much instantaneous.
There’s some impressive supporting
facilities too. Live Sets can be saved and
loaded quickly to and from a USB stick,
and individual ones picked out from
previously saved bulk dumps. There’s even
a Manager page in the menu system for
swapping positions and copying them
from place to place in the internal memory.
When you have them where you want
them, a footswitch can be used to advance
through the list sequentially.
The YC61’s drawbars are accompanied by LEDs to show their saved state, which is rather ingenious.
and then a second for Chorus, Flanger
and Phaser effects. The Sub section, while
we’re at it, has just a single effect of its
own, switchable between Chorus/Flanger,
Rotary speaker, Tremolo and Distortion.
Beyond these insert-type effects
there’s a Delay with switchable analogue/
digital characteristics, and a simple
Reverb, both accessible to any or all of
the sound-generating sections. Finally
there’s the same useful three-band
Master EQ as on the YC61, but for some
reason the CP88 is granted the option of
having EQ settings and status stored for
individual Live Sets.
Hammer Rite
The CP88’s keyboard is one of Yamaha’s
own NW-GH (Natural Wood Graded
Hammer) models that has wood
visible on the sides of the white keys.
Under the hand the quite slender and
strongly textured black keys made me
think more than anything of top-flight
acoustic grands from the early part
of the 20th century, which is a big
plus-point, as far as I’m concerned.
There’s no escapement-like resistance
on the downstroke, aftertouch or release
velocity, but the triple-sensor design
makes for reliable retriggering even
when keys haven’t been fully released.
Octave width is a standard 165mm
(which makes a two-keyboard combo
with the narrow-span YC61 a subtly
strange mismatch), and the white key-dip
an unremarkable 11mm. There’s a bit
of a hollow clatter on the downstroke,
much quieter than some cheaper actions,
and the release is more muted again.
Subjectively, I found the weight and
resistance beautifully judged, fast, precise,
neither light nor heavy, and musically
rewarding for both acoustic and electric
piano sounds. Just as I remember the
CP4. It’s a good ’un.
The piano sounds themselves are
identical to, and exhibit the same very
high quality as those in the YC61. Here
though, fittingly, there are additional
grands. The desirable and versatile CFX,
C7 and S700 are joined by a plummy
Bosendorfer Imperial 290 that reeks
of old-world class and a really good,
balanced and neutral CFIII. There’s
also one more upright, an SU7 with
a surprisingly complex and attractive
character. You also get the same layered
CFXs and CP80s as in the YC61, along
with a rather coarse, clangourous (and
bizarrely noisy) ‘Digi Piano’.
There’s extra value in the E Piano
section too, with the YC61’s already
generous line up supplemented by two
more Rhodes models, a 73 Studio and
74 Stage. These are excellent, amazingly
responsive, with pronounced key-release
noises. Really, the CP88’s Rhodes sounds
are right up there with the very best of the
modelling or sample-based competition.
Finally the Sub section has 17 pad
and string sounds (varying from the

78 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
AUDIOPHILE SOUND MEETS
PORTABILITY.
Avantone is proud to unleash
Planar: the perfect follow-up to our
acclaimed Mixphones. Planar is the
culmination of our experience in
creating reference-grade monitoring
products, and the demands of
modern, professional end-users.

Featuring planar drivers for extreme

detail, accuracy, response time, and
supreme comfort for long sessions,
Avantone’s Planars are a perfect
solution for mix engineers, musicians,
podcasters, live-streamers, and hi-fi
enthusiasts.

Planar is perfectly weighted for long-

listening sessions, and provides
additional comfort with their soft
and spacious ear pads. Sessions
that last for hours will only feel like
minutes when wearing them!

Planar: Avantone’s offering of the

best audiophile sound reproduction
— now portable.

Visit www.avantonepro.com and

get the entire story on Planar’s
audiophile portability.

©2020 All Rights Reserved, Avantone Pro. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.
 ON TEST
YA M A H A C P 8 8 & Y C 6 1
The CP88’s rear panel is much the same as
the YC61’s, but also offers a pair of XLR
audio outputs.
Oberheim-esque synthetic to the
naturalistic, by way of a single choir
and Mellotron strings). Also, 10 organs
that encompass a handful of preset
Hammond registrations, a single Vox,
Farfisa and an (unusual but nice) Elka
Panther, plus full-ranks and single-flute
church varieties. Then it’s 11 chromatic
percussions (think vibraphones,
xylophones and some percussive synth
bells), and 25 ‘others’ that include
basses, synth leads, steel and Strat
guitars, a few brass instruments, jazz and
Mellotron flutes, and a harmonica.
I don’t want to keep repeating myself,
but just for the avoidance of doubt, the
CP88’s pianos are really good. Timbral
complexity across the pitch range, velocity
gradation from the NW-GH action, decay
phase plausibility and nuanced pedal
response all stand up to scrutiny. As with
the best of the hardware and sample
80 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
library competition, you’d be hard-pushed
to tell you weren’t listening to the real
thing on a recording. Only anti-musical,
forensic single-note ‘pixel peeping’ would
give the game away.
Having said that, I was surprised how
subtle the piano Damper Resonance
effect is: I often struggled to tell whether
it was on or off, especially for the CFX. It’s
not adjustable like on the YC61.
And then, while I’ll readily
acknowledge that the provided Sub
sounds maintain the quality I saw in the
YC61, I struggle to understand why there
are so few: fewer than 65 compared to
the 300 on the CP4. There’s virtually no
naturalistic pop/jazz or orchestral brass,
no section or solo woodwind and no
orchestral combos, timps or drums.
Sound-editing facilities are close to
non-existent too. The CP88 doesn’t
even get the YC61’s single-knob filter
control, so there isn’t a filter at all here,
not even lurking amongst the effects.
It is perversely equipped with separate
envelope Attack and Release knobs, but
once again they don’t work for all sounds:
Attack is too often disabled for some
string sounds, for example.
I’m also bound to mention the odd
misfire in the current soundset (and
actually these specific comments hold
true for counterparts in the YC61 too).
The single glockenspiel sound is out
of tune, quite sharp and together with
a xylophone it has a big unnecessary
baked-in room ambience. The two
clavinets, meanwhile, are presented an
octave lower than everything else.
Another grumble concerns the insert
effects, which when toggled on and off
cause momentary interruptions to their
sound generator’s output. I remember
a similar problem with the CP4, and it’s
annoying it hasn’t been solved, especially
as the same problem is not evident on the
YC61. It’s also a shame that the shared
Delay effect has no ping-pong option or
tap tempo button.
On a brighter note, a menu-accessible
‘Advanced Mode’ provides a useful
workaround for when the strictly

preconfigured effect provision in each
section becomes a limitation. It allows
any generator to access sounds outside
its normal repertoire: so you could load
the Piano section with a bass guitar, say,
to access the Compressor there. Sound
selection becomes a little less intuitive,
because the big categorised selector
knobs are disabled, but that’s a small
price to pay. It’s also good to see the
CP88’s reverb being equipped with
a (Decay) Time parameter, adjusting the
tail between about 1 and 20 seconds. It’s
especially valuable as (unlike the YC61)
there aren’t any section-level reverbs.
Back To Black
Having spent a lot of time playing and
generally getting to know the YC61 and
CP88 I really applaud Yamaha for giving
the player a more hands-on experience,
quite literally. I personally have always
clicked with and enjoyed using Nord’s
user interfaces, and there is a heck of a lot
of overlap here. It feels up to date, in
a pleasantly retro sort of way.
I’m also aware that Yamaha have done
something clever in dovetailing these
models’ capabilities. As I mentioned
before, the YC61 bears comparison to
a Nord Electro, and the CP88 to a Nord
Piano. Each makes for a useful gigging
keyboard in its own right of course, and
yet put the two together (for only a little
more than the cost of a Nord Stage 3,
notably) and you have a complementary
pairing that solves the age-old problem
of playing organ sounds from a hammer
action keyboard, and pianos from
a waterfall action.
Nothing is perfect of course, and
the most disappointing aspects for me
are how sparse the CP88’s non-piano
soundset is, the lost opportunity of the
YC61’s transistor organs, and the relative
weakness of both keyboards’ abilities
as synths. A similar criticism about synth
sounds can of course be levelled at the
Nord Electro and Piano, which don’t
have a pitchbend, mod-wheel or cutoff
knob between them. But the Nords
score highly in the availability of a large
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Alternatives
I’ve mentioned Nord’s current line up several
times, and those really are the closest
competitors in terms of the basic design
concept. For piano players the Korg
Grandstage and Roland RD-2000 stand out,
for different reasons, and organists should
check out the ‘new’ Korg-manufactured
Vox Continental as well as Roland’s
budget-friendly VR-09 and 73-key VR-730.
number of super-vibey vintage string
machine, synth, Mellotron/Chamberlin
and even Fairlight sounds in their
user-configurable sample libraries. These
chime with a funky ‘gigging’ keyboard
character much better, I think, than
Yamaha’s smattering of more generic,
general-purpose sounds. I could pick out
a few other little negative points too,
like how it’s difficult to see panel section
divisions in low light, or the sound
category knobs, which feel redundant
when there are only two sounds in
a category, and might have been better
employed as endless encoders.
Take the YC61 and CP88 on their own
terms, though, with their clear strengths
in the worlds of tonewheel organs and
acoustic/electric pianos respectively, and
life with these keyboards could be very
sweet. The YC in particular is a hoot to
have around: a little ripper! Its Hammond
emulation is one of the best out there,
all set for two-manual use, and with
a beautifully implemented rotary speaker
effect that is arguably only beaten by
specialist pedals like the Neo Ventilator.
The CP88’s grands and Rhodes are
uniformly excellent, musically rewarding
and fruitfully allied to the much-admired
NW-GH action. Construction quality
of both models is impressively high,
and they look set to endure long, hard
working lives. Then there’s the (mostly)
glitch-free sound transitions, extensive
audio and pedal connections, highly
configurable operating systems and clear,
useful memory management. This stuff
is less sexy on the spec sheet, but often
makes all the difference to usability in
a whole variety of use contexts.
Are they Nord beaters? Not
unquestionably, no. But they’re an entirely
viable alternative in a hotly contested
market sector, with persuasive strengths
and characters of their own.
££ CP88 £1729, YC61 £1599.
Prices include VAT.
WW www.yamaha.com
81
 INTERVIEW

Recording Viscerals
The rules of heavy metal are well established,
but for their latest album, Pigsx7 guitarist and
producer Sam Grant added a few of his own.

82 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

WILL STOKES
I
t’s probably not a stretch to
assume the phrase “don’t let the
name put you off” has become
something of an epithet to Pigs
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs. In fact,
few names could better express
the north‑eastern British neo-metal
band’s energy, aggression, artistry
(it’s seven repetitions, no more, no
less) and disarmingly lighthearted
self-awareness. The band’s rhythm
guitarist and producer Sam Grant
cheerily informs me that it’s by no
means the most off-kilter band name
he’s played under, and since this is
a family-friendly magazine I won’t
quote him on that any further.
The 2018 release of critically
acclaimed LP King Of Cowards saw
doors open for Pigsx7 that they’d
never previously thought possible,
considering that up to that point
they had thumbed their nose at
almost every sensible career move
suggested to them. Suffice to say,
when third album Viscerals was
announced in January 2020 the weight
of expectation was considerable.
Fortunately, the band couldn’t have
been better equipped to achieve what
they needed. Not only can they boast
a formidable player-producer in the
form of Grant, a true sonic obsessive with
a hawk’s eye for detail, they also enjoy
on-tap access to a studio lovingly built
from the ground up by the man himself in
the band’s native Newcastle: Blank Studios.
Road Hogs
“King Of Cowards had been out around
six months,” Sam recalls. “The gigs we
were doing were really stepping up with
each tour. We were heavily in tour mode,
so finding the time to write was a bit more
tricky. We booked a couple of weeks at
Blank to demo and write, and we already
had the recording dates booked in! It was
a really daunting prospect, starting the
demo process on tracks that we knew in six
weeks we’d be recording for an album. That
was scary. But we knew what each other
had in terms of the formative ideas, so there
was a sense of understanding about how it
might look and how it would work.”
Operating on the boundary of such
a delineated genre as metal presented
the band with a familiar dichotomy. Sam
reflects: “It feels like you have a fork in
the road. You could go down one route
and say, this band is heavy, ergo they’re
a metal band, and so let’s make it sound
‘metal.’ There are established tropes in
metal production, with an audience that
often expects a particular sound. But then,
there’s this sense that when we write and
play music together the driving force is
about euphoria and catharsis, elevation;
and volume and weight are just vehicles
for that. We don’t necessarily want to
be in a ‘metal band’ per se, but we find
ourselves in that space via means. If you
want to be in a metal band, then you need
to sound like a metal band.”
Make It Sow
Central to Sam’s methodology is
establishing a finite set of rules to govern
the recording process. “It’s an album of
rules,” he says. “You set the creative rules
and they define your decisions thereafter.
The rules going into an album are really
important, because in this day and age
you can go so far in so many directions
that you can lose a sense of direction
really quickly. And they’re arbitrary rules
— you just set them because they force
a creative window.”
So what were the rules for Viscerals?
Sam rattles them off breezily: “One:
the AEA R84 ribbon mic was on every
instrument in some form or other. It could
be part of a pair, but it has to be there. It
acted tonally as a mirror to where I wanted
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Pigsx7 rhythm guitarist and
producer Sam Grant.
the album to head. Two: dynamic. That
was a big one. It had to have moments
of respite. Another one was to find the
mid frequencies. Do everything possible
to pull mids into the record — overload
it! So then there’s a really rich sense of
harmonic. Lastly, the plate reverb is the
primary reverberance.”
Blank’s custom plate reverb was all
but installed specifically for Viscerals,
and has since become a key element
of the studio. Testament to his diligent
resourcefulness, Grant built it himself. ‘I’d
wanted to do that for a long time, and
bought a massive sheet of cold rolled
steel a few years ago with the intention
of making a plate out of it. I’d decided on
King Of Cowards to use lots of room mics,
lots of corridor mics. It was natural reverbs.
This time around I didn’t want to just get
the same sound again. The nice thing
was, because I’d built it myself, picked
the piezo mics myself [phantom-powered
PF5102 JFETs]... Everything about it is
its own specific thing. All those things
add up to something that’s a distinctive
reverberance, one that wouldn’t be on
another record. The plate is in the live
room, on the wall, so no matter what is
going on in there the piezo mics are always
plugged in if you want them. You don’t
even need to be sending signal to it to get
it. It’s a really distinctive sonic signature.
Drum Chops
Exacting the right drum sound was
foundational to Viscerals, with Sam and
engineer John Martindale pulling no
punches when it came to ensuring the setup
did right by Christopher Morley’s playing.
83
 INTERVIEW
PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS

Lead guitarist Adam Sykes (left) sets up a Neumann U47 FET, while drummer Christopher Morley
adjusts his kit. Sam Grant’s custom-made plate reverb is just visible, hanging on the wall to the left. captured. There was a mic on the bottom
of the snare too,” Sam remarks, “but no
“We took a day miking the kit, playing beater to pull in a bit of attack. With the one cares about that.”
around with different snares, re-heading snare it was more about fatness, so it was
the drums. We got a nice big Ludwig kit the Beyerdynamic M201 which is quite
Amping Up
and Chris had some nice Zildjian A-Custom a fat-sounding mic, and that was alongside With careful adherence to his own set of
cymbals. It was a felt beater on the kick an AKG C451 pencil mic. They balance album-specific recording principles, Sam
drum, not a plastic one. A lot of metal nicely; you get a lot of attack and crack knew from the off how he planned to
these days wants a lot of click and I wanted off the condenser, and from the M201 capture his own and fellow guitarist Adam
to try and move away from that clickiness, you get that more accustomed fat snare Sykes’ performances. “I had a very specific
that brightness. I wanted a darker kit. sound. The snare was tuned quite low so idea of the shape of the guitars before
“The principle was two R84 ribbon you get that woof and punch from it, and recording them, and that is that the rhythm
mics as overheads. That’s your starting it was about trying to make sure that was [guitar] is two takes, panned hard left
position. Pull up those and hard right so we’ve made that space
faders and build a kit for the drum kit. That also creates lots of
around those R84s. There’s space in the middle for the lead guitar
a Neumann U87 just and vocals. One thing about guitars is that
above the drummer’s right tonally they have to be as thick as possible
knee, set to omni, kind of — as harmonically dense as possible. So it
capturing the whole kit. was a lot about multiple amps.
It’s quite an attack-y mic, “I really like, for my guitar in particular,
but it’s a bit of a glue when the Orange OR80 and the Vox AC30,
you bring it in. And then totally blown out, and then combining
there’s a parallel of that those two amps. With the same take,
which is crushed through all you’re doing there is combining the
an 1176 compressor, so different harmonic deliveries they give
really distorted. Really to make a thicker tone. Adam uses
thick and fat. a Matamp. Really nice-sounding amp.
“On the kick drum we Adam’s sound is a bit more grabby, a bit
had a Neumann FET 47 tighter in the mids, and it sits nicely as
on the outside, that was a focused centre sound.”
the primary kick sound, As Sam reflects on such aspects of the
and then inside the kick recording process, small visual cues serve
drum was an AKG D112, as reminders of his integral role in Pigsx7
lying down. A Sennheiser as a touring musician, as well as in the
MD421 was up against the studio. His hand-wired OR80 amp head,
for instance, is adorned (not by him, I’m
One of Grant’s self-imposed
told) with a strip of tape labelled ‘Dad’ in
rules for the recording of
Viscerals was that the AEA commemoration of the birth of his son.
R84 ribbon microphone be Sam continues: “With the guitars it was
used on every source. again the R84 and U87 as a pair, and then

84 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
 INTERVIEW
PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS
All the guitars were recorded in stereo, with an
AEA R84 and Neuman U87 up close and a pair
of Coles 4038s set up further back.
a set of Coles 4038s as room mics and
some DPA 4090s in the corridor. I was still
always tracking the corridor with the DPAs,
across all the instruments, but most of the
time they were turned down or off. I’ll put
more mics up than I need, knowing that
I can just drop them in the mix.
“For the bass it was a Fender Bassman
head, DI’d out for the most part. It’s
a phenomenal head, the Bassman. That
was run through a cab with the FET47
and R84 on it as a pair. The bass tone was
amazing. The distortion on the Bassman
head is so nice compared to a lot of other
bass distortions.”
Once More With Squealing
Frontman Matt Baty’s powerful vocals by
no means represent the only ‘voice’ in
Pigsx7; a dynamic that Sam was keen to
represent on Viscerals. “Adam, with a lot
of his lead stuff, was working with Matt in
terms of his lyrics,” he explains. “You know,
when one comes forwards the other one’s
stepping back, and then when the other
goes forwards the first steps back. Then it
was a bit of Middle and Sides EQ on it just
86 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Rhythm guitars were tracked through
Grant’s Orange OR80 head.
to notch some of the centre frequencies
that would otherwise make it difficult to
discern the ‘speaking’ parts, so to speak:
the solos and the voice, and occasionally
the synths.” A Moog Sub Phatty and Korg
MS20 were the band’s synths of choice.
“Matt can’t track vocals all day because
he’d just blow his voice out,” Sam tells
me. The answer was to choose their vocal
battles carefully and time them wisely, with
as few passes as possible. The producer
was well aware of the pressure to capitalise
on Baty’s performances: “I needed to
capture a vibe as much as possible. It
was very much a case of the R84, but this
time it was running through a BAE 1073.
Instead of going through a nice clean
ribbon preamp, it was going into a thicker,
tonal pre, a much darker one. That
was running into the 1176 compressor,
because he moves to and from the mic
in a performative manner. And then the
two Coles mics were a few metres back,
going through the ribbon pre. You can
over-compress it then, on the 1176, but
there’s that bit of space there still.
“[Matt’s] vocals have to battle with
a really thick, heavy mix. You can go one
of two ways about that: you could go with
a really bright, edgy U87 or something;
something that’s going to be detailed
and sit on top; or you can go down this
route where you’re saying, ‘OK, let’s take
on the fight!’ And that’s what we did
with this one.”
Notwithstanding the unapologetic
purity of their modus operandi, it would
be remiss of Pigsx7 not to acknowledge
the diversity of their growing listener
base. Ever shrewd, Sam considers how the
band’s potential to extend a sonic hand
to first-time listeners and metal uninitiates
found its way into the recording process.
“Knowing that you’ve got the potential
for radio play on an album makes you
consider certain aspects. One of the big
things with that is how the vocals sit. It’s
like, on the one hand radio will want this
idea of the lead vocal, but on the flipside
the metal world... well, it’s the other end
of the spectrum. So you’re playing this
game. The easy thing about these mixes,
though, is that I don’t actually have to
worry too much. Like with the rhythm
guitars creating that space, the vocals
have a really nice space to sit in the
mix. It’s somewhere between modern,
contemporary popular music production
and Albini-style ‘true to the material’
approach. There’s a simplicity within the
arrangements, within the instrumentation
and sonics, which allows for huge amounts
of fun to be had in making each sonic
as interesting and as deep and rich as
possible. And, I guess that’s not normally
an attitude that’s taken in rock or metal.”
It was in the near-effortless mixing
phase that Grant’s attention to detail
in the album’s tracking phase paid its
dividends. “I’ve got an idea of where it
should go,” the producer explains. And
the rest of the band are really canny and
just hearing the final mix go, ‘Ace!’ Loads
of trust. It’s really nice. Because I’m also
in the band, playing with the others day
in day out, we all know kind of where it
is anyway — even just the mood and the
direction. I’m not going to miss the point. As well as live instruments, Viscerals features the sound of a Korg MS20 and a Moog Sub Phatty.
The mixes tend to happen quite quickly.
With my own music, I’ll never get hung 24 Neve channels,’ or ‘There’s 32 SSL a clinician he was with his technique and
up on decisions, I’ll just go on instinct. channels...’ That’s not to say that in big decision-making, Grant’s priority was that
Sometimes I’ll listen back and change my studios people don’t have that way of Pigsx7’s performance shone unwaveringly
mind, but it’s nice to have a project which thinking, but I think we might think that throughout the record, above all else.
is very quick and pure and direct.” way more than most. Because we have “A performance that’s full of passion and
to. One of the things for this album in nuance could be recorded on crap gear
Blank Canvas particular was the DACS MicAmp 2. It’s and sound amazing,” he says. “The primary
Blank Studios’ control room boasts a beautiful preamp for ribbon mics. I sing port of call for us is people. We’re people
a pair of flush-mounted ATC SCM50ASL the praises of the DACS pres. working with people. I’ve been to a number
monitors: “Super detailed in the mids,” This setting would come to nurture of studios as a musician and it’s just icy
Sam emphasises, “like, super detailed. And a particularly valuable philosophy for the cold! And you just walk away like, ‘Oh, my
when you want to create an album that’s engineers at Blank, what Sam defines as God. That was hard work.’ It shouldn’t be.
massively stacked in the mids and you want “working with musicians psychologically, It should be such a fun experience. You
to make it all work, that’s quite important!” as opposed to with technology.” Much should almost forget that there’s gear. You
At this point, you might be expecting the of the sound of Viscerals lies in the should almost forget that there are things
customary engineer’s ode to a talismanic, very fact that no matter how much of between you and the sound.”  
32-channel studio centrepiece.
Well, at Blank, there isn’t one.
“We haven’t got a console at
the studio,” Sam tells me. So,
everything is about preamp
selection; picking preamps for
sources. Over the past 12 years,
as a group of engineers, we have
had to go from zero. Like, we got
five grand off the council in 2008
as part of a business development
grant. And that’s been it, really.
But what that’s done is forced
our hands to understand every
bit of equipment that we add to
the setup. You end up starting to
understand it as a modular tool,
the studio. Because we’d never
walked into a studio where it’s
just like, ‘There you go, there’s

Rather than being based around an

analogue console, Blank Studios
houses a large collection of outboard
preamps (visible in the rack to the
lower right of the DAW controller).

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 87
 ON TEST

Output Thermal
PAUL WHITE

O
utput are one of the
most adventurous and
free-thinking plug-in
designers around at the
moment. You certainly couldn’t Parallel Distortion Processor
accuse them of relying on
digital emulations of rusting tin From subtle warmth to full-on modulated mayhem, this
boxes full of valves and that plug-in covers a lot of ground.
smell of toasted Bakelite!
Their latest creation,
Thermal, follows a similar
paradigm to their Portal
granular processor, which
was one of my picks as Gear
Of The Year in 2019. But
this one’s central purpose
is distortion. Just like Portal,
there are sophisticated
modulation options, additional
effects and an X-Y controller,
for adjusting parameters
assigned to macros. Available
for Mac and Windows, it
supports the usual AU,
VST2/3 and AAX formats,
and can be installed on up
to four machines.
There are plenty of presets,
all arranged by the type of
sound they’re intended to
process, and you can just load
one and then fiddle with the
X-Y pad to get an idea of how
things work. But if you stick to
the presets, you’ll miss out! engines, each of which can again be clicking on the orange circle above the faders icon
loaded with any of the nine effect types. takes you back to the simplified plug-in view.
Parallel Lines The two master effects sections are Each section has an On/bypass switch and a solo
Thermal starts by splitting the arranged in series, and are followed by function, and most controls can be linked to a macro.
signal using a three-way filter high- and low-pass filtering, a master You set this up by dragging the ‘+’ assignment
section. Though it looks like compressor and a wet/dry mix slider. indicator adjacent to each macro knob onto the
one, this is not a crossover Fire up Thermal and you’re greeted control you want to include. Do this, and a coloured
filter, but rather three parallel by a large orange X-Y pad with animated circle matching the colour of the macro knob will
signal paths, each with its graphics, two macro control knobs, the appear next to the control. Dragging up and down on
own high- and low-pass filters wet/dry slider and the patch browser. The this little circle sets the control range, as indicated by
to restrict the frequency pad put me in mind of an alien eyeball, a coloured line segment around the knob in question.
range. The frequency ranges floating in a pool of orange lava, but the
can overlap as much as you graphic changes according to settings
Dirt & Movement
like, and can be dragged within the patch. Each Stage can be treated with its own distortion
up/down in level. Each of the Click on the little ‘controls’ icon, type, one effect type (bit reducer, chorus, compressor,
three parallel paths, called and the window changes to reveal stereo delay, filter, flanger, frequency shifter,
a Stage, starts with a choice the inner workings of the plug-in. This phaser and reverb), plus stereo width (based on
of 19 different analogue view is arranged in sections, with the M-S processing) and Tone controls, which work
and digital distortion types. three-channel filter at the top, and below independently of any other filtering in the Stage.
Post-distortion, each Stage this are sections for the Stage Processing There’s also a Refilter tickbox, which is used to filter
has a choice of nine more Controls (one tab for each Stage), the out unwanted harmonics.
conventional effects. Once the two modulation generators, the X-Y pad, The distortion section takes the name of the
three signals are recombined, effects and master section. The Macro distortion type currently assigned to it, and is where
there are two further effects controls are in the panel to the right, and you choose and adjust the distortion type for the

88 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
selected Stage. A dynamic display shows
the distortion shape along with the result
of any modulations, and the effect can be
adjusted using the Drive, Output, Shape,
Frequency, Depth and Clip Controls.
Controls that aren’t relevant to the current
distortion type are helpfully greyed out.
Some of the options seem to behave as
phase distortions, adding harmonics by
changing the shape of the wave, rather
than the more conventional approach
of clipping or applying soft saturation.
Others use digital fold-over, bit reduction,
or analogue-style saturation. So, taken as
a whole, the options cover a lot of ground
but there’s further complexity if you want
it: the distortion panel has a feedback
section, with adjustable delay time and
feedback amount.
The two global
modulation sections “It’s possible to coax some beautiful effects out of
allow just about any
parameter to be
Thermal, with treatments ranging from the fairly
modulated, and this
is where the rhythmic
fun really starts. Here, you can draw in
complex modulation shapes by clicking
and dragging to add and move points.
It’s possible to create complex patterns
or smooth curves and ramps. Or you
can load preset patterns and basic
waveforms. These modulators can be
tempo sync’ed or left free-running, and
The signal path is split into three at the outset and each ‘Stage’ can be filtered, distorted, effected and modulated to your
heart’s desire before being recombined and mangled again!
there’s a randomise option if you need some creative can turn a pad or drone into
inspiration. An adjustable Humanize function applies a useful rhythmic element,
some random variation to the modulation envelope. but a drum loop can be made
Creative use of this section allows complex rhythmic to sound more electronic,
effects to be set up as the ‘+’ symbol can be dragged fatter, edgier or gritty
to other parameter controls to modulate them by any and aggressive.
desired amount. Virtually all of Thermal’s controls So, do you need Thermal?
can be modulated in this way. Both Bipolar and For anyone with the slightest
Unipolar modulation characteristics are supported affinity for experimentation,
and favourite envelope shapes can be saved it is a dream playground.
for future use. It’s possible to coax some
beautiful effects out of
Feel The Heat Thermal, with treatments
Once you have a grasp of the signal flow, working ranging from the fairly subtle
with Thermal is surprisingly intuitive, despite its to the very assertive. Pads
apparent complexity, and the Stage solo function can become rhythms, simple
can make editing settings much easier. The two drums can become complex,
modulators are the key to adding movement to the harsh sounds. Warm and
polite sounds can
be made to pop out
of the mix.
At one
extreme, Thermal
subtle to the very assertive. ” can add a new
dimension to EDM
effects, and a faint visual grid makes it easy to create productions. But it can also
precise rhythms. Grab a point to move it or grab sound deliciously smooth
a line part way along to bend it. Adding a rhythmic in chillout, ambient or
modulation to the Drive control of one or more cinematic compositions. If
Stages picks out the beat with timbral changes, and you’re a singer-songwriter
this can be further emphasised by using the resonant with just a vocal and piano
filter in one of the effects slots and modulating its or acoustic guitar, you’ll
cutoff frequency. Simple strategies such as these get through life without it.
But, even then, some of
the gentler treatments are
great for warming vocals or
instruments unobtrusively.
Even in mainstream pop
Thermal can finesse drum
parts and loops, or create
interesting backdrops from
synth and guitar parts.
I’ve only really scratched
the surface here: the
possibilities are so numerous
that I’m still unearthing new
uses for Thermal. But already
I love it.
summary
A splendidly anarchic approach
to distortion-based processing
that could find applications in
many musical genres, though
it will be of particular appeal to
the more experimental musician.
I have already found numerous
uses for Thermal on my current
album project.
££ £134 including VAT.
WW https://output.com
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 89
 TECHNIQUE
Managing
Sibilance
Prevent those pesky esses
from ruining your tracks!
M AT T H O U G H T O N
V
ocal sibilance can not only sound
distracting, it can also interact
unhelpfully with some of your mix
processing. And it can prove a frustratingly
stubborn problem. So how best can you
stop over-prominent esses compromising
the quality of your mix? I’ll take you
through some solutions in a moment,
but first, let’s consider what makes
sibilance problematic.
The sound people make when
pronouncing the letter ‘s’ can range in
character from a full-on lisp, through fairly
smooth ess sounds, all the way to a whistle
or a ‘sh’, and some of those sounds
naturally draw attention more than others.
It can be different in pitch, too. Female
voices tend to have higher-frequency esses
than male ones. All seem to have most
energy in the 3-6 kHz region (where our
hearing is relatively sensitive), though some
have considerable energy higher up as well.
Importantly, to make any ess or ‘sh’
sound, we force air through our front
teeth, which usually means directing
a blast of air directly at the mic. That can
be compounded by the mic itself: lots
of vocal mics are voiced with a broad
boost somewhere around 5kHz to make
voices sound closer, breathier or more
intimate, and that will boost any sibilance.
Furthermore, cheap mics and preamps
90 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
may have relatively low high-frequency
headroom, which can lead to distortion,
which compounds the problem.
Lots of processing and effects that you
use in your production can also magnify
the sibilant frequencies, and the sibilance
can affect the way some processors react.
Throw double-tracking and layered backing
vocals into the mix, and if the esses in those
parts aren’t neatly aligned things can start
sounding sloppy, particularly if layered parts
are spread across the panorama.
Prevention: Better Than Cure
The best time to deal with sibilance is
before it’s actually a problem, ie. when
you’re recording. An experienced performer
should be aware if they naturally emphasise
esses more than most, and may or may not
have developed mic technique to address
that. If not, a cheap, effective trick is to
block any gap between their front teeth
with dental wax (great if self-recording,
though some singers will take more kindly
to the suggestion than others!).
Alternatively, try the old trick of securing
a pencil to the front of the mic with rubber
bands. Theory suggests it could cause
turbulence near the mic diaphragm, but it
doesn’t seem to be a problem in practice
and this ‘hack’ can be surprisingly effective.
Perhaps a simpler tactic is to hang the mic
upside down, from slightly above, with the
mic pointing towards the mouth but not
placed in the path of any sibilant air-blasts.
Importantly, this won’t compromise
the vocal sound.
If none of the above work, the gear
could be making an unhelpful contribution.
First, check the levels at all points in the
chain, and ensure there’s no distortion
occurring on loud esses at the mic, preamp
or anywhere else. Then consider swapping
the mic: if you’re working with the sort
of bright-sounding mic described earlier,
a different capacitor mic with a relatively
flat frequency response might keep you
closest to that sound without emphasising
the sibilance. Note, however, that EQ
boosts you apply later could put you back
at square one. A high-quality moving-coil
dynamic (such as a Shure SM7b, an
Electro‑voice RE20 or a Heil Sound PR-40)
might be better, as their construction means
they don’t react so dramatically to sibilance,
though this means they’ll deliver a slightly
changed vocal sound too (which may or
may not be a good thing). Another good
option is a ribbon mic. These generally
sound a little ‘darker’ than capacitors due
to their HF roll off, but they can usually take
substantial HF EQ boosts without losing
that smoothness (probably because the
ribbon’s resonance is very low, well outside
the wanted audio range).
Modern preamps, even those built
into affordable interfaces, aren’t usually
a problem, but cheap analogue gear

