Recording & Mixing

Paul White explains how to get the best out of Amp Simulation software, from getting a good guitar input signal, setting up effective monitoring for encouraging the best performance and tips on achieving the desired end-effect.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:50 - Getting A Guitar Signal
03:39 - Dealing With Latency
04:42 - Monitoring
05:54 - Using Your Own Pedals
08:15 - Using Speaker Cabinet Emulations
09:11 - Adding Room Ambience
10:00 - Creative Sound Design
10:27 - Using Amp Modelling With Other Instruments

Paul White Biog
Paul White joined the Sound On Sound team in 1991 where he became Editor In Chief, a position he held for many years before recently becoming Executive Editor. Paul has written more than 20 recording and music technology textbooks, the latest being The Producer’s Manual.

Having established his own multitrack home studio in the 1970s he’s worked with many notable names including Bert Jansch and Gordon Giltrap. He’s played in various bands over the years and currently collaborates with Malvern musician Mark Soden, under the name of Cydonia Collective. Paul still performs live claiming that as he has suffered for his music he doesn’t see why everyone else shouldn’t too!

http://www.cydoniacollective.co.uk/

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Paul White and Hugh Robjohns pick their hardware and software highlights from the last 12 months, plus feature some late arrivals.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:14 - ASM Hydrasynth Deluxe
02:01 - Boss RE-202 Space Echo / IK Multimedia Amplitube X-SPACE Reverb / Red Panda Particle 2 Granular Delay
02:57 - Moogerfooger Plug-ins / UAFX Amp Emulator Pedals
04:12 - IK Multimedia Amplitube TONEX Amp Simulation Software
04:47 - Arturia Efx Fragments Granular Delay / Eventide Physion II
05:25 - PMC6-2 Monitors
07:00 - MiMU Jellyfish Granular Synth
07:45 - The Great Chip Shortage
09:11 - Rob Papen eXplorer-8 Bundle / Sub51 and Soundtrax Drop Pad

10:26 - Sonnect Audio Sound Bullet
11:46 - Eventide H90 Harmonizer® Multi-FX Pedal / Two notes ReVolt Amp Simulator Pedal
13:38 - Waves BB Tubes Plug-in
14:27 - Hardware Recorders
17:05 - Synth Sounds For Guitar

Paul White Biog
Paul White initially trained in electronics at The Royal Radar Establishment in Malvern then went on to work with Malvern Instruments, a company specialising in laser analysis equipment, before moving into technical writing. 

He joined the Sound On Sound team in 1991 where he became Editor In Chief, a position he held for many years before recently becoming Executive Editor. Paul has written more than 20 recording and music technology textbooks, the latest being The Producer’s Manual.

Having established his own multitrack home studio in the 1980s he’s worked with many notable names including Bert Jansch and Gordon Giltrap. He’s played in various bands over the years and currently collaborates with Malvern musician Mark Soden, under the name of Cydonia Collective. Paul still performs live claiming that as he has suffered for his music he doesn’t see why everyone else shouldn’t too!

http://www.cydoniacollective.co.uk/

Hugh Robjohns Biog
Hugh Robjohns has been Sound On Sound´s Technical Editor since 1997. Prior to that he worked in a variety of (mostly) sound-related roles in BBC Television, ending up as a Sound Operations Lecturer at the BBC´s technical training centre. He continues to provide audio consultancy and bespoke broadcast audio training services all over the world, lectures at professional and public conventions, and occasionally records and masters acoustic and classical music too!

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

In the final episode of this 5 part series, Mark Mynett, sound engineer and senior lecturer at Huddersfield University, gives us an in-depth look at how to process and mix the various elements of a song recorded using live instruments.

Chapters
00:16 - Introduction
01:36 - Mix Preparation: Performance Edits and Mix Groups
01:00 - Polarity Summation
07:27 - Waveform Edits and Gating
09:48 - Multing
10:20 - Drum Sample Implementation
10:57 - Three Approaches To Mixing
12:56 - Master Buss Processing
14:28 - Compression and EQ: Signal Chain Order
16:07 - Compression Topology
19:43 - Drums: Compression, Signal Stability, Transient Design and Colouration
32:53 - Drums: Parallel Compression
37:09 - Drums: EQ
47:45 - Drums: Reverb Processing
49:40 - Bass: Compression and EQ
54:38 - Acoustic Guitar: Compression and EQ

56:19 - Harmonically Distorted Electric Guitar: EQ, Dynamic EQ and Multi-band Compression

60:28 - Vocals: Compression and EQ
65:46 - Vocals: Effects Processing

Mark Mynett Biog
As well as Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production at Huddersfield University, Mark Mynett is a live music front-of-house engineer, and record producer/engineer/mix and mastering engineer. Mainly focused on indie, rock and metal genres, he produces from his own studio - Mynetaur Productions – where he recently completed the latest My Dying Bride album ‘The Ghost of Orion’: referred to by Dom Lawson (The Guardian, Metal Hammer, Prog, Classic Rock) as “…a master class in modern metal production”.
Metal Music Manual (instructional book for producing contemporary metal music)

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Mark Mynett, sound engineer and senior lecturer at Huddersfield University, presents part four of his recording series. Here he details how to prepare a vocalist for studio recording and how to select and set up your recording equipment for optimal results.

