Sound Sources i am going to use are: Plug In Synths, Plug In Sampler, Loops and Recordings.

Recordings will obviously be the fun part and will be described when done. Planned are recordings of manipulated guitars, room ambience, guitar amps and percussion including improvised stuff like bottles, cans, boxes, furniture, my belly…

Loops are the boring part and therefore ignored.

Plug In Sampler i constantly use are the Kontakt 3, Battery 3 and the EXS of LOGIC Pro. I also have a great selection of selfmade and/or edited sampled percussion and drums. Gymnastic equipment through a tube eq for example…

Plug In Synths are also often from my Native Instruments Komplete 5 like Absynth 4, FM 8, Massive… But there are others i really love to explore like LOGIC Pros ES2 + Sculpture (Physical Model Synth), the ImpOscar and u-he Zebra 2 <– thats a tip for the interested too !

Hard…WHAT ?? Wasnt i planning to produce an ELECTRONIC album ? Didnt i write about all those great sounding Plug-Ins ? Is the time, money and loss of space worth it ?

To my mind - Yes !

There still is a difference. A small one if you already have perfectly recorded tracks from “real” instruments. But if you tend to stack sound generated by algorhytms only as when generally using Plug In Synthies & Sampler, the difference is not so small anymore. And if you are going to saturate or even go into distorion with real analog hardware you will more clearly notice it. You will see - no - hear it soon

The newest addition to that rack is a pair of Chandler Germanium Compressors (the blue and yellow ones) displacing my SSL Mixbusscompressor Clone. These versatile new units will become quite busy while “tracking” the various sources be it Plug Ins or recordings.

The silver-grey Box is a clone of two vintage UREI 1176. Thats the reason for me not to use the UAD 1176 that much anymore… Hard Sounds - this is your destiny - get squashed even more by this classic.

The Black Unit with silver knobs is a custommade Guitar Pre-Amp (with Tubes of course) for the Sounds which are not hard enough yet

The one at the bottom is an old TLA Tube EQ. Instant thickness with presence (by dialing in a certain frequency and tunrning the gain until the peak LED burns… constantly) Not for the fainthearted. Many times used as a Mic Pre as well (with the highs boosted while recording). The knobs are making ugly noises if they are turned. That is a bit annoying. Maybe i should use that noise as an effect ?

The Audio Interface is nothing to be proud of but it works reliably… if it breaks i might get an Apogee… Oops, that was my drink going into the 828…

Although many of the standard LOGIC PRO Plug-Ins are good tools there are specialists which definitely  bring the DAW to another level.

My favourite Plug-In EQs are the Neve EQs from the UAD (especially the 1081 for its flexibility AND sound), the Waves SSL Channelstrip EQ (very flexible and with really tight sound - ideal for everything that needs to be EQd a bit more but still be upfront ) and the URS Channelstrip Pro (although its very high flexibility often is too much - but it still sounds nice and clean). The TriTone Hydratone EQ is an analog, fat sounding EQ with the benefit of its own type of “saturation” which often can substitute a compressor. For extreme clean EQ i sometimes use the PSP Neon HR and for some different character i also have the Waves API EQs (wonderful sound, cool to improve a source, but definetly hard to use if there are problems in the mix)

My favourite Plug-In Compressors include many of the UAD cards: LA2A (for densitsy), Neve 33609 (for tight punch and “glue”), 1176 for snap and aggression (of course i still prefer my hardware clone - but hardware is another post), PSP Vintage Warmer 2 and Mixpressor (for upfront, hard sounds - fat, but often to intransparent for acoustic sources). The PSP Master Comp is a good sounding transparent one (and can be mixed in which is always a benefit) but is so hard to the CPU (or programmed badly) that i try to avoid it in a dense arrangement and if i dont bounce.

Before someone asks… if you only can afford ONE EQ/Compressor plug-in you should get the URS Channelstrip Pro - its affordable and you could mix quite anything with it. If you have a higher Budget get one or better two UAD cards with at least the following Plugs: 1176, LA2A, Neve 1081, Pultec Pro. Get the Waves SSL Bundle or the URS Channelstrip Pro on top and you really have a good bandwidth of sounds to mix with.