Here, I’ve used Steinberg’s SpectraLayers (rather
crudely!) to highlight some ess sounds recorded
on a cheap mic. These sounds dominate the
upper (blue) area, and the darker lines mean
there’s more energy at those frequencies. The
main energy here is around 4-6 kHz, but you can
see plenty of information above 10kHz too.
that distorts easily can interact in a nasty
way with essing. So do watch those
levels and listen out for problems, and if
you’re deliberately driving a preamp into
saturation, keep an ear out for the impact of
that on those esses.
Conventional De-essing
Whatever you do when recording, there
will inevitably be occasions when you need
to address sibilance later, whether because
a part was poorly recorded or because
sibilance is emphasised as a side-effect of
mix processing and effects. Usually, you’d
want to address problem sibilance at the
beginning of the signal chain, though as
I’ll explain there are other places de-essing
might be required.
In most cases, the first thing I try
is a simple, static EQ cut. This can
often tackle sibilance very well, but
can sometimes unhelpfully colour the
vocal sound more generally, potentially
compromising the intelligibility of some
lyrics too, so listen carefully for such
unwanted side-effects. This tactic can
be very effective where the essing has
become offensive only because you’ve
EQ’ed the part for another reason. For
example, when applying a high-shelf boost
to brighten a vocal, an accompanying dip
in the sibilance region won’t generally
detract from the overall sense of ‘lift’. If
you’re struggling to identify the offending
frequencies — the best results can
sometimes require two or three narrow
cuts — try looping playback on an ess
sound and use a frequency analyser plug-in
to guide you. Melda’s free MAnalyzer, for
example, allows you to zoom in and will
display the centre frequency of any peaks.
If you slow down its response, it’s easier still
to see where the energy is building up.
When EQ can’t reduce the sibilance
without unacceptable collateral damage,
it’s time to consider more sophisticated
de-essing tools. Most de-esser plug-ins
work in real time as the audio is fed
through them, though there are some
offline tools too which I’ll discuss later.
Most work in broadly the same way: they’re
essentially compressors with a side-chain
It may look a little DIY, but the pencil-on-a-mic
filter that you tune so they act only where trick can be very effective at taming sibilance.
there’s sibilance. They may be ‘full band’,
and duck the whole signal like a regular de-essers in series, each contributing to
compressor, or ‘split-band’ and duck only the overall gain reduction, or perhaps
the sound above a crossover frequency. try automating the threshold. Multiband
They may or may not allow user control compressors can be configured as de-essers
over various other parameters but, usually, too, of course, and sometimes they’ll offer
I don’t find that they actually need to be you a little more useful control over things
hugely tweakable. Something that I think like the attack and release time.
is important is the ability to monitor the Dynamic EQs are similar tools, in that
side-chain/detector frequencies and, they’re also threshold-based dynamics
ideally, the delta signal (so you hear only processors, but you get finer control over
what’s being removed, which is helpful to which frequencies are pulled down and
understand the side-effects). This makes by how much. Some can be configured
setup quick and easy, which is the whole to operate separately on the Left, Right,
point of this sort of de-esser. Mid or Sides channels, which can be useful
You might sometimes find it tricky to if you need to reduce sibilance on a part
arrive at one setting that does it all, and with more than one singer, or where there
in that case you might try stacking two are vocals and instruments (or bleed from
Don’t write off simple EQ moves as a remedy, particularly if the sibilance only becomes an audible
problem after applying a high-shelf boost.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 91
 TECHNIQUE
MANAGING SIBILANCE
instruments recorded using other mics) on
the same recording. It’s also worth bearing
in mind that all of these types of dynamics
processors can be set to react to an external
side-chain signal.
Probably the most accurate de-essing
processors are offline ones, such as the
one in iZotope’s RX. Both Melodyne 5 and
Revoice Pro are also able to identify esses
and other unpitched sounds, and these
allow you to drag these sounds down in
level as you go through to do other edits.
This can be a great way to tackle recorded
sibilance in a mix prep stage (when you
might do any denoising and tweak clip
FabFilter’s Pro-DS gives you loads of control,
but particularly handy is the headphone icon,
which allows you to hear only what the de-esser is
removing — a great help when fine-tuning things
to minimise unwanted side-effects.
envelopes, fades and so on) but, even
if your DAW supports the ARA plug-in
format, I find they can be a bit trickier
to fit into your workflow once you’ve
already started mixing.
Chop & Change
Talking of ‘mix prep stages’, probably my
favourite option is to use my DAW’s editing
tools to manually chop out and attenuate
problem esses. I know it sounds laborious,
but it has its advantages, and with
experience things like esses and breaths
become really easy to spot in a waveform
— easier still if you have a DAW with
92 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
a spectrogram view (eg. Reaper). So if you
already go through and prep the various
audio files before you start mixing, it’s not
a great leap further to cut the esses out
and put them on another DAW track. This
allows you to ride/automate the sibilance
channel fader or a low-pass filter to soften
the esses. It prevents the esses changing in
level as you add processing to your main
vocal part, and they won’t accidentally
trigger any threshold-dependent
processors you use on the main vocal
track either. (Just remember that if you
want to include all the esses in any other
vocal processing, you’ll need to route
both these tracks to
a bus and apply that
processing there.)
You’ll also have
a ready-made solution
to another problem
I sometimes encounter:
a stray ess that just sounds
a bit weird; an ess that’s
perhaps more whistly or
lispy than others and draws
attention. All you need to
do is mute/chop out the bad ess, and copy
and paste a good one in its place.
Effects & Processing
I mentioned earlier that sibilance can
interact with your processors and
effects. A typical mix includes all sorts
of processing, most of which will come
downstream of de-essing, which is usually
done early in the signal chain. You’ll
often find that you need to tweak your
de-essing settings in light of channel EQ
and compression, distortion, saturation or
harmonic enhancement processing.
That said, there are other places you
can make useful adjustments. For example,
you can EQ the side-chain of a compressor
to change how it reacts to sibilance. Send
effects such as reverb and delay can draw
If you already prep your files in other ways, it’s
not a huge amount of extra effort to cut esses out
to another track where you can change their level,
apply low-pass filtering and other processing,
to give you much greater control over any
recorded sibilance.
unwanted attention to esses, but in these
cases I find it’s better to use filtering or
a de-esser on the aux track, just before the
effects plug-in. That way, you don’t have to
change the sound of your ‘dry’ vocal, but
only the sound entering the effect. Finally,
also listen out for the effects of any bus
processing. I tend to use the ‘top-down’
approach to EQ, and often apply fairly
assertive HF boosts on the master bus.
These naturally bring up any sibilance,
but rather than EQ the sibilance away, it’s
often easier just to route the vocals around
that master bus EQ.
How Much Is Enough?
It’s important that the cure isn’t worse than
the disease. All the close attention you pay
to sibilance while treating it can cause you
to lose perspective. Listening fatigue can
cause you to be too light-handed, because
your ears grow accustomed to the sibilance.
But on the other hand, the intensity of your
focus on sibilance can cause you to be
overzealous in treating it, resulting in a part
that sounds somewhat dark and lispy. So
how do you know if you’re striking the right
balance? As always, regular breaks will help
you avoid listening fatigue, as will avoiding
playing things back on loop for too long
while you tweak. But it’s also a good idea
to have some reference material to hand.
Many years ago, Mike Senior recommended
Natalie Imbruglia’s ‘Torn’ for this: he found
the essing is just that bit too much, so it
served to tell him when he needed to pull it
down a bit. I’ve been happily using that tip
ever since. Whatever you use as a reference
for sibilance, it’s good to have one to help
you retain perspective!
 D I S C O V E R

ST RI NGS • B R A S S • WOO DWIN D S • PERC U S S I O N

PERFORMED BY T H E BBC S Y MPH ON Y ORC H E S T R A

R ECORDED AT MAIDA VAL E S T U D IOS

AVAI L AB LE FOR £ 4 9 OR F R EE
 ON TEST
Plugin Alliance
Brainworx Amek EQ200
EQ Plug-in
This Brainworx EQ is
inspired by esoteric
mastering hardware.
M AT T H O U G H T O N
D
espite the Amek branding,
Plugin Alliance’s new Brainworx
Amek EQ200 is actually inspired
by owner Dirk Ulrich’s love of certain
mastering hardware, notably EQs made
by Sontec and GML. Before you rush out
to compare it with those frighteningly
expensive mastering units (or plug-in
emulations of them), I should point out
that this doesn’t directly emulate either.
Rather, the Brainworx team set out to
create a hybrid that builds on what Ulrich
considers the most desirable control
elements and tonal characteristics of those
processors. They’ve taken the opportunity
to extend the functionality in software too,
with new features and some that were
introduced on previous Plugin Alliance
software. The Amek EQ200 is available in
94 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
the common plug-in formats for Mac and
Windows. Installation on my MacBook
Pro (Mac OS 10.14.1) was hassle free, and
I tested the AU and VST2 and 3 versions in
Reaper and Cubase.
Workflow
This is a dual-channel five‑band
parametric EQ, each band of which is
individually bypassable, but it boasts
many other features. There are additional
12dB/octave high- and low-pass filters
plus a Mono-maker elliptical filter,
a Mid-Sides‑based stereo width control,
and a THD harmonic distortion control.
There’s generous overlap between the five
parametric bands. The two channels can be
linked/unlinked as you prefer, and can be
configured to process the Left and Right or
Mid and Sides channels. So there’s plenty
of flexibility here, though you can’t select
L-R/M-S per band, which would be nice.
There’s no frequency analyser or visual
representation of the changes you make to
the frequency response, of the kind we’ve
grown accustomed to seeing on so many
digital EQs, but I actually like that. Much as
I like to think I’m not swayed by what I see,
I find I make different decisions, and largely
better ones, with less assertive boosts
and cuts, when I use an EQ with this sort
of interface — where the sound and the
position of the knobs are all I have to go on
— than I do when using something like, say,
FabFilter Pro-Q3.
Despite the profusion of virtual knobs,
buttons and LEDs, the layout is clean and
intuitive, particularly when you have the
lower panel hidden. The LP/HP filters are
at the outside of each channel, and on
each channel the bands run, reading left to
right, from low to high. Gain is at the top,
Plugin Alliance
Brainworx Amek
EQ200 $399
pros
• Sounds great.
• Useful additional mastering facilities.
• Gain-scaling, invert and auto-listen
features are genuinely useful.
cons
• Expensive to buy outright.
summary
The Amek EQ200 sounds good, is
thoughtfully designed and encourages you
to use your ears.
bandwidth in the middle and frequency
at the bottom. Beneath each gain control
is a switch to change the scale from ±15
to ±7 dB. The latter generally proved
more useful to me in mastering and on
master-bus EQ — both roles in which this
EQ serves well — as it makes fine control
much easier. Worth noting is that if you’ve
already moved the knob from its neutral
position, and then click the ±7/±15 button,
you’ll change the amount of boost/cut on
that band. I’d have preferred it if the value
remained constant (when still in range) but
the knob moved accordingly, and a global
button for this might be helpful too.
Nonetheless, it’s a useful facility.
Between the two channels, are more
controls. The Gain Scale knob and Invert
button are thoughtful features. Many is
the time that I found I’d boosted/cut the
right frequencies,
but had generally
overcooked things, “The top panel includes a number of useful
and backing
things off on
utilities, not least a 32-step undo.”
the Gain Scale
control delivered the desired result really
quickly. On occasion, I also found it useful
to exaggerate what I’d done — rather
like a magnifying glass that led me to
refine some decisions before dialling
the Gain Scale back again. Its real use,
though, is for boosting to find undesirable
resonant frequencies, then hitting Invert
to take them out, and then scaling those
cuts to taste. Very handy.
The EQ In button is a bypass, as you’d
expect, except that it applies not only to
the EQ bands but also the various other
top and bottom panel controls. By default
the two channels are linked for L-R stereo
operation, so clicking either bypass button
bypasses both channels. In the lower
panel, though, you can choose to unlink
the channel controls, including the bypass.
(Very occasionally, in v1.0, changing the
link/unlink setting triggered a bug in the
master output level control, making it apply
only to one channel.)
What you can’t do is to first unlink the
channels and apply a corrective offset to
one, and then apply a linked boost/cut to
the same band. If, say, I’d applied a 1dB
boost to the Sides channel while unlinked,
and then I linked the channels and tweaked
the same band in the Mid, I’d lose that
1dB Sides boost; the Sides would jump to
and follow the Mid setting. I’d prefer it if
there were an option for the second action
to apply an offset to the first, so boosting
the Mid by 1dB would increase my 1dB
Sides boost to 2dB. Of course, this being
software you could use two instances to
achieve the same thing.
The remaining control in the middle of
the GUI engages an Auto Listen facility.
Switch this on, and when you click and
drag a Q or frequency control it will solo
that band. More helpful still is that you can
achieve the same thing using a modifier
key. There are also modifier keys for fine
control and to jump between the default
and last settings — the actual keys for
these modifiers vary according to the
plug-in format and the OS, as detailed in
the PDF manual.
A feature in the Advanced panel is
Plug-in Alliance’s Tolerance Modelling
Technology. The idea is to simulate the
per-channel differences of analogue
hardware that result from variations in the
tolerances of components. You can choose
one of two stereo modes. The first has
both channels identical, while the second
uses different profiles for each. In either
mode, you can select which two of up to
20 modelled profiles are used. I can’t say
I found it of much use in this particular
plug-in — it’s a feature that really comes
into its own when using many instances on
different channels, such as you might with
PA’s SSL channel-strip emulation. But it’s
a nice extra, and if you work with lots of
top-down EQ on the stereo mix bus and
various subgroups it could be useful here.
This lower panel also hosts the master
input/output level controls, each with a 0
to -60 dB LED-style meter. A correlation
and stereo balance meter nestles
between the Mono Maker and Stereo
Width controls. A Mid-Sides stereo-mode
selector and THD control complete the
lower-panel selection. The former is
self-explanatory, the THD control less
so. It threw me a little at first because
the ‘T‘ stands for ‘third’, not ‘total’ as I’d
anticipated. Turn the knob clockwise and
you increase the prominence of the third
harmonic in the modelled distortion, and
when you then boost an EQ band, its
associated harmonics rise faster than the
overall frequency response. It’s all pretty
subtle stuff in the grand scheme of things,
but the character is generally easy on the
ear, and this is one thing that sets this EQ
apart from a lot of others I’ve used.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
The top panel includes a number
of useful utilities, not least a 32-step
undo. An ABCD facility allows you to
compare different settings and to copy
and paste between them, without having
to save/load presets. It’s the sort of
unremarkable, workmanlike feature that
I wish every developer included. A Reset
button sensibly ‘zeros’ the controls on
the current ABCD instance, rather than
for the whole preset (for the latter, you’d
use a zero’d preset). Nearby, you’ll find
useful Mid and Sides solo buttons, a GUI
scaling button, and another to show/hide
the lower panel.
Finally, there’s V-Gain, which models
the noise inherent in analogue electronics
and gives you control over the level of
that noise floor. This defaults to being
on, and can become quite obvious once
you’ve lifted the high
end and applied some
compression and
limiting. I can’t complain
that it’s there (some folk
like this sort of thing,
and Brainworx are not alone in modelling
this stuff) but an early move for me was to
switch it off and save that over the default
settings preset!
Sound Judgment
Whether the Amek EQ200 sounds
precisely like the mastering hardware that
inspired it I can’t really say; I don‘t have
easy access to those units and it isn’t
intended as an accurate model anyway. But
I did compare it with some of Acustica ’s
‘sampled’ mastering EQs, including their
Green 3, which is based on the GML8200.
I compared them both on a range of
material for mastering and bus processing.
The Amek EQ200 generally acquitted itself
fairly well in these comparisons, though
sounded a touch ‘softer’ in the high
end in particular. The Amek EQ200 won
hands-down when it came to versatility,
though, given the additional band and the
various lower-panel features.
The price of the Amek EQ200 isn’t
trivial but might make one of Plugin
Alliance’s subscription plans very
appealing. If you already subscribe to their
Mix & Master or Mega bundles, you just
got a very fine plug-in for ‘free’ and I’d
urge you to check it out.
££ $399. Also included in subscription
bundles from $14.99 per month.
WW www.plugin-alliance.com
95
 TECHNIQUE

96 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
The audio interface is at the centre of every
modern studio, but how do you choose
the right one for you?
SAM INGLIS step towards answering
this question, count up the Preamp gain is most commonly adjusted

T
hirty years ago, control rooms
contained big mixers and racks
of audio processing equipment.
Today, the computer is the cold robot
heart of the studio, and software has
replaced the console and outboard.
This change means that one piece of
equipment has become indispensable.
You can’t run a computer-based studio
without an audio interface — but how do
you know which interface is right for your
computer-based studio?
Analogue Inputs
Getting sound into a computer is
a two-stage process. First, an analogue
signal is converted to a stream of
numbers. Then this stream of numbers is
fed into the computer. This second stage
is the core function of an audio interface,
but nearly all of them do both.
In other words, most interfaces can
accept analogue signals directly. What’s
more, they can often take two different
types of analogue input. A ‘line’ input
expects signals at a standard studio level
such as is generated by synthesizers,
mixers or mic preamps. However, we also
want to plug microphones and electric
guitars directly into our audio interfaces.
These put out feebler and less predictable
signals, which have to be preamplified
before they can be digitised. Most
project-studio interfaces thus feature
analogue inputs with mic preamps and/or
sockets to plug a guitar into. Often, you’ll
find dual-purpose sockets which combine
an XLR for mic input
and a quarter-inch jack
for line input.
So one of the most
basic questions to
ask yourself is: how
many analogue inputs
do I need, and of
what type? As a first
number of sources you’re using an analogue potentiometer.
going to want to connect
simultaneously. If you only ever
record yourself, you might only
need one or two inputs, even
if you’re building complex
tracks by overdubbing. If you
record bands live, you may
require enough inputs to cover
a multi‑miked drum kit, several
other instruments and vocals. Some interfaces allow preamp gain to be controlled digitally,
In a studio where the audio which offers increased precision as well as recallability.
interface is the only item of
hardware, you’ll need it to have as many
mic preamps as you’re ever likely to want
to connect mics. But if you plan to use
your audio interface with a hardware
mixer, or you only ever record synths, or
you have other equipment already that
can amplify the signals from your mics,
you might well prefer to get an interface
that has only line-level I/O.
Breaking A Tie
This only gets us so far, because there
are a lot of audio interfaces that seem to
offer identical analogue input facilities.
If you have to choose between several
models with the same features, you
should also consider the following:
• The audio performance of interfaces
varies, and some of these differences
can be important. Read the ‘Which
Specs Matter?’ box for more details.
• Some interfaces have separate mic and
line sockets for the same inputs. This
allows you to leave mics and line-level
sources permanently connected and
switch them on the fly as needed,
rather than having to re-plug.
• On some interfaces, mic preamp
gain is adjusted digitally. This is more
precise than using an analogue control
and means that settings can be fully
recalled and sometimes even stored
with your DAW project.
• If you use capacitor microphones,
you’ll need your interface to offer
phantom power. Nearly all do so,
but sometimes this is only switchable
globally or in groups. This can be
relevant if you want to connect things
like ribbon mics, which shouldn’t
encounter phantom.
Analogue Outputs
Audio interfaces perform a comparable
two-stage job at the ‘back end’ of the
system, spitting digital audio out of the
computer and turning it into an analogue

Many interfaces use

space-saving ‘combi’ input
sockets that can accept Nearly all audio interfaces have at least one
either an XLR cable from built-in headphone output, and many have two.
a microphone, or a line Often these show up in your DAW software as
input on quarter-inch jack. separate outputs, but not always.

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 97
 TECHNIQUE
HOW TO CHOOSE AN AUDIO INTERFACE
signal. The most basic reason for this
is so that we can connect speakers or
headphones to hear sound coming out of
it! Nearly all interfaces therefore feature
at least one pair of line-level outputs and
at least one stereo headphone socket.
Again, the key question to answer
is: how many outputs are you likely to
need? Bear in mind that there are almost
no audio interfaces with more than
two headphone outputs. For recording
more than two musicians at once, you’ll
thus need a dedicated multichannel
headphone amp. This, in turn, will need
to be fed from its own pair of line-level
interface outputs. Bear in mind, too,
that unless you have an outboard
monitor controller with built-in speaker
switching, you’ll also need a separate
pair of line-level outputs for each pair of
speakers you have.
Remember, also, that outputs aren’t
only used to feed monitoring systems.
To integrate hardware compressors or
equalisers into your software mixes, you’ll
need line-level outputs to feed them and
line-level inputs to receive the processed
signal. The same goes if you want to mix
on an analogue console.
Going Deeper
Once again, considering only the
raw numbers will probably leave you
considering lots of interfaces with the
same basic output arrangement. If so, it’s
time to ask yourself some more detailed
questions that will help you find the most
suitable interface for your needs.
Which Protocol?
Four main connection protocols are in widespread use for connecting audio interfaces to Macs
and PCs, though Ethernet is less relevant to project studios at present. I’ve summed up the main
pros and cons of each in this table.
Connector Pros
USB Affordable and simple to use,
future-proof and available on
all computers
Thunderbolt Usually offers very fast low-latency
performance, easy to use, often
permits interfaces to be used
in multiples
PCIe Generally offers the best low-latency
performance, often permits a choice
of converters
Ethernet Extremely flexible, especially in
multiroom installations, allows very
long cable runs, multiple computers
can share access to system
98 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Monitor control features on audio interfaces vary
considerably. If your interface doesn’t offer features such
as speaker A/B switching, talkback and mono, you may need to
budget for an additional hardware monitor controller.
• M ost audio interfaces provide some
monitor control, but the features on
offer vary wildly. At its most basic, this
is a simple level control for one pair of
outputs. At its most sophisticated, you
might have configurable control over
multiple outputs, along with additional
features such as talkback, dim, speaker
switching, a button for checking your
mixes in mono, and so on.
• Headphone outputs don’t necessarily
all appear as separate destinations in
your recording software. Sometimes
they duplicate what’s feeding one pair
of line outputs, though you’ll often
have some choice about which pair.
• If you use modular synthesizers
such as Eurorack devices, you might
want to consider buying an audio
interface with ‘DC-coupled’ outputs
that can generate a steady-state
or DC voltage. These can produce
the control voltage signals used to
drive modular synths, allowing you
to sequence your synths in software.
(See the ‘Modular Interfacing’ article
Cons
Low-latency performance can be
indifferent, interfaces generally can’t
be used in multiples
Not universal on Windows
computers, more expensive than
USB, cables are costly
Not available on laptops, typically
a high-end professional option
Complex and can be hard to set up,
low latency requires a dedicated
Ethernet card in the computer, rival
incompatible standards
elsewhere in this issue for an in-depth
guide to this.)
Room For Expansion
A little research into larger interfaces
will reveal that once you get beyond
eight mic inputs, your options narrow
dramatically. Yet eight mic inputs is not
enough to track a band. What if you need
12, 16 or even more mic inputs?
One option is a mixer that
incorporates an audio interface.
Products like the Zoom L-12 and L-20,
Behringer’s X series, the Tascam Model
16, Soundcraft’s UI mixers, PreSonus’s
StudioLive consoles and the QSC
TouchMix‑30 Pro provide lots of inputs,
and can take care of live sound and cue
mixing as well as recording. They can
be excellent choices for people who
work primarily with bands, but there’s
a lot of variation in the features on offer.
A detailed comparison is outside the
scope of this article — but very much
within the scope of Chris Korff’s piece
elsewhere in this issue!
Some manufacturers offer very similar interfaces
with both Thunderbolt and USB connectivity.
 You can’t unhear quality

The Interface Series

Audient Console Mic Pres | Class-leading Converter Technology
JFET Instrument Inputs | ADAT Expandability | Console Styled
Monitor Control | USB | All-Metal Construction and more...
 TECHNIQUE
HOW TO CHOOSE AN AUDIO INTERFACE
The two main formats used for digital I/O on
small interfaces are coaxial, which can carry
stereo audio in the S/PDIF format, and optical,
which can carry either stereo S/PDIF or
eight-channel ADAT Lightpipe signals.
A second option is to attach more
than one audio interface to your
computer. Usually, this means buying two
interfaces from the same manufacturer,
and even then, multiple working is hardly
ever supported on USB audio interfaces.
Interfaces that can be connected in
multiples usually do so using Thunderbolt
ports or PCIe slots; not every computer
has these, and interfaces that exploit
them tend to be more expensive than
USB equivalents.
Digital Inputs
Fortunately, there’s a third option: adding
more analogue inputs to an existing
interface. Interfaces often provide more
paths to the computer than they have
analogue inputs. These paths are fed by
digital inputs, which can accept signals
already converted to digital data by some
other device. Indeed, some interfaces
only offer digital inputs, the idea being
that users can assemble a bespoke system
by choosing their converters separately.
Which Specs Matter?
All manufacturers publish technical data about
their products. Unfortunately, this often leaves
out important measurements such as low-latency
performance, but specifications can still be useful
in deciding which model is right for us.
In some respects, the technical performance
of modern audio interfaces is so good as to be
a non-issue. For instance, all of them have a flat
frequency response throughout the audible
range, so won’t audibly change the timbre
of sounds going in or out. Many also offer
a dynamic range of at least 110dB on both inputs
and outputs, which is far more than is needed to
capture any real-world signal. So an even higher
dynamic range figure, for example, is perhaps
best treated as a sign that the manufacturer
knows what they’re doing, rather than something
that will directly benefit our recordings.
Specifications that make a real difference
include gain range and maximum input level
for mic preamps. The larger the gain range, the
wider the range of input signal levels that can be
100 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Digital audio can be encoded
electrically, but it can also be represented
optically, using pulses of light. The key
point is that the encoding scheme and
the physical medium are independent of
one another. The most common optical
connector is thus used for two different,
incompatible types of digital audio data
— one of which can also be sent over an
electrical wire! That data type is S/PDIF.
Connecting an optical or
electrical S/PDIF cable from
the output of one device to
the input of another will carry
two channels of digital audio
between them. However,
the same cables that carry
optical S/PDIF signals are
also used for a multichannel
format known as ADAT or
Lightpipe. If you’re working
at the standard 44.1 or 48
kHz sample rates, a single
Lightpipe connection can
carry eight channels of digital
audio in one direction. In the
project-studio world, this
Most Windows music software uses the ASIO (Audio Streaming
makes it ideal for affordably Input Output) protocol to communicate with the audio interface.
expanding an audio interface, As this is a third-party standard, you’ll always need to install
and there are lots of a driver before you can use your interface.
accommodated. The maximum input level gives
you a reference point for that versatility. If this
is high — say, +23dBu — you’ll know that you
can safely record drums and other loud sources
without fear of clipping. But unless the gain
range is also high, it might be a struggle to get
a respectable signal level on quiet sources, such
as speech recorded with a dynamic mic. There is
quite a lot of variation between interfaces, so it’s
worth thinking about what applications really
matter to you. (Gain range is sometimes defined
using maximum and minimum values, in which
case you can calculate the range by subtracting the
minimum from the maximum. If, for example,
the minimum gain is -5dB and the maximum is
+55dB, the total gain range is 60dB.)
If you record quiet sources, you want to be
able to do so without adding unwanted noise. All
mic preamps introduce some noise into the signal
path, but some perform better than others in this
respect. The key measurement here is Equivalent
Input Noise or EIN. Look for the largest
rackmount units on the market that offer
eight channels of analogue-to-digital
conversion with ADAT connections.
Beyond the project-studio world,
you’ll find many other digital formats,
most of which need not concern us
here. Assuming your expansion plans
are centred around ADAT and/or S/PDIF,
there are a few considerations to bear
in mind:
• Optical connectors are usually
switchable between ADAT and S/PDIF,
but this is not always the case, so do
check that optical S/PDIF is supported
if you need it.
• Many interfaces carry two pairs of
optical connectors. Sometimes these
negative number and be aware that A-weighted
figures look better than unweighted ones.
The very best preamps manage about -129dB
unweighted, which equates to about -132dB
A-weighted.
On the output side, maximum output level
for line outputs can be important if you want
to connect your interface to old-school studio
hardware. Most professional outboard is aligned
for a maximum level of +20 or +24 dBu, but
not all interfaces can generate this. This can
mean that the outboard won’t deliver optimum
performance, and in extreme cases, you might
struggle to get a hardware compressor to do
anything if you can’t feed it a strong enough level
from your interface!
The built-in headphone outputs on audio
interfaces also vary, and some can drive
headphones louder than others. Unfortunately,
this is a specification that is often presented in
different ways or not at all, making it quite hard
to compare rival products.
Wherever songs are made.
Making music is a life-long pursuit. You may be on the verge of Studio 24c 2x2 USB-C audio interface

performing your first live DJ set, or perhaps you’re in the writing phase
of your twelfth solo record. No matter your musical goal, we’ve got a
recording solution that’s right for you at every step of the way. Studio 26c 2x4 USB-C audio interface

Setup is quick and easy thanks to seamless integration with Studio One
Artist, your new music creation headquarters. Studio Series’ world-
Studio 68c 6x6 USB-C audio interface
class XMAX mic preamps and 24-bit/192 kHz converters ensure that
every nuance of your performance is captured in sterling quality.

