Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2017 i Future Music

The Future Of Music Pioneer’s DJM-750 upgrade inherits traits from the NXS2 Pioneer DJ have announced the next edition of the DJM-750. The MK2 inherits a whole bunch of ‘club-standard’ features from the company’s NXS2 range. The Magvel crossfader combines smooth control with long-term use – the contact-free magnetic system is apparently designed to endure millions of performances, no less! Secondly, some of the effects from the NXS2 have been handed down: Sound Color FX with parameter control and selected Beat FX with FX Frequency. Powering all of this is a 64-bit digital signal processor with dithering technology. Digital/analogue conversion (and back again) is taken care of with the 32-bit converters. You’re also able to connect outboard effects to combine with the DJM-750 Mk2’s internal effects via the Insert send/return…

LIKE IT? TRY THESE… Lain ‎ Brother Soul The lyrical talents of Lain loom large over Wookie’s seminal debut. For more soulful vocals, revisit his very own artist album from 2005. ADD THESE TO YOUR PLAYLIST: Peaceful Waters, What I’m Feeling, Free Teddy Riley ‎ BlackRock The New Jack Swing pioneer [Blackstreet/Guy] was something of a hero for Wookie. Check in on his 2001 solo album to catch his fave producer at his peak. ADD THESE TO YOUR PLAYLIST: Teddy Are You Ready, Diggin’ Your Girl, She Was Sleeping Soul II Soul ‎ Club Classics Vol. One Wookie cut his teeth in the studio for the Soul II Soul crew. Crank this astounding album up and bask in that legacy, as he must have. ADD THESE TO YOUR PLAYLIST: Keep…

Chad Van Gaalen Light Information Sub Pop Three years on from his last album, the widely acclaimed Shrink Dust, Canadian singer, composer, multi instrumentalist, director and artist Chad Van Gaalen returns with his charming and immersive sixth studio album. Light Information is full of the dynamic artist’s shimmering summer melodies, jangly pop tunes, psychedelic excursions and pacey indie rock sounds. Although dealing with themes including paranoia, isolation and disembodiment, the record is full of warmth, empathy and human touch. With a distinct personal and intimate feel on the record, Van Gaalen lets us into his dreamy, laidback world but at the same time injects a pace and energy that creates an addictive drive and momentum. The guitars are hazy but with a rough, raw edge, just as the bass is…

QUICK TIPS To further enhance textural sounds > DO: Experiment with long and dense reverbs on impactful hits, even if they’re rich in bass. There’s an old (and often inaccurate) rule that you can’t add reverb to bass tones. But in the world of cinematic transitions, lengthy reverb tails on hits and booms are highly encouraged. > DON’T: Be afraid to render your ‘massed transition effects’ to a single stereo file to manage volume contours precisely. Often this can be beneficial to create a fade in, or manage long reverb tails with basic audio effects which apply to the ‘whole’ sound, rather than just its constituent elements. > DO: When creating sub drops in tracks behind a fixed harmony, make sure your drops land on the ‘root’ note of the…

Transitions in club tracks Dance producers have long understood the power of in-between parts, and with some cinematic principles, we can make our transitions even better In this track, we’re going to see how to turn what starts as ‘just another four bars’ of a track into a development section which bridges what comes before to what happens afterwards. What’s interesting is that, having been on this little four bar journey, when the track returns after it, it sounds developed or changed in some way. In truth, it’s simply a repeat of the opening eight bars, but the way in which the transition is managed somehow gives new weight and importance to what comes after it. That said, transitions like the one we’re building here offer the perfect ‘introduction’ to…

THE TRACK Muzzy Spectrum Monstercat, 2017 © Olly Curtis Purveyor of rousing big room bass music Muzzy (aka Mustafa Alobaid) has quickly risen to prominence in the last half decade thanks to a string of releases on Canada’s genre-hopping Monstercat. We caught up with him in his Hampshire studio to find out how he created the epic title track from his Spectrum EP, a stadium D&B monster that’s packed with ear-mangling bass sounds and performances from session musicians. How did the idea for Spectrum come about? “I had a concept in my head that randomly came to me after playing some video games. I just wanted to write something that was bigger and better than the other stuff I’ve done in the past, expanding on an…