Reverb and Delay… Yes, i heard about people using those… One of the best tips i can give anyone: Get an Impulse Respone Reverb (LOGIC Pro comes with the Space Designer for example) add good Impulses and get creative. For fast tracks try to shorten the standard Halls and Rooms so that they only give you the early reflections (you get depth and the feel of space but not the muddy wash of long reverb). Space Designer has a great envelope for shortening - try it (if you own LOGIC that is). For acoustic or orchestral Sounds use Waves IR-1, IR-L or Altiverb. They do sound a bit more realistic.

For Chorus, Flanger, Phaser i really like to use the UADs Roland Chorus and Dimension D, PSP Nitro and the collection of Audio Damage. A Budget tip - they are really cheap ($29 to $49). Go figure: www.audiodamage.com

For the friends of electronic music without the knowledge about production: DAW means digital audio workstation and most of the times the main tool for music producer. You may skip the rest of the post now - its just for the nerds out there interested in “the tools”

For now i work with LOGIC PRO 8 on a Apple Mac Pro “Quad” with 3GB RAM and more than 2TB harddrivespace plus a 23″ Apple TFT. I have two UAD cards with nearly all Plug Ins Universal Audio sells. For controlling the levels and writing automations i use an EMAGIC LOGIC CONTROL plus XT extension - giving me 16+1 real faders and knobs with high resolution. For Monitoring i use PMC DB1SA speakers (the smallest they have) and a GENELEC subwoofer. If you just got to much money and are interested in great sound - get some big PMC speakers - you wont regret it… i might even come listenig to some music at your house for fun :D 

 

The Headphones are Sennheiser HD 650 and the Keyboard is a new Korg K61 - hope it works longer than that Edirol PCR i had before. Behind the white screens of aluminium and fabric are the absorber for the acoustics… at least a minimal approach… its not a full blown studio anyway… the studio ill use is ten minutes away from my “headquarter” and will also be described in detail in a future post.

The Monitor Controller is a PreSonus Monitor Station that substituted my Mackie Big Knob some days ago because the Big Knob was… well… too big. Its cool because its smaller and lighter in color (silver) but be warned - it makes an awful loud noise if hooked to active speakers and switched off. Maybe the Big Knob will stay… 

Whats the Status right now ?

In the last years i was quite busy with composing/producing music for advertising and media. But beside this work i collected every cool sound, every unheard mixing idea and every beautiful melody which came to my mind. If i now look into the folders of my harddrive ill easily find dozens of preproduced tracks, ideas, grooves. Nothing finished yet, but a lot of potential audio jewels.

What to do with such a mess ? And what to do with the experience i got from working with so many styles for advertising ? What to do with nowadays audio possibilites which would have been a “dream studio with several hired guys” some years ago and would have been absolutely impossible to have more than a decade ago…? (Ill talk about the technical details later for shure)

Another problem with those snippets and recordings was that there was no common style to them, no big scheme, not even the same “sound” of mixing. They where all just to different to simply put them on one album even if you´d “remix” them all.

Then i realised that I never did a concept album. Something which is not a mere “best of” collection of the last years but more like a collection of about twelve different angles of view onto one common topic. And that was the challenge i got hooked up with. Some days later i had a topic i thought to be ideal - not to cheesy but diversive and a bit technical as well… No, i wont tell you that topic yet… It doesnt even matter for the future consumer of the album - it is just my own guideline to not get lost in the varieties of sounds and styles and its there to not make it too easy for me

Welcome everybody ! In the next weeks (12 Weeks still aint “months” ) i will try to write daily about all the processes neccessary to make a full length electronic album.

I will include all the sources of inspiration, the thoughts, the tools, the places, the people, troubleshooting with before/after examples, fotos and stories. There will even be polls about some of the decisions and YOU are always able to comment or ask questions.

I hope all of you will enjoy the

FOOTPRINTS OF AN UPCOMING RECORD

ROLF MAIER BODE