Wherever songs are made, Studio Series USB-C interfaces Studio 1810c 18x8 USB-C audio interface
are there. Start making yours at www.presonus.com.

Studio 1824c 18x18 USB-C audio interface

STUDIO USB-C SERIES ALL STUDIO USB-C SERIES INTERFACES INCLUDE

AUDIO INTERFACES PLUG-IN SUITE

OVER $1,000 VALUE INCLUDED FREE

192 kHz, USB-C Recording Interfaces

©2020 All Rights Reserved, PreSonus Audio Electronics. PreSonus is a registered trademark of PreSonus Audio Electronics, Inc. Studio One is a registered trademark of PreSonus Software Ltd. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.
 TECHNIQUE
HOW TO CHOOSE AN AUDIO INTERFACE
Larger interfaces often include sophisticated
DSP mixing features, which are controlled from
dedicated Mac OS and Windows programs.
can be used to add two eight-channel
ADAT expanders, for a total of 16
extra channels. In other cases, though,
the limit is fixed at eight channels, and
the second connector is used only at
88.2 or 96 kHz sample rates; at these
rates, twice as much data needs to be
moved around, and eight channels’
worth of audio will no longer ‘fit’ down
a single optical link.
• Not all interfaces allow you
to use ADAT and
Small interfaces sometimes implement direct
monitoring using a simple balance control, which
allows some of the input signal to be directly fed
into your headphones and monitors.
102 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
S/PDIF expansion at the same time,
even if both sockets are available.
• In order to communicate successfully,
digital devices need a shared timing
reference, so once you introduce
any sort of digital connection into
your studio, you’ll need to learn
about clocking. When only two
devices are involved, this is usually
straightforward, and it will be
explained in the product manuals.
Latency & Software
In an ideal world, we’d monitor
what’s being recorded
through our recording
software. The problem
is that getting the
data into and out
of the computer
takes time, and if
it takes too much
time, there’s an
audible lag between
playing a note and hearing
it on headphones or speakers.
The total time taken for a signal to
travel through a recording system, from
source to monitor system, is known as the
round-trip latency. Some people are more
sensitive to latency than others, but once
it gets much above 10ms, most will notice
it. Interfaces are supposed to report
their latency to the host computer, but
many do not do so accurately. Latency is
adjusted using a setting called buffer size.
The lower the buffer size, the lower the
latency — and the greater the demand on
the computer’s Central Processing Unit.
For any given buffer size, some
interfaces will perform better than others,
both in terms of the CPU load and of the
actual latency they deliver. Thunderbolt
and PCIe interfaces often outperform
USB interfaces here, but another
important factor is the driver software
that handles data transfer between
interface and computer.
Many USB interfaces are ‘class
compliant’, and can use the Apple driver
built into the Mac OS operating system.
This is good enough for most purposes,
but interfaces that employ custom driver
software usually perform even better.
This includes some USB interfaces, and all
Thunderbolt and PCIe models.
On Windows, recording software uses
the ASIO driver format developed by
Steinberg. This isn’t part of Windows,
so you’ll always need to install a driver,
and the quality of these is quite variable.
Many manufacturers of USB interfaces
license third-party driver software from
developers such as Thesycon, whilst other
manufacturers code their own drivers. The
latter usually offer better performance,
but the situation is complex and it isn’t
always easy to tell what driver a given
If you don’t have other rackmount
equipment, you may well find that
a desktop interface is more convenient.

interface uses. For more detail

and for rigorous measurements
of low-latency performance on
Windows computers, a visit to
Vin Curigliano’s DAWbench
website is essential.

Mixing In
In general, low-latency
performance is better today than
10 years ago. But even with the
best drivers, a round-trip latency of
under 5ms can be hard to achieve,
especially on USB interfaces. For
this reason, many audio interfaces
build in a mixer which allows us to
hear input signals without waiting
for them to pass through the
computer and recording software.
On some small ‘desktop’
interfaces, this mixer is controlled vary between audio interfaces. If you’re • L evel meters provide indispensable
using a simple knob that adjusts still struggling to choose, perhaps information about the amplitude
a balance between input signal and these considerations will help to tip of signals going in and out of your
playback from your recording software. the balance: interface. This information is always
Where more than a couple of inputs available in software, but most
and outputs are concerned, though, • S
 mall interfaces can often be interfaces also provide hardware
manufacturers build in a digital mixer ‘bus powered’ through the USB meters too. If the reassurance and
controlled from software. or Thunderbolt cable, and some immediacy of good hardware metering
Manufacturers take varied approaches offer no alternative. Bus powering is important to you, be aware that the
to the design of digital mixers and the
software that controls them. Some build
in very powerful and complex mixers
with endless routing options. Others
concentrate on simplicity and ease of use,
offering just enough functionality to cater
for typical use cases. Yet others build in
not only mixing features but also plug-in
equalisers, compressors, reverbs and Clear, comprehensive metering can be a big plus for some users.
other signal processors. Digital mixers in
interfaces can sometimes be controlled is convenient and makes the functionality on offer is very variable,
remotely from tablets and phones, interface more portable, but can ranging from a single LED on some
and even sometimes within recording limit performance. For example, interfaces to highly configurable,
software by the same manufacturer. bus-powered interfaces often colour touchscreen displays on others.
Which of these approaches suits you is cannot drive headphones as loud as • Some interfaces include MIDI In
a matter of personal taste, but be aware mains-powered rivals. and Out ports for digital control
that all of them can be implemented well • Some mains-powered interfaces of synthesizers.
or badly, and it pays to do some research. require an external power supply. This
Read SOS reviews and check user forums can be inconvenient, and a lost or Finally, always remember that an audio
online before parting with your cash. This damaged PSU will put your studio out interface requires committed support
is an aspect of interface design that’s of action until it can be replaced. from the manufacturer, for instance
easily overlooked, but it will affect your • Larger interfaces almost always adhere by providing driver updates. Some
day-to-day experience with the product to the 19-inch rackmount format, but manufacturers have a better track record
like nothing else. smaller ones come in many shapes and than others when it comes to providing
sizes, so ergonomic differences might this support, especially for discontinued
Other Factors affect your decision. If you are going models. Choose right, and your interface
Besides the core features I’ve already to use your interface in a rack, do you should last you through many OS and
described, there are other features that want all the sockets on the back? computer upgrades!

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 103

 F E AT U R E

Many of the features that won live sound engineers over

to digital desks also have huge potential in the studio.
We check out some of the best options.

PreSonus StudioLive

CHRIS KORFF ‘analogue warmth’ gained traction around personal monitor mixing, huge amounts of
the turn of the century, they started to DSP, and direct-to-USB recording started

W
hen large-format digital
consoles from the likes of
Sony, Tascam, SSL and AMS
Neve first appeared, they were targeted
at recording studios as well as broadcast
and post-production. They never came
to dominate the recording sector in the
same way, though, and as the notion of
become rather unfashionable.
At about the same time, digital
technology began to take over the
live-sound market, as live productions
became ever more ambitious and
required ever higher channel counts.
Advanced features like remote control,
audio networking, scene saving and recall,
trickling down into the lower end of the
live-sound market, and it wasn’t long
before studio shut-ins saw their potential
for recording applications. In particular,
the fact that so many of them can also
work as multichannel audio interfaces
means that modern digital mixers can
fulfil a number of roles: preamplification,

104 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

A-D/D-A conversion, routing and
mixing are built into one box. So, Behringer X Series
whether you need a fader-packed
console for hands-on mixing, you
do enough live work to justify
owning a digital desk, or you’re
simply drawn to the idea of having
an interface and mixing engine in
one unit, let’s see what the current
crop of digital mixers can offer you.

PreSonus StudioLive
PreSonus’ original StudioLive
console was specifically designed
for both live and recording
applications, combining familiar
analogue-like ‘one channel per
fader’ operation while offering 32
channels of computer recording
over Firewire. The range has grown processing, you can even transfer mixer personal monitor mixers, and more. Like
steadily since the first one appeared in settings between them. the StudioLive range, the X32 series has
2003, adopting the USB protocol along expanded to cover a number of different
the way, and now spans everything from
Behringer X Series form factors, like the compact Producer
large-format 64-channel consoles to the The X32 had a profound effect on the edition and various rackmounting options.
dinky 1U‑rack StudioLive 16R. StudioLive live music scene, and arguably did more More recently, Behringer have also
mixers also offer an impressive amount than any other mixer to convert the lower launched the intriguing Wing mixer, which
of integration with PreSonus’ Studio echelons of live sound over to digital. For also looks to have recording applications.
One DAW. For example, you can use the price of a decent analogue board,
a StudioLive mixer as a Studio One DAW small venues and gigging bands could
Soundcraft UI24R
controller, and because both console and enjoy flying faders, virtual soundchecks, As live engineers started patrolling their
DAW use the same Fat Channel signal LCD scribble strips, remote stageboxes, venues with iPads, some bright spark

Soundcraft UI24R

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 105

 F E AT U R E
D I G I TA L M I X E R S I N T H E S T U D I O

Allen & Heath Qu-SB

started to wonder whether mixers needed including the Qu-Pac and Qu-SB. Both a touchscreen and encoder, allowing you
a control surface at all. And then someone are based on the tech from their larger to access all of the main functions directly.
(possibly the same person) went further, Qu-series consoles, and they offer Naturally, both can also function as
and asked if we couldn’t just hide all a similar amount of analogue I/O, but multichannel audio interfaces over USB.
the mixer stuff inside a stagebox, chuck differ chiefly in terms of the amount of
a WiFi router in there for good measure, physical control they offer. The Qu-SB can
Mackie DL Series
and banish stage snakes altogether... only be controlled remotely, via Ethernet Despite being nearly a decade old, the
The Soundcraft UI series was born. The or Wi-Fi, whereas the Qu-Pac sports Mackie DL1608 remains the mixer of
UI12 and UI16 offer excellent value
for live situations where faders aren’t
needed and space is at a premium,
but the flagship UI24R is the one to
look at if you’re looking for a recording
mixer-cum-interface. Like most of the
other mixers here, it can operate as
an audio interface and a direct-to-disk
recorder, but the UI24R is slightly unusual
in that it can do both at the same time,
offering a convenient redundant setup for
when failure is not an option.

Allen & Heath Qu-Pac

& Qu-SB
Soundcraft aren’t the only proponents
of the stagebox-format mixer: Allen & Mackie DL32R
Heath also make some enticing options,

106 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

 CONNECTS EVERYTHING,
SOUNDS AMAZING.

It’s time your music had an upgrade. Four

71dB gain DiscretePRO® preamps. Ultimate
rig integration with 4 mic pres, 8 line ins, dual
speaker, 4 inserts, MIDI, phono, Bluetooth, USB
hub, ADAT expansion and re-amping functionality
- all at your fingertips, with a world-class effects
suite included. This isn’t just an interface. It’s the
hands-on heart of your studio.

£839 RRP. AVAILABLE NOW.

Exclusively distributed in the UK and Ireland by Source • T: 020 8962 5080 • W: sourcedistribution.co.uk/arturia
 F E AT U R E
D I G I TA L M I X E R S I N T H E S T U D I O
Zoom LiveTrak L-12
choice for our Executive Editor Paul
White, mostly because the remote
Master Fader app is so intuitive and
quick to use. You can now get various
rackmounting DL-series mixers, of which
the flagship DL32R, with its 32 analogue
inputs and 14 assignable mix outs, would
make a formidable studio centrepiece.
And if faders are a must-have, Mackie
also offer the DC16, a substantial
hardware controller with 17 faders and
encoders, extra I/O via Dante, and
a talkback section.
Zoom LiveTrak
More than ‘just’ a digital mixer, Zoom’s
LiveTrak devices are also highly capable
stand-alone multitrackers — so while
most of the other models here can make
‘rough and ready’ multitrack recordings
of all their inputs without a computer, the
LiveTraks can do overdubs and punch-ins,
have a proper project management
Yamaha TF-Rack
108 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
system,
facilitate song
position markers,
and so on, all in
addition to being able to
work as audio interfaces. They
also all boast multiple headphone
outs with individual foldback mixes,
and the baby of the range — the LiveTrak
L-8 — can even run on batteries.
Yamaha TF-Rack
One company who never gave up on the
idea of digital studio mixers is Yamaha,
whose venerable 01 and DM series mixers
are still in production today — indeed, our
Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns still has
and uses a DM1000 in his home studio.
QSC TouchMix-30 Pro
They also make the (large and expensive)
Nuage post-production consoles and,
more realistically for most of us, the
TF series of live-sound desks. With its
intuitive touchscreen, rackmount form
factor and optional Dante connectivity,
the TF-Rack looks like a particularly
studio-friendly option.
QSC TouchMix-30 Pro
QSC’s TouchMix series are highly
regarded by live engineers for their sound
quality, robustness and usability. Although
they weren’t originally conceived with
studio recording in mind, a major firmware
update to the flagship in the range, the
TouchMix-30 Pro, added 32 channels of
bi-directional audio interfacing via USB.
It also has a number of unusual but very
handy extra features, including DCA and
mute groups, a real-time analyser, and
a graphic EQ room-tuning wizard.  
WE’VE DONE
IT AGAIN.
Scarlett is already allowing more than three million musicians, songwriters
and producers to record, mix and play back audio in studio quality everywhere,
all the time. Now, featuring six configurations of ins and outs with the best
performing Scarlett mic preamps the range has ever heard, updated with Air,
high headroom instrument inputs, and high-performance converters, the 3rd
Generation is the best in class USB interface range on the market today.
Created in collaboration with legendary designers Greg Mackie and Peter Watts.

Featuring pristine, studio-grade DSP audio processing and instant analogue

control, the KORG MW mixers will satisfy any audio mixing application.

The convenience of analogue.

The power of digital.
korg.com
 TECHNIQUE

CV & The Audio Interface

Everything you need to know to get your DAW talking
to your modular system via your audio interface.
ROBIN VINCENT speed of the LFO, it reaches a frequency — a DC voltage or, if you like, a signal with
that’s within the range of human hearing, a frequency of zero Hertz.

T
he roads of MIDI between computer
and hardware synthesizers are
well-trodden, but once you become
a devotee to control voltage (CV) you need
different pathways to find your way from
DAW to Eurorack and back again. Let’s have
a look at what you’ll need to pack in your
backpack for the journey, along with your
sandwiches and a nice flask of tea.
The Theory
Audio signals and CV signals are all
variations in electrical potential, and they
run along the same sorts of cable. Part of
the point of modular synthesis is that there
is some crossover between the content of
audio and CV signals. An LFO, for example,
generates a cycling control voltage that
we use to modulate parameters within
a synthesizer. As you increase the rate or
whereupon we can treat it as an oscillator
generating an audio signal. Conversely, an
audio signal can be used as a modulation
source, and many audio oscillators can be
slowed down to a frequency below the
threshold of hearing.
The outputs on computer audio
interfaces are, as you’d expect, designed to
output audio signals. But since audio and
control voltage signals are so similar, surely
we can also use our DAWs to generate
CV signals and our audio interface to
pipe these into our modular synths? Well,
sometimes. The issue here is that although
audio and CV share the same method of
delivery, their content can be completely
different. Audio voltages are constantly
changing, or otherwise we wouldn’t hear
the results as audio. Crucially, however,
a CV can be a static, unvarying value
In a system designed to record and play
back audio signals, the ability to reproduce
signals below 5Hz or so is a mixed blessing.
The DAW software itself generally has no
problem with very low frequencies, but
many audio interfaces are deliberately
designed to filter them out; they can’t be
heard, and they can cause interference or
DC offsets that could distort our audio or
damage our speakers. And so the biggest
obstacle to using our DAW to record,
play back or generate CV is an audio
interface that filters out DC and very low-
frequency signals.
DC-coupling
There are two ways of dealing with this.
One is a bit of a fudge, while the other
requires that you have the right sort of
audio interface. Most audio interfaces have

112 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

what is called AC-coupled outputs, where
a capacitor is used to filter out the extreme
low frequencies. This is a disaster for CV, as
it cannot output the sort of slow-moving or
static values we need.
Outputs without this filter are described
as DC-coupled, and are increasingly
common in audio interfaces as the use
of CV is on the rise. These are capable of
generating stable DC voltages and very
slowly changing control values, which is
exactly what we need to drive a modular
synth. One manufacturer whose interfaces
have always been DC-coupled are MOTU,
while DC-coupled outputs and inputs (but
not necessarily both) can also be found on
interfaces by RME, Universal Audio, NI,
Apogee and PreSonus, who’ve now made it
a feature across their entire range.
However, just because an interface has
DC-coupled outputs doesn’t necessarily
mean it’ll be a fully capable source of CV.
The Eurorack format specifies a control
voltage range of ±5V, but many portable
and bus-powered interfaces are not capable
of such wide voltage swings. For example,
I recently reviewed in this magazine three
USB-powered audio interfaces: the RME
Babyface Pro FS, Native Instruments
Komplete Audio 6 and MOTU M4. The
KA6 could output a range of ±2V, the M4
achieved about ±3V whereas the Babyface
Pro could produce the whole ±5V. A good
way to get a rough idea of an interface’s
capabilities in this department is to check
the specs to find out the maximum output
level on the line outs: NI quote +11.5dBu
for the KA6, MOTU +16dBu for the M4 and
RME +19dBu for the Babyface Pro.
AC-coupling
If you have an AC-coupled audio interface
then you are mostly out of luck — except,
as I say, that there is a possible fudge.
This involves using amplitude modulation
to sneak the low frequencies through the
interface by superimposing high-frequency
signals on them and then removing the AC
component afterwards. This requires a filter,
which is a relatively simple circuit to build.
Expert Sleepers used to sell a little module
that did it, but now they’ve turned it into an
algorithm within their Disting module, which
does the same job. Going the other way,
you’ll need something that will convert your
CV into an amplitude-modulated signal that
you can sneak past the AC-coupled audio
inputs. The Disting again has an algorithm
that’ll do this, and I’ve not come across
anything else that does.
Provided the software you’re using
(which we’ll come onto in a moment)
supports an AC mode, then, you can either
make a few circuits or buy a number of
Disting modules and be all set for sending
CV signals from your DAW to your Eurorack
and back again. Realistically, though, it’s
probably much simpler just to get yourself
a DC-coupled audio interface.
CV Generation In DAWs
There are several bits of music software that
can generate and output control voltage.
There’s CV Toolkit from Spektro Audio,
MOTU Volta, Reaktor Blocks, Dialog Audio
SQ4 and Audulus to name but a few. But
for this article, I’m going to highlight Bitwig
Studio, Ableton Live CV Tools and Silent
Way from Expert Sleepers.
Bitwig has a couple of devices within its
modular structure that can generate and

Class-leading
Pro Audio Solutions
RME’s professional audio interfaces combine
comprehensive features with intuitive, flexible mixing
and monitoring control courtesy of TotalMix FX.

Ultra-low latency operation and RME’s legendary driver

stability offer unrivalled sonic excellence on Mac,
Windows and iOS, for studio and live engineers who
refuse to compromise on sound or performance.

Worldwide Distribution: Audio AG, +49 8133 9181-0, www.audioag.com

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 113
UK Distribution: Synthax UK, +44 1727 821870, www.synthax.co.uk
www.rme-audio.com
 TECHNIQUE
MODUL AR INTERFACING
Expert Sleeper’s Disting module allows you to
partake of the dark art of AC-coupling.
receive CV. HW CV Out is a simple knob
that sends voltage out of a specified audio
output. You can then start applying internal
modulators like LFOs, step sequencers,
randomisers or even MPE expressions to
that knob to produce the sort of CV output
you’re after. You can create fabulously
complex forms of modulation within The
Grid environment and attach
it to that knob to send it to
your modular.
The other device is the HW
“There’s definitely something in the
CV Instrument which gives way CV works that offers something
a pitch output and a gate
output to provide a melodious
signal for sequencing or
playing from a keyboard. The
octave range of the intended oscillator has
to be tuned and calibrated to match the
pitch to the voltage. This is done by routing
the output of the oscillator back into Bitwig
and running a calibration process. This
can be a bit fiddly; you need to get input
levels right and use quite a bit of trial and
error to get it to scan correctly. But, once
accomplished, you can send tunes out from
Bitwig into that particular oscillator. If you
want to try another oscillator then you’ll
have to recalibrate.
If you want to go in the other direction
of controlling instruments or devices within
Bitwig from your modular you can add an
HW CV In modulator to any device, specify
114 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
the input, and then direct the voltage to
whatever parameter you wish. It’s really
very straightforward.
Bitwig CV devices have an AC mode
and so can generate amplitude-modulated
CV signals and interpret them coming in.
In theory, then, Bitwig should work well
with regular AC-coupled audio interfaces
provided you have that bunch of Distings
to hand. In practice, however, I had great
worth pursuing.”
difficulty getting the calibration of the Bitwig
CV instrument to work in AC mode, whereas
I had no trouble with the Silent Way plug-ins.
Live CV Tools
Ableton Live version 10.1 introduced the
CV Tools pack of devices for Max For Live,
designed to handle the CV side of things.
It has a CV Instrument device very much
like the one in Bitwig for handling melodic
output of pitch and gate signals. A CV
Triggers device works like a drum machine,
and a Rotating Rhythm Generator can
generate all sorts of interesting patterns.
For modulation there’s a simple CV
LFO which can output various waveforms.
There’s also a CV Shaper in which you can
create any wave shape you like. CV Utility
is more like Bitwig’s voltage knob: you can
apply all sorts of modulation to it from
internal devices or MIDI controllers attached
to Live. All of these rely on you having
a DC-coupled audio interface, as there’s no
AC mode. For CV coming into Live there’s
a CV In device that takes any incoming
voltage and lets you map it to any software
parameter. This has a Pitch
mode that can be used with
an AC-coupled interface to
convert an oscillator pitch into
CV in real time, so that’s at
least something.
With their ES-1 modules,
Disting and DC-coupled
Eurorack audio module,
Expert Sleepers are undoubtedly the
experts in CV and DAW integration. Silent
Way is their bundle of CV tools that you
can use as plug-ins in any DAW, and offers
a comprehensive range of functions. Silent
Way is also available as a Rack Extension
for Reason and as virtual modules for VCV
Rack opening up both of those modular
environments to copious amounts of
CV control.
There’s a ton of stuff in here for
generating voltages as pitch or modulation,
gates and triggers, quantising, controllers
and followers. Amongst them is the Voice
Controller, which does the same Pitch and
Gate thing as the devices in Bitwig and
 Live, but adds a whole bunch of envelopes,
LFOs, portamento and detuning. It creates
an entire synthesizer voice in voltage which
you could connect to all sorts of bits of your
modular. Silent Way also has an AC Encoder
which will do all the hard work in using
amplitude modulation to get through an
AC-coupled audio interface.
Making It Work
So, armed with the right software and the
right audio interface, is it easy to get your
DAW talking to your modular? Yes, for the
most part.
The easiest way to get CV flowing into
and out of your computer is via the Expert
Sleepers ES-8 or ES-9 DC-coupled audio
interface modules. They connect via USB
and become the audio engine for your DAW.
The ES-8 has four inputs and eight outputs
and is expandable via ADAT, whereas the
ES-9 has 14 inputs, eight outputs plus ADAT
and S/PDIF, the only difficulty being that
there are no microphone, instrument or line
inputs such as you might need for recording
non-modular signals into your DAW. The
ES-9 does at least provide audio outputs
Cenzo Townsend – Mix Engineer – Decoy Studios
(Everything Everything, Keane, Inhaler, Oh Wonder, Maccabees, Editors, The Specials)
Analogue FET Limiting Amplifier
for monitoring non-CV audio. Otherwise,
DC-coupled audio interfaces like those from
MOTU and PreSonus can do the job
really well.
There’s one caveat, which is that if your
DC-coupled audio interface has balanced
TRS outputs, you’ll need what’s called
a ‘floating-ring’ cable. If you try to use
a standard mono-to-mono patch cable from
your interface to your modular, you’ll only
get the positive half of the signal. To get
the full range you need a TRS-to-TS cable
that’s wired as a floating ring rather than
being simply a stereo-to-mono cable. Expert
Sleepers can supply them, and you can also
use insert cables that have TRS on one end
going to two TS jacks. This has the added
bonus of giving you positive CV on one jack
and an inverted version on the other.
So, to summarise, there are two possible
signal paths for driving a modular from
your computer:
• C omputer > CV-capable software
> DC‑coupled audio interface >
floating‑ring cable > modular.
• Computer > CV-capable software with
Distributed in the UK by SCV Distribution
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c owww.scvdistribution.co.uk
AC mode > AC-coupled audio interface
> Disting > modular.
The Digital Alternative
Whether it’s worth the effort to have
control voltage running through your
digital workspace is really up to you. The
alternative is to look at MIDI-to-CV and
CV‑to-MIDI options that tend to work right
out of the box.
You could, for instance, have
a Hexinverter Mutant Brain MIDI-to-CV
converter module, which will convert
a single MIDI connection into 16
Eurorack‑compatible outputs from notes
to modulation, gates, triggers and clocks.
Going the other way, you could use the
Befaco VCMC to take CV notes, gates and
modulations and map them to MIDI notes,
events and controllers. MIDI-to-CV tends
to be unipolar, though, and doesn’t have
the feel of CV control. It feels like you’re
sequencing MIDI equipment rather than
experimenting with the impact, interaction
and mixing of voltage. There’s definitely
something in the way CV works that offers
something worth pursuing.
“With a history such as Black Lion’s -
manufacturing and modifying gear for
over 14 years - it’s no surprise they
are able to deliver a product as well
designed and intricate as the Bluey.
“It brings energy and attitude...”
m / September 2020
115
 ON TEST
Arturia
AudioFuse
Studio
USB Audio Interface
Arturia’s audio interfaces just
keep getting better.
SAM INGLIS
W
hen it appeared in 2017,
the Arturia AudioFuse
was probably the most
versatile desktop audio interface ever
made. Not only did it combine mic and
line-level audio I/O with digital inputs in
S/PDIF and ADAT format, it also offered
a blizzard of additional features. These
included monitor control, talkback
and a built-in USB hub, along with
re-amping capability, insert points on
both analogue ins, phono inputs and an
earth terminal that could be used for
connecting a turntable, mini-jack MIDI In
116 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
and Out and both full-sized and mini-jack
headphone sockets. The AudioFuse also
sounded very good, thanks in part to
Arturia’s class-leading DiscretePRO mic
preamp design.
This cornucopia of features was,
however, accompanied by a few quirks.
Some of these have been ironed out in
firmware updates, but I never grew to
love the AudioFuse’s unusual hybrid direct
monitoring system, its rather crowded
layout, or its dependence on generic
audio drivers. And, with my reviewer’s hat
on, I could never quite figure out what
sort of user this incredibly comprehensive
feature set was aimed at.
The AudioFuse remains a current
product, and was joined last year by the
AudioFuse 8Pre. The 8Pre showcases
Arturia’s mic preamps in a much more
streamlined interface targeted squarely
at bands, drummers and other people
needing to record multitrack audio. By
ditching some of the original AudioFuse’s
more unconventional features, simplifying
others and repackaging the whole thing
in a spacious and smart 1U format,
Arturia really allowed its good qualities
to flourish, and the 8Pre seems to me an
extremely strong product.
A Longer Fuse
This year finally sees the AudioFuse
relinquish its crown as the most versatile
desktop interface ever made, but only
because Arturia have made one that’s
even more versatile. The AudioFuse
Studio replicates all of the AudioFuse’s
The AudioFuse Studio crams a huge amount of
connectivity on to its back panel, without being
so bafflingly crowded as the original.
many and various I/O options, adds some
new ones of its own, and packages the
sum in a larger desktop case that is, to
my mind, both better looking and better
laid-out. If the original was the Swiss Army
knife of audio interfaces, its new sibling is
an entire central European cutlery drawer.
The original AudioFuse was designed to
be bus-powered, but in practice this isn’t
possible on some computers and requires
some compromises in performance.
Sensibly enough, Arturia haven’t tried to
make it an option on the Studio, which
is powered instead from an external PSU
with a locking adaptor. The Studio also
doesn’t have the AudioFuse’s rigid lid
to protect it on the road, presumably
reflecting the fact that you’re less likely to
be using it on roads. However, permanent
powering means the AudioFuse Studio can
be used as a standalone mixer/preamp/
format converter/multi-bladed implement
without a computer attached, which is
probably more useful. When you do attach
a Mac or PC, you do so through a USB
3 Type-C socket, but the Studio is fully
compatible with USB 2 and comes with
both types of cable.
As on the 8Pre, Arturia have binned
off the AudioFuse’s direct monitoring
system, which is no bad thing in my
view. What you get instead is a more
conventional internal digital cue mixer,
controlled from the AudioFuse Control
Center utility. Where this differs from
the 8Pre’s version is that there are three
separate mix panels. Labelled Main, Cue
1 and Cue 2, each of these can draw on
all the available analogue and digital
inputs. This addresses one of the 8Pre’s
few shortcomings, allowing you to send
different cue mixes to the two headphone
outs and to the main outputs.
One of many very nice touches is that
the signal feeding Headphones B — which
can be any of these three sources — can
also be made to feed the second pair of
speaker outputs, with its level governed by
Headphones B’s level control. So not only
could you choose to feed a different mix to
your alternate speaker pair, if desired, but
you also gain independent volume control
for the main and secondary speakers.
(That’s in addition to the already thoughtful
option to apply a fixed volume offset to
the second speaker pair...)
Front To Back
The AudioFuse Studio has four identical
front-panel inputs on combi XLR/jack
sockets. Like those on the 8Pre, each can
operate as a mic input or a high-impedance
input, and connecting a line-level source

Arturia AudioFuse
Studio £799
pros
• Amazingly comprehensive feature set.
• Excellent sound quality.
• More flexible and ergonomically better
than the original AudioFuse.

cons
• With so many features on offer, it’s
probably inevitable that you’ll end up
paying for some you never use.
• Generic drivers offer adequate rather than
stellar low-latency performance.

summary
Creating an interface that’s even more
feature-rich than the original AudioFuse
was a challenge, but Arturia have done
it. More importantly, they’ve also ironed
out some of its quirks, and the Studio is
a pleasure to use. The AudioFuse Control Center utility provides access to three separate cue-mixing panels. Each can ‘see’
all of the AudioFuse Studio’s inputs, although it’s also possible to hide I/O you’re not using.

