Distributed in 94 countries, Mix is the world's leading magazine for the professional recording and sound production technology industry. Mix covers a wide range of topics including: recording, live sound and production, broadcast production, audio for film and video, and music technology.
EVER WONDER IF SOMEONE’S PUTTING YOU ON? We always appreciate getting e-mails and comments about Mix and the industry in general, but every once in a while, we just gotta wonder whether someone’s putting us on. It’s the web equivalent of the phrase “O.K., Where’s the hidden camera?”—wondering whether Allen Funt is gonna come out from behind a curtain. And sometimes, maybe it’s simply a sad reflection on whoever actually sends these things.
One time, some guy inquired, asking for a recommendation about what kind of outboard mic preamp he should buy. Someone told him his tracks would sound much better if he bought a Neve preamp. I replied that to in order for us to maintain some kind of impartiality, we have a policy of not recommending any specific products unless it is part of a written article, review, etc. But out of curiosity, I asked him what kind of mics he had. He replied he had a couple of Shure SM57s.
Believe me, there are few mics more amazing than this must-have, time-tested classic, but at this point the “Candid Camera” alarm went off in my mind. However, diplomacy set in and I recommended he could probably get more quality for his money by first getting some better mics which later—once he’s ready to invest in a super-quality preamp—would really make sense. Problem is some schmoe, an “expert,” no doubt, gave some one-size-fits-all advice that really didn’t fit his particular situation.
Another time, some guy e-mailed after reading what we assumed was a thoroughly tongue-in-cheek article I wrote on the back page of our AES issue last year with a bunch of joke press releases called “Products You Won’t See at AES”. You can check it out here: CLICK HERE FOR ARTICLE.
Among other things—including gems such as “The Roach Coach Music Library,” a “Drunkulator” plug-in and a “Stoogelizer” outboard processor—the list described the “Virtual Sur-Reality” helmet, which would give users the visual impression they were mixing in Abbey Road studios or the Sydney Opera House rather than the cheesy studio or dumpy basement club they were in.
It was written in jest, yet some poor soul actually thought it was real (talk about sur-reality!) and wondered how he could contact the manufacturer. I’m sure it was quite a letdown for this person to hear the truth, but maybe there’s a lesson to be learned here that indicates there might be a market opportunity for someone to actually make such a product. Any takers? And hey, if it’s on the Internet, it’s gotta be real… doesn’t it?
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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THIS HASN’T BEEN THE BEST WEEK. Jim Cowan, an old friend just passed away after a bout with cancer. Just 52 years young, he was a 20-year veteran of Neutrik USA (in fact, he was the company’s first employee), starting out as general manager and eventually becoming company president.
Jim was an amazing person who was loved by everyone in the audio industry and even though we lived on opposite coasts, seeing him at tradeshows was always a great experience. Even better was some years ago when we spent a week in Liechtenstein, checking out the sights, including visiting Neutrik’s plant and company HQ in this tiny European country of 62 square miles—barely larger than the 49-square mile footprint of the city of San Francisco. In those few days, I really got to know what an intelligent, creative and caring human being he was.
And anyone who ever met Jim would tell you he loved the pro audio industry. In a Mix interview, he talked about the satisfaction he felt from “meeting and having one-on-one conversations over the years with industry leaders and pioneers such as Hartley and Melia Peavey, Greg Mackie, Phil Hart, Charlie Wicks and Michael Laiacona—to name just a few. I have been fortunate to have met some of the most talented artists, engineers, installers and designers in the industry.” Jim also recalled that one of his most rewarding accomplishments was getting Neutrik’s Speakon connector accepted by manufacturers, users and installers. “It was a big challenge for Neutrik to create something totally new and to get the industry to like it, believe in it and support it,” he said. But Jim’s persistence and hard work paid off, with Speakon now accepted as a worldwide industry standard.
Jim was a devoted father to his sons, participating in their track and soccer programs and coaching youth basketball and Little League baseball teams. He enjoyed traveling, was a serious wine enthusiast and a proud member of the Red Sox Nation. Jim is survived by his wife Kate, sons Daniel and Gregory and his mother. As the disease that took him progressed, and he knew the end was near, he requested that friends who remembered him should donate to Ocean of Love, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping children with cancer and their families. It’s no less than I would expect from a man with so much love and who was loved by so many. Farewell, friend–you will be not be forgotten.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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DURING MY 28-YEAR TENURE HERE AT MIX, I’ve done hundreds of interviews with people in all aspects of pro audio–engineers, producers, live sound mixers, artists, educators, studio owners, manufacturers, designers–you name it. But it isn’t very often that I’m the one being interviewed, although a couple of these instances occurred recently. One was by my old friend Alan Parsons, who was doing some kind of video documentary and talked to me about Mix magazine during the AES show. It’s too bad he didn’t interview me about the time we spent a week teaching audio seminars (and goofing off) in Argentina for some events sponsored by the wonderful Mercedes Onorato, but like the old saying goes, what happens in Buenos Aires STAYS in Buenos Aires. There are a lot of great stories about that trip, but maybe some other day…
My other interview was by the awesome, talented publicist Marsha Vdovin, who spoke to me a couple weeks ago about my work with the TECnology Hall of Fame, which I founded five years ago as a spinoff to the TEC Awards, to honor audio innovations and innovators from the relatively short (OK, 125-year) history of pro audio, going back to the early work of pioneers such as Edison and Berliner. Marsha’s project had to do with this year’s induction of Bill Putnam’s 1176 compressor—truly a classic in anyone’s book. In fact, I was equally honored to have Bill Putnam Jr. (of the reborn Universal Audio) be on hand to accept the award in the memory of his father.