PRODUCER’S GUIDE Producer’s Guide to stereo width Since the advent of dual speaker setups, producers and mix engineers have consistently pushed the boundaries of stereo manipulation. From the classic Beatles mixes featuring unsettlingly-wide hard-panning, through to modern electronic tracks that employ reverbed basses and insane auto-panning parts, stereo mixing techniques are possibly the most essential – and often misunderstood – aspects of a well-crafted mixdown. But without the exact combination of width, stereo interest and mono compatibility, you can easily end up with a track that’s either too narrow or too wide. Striking that perfect balance is tough, and can take even the most seasoned studio pros years to get right. Over the next few pages, then, we’re going to dive further into the world of stereo width. We’ll show…

QUICK TIPS 1 Right from the start of the track-making process, religiously sum your master output to mono on a regular basis to check for mono compatibility. 2 With panning less is often more. Subtly pan your drum buss two degrees in one direction, and your bass by the same in the opposite direction, to separate them ever so slightly in the mix. 3 To make your main chorus or drop section more intense than the previous section, use automation to increase the width of key elements. Or, automate send levels to push parts harder into reverbs and delays. 4 When layering claps and snares, pan out the hits by varying amounts to create a characterful, spread-out stereo effect. 5 Use a reverb with a mix control for blending between…

Filters, gating, EQ and dynamics control Through the following steps, we’ll be controlling a number of parameters within a single channel strip plugin, to tame a drum loop Running drum loops alongside programmed drum parts is a popular production technique, as loops can bring groove and mix weight to a collection of one-shot sounds. The only problem is that loops tend to ‘reinforce’ frequency content which is likely to be present in your programmed drum parts, which can create all kinds of conflicts. Maybe your loop contains a kick drum whose frequencies fight those of your programmed kick pattern. Or maybe the snare, clap or hi-hat parts in the loop create too much bite or a volume spike in other areas. Channel strip plugins can tame all of these problems…

Vintage Channel Strips Group sounds before using a channel strip Apply a modern take on a channel strip’s modular approach to glue several synth sounds together 01 > We start with three synth parts, all of which are contributing to a main pluck sequence. Alongside this, there are kick, rim shot and ride cymbal parts. Right now, the synths are all being individually routed to the main output, with nothing ‘tying them together’. 02 > We change this by grouping the synths to their own auxiliary ‘group’ buss. Here, we set up iZotope’s Neutron plugin and set up EQ as the first module. We roll out a little bass and mid-range before adding some top-end at 5kHz. 03 > Next, we switch on Compressor 1. This gives 3-band compression. We…

Reviews Roli Seaboard Block £279 The latest Seaboard is here! This time, it’s part of the ‘Blocks’ modular range. Dan ‘JD73’ Goldman checks it out… It retains the upmarket feel of its bigger siblings in a more affordable form-factor Roli’s Seaboard Rise really impressed me (despite some key spacing/width reservations) and so I was eager to try the latest Seaboard Block. Blocks is Roli’s newest range, which includes several modules which can be connected via Roli’s onboard DNA connectors to essentially form a modular system of controllers that can be expanded as required (including up to six Seaboard Blocks to form longer/L-shaped Seaboards). Each Block has a different remit including looping (Loop Block), performance control (Live block), expression control (Touch Block) and there are currently two ‘master’ Blocks including the…

Reviews Expressive E Touché £349 This hand expression controller goes against the grain with its unique feel and look. Dan ‘JD73’ Goldman checks it out Touché feels like a finger-sized version of those wobble/balance boards in kids’ playgrounds! Standard pitch and mod wheels do a solid enough job, but they seem pretty one-dimensional, particularly as these days we are very much used to touchscreens and touch devices. So enter Expressive E, the innovative French startup aiming to bring expressive touch control to the masses with their Touché controller. I’ve always loved Kaoss Pads and wished a company would make a standalone device that could control multiple MIDI/CV parameters across multiple instruments in a hands-on way; that’s pretty much what Touché brings to the table, and more! Touché feels like a…