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 117

 ON TEST
ARTURIA AUDIOFUSE STUDIO

The Audio Settings dialogue is

appropriately exhaustive.

bypasses the mic preamp for the

cleanest possible signal. Each also
has its own dedicated insert point
on the rear panel. What’s new
compared with other AudioFuses
is that each channel now has
a latching/momentary Listen button
in addition to its phantom power,
pad, polarity and source selection
buttons. Depending on how you
have things configured in the
Control Center, this either triggers
the Solo function for that channel
in the cue mixer, or sends the input
to a separate PFL bus. The PFL
bus bypasses the channel faders
in the mixer, and can be routed to
any or all of the speakers or either
headphone output. I think this
is a great addition, allowing the
anxious engineer to check up on
any suspect sources in his or her
mix during a take, without affecting
what the musicians are hearing.
As well as the four front-panel
inputs, there are four further Both of these can be switched into because of the relatively modest
analogue input paths, all of which do a re-amping mode, allowing you to expansion in I/O. It’s because the Studio
double duty. Each has a quarter-inch, feed a DI’d guitar recording out to an is much more pleasant to work with. The
line-level balanced jack, but if you use the amplifier at the correct level and with the form factor is a big improvement, the
turntable inputs, those override inputs appropriate source impedance. Routing new cue-mixing and direct monitoring
5/6, while 7/8 share a two-lane computer the DI’d input directly to an auxiliary arrangements are excellent and the
highway with yet another input type: output during tracking allows you to PFL option is really handy. Along with
Bluetooth. Pressing the button at the top record both direct and miked sounds, with numerous smaller enhancements, it
right of the main panel causes the Studio minimal monitoring latency. This output all adds up to a feeling of refinement
to proffer itself for pairing, and I had no pair is also DC-coupled, meaning they can and ergonomic design that was slightly
trouble playing music into it from my be used to generate control voltages for lacking in the original — while, of course,
phone. Bluetooth input seems to blithely use with a modular synth. the Studio version retains that device’s
trample upon everything that’s going on Compared with the AudioFuse, there’s excellent sound quality.
in the Control Center mixers, though. no new digital I/O as such on the Studio, Arturia are still offering generic drivers
The Studio’s three pairs of quarter-inch but a second pair of optical sockets allows with the AudioFuse range, rather than
output jacks are as versatile as you’d the full eight-channel ADAT count to be coding their own. These will never quite
expect, especially the ‘auxiliary’ outputs. maintained at 88.2 and 96 kHz. match the performance offered by rivals
such as RME, MOTU or Focusrite who
Light The Fuse use custom drivers, and that’s a shame,
Bundled Software As I’ve already mentioned, the but at least the Studio’s improved direct
Most audio interfaces these days come with original AudioFuse is extraordinarily monitoring features mean you’re less
software to sweeten the deal, and Arturia’s comprehensive, and the Studio version likely to need to run it at super-low buffer
offering in this department is particularly even more so. On paper, though, the sizes. I liked the AudioFuse Studio a lot,
toothsome. Analog Lab Lite is a virtual differences perhaps don’t seem as great and although I didn’t get the chance to
instrument which collects together some as all that. Isn’t the Studio version just test them together, I think that adding
choice presets from their V Collection,
a double-width AudioFuse with an extra an AudioFuse 8Pre as an ADAT expander
but you also get Arturia’s 3 Preamps You’ll
Actually Use, plus their Minifilter, Comp pair of mic/line/instrument inputs and would give you a killer setup for many
FET-76, Delay Tape-201 and Reverb a pair of auxiliary outputs? And given band and location recording duties.
Plate-140. In each case, you’re getting that this makes it much less portable, is
the full version of the plug-in rather than it really worth spending the extra to get
a taster course, and if you were to buy all of the Studio? ££ £799 including VAT.
these separately it’d cost you a significant WW www.sourcedistribution.co.uk
To my mind, it certainly is worth
chunk of the price of the AudioFuse itself. WW www.arturia.com
the difference, but that’s not so much

118 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

NEW RELEASE
One Plugin.
Endless Effects.
The Soundtoys Effect Rack is now available
outside the bundle!
Effect Rack is the most powerful plug-in in the
Soundtoys arsenal. It’s a single, self-contained plug-in
built around 14 full-featured Soundtoys effects. The result
is a multi-effects processor that combines the gorgeous
sound of our most-loved and creative effects with a fun,
easy-to-use interface.
Crystallizer, Decapitator,
Devil-Loc Deluxe, EchoBoy,
EchoBoy Jr., FilterFreak 1 and
FilterFreak 2, MicroShift, PanMan,
PhaseMistress, PrimalTap,
Radiator, Sie-Q, and Tremolator
are built-in to Effect Rack.
Effect Rack’s global controls give you even more power.
Use the Recycle knob to create instant feedback and the
Mix control for easy parallel processing. The extensive
library of presets makes it easy to find new creative
inspiration and to save your own multi-effect masterpieces.
Free 30-day Trial at soundtoys.com
 ON TEST

Novation
ROBIN VINCENT

W
hen Novation revealed the
Launchkey Mini MkIII last

Launchkey MkIII
year you knew it wouldn’t
be long before the rest of the Launchkey
range followed suit. It’s taken longer than
expected, but everything that made the
Mini MkIII a very cool little controller has
been stretched out into the full-sized and
infinitely more playable Launchkey MkIII.
What’s New?
The model under review is the largest
in the range at 61 keys. Along with the
usual 25- and 49-key options there’s now
a 37-key version for those people who
find the 49 too big or the 25 too small.
The features are the same across the
range except that only the 49 and 61 have
the fader bank.
This new version looks sedate and
serious. It’s all clean lines, angles and
elegance and it does that thing where
it instantly makes the very capable MkII
look garish and unfashionable. What
were they thinking with the coloured
underbelly of the MkI and MkII? It was
really easy to unpack, slid out of the
box with one hand and I was delighted
to see foam packed under the keys.
Controller Keyboard
The third generation Launchkeys offer versatile
control over hardware and software alike.
It’s pleasingly compact for a 61-note
controller at only 26cm deep, which is
a bonus for our crowded desktops and
studio spaces.
Beyond the sharp lines the most
obvious change is that the pads and
faders have swapped positions. Pads
are now over on the left with faders in
the middle, just off-centre, and only the
transport controls on the right. I wonder
how much customer feedback went into
agonising over that decision?
The hardware has a poise to it that
raises both a smile and your expectations.
It’s still made of plastic but doesn’t
seem as clunky as many 61-keyed MIDI
controllers can feel. The look is cemented
by the replacement of the red three-digit
display with a cool blue-backed LCD with
two rows of 16 characters. The pads are
nicely set just that little bit lower and all
the other buttons follow the style and
height. The knobs are upright, cylindrical,
feel slightly rubberised to the touch,
and are taller and much more solid than
the ones on the Launchkey Mini. They
give a good, smooth resistance. The
faders have a similar feel and are now
accompanied by RGB buttons which will
no doubt make themselves useful.
The keys themselves have a relatively
light, synthy feel. The white keys are
shiny and grip your fingers whereas
the black keys have a less grippy matt

120 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

texture. They are velocity-sensitive,
offering three selectable curves or can be
turned off. There’s no aftertouch on the
keys but the pads are both velocity- and
pressure-sensitive and will do single or
polyphonic aftertouch.
Rounding off the physicality we have
proper rubberised pitch and modulation
wheels, and out the back there’s a single
USB socket, sustain pedal input, and an
old-fashioned and very welcome 5-pin
DIN MIDI output. It’s USB powered and
that’s the only cable that comes in the
box. This brings me to one of my only
complaints about the Launckey MkIII:
Most computers keep the power on their
USB ports even when turned off, so the
only way to stop the glow of those pads is
to pull the USB cable out.
Before we plug it into Ableton Live
(for which it is largely designed) there
are a number of useful standalone
features baked into the controller that
don’t require a computer at all. There’s
a wonderfully fun Arpeggiator, eight
scales and inbuilt chords that you can use
with any external MIDI gear via the MIDI
Out on the back.
Arpeggiator
The Arpeggiator comes from the
Launchkey Mini and has all the usual
directional and timing features you’d
find with any arp, but it also has some
special generative sauce in the flavour
of Mutate and Deviate. Mutate takes
the notes you are holding and starts to
add octaves, harmonics, intervals and
finally chaos, depending on how far you
dial it in. Deviate does the same with
rests dropping in all kinds of rhythms
before hitting complete randomness.
They transform a familiar function into
something enormously fun and creative
— it can keep you entertained for hours.
The main functions of Type, Rate,
Octave and Rhythm are mapped out on
the keyboard and accessible by holding
the Shift key. The first five knobs take
on the roles of Tempo, Swing, Gate
Length, Mutate and Deviate respectively
and are again accessible by holding
the Shift key. One of my biggest gripes
about the Launchpad Mini is that you
had to hold a button to manipulate
the Arp, which prevented you from
playing and manipulating at the same
time. Well, it looks like Novation have
taken that on board because you can
now lock the Arp controls on by briefly
holding down the button. The functions
A five-pin MIDI Out and
a host of onboard features mean
the Launchkeys play especially
well with hardware synths.
from the keyboard are now selected on
the pads meaning that you can keep
playing with one hand while accessing
the Arp functions with the other. That’s
a huge improvement.
Screen
This might be a good point to talk about
another improvement, which is the screen.
Every time you move a knob or touch
a pad the screen tells you what you’ve just
done. This sounds a bit after-the-fact but
it’s a terribly useful confirmation that helps
make the workflow more intuitive. It works
especially well with the usage of the pads
in Arp mode and selecting Scales and
Chords where you are faced with a cryptic
row of coloured pads. Tap a pad and the
screen tells you its current function and
you find yourself a lot less baffled.
Scales/Chords
There are eight scales to choose from,
which quantise the notes on the keyboard.
Then, using the Chord mode, the pads
can become instant scale-appropriate
chord generators. You get a row of triads
with inversions, a row of 7ths, 9ths and
6/9ths which you can reach via the up/
down arrows. If you go into User Chord
mode you can create and save your own
bank of chords. Just hold a pad and play
up to six notes to enter your chord. It’s at
this point that you’re wondering where
you’re going to get an extra finger to play
a six-note chord with one hand, but you
don’t need to play a chord, just play the
notes you want to appear in the chord
one after another. You can transpose the
chord with the up/down arrows and even
copy the chord to the next pad to create
a bit of a progression.
Finally we have Fixed Chord mode
where you hold the button, play
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
a chord and then you can play that
same chord up and down the keyboard
transposing aswe go.
With or without a computer the
Launchkey MkIII has a lot to offer as
a standalone MIDI controller. All the
knobs, pads and sliders send out MIDI
and are mappable to software or
hardware MIDI devices. In Drum Mode
the pads are set to MIDI note numbers
which are set by default to trigger GM
drum sounds. But it also potentially gives
you another place to play or trigger
things from a separate MIDI channel to
the keyboard. There’s no split function on
this controller, but that’s a sneaky way of
getting some dual control action.
Ableton
The Novation integration and workflow
with Ableton Live is mature and
well documented. Working with this
Novation Launchkey
MkIII From £159
pros
• Style and design.
• Ableton Live integration.
• Not just for Live.
• Arpeggiator Mutate and Deviate.
• MIDI Out port.
• Can store for custom modes.
cons
• No Off button.
• No aftertouch.
• Transport buttons don’t light up.
summary
Novation bring both style and substance
with the MkIII Launchkey, offering
near-perfect Ableton Live integration along
with some tasty standalone features and
a fun generative arpeggiator.
121
 ON TEST
N O V AT I O N L A U N C H K E Y M K I I I
combination has become fast, intuitive
and almost idiot-proof. Provided you
are running Live 10.1.15 or above then
everything is done for you and the
Launchkey puts itself into Session Mode
ready to give you control over pretty
much everything.
The two rows of pads give you
a colour‑matched display of two rows of
Session clips. You trigger them by tapping
the pad or you can launch a session by
pressing the big side arrow button. But
that’s only for the top row. The second
row can double as a Stop, Solo or Mute
for the clip above it. You can navigate
around the Session using the up/down
arrows and the Track left/right buttons.
Ableton Live displays a red rectangle
around the 16 clips currently in view on
the pads. The only slight annoyance here
is that to move the view one step to the
right requires tapping the Track button
eight times to move the track selection
all the way over to track nine. You can get
around this by using the buttons under
the faders to select the far right or left
track first, but you’d think there’d be an
easier way just to move the view window
left a bit or right a bit.
The Pots take on panning by default
but you can quickly employ them as
volume, sends or Device controls with the
touch of Shift+Pad. You can switch the
pots to Pickup Mode in the settings which
means that when switching between
different types of control the position
of the pots are saved and are only
reactivated when you turn the pot back
through that saved value. This prevents
sudden controller changes when you first
turn a knob.
On the 49- and 61-key versions the
faders take on volume control over the
current eight tracks in view but these
can also be switched to control sends or
Device parameters. However, it won’t let
you select what the Pots are currently set
to and vice versa.
The process of recording into clips,
mixing, manipulating and moving on is
really smooth. You can work and play on
a track while hardly touching the mouse
at all. A couple of additional buttons
in the MkIII make this easier. ‘Capture
MIDI’ is the coolest new feature in Live
that the MkIII has a dedicated button for
and it brilliantly stuffs whatever you were
playing into the nearest clip. But you’ve
also got a Quantise button, Click On/
Off and my most commonly executed
command: undo.
122 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Custom Modes
Novation look after the configuration of their
hardware devices using a browser-based piece of
software called Components, in which you can
set up the MIDI functionality of every knob,
button, fader and pad. You can create custom
modes that give the faders the right MIDI CC#
to match your particular hardware synth or turn
Device selection is now also a breeze:
press the Device Select button and
then tap the appropriate pad. Under
that button is Device Lock which locks
the controls to the currently selected
device so you can keep on tweaking
while wandering off to other devices or
other tracks.
One last feature is found with the
button with three dots. This makes
a bunch of pads emulate the arrow keys
on a keyboard and the enter key. You can
now quickly navigate around all sorts of
menus and parameters and select them.
It’s also a very neat way of zipping around
the session clips to choose one to fire
outside of the 2x8 pad window.
There are things you can’t do like
create tracks, browse and load plug-ins
or samples, so the integration and
functionality is more about playing within
a session you’ve built. So if you were
to load up a drum kit and a bunch of
instruments you could go to town with
the Launchkey, building up entire sessions
filled with clips. And within that preloaded
environment it’s so easy to jam away with
yourself without ever having to leave
the keyboard.
Conclusion
Throughout writing this review I’ve
been referring back to the images and
pads into program changes. You then upload
that Custom Mode to your controller. The
brilliant thing about the MkIII is that you can
now store four Custom Modes independently
for the Pots, Faders and Pads in the Launchkey
itself. You can leave the computer behind and
swap modes whenever you need to.
manual of the MkII and I can’t quite
believe how old and clunky it appears. In
comparison the MkIII is a work of art in
keys, RGB pads and plastic. The sense of
style and design is spot on and it looks
totally fabulous on my desk. It feels like
Novation have worked hard to pull in
a more fluid Ableton Live integration that
means you can stay at the keyboard, stay
being creative, rather than dropping to
the mouse.
That said, it’s the MIDI Out socket and
those standalone features that elevate this
device from being an Ableton Live-based
keyboard to being a controller that’s
creatively useful in any MIDI situation.
It’s no longer tied to your computer
and can take on our hardware needs
too. It’s also worth mentioning that the
Launchkey MkIII has scripts for enhanced
functionality with both Reason and Logic,
and there’s also good old HUI support
for all the other DAWs and you can get
busy mapping the controls to whatever
you want. So while it’s a superb choice
for Ableton Live users, the Launchkey
has more than enough to keep things
interesting for users of anything.
££ Launchkey 25 MkIII £159.99, 37
£179.99, 49 £209.99, 61 £259.99.
Prices include VAT.
WW www.novationmusic.com
 INSIDE TRACK
Secrets Of The Mix Engineers:
Ariel Rechtshaid & Rostam Batmanglij
Haim’s latest album was made with a mix of
old-school and modern techniques and equipment.
PAUL TINGEN
H
aim’s third album, Women In Music
Pt. III, was not only a UK number
one, but also exceptionally well
received in other ways. The album scored
a whopping 89 out of 100 on Metacritic,
with writers noting its experimental and
eclectic nature, and saw the band moving
away from the sunny Californian pop/rock of
their first two records.
Women In Music Pt. III was produced by
the band’s singer, guitarist and drummer
Danielle Haim, together with her boyfriend
and producer Ariel Rechtshaid, and Rostam
124 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Batmanglij. The latter was once both the
producer for, and a member of, Vampire
Weekend (see the SOS May 2010, www.
soundonsound.com/people/secrets-mix-e
ngineers-justin-gerrish-rostam-batmanglij),
but since 2016 has ventured out on his own,
both as a solo artist and a producer for such
artists as Frank Ocean, Lykke Li, Wet and
Maggie Rogers, among others.
Talking via Skype, Rechtshaid and
Batmanglij explain that much of the sound
of Women In Music Pt. III was the result of
recording and treating real instruments to
make them sound old, and then sampling
them to make them sound modern again.
Photo: Grant Spanier
Rostam Batmanglij & Danielle Haim
“Yeah, it is sort of what we did,”
comments Batmanglij, laughing. “In
general many samples are taken from old
recordings, so we first made things sound
like old recordings, and then we did things
to make them sound gritty and grainy so
they sound like a sample, and then the final
step was to make them sound big! Some
of our choices were really us flying by the
seats of our pants, as we were trying to
retrace the steps of how old recordings
were made, and then making that sound
like a sample. That was a huge goal.
“We didn’t actually sit down and
say, ‘We are going to make something
sound old and then make it sound new,’
clarifies Rechtshaid. “We were not really
consciously talking that way. But speaking
for myself, I am very influenced by hip-hop
production, and coming up as a kid in LA
in the ‘90s I got my hands on a sampler
and tried to find the same breakbeat
they used on, for example, an Ice Cube
record. I have always been a student of
recording history, and I also am a huge fan
of music software. We tried to combine
these two, but that’s obviously not going
to sound retro. We were pushing plug-ins
and our laptops as far they could go,

‘I’ve Been Down’
Written by Haim & Rostam Batmanglij
Produced by Danielle Haim, Rostam
Batmanglij & Ariel Rechtshaid
and this lends itself to a modern sound,
because these are modern tools.”
Eclectic Avenue
Rechtshaid has an eclectic background. As
a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, engineer
and producer, he has worked in pop and
alternative rock with the likes of Adele,
Diplo, Vampire Weekend, Madonna and
many more (see www.soundonsound.com/
people/ariel-rechtshaid), and he’s been
involved with Haim since their 2013 debut
album, Days Are Gone.
Batmanglij brought his own eclectic
mix of influences to the table, not only
having similarly diverse studio roles as
Rechtshaid, but also as a result of his
cultural background. Born in Washington,
DC to Iranian and Persian parents, he says
he “definitely grew up listening to music
from all around the world. There was a lot
of Persian music playing in my household,
there was African music, there was folk
music, there were the Rolling Stones. I think
on this Haim album everybody’s influences
pushed the album to be the eclectic mix
that it became.”
Work on Women In Music Pt. III began
in the first half of 2019, without those
involved actually planning to make an
album, as Rechtshaid recalls. “About a year
ago Danielle was kind of frustrated with the
pressure of putting out records in time for
touring and so on, and said she just wanted
to put out one song. So we did a song
called ‘Summer Girl’, and this and its video
made by Paul Thomas Anderson came
together really effortlessly, which created
a new, looser direction for us.
“We did a few more songs, still thinking
of singles and not of making an album,
and then the record company asked what
our thoughts were about doing an album.
So the concept came in the middle, as
opposed to at the beginning. The sounds
and styles on this record have surprised
people, and it is rewarding to get that
reaction. But the album is eclectic because
Haim are eclectic. It was only a matter of
time before all those styles would show
themselves on one record. The band are
also only three records into their career,
they’re still getting warmed up and getting
better at what they do.”
Team Effort
‘Summer Girl’ was released on 31st July
2019, and was followed by the singles
‘Now I’m In It’ and ‘Hallelujah’ a few
months later. ‘Summer Girl’ was also
started by Danielle Haim in response to
Rechtshaid’s cancer diagnosis (he is since
in remission), and her first step was a demo
she had made in GarageBand on her
phone. About half the songs on Women In
Music Pt. III were started with some kind
of demo and then developed in the studio,
and the other half was written in the
studio. The latter is actively encouraged
by Batmanglij.
“I guess it is a common thread for
records on which I have been a producer
that there is a lot of writing songs from
scratch in the studio. This may be because
my role as a producer is always to fill the
space that needs to be filled. If somebody
comes into the studio and says: ‘I want to
write a new song today,’ inevitably that’s
something that I take pleasure in doing.
“It’s part of my journey, which is that with
every recording I have been a part of, I have
been in the role of producer. I was the sole
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
Ariel Rechtshaid at his
Burbank studio in 2017.
Photo: Ashley Beliveau
producer of the first two Vampire Weekend
albums, and then Ariel and I co-produced
the third one, Modern Vampires Of The City
[2013]. I think I was about 14 when I realised
that it is what I specifically wanted to do as
a career: write songs and produce them.
I love making music on my own, but also
working as a producer as part of a project
with other people.”
Women In Music Pt. III obviously fell into
the latter category. Not only did Danielle
Haim, Batmanglij and Rechtshaid produce
the entire album together, they also
co-wrote most songs with the other two
members of Haim. The credits also feature
an extensive cast of additional musicians,
engineers and well-known mixers — among
the latter are David Fridmann, Manny
Marroquin, Tom Elmhirst, Neal Pogue and
Shawn Everett. Batmanglij elaborates on
how it was all put together.
“The timeline is that we started with
‘Summer Girl,’ and then we finished the
last song in January, which was ‘I’ve Been
Down’. There was a vinyl release soon
afterwards, on which Ariel and I mixed
several of the songs, and for the digital
release later [released 26th June], several
more songs were sent to outside mixers.
Ariel and I mixed three songs on the digital
album, including ‘I’ve Been Down’.
“The way a lot of the album progressed
was with people splitting off into teams.
Ariel and Danielle would work together, and
Danielle and I, and Ariel and I, and Estee
and Alana, and so on, and then we’d make
final decisions about things when we were
all in the same room together. The most
effective work happened when we were in
teams of two. The song ‘I’ve Been Down’
was a case in point.
125
 INSIDE TRACK
A R I E L R E C H T S H A I D & R O S TA M B AT M A N G L I J • H A I M

“Danielle came into my Much of Haim’s latest album

Photo: Ariel Rechtshaid

studio one morning saying: ‘I was recorded using Ariel
want to write something new.’ Rechtshaid’s Scully 280
She sat down in front of Pro 16-track tape machine.
Tools and sketched in a drum
part using a Native Instruments then the signal goes from
Kontakt drum kit I pulled up the repro head of the tape
called Waves Factory Old Tape machine to Pro Tools as well.
Drums. We began writing the So I’m recording two times
song very quickly with me on 8-track at the same time in
acoustic guitar. You can still Pro Tools. The moment the
hear that acoustic guitar part in recording is done, I align
the final recording. We wrote the recording from the tape
the verses and chorus of the recorder with the digital
song in a couple of hours, recording, which means
and recorded most of it. The I have it in a playlist, and can
chords for the bridge of the continue to work in Pro Tools.
song where later written by “I started working with
Ariel and played by me on the Scully 280 when we
a Hammond organ, and the began the Haim record, and
bridge was written on top of wanted to use the mic pres
those chords.” on the machine. While tape
Rechtshaid recalls: “One recordings usually sound
day Rostam and Danielle were nicer to my ears, with the
together, and they put up Scully things almost feel like
a little drum loop, and then a different performance.
came up with a part of the It sounds wildly different.
song. We thought the album I would listen to Danielle play,
was complete, so we were like, and then I would listen to the
‘Is there still something missing Scully and it instantly brought
from this record, is there space me somewhere else, like to
for another song?’ But I remember hearing whatever toys were at hand. I have a record a ‘60s drum sound. The problem is that you
the song and loving it and wanting to player, and I was pulling up some of my cannot mult after the Scully mic pres on the
finish it. When Danielle came to my studio breakbeats and scratching them in. If it tape machine before the signal hits tape.
in Burbank it was just a drum loop and worked, it worked. Historically we did not So I had a bunch of mic splitters built, with
acoustic guitar and Danielle then played the have access to live tracking space quite so good transformers, by Jensen. Instead of
beat on real drums, and we recorded them freely as we did on this record, so that gave splitting the signal after a Neve mic pre we
on my 16-track Scully tape machine.” us a lot more freedom. Also, I now have split immediately after the microphone. One
all the necessary gear, with microphones signal goes to my Neve mic pres and then
On Tape and a tape machine that I got working over into Pro Tools, and the other goes straight
Women In Music Pt. III was recorded in the years, all in a bizarre setup. All these to the Scully, and from there to Pro Tools.”
a variety of locations, amongst them Vox ingredients informed the record.
in LA and the Strongroom in London, but “My tape machines are a Scully 280,
Vintage Vibe
mostly at Rechtshaid’s and Batmanglij’s a 16-track 2-inch; an Ampex 440 1-inch The Scully 280 tape recorder was used by
studios. The two producers elaborate on 8-track; and an Ampex 350 quarter-inch. the likes of Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling
their studios, and how they used them I usually run a microphone into the balanced Stones. Recording onto that machine
for their old/new process. Notable is that input of the tape machine, using the internal definitely added to the vintage vibe the
the studios of both are full of musical mic pre, and that sounds completely producers of Women In Music Pt. III were
instruments and all manner of unusual gear, magical to me. I became obsessed with that after, before modernising it, of course.
in the case of Rechtshaid tape recorders, sound. Before I got my hands on the Scully Batmanglij elaborates.
which played an essential part in achieving tape machine I had Scully mic pres, because “We used tape in a specific way, mostly
the ‘old’ aspect of the sounds, as was the they were an affordable, vibey, vintage for drums. Particularly the way the room is
case when recording the drums for ‘I’ve option. I loved the way those mic pres captured on the tape has a special presence.
Been Down’. sounded, so when I got the 280, I wanted to There’s noise and hiss, and especially when
Rechtshaid: “We wrote and recorded immediately start recording into it, but that you use a lot of compression, it makes the
in my studio, Heavy Duty, and in Rostam’s didn’t fit with my workflow. drums come to life. Tape also changes the
studio, Matsor, and my tracking room, “With the 440, for example, my signal transients and makes them more pleasant.
which is eight minutes from here. Sonically, chain is mics going into my Neve BCM10 or Once you get a vibey drum sound in the
we were experimenting all the time. It other external mic pres. The signals come computer, you can do anything you want to
was like we had been preparing years for up on a patch bay, and they are multed it. But the vibe is what you have to capture
this moment subconsciously, and we used to Pro Tools and the tape machine. And initially, and that is what the tape machine

126 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

really does. ‘Summer Girl’
also started with Danielle
drumming, and we
recorded those drums and
the saxophone on tape
at Vox, where they have
great tape machines.”
Like Rechtshaid’s
studio, Batmanglij’s facility
has a combination of 21st
century state‑of‑the‑art
stuff and gear that can
add a vintage vibe. The DI’d bass enjoyed a simple signal chain
“I have some old and new comprising just a FabFilter compressor and
Neve mic pres, and two Pro Tools’ Air Distortion plug-in.
Tube-Tech compressors,
and a Blue Stripe
Anniversary Edition 1176.
My soundcard is a UAD Apollo 16 and my edge. This process of in-the-box treatments I were mixing as we went, passing songs
monitors are the Dynaudio BM5As and was in effect rough mixing, and they took back and forth to each other.”
PMC twotwo.8s, with the big sub. I bought this to a point where they didn’t really need Batmanglij: “There were times when
the Dynaudios when I was 22, and I have to do final mixes. Ariel and I would sit together in front of
mixed every record on them that I have Rechtshaid: “Many people source loops a session, but we did a lot of the work
ever made. They were just $500 each, but and samples, and they make songs around separately from each other, and then we’d
I love them and know how to make things that. We were making songs and then trade sessions. We synchronise our drives
sound good on them. The studio has super- designing sounds that have the right vibe every two or three days using SyncPro,
quiet air conditioning, because it’s all in one for that song. This is part of production, and and we easily can open up each other’s
room. The noisiest thing in my computer is also of mixing. So much of mixing is in the sessions in our computers. The reason that
my Mac Pro, the black one that looks like production these days, and at the end of process works is because we like the things
a trashcan. that process there often was no purpose to the other does. Ariel and I also both try to
”I have several microphones, including doing another mix. When the song is right, get things to sound as close to a finished
an AKG C414, Neumann U87, two Coles and the production is right, it becomes like recording from the very beginning. With
mics, and an RCA KU-3A ribbon, but my a choice rather than a necessity to send it to anything we sent to external mixers we
main microphone is the Sony C800G. How an external mixer. So in effect Rostam and would have done our best to make it sound
bright it is depends on what
preamps and compressors you
pair it with and the room you
record it in. I have all mics, mic
pres and compressors always
patched in, ready to record,
so I literally only have to hit
one key in Pro Tools to record
whatever instrument. I’m also
a big fan of using DI, and for
the Haim record I got the
Tonecraft 363 tube DI, which
is amazing.”

Chop & Change

Batmanglij and Rechtshaid
did a lot of the engineering
themselves, and spent many
hours chopping and editing
vintage-sounding recordings
and then adding all sorts of
plug‑ins to add a contemporary

Drum bus processing on ‘I’ve Been

Down’ included FabFilter’s Pro-Q
3, PSP’s Vintage Warmer, Waves’
Chandler TG12345 emulation and
Oeksound’s Soothe.