Chapters
00:15 - Introduction
00:31 - Preparing For Vocal Recording
05:08 - Recording Vocals At Home
06:53 - Microphone Selection
14:41 - Microphone Placement
24:05 - Printed Compression
30:27 - Headphone Cue Mix

Mark Mynett Biog
As well as Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production at Huddersfield University, Mark Mynett is a live music front-of-house engineer, and record producer/engineer/mix and mastering engineer. Mainly focused on indie, rock and metal genres, he produces from his own studio - Mynetaur Productions – where he recently completed the latest My Dying Bride album ‘The Ghost of Orion’: referred to by Dom Lawson (The Guardian, Metal Hammer, Prog, Classic Rock) as “…a master class in modern metal production”.
Metal Music Manual (instructional book for producing contemporary metal music)

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Mark Mynett, sound engineer and senior lecturer at Huddersfield University, details best practices for setting up and recording rhythm and lead guitar parts.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:40 - How To Manage Distortion
06:10 - Pre-Recording Preparation
07:16 - Double Tracking And Quad Tracking
09:07 - Finding A Clear Midrange Tone
14:20 - Isolation And Ambience
15:46 - Microphone Selection
19:23 - Mic Placement
25:17 - Multitracking Tips
34:03 - Recording Guitar Solos
36:39 - Adding EQ At The Recording Stage

Mark Mynett Biog
As well as Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production at Huddersfield University, Mark Mynett is a live music front-of-house engineer, and record producer/engineer/mix and mastering engineer. Mainly focused on indie, rock and metal genres, he produces from his own studio - Mynetaur Productions – where he recently completed the latest My Dying Bride album ‘The Ghost of Orion’: referred to by Dom Lawson (The Guardian, Metal Hammer, Prog, Classic Rock) as “…a master class in modern metal production”.
Metal Music Manual (instructional book for producing contemporary metal music)

Audio Clips: Baron Carta
Baron Carta at Spotify

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Mark Mynett, sound engineer and senior lecturer at Huddersfield University, talks us through prepping for and recording a bass session, including ways to generate multiple layered tracks for use in your final mix.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
01:30 - 1. Intonation And Tuning
02:54 - 2. Active DI Boxes
06:00 - 3. Amp, Cab And Mic Setup
14:01 - 4. Layering Bass Sounds
17:51 - 5. Introducing Distortion

Mark Mynett Biog
As well as Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production at Huddersfield University, Mark Mynett is a live music front-of-house engineer, and record producer/engineer/mix and mastering engineer. Mainly focused on indie, rock and metal genres, he produces from his own studio - Mynetaur Productions – where he recently completed the latest My Dying Bride album ‘The Ghost of Orion’: referred to by Dom Lawson (The Guardian, Metal Hammer, Prog, Classic Rock) as “…a master class in modern metal production”.
Metal Music Manual (instructional book for producing contemporary metal music)

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Mark Mynett, sound engineer and senior lecturer at Huddersfield University, talks us through the setup and recording of live drums.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:36 - Recording Multiple Instruments
01:12 - Pre-Recording Preparation
03:46 - 1. Miking The Kick
12:08 - 2. Miking The Snare
24:24 - 3. Miking The Toms
29:24 - 4. Miking The Cymbals
38:54 - 5. Overheads For Room Ambience

Mark Mynett Biog
As well as Senior Lecturer in Music Technology and Production at Huddersfield University, Mark Mynett is a live music front-of-house engineer, and record producer/engineer/mix and mastering engineer. Mainly focused on indie, rock and metal genres, he produces from his own studio - Mynetaur Productions – where he recently completed the latest My Dying Bride album ‘The Ghost of Orion’: referred to by Dom Lawson (The Guardian, Metal Hammer, Prog, Classic Rock) as “…a master class in modern metal production”.
Metal Music Manual (instructional book for producing contemporary metal music)

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Grammy Award winning engineer Bob Clearmountain details his unique approach to mixing music in Dolby Atmos using an analogue desk.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:26 - Mixing In 5:1
04:16 - Setting Up Studio Monitoring
06:24 - Upgrading For Atmos
08:24 - How To Approach Atmos
11:14 - Placing Sounds
15:25 - Beds And Objects
19:11 - Working From An Analogue Console
23:11 - Using The Centre Speaker
27:23 - Incorporating Plug-in Effects
28:40 - Adding Compression In Surround
34:29 - Checking The Mix
37:21 - Frustrations With Atmos
41:34 - Recommended Listening