Reviews Koma Elektronik Field Kit from €179 This ‘electroacoustic workstation’ can use the world around you as an inspiring audio signal – Bruce Aisher gets to grips with it The Field Kit is best thought of as an electroacoustic music toolbox, where everyday objects can be used to create, or manipulate, sound. The unit itself comes in the form of a metal panel (in the usual Koma livery) laden with sockets, sliders and knobs embedded in a plywood case. Even before you get plugging, this is a thing of beauty - the ultimate in geek chic aesthetic. A kit version (with all the nasty SMT components pre-installed) is available (and will save you 50 euros), and a Eurorack panel is available for those wanting to expand their modular rig. Besides…

Getting realistic fills What’s the best method for adding natural-sounding fills to my drum tracks? Drummers play fills naturally, but programming them in DAWs can require careful planning. There are a few useful methods for adding human-sounding fills to more static loops. The first is by finger drumming and converting the audio to MIDI – most DAWs have this function, along with the inevitably necessary quantisation. Alternatively, make some loops, have fun playing in fills using software or hardware drum machines over the top in MIDI or audio, then cut out the best bits and sprinkle them through your track. Here are some ideas… After you’ve made your main loop using a software drum machine, duplicate that track and kit, then simply hit record and play in fills in real…

CLASSIC ALBUM Wookie Wookie S2S Recordings, 2000 Words by Roy Spencer This is a man who has got his own sound. As one of the key producers of his generation, Wookie fearlessly joined the dots between the crisp new UK garage sonics of the dawning millenium, and the fierce chops and bass drops of the underground jungle scene. He took the cutting-edge soundtrack of the clubs, and wove in cellists and live musicians, touching on Latin flavours and jazz, before allowing his right-hand vocalist, Lain, to ride these intoxicating rhythms with the command of a Gospel preacher, and the effortless swagger of a slick R&B video star. Wookie, and his productions, oozed confidence – thanks in no small part to the world they came from. His studio was located in…

ALBUM OF THE MONTH Kutmah TROBBB! Big Dada Following the release of some highly acclaimed twelve inches and mix compilations, experimental beat-making producer Kutmah, real name Justin McNulty, finally unleashes his long-overdue debut album. The Revenge of Black Belly Button (TROBBB!) finds the West Coast-based producer collaborating with an impressive list of the beat movement’s most revered artists, with the likes of Gonjasufi, Jonwayne, Jeremiah Jae and Force Funk all contributing amongst others. A rich and diverse palette of over 31 tracks occupies a record that is as expansive as it is experimental and immersive. Touching on hip-hop, industrial, jazz, dub, punk, rock, new wave, psychedelia and bass-driven electronic music, McNulty manages to sew disparate styles into a coherent and fascinating tapestry of exciting sounds. Deconstructing his vast influences, he…

RECOMMENDED Bicep Bicep Ninja Tune Since first emerging with their much-loved blog, Feel My Bicep almost a decade ago, Belfast duo Matt McBriar and Andy Ferguson have forged a standout career as highly respected producers, DJs and label owners. Now based in London, the world-touring duo also have a beautifully constructed and highly accomplished debut album to add to their accomplishments. The self-titled record encapsulates their ethos of making music as a whole. Open minded, genre-fluid and drawing on the history of electronic music whilst saying something new and contemporary, this feels like Bicep’s expressive love letter to electronic and club culture, built on foundations of classic house, spacey techno, old school breaks and Italo disco with elements of 90s downtempo and IDM. Bicep inject their high-energy and raw club…

Adding contrary motion with sub drops As your riser climbs, creating a deep sound which falls in pitch at the same time creates powerful ‘opposite’ motion. Enter the sub drop If you’re looking for rib-shaking drama, nothing quite matches the potential of the sub drop. This is the musical equivalent of that lurch you feel as a rollercoaster completes its opening climb and begins its plunge down the first ramp, putting your heart in your mouth and your stomach somewhere near your throat. Sub Drops can be used in isolation, but they’re often most effective as a ‘contrary motion balance’ to provide downwards movement as risers climb in the opposite direction. Through the following three steps, we’ll discover how to personalise a sub drop, creating exact movement by adjusting pitchbend…

Cinematic Sound Design Violin riser metamorphosis Here we’re building a cinematic riser from a number of individually recorded violin performances. Modulation, fades and stereo effects go a long way © Panther Media GmbH / Alamy Stock Photo We start by recording a solo violin playing a series of tremolo pitched glissandi. ‘Tremolo’ means scrubbing the bow quickly back and forth across the strings whilst ‘glissandi’ means multiple recordings of sliding pitches (we use ‘glissando’ for a single sound). All our recordings slide upwards. Here’s the first recording by itself. Each recording was recorded to a click at 90bpm for 8 bars. As a result, when we place each file on its own audio track and press play, all of the recordings build over the same time period. Here they all…

Stereo Width Understanding stereo width To fully get a handle on width, and how to dial in the perfect balance of width and solidity at the mixing stage, it helps to first understand how stereo audio works in relation to human hearing. In the real world, our brain uses a source sound’s level and timing differences to accurately pick out where that sound is positioned around us, how close or far away it is, and the speed of its movement. Relating this to a stereo monitoring set-up, we use a pair of speakers (or stereo headphones) to approximate how we hear with our two ears. If a signal contains the same information in the left and right channels, it will sit dead centre in the mix – it will be…

In The Studio With Nosaj Thing Profoundly influenced by hip-hop from an early age, Jason Chung has helped create a new language for the genre through his abstract sonic approach. Danny Turner chats to the LA-based producer prior to the release of his fourth album, Parallels © Ye Rin Mok With his debut Nosaj Thing album, Drift, coming to prominence at the end of the last decade, producer Jason Chung demonstrated a nonconformist approach to making music from the very beginning. Despite having only a loaned version of FL studio and a Sony Walkman to keep him company, he managed to skilfully create a unique brand of leftfield glitch-hop, fractured by chromatic melodies and dark atmospheres. Further albums, Home (2013) and Fated (2015) exemplified Chung’s laptop-driven production style. Cementing his…

In The Studio With Rex The Dog After finding success in the mid ’90s with his dance project JX, Jake Williams had time to contemplate his next move, the elusive canine creation Rex The Dog. With Williams’ ever-growing obsession with modular, Danny Turner steadies himself for a lesson in analogue © Will Ireland British dance DJ, remixer and producer Jake Williams (aka Rex The Dog) sold a heap of records in the mid ’90s as one half of the duo JX, which had two Top Ten UK hits, Son Of A Gun and There’s Nothing I Won’t Do (feat. Shena). Further collaborations surfaced in the late ’90s, including dance supergroup Planet Perfecto with Paul Oakenfold, and the club hit POW, in tandem with Kris Menace. In 2008, Rex The Dog…

FMCHOICE Plugin channel strips UAD SSL E Channel Strip | £189 Emulating the EQ and dynamics capabilities of SSL’s classic E Series mixing consoles is no mean feat but UAD’s revised plugin does this extremely accurately. Slate Digital Virtual Console Collection | £78 This allows you to pass your signals through the emulated topology of a number of classic consoles, from Neve, API, Trident and SSL. Waves EMI TG12345 Channel Strip | $33 Modelled on the TG series consoles EMI built for Abbey Road studios, you’ll find character aplenty in the modules offered here. Softube Tube-Tech Classic Channel | £169 Great for processing, this combines the ‘Pultec’ style PE 1C, the midrange ME 1B equaliser and the Opto, tube-emulated CL 1B compressor. iZotope Neutron | €119 Marketed for ‘mixing’, but…