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 127

 INSIDE TRACK
A R I E L R E C H T S H A I D & R O S TA M B AT M A N G L I J • H A I M

the drums up two semitones. I was just

experimenting to see how the ring of the
snare sat in the mix. Also, pitch‑shifting
makes things sound more sampled, of
course. I sent this to Ariel, and the next
time I got the session back, he’d replaced
the Sound Shifter with the Serato Sample
plug-in, doing the same pitch‑shifting, but
with a different sound.
“The drum bus has the FabFilter Pro-Q 3
dipping around 200Hz, the Waves TG12345
for compression and EQ, the PSP Vintage
Warmer and the Oeksound Soothe. The
Rolling Stones were a touchstone for us
in this song, and the Vintage Warmer
is on a semi-driven tape setting adding
saturation. Because the drums were
compressed heavily, and also because of
the pitch‑shifting, we got some unlistenable
harsh frequencies, which were taken out by
the Soothe.”
Next, Batmanglij recalls the bass
recording: “There’s a Fender Jazz in
the bridge, and the rest of the song has
a Hofner bass. They were both recorded
using the Tonecraft DI.”
“We used the FabFilter Pro-C 2
Arturia’s Wurli plug-in provided the electric piano sound.
compressor and the Pro Tools Air Distortion
as good as possible. We wouldn’t send out the one RCA 44. There’s also a Neumann on it. It is very simple,” adds Rechtshaid.
unfinished mixes. But in the case of ‘I’ve FET 47 on the kick, and an STC 4033. They “We did not do much fancy stuff like parallel
Been Down’ we were entirely happy with gave us a bit more low end. But 95 percent compression and stuff like that. It is great
the way our mix sounded.” of the sound came from the RCA 44, which for certain things, but not for this song. This
has a very Rostam move on it, in that he song was emoting immediately, and it was
Drums & Bass dipped 6.45kHz. He is very sensitive to what about not losing that.”
Batmanglij: “There’s quite a bit of editing he calls harsh frequencies.”
on the drum tracks, because we love drums Batmanglij: “When working on ‘Summer
Wurli
that have a combination of natural and Girl’ I used the Waves Sound Shifter plug‑in Batmanglij: “We wanted to have the sound
unnatural. So we preserved Danielle’s feel, to pitch the drums down 4-5 semitones, and of an old Wurlitzer, recorded to tape in
but we also cut things up to add a quality that added quite a bit of grit. I did it again a dusty studio. It enters in the bridge.
that’s hip hop influenced. It makes it sound with the drums on this song, pitch‑shifting I rarely do this, but I created a Pro Tools
like a loop of an old soul
record that has been
chopped up. We were
also arranging the drum
part. While recording
drums we asked Danielle
to do one take of fills,
and we later created
a drum performance
using these fills.”
Rechtshaid adds: “The
drums were recorded
very simple. Most of the
drum sound comes from

The saxophone was heavily

processed, with multiple
EQs, delay, formant shifting
and a convolution reverb
using an impulse response
captured by Batmanglij at
his own studio.

128 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

track preset in a different session, and then
used it here on the Wurli track. The Wurli V2
plug‑in is made by Arturia, and they achieve
the sound with synthesis, as opposed to
sampling, and it sounds very real to me.
None of the pedals are used, but the reverb
is activated.
“Then there’s the Aberrant DSP Sketch
Cassette, a plug-in made by two young guys
in upstate New York. It just cost $20, and
I think it is one of the best plug-ins that has
ever been made! It adds a very vintage vibe,
and has something called NR Comp, which
is a very aggressive multiband compressor
that really changes the sound. After that
there are the Goodhertz Vulf Compressor,
and the Goodhertz Wow Control for yet
more wow and flutter. All this was about
retracing the steps of an old or sampled
recording. In the old days people recorded
to tape and then they had to bounce tracks
down to other tapes, and when you do that
you are having tons of different wow and
flutter enter the signal. My goal here was to
recreate that situation.”
Saxophone
The saxophone was heavily processed, as
Batmanglij explains: “Yes, there are a lot of
plug‑ins on the sax! It was recorded with the
Sony C800, and played by Henry Solomon,
who has a new sound that was integral to
this album. There are a Pro-Q 3 and a Waves
RCompressor and the Avid EQ3 7‑band
doing a low-cut, and the Soothe to take
out harshness. But the main plug‑ins are
the Soundtoys Little AlterBoy, the Altiverb,
and the UAD Helios. I love formant shifting
the saxophone. The formant shifting from
the Little AlterBoy makes it sound more
sampled, again, and also much darker.
I am also using the distortion that is built in
the Alter Boy.
“The UAD Helios EQ changes the sound
quite dramatically. The most fascinating
plug‑in on the sax comes after that and
is the Altiverb, because it uses a sample
that I made myself at Vox, by putting my
Dynaudio BM5s in the live room there, and
recording the impulse response. That is part
of how that saxophone sounds so alive. I am
already recording the sax from about three
feet away, and then adding more room
with the Altiverb. Finally, there’s the Slate
Digital Repeater set to an 8th‑note delay,
just a touch to bring it into the realm of the
Rolling Stones in the ‘80s.”
Acoustic Guitar
Batmanglij: “I recorded my acoustic guitar
with the two microphones that I normally
The acoustic guitar was treated with some EQ and a dose of Sketch Casette.
have on my piano, an upright Steinway
K52. The mics were about two and a half
feet apart from each other, and both facing
the acoustic guitar. By not having the mics
so close to the guitar you get a lot of room
sound. Trying to get more room sound has
always been my approach to recording
acoustic instruments. I added the Waves
Q10, using a preset that I made to get rid
of the low mids.”
Rechtshaid adds: “When Rostam and
I were doing Modern Vampires In The
City, we were obsessed with the UAD
ATR102 plug‑in, because it is adding EQ,
compression, modulation and distortion.
During the making of this album, Rostam
got the Sketch Cassette plug‑in, and we
first used it on the acoustic guitar. We were
going for Keith Richards’ acoustic guitar
sound in the Stones’ ‘Street Fighting Man’.
That plug-in gave us the essence that we
were looking for. It’s great.”
Vocals
“Danielle’s vocals were recorded with
the Sony 800, and a Neve 1073LB and
my 1176AE, black with the blue stripe,”
Batmanglij explains. “There’s not much
on the lead vocals, other than the Waves
Q10 EQ, the UAD 1176AE in the verses
and Waves CLA-76, and then a send to
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
a nonlinear reverb. The nonlin is the main
feature on the vocal sound. I am a big fan
of using the nonlinear on vocals just to give
a little bit of a 3D quality. The version that
I like the best is the Altiverb AMS RMX16
nonlin. I have the real unit, but I also like
the way that Altiverb version sounds.
“There’s a different vocal sound in the
bridge. The plug‑ins are again the Waves
Q2, taking out everything below 60Hz
and dipping
around 250Hz;
the CLA76; and
then there’s an
echo panned all
the way to the
right, coming
from the UAD
EP-34 Tape Echo.
The dry vocal is in
the centre. More
space is added
with a send to
a chamber reverb
aux, which uses
the Cello Studio
in Altiverb. We
also had a send
to the Ocean
Way aux for the
chant in the bridge. That aux has the UAD
Ocean Way Studios plug‑in, as well as the
Cranesong Phoenix II, and the Massey
L2007 limiter for more loudness. The idea
is to make the chant sound like a handful
of people singing in a room, even though
they were recorded individually.”
Master Bus
Batmanglij: “The UAD SSL G-Series Bus
Compressor is grabbing a few peaks. The
iZotope Ozone 9 is not doing very much,
mostly just dynamic EQ, taming some
frequencies that had built up, and allowing
us to have a loud recording that isn’t
harsh. The Waves L2 Maximizer is the final
plug‑in, and you either like it or you don’t
like it. I tend to like it!
“As we mentioned, the touchstone
with this song was the Rolling Stones,
and in the bridge I was thinking of Phil
Spector, but updated. That is always
floating around in the back of my
mind during the making of the entire
album: how do we make something
that touches on those older recording
techniques and effects, and also make it
sound modern and competitive? Strict
recreation is less inspiring to me; I want
the recordings that I am a part of to
sound of a new era.”
129
 ON TEST
Apple Logic 10.5
Digital Audio Workstation
Logic 10.5 introduces a raft of new features
and remains exceptional value for money.
MARK WHERRY
I
always get a slight frisson when Apple
release a major new version of Logic
Pro X. Part of this can be attributed to
nostalgia, but mostly it’s because Apple
never pre-announce such a release: it just
shows up on the App Store, accompanied
by a press release and an updated web
page. This time, however, a major new
release wasn’t quite so unexpected,
thanks to a screenshot that had briefly
appeared on Apple’s web site at the end
of March. The screenshot in question
showed a version of Logic featuring what
looked like two GarageBand-inspired
features — Live Loops and Remix FX
— portending what could be expected in
a forthcoming upgrade.
Despite the toothpaste being out of
the tube, Apple remained silent until May
12th when I found myself downloading
Apple Logic 10.5 £199
pros
• Live Loops seamlessly integrates modern,
loop-based music creation into the
existing Logic workflow.
• Sampler and Quick Sampler reinvigorate
Logic’s sampling abilities.
• Step Sequencer offers abundant
functionality and is just plain fun.
• Live Loops and Remix FX can be
performed via multitouch gestures using
the Logic Remote app.
cons
• It’s churlish to complain about much at
this price. But...
• The Piano Roll editor remains
less sophisticated than some of the
competition.
• Serious surround work doesn’t seem to be
a priority.
summary
Logic Pro 10.5 is a comprehensive upgrade,
with new functionality, workflows, samplers
and content. And, as Apple suggest, it
embodies some of the most significant
changes to the application since the
introduction of Logic Pro X.
130 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
the newly released Logic Pro 10.5 from
the App Store. As with previous upgrades
since the launch of Logic Pro X in 2013,
it was once again free for existing users,
and newcomers will be charged the very
reasonable price of £199.99 for the entire
package. You just need a relatively good
Mac running at least Mac OS Mojave
10.14.6, with 6GB of free storage for
a minimal installation; with Logic Pro 10.5
boasting 2500 new loops, 70 extra kits,
and over 1500 additional patches, the full
set of content requires an installation with
72GB of storage space.
It’s worth noting that when Apple
recently extended the free trial period
of Final Cut Pro X (the company’s video
editing application) from 30 to 90 days,
they also introduced a free trial of Logic Pro
X for the first time. This can be downloaded
from the company’s web site (as opposed
to the App Store) and currently expires
after the same generous period.
Apple recommend that existing users
should back up both their project files
as well as the currently installed version
of Logic Pro X before updating, and
this is exceptionally good advice. Whilst
backing up work is always prudent, it
won’t be possible to download previous
releases of the application from the Mac
App Store once you’ve updated to 10.5.
You can archive the existing version by
right-clicking the application’s icon and Logic has used a linear method of
selecting Compress from the contextual timeline-based sequencing, while the new,
menu, storing the resulting .ZIP file (which nonlinear approach invites an unavoidable
you might want to rename) in a safe place comparison to Ableton’s Live, enabling
in case you need to revert to this earlier you to work from a collection of ideas in
version, or move it to another Mac. a more free-form manner without worrying
about a timeline.
It’s Alive To make this possible, the Project
As anticipated, the headline new feature window can now display two different
in Logic Pro 10.5 is indeed Live Loops, views, either together or individually.
first seen in GarageBand 2.1 on iOS There’s the traditional Tracks Area we all
back in January 2016. However, as know and love, where regions of musical
you might expect, Logic Pro X proffers data are represented by rectangles based
a more sophisticated implementation, on their musical length, and the new Live
aiming to combine a second, nonlinear Loops grid, where individual musical ideas
approach to music creation within a single, that generally work well as loops are stored
Logic-based workflow. Traditionally, as cells within that grid. A vertical line of
cells in the grid is referred to as a scene,
and each horizontal row plays a cell back
via the corresponding track in the track list
(or ‘Track Header area’ in Logic parlance).
This is particularly neat, since it makes it
straightforward to share ideas between the
two areas, as we shall see.
Getting started with Live Loops is easy,
thanks to some new options in the Project
Chooser window. By selecting New Project
in the list on the left, you can either create
an Empty Project as before, or you can
start a new Live Loops Project, where the
Live Loops Grid is shown instead.
Conceptually, cells are to the Live
Loops grid what regions are to the Tracks
Area, and in the same way you can have
different types of regions — such as audio,
MIDI and Drummer — the Live Loops grid
also has the equivalent cell types. Empty
cells are displayed as blank, dark grey
rectangles, while a cell containing musical
data is represented by a colourful square.
A cell looks a bit like a region, in that its
name is shown at the top above a visual
overview of the content, this time in the
form of a circular graphic representing the
Loop Length of a cell.
A Play/Stop button appears when you
hover the pointer over a cell, which can
be clicked to start a cell playing. During
playback, an animated pie slice represents
the playback location, and you can stop
a cell by once again clicking its Play/Stop
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
button. Alternatively, you can also stop
a cell by clicking the Play/Stop button
in an empty cell on the same row, or by
clicking that row’s Stop button located on
the far right of the Live Loops grid. Note
that although you can play back cells on
different rows simultaneously, only one cell
per row can be playing at any given time.
Starting a cell on the same row as another
cell that’s playing will switch playback to
the newly started cell, ceasing playback of
the previous cell.
To start all cells within a scene, click
the trigger button for that scene depicted
by a ‘hat’ symbol at the bottom of the
Live Loops Grid. To stop the playback
of a scene (or any combination of cells),
131
 ON TEST
APPLE LOGIC 10.5

you can click the Grid Stop button at the

bottom right of the grid.
As you start and stop cells playing,
you’ll probably notice that a cell doesn’t
necessarily start or stop playback
immediately when you click its Play/Stop
button. This is because Logic waits for
the cell’s next Quantise Start time before
carrying out the action, enabling cells
to be started and stopped in time with
other cells that might be playing. If a cell
has a Quantise Start time of ‘1 Bar’, for
example, it will always start or stop playing
on the next bar position.
Each cell can have its own Quantise
Start value, although a cell will use the
grid’s Quantise Start time if its own
parameter is set to Global. To set the
grid’s Quantise Start time, simple click
the setting in the right-hand side of the
Live Loop grid’s toolbar. And you can
also assign a Quantise Start time to
a scene, which will be used by all the
cells in that scene when it’s triggered,
overriding a cell’s own setting. To do this,
right-click a scene’s trigger button to open
a contextual menu and select the time
required from Quantise Start submenu.

Queue On Cue
Starting and stopping cells during playback
as just described is known as queuing,
although ‘cueing’ might seem more
appropriate. If you want to queue a cell
for playback, simple right-click a cell and
choose Cue Cell Playback from the context
menu. You’ll notice how a cell that’s
queued for playback blinks to indicate it
will start playing when you engage Logic’s
normal playback, such as by pressing
Space. If you stop the playback by using
Logic’s transport (pressing Space again, for
example), playback stops immediately, as
opposed to waiting for the next Quantise
Start position, but the queued cell remains
queued. You can dequeue a cell by
right-clicking it and selecting Dequeue Cell
from the context menu, or clicking the Grid
Stop button.
Queuing a single cell for playback
probably isn’t that useful, so it’s possible
to select multiple cells simultaneously
and add all of them to the queue. To do
this, select a cell by clicking its name at
the top part of a cell, and then, holding
down Shift, select other cells in the same
manner. Using the Cue Cell Playback
command from the context menu will
queue the selected cells, or you can use
the handy Option-Return key command.
Selected cells can be removed from the
EXS24 metamorphoses into Sampler in Logic Pro 10.5, sporting a modern user interface that
incorporates playback and editing parameters in a single, resizeable plug-in window.
queue by choosing Dequeue Selected
Cells from the context menu or by pressing
Option-Return again, as well as using the
Grid Stop button, or by using Logic’s Stop
command multiple times by pressing Enter.
As you might expect, you can queue
and dequeue a scene rather than individual
cells by right-clicking a scene’s trigger
button and choosing Queue and Dequeue
Scene from the context menu. And, again,
you can dequeue a scene using the Grid
Stop or standard Stop commands.
Following typical Logic conventions,
cell parameters for a selected cell can be
adjusted in the Cell Inspector, and you’ll
find region-like settings you’ll already
be familiar with for muting, transposing
and quantising. These take their place
alongside settings for configuring
playback, the loop, length and speed of
a cell, as well as neat reverse option that
plays a cell backwards.
Cells can be created manually by
right-clicking an empty cell and selecting
the appropriate option from the contextual
menu. If you right-click an empty cell on an
audio track/row, you can select Add Audio
File and choose the file from the Open
dialogue; alternatively, you can drag in an
audio file, as such one from the Library.
Should the audio file in question already
contain metadata with loop information,
this will be used by the new audio clip.
Similarly, if you want to program your
own cell using note data, right-click an
empty cell on a software instrument track
and select Create MIDI cell. Like MIDI
regions, MIDI cells can be edited in one
of the editors, and double-clicking one
opens the Piano Roll editor by default.

132 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

If you want to create a cell that can be
programmed using Logic Pro 10.5’s new Remote Loops
Step Sequencer (which we’ll cover later in
Given that a mouse or trackpad isn’t always the most tactile way to trigger Live Loops, Logic
this review), you can create a pattern cell supports Novation’s Launchpad controllers, automatically mapping Live Loops to the pads and
instead. And finally, as you might expect, other controls. Since I don’t own a Launchpad, I wasn’t able to try this for myself. However, it’s
if you have a Drummer track, right-clicking also possible to trigger Live Loops from the newly updated Logic Remote app for iOS, which
an empty cell in the corresponding row is freely available on the App Store and works with either an iPhone or iPad running iOS (or
provides access to a Create Drummer Cell iPadOS) 13.1 or later. This worked brilliantly, especially on an iPad where the larger display lets
you simultaneously control the master Remix FX, enabling a fluid, multitouch performance.
command from the context menu.
It’s also possible to record your own
audio and MIDI cells, starting with an
empty cell or by creating a cell and
recording into it. The advantage of the
latter approach is that you can configure
a cell’s parameters before recording, and,
indeed, a cell will be created for you in
any case if an empty cell is selected and
you start adjusting its parameters. You
can start recording by clicking a cell’s
Record button, which appears instead of
a Play/Stop button when a track is armed,
or simply press Option-R on a selected cell.
The length and behaviour of the
recording for a cell is set in the Cell
Inspector, and one particularly neat option
is to set the Cell Recording mode to
Takes, so that a new cell is created every
time there’s a loop, which becomes a take
cell once you press Stop. You can switch
between takes as normal, or — and this is
the cunning part — unpack the takes to
different cells by right-clicking the take cell
number and choosing a command from
the ‘Unpack Take Cell to’ submenu. For
example, selecting Next Empty Cells Right The Logic Remote app, seen here running on an iPad Pro, makes it possible to control features
such as Live Loops and Remix FX from a compatible iOS device.
(or pressing Ctrl+Command+U) creates
new cells in scenes to the right of the take
cell, whereas choosing New Scenes creates so you can drag a cell from the grid to The logical culmination of this workflow
new, empty scenes that the additional the Tracks Area to create a new region. is the ability to record a performance
takes are placed into. Copying between the two areas in this in the Live Loops grid into a standard
way creates independent copies of cells arrangement within the Tracks Area.
You Spin Me Right and regions, so tweaking a region you’ve To do this, ensure that Cycle mode is
Round, Logic copied to a cell doesn’t affect the cell that disabled, click the Enable Performance
As I’ve already hinted at, one of the best was created, and vice versa. Multiple cells Recording button (on the left side of the
things about Live Loops is the way it can can be copied at once, or you can copy grid’s toolbar) so that it turns red, and
be used — quite literally — alongside the or insert a scene to the playhead position start recording in the usual manner by
traditional Tracks Area. Both can be visible by right-clicking the appropriate scene clicking the Record button. Now, dressing
simultaneously when the Show/Hide Live trigger and selecting Copy or Insert Scene in your DJ attire with the optional smoke
Loops Grid and Track Area buttons are to/at Playhead. machine and strobe lights activated, let the
enabled, and a divider line separating the Creating regions from cells is relatively performance commence, stopping Logic’s
two areas can be dragged to see more of straightforward, whilst you can take full transport when you’re done.
one and less of another. And because the advantage of the Track Area’s editing There’s a good deal more to say about
track list is persistent between the Live tools when producing a cell from a region. Live Loops, especially since it’s one of
Loops grid and Tracks Area, with each row For example, in addition to dragging those features that’s simple to get started
in the grid corresponding to the equivalent a region into the grid, you can use the with, but offers a broader complexity
track, you’re working with the same set of Copy Region Selection to Live Loops the deeper you delve. For example,
tracks in either area. command from the Track Area’s Edit menu it is possible to use Smart Tempo and
This split area view makes it possible to to make a new cell on the appropriate row transients on audio cells, as well as other
drag one or more regions from the Tracks from a selection, which can be a simple advanced functions. And although Apple
Area to cells in the Live Loops Grid, and region selection, or, for example, copied suggests Live Loops is ideal for those
this works the other way around as well, from a marquee selection. making music in such genres as EDM and

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 133

 ON TEST
APPLE LOGIC 10.5

The new Quick Sampler makes it

possible to create a new sample-based
instrument from a single audio file.
Here we can see a drum loop with
markers that have been created from
transients, enabling each slice to be
played independently.

hip-hop — which may be true

— I actually think this nonlinear
way of working is going to be
useful for those working in pretty
much any genre.

Say Hello, Wave

Goodbye
Something that gave me a tinge
of wistfulness in Logic Pro 10.5
is the sun setting on the EXS24
sampler; after 20 years of service,
you’ll no longer find it in the
list of available instruments.
I remember the excitement
of receiving Emagic’s Xtreme
Sampler 24-bit in the summer
of 2000 and being blown away
by its simplicity, integration with
Logic Audio 4.3, and efficiency
compared with other software samplers at
the time. However, change is inexorable,
and replacing EXS24 is a new instrument
called Sampler — how do they come up
with these names?
The first thing to affirm about Sampler
is its backwards compatibility with EXS24.
It uses the .EXS file format natively for both
reading and writing instruments, and when
you load a project created with an earlier
a version of Logic using EXS24 plug-ins,
these instances will be automatically
reassigned to Sampler with the same
instrument and settings loaded as before.
At the top of Sampler’s interface is the
Navigation bar, where you’ll see a group
of buttons. The first three — Synth, Mod
Matrix and Modulators — give access
to familiar playback parameters, while
the last two — Mapping and Zone —
provide instrument-editing capabilities
for adjusting Zone settings and specifying
how those Zones are mapped. Clicking
a Navigation button scrolls to the
appropriate pane, and a small yellow ‘LED’
indicates whether a given pane is visible
in the interface — clicking it toggles the
visibility of the corresponding pane. You
can also Option-click a Navigation button
to show only that pane (hiding all others)
or double-click it to expand a pane to fit
the available vertical space.
In reorganising the interface, there are
a few things worth noting for existing Logic
Pro users. Firstly, certain global settings
previously accessed via EXS24’s Options
and Virtual Memory windows are now
located in the Audio pane’s Sampler tab in
Logic’s Preferences window, which makes
sense. The commands for importing DLS,
SoundFont and Giga-format instruments
have been removed, although, for the
longest time, all these options have done is
throw up a message box telling you where
to place the file to be imported. You can
still place files at this location (~/Music/
Audio Music Apps/Sampler Instruments)
to be imported as before. And finally,
a familiar Actions pop-up is available
with additional commands concerned
with initialising and mapping the synth
parameters found in the Synth, Mod Matrix
and Modulators panes.
While the playback features remain
largely as EXS24 users have come to
expect, albeit now made more accessible
by the cleaner façade, there are a couple
new engine features that merit a mention.
An instrument can now use up to five
envelopes and four LFOs, each offering
a full set of controls, with the LFOs offering
monophonic or polyphonic triggering.
You can add or remove envelopes and
LFOs via the +/- buttons at the top of the
Modulators pane, although one envelope
must be present in each instrument.
In addition to extra modulators,
Sampler also includes a second filter stage
that can be enabled or disabled like the
first. The filters run in series by default,
although it’s also possible to use them in
a parallel configuration where the balance
of the output signals can be set with the
Filter Blend knob, which can be modulated
to crossfade between the filters.
The Creation Myth
Playback advancements aside, arguably
the biggest improvements in Sampler
come from a more streamlined approach
to instrument creation and editing. As
an example, there’s no longer a separate
window for editing instruments; the
Mapping and Zone controls are now
included as panes within the main
interface, allowing for a simpler workflow.
Starting with an empty Sampler
instance, you can drag audio files and
regions onto the Navigation bar to
build your instrument. When you drag
something over this bar, it displays
two dropzone areas: Chromatic and
‘Optimized’. Chromatic will map the
samples to keys chromatically from C2,
using the original looping, length, tuning
and loudness settings from the audio
file. Optimized, on the other hand, will
map samples to keys based on pitch
analysis, crop any silence, search for
loop points, and adjust the tuning and
loudness as required, courtesy of some
Redmatica-inspired goodness. These tasks

134 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

 can also be carried out after a zone has
been imported if you’d rather start with
the default, vanilla options.
When one or more items are dragged
over the Chromatic area, it splits into
two further dropzones specifying either
Zone per File or Split at Silence. If the
audio is dropped on to Zone per file,
a new group will be created containing
one zone for each file; if the destination
is Split at Silence, a new group is created
for each file, with zones being created
within each group representing audio
segments split between silence from the
appropriate file. Similarly, if the Optimized
dropzone is used, this also subdivides
into two dropzones: Zone per File, as
just described, or Zone per Note, where
a group is again created for each file, but
this time with zones being created and
mapped based on the pitch analysis of
each note in a file.
This represents just one method to
create groups and zones. You can also
create them manually through the Group
and Zone menus in the Mapping pane,
assigning audio files to zones as required,
Re-re-remix FX
Logic 10.5 includes a new Multi Effect called
Remix FX that, as with Live Loops, is also
based on a similar feature in GarageBand. In
fact, it looks and sounds pretty much identical,
with the exception that it can be used like any
other effect in Logic on any track and not just
the master output.
Remix FX features two Kaoss Pad-like
vector controls, with each addressing one of six
available effects: Filter, Repeater (for stutter-like
effects), Wobble (an analogue-esque filter with
modulation), Reverb, Orbit (a flanger and
phaser) and Delay. The horizontal and vertical
axes control parameters based on the selected
or by dragging audio into the Zone pane
or onto a key or range of keys in the
Mapping pane’s keyboard view. Adding
and removing audio files to and from zones
can be achieved just as easily with a similar
variety of methods.
Since the concept of Articulations was
added in Logic Pro 10.4, it makes sense
for Sampler instruments to support this
functionality in a similar way to other
instruments like the Studio Horns and
effect, so with Filter chosen, for example, the X
and Y axes modulate the cutoff frequency and
resonance amount. Each effect also has an extra
parameter accessed via the settings button; in
the case of Filter, this selects between ‘Phat’
(24dB) and ‘Classic’ (12dB/octave) modes.
The centre section of Remix FX has two
faders for gating and down-sampling effects
(the latter similar to Bitcrusher), along with
buttons for manipulating the playback of
incoming audio. You can reverse the playback,
add a vinyl-inspired record scratch, or emulate
a tape stop effect with the requisite sloowiiiiing
down effect.
Strings plug-ins, which were also included
in the previous update. Articulations are
specified at the group level with an ‘Enable
by Articulation’ parameter: simply switch
it on and specify an Articulation ID value
(starting with 1) to which that group should
belong. When an instrument is loaded
that supports Articulations, you can select
New from the Articulation Set pop-up
in the Track Inspector, which will create
and use an Articulation Set based on the

jones scanlon Baby Reds

When Size Really Matters
Perfect for Broadcast Vehicles & Home Studios

“ The Baby Red [...] plays a remarkable

trick of sounding huge “

“ It has enormous authority and clarity

and displays all the subjective qualities of a
much larger monitor working well within its limits “

“ Reverb tails, compression artifacts and imaging

qualities are all startlingly clear “

“ The Baby Red is unique, and impossible not to love “

~ P H I L WA R D ( A L L Q U OT E S F R O M S O U N D O N S O U N D M AGA Z I N E R E V I E W, AU G U S T 2020 )