Bob Clearmountain Biog
Bob Clearmountain is an American recording engineer, mixer and record producer. He has worked with many prominent names in music including Bruce Springsteen (mixing Springsteen's Born in the U.S.A. and 25 other projects), The Rolling Stones (re-mixes of the singles "Miss You" and "Out of Tears" ) as well as their Tattoo You album amongst  over 20 album, movie and concert video projects, Bryan Adams (producing and/or mixing nearly all of his albums since 1983), Robbie Williams, Huey Lewis & The News, Toto, Bon Jovi (These Days, Crush, Bounce), Simple Minds, The Pretenders, David Bowie, Roxy Music, Bryan Ferry, INXS and 235 other artists. Bob has released some signature plug-ins with audio hardware and software manufacturer Apogee Electronics.

https://www.mixthis.com/

Apogee Electronics Biog
Apogee originally made their name with special anti-aliasing filters that solved many of the early problems associated with digital audio. Later, Apogee’s complete conversion systems pushed the envelope of digital audio quality and established Apogee as a key innovator in the field of professional digital audio. Today, Apogee converters and audio interfaces are regarded as the reference standard in the audio industry.

Products such as Symphony I/O, Big Ben, Ensemble and Duet all set the benchmark by which digital audio recording hardware is judged. Now with their latest products JAM and MiC, designed especially for Apple’s iPad, iPhone and GarageBand software, Apogee continues to be at the forefront of recording technology. Apogee’s mission is to build products that offer ultimate sound quality and innovative design to all music creators from the aspiring artist to the discerning audio professional.

https://apogeedigital.com/

Sam Inglis Biog
Editor In Chief Sam Inglis has been with Sound On Sound for more than 20 years. He is a recording engineer, producer, songwriter and folk musician who studies the traditional songs of England and Scotland, and the author of Neil Young's Harvest (Bloomsbury, 2003) and Teach Yourself Songwriting (Hodder, 2006).

https://www.soundonsound.com

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

In this Behind The Brand feature, Nuno Fonseca of Sound Particles talks to Paul White about their rapid rise in the film and audio industry and how they are using their sound particle plug-in technology to bring exciting new developments to sound design and audio recording.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
00:13 - Launch In The Film Industry
02:59 - Moving Into Music
04:53 - Controlling 3D Sound
07:26 - EastWest WordBuilder
11:05 - Density
14:07 - The End-User Format
17:04 - Solving Binaural
19:45 - Head Tracking
21:42 - Future Developments

Sound Particles Biog
Sound Particles creates 3D Audio Software that brings the power of computer graphics to the sound world, allowing sound professionals to create breathtaking sounds that simply would not be possible to create in any other way. Sound Particles provides the world’s first native 3D audio software combining CGI and audio techniques to create a new audio standard. The software creates the most realistic sound effects allowing perfect coherence between image and sound due to its true 3D CGI integration, while increasing the productivity of audio professionals.

Based in Leiria (Portugal) and founded by Nuno Fonseca, a former university professor, Sound Particles has been steadily growing since being founded in 2016 and is now composed of a team of over 30 people (with 1 in the UK and 1 in LA).

Sound Particles’ unique software is used in all major Hollywood studios and top videogame companies, in productions like "Dune", “Game of Thrones”, “Ready Player One”, "Frozen 2", "Star Wars" and many others.

https://soundparticles.com/

Paul White Biog
Paul White joined the Sound On Sound team in 1991 where he became Editor In Chief, a position he held for many years before recently becoming Executive Editor. Paul has written more than 20 recording and music technology textbooks, the latest being The Producer’s Manual.

Having established his own multitrack home studio in the 1970s he’s worked with many notable names including Bert Jansch and Gordon Giltrap. He’s played in various bands over the years and currently collaborates with Malvern musician Mark Soden, under the name of Cydonia Collective. Paul still performs live claiming that as he has suffered for his music he doesn’t see why everyone else shouldn’t too!

http://www.cydoniacollective.co.uk/

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts

Tony Ni from Soundtoys sits down with Sam Inglis to discuss his mixing workflow and to explain how he uses core Soundtoys plug-ins to achieve his sound.

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction
02:54 - 21 Plug-ins
05:44 - Workflow Tools
07:05 - Getting The Balance Right
11:24 - EQ And Saturation
21:22 - Parallel Processing The Drums
28:38 - Using Saturation On Vocals
35:07 - Adding And Automating Echo
47:06 - Getting Started With Soundtoys

Soundtoys Biog
Based in Burlington Vermont, USA, Soundtoys (formerly Wave Mechanics) was founded in 1996 by Ken Bogdanowicz, the DSP effects designer behind the legendary H3000 Ultra-Harmonizer and the DSP4000 line of hardware signal processors from Eventide. Soundtoys develops world-class, creative signal-processing software for audio production, mixing, and sound design.

Soundtoys users include Mike Dean, David Sitek, James Blake, Ariel Borujow, Jamie Lidell, Greg Wells, Dave Pensado, Tony Maserati, Tim Kelley, and Blake Mills.

https://www.soundtoys.com/

Sam Inglis Biog
Editor In Chief Sam Inglis has been with Sound On Sound for more than 20 years. He is a recording engineer, producer, songwriter and folk musician who studies the traditional songs of England and Scotland, and the author of Neil Young's Harvest (Bloomsbury, 2003) and Teach Yourself Songwriting (Hodder, 2006).

https://www.soundonsound.com

Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts