Interviews
Shooter Jennings: Steering the Ship
by Geoff Stanfield
Waylon Albright Jennings, known as “Shooter,” is the child of famed “outlaw country” luminaries Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter. But how did he end up producing artists like...
Waylon Albright Jennings, known as “Shooter,” is the child of famed “outlaw country” luminaries Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter. But how did he end up producing artists like...
For over 100 years, New York’s Lower East Side has been known as one of the most culturally rich areas in Manhattan. It was one of the first neighborhoods in the city, becoming home to a...
Several decades ago a young engineer left Italy for New York, looking to enter the studios of Manhattan. These days, Marc Urselli is a respected producer, recording engineer, and front of house...
Years ago, I was recording the group Ravens & Chimes in Montreal at Hotel2Tango with Howard Bilerman [Tape Op #47], when the bandleader, Asher Lack, mentioned, “I’ve got a friend who...
Brian Silak and I had the honor of visiting engineer/studio owner Denise Barbarita and her husband, drummer/music educator Rich Kulsar – both recent Grammy winners – at their Long Island...
What do Björk, Beach House, Slowdive, Liturgy, !!!, The Mars Volta, Deerhunter, Explosions in the Sky, serpentwithfeet, and Ryuichi Sakamoto all have in common? Mastering and mixing engineer...
I first met Jesse Lauter in 2009, when we interviewed him for his production and engineering work on the Low Anthem’s Oh My God, Charlie Darwin [Tape Op #114]. We’ve stayed in touch...
In 2017 John and I went to visit Scott Jacoby in Manhattan at his Eusonia Studios. Since then he’s mixed Jason Mraz’s Look for the Good album, produced and written for a diverse slew of...
I think the best music reaches you on a subconscious level, connecting with you in a way that’s not always immediately obvious – when you hear something that makes a real connection, you...
What would be the most important concept I would explain to someone just starting out recording music? There’re a lot of things I’d like to say, but one of the most salient is,...
Last month, I purchased my own HEDDphone Air Motion Transformer headphone hedd.audio after I received a tmesis-laden email from Heba Kadry [see this issue]. “Absolutely ---king amazing”...
I have used Earthworks products since early in my career, and have always wondered what a flagship Earthworks studio vocal microphone would be like to use in one of my sessions. Much to my delight,...
I use in-ear monitors (IEMs) to really dig down deep into the details of mixes I’m tweaking – most especially vocals. You can clearly hear weird breaths, overly loud esses, plosives on...
I was told early on in my career, “Start at your source and work your way back,” and it’s never let me down. If I get stuck on a problem for too long, it’s usually because...
Did you know it’s possible to spend $4000 on a 12-inch powered subwoofer? Wait, no, that’s not what I’m reviewing here! While writing this review I ended up scanning Sweetwater and...
NUGEN Audio, in case you’re not familiar, have been making sizable inroads in the post-production and mastering worlds over the last 16 years with plug-ins that I generally characterize as...
At the January 2020 NAMM Show (which seems like a lifetime ago) the New STAGE 1 Board Combo was one of the cooler things I saw. It’s really simple; an amp-sized heavy-duty ABS polymer plastic...
After a series of moves that necessitated selling most of my recording gear, I recently found myself with a stable spot for a small office/studio that’s largely dedicated to working alone. High...
If the COVID-19 pandemic has any silver lining, it’s the way it has invited the reimagining of entrenched habits. When we all mothballed our tracking rooms in March, we became pretty open-minded...
Late last year, Apogee Digital released Clearmountain’s Domain [Tape Op #135], a plug-in that allows users to emulate the effects that renowned mix engineer, Bob Clearmountain, has been using on...
FabFilter’s Saturn was one of 2012’s most celebrated plug-ins, offering multi-band distortion and saturation, along with a sleek GUI, plus a powerful modulation section that was embraced...
Talking and writing about microphones feels a bit like talking and writing about wine – we all like what we like, and mouthing off about it can get pretentious pretty quickly. Nonetheless, we...
Crystals is Eventide’s latest port of its iconic H3000 Harmonizer algorithms into a simpler plug-in GUI – similar to their Blackhole, MangledVerb, Spring [Tape Op #137], MicroPitch, along...
In 1947, a young Dr. Heitaro Nakajima was hired by the technical and research division of Japan’s public broadcast house NHK. Although he’d have a long and illustrious career (later...