650 Watts Driver 6.5”

Dual Channel studio monitors 2 Way System
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 135
www.jonessc anl on.c om @ wa yn e j o n e s a u di o f c y t
 ON TEST
APPLE LOGIC 10.5
Sampler instrument. It would, of course, be
convenient if there was a way for this step
to be carried out for you.
Despite the nostalgic tone used earlier
to describe EXS24’s retirement, it was
admittedly a plug-in that harkened back to
an earlier era and, if one is being honest,
an improved replacement was probably
overdue. L’EXS24 est mort, vive l’EXS!
Quick Quick Slow
For those whose sampling needs are,
dare I say, simpler, a second new sampler
instrument called Quick Sampler is also
included. This is conceptually redolent
of Live’s Simpler and Cubase’s Sampler
Track. Reminiscent of the early days
of sampling, Quick Sampler creates
a sampled instrument from a single audio
file; and, unlike most so-called samplers,
actually allows you to record a sample
directly into the plug-in from a hardware
input or the internal output of a software
instrument or bus. Alternatively, you can
drag an existing file or region into the
waveform display rectangle in the upper
section of the plug-in’s interface. And it’s
even possible to use a MIDI clip or region
if its output is a software instrument,
prompting Logic to automatically render
an audio file to be used as the basis for
a new instrument.
When you drag something to be
imported into Quick Sampler the upper
section shows two dropzones, similar to
Sampler, so you can decide whether to
import the original audio as is, or whether
it should be ‘Optimized’. Since the choice
is non-destructive, you can later revert to
either the original or optimised sample by
using the Reimport Original or Reimport
Optimized commands from the plug-in’s
Action menu.
Any audio file that’s used by or created
with Quick Sampler is stored within
a Project. If you’re saving a Project using
folders, for example, a Samples folder is
created within the Project hierarchy that
saves independent copies of existing
samples and any recordings made with the
plug-in’s Recorder mode.
Quick Sampler offers three modes of
playback: Classic, One Shot and Slice.
Classic mode plays back the sample for as
long as you hold a key and enables loop
points to be specified, whereas One Shot
plays the entire sample when triggered
and obviously doesn’t permit looping.
In either mode you can set whether the
sample should be played forwards or in
reverse, which is a nice touch.
136 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Drum Machine Designer has been updated in Logic Pro 10.5. In the kit shown, the Kick 1 pad triggers
a Quick Sampler instance, the editor for which is displayed inside the Drum Machine Designer window.
The upper section is shown by default when Q-Sampler Main is selected, and the lower section is
accessible when you click the Q-Sampler Detail button.
Slice mode places markers within the
sample to indicate slices of audio, such as
different beats within a drum loop. Each
slice is mapped to an ascending keyboard
range, beginning from the specified Start
Key, and is played back for the full length
of the slice when triggered. You can invoke
Classic-style playback by enabling the
Gate parameter, or instruct Slice mode to
continue playback past the triggered slice
to the end of the sample by toggling the
‘Play to End’ button.
The lower section of Quick Sampler’s
interface provides access to synth-style
controls used for playback, consisting
of two LFOs and a simple four-way
modulation matrix, along with pitch, filter
and amp stages, each modulated with
a dedicated envelope. Different envelope
configurations are available, although
envelopes containing a release stage are
only available when using Classic mode.
And it’s particularly fun to modulate the
sample or loop boundaries for some
interesting variations.
Normally, in Classic or One Shot modes
(with Key Tracking enabled in the pitch
pane, as it is by default), the pitch of the
sample is adjusted based on the root
key by speeding up or slowing down its
playback rate. However, Quick Sampler
also features a Flex mode, enabling
a sample to sound with the appropriate
pitch adjustment without changing
the playback speed. You can also set
a multiplier for the playback rate, such
as half or double speed, for example,
and specify whether the sample playback
follows the Project’s tempo, which is useful
for gapless playback in Slice mode.
Designer Drums
Drum Machine Designer, which was
introduced in Logic Pro 10.1 for
managing electronic drum sounds, has
been revamped in Logic Pro 10.5. It now
uses Quick Sampler for audio samples
and Drum Synth (see box) as the default
instrument for synthesized drum sounds
instead of Ultrabeat. As before, adding
Drum Machine Designer to a Software
Instrument track turns that track into
a Track Stack where each drum has its
own sub-track within the master track,
and you can change the plug-in used by
each of these tracks to any instrument
plug-in.
The interface looks largely the same at
first glance, offering 48 drum pads split
across three pages. You can mute and solo
a pad’s sub-track using the M and S buttons
as before, but the MIDI input and outputs
for each pad are now user assignable. For
example, if a pad’s input is set to C1 and its
output is C2, notes played with a pitch of
C1 on the master track will trigger a sound
with a C2 on the appropriate sub-track.
This means you can now have multiple pads
being triggered from the same input note,
amongst other possibilities.
 Slip Rotate It
Two of my favourite new editing capabilities in Logic Pro
10.5 allow you to slip and rotate content in regions, courtesy
THE MIDI
SPECIALISTS
of new commands hidden in the ‘Edit / Move’ sub-menu,
which are more usefully assigned as key commands. Whereas
the existing Nudge Left and Right commands move an entire
region left or right by the nudge value, Slip Left and Right
(Ctrl+Option-Left/Right) moves the contents of a region left
or right, whilst leaving the region boundaries where they are.
This is useful where you have content that exists outside of the
current region boundaries, such as when an audio region plays
back just a bar or two of a larger audio file, and you want to
‘slip’ that content within the region. MIDI USB
The Rotate commands are perhaps less obvious. What does
it mean to ‘rotate’ audio and MIDI data within a region? With
Host mkII
the nudge value set to an eighth note, for example, selecting
Rotate Left (Ctrl+Option+Command-Left) will shift the USB Host to
content left by an eighth note and ‘rotate’ what was in that first MIDI IN AND MIDI Converter
eighth note around to be the last eighth note in the region. OUT FOR Using a USB device with a MIDI USB Host
USB-ONLY
For a MIDI region this moves notes in the existing regions, KEYBOARDS removes the need for a computer. MIDI In & Out are
whereas rotating an audio region creates a folder containing provided for USB MIDI keyboards and controllers.
two regions that consist of the front and back parts of the
original region.
This feature is a great idea, although I noticed some
odd behaviour when rotating MIDI events. For example,
if I have three-bar MIDI region that I resize to be two
bars in length, rotating left affected MIDI notes beyond
the region end point rather than only the notes within the
Thru-12
SPLIT A
region boundaries. I’m not sure if this is a bug or a feature, SINGLE MIDI
but the result seemed counter-intuitive compared to my MIDI thru box SOURCE INTO
understanding of what should happen. MULTIPLE
One MIDI in and 12 MIDI Thrus. OUTPUTS
Thru-5 and Thru-25 also available
Hovering the pointer over the kit pad reveals new mute
and solo buttons for the plug-in’s master track, along with
an Actions button that reveals more commands than the
previous right-click menu. Some of the new options include
Merge-4
being able to toggle the selection of a pad by key input, or
MIDI Merge Box
a sub-track from a pad, as well as re-ordering pads either
Merges the data from up to four
chromatically or according to the GM drum standard.
separate MIDI sources (e.g. Master
When you open Drum Kit Designer, you’ll be presented CORRECTLY keyboards or controllers) into a single
with an empty kit. As before, you can load an existing kit COMBINE
MULTIPLE MIDI MIDI data stream which appears at
or assign individual sounds to pads from the Library, or by SOURCES INTO both of the MIDI out sockets.
dragging and dropping audio. One particularly neat feature A SINGLE
OUTPUT Merge-8 also available
is the ability to drag a number of audio files or regions to an
empty spot in the track list, whereupon Logic will ask if you
want to create a new track using either Sampler or Drum
Machine Designer. If you choose the latter, a new Track
Stack will be created with an instance of Drum Machine
Designer, and each audio element will be assigned to a pad Pro-Solo mk3
within a new kit.
MIDI-CV Converter
Step In Time High-spec, single synth MIDI MIDI FOR
YOUR
to CV converter. VINTAGE
Until now, there have been three basic region types you can
Modular Solo also available SYNTH
use as containers for different kinds of musical data in Logic
Pro X: MIDI, Audio and Drummer. In Logic Pro 10.5, there’s
a fourth type of region referred to as a Pattern region, which
contains notes and automation data that can be edited
in the new Step Sequencer. Pattern regions are coloured KEEP ALL YOUR SYNTHS, SEQUENCERS
yellow by default, showing an overview of active steps when AND CONTROLLERS TALKING WITH
viewed with sufficient height. And if you’re working in the KENTON MIDI PRODUCTS
Live Loops grid, it’s also possible to use and create the
equivalent pattern cells that function in much the same way
as pattern regions. Buy from selected dealers or online at kenton.co.uk

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 137

 ON TEST
APPLE LOGIC 10.5

Logic Pro 10.5’s Step Sequencer is

accessible in the Editors pane or in
a dedicated window (shown here)
and can be used to program cells or
regions containing patterns of both
notes and automation.

To create a pattern cell or

region, you can right-click an
empty cell in the Live Loops
grid or an empty spot in the
Tracks Area and select Create
Pattern Cell/Region, which
can be assigned to a key
command. Double-clicking
a pattern region will open it in
the Step Sequencer tab of the
Editors area.
The Step Sequencer
pattern contains a series of
rows, each comprising the
number of steps defined by
the Pattern Length menu
on the Step Sequencer’s toolbar. The
lengths range from 12 to 64 steps in
varying increments, and although the
ability to use an arbitrary number of
steps would have been nice, there is
a workaround by setting the loop start
and end parameters for each row. The
step length is specified by the Pattern
Step Rate menu, located in the toolbar
above the row headers list, offering the
usual Logic variety of straight, triplet and
dotted values.
Little Drummer Synth
Where Quick Sampler
is ideal for playing back
sampled drum sounds,
another new plug-in called
Drum Synth is perfect for
creating those retro-esque,
electronic equivalents.
While many presets are
included, creating and
tweaking your own hits is
easy. Start by using pop-up
menus to select the group Drum Synth is a new instrument for generating electronic drum
type (either Kicks, Snares sounds. The simple interface lets you pick a type of drum, and then
and Claps, Percussion or adjust the tone with a number of straightforward controls.
Hats and Cymbals) and
sound type (which depends on the chosen
group) to be generated by the synthesis engine.
The icon will change accordingly (which can be
clicked on to trigger the sound), and a number
of parameters will be shown, such as pitch,
tone, key tracking, and whether to use Mono,
Poly(phonic) or Gate modes for playback.
Each group also has number of specific
parameters. For example, the ‘Snares and
Claps’ and ‘Hats and Cymbals’ groups have
a Body parameter to adjust the depth of the
Step Sequencer works seamlessly with
Drum Machine Designer, and using this
plug-in is a good way to become familiar
with Step Sequencer, since pattern regions
on Drum Machine Designer master tracks
automatically give you a set of rows based
on the notes of the chosen kit. To toggle
steps on and off, make sure the Edit Mode
selector on the Step Sequencer’s menu bar
is set to Step On/Off on the left side, and
then click a step to turn it on or off. As with
the Step Editor, you can click to turn a step
sound, whereas the Kicks group has a Shape
parameter to adjust the shape of the kick
drum generated, from a small, tight sound, to
a larger one with a boomy resonance.
Drum Synth a great little plug-in that’s
luculent and simple to use — especially
compared to Ultrabeat — and sounds crisp
and clean, and ready for further devilish
processing. It seems fittingly at home when
used within Drum Machine Designer, as
though it should always have been there.
on and then drag the mouse wherever
you like to activate other steps. The
same technique works when clicking to
disable a step and dragging to deactivate
other steps.
To adjust the values of properties
associated with a step, enable the right
side of the Edit Mode selector, choosing
the property to be edited on each row
header from the pop-up menu. The default
is ‘Velocity/Value’, which, unsurprisingly,
lets you adjust the velocity of notes by
clicking the desired step and dragging
vertically — you can also drag horizontally
to adjust the velocities of multiple steps
in one pass. Properties like velocity can
be adjusted for a step whether that step
is on or off, although active steps appear
in a brighter hue. A nice touch is that you
can Command-Click when adjusting most
properties to turn steps on or off without
having to switch edit modes.
In addition to velocity, the right-side
edit mode also allows you to set values for
gate (to shorten the note length triggered
by a step), tie (adjusting a step length by
tying it to the next and/or previous step),
skip (setting that step to be skipped during
playback), note repeat (dividing a step so
that it triggers multiple times), chance (sets
the probability of a step being triggered),
loop start and end, and more.
As well as using the Edit Select Mode
to set what’s being edited on the row
headers, you can also use multiple subrows
to view and edit parameters for each row,
a bit like using automation tracks in the
Tracks Area. To make this possible, each

138 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

row has a disclosure triangle that can be
toggled to reveal subrows. Two subrows
are available by default, and you can add
or remove subrows as desired.
In addition to creating steps that can
play back notes, you can also assign
rows to trigger automation parameters
as well, either in the same pattern or in
a separate pattern region. This means that
because pattern regions can be created on
audio tracks, you can automate an audio
channel by creating a pattern region on
an additional audio track assigned to the
same audio channel as the track playing
back audio regions. This only works
with regions (which is to say: not cells),
but is a pretty neat way of modulating
any parameter that can be automated
(including those on insert plug-ins) to
create some interesting textures, especially
if you create a random set of data for
a given row as a start point.
A pair of particularly neat commands
are Randomize Row Values and Randomize
All Values, which can be selected from the
Functions menu on the Step Sequencer’s
menu bar. Using these commands, you
can generate random values of a chosen
parameter type for the selected row or
all rows in the pattern. And, as you can
imagine, these commands can lead to
some interesting modulations to use as
a starting point, especially when controlling
automation parameters on effects plug-ins.
There’s so much more to like about
Step Sequencer, such as the ability to
set the playback direction of rows and
patterns, rotating steps within rows and
patterns, loading and saving patterns and
templates from the Pattern browser, and,
and, and... To paraphrase Woody’s Allen’s
character in Annie Hall, I love Logic’s new
Step Sequencer. You know, I lo-ve the Step
Sequencer. I-I love it!
Logical Intuition
Logic Pro 10.5 represents a significant
advance from 10.4. Jjust one of the
headline new features would be a welcome
part of any upgrade, but together they
form a coherent workflow that doesn’t feel
shoe-horned into the Logic environment
(pun intended — yes, the Environment
is still there). You can start in Live Loops,
create regions based on clips in Tracks
View, turn the results into a Quick Sampler
instrument, and build a new pattern
with Step Sequencer, which can then be
dragged back into a Live Loops grid. Neat.
There are some areas of Logic that
still feel neglected, such as the Piano Roll
Redmatica Redux
If some of the automatic mapping, slicing,
tuning and looping features found in Sampler
and Quick Sampler seem distantly familiar,
it’s likely they’re based on technologies from
a company called Redmatica. The brainchild
of developer Andrea Gozzi, Redmatica was
known for products like AutoSampler and
Keymap, allowing you to create and edit EXS
instruments with tools superior to those found
in Logic Pro.
Although there was never any official
announcement Apple had acquired
Redmatica, Gozzi closed up shop in June
2012 and left a message on his web site
explaining he had “decided to close Redmatica
to pursue other interests” before joining Apple
in August of that year. Until now, the only
obvious sign of this acquihire was MainStage
3.1’s inclusion of a simplified version of Auto
Sampler back in 2015, the dionym becoming
split across two words. Auto Sampler is now
also included with Logic Pro X for the first
time in version 10.5.
Auto Sampler was first reborn in MainStage 3.1, but is now part of Logic Pro X. Unlike most
modern plug-in editors in Logic, Auto Sampler’s interface isn’t visually scalable.
editor and the fact that surround sound
handling hasn’t evolved much since its
introduction in Logic Audio 4.5. However,
there are many competing products that
remain largely stereo, and which offer
a similar level of note-based editing.
It’s only when you compare Logic with,
say, Cubase Pro, that such shortcomings
become more apparent. However, Cubase
Pro costs £499 from Steinberg’s online
shop (and requires a USB-eLicenser) with
additional charges for updates, though
this is perhaps an unfair comparison,
given that Apple obviously don’t have to
rely on sales of Logic Pro X to keep the
company afloat.
Logic Pro 10.5 is described in typical
Apple fashion as the “biggest update to
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
As its name implies, Auto Sampler is
a handy plug-in for creating EXS-format
instruments by automatically sampling either
a software or external MIDI instrument or
sound source. Simply specify how detailed you
want an instrument to be sampled in terms of
the note range and number of velocity layers,
along with some other handy options for the
capturing round robins, sustaining sounds,
automatic looping and one-shot triggering,
and click Sample. It’s then time to enjoy a cup
of Earl Grey whilst Auto Sampler carries out
its work, or even a hearty meal following by
a nap depending on the number of samples to
be recorded.
I’ve used Auto Sampler since the Redmatica
days, and more recently in MainStage, to
satisfy my desire for using old Roland synth
patches and it really is a terrific tool. In fact,
it’s a little surprising Apple waited five years
to add this plug-in to Logic Pro, although its
inclusion makes sense in 10.5 alongside the
new sampler plug-ins.
Logic since the launch of Logic Pro X”.
However, despite the inherent hyperbole
of such a statement, after having worked
with this latest incarnation, I’m inclined
to agree. Certainly, the application has
matured considerably in the seven years
since the launch of Logic Pro X, and
each release since has brought with it
a lavish assortment of new functionality
and content, while at the same time
modernising a program that was originally
released nearly 30 years ago. It’s probably
the best £199.99 you’ll ever spend on
music creation software.
££ £199.99 including VAT.
WW www.apple.com
139
 ON TEST
Apogee Clearmountain’s Spaces
Convolution Reverb Plug-in
For most of us, Bob Clearmountain
needs no introduction; he’s worked with
everybody from David Bowie to the Rolling
Stones. His first collaboration with audio
interface manufacturers Apogee resulted
in a set of plug-ins called Clearmountain’s
Domain, which emulated his go-to signal
chain. Clearmountain’s Spaces was
originally part of that chain but it’s now
available separately.
Based on impulse
responses, it incorporates
profiles of some of
Clearmountain’s favourite
rooms and echo chambers,
along with some of the
processing used on many
of his hit records. AU, AAX
and VST plug-in formats are
supported (Mac OS 10.12.6/
Windows 10 and higher)
and protection is via an iLok
account, though no physical
iLok is required.
It is beautifully simple to
use. There are three ‘spaces’,
each with its own slider and
on/off button for balancing
its contribution to the overall
reverb character — the idea is that the
plug-in is used to create a Composite
Space that changes character as you adjust
the mix of the three elements. There’s
also a three-band EQ, as well as global
pre-delay adjustment and a switchable
de-esser. The centre of the GUI is
dominated by a goniometer-type display
that shows stereo activity.
The EQ, which affects the signal before
the reverb, is adjusted by dragging points
Eventide Undulator
Modulated Tremolo Plug-in
Eventide’s Undulator is the latest
in their H9 series of plug-ins, and
is available both for Mac/Windows
desktop computers (all the usual
plug-in formats) and for iOS devices.
Authorisation is via an iLok account,
to either a physical iLok or a specific
computer, and two installations are
allowed. Eventide are donating all the
proceeds from the desktop version of
the plug-in to the Equal Justice Initiative
and the NAACP Legal Defense and
Education Fund.
140 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
on a curve, while the de-esser (the DS
button, also pre-reverb) is either on or off.
De-essing a reverb feed is a common way
to stop sibilants making the reverb sound
splashy, so it’s a welcome inclusion.
The first space, called Apogee Studio, is
a shortish and fairly warm-sounding room
ambience recorded in Apogee’s in-house
recording studio. Next up is Mix This,
a medium-length, brighter reverb recorded
in the echo chambers of Clearmountain’s
own Los Angeles studio. Input
configuration buttons, for use when the
plug-in is used in a stereo insert slot, allow
this space to be configured for true stereo,
stereo-to-mono and stereo crossfeed
routing, the last of those reversing the
left and right outputs. The longest space,
Roscoe, is a rich-sounding reverb recorded
in a Los Angeles studio belonging to one
of Bob’s friends.
Despite the apparent simplicity and
surprisingly affordable price of this plug-in,
Undulator’s modulated tremolo started
life in Eventide’s H3000 effects processor,
and essentially it combines a multitap
delay with feedback and detuning,
alongside a multi-waveform tremolo
whose depth and speed can themselves
be modulated. It can be used to add
richness or movement to guitar sounds,
pads or samples, and the effects on offer
go from subtle, textural enhancement to
very obvious rhythmic modulation.
If you’ve used other H9-series plug-ins,
Undulator will feel familiar. There are
two rows of parameter knobs, faders for
the input and output levels, three virtual
footswitches for bypass, Fast/Slow and
it’s actually quite versatile, and it sounds
great; I found it effective on vocals and
instruments as well as on drum submixes.
Of course, you get the usual wet/dry
control to balance the composite space’s
overall contribution too, so rather than
being ‘just another room reverb’ for
livening up individual parts or submixes,
these spaces can also be applied (in
moderation) to a complete mix, to add
realism and complexity without obscuring
the source material; if you’re after that
Tamla Motown ‘all recorded
in the same room’ vibe,
this plug-in will be your
new best friend. I also tried
adding it to one of my
more ambient mixes, and
it both glued the elements
together and added an
analogue-like smoothness.
Bob Clearmountain has
always appreciated the
unique nature of real spaces,
and the great thing about
this plug-in is that it allows
you to combine the best
aspects of three different and
musically excellent spaces
that are in three geographical
locations. The EQ section
can make a huge difference
to the reverberant sound, as the various
presets ably demonstrate, many using
setups that Bob used on specific records.
For example, one of the included preset
examples is the treatment for Keef’s guitar
on the Stones’ ‘Start Me Up’. In short,
if you’re looking for some fairy dust to
simply make things sound better, this
might be just what you need. Paul White
££ $49
WW https://apogeedigital.com
Tap tempo, and a ribbon controller that
allows smooth morphing between two sets
of parameter settings. The footswitches
can be controlled by MIDI if required (in
Logic Pro Undulator can be instantiated
as a MIDI-controlled effect as well as
a standard insert). To program the ribbon,
you drag the white dot at the tip of any
knob to the required position for the
left-hand side of the ribbon, which shows
a blue arc from the initial knob position
to the programmed knob position. Then
drag the blue dot at the opposite side
of the arc to the desired position for the
right side of the ribbon, and repeat for
any other controls you’d like to add. These
settings are saved as part of a user patch
and the ribbon may be controlled via
a MIDI mod wheel or joystick.
For tempo adjustment there’s Manual,
DAW sync or Off, the latter handing over
control to direct tempo value entry or the
tap-tempo switch, and there’s also a small
Retrig button that resets the tremolo
and secondary modulation LFOs to the
beginning of their cycles.
The top row of controls adjusts the wet/
dry Mix, modulation Speed and Depth,
LFO Shape (Sine, Triangle, Peak, Random,
Ramp, Square, Sample and Hold, Envelope
or ADSR), Feedback and Spread, the last
adding a little detuning to the delays,
which are otherwise fixed. If Envelope or
ADSR is selected via the Shape control, the
modulation is controlled by the amplitude
of the audio input, and the Speed control
changes to Sensitivity.
On the row below are the secondary
modulation controls, which again offer
a choice of waveforms or an ADSR or
IK Multimedia Z-Tone Buffer
Boost & Z-Tone DI
Variable Impedance Guitar Preamps
Electric guitars with passive pickups are
fickle things, as their sound is affected by
the load they drive (the impedance of the
connecting cable and the input impedance
of the amplifier or pedal to which they’re
connected), and this loading not only results
in HF loss but it also affects the resonant
frequency of the pickups.
IK Multimedia’s Z-Tone products puts
the user in control of these variables,
by equipping a high-quality instrument
preamp with the means to adjust the input
impedance to best suit the instrument.
There are two related products on review
here, the more compact Z-Tone Buffer
Boost and the larger Z-Tone DI.
Taking the Buffer Boost first, this takes
the form of a dual footswitch stompbox.
It features a transformer-balanced, 600Ω
XLR output, with ground-lift switch, for
feeding mixers or audio interfaces. There’s
also a buffered, unbalanced quarter-inch
output jack with a 56Ω impedance. A Link
jack is wired in parallel with the guitar
input jack, and this can be used to feed the
signal on to an amp with the benefit of the
variable impedance.
The Z-Tone Buffer Boost can be powered
from a 9V battery, a 9V pedal power supply
or 48V phantom power; phantom takes
precedence over the battery when present.
envelope follower to modulate
the way the main LFO behaves.
Here, you can set how much
the secondary modulation
affects the Speed and Depth of
the main LFO.
A minor frustration with
this plug-in is that the delay
isn’t adjustable in level, so it
hovers in the background of
every patch; you can’t set up
a ‘nothing-but-tremolo’ effect.
That aside, the combination of the
delay with a little feedback and
detuning, plus tremolo, produces
a really sweet enhancement for
string patches and the like. The
secondary modulation facilities
make it possible to set up
a tremolo that changes speed according steps. Given its low cost, there’s much to
to LFO or envelope settings, while the commend this plug-in. Paul White
choice of waveforms offers a wide palette, ££ Mac/Windows version $19. iOS
ranging from smooth, sine-wave tremolo version $7.99.
to choppy square or sample and hold WW www.eventideaudio.com
Its preamp can be switched
from JFET to Pure. The
JFET mode, which uses
a discrete junction gate
field-effect transistor, adds
a little harmonic colour,
whereas the Pure mode
sounds very clean.
The preamp can be
switched to suit passive
or active pickups too
— the latter have a lower
impedance than passive
ones and aren’t affected
by load impedance in
the same way. In Active
mode, the Z-Tone
control, which adjusts the
impedance between 1MΩ
and 2.2kΩ, is bypassed and
a fixed 20kΩ impedance is
employed instead.
There are just three
knobs to adjust: Gain, which
works on the input; the
Z-Tone Sharp/Bold knob, which controls the has the same core control and connectivity
impedance; and Boost, which can add up options as the Buffer Boost. Additionally,
to 10dB of gain. The leftmost footswitch is it has a switchable 20dB pad that also
Bypass, and the rightmost one brings in the bypasses the Z-Tone variable impedance
Boost. Both have status LEDs. control when in use, for when you need
Conceptually similar, but presented in a more conventional DI box to use with
a DI-box format without the footswitches or higher-level sources.
boost option, the Z-Tone DI has a choice of Both units offer a frequency response
battery or phantom power operation, and that’s flat to within 1dB from 5Hz to 30kHz.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 141
 ON TEST

The dynamic Range is quoted as better than
114dBA for both outputs.
I tested both units with guitar and bass,
with interesting results in both cases. At the
full 1MΩ end of the impedance control, the
sound was much the same as going into
the high-impedance input of a typical audio
interface, which is a sound that I often find
slightly thin and lacking in weight. Go to
the other extreme and you lose about half
your level, and the result sounds quite dull;
it won’t be your go-to setting but may be
useful in some situations. The Goldilocks
zone lies somewhere between the two
extremes, and when I found it the bass
sound warmed up slightly and my DI’d
Strat sounded just that bit more solid,
with a less ‘glassy’ high end. The choice of
Pure or JFET modes brings about a subtle
difference in tone, but it’s useful one.
I generally preferred the more ‘organic’
sound of the JFET option.
As a solution to fine-tuning guitar and
bass sounds prior to DI’ing, both units do
an effective job, and both are very solidly
built too. In a live performance situation,
the pedal version would be more practical,
as it allows both for bypassing and adding
boost. But either would do a fine job in the
studio. Paul White
££ Z-Tone Buffer Boost €207.39. Z-Tone DI
€182.99. Prices include VAT.
WW www.ikmultimedia.com

Soundevice Digital SubBass leaves that large and enigmatic

Doctor 808
Sub-bass Generator Plug-in
As its name might suggest, SubBass
Doctor 808 is particularly well suited
to EDM drum processing but it has
applications in other genres too. It
supports the common Mac and Windows
formats, and Authorisation is via
a personalised key file, so you can install it
on all your machines.
SubBass Doctor 808 is designed
to add sub-bass to sounds that already
reside in the low-frequency register.
As the information provided with the
plug-in doesn’t say what frequencies are
generated, I checked with a spectrum
analyser, which showed that almost all the
added information was sub-50Hz, which
is sub indeed!
The resizable GUI sports five knobs,
plus metering for the input and output,
but as two of the knobs set the input and
output levels, there are only three that
are used to tweak the effect itself: Sat%,
Cure and Sub.
Sat% adds saturation, but only to very
low frequencies, so its effect is more to
compress and enrich rather than to add
obvious dirt. It works in parallel with the
sub generator. Sub simply regulates the
level of the sub component that’s being
added back into the signal path, which
Cure knob in the middle of
the window. The manual says
rather vaguely that it provides
‘Frequency solving of your
bass’, so I had to resort again to
a spectrum analyser. From what
I could see, it shapes the added
sub-bass component and
reduces the level of extremely
low (sub-sub?) frequencies that
might otherwise induce a panic
attack in your speakers. A call
to the designer confirmed that
it helps tame what’s going
on below 40Hz, but that it
also has some effect on the
harmonic structure.
The ‘how does it sound?’ question compromising the overall sense of clarity in
rather depends on the frequency range of the sound. By combining the Sat and Sub
your listening system, as the synthesized processes, you can add serious weight to
frequencies that are added will be below bass sounds and, unlike some other sub
the range of some smaller speakers; you processors I’ve tried, the control range
may have to resort to headphones and prevents you from adding too much or
meters to find out what’s really going on. processing frequencies that are best left
Unless the sound being processed is pretty alone. That being the case, it’s pretty
deep-sounding to begin with, little or difficult to make this plug-in sound bad
nothing seems to be added, so this really is and those creating EDM for reproduction
a treatment for kicks and bass instruments. on club sound systems will find a lot to
Those caveats aside, though, like here. The plug-in comes with a set of
SubBass Doctor 808 produces very presets, of course, but with so few controls
smooth-sounding, natural results, you barely need them. Paul White
and I really like the way the saturation ££ £52 including VAT.
section helps to beef things up without WW https://unitedplugins.com

Neunaber Wet Reverberator Reverb Plug-in
Just when I thought the last thing the world needed was yet
another reverb plug-in, Neunaber came along with something
a little different. Neunaber are best known for their high-end
guitar reverb effects pedals, but they’ve now ported their reverb
algorithm into software, to create the Wet Reverberator plug-in
(VST2.4, VST3, AU and AAX formats) for Mac and Windows.
Authorisation is via a license key code, which removes the time
restriction from the otherwise fully functional demo .
Neunaber tell us that Wet Reverberator is based on an
algorithm that has been refined over the last 10 years and is
used in their Immerse Reverberator MkII pedal. The plug-in,
though, has an expanded feature set. Currently (v1) the plug-in
is stereo-in, stereo-out only. So if you want to use it on a mono
source in Logic Pro X (the DAW I used to test it), it’s necessary
to set the track to stereo and to insert a Direction Mixer plug-in
before Wet Reverberator, with the width set to zero to place the
dry sound in the centre; otherwise the dry sound only comes out
of one channel. I’m told this will be resolved in a future update.
The GUI is clearly laid out, with slider controls for the values and
a very useful Visualiser in the middle of the screen that shows both
the current EQ settings and the reverb’s density as it decays. To the
left of the screen under the Size and Shape heading are four faders

142 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

HOME RECORDING... SOLVED.

JOHN LENNON SONGWRITING CONTEST WINNER, CARLA HASSETT (Jazz Category)

WITH HER NEW B16 MOTHERSHIP HOME RECORDING SOLUTION

B16 Motherboards: B4 MIC/LINE Daughter Card Features: B22 ORCA Control Room Monitor Features:
• BMB1 - Avid DigiLink • 4-channel MIC/LINE ADC • Audiophile attenuator
• BMB2 - MADI • NextGen Analog BOPA14 • 2 stereo speaker outputs and 1 headphone output
• BMB3 - Dante • NEW BX6 input transformers • 2 DAC channels with switchable BX5 transformers
• BMB4 - SoundGrid • ADC filter select • NextGen Analog BOPA14 or BOPA11
• BMB5 - USB 2.0
• BMB6 - AES/UBU

GET IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME.

