Andrew Savage, one of the co-songwriters of Parquet Courts, is decidedly "not an engineer," yet he owns tape machines and once built a studio with his friends in Denton, Texas. Savage's top priority...
I still remember my first experience hearing Taylor Deupree's Northern on a winter night back in 2007. Reaching into a stack of borrowed CDs in my apartment, I randomly selected a disc for some...
Here Photo: At The Old Western waiting for the rest of the musicians... Luke Temple wears several masks and many hats. Since 2005 he has released five solo records under his own name, four as Here...
Way back in [Tape Op #39], we received a wonderful report on how The Mammals utilized a bunch of borrowed gear and gathered talented friends to track their Evolver album at home, in upstate New York....
Photographer Brian T. Silak and I met up with indie rock legends Yo La Tengo at the SOHO Manhattan offices of Matador Records. We discussed the evolution of the band's songwriting and recording...
Although I’d heard of Berlin-based musician Nils Frahm, I actually first heard his music on his beautiful and recently released LP, All Melody, which I reviewed online for Tape Op #123. Nils was...
Lead photo text: Author Wally Wilson behind the first Sphere multitrack console at Creative Workshop, Nashville, TN, 1976. Recently there's been renewed interest in Sphere consoles, and the history...
How many of you ladies and gentlemen are making music these days intended for listening primarily on a five CD changer set to shuffle? If that's your audience, you might feel forced to use multiband...
If you're one of the folks doing all your music making in-the-box, with your DAW and plug-ins, then you can skip the rest of this rant. Consider yourself lucky, as this older analog gear is getting...
While attending the Summer NAMM Show, I ran into several friends who thought I had left Tape Op completely. I apologize if my “Gear Geeking” column in the previous issue wasn’t clear...
It's been a few years since we reviewed Pro Tools 11 [Tape Op #101], the first version of the venerable DAW that featured 64-bit architecture and a newly reimplemented Avid Audio Engine, as well as...
I stumbled on this book from a recommendation by a friend from my past corporate life, and I'm passing this tip on. You may not know the name Bonnie Siegler, but you've encountered Siegler's work. The...
Anyone familiar with TAMA drum hardware will have the same reaction to learning that the respected drum maker is now selling mic stands: What took so long? I'm actually old enough to remember the...
I love electro-mechanical reverbs. I've owned several plate reverbs and currently have a Hamptone-customized EMT 140 along with two different Demeter Real Reverb units [Tape Op #21, #109]. I use these...
Large-format recording consoles; there just aren't as many of them being made these days compared to decades past. A portion of the industry has moved towards totally mixing in the box and tracking...
Subtitled "Learning to Make Musical Choices," Wessel Oltheten's book is one of the most comprehensive guides to mixing music I have ever come across. As Peter Katis [Tape Op #31] is quoted on the...
In January 2018, Focusrite introduced USB2.0 class compliant versions of three audio interfaces in the Clarett range that were previously available as Thunderbolt-only devices, opening up the range to...
Uh-oh. Looks like the cool techs at Steinberg have been up to something. Audio interfaces are traditionally designed to offer transparent conversion from capture to representation. Though the new...
I had a blast reviewing Meris' Ottobit Jr. Bitcrusher and Mercury7 Reverb pedals [Tape Op #123]. The three-person company (steered by inventive folks formerly of Line 6 and Strymon) has been turning...
Recently, while pondering the anonymous-yet-crucial role of the lowly microphone cable in studio and on stage, Fjord Audio owner Spencer Tweedy found himself in a quandary: could there be high quality...
DPA's approach when creating the d:vote CORE 4099G Instrument Microphone was to create a mic that is equally at home on the stage and in the studio. When I perform live, I want my acoustic guitar to...
The rack-mount power strips I bought on eBay years ago (lots of server equipment to be found for cheap there) had blank front panels and six or eight outlets on the rear. I've since replaced them with...
Veteran Tape Op readers will know that I have tremendous respect for Bob Muller and Chris Muth of Dangerous Music [Tape Op #45]. Over the years, I've contributed to many reviews of their products...
The reports of the death of the PC/Windows DAW Cakewalk were greatly exaggerated. With tens of thousands of users, many willing to pony up a hundred dollars plus every year for updates, and various...
Monitors of all shapes and sizes have always seemed like an extension of the stereo speakers I saved up my paper route money to buy when I was a kid. Over time they got better, clearer, definitely...
I didn't realize Auto-Tune was 20 years old this year, and I'm sort of in shock. I remember renting the ATR-1 hardware version from a local studio back then and trying to tune some poorly pitched...
The Booty Shakers and The Little Booty Shakers make up a family of incredibly simple drum isolation mounts. They have been well designed by two guys in San Diego who refused to settle with drum tones....
When looking for a new TT patchbay with DB25 connectors to add to the several I already have, I needed options beyond the typical offerings; something that was a step up in terms of quality and...
Ableton once again delivers a compelling update to their always imaginative music creation software suite, Live. Version 10 feels like an addition of significant fit, finish, and refinement to what...
Unlock the studio and walk in. Power up each rack, then the console, then lean over the console to turn on each powered monitor. Be sure to do the monitors last or they go pop and swearing ensues. Ten...
I have always looked at cost versus performance with gear, and although I love the classics, I don't always love the price tag. I enjoy DIY projects for several reasons; gaining a better understanding...
Subtitled New York Songs and Stories, producer, musician, songwriter, engineer, and occasional Tape Op contributor Chris Stamey details his youth in North Carolina and his adventures in NYC of the...
Sphere Recording Consoles may not be the most recognized name in pro audio, but to those in the know, Sphere represents the holy grail of mixing consoles. [See Wally Wilson's article on Sphere...
Alan Parsons' Art & Science of Sound Recording (ASSR) encompasses an array of audio recording educational tools and events built around Alan's [Tape Op #42] studio mastery and patient explanations...
In the "modern recording era" (let's say 1950 until present), there are a few compressors that can easily be called Classic with a capital "C". You know, the ones by Fairchild, Teletronix, UREI, dbx,...