Reviews Lewitt LCT 240 Pro £149 The Lewitt LCT family gets a new sibling aimed at delivering value for money. Robbie Stamp finds out if it’s buy or bye It easily holds its own against the models I’ve tried in this price range Lewitt stress the words ‘nuanced’ and ‘transparent’ in the literature for the LCT 240 Pro. At £149, this is a tall order, as every cost-cutting decision can nibble away at the performance of the capsule, the amplifier and the casing. Budget microphones are rarely transparent and rarely deliver a nuanced sonic performance. However, it’s not impossible, and simplicity is key. In this respect Lewitt start well with a straightforward rectangular side-address cardioid condenser design with no additional controls. The package includes a basic, good-quality mic clip, a…

LIBRARY MATTERS Installing the download version of Syntronik is a bit of a pain. It requires 50GB of sound files which need to be downloaded from IK’s site after installation as 23 files that ned to be downloaded, mounted/unzipped and installed individually. It’s a laborious and slow process that will have you crying out for a download manager. A boxed version with USB drive is available for 30 euros more, as is a free version – containing its core engine and a minimal selection of sounds, to which users can add sound content as individual purchases, bought instrument by instrument, priced at 49 euros a piece.…

SOUNDS & SAMPLES UVI Beatbox Anthology 2 ¤149 As with older synths, there is an ongoing fascination with classic drum machines. Unlike synths, though, there’s a longer tradition of using samples to access their distinctive sound. A trawl though much of that last 25 year of dance music will reveal more tracks using 909 samples than the real thing. Enter UVI’s Beatbox Anthology 2, a new version of their earlier instrument with extra sound sources (including the spanking new MatrixBrute), updated interface and more flexible effect processing. Each of the 12 drum slots can host 3 layered elements - each with a distortion, envelope and LP/HP filter section – which are fed into their own compressor and EQ, before being sent to the four global delay/reverb effects via individual sends.…

The Minitaur gets new LFO waveforms in latest update Moog Music have released the version 2.2 firmware update for the Minitaur bass synth and 3.2 update for the editor, with both being available for free. It’s been a while since we last saw an update to the Minitaur, so users will be keen to know what’s on offer in the latest update. Version 2.2.0 adds six different modulation sources: Triangle, Square, Ramp, Saw, Sample & Hold and Filter EG. Oscillator hard sync is also available, enabling you to create entirely new sounds with the Minitaur. You also have the option of modulating oscillator 2 only with the hard sync function engaged. Version 3.2 of the editor/ librarian adds full Windows support, plus support for all of the new firmware features.…

Classic Album Track by track with Wookie © @bvonenoch & @joshbratt87 “I knew I wanted to do something British. Prior to that I was emulating the Americans, doing R&B. I wanted to represent me, and the scene. I was a big raver. Always at Crystal Palace, Milton Keynes... all over the place. I hung around with DJ Hype … jungle, I was around all that … Metalheadz on Sundays. It was just a vibe. I was heavily influenced by that drum & bass sound, so I fused that with what I already knew, which was the R&B stuff.” Fast forward to 2017, and what’s Wookie up to now? Well, this year he dropped the outstanding new tracks Reach Out and Plutonomy on…

Albums Hercules & Love Affair Omnion MR.INTL Andy Butler’s highly stylised disco outfit Hercules & Love Affair return with their impressive fourth album. Their first LP since 2014’s The Feast Of The Broken Heart, Omnion represents something of an expansion in direction by the alt-disco collective. This record finds the band going beyond their usual dancefloor aesthetic and digging deeper into leftfield electro pop. The tempo and pace of the record is more contained yet the soundscapes are more expansive overall. Discussing topics such as Butler’s previous drug addictions and the current state of the world, Omnion has a more serious tone than previous Hercules & Love Affair albums, but still contains plenty of the colour, sparkling attitude and raw confidence that always marks Hercules & Love Affair’s presence. Glittering…