BURLACTICUS
R E C O R D I N G C O M PA N Y MADE IN THE USA BURLAUDIO.COM
 ON TEST

which control Mix, Delay (pre-delay), which affect the way it works on signals
Attack and Decay. Attack smooths out within the reverb algorithms and it’s most
the onset of reverb to soften transients evident at long decay times; you just pick
such as heard in picked guitar or drums. which works best.
Decay covers an enormous range Sonically, Wet Reverberator is a gift
from room ambience to near-infinite to anyone into ambient music, as it is
cavern-like drones. possible to create lush washes that don’t
EQ is provided via sliding first-order overpower the dry sound. But at shorter
low-cut and high-cut filters, and there’s decay settings it also fares well in most
also an EQ tilt control that pivots conventional applications. It’s difficult to
around 500Hz. Below the Visualiser quantify just what makes a reverb sound
display there are two further sliders good, but this one is a bit special. I don’t
for setting the damping frequency and often use bit reduction, but it can be
attenuation to emulate the way reverb useful here if you want to add a bit of dirt
decays in a real space. to short snare reverbs and the like. I hope
To the right is a modulator section that at some point Neunaber also decide
and a Fidelity section where you can to port their Shimmer Reverb algorithms
apply bit-reduction and control the stereo width from mono to to a plug-in format, but in the meantime you can get pretty close to
extra wide. The LFO-based modulation has controls for Rate that effect by using Wet Reverberator in an aux send, and putting
and Pitch, and while it isn’t possible to turn the modulation off, an octave-up pitch-shifter set to a 50-percent wet/dry mix in front of
the effect of modulation can be set to a minimum by setting it. I’m sure this will become one of my go-to reverbs. Paul White
the Modulation Controls to ‘LFO: 1’, with rate and pitch at their ££ £38.70 including VAT.
minimum settings. There’s a choice of two LFO configurations WW https://neunaber.net

Sugar Bytes Looperator For iPad continues. It is,

Step-based Multi-effects Processor
Sugar Bytes have acquired a loyal following
for their undoubtedly leftfield, quirky
and sometimes just a bit bonkers line of
desktop plug-ins. To their credit they’re
one of few desktop developers who have
fully embraced the mobile music-making
environment, and they’ve brought many of
their popular desktop plug-ins to iOS.
The latest to undergo this journey is
Looperator, a ‘free to try’ download from
the App Store, whose full feature set can
be unlocked if you like what you see/hear
via an in-app purchase. The app requires
an iPad running iOS 12 or later, and works
both standalone and as an AUv3 plug-in.
MIDI Learn, Ableton Link and cloud-based
preset sharing are also supported.
As far as I can see, the iPad version
of Looperator is pretty much a complete
port of the desktop version I reviewed
in SOS November 2015 (https://sosm.
ag/sugar-bytes-looperator). To recap the
underlying concept, you feed Looperator
an audio source, which it will then slice
into 16 steps. For each step, you can
apply a series of effects that include filters,
stutters, slices, distortion, tape stops,
volume modulation and looping. Based
on whatever step length you specify, the
pattern of step-based effects is then cycled
in sync with the tempo (of the standalone
app or your AUv3 host) while playback
of the audio source (live or prerecorded)
frankly, super cool,
and particularly good
for creating rhythmic
effects to spice up
your latest electronic
music mix.
As on the desktop
version, the main
display shows the
waveform of your
incoming audio and
the six available
‘lanes’ of effects
that can be applied. Each lane focuses
on a specific collection of effects and, at
any step, your audio is processed from
top-to-bottom in the effects chain. Lanes
can be reordered, though, and you can also
adjust the wet/dry balance in various ways.
There’s an impressive range of general
presets to get you started, as well as
presets for each of the various effects types.
However, you can also define your own
user effects in each lane. As this seems to
be a pretty complete port, interested users
might want to dip into the SOS archives and
read the more in-depth desktop review, but
the bottom line is that Looperator provides
a huge range of creative effects options.
While the functionality of the plug-in
mirrors that of the desktop, the experience
of using it on an iPad under iOS is rather
different, of course. First, I experienced
absolutely no problems using the app either
standalone or as an AUv3 plug-in hosted by
Cubasis 3.1. The UI is very nicely designed,
and there are plenty of things to touch;
if your AUv3 host allows you to switch it
to a full-screen display as you tweak (as
Cubasis does), exploring Looperator’s
many creative options is a much more
satisfying experience.
Beyond that, I can only repeat what
I said when reviewing the desktop version.
While Looperator can do subtle if required,
it excels in those attention-grabbing special
effects that provide a production-style sonic
hook for your track. In this role, it’s a heck of
a lot of fun. It might not appeal so much to
singer-songwriter types, but if your musical
muse lies in any form of electronic music,
and you like to spice up your mixes with
some creative effects, Looperator is well
worth exploring. John Walden
££ Free to try; £17.99 in-app purchase to
unlock full feature set.
WW https://sugar-bytes.de

144 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

 VIDEO DOCUMENTARY ORIGINAL S

IN ASSOCIATION WITH

Pete Cannon: Producing Jungle

The sound of jungle is intrinsically linked with the computers and samplers of the ‘80s and ‘90s.
In the latest SOS Video Feature, we talk to jungle producer Pete Cannon about how
and why he’s still using Akais, Ataris and Amigas.

www.youtube.com/soundonsoundvideo
 ON TEST
Sample Logic
Cinematic Guitars Motion
Kontakt Instrument
HHHHH
Sample Logic’s Cinematic Guitars series is a
well‑established part of many a media composer’s
sonic arsenal. Built around sample sets derived
pretty much exclusively from guitar sources, the
front end combines ‘quad core’ sample playback
(four sample engines can be combined in a single
preset), sophisticated effects for each core and
a master effects chain, step-based control of
both effects and pattern/arpeggiation plus an
XY pad to create additional sonic motion, and
that can also be animated. Shipping with massive
collections of presets, and tools for randomising
sound creations so something new can always sit
under your fingertips, they have supplied many a
cue for films and TV shows.
The latest iteration of the franchise is
Cinematic Guitars Motion and users of the earlier
titles (such as Cinematic Guitars Infinity, reviewed
in the December 2015 issue of SOS) will find lots
that’s familiar in terms of workflow. However, this
time around, Sample Logic have brought the UI
bang up to date, made some changes under the
hood, enhanced various aspects of the feature
set and, of course, built the latest title from a
brand‑new 33GB library of samples.
Requiring a full version of Kontakt 5.8.1 or
later, it has to be said that CGM is an impressive
beast. With over 850 instruments and presets
included, there is plenty to explore even before
you dig into the multitude of possibilities
offered by the powerful front end. The ‘motion’
part of the title is apt as many of these presets
make very good use of the step-based pattern
features, the effects and the XY controller that
can adjust the blend between the four sound
cores in real time. And, while I was perhaps a
bit surprised that the new and improved preset
browser didn’t include a ‘rhythmic’ tag amongst
its other useful descriptors, as so many of the
preset sounds offer rhythmic elements — either
via note arpeggiation or step-based effects
— CGM can easily set the pace of a cue as well
as create its harmonic/melodic properties.
146 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
SAMPLE LIBRARIES
There are lots of presets here that could
easily generate a complete short cue without
the need for any other sound sources.
Whether used for tension, action, drama or
more melancholic and calm moods, CGM is a
powerful tool once you dig in. Perhaps the
only other thing to note is that,
while there are plenty of organic
types of sounds included, this is
perhaps more of an electronic
or synthetic sound source.
It could, however, easily be
combined with more traditional
orchestral‑type sounds.
As with earlier Cinematic
Guitars titles, pricing suggests
this is targeted at the working
media composer and, if that’s
you, and deadlines are always short, then
Cinematic Guitars Motion will most certainly
warrant serious consideration. Hefty in size and
price but matched by some equally hefty sonic
possibilities. John Walden
$349.99
www.samplelogic.com
Orchestral Tools
Tableau Solo Strings
Sine Player
HHHH
This tasteful library is the flagship of the
Organic Samples range, created by young
composer Maxime Luft in conjunction with the
Orchestral Tools samplemeisters. Tableau Solo
Strings (60GB) consists of violin, viola and cello
solo instruments recorded at the Teldex Scoring
Stage, Berlin, from five mic positions. The same
hall and miking scheme are used in Orchestral
Tools’ other collections, so these solo strings
should fit nicely into the family. The instruments
may be bought separately, or together as a
discounted bundle.
The violin samples were performed by Farida
Rustamova on a 1745 Guarneri instrument.
Despite its antiquity, the old fiddle sounds full of
life. Its rich, vibrant, singing tone is ideally suited
to melodic playing, and its swooping portamento
slides are a joy. Long notes are played in a
variety of attacks, with and without vibrato.
You can’t crossfade between the two, which
is a pity. While the player’s strong, expressive
vibrato style is great for stirring romantic lead
lines and dramatic themes, I found
it a touch overbearing for simple
folk melodies.
This solo cello’s liquid-sounding
legatos and soaring portamentos
are a pleasure to play, and its
reflective, noble tone is a
great melodic resource.
Cellist Vasily Bystroff also
turns in some brilliant,
biting and visceral short
notes; when he digs
into his louder spiccato
deliveries, you can
almost see the rosin
flying off the bow. In an
unusual twist, the cello’s
trills and tremolos start
slowly and gather pace, adding
a mobile expressive element to
standard articulations.
My ‘best in show’ award goes
to the viola. Played by Alejandro
Regueira, this superb instrument’s
short spiccatos range from light,
insistent brushes to a furiously
emphatic bowing, a great
articulation for driving ostinatos.
The viola’s dark, mellow tone also
works a treat for stately heroic
themes and slow-moving ballads;
its legatos are less adaptable to
fast playing, but if you’re prepared
to massage your MIDI notes after
the event, they can produce good
melodic results. On the downside,
the note attacks of the non-vibrato
articulations are generally slower
than those of the vibrato samples,
which can be a problem when
combining both in a melody.
All instruments utilise a superior
VSL‑style legato mode, and play
sustains, marcatos, pizzicatos,
tremolos, semitone trills and four
types of mordent grace note.
These solo strings are beautifully
recorded and played with great
commitment, and the samples
successfully capture the personality
of each player.
On a technical note, the library
runs on Orchestral Tools’ free Sine
Player, which connects to the company’s online
store and allows you to download instruments
and mic positions, rather than waiting for the
whole shooting match to trickle down the wire.
It’s a great innovation which allows buyers to
get straight to work with these classy samples.
Dave Stewart
€119
www.orchestraltools.com
Sonic Atoms
Baltic Shimmers
Omnisphere Expansion
HHHH
Originally developed for use with the free Halion
Sonic SE 3.4 sample player, Baltic Shimmers
is now also available as an expansion pack for
Spectrasonics Omnisphere and is described by
its Polish creators as a collection of ambient
sounds inspired by the sea. Sound sources
include the sea, birds, acoustic and electronic
musical instruments, and a lot of processing,
which apparently includes recording many of the
sounds to tape. While the sounds were created
with film and game scoring in mind, they also
work well on minimalist music.
The instruments are categorised as Shimmers,
Pads and Drones, each with its own set of
presets. In all there are 144 presets and the pack
includes around half a Gigabyte of samples.
Sounds in the Shimmer category can be made
to morph in three stages from a fairly static
sound into something more motional, which
the designers suggest is the equivalent of
going from a clean sea to waves or foam. Some
work as evolving pads while others are better
played as single notes. Sounds in the Drones
section can vary in level, timbre and sometimes
pitch as they evolve, so they are best suited to
single‑note work. These vary from
tranquil to mildly disturbing. Drones
work best played monophonically
and tend to evolve over a long
period, which can be extended by
applying modulation.
Pad sounds are made up from
three layers, the first two of which
are long, textural sounds played
either forwards or backwards, while
the third is a sea type of sound
triggered when the key is released.
I found that Omnisphere’s Orb provides an easy
way to add further dynamic variation to the
sounds. The mod wheel generally affects patches
by changing their level or character. Some of the
patches have an element of cloudiness about
them while others pulsate and flow.
Many of the sounds make ideal beds
for minimalist music with the long, evolving
sequences keeping things interesting without
being too attention grabbing. If you
make relaxation music, then head
for the Pads section — just add a
reverb‑soaked piano melody and
you’re home.
All the sounds have an organic
quality about them. You wouldn’t
generally use these types of sound
to play melodies, but the pads work
well for sparsely voiced chords. You
can also create your own sounds
by taking layers from the different
presets and recombining them so
there’s plenty of scope to push the
boundaries if you don’t mind a little
light editing. Similarly, changing
Omnisphere’s filter settings, using
the Orb or changing effects helps
ring the changes. Given its low
cost and the high quality of the
sounds on offer, Baltic Shimmers
is perfect for its original game and
film design brief but it also has a
role to play in experimental, chillout
and minimalist ambient music
composition. Paul White
£34.99
www.timespace.com
Ergo Kukke
Trails
Kontakt Instrument
HHHHH
Designed by musician/composer
Ergo Kukke, and available via
Kontakt Hub, Trails is perhaps best
described as a blend of playable
instrument, rhythm/pulse creation
and abstract sound design. The
library is primarily aimed
at media composers,
so if ‘epic cinematic
composition meets
sound design’ is your
thing, Trails has the
potential to appeal.
Sonically, Trails is
built from nearly 13GB
of sampled sounds and
ships with a powerful,
custom-built Kontakt
(v.5.8.1 or later required) front
end. The 270+ Snapshot presets
are divided into five categories —
Atmospheres, FX, Menus, Oneshots
and Rhythmic — although each uses
the same UI. Like a number of other
current composer-targeted tools,
Trails features a multicore sound
engine, allowing you to blend up
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
to four of the underlying samples. The interface
is laid out in a very logical fashion, with the four
sound engines arranged around a central XY pad
that allows you to adjust the blend between them,
either manually or via automation configured on
the Movement Page. Other pages of controls
provide access to the comprehensive effects and
modulation options.
Within the Main page, each of the four sound
engines are identical. All the usual features are
present, including a drop-down menu for sound
selection, basic mixing/tuning features, an ADSR
envelope, multimode filter and three‑band
EQ. It’s straightforward in operation but, by
the time you combine all these options, you
have some mightily impressive sound‑design
possibilities. If you need some help, Trails includes
a randomisation system that operates at multiple
levels. This is actually very well implemented.
Of course, this would all be so much fluff if
the sounds themselves were anticlimactic; that’s
absolutely not the case as, once you dig in,
Trails sounds fabulous. Given the five different
categories of sounds, a few instances of Trails
is really all you need to create your next epic
cinematic music/sound-design crossover cue.
The potential for pads/atmospheres is huge,
the sound effects and one-shots make it easy to
add tension and resolution, and there is enough
melodic potential to make it genuinely musical
(as opposed to pure sound design). For drama,
sci-fi, horror or otherworldly atmospheres, Trails
provides a very creative toolset.
Perhaps the only downside is the price, and
while that might be beyond some, it’s still very
competitive given the products it is competing
with. If you want a cinematic sound-design/
compositional tool that does dark, moody,
impactful and atmospheric, and are prepared to
look beyond the usual suspects for something
a little different, then Trails Cinematic Visions is
most certainly worth auditioning. John Walden
£174.50
www.kontakthub.com
Audio examples of this month’s libraries are
available at www.soundonsound.com.
147
 T E C H N I Q U E / D I G I TA L P E R F O R M E R

Beats Of Burden
The latest version of DP includes some powerful timing
& tempo-manipulation tools.
MIKE LEVINE

D
igital Performer
has long had
excellent features
for manipulating beats and
tempo. With the arrival of
DP10, those capabilities have
been significantly upgraded.
This month we’ll look at
some tips for using DP’s
beat‑detection, time-stretching
and tempo-related features.
The new Stretch Edit
Layer, which is available in
both the Sequence Editor
and Waveform Editor, takes
advantage of the new Beat
Detection Engine introduced
in DP10 to offer additional functionality for
editing beats and changing tempos.
You can turn on Stretch functionality for
an audio track by going to its Track Settings
Menu in the Sequence Editor and selecting
Stretch. Even if the audio you’re importing
doesn’t have embedded tempo information,
DP will automatically conform the audio
in the track to fit the project tempo. This
feature will work whether you’re using the
Tempo Slider or the Conductor Track.
The most obvious use for setting
a track to Stretch is to bring in sounds
from outside the project, such as loops,
The Beats layer in DP10’s Waveform Editor.
and conform them to the project tempo.
If you Stretch-enable all the audio tracks in
a project, you can freely change the project
tempo; all the tracks will automatically
adjust along with the changes. Stretch will
even follow multiple tempo changes in the
conductor track. The quality of the ZTX Pro
time-stretching technology that DP employs
is excellent and flexible, so it can be applied
to all types of audio material.
If you know in advance that you’re going
to be experimenting with song tempo, it’s
easiest to go to Preferences / Pitch and
Stretch, and check Stretch Enable in the
Default Options for Tracks in New Projects
When Stretch is enabled on audio tracks, you can
add tempo changes in the Conductor Track, such
as the ritardando at the end of this song.
and Default Options for Tracks in Current
Project categories. That way, every track
you create will be Stretch Enabled from
the start.
Tempo Changes
You can use the Stretch capabilities of audio
tracks, in conjunction with the Conductor
Track, to program in tempo changes, such as
a ritardando or accelerando, or to just add
some slight tempo variations into a song
recorded to a click. This gives you a lot of
arrangement flexibility in a mix or
remix situation. To do this, first check
that all your audio tracks are set to
Stretch in the Track Settings Menu.
Next, make sure your tempo is being
controlled by the Conductor Track.
If not, make a note of the song’s
bpm setting, and hold down the
disclosure arrow to the right of the
Tempo Slider and change it to the
Conductor Track.
DP’s tempo will change to the
default of 120. Open the Conductor
Track in the Event List and put in
a tempo change at bar 1:1:000.
If you don’t remember what the
original tempo was, you can quickly
switch back to the Tempo Slider to

148 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

see and then return to the Conductor Track
and enter it in the Event List.
Next, find the spot in the song where
you want to change the tempo. Say
you want to add a ritardando in the last
measure, ending on the last beat. Go to
Project / Conductor Track / Change Tempo,
and use the Change Tempo dialogue box
to program the change in. Alternatively, you
can use the Pencil Tool and draw it into the
conductor track. Hit Play and you’ll hear all
the audio and MIDI tracks follow the tempo
change. Adjust as needed.

A Stretch In Time
You can also manually stretch beats
to correct or change a part, either in
the Waveform Editor, which has been
reorganised and spruced up in DP10,
or in the Sequence Editor. The process
works best for small corrections. Once you
Using the Stretch Edit Layer, you can manually
start dragging beats too far, you’ll notice drag audio in time to make changes or
impact which beats are detected when you
degradation of their transients and impact corrections to the rhythm. increase the threshold. Drag the handles on
the timing of surrounding notes. One thing the beats down to reduce their velocity. You
that helps is to experiment with different From there, you could use the Quantize can also add beats with the Pencil Tool or
Snap-to-Grid settings when you’re making command set to Soundbites to correct or delete them with the Mute Tool.
the adjustments. The larger the note value change the part. Or you could drag the Remember that, unlike the Stretch
in the grid, the more any stretches you make newly separated Soundbites manually to layer in the Waveform Editor (or Sequence
will impact surrounding beats. where you want them. Another reason to Editor), editing beats doesn’t alter the audio
Beats are bordered on either side by make Soundbites from the beats is to create directly. What you’re editing is a map of the
a red line that represents their Anchor samples to load in a sampler instrument positions of the beats in a Soundbite, which
Points. You can move these around if you such as DP’s Model 12. DP will use as reference when performing
need more control over what gets stretched You can also switch the Waveform editor beat and tempo operations.
on either side of the beat. Hover over the to show beats, and edit them if needed,
line until you see a bi-directional arrow, and before separating a Soundbite by its beats
MIDI Beats
then drag in either direction. or using another beat operation. You can Another trick the Beat Detection Engine
Another option for time-correcting even raise and lower beat velocity, which will can perform is to covert beats into MIDI
beats is to use the Region / Quantize /
Beats Within Soundbites command, which
allows you to quantise both audio and MIDI
material together in one operation. Just like
with quantising MIDI, the key to successful
results is to set the parameters such as Grid
Value, Sensitivity and Strength, so that you
get just enough time correction without
removing the feel.

Bite Me
An alternative method for manipulating
beats is to use the Audio / Audio Beats /
New Soundbites option from the Beats
menu to create new Soundbites based
on the audio beats in the original. These
new Soundbites will start precisely on their
initial transients.
When you select New Soundbites, you’ll
get a dialogue box with a Beats Strength
Threshold slider, which will adjust the
sensitivity of the beat detection. If too many
beats are being detected, push the slider Using the New Soundbites from Beats command, a single Soundbite has been cut into many smaller
more to the right. ones, all starting right on the beat.

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 149

 T E C H N I Q U E / D I G I TA L P E R F O R M E R
TIME-STRETCHING

information. To do this, select the Soundbite

with the beats you want to convert
and go to Audio / Audio Beats / Copy
Beats as MIDI.
You could use this function in several
different ways. Say you’ve got an audio
percussion track that has a nice groove to it,
but the sound or instrument is wrong. You
could convert it to MIDI and use a sample
of a different percussion instrument. Bear in
mind, though, that because beats have no
pitch information, the MIDI track you create
with the Copy Beats as MIDI command
will all be on one note: C3. You’ll almost
certainly have to go in and do some editing
of the pitches to get them to trigger the
desired sound.
You could even use it on an audio drum
loop that you want to convert to MIDI. The
transposition would be time-consuming
for a song-length part, but if you’re just
The MIDI notes in the track here were extracted
converting a loop of a few bars, it only takes from the drum track above them using the Copy patterns of transients. Just because you
a minute or two. Beats as MIDI command. see a considerable number of beats inside
a measure, that won’t necessarily create
Adding A Click Soundbite Tempo. If you don’t have the problems for tempo analysis. That said,
You can also tap into the power of DP10’s tempo set on the Conductor Track, you’ll there are some songs where you’ll have
new Beat Detection Engine to create a click get a dialogue box asking if you want to do some additional editing. You might
track and grid for a piece of music recorded to switch to the Conductor Track or stay need to insert meter changes to match any
with no tempo reference. The process works with the Tempo Slider and use an average that may be in your song. You also might
best on music with a prominent tempo and setting. Choose the Conductor Track option find that DP analysed your song’s tempo
without rubato sections. For this operation, for the most accurate results. Listen with correctly but made the click twice as fast
open a new sequence, and import the mix the click turned on to see how well things or twice as slow as you want a quarter-note
onto a new track. are lining up. value to be. In those situations, try selecting
If the music in your file has a pickup, DP’s Beat Detection Engine is smart Audio / Audio Tempo / Halve Soundbite
so that the first hit isn’t on beat 1, you’re enough to be able to figure out a tempo Tempo, or Audio / Audio Tempo / Double
best off temporarily cutting the Soundbite from beats even when it’s showing intricate Soundbite Tempo.
to remove the pickup. In order to make You can do further manual adjustments,
the tempo-detection process line up if necessary, using DP’s Adjust Beats feature,
The tempos on the right were calculated by DP
with the measures in the timeline, the to create a tempo grid for this song, which was which is accessed via Conductor Track /
downbeat of the first full measure of music recorded without a click. Adjust Beats.
needs to start at the
beginning of a bar.
Cut right on the line
indicating the detected
beat, then place it
at the beginning of
the measure where
you want it (typically
2:1:000). Make sure
that it’s precisely
located by opening
the Event List for
that track and, if
necessary, typing in the
correct location.
Next, select Audio
/ Audio Tempo /
Analyze Audio Tempo.
Then choose Audio
/ Audio Tempo /
Adjust Sequence to

150 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

 SUBSCRIBE and SAVE
TABLET | WEB | PRINT
PLUS BONUS PDF

1 ICONIC MAGAZINE
4 GREAT WAYS TO READ IT
TABLET - WEB - PDF - PRINT
All this for less than the price of a Coffee+Pastry each month!

Go to www.soundonsound.com/subscribe
• Go DIGITAL - get 12 monthly Tablet issues
+ all locked Web articles + monthly Full Issue
PDF download the day the issue goes live.
ADDED VALUE BONUS!
Every Digital sub includes a 5‑device licence to
our App: mix and match across iOS/Android
tablets for convenient access.

• Go PRINT+DIGITAL - get the best of both ONLY READING SOS IN PRINT?

worlds and save over 50%.* Choose our full Print+Digital bundle
for unlimited 24/7 access.

Small Print
* The 50% discount offer is based on the UK retail price of the Print magazine,
Tablet and Web subscription when sold seperately.
Subscriptions can be cancelled at any time and you will receive a pro-rata refund for all outstanding issues.
 TECHNIQUE / REASON
External Influences
Using MIDI controllers with Reason.
SIMON SHERBOURNE
I
’m increasingly turning to hardware
sequencers to make music, but even
when I’m not using Reason as a DAW
or plug-in it’s still my favourite sound
module. Reason has two completely
different systems for configuring MIDI
sources. This month we unpick some of
the confusion around this to find the best
ways to sequence and play Reason from
external devices.
Incoming
Most Reason users connect a keyboard
controller to play Reason’s instruments,
tweak controls and record MIDI parts into
152 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
My KeyStep Pro sequencing Rack, with a drum
machine and three synths.
the Sequencer. Unless told otherwise,
Reason assumes that a connected device
should act like a master, and will direct
all MIDI from it (regardless of channel)
to whichever track or device is selected.
You’ll find the device/port listed in
Reason’s Control Surfaces Preferences
(screen 1) under ‘Easy MIDI Inputs’.
Reason has an intelligent MIDI
control and mapping system called
Remote. Controllers that you declare for
Remote use (also in the Control Surfaces
Preferences) can take advantage of fluid
mapping of controls to Reason’s devices.
Many MIDI controllers have predefined
Screen 1: The Control Surfaces preferences is
where MIDI controllers are usually set up.
mapping schemes (‘Remote Codecs’) that
Reason uses for this purpose.
This is in line with how most DAWs
work, but alongside this Reason has
a separate direct MIDI routing system
specifically for patching incoming MIDI
channels directly to devices in the Rack.
This method is great for connecting
an external sequencer, or for using the
Reason Rack purely as a multitimbral
sound module.
MIDI Patchbay
The direct MIDI routing system lets you
elect up to four MIDI ports to appear on
a virtual MIDI interface at the top of the
Reason Rack. These are chosen in the
Sync tab of Reason’s Preferences, under
the External Control heading (screen
2). Simply choose MIDI ports from the
pop-up lists next to each the four buses.
Next, go to the Rack, scroll to the
Hardware Interface at the very top, and
show the Advanced MIDI panel (screen
3). The panel has four buttons for viewing
the busses (MIDI Ports), with panes for
the individual channels. The pop-ups
list every device in the Rack, and set
the routing target for each incoming
MIDI channel. Note that Mix Channels
modules are shown as well as instruments

Screen 2: Ports you want to appear in the MIDI
Rack Interface are selected in the External
Control section of the Sync Preferences.
and effects (so that you can automate
them from external CC sources). There’s
often some overlap in device names,
so be careful that you’re routing to the
right place.
The main screen shows the Rack I’ve
set up for sequencing with an Arturia
KeyStep Pro, which has four channels.
A Kong drum machine is patched to the
Lock Box
Using Reason’s External Control system is not
the only way to directly patch MIDI to a Rack
device. MIDI controllers (or other MIDI
source ports) that are enabled in the Control
Surfaces Preferences can be Locked to a specific
device, either from the Edit menu or right-click
menu (screen 4). The port will subsequently
only communicate with that device, regardless
of Rack or track selection in Reason.
In fact, there’s a couple of notable
advantages to working this way. Firstly, you
can take advantage of the MIDI control
learning, in other words use the Remote
Override Mapping feature to control
parameters without having to look up and
configure CC values on your hardware.
Secondly, you can record into Reason tracks.
Screen 4: As an alternative to using the
Advanced MIDI Hardware Interface,
single‑channel sources can be locked to
a specific device from the right-click menu.
Screen 3: The Advanced MIDI panel of the
Rack’s Hardware Interface lets you patch
incoming MIDI channels to devices.
KeyStep’s Drum track on channel 10.
The other three synths are played by the
three Arp/Sequencer tracks available on
the keyboard.
Note On Sync
When you’re using Reason purely as
a sound module, you might not need to
sync Reason’s transport. However, you
might want to send it MIDI clock from
an external source so that synchronised
effects and modulators match your
external sequencer’s tempo. You can
choose your MIDI clock source in the Sync
Preferences, below where you set up your
control busses.
However, while you might not need
to think about timeline sync, you do
need to be aware of audio latency when
using Reason as an external sound
source. The audio buffer (in Audio
Preferencess) determines how quickly
you’ll hear a sound from Reason after it’s
triggered from your external sequencer
MIDI routed via the External Control busses
has no connection to the Sequencer, which
is a problem if you hoped to capture your
external sequences as MIDI in Reason.
So why not go this route all the time? The
answer comes down to MIDI Channels.
Connections via Remote and the Control
Surface setup page are port-based. So you
can direct or lock any MIDI port to a specific
device, but can’t specify a channel. The
External Control interface splits out each port
to multiple channels and makes them available
in the Rack. The example I’ve used here with
the KeyStep Pro would not be possible without
using the Advanced MIDI interface, as the
four sequencer channels are MIDI channels
within a single port.
Incidentally, I could set up the KeyStep Pro
as both a Remote-style master keyboard and
an External Control sequencer, but it would
require connecting it via two separate ports:
the USB, and a standard MIDI port via an
interface. I suspect I could set up some clever
filtering by connecting via a Retrokits host
like their new RK-006. With more controllers
offering both master keyboard and sequencing,
it would be great if Reason could offer channel
selection as part of its Control Surface setup.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
or controller. If this delay is a noticeable
amount, sounds triggered in Reason will
be out of time with other stuff you’re
sequencing. The simplest way to fix this
is to set the latency of your audio driver
as low as possible (I try to never go above
128 samples). Your hardware sequencer
may also have some way to offset MIDI
timing to different outputs, but this
doesn’t help with live playing.
Continuous Control
As well as note sequencing you can use
the External MIDI Bus connections for
controlling and automating Rack devices
from knobs, sliders and other MIDI CC
sources. However, because patching
via the Rack interface is not part of the
Remote system, you can’t simply map
(learn) any MIDI source to a device control
with the usual Remote Override option.
Instead, you’ll need to use the
predefined MIDI CC assignments built
into the Rack devices. You can find these
in the MIDI Implementation Chart that’s
part of Reason’s documentation. For
example, Filter A on the Malstrom synth
in my Rack responds to MIDI CC#79. The
KeyStep Pro has a dedicated controller
bank of five encoders. I configured the
first of these to send on controller 79, and
I set its MIDI channel to 4 to match the
note track patched to the Malstrom. Now
I can both sequence and automate the
synth from my hardware.
Inter-app
Traditionally, the External Control busses
have also been used to trigger Reason
from other software apps running on the
same computer, especially if they didn’t
support Rewire. The need for this has
faded with Reason becoming a plug-in:
it’s easier to run Reason’s instruments
directly inside your DAW than to set
up internal MIDI busses. However, if
you prefer to use Reason as a complex
multi-device Rack environment, the
original method may still appeal, as the
Reason plug-in can’t accept multiple
MIDI inputs. Macs have an internal MIDI
port available by default, which you can
see as IAC Driver Bus 1 in the screens.
For Windows users I’d recommend
installing loopMIDI.
153
 TECHNIQUE / PRO TOOLS