Cinematic Sound Design CINEMATIC SOUND DESIGN Transform your tracks with silver screen-worthy FX and transitions When we talk about structure in music, we acknowledging that there are different sections in tracks and that they need different labels to be identifiable. Verse, Chorus, Pre-Chorus, Introduction, Coda, Drop… regardless of musical genres, there is a language of adjectives which sets one section aside from another. Whilst these sections might differ in musical key, instrumental arrangement, tempo, or any number of other ways, signposting the transitions between one section and another has become a compositional requirement in its own right. In fact, it’s an area which commands so much consideration that these days that there are even sample libraries dedicated to the whole practice: NI’s Rise & Hit library is perhaps the most…

Cinematic Sound Design Reimagining everyday sounds Top sound designers find ways to use the sounds around them. Here, we’re turning recordings of a dishwasher door into a droning cinematic texture © Simon Belcher / Alamy Stock Photo We’re starting by making recordings of an old dishwasher. Its hinges and springs are rusty, so it creaks if you open the door slowly, with an amazing resonance. These are the raw recorded files of the doors opening and closing. We start by importing one of the dishwasher sounds into Iris 2. Here, we use the Radius RT pitch mode and shift the pitch down to create a deep drone. We use LFOs to flutter a low-pass filter treatment and set up Distortion as a master effect, also with some modulation via an…

Personalising white noise risers We’ve all heard white noise sweeps with their cutoff frequencies steadily climbing. Through the following steps, we’ll look at a more original take The principle behind a white noise riser is simple: create a sound with a white noise oscillator, run it through a low-pass filter, and gradually (or quickly) automate the filter cutoff so that it ‘opens up’ to create a increasing rush of drama. However, the fact that this basic technique can be described in just a few words suggests it’s in need of some updating. Over these three steps, we’ll start exploring some ways to take white noise risers slightly off their well-trodden path, looking at effects that can shape a white noise sweep in more interesting ways. But these are just the…

Cinematic Sound Design SAMPLING, PROCESSING AND RESAMPLING “There are a number of things which audio-processing tools in DAWs aren’t very good at” Modern DAWs are so good at manipulating recordings that an enormous amount of sound design can be done using rendered audio files. We can reverse sounds, change their gain, timestretch and pitchshift them, and so much more. The length of audio files is easy to manipulate too, as the Scissors, Chop or Trim tool in your DAW will easily be able to snip audio files to remove unwanted sections, with real-time fade-ins and -outs ready to finesse these boundaries and deal with unwanted clicks. Often we can even ‘auto-trim’ by using tools to remove sections of audio which fall below a particular volume threshold, to allow us to…

In The Studio With Washed Out Ernest Greene, aka Washed Out, returns to the fray with the psyche-house brilliance of his new album, Mister Mellow. Hamish Mackintosh caught up with Greene at his musical HQ in Atlanta, Georgia to find out more about the album’s genesis © Love Stories Co Samples, blissed-out beats and disorientating vocals… more leftfield than previous offerings Paracosm and Within And Without, Ernest Greene has let his penchant for samples run wild and the results are glorious. Billed as a ‘visual album’, coming as it does with an accompanying film, Mister Mellow, sees Greene grapple with life’s complexities in a most elegant fashion while never once forgetting to court the dancefloor. Just as well, really, given Washed Out’s new home at the beat-centric Stones Throw label.…

. . YOUTUBE MORE UNMISSABLE VIDEO FEATURES FROM FUTURE MUSIC Meet our line-up of exclusive YouTube goodness. Head online for all this and more! Top producers go in-depth on the sounds, ideas and techniques behind their latest releases Dapayk & Padberg, Sink This Ship The German duo invite us into the studio to show us how they created their lush, synth and vocal driven track from thier latest LP, Harbour. DON’T MISS: Black Saint, Could You Love Me? The London trio break down their recent hit, with its blend of deep house and classic noughties R&B vibes, in Logic Pro X. Reset Robot, Guitar Man The tech-house artist deconstructs one of his latest tracks, showing us how he does it in his Southsea studio. Heist,…

Stereo bass secrets It’s often said that bass parts should be left in mono, but this isn’t a hard and fast rule. Let’s try giving our low end some stereo enhancement! Common production advice says to keep low-frequency elements in mono. In theory, this still rings true – low frequencies are less directional compared to high frequencies, so panning or widening sub-200Hz elements will only serve to weaken low-end power in a mix. Yet, in spite of this, reverb-drenched kicks and ultra-wide mid-range basses have been a fashionable feature of modern electronic music for a few years now. With that in mind, here are three things to consider when widening bottom-heavy sounds in a mix. The secret is to pocket the frequency content of your width just above…

MODULAR MONTHLY Fuzzy lo-fi goodness ZVex have brought Fuzz Factory and Instant Lo-Fi Junky to Eurorack The Fuzz Factory is an undisputed classic of the guitar pedal world and was the first self-oscillating germanium fuzz when ZVex created it in 1995. Based on a ’60s Fuzztone design, it is vastly expanded by ZVex. So it has ’60s heritage, is a ‘classic’ of the guitar world but what does it bring to the Eurorack format? Well, we’d say total destruction! Cue the devil horns, fire up some waveforms and mangle your way through fuzz destruction while throwing yourself around like Adam Sandler in Little Nicky, rocking out to Van Halen… Or take a calmer approach to the softer fuzzy goodness you can coax out of it, as the Fuzz Factory is…

TOOLKIT Vintage Channel Strips Mixing and matching plugins is one approach but sometimes nothing beats dedicated channel strips Setting up chains of effects to process individual or grouped sounds within a mix is second nature for producers and mix engineers alike. We work intuitively, with one plugin for tone control often suggesting another for dynamics taming before we add a third and a fourth, creatively adding effect after effect to smooth out or rough up our sounds, as we see fit. But in the pre-DAW days, mix engineers and producers had far fewer options when it came to shaping the sounds in their tracks. Often, key controls for tone and compression, in particular, were handled by their choice of mixing console. Classic consoles from the likes of SSL, Neve, API…

QUICK TIPS 1 Play with the Pre-Dyn(amics) button many vintage channel strips offer. Placing EQ before compression/ expansion stage often yields a very different result to using it after. 2 Many of us associate classic channel strips exclusively with audio channels. Large format mixers were as likely to be receiving inputs from synths and drum machines as they were microphones. Don’t restrict which audio sources you process through channel strip plugins. 3 Why not match insert channel strip effects to a stereo buss compressor from the same manufacturer? The SSL G Series Bus Compressor, API’s 2500 Compressor and the Neve 33609 are good examples, where components sourced and made by the same companies can provide a joined-up approach.…

Reviews IK Multimedia Syntronik €299 This hybrid instrument claims to replicate 38 iconic synthesizers. Si Truss sees if it’s to good to be true… With ROMpler stalwart SampleTank and amp sim empire AmpliTube to their name, IK Multimedia are certainly no strangers to either multisampling or modelling. Yet even for them, Syntronik seems like something of an ambitious undertaking. This hybrid instrument recreates the sound of 38 of the most iconic synths of all time, using a combination of multisampled oscillators, analogue-modelled filters and what they’re calling ‘Drift’ technology, which emulates the wavering (pitch modulation) inherent in classic analogue oscillators. Rather than offering exact replications of all 38 instruments, Syntronik divides its source material across 17 familiar-looking virtual instruments. Some of these are straight replications of a single instrument –…

Reviews M-Audio M-Track 2x2 Vocal Studio Pro £170 If you’re looking for your first budget home recording setup, M-Audio may have just what you need. Stuart Bruce investigates You’re up and running very quickly with a powerful little music production setup Having unpacked your M-Track 2x2 Vocal Studio, the first thing you notice is that you really do have everything you need. This bus-powered interface is compact and simple. Channel 1 has a dual mic and line input and can provide phantom power; Channel 2 is a dedicated DI/line input, and for a stereo line signal you could use both channels together. There’s a headphone output on a 1/4-inch TRS with associated volume knob, and a pair of 1/4-inch TRS jacks for monitors, fed from the big volume knob in…