Split & Polish

We explore Avid’s Pro Multiband Splitter plug-in.
JULIAN RODGERS

I
’ve always felt the Pro Series plug-ins
from Avid are unsung heroes of the
plug-in world. They’re provided
to subscribers as part of the Pro Tools
bundle, so they are almost ubiquitous,
and they provide a definite step up in
terms of features and quality compared
to the stock plug-ins. I’ve spoken about
some of these plug-ins in the past in this
column, but one of the most useful is the
Pro Multiband Splitter. It’s a simple plug-in
— basically the same as the Pro Multiband
Dynamics processor, but without the
dynamic processing. One thing that
many people don’t realise about the
Pro Multiband Splitter is that you can
output each band to a bus and, via
that bus, to anywhere else in the mixer.
These busses are automatically created
and are accessed via the input selector
in the plug-in menu. The Multiband
Splitter gives access to these splits and
nothing else.
The Small Phases
An important point to make about both
the Pro Multiband Dynamics and the Pro
Multiband Splitter is that the filters used in
their crossovers are of the minimum‑phase
variety. Linear‑phase filters have been
available for a long time — the first
example of a phase‑linear multiband
compressor I ever used was the Waves
Linear Phase Multiband Compressor back
in the early 2000s — but the issue with
linear‑phase filters has always been that to
Loudness Analyser
Another unsung ‘utility’ plug-in in the Pro Series is the AudioSuite Loudness Analyser, which
complements the Pro Limiter very well. For anyone working to loudness standards this is a very
straightforward problem solver. Since the popular music streaming platforms started using
loudness normalisation, LUFS are no longer only relevant to those working in post production
and broadcast. If you distribute music online then understanding loudness is something you need
to think about. The Loudness Analyser offers an offline, faster‑than‑real-time measurement
of integrated loudness, as well
as peak and loudness range
measurements. While more
comprehensive third‑party tools
are available, as someone who
works to loudness standards
every day I have to say this is all
I need.
Avid’s Pro Multiband Splitter plug-in lets you
separate audio into different frequency bands and
send those bands separately to the mixer.
exhibit the phase response that they do,
they necessarily incur significant latency.
For the majority of applications the sonic
differences between a minimum‑phase
and a linear‑phase filter is subtle, but the
latency of a linear‑phase filter is large,
so in most cases, minimum-phase filters
are a perfectly acceptable compromise.
That being said, the provision of a choice
between minimum phase and linear phase
filters would be a nice option to have.
The FabFilter Pro MB is one of several
plug-ins that come to mind that offer
such a choice, but unfortunately it doesn’t
offer the option to split each band out
separately in Pro Tools.
The significance of the phase response
of the filters is that the crossover in
Pro Multiband Splitter isn’t completely
transparent, as can be demonstrated if
you try to null it against a polarity-inverted
parallel path. For most purposes this
doesn’t matter, but for processing entire
mixes it is something to be aware of. It’s not
necessarily a bad thing but, particularly if it
is being used in a parallel application, it will
colour the sound just by being there, even
before any processing has taken place.
Getting Creative
So the concept is clear, but why would
you want access to these split bands, and
are there any caveats to be aware of while
using them? The idea of inserting a flanger
on the low mids, a reverb on the top end
and Auto-Tune on the sub-bass might be
original but it’s unlikely to be useful. How
could this ability to route and process each
band separately be used to solve issues we
actually experience when mixing?
I won’t refer to any compression
examples as these might be better served
using the Pro Multiband Dynamics plug‑in.
Though the possibilities presented by
using types of compression on different
bands — for example an LA‑2A on the bass
frequencies and an 1176 on the top end
— might be interesting, they also sound like
a potential nightmare and I’m happy to stick
with a dedicated multiband compressor for
these applications. If you feel brave then

154 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

Combining Pro Multiband
Splitter with a chorus effect
applied only to the upper part
of the spectrum yields an effect
much loved by ‘80s bassists.
help yourself, but I’ll stick
with conventional wisdom.
The first non-compression
example that comes to
mind when I think of
multiband processing is
the bass chorus pedals
which I thought were so
cool in the ‘80s, but which
subsequently left me
wondering what I could
have been thinking in the
‘90s. The setup involves
a two-way split from the
bass track with a chorus
(or a flanger if you want
to go extra-gothic) on the high band only.
With the crossover frequency set correctly
this keeps the modulation away from the
fundamental but can add richness and
width to the top end — very ‘80s, just add
a fretless and you’re there!
You can achieve similar results by
high‑pass filtering a duplicate bass part and
modulating that, but this seems a better
way of doing it, since being able to mute
and solo the splits independently makes
setting the correct crossover frequency
much easier.
Beefy Kicks
A subtler application is to use a split to
saturate the bottom end of kick drums,
basses or anything which has significant
deep bass. Any plug-in which distorts
can be used, and one of the fascinating
things about distortion is how different
the characters of different plug-ins can
be on the same source. Experimentation
is definitely recommended here, but
of the stock Pro Tools plug-ins, Avid’s
Lo-Fi is an obvious contender. Leave the
Sample controls alone and experiment
with the Grunge section at the bottom.
Distort and Saturation have very different
personalities so try both. On the kick drum
I was experimenting with I found the best
results using Softube’s free Saturation
Knob plug-in.
These effects can be used in two
different ways. Adding harmonics to put
some ‘fur’ on the deep bass frequencies,
extending them up into the more audible
part of the spectrum, is particularly useful
if playback on limited‑bandwidth systems
is anticipated. And because distortion
becomes progressively more pronounced
with level, you can also use this technique
to emphasise bass transients.
Wide Open
Multiband treatments using time‑ or
gain‑based processing are ripe for
exploring, but the most consistently useful
application I’ve found is in something far
more basic: multiband panning. Many of
us have seen ‘mono-izer’-style plug-ins,
which vary the width of stereo signals with
frequency. For good reason these are
almost invariably pushing the top end wider
while narrowing the bass frequencies down
to mono. This can be achieved quite simply
in Pro Tools, with Multiband Splitter offering
a convenient way to experiment with the
width of sounds or even entire mixes. Here’s
how to do it:
• C reate a stereo Aux Input and insert Pro
Multiband Splitter on it.
• Create four more Aux Inputs to route
the splits out to. The split outputs
from the Splitter can be found under
Plug-in, below Input and Bus in the
plug-in menu.
• Name these four Auxes Low, Low Mid,
Mid High and High, and select them all.
• Holding Command+Option+Shift, select
the Low output from the splitter and
the inputs will cascade across all four
auxes in the correct order. (If you’re on
Windows, hold Control+Alt+Shift). Solo
safe these Auxes by Command‑clicking
on the solo buttons (Control‑click on
a PC) and you’ll be set up.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020
You should now have five
Aux Input tracks, and
by routing stereo audio
into Splitter it will output
through the four split
paths. You can adjust the
stereo width of different
parts of the spectrum using
the channel pan controls.
To make this easier, click
the tiny fader icon on the
right‑hand side of the
output selector in the
Mix window, or in the I/O
section of the track headers
of the Edit window. This
will open the floating fader
window, and if you tick both
the Link and the Inverse Pan
buttons (immediately to the
right of the Safe button),
then as you turn one pan
control the other moves in the opposite
direction, making it easy to experiment
with adjusting the width of each band.
Having done this I’d recommend saving
these five tracks as a track preset so they
can be recalled in a single operation with
the routing intact. Once this is done, bus
your desired signals through this setup and
experiment. One interesting area worth
investigating is using automated multiband
panning to add motion to sustained sounds
like pads and atmospheres.
There is a lot more to multiband splits
than esoteric processing choices, so try out
these ideas and see how you get on.
By ticking the Link and Inverse Pan buttons, you
can easily experiment with the width of each of
your separate frequency bands.
155
 TECHNIQUE / CUBASE
Export Duty
JOHN WALDEN
W
hile archiving your projects is
perhaps not the most exciting
aspect of working with Cubase,
you’ll one day thank your younger self for
having put in the effort, so in this month’s
column I’ll examine the archival options for
users of Cubase Elements, Artist or Pro.
Archiving isn’t just about saving your project
to another hard drive; it should ensure that
you have a backup copy should the original
project be lost or become corrupted. It
should also ensure that you can access your
project even without the current versions of
Cubase or the plug-ins you used.
The first step is to decide on the
balance between your desired degree of
future-proofing and the time and effort
required to achieve it. I tend towards
pragmatism rather than perfectionism, and
will focus on the former here. But hopefully
there will be enough ideas here that
you can develop a more comprehensive
strategy if you prefer.
All Backed Up
A sensible first step is to create a
self-contained backup copy of a project
that would restore the project on your own
host system in the event of data loss. It’s
a two-step process and can be done in an
identical fashion in Pro, Artist and Elements.
156 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Future-proof your projects in Cubase.
First, execute the Media/Prepare Archive
command. This will check whether all files
referenced by your project reside in the
project folder, and will place copies of them
in there if not. Second, from the menu,
select File/Back Up Project, and you’ll be
prompted to specify a new folder for the
backup copy. A few tickbox options dictate
exactly what gets placed in the new folder.
Minimise Audio Files (only copy those
portions of any audio files actually used on
the timeline) and Remove Unused Files will
help keep your backup compact. Provided
everything else (plug-ins, sample content
locations) remains the same on your host
system, this backup project should open
fully intact and ready to go if your original
working copy is lost.
The Future Is Now
While useful in the short term, the above
process won’t protect you from plug-ins
that might go missing in the longer term.
The most straightforward insurance against
this problem is to render all the project’s
audio and virtual instruments tracks as
audio files, with all channel-level processing
included. If you like, you can do the same
with all the channel processing bypassed,
so you have a version of your audio files
with any edits, for example, but free from
processing, which is handy if you want to
revamp your project in the future.
What follows will work in all versions
of Cubase. It’s a little clunky, though,
and users of Pro have a better option in
the Export Audio Mixdown dialogue, on
which more later. First, save a copy of
your project with a suitable ‘version for
future-proofing’ name. If the Freeze button
isn’t already visible, right-click on any track
in the Track List to open the Track Controls
Panel and make it visible for both Audio
If you are not using Cubase Pro, a workaround
combining the track Freeze and Audio
Mixdown dialogue features can let you create
an audio-only render of all audio and virtual
instrument tracks within a project.
and MIDI tracks. Track freezing is actually
designed for reducing CPU loads, but it
also happens to create an audio render of
the frozen track, and places this in a new
folder (sensibly named Freeze) in your main
Project folder. The render file ‘captures’
both the audio and the results of any
channel processing, but there is a catch.
In order to keep the file sizes compact,
the Freeze function only captures those
sections of your track where something
is actually happening, and without a little
further intervention before freezing, the
format of these renders doesn’t really meet
our ‘archiving’ needs.
For audio tracks, the workaround is
simple. First, find a short (a single bar or
beat) section of one of your audio tracks
that contains silence. Second, copy this
clip to the very start of every audio track
that doesn’t already start at bar 1, beat 1.
Third, select all the audio events on a track
(or tracks; you can handle multiple tracks
simultaneously) and from the file menu
execute Audio/Bounce Selection. This
replaces all the separate audio events on
each track with a single contiguous event
starting at bar 1, beat 1. Finally, if you now
Freeze each audio track, the Freeze files
will all start from bar 1, beat 1 and can be
dragged into a new project.
For virtual instrument tracks, a different
workaround is required, and must be done
one track at a time. In the MixConsole,
make sure the output of every virtual
Pro’s Audio Mixdown
includes batch processing,
making it easier to create a
render of all the audio and
virtual instrument tracks
within a project.
instrument track is set to
the main Stereo Output.
Next, bypass any plug-ins
on the Stereo Output
bus (so you don’t end up
capturing a ‘mastered’
version of the instrument’s
audio). Then set the left
locator to bar 1, beat 1
and the right locator to a point just beyond audio) over a time range defined by the
the end of your project. left and right locators, so every audio file
Finally, one VSTi track at a time, solo the created starts at the same time point and
track and execute the File/Export/Audio is exactly the same length. You can define
Mixdown command. In the Audio Mixdown a dedicated folder for the exported files
dialogue box, specify a filename to reflect and a naming scheme that can number
the track’s contents and point the File and name the tracks. (Note that I’ve also
Path to the Freeze folder (which, assuming deselected the Create Audio Track and
you’ve already dealt with your audio tracks Insert To Pool options.) Perhaps the only
as described above, will already be there). catch is that you have to choose stereo
In the After Export section, deselect the (the default) or mono bounces; you can’t
Create Audio Track and Insert To Pool do both at once. So either choose to live
options (so you don’t get extra tracks or with stereo (no real hardship, unless you’re
audio file entries cluttering up your project) trying to create a particularly compact
and hit Export Audio. Repeat as required archive) or perform the export in a couple
for each virtual instrument track. of passes, dealing with stereo and mono
Then there’s the MIDI: the audio might (tick the Mono Downmix box) separately.
give you all you need, but you may want Either way, Pro makes this process
to consider archiving the MIDI information incredibly efficient, and for users of other
used to trigger any virtual Cubase versions, this might be reason
or hardware instruments enough to upgrade.
so that you can, for
example, choose different
Peace Of Mind
voices or layer different Yes, it’s fiddly, but if you’ve followed all
parts and so forth at these steps, you’ll have access not only
a later date. To do this go to a backup of your project, but also
to File/Export/MIDI File. a version of the project’s tracks where
You’ll find a few options you can drag and drop all the files to
here, so you should feel bar 1, beat 1 of a new project. You’ll
free to explore them, but have a pretty good working version of
the defaults should suffice. the original audio, the processed audio,
the MIDI information — including the
Go Pro? project tempo — and to virtual instrument
Cubase Pro makes this tracks. Together, these files should meet
all much easier as it pretty much any need when it comes to
allows the simultaneous resurrecting a project, be it tomorrow or
export of multiple tracks many years down the line.
(any track type that uses Whichever route you took, it’s now time
to copy your archive to an external drive,
and ideally somewhere off-site too. Next
Using the Audio Mixdown
time, I’ll expand on these ideas and look
dialogue (shown here in
Cubase Elements) allows
at additional export options to help ensure
you to render your virtual a smooth workflow when collaborating
instrument tracks to audio, with other musicians or mix engineers.
albeit one at a time. Until then, keep your data safe.
w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / September 2020 157
Q
Q What is a speaker’s
crossover
frequency?
What exactly is the crossover frequency in
studio monitors, and how much attention
do I need to pay to that spec?
Jem Goodman via email
SOS Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns
replies: Most monitor loudspeakers use
two (or more) separate loudspeaker
drivers, because it’s almost impossible
to make a single driver that can cover
the full 10-octave audio frequency
range with the kind of accuracy and
power-handling that is typically required.
So it’s common for a monitor loudspeaker
to have at least two drivers: a ‘woofer’ or
‘bass-mid’ driver, which handles the lower
frequencies, and a ‘tweeter’ to handle
the higher frequencies. This would be
called a ‘two-way’ monitor speaker, but
there are also designs with three drivers
(three-way) and more.
Whatever the configuration, it’s usually
necessary to send only the appropriate
frequencies to each driver, and so
a ‘crossover’ is required. Essentially, this
is a set of complementary high- and
low-pass filters. For a two-way design,
one filter (a high-pass) allows only the
higher frequencies through to the tweeter,
and another (low-pass) routes only the low
frequencies to the woofer.
A speaker’s crossover filter determines what frequencies are sent to which driver.
158 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
YOUR TECHNICAL QUESTIONS ANSWERED
The ‘crossover frequency’ is where
these two filters overlap (see diagram).
Typically it will be somewhere between
1 and 3 kHz, but the actual crossover
frequency is broadly dependent on
the physical size of the tweeter — that
determines its power handling and the
lowest frequencies it can reproduce
— although many other design
parameters are taken into consideration.
In a two-way system the crossover
point often ends up right in the middle
of the critical vocal frequency range,
and since both drivers are inherently
reproducing the signal through the
crossover region this can result in some
unwanted artifacts, especially if listening
off axis. A three-way speaker system
avoids this problem as the two crossover
regions can be set below and above the
critical vocal range.
Q What cable do I need
to connect an RME
ADI-4DD to a TC
Electronic Reverb 6000?
I’m trying to get an old TC Reverb 6000
MkI connected digitally to my new
UAD-Apollo x8 interface to give me
four stereo reverb engines. However,
the TC6000 has a 25-pin D-sub AES3
connector, which I believe is wired in
Yamaha format while the Apollo x8 has
Q&A
Alva make a 0.5m Yamaha-to-Tascam format
D-sub cable, but it needs to be connected to
a D-sub snake to plug in to the RME ADI-DD.
dual ADAT Toslink connectors, which
I understand can support eight channels
up to 96k if used together.
I intended to use an RME ADI-4DD
AES-to-ADAT digital format convertor box,
which I remember you have previously
reviewed. The RME’s 25-pin D-sub AES3
connector conveniently has an internal
jumper which can be changed to swap
between different formats, including
Yamaha. So, if I change the internal jumper
on the RME to the Yamaha D-sub format,
what sort of cable do I need?
Adrian Mathie via email
SOS Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns
replies: Yes, the original TC Electronic
Reverb 6000 did indeed use the Yamaha
(YGDAI) format for its eight-channel
AES3 connector, and the RME ADI-4DD
would make an ideal format converter
for this situation; I use one myself for this
purpose too.
However, to use the RME’s D-sub
port in the Yamaha format, you’d
require a D-sub-to-D-sub cable wired to
the Yamaha format at both ends, and
I can’t find any commercially available
off-the-shelf options any more.
Of course, you could have one
custom made, but if you were going to
do that it would probably make more
sense to have it wired as a converter
cable (Yamaha-to-AES59/Tascam format)
anyway, and leave the RME box in its
default AES59/Tascam setting. There are
plenty of companies online who could
build a suitable custom cable like this.
If you’d rather buy off-the-shelf
standard cables instead, I’d support
RME’s recommendation of using Alva’s
digital cables. Alva make a short (0.5m)
Yamaha-to-Tascam converter cable
which is used as an extension to one of
their standard AES59/Tascam-format
D-sub‑to‑D-sub cables (available in 1, 3
 PODCASTS
ELECTRONIC
PEOPLE &
MUSIC MUSIC INDUSTRY

Robin Rimbaud - Scanner Cranborne Audio - Sean Karpowicz

Life beyond the computer screen
Robin Rimbaud tells the story of how a
fascination with tape recorders, and the work of
composers John Cage and David Tudor, led to a
studio filled with exotically named instruments,
and creating music without a screen.
Behind The Brand
Hugh Robjohns chats to the Managing Director of
Cranborne Audio, Sean Karpowicz about how and
why he started this innovative British pro-audio
manufacturer, the many business and technical
challenges involved along the way, and his company’s
approach to product design and manufacture.

ELECTRONIC RECORDING
MUSIC & MIXING

Alex Ball - Making The ARP Troubleshooting Acoustic

Synth Documentary
YouTube Synthesizer Historian
Over the last year, Alex has been busy producing
one of the most detailed examinations of the ARP
company, its founder Alan R Pearlman, and the
numerous people involved in making the American
synthesizer manufacturer one of the most revered
brands in the industry.
Guitar Recordings
Expert Tracking & Mixing Tips by Mike Senior
Mike Senior delves into some of the most common
troubleshooting tasks when dealing with acoustic
guitar recordings at mixdown, and shares his own
favourite processing fixes.

Follow our channels by subscribing to the shows on Apple Podcasts,

Google Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

All shows are mastered to the highest quality the podcast channel will support and are in stereo.

Check out our website page for further details

www.soundonsound.com/podcasts
Q
or 5 m lengths). I use Alva cables a lot
(including Yamaha converter cables)
and find them to be both reliable and
very good value. This one has the male
Yamaha connector, which you can plug
into the Reverb 6000, but a female
Tascam connector at the other end. You
need a male Tascam connector to plug
into the ADI-4DD’s D-sub. If the units are
close by, a simple D-sub male-to-male
gender changer would be the least
expensive way to do that, but it might be
a bit cumbersome hanging off the back of
the RME. Probably a better option then
is a regular D-sub-to-D-sub cable. You
can then run Toslink optical cables to the
Apollo interface.
In an extended digital system like this
clocking is important. Although you could
use the Toslink connectors to provide
clocks, I’d recommend using a BNC cable
from the Apollo’s word-clock output
to the RME’s clock in, configuring the
Q&A

Apollo as the lead clock and the RME

as a follower. The Reverb 6000 should
be configured to follow the clock of its
AES inputs.

Q What’s the best way

to clean dust from
my gear?
Protecting your gear from dust needn’t cost a fortune!

My home studio is plagued by dust! It
seems to get everywhere. Obviously,
I vacuum and so on, but it’s really hard
to remove from my keyboards, my mixer
and the various cables that hook it all
up — I keep sucking up little things like
screws and plectrums. Is there a ‘right’
way to clean this stuff?
Dan Hill via email
SOS Reviews Editor Matt Houghton
replies: I’m not sure about a ‘right’ way,
but there are certainly ways and means.
The simplest way I find to tackle dust on
fiddly surfaces with knobs, keys or faders
on them is to use a vacuum cleaner, but
to use a paint brush or old-fashioned
shaving brush to loosen the dust from all
the nooks and crannies; as it comes off,
it flies straight into the vacuum cleaner.
Most of the cheapo handheld things
don’t seem to have enough ‘suck’, and
while a good chunk of money can buy
you a more powerful one, I prefer to use
a regular vacuum cleaner with the head
detached, and stop it from guzzling tiny
gadgets by putting a filter over the end
of the tube that allows air and dust to
pass through but nothing larger. If anyone
in your house is throwing out some old
tights, that material will do nicely: attach
firmly with a rubber band and you can
de-dust to your heart’s content. Don’t
forget to clean the dust from all the less
obvious places it tends to collect, like
the tops of any acoustic panels, shelves,
door frames, keyboard stands, chair
legs, underneath sofas and so on. I find
that cables can be real dust magnets,
especially if you have an old-school
analogue setup with a console, patchbay
and multicore snakes everywhere. A damp
cloth will get rid of most of it easily
enough, so it’s worth making sure you can
easily get behind any racks or console.
Once you’ve given the place a good
deep clean, the surest way to keep the
dust at bay from something like a mixer
or keyboard is to invest in dust covers.
Dedicated ones come in various forms,
from branded accessories to match
your keyboard, to universal stretchable
spandex ones. If you’re a cheapskate like
me, unfitted cotton twill dust sheets from
the DIY store work well. Not only can you
cut them up to cover several bits of gear
with one sheet, but you can chuck them in
the washing machine from time to time.
It’s worth noting that this isn’t just an
aesthetic issue: a lot of mixers have jack
sockets on the top panel, and dust falling
into these can cause problems in the
signal path (interruptions, crackles and
so forth). The dust cover will also protect
against that too. If it’s already a problem,
try squirting in a bit of Deoxit D5 and
pushing a lightly burred (ie. sandpapered)
jack plug in and out of the socket.
Another thing to consider is oil and
grease. Every time you put your mucky
fingers on your gear, you leave behind
a thin layer of grease, not to mention the
residue of any sneaky studio snacks you
may have been indulging in. You might
not even see it, but the grease can be
a bit of a dust/dirt magnet. I usually use
isopropyl alcohol to remove it but you
could also try glass cleaner. It’s better to
put this directly on the cloth and rub the
surface than spray the liquid on your gear.
Needless to say, don’t use a cloth that will
leave fibres behind; microfibre ones such
as those used to clean spectacles and
camera lenses seem to work pretty well.
That’s about it for the day-to-day
stuff — cleaning inside faders and pots is
a whole different story!

160 September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m

 WE’VE GOT THE PROS COVERED.
PRO Look.
PRO Build.
PRO Results.

PMC Studio

“Since installing GIK treatments,

“The GIK Acoustics Monster Bass “The wide selection of colours, sizes
the sonic difference has been really
Trap was the perfect trap to reduce a and modularity of their panels were a
astounding.”
resonance that I detected in studio B.” major factor in our decision to use GIK
RUPERT NEVE DESIGNS BOB KATZ, MASTERING ENGINEER products.”

LUCA BARASSI, ABBEY ROAD INSTITUTE

Get Free Help With Room Set Up - Talk to one of our Acoustic Designers for Free
Order Direct at HTTPS://GIKACOUSTICS.CO.UK
+44 (0) 20 3815 8608 (UK)

The Advertisers Index

AMS Neve ✆ 01282 457011 67 Nova Distribution ✆ 020 3150 4446 49

API www.apiaudio.com 85 Nugen Audio www.nugenaudio.com 45

Antelope Audio www.antelopeaudio.com 59 Orosys ✆ 0033 964 410 535 25

Aston Microphones ✆ 0845 500 2500 17 Presonus Audio Electronics www.presonus.com 101

Scan Computers International ✆ 01204 474747 63

Audient ✆ 01256 381944 71, 99
SCV Distribution ✆ 03301 222500 9, 61, 115, 123
Audio Distribution Group www.audiodistributiongroup.com 27
Softube www.softube.com 33
Avantone Pro (RAD Distribution) www.avantonepro.com 79
Sontronics www.sontronics.com 23
Burl Audio www.burlaudio.com 143
Sound Radix www.soundradix.com 55
DV247 ✆ 01708 771900 28-29
Source Distribution ✆ 020 8962 5080 107
Focusrite Audio Engineering ✆ 01494 462246 109
Sound Service GmbH www.sound-service.eu 21
Gear4music www.gear4music.com 11
Sound Technology ✆ 01462 480000 5
GIK Acoustics Europe www.gikacoustics.com 161
Soundtoys www.soundtoys.com 119
Golden Age Music ✆ 0046 322 665 050 51
Spitfire Audio www.spitfireaudio.com 93
Josephson Engineering www.josephson.com 57 Synthax Audio UK www.synthax.co.uk 35, 113
Kenton Electronics ✆ 020 8544 9200 137 Universal Audio www.uaudio.com OBC

KMR Audio ✆ 020 8445 2446 41 Warm Audio www.warmaudio.com IFC

Korg www.korg.com 110-111 Wayne Jones Audio www.waynejonesaudio.com 135

MOTU www.motu.com 3 Whirlwind USA www.whirlwindusa.com IBC

w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m / November 2016 161

www.soundonsound.com
 WHY I LOVE...

THE JBL
CONTROL ONE
HELEN SKIERA Why there was a wardrobe at all Ones. These being so light, “So why don’t you just look
in this theatre I could not explain I could rig them from the after your speakers?” I hear

W
hen asked “What
is your favourite
loudspeaker?”
I feel, as a sound designer in
theatre and live performance,
the answer ought to reflect
the stunning selection of d&B,
Meyer and E&M gloriousness
that I get to experience on
a regular basis. Publicly it will be
but, secretly, my love is reserved
for a tiny little box that has been
my saviour in many situations.
For theatre designers, the
first shows of our career are
often low/no‑pay situations in
low/no‑tech function spaces. In
one particular venue, a room
above a pub, the ‘sound
system’ (I use this term in its
loosest sense) did emit some
sort of audio, but any serious
resemblance to loudspeakers
ended there. It was not the
unique qualities of the speakers
that were initially the most
notable, but their positioning:
one was on the floor, and the
other on top of a wardrobe.
then or now, but I did ask the
appointed sound technical
person if it would be possible to
have them at the same height.
This particular technician was,
as so many were in those days,
male, bearded (in an ‘I haven’t
seen soap or a razor since the
‘70s’ way, rather than hipster
cool), deeply unfriendly, and
with all the sartorial elegance of
Stig of the Dump. He fixed me
with a gaze and said, “No one’s
ever complained before.”
With the rigging choices of
‘on top of a wardrobe’ or ‘not
on top of a wardrobe’, I opted
for the latter. I lifted down the
offending unit and discovered
that the two boxes were entirely
different flavours of thing. Audio
output sounded like it was
passing through particularly tired
marshmallows — two different
types of marshmallow, of course.
The very lovely Royal Court
Theatre, where I had a real job
at the same time as designing,
loaned me four JBL Control
overhead grid, and this gave
surprisingly good coverage in
the audience area.
But how good is the
sound from a Control One?
Well, compared to hearing
audio through two different
wardrobe-mounted (or not)
fluffy-floofy, clarity-free boxes of
doom, really very good indeed.
I remember listening to a Handel
extract that I had carefully
carved out using Audacity for
a particular cue, and at that
moment, it was one of the best
things I had ever heard. Context
counts for a lot, and is perhaps
worth remembering in every
aspect of creating audio for
a live performance.
As the shows got bigger,
the rigs got bigger and better,
but there is still room in the
biggest of rigs for a Control
One. A great thing about them
is that they are so inexpensive,
meaning that if something
bad happens to them they can
be replaced.
you cry. Well, in theatre we
sometimes need sound to come
out of the ground, or through
a wall, or be in the same place
that someone spills water every
night. Control Ones with dented
grilles, sticky with fake blood or
painted bright yellow for some
forgotten scenery reason are
the unsung heroes of theatre
audio. Front of house, the main
system takes all the glory, but
right in the action, on‑stage
speakers are often vital. If the
doorbell or a phone doesn’t ring
when it should, your show will
be severely affected, and the
audio needs to be situated in
a realistic space that might be
subject to all sorts of abuse. So
when we’re told, “The designer
needs something to make the
sound of frying oil, then have
a bag of gravel emptied over
it, and in the next scene they
pour petrol over it and set
fire to the whole thing,” the
only answer can be, “Let’s use
a Control One.”  

NEXT MONTH IN
Jarvis Cocker
We talk to living legend Jarvis Cocker about his latest JARV IS... album, and
the unique approaches of the many producers he’s worked with throughout
his extraordinary career.

October issue on sale Thursday 17th September.

Available
162 at WH Smith and all good newsagents.
September 2020 / w w w . s o u n d o n s o u n d . c o m
Subscribe at www.soundonsound.com/subscribe.
INTRODUCING RACK LIGHTNING TM

WHIRLWIND’S ADJUSTABLE LED SYSTEM TO ILLUMINATE YOUR RACK!

The Whirlwind Rack LightningTm
series is our newest rack rail lighting
system that can illuminate your rig in 8
different color settings with an adjustable
dimming control to get you out of the
dark ages and into the light! Available
as a rack rail version, or as an overhead
single space unit! Find out more at our
website, and get enlightened! We stand
behind our Whirlwind brand, and we
thank you for doing the same. We didn’t
earn your trust cutting corners, and
we’re not about to start! One factory, one
phone call. It’s that simple! Give us a call
and get your next project under way, and
we’ll continue to do what we do best!

C US
LISTED

C US
LISTED

europe@whirlwindusa.com Made in USA

DEEP APOLLO BUILT-IN INTEGRATED ALL-NEW
INTEGRATION NEVE SUMMING
®
MULTITRACK TAPE LUNA INSTRUMENTS
A Fast, Natural Instant Classic Warmth and Punch Incredible Realism
Workflow Console Sound on Demand to Fuel Inspiration

ANALOG SOUND AT THE

SPEED OF LIGHT.

LUNA transforms Apollo interfaces into the most inspiring and fully‑integrated
Mac‑based recording systems on the planet. FREE for all Thunderbolt Apollo owners.

AVALABLE NOW

uaudio.com/ luna
R E COR D IN G SYST E M
Mix with the best!
“Besides the excellent interviews and fascinating, “As a professional I admire Sound On Sound
in‑depth recording and mixing articles, I can as one of the most trusted and credible
always depend on Sound On Sound for sources of inspiration and information.”
complete, unbiased reviews of the latest
pro‑audio gear. “ Jack Joseph Puig, mixer, producer, Grammy
Award winner (Rolling Stones, U2, Mary J
Bob Clearmountain, engineer, producer and Blige, Black Eyed Peas)
mixer, Grammy Award winner (Bruce Springsteen,
The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, INXS)

The World’s Best Recording Technology Magazine

These articles were originally published

in Sound On Sound magazine,
September 2020 edition

follow us
on Twitter

find us on
Facebook

go to the SOS
YouTube channel

visit the
SOS forum

Subscribe and Save Money!

Visit our subscriptions page at www.soundonsound.com/subscribe
for more information on the Sound On Sound App go to: www.soundonsound.com/app
Sound On Sound, Allia Business Centre, King’s Hedges Road, Cambridge, CB4 2HY, United Kingdom
Email: subscribe@soundonsound.com Tel: +44 (0)1223 851658

All contents copyright © SOS Publications Group and/or its licensors, 1985-2020. All rights reserved.
The contents of this article are subject to worldwide copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part, whether mechanical or electronic, is expressly forbidden
without the prior written consent of the Publishers. Great care has been taken to ensure accuracy in the preparation of this article but neither Sound On Sound Limited
nor the publishers can be held responsible for its contents. The views expressed are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the publishers.