The sad side of pro audio’s history is that it’s fleeting, very fragile and often poorly documented. Researching this stuff ain’t easy. Many manufacturers are long since out of business. At some companies, no one remains who has any knowledge of the original product—even a few years later. The history of pro audio—our very lineage—is woefully neglected and sources are scarce, if not impossible to find, so ANY effort to chronicle our past is a worthwhile effort. You can check out profiles and information about all of the TECnology Hall of Fame inductees to date by clicking on TECnology Hall of Fame, http://mixonline.com/TECnology-Hall-of-Fame/.
Anyway, after all these years, it was great to chat with Marsha about some of the background behind the event and recall a few highlights. But rather than spoiling all the fun, you can check it our yourself at the Heritage Section of Universal Audio’s website. These guys really understand the importance of history.
As a sidenote to this year’s TECnology Hall of Fame, one of this year’s other inductees was for the Kurzweil 250 keyboard, and although Ray Kurzweil wasn’t able to attend, we were pleased to have his daughter Amy accept the award on his behalf and keeping with the trend, Eric Blackmer, son of the legendary late David Blackmer, accepted the induction for his father’s classic dbx 160 compressor.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE “COMMENTS” LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
YOU CAN TELL IT’S AN ELECTION YEAR. Members of the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress are considering the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, which would require the Federal Communications Commission to prescribe a standard to preclude commercials from being broadcast at louder volumes than the program material they accompany.
The text of this proposed legislation (bills H.R. 6209 and S. 3154) states:
“Within one year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Federal Communications Commission shall prescribe pursuant to the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 151 et seq.) a regulation that provides, in connection with any video programming that is broadcast or that is distributed by any multichannel video programming distributor, that—
(1) advertisements accompanying such video programming shall not be excessively noisy or strident;
(2) such advertisements shall not be presented at modulation levels substantially higher than the program material that such advertisements accompany; and
(3) the average maximum loudness of such advertisements shall not be substantially higher than the average maximum loudness of the program material that such advertisements accompany.”
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE “COMMENTS” LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
I HAVE MASTERS–LOST MASTERS–ON MY MIND THIS WEEK. A couple days ago, I got a blog reply from a guy named Tony Vick, who once upon a time, was in a band called “The Din.” So far so good, but the bad part comes in because the group was signed to Rocshire Records, a label funded entirely by money embezzled from (aircraft giant) the Hughes Corporation. Tony had read an archived copy of my “How to Make a Million Bucks in the Music Biz” AudioBites column (July 2007) and was wondering if I had any leads on how he could get access to his masters. Unfortunately I don’t have any leads to help him–maybe someone out there knows where the FBI keeps master tapes that were seized as part of criminal investigation 25 years ago, but my guess is that the odds aren’t in Tony’s favor on their survivability today. And IF anybody does know, please drop me a line and I’ll get the word out.
Anyway back to today’s story… A month ago, I wrote about walking through URBAN ORE, the local recycle/reuse store three blocks from the Mix offices, across the border in Berkeley.
During my lunch hour today, I went by to peruse their latest offerings. Every once in a while, this place has something surprising–by the way, that Neve/Necam 96 power supply is still on the shelf there–but what I saw today was both odd and sad: Hundreds and hundreds of reel-to-reel tape masters–analog and digital (probably Mitsubishi)–which mostly were marked with notes/track sheets from Fantasy Studios, although some had Hyde Street Studios markings. There they were, quarter-inch, half-inch, 1-inch (probably ProDigi 32-track) and tons (literally) of 2-inch analog reels–piled up high on pallets and rolling freight carts. Most seemed to be mid-late ’80s and ’90s–and mostly Ampex formulations.
How did they get there? This one’s easy. Most studios offer tape storage for clients’ materials, and over time, people forget to pick up their masters. And with the recent ownership change at Fantasy Studios, somebody figured (and rightly so) that they weren’t really responsible for master tapes from sessions going back two decades or more, so after being degaussed, these abandoned masters went off to the recycle store.
Warning to the wise: If you have masters that you’ve been storing at some studio–any stiudio–from years back, you might just look into getting them back–before they disappear.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
RESPONSE FROM FANTASY STUDIOS
Nina Bombardier, the previous studio manager, tried for 1-1/2 years prior to the changeover of ownership to contact the rightful owners of the tapes. While many people did respond and pick up their masters, there were many who did not. I personally witnessed her day after day try to contact people via phone, email, and letter. Feeling that more than the “best reasonable effort” was made to contact the owners of the tapes, Concord Records, the previous owners of the studios made the decision to donate the remains to Urban Ore for recycling. All tapes had been degaussed before and after donation. The state of California states that it is a courtesy not an obligation for a studio to store the works of an artist more than 30 days. (This is something that we stress to clients). Many of these tapes had been there 20 or 30 years. Having to clear out the vault for a new tenant forced the decision. I share this to give a more complete picture to the situation.
Jeffrey Wood Fantasy Studios
REPLY FROM GP: Thanks Jeff, for the clarification. Certainly it was never my intent to blame either you, Nina, or Fantasy Studios for the disposal of masters that were essentially abandoned after some 20+ years of storage. But at least you’ve made it clear that prior to disposal, these were properly degaussed. So rather than a treasure hunt for lost masters, maybe this is an opportunity for on-a-budget recordists to perhaps pick up some bargain 2-inch stock, as I assume most of the 1/4-inch stuff is full of splices and leader, making it less than useful for re-use, except as a source of clean take-up reels. My main intent in the column was to wake some people up who may be facing similar situations where their masters may be lurking in other facilities. Thanks again for your comments. –George Petersen
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THIS WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. Former Mix and Electronic Musician associate publisher Carrie Anderson passed away this week, following injuries from an automobile accident near her home in San Jose.
Carrie was one smart cookie. A Magna Cum Laude grad of Boston University, Carrie first worked at Yankee, a magazine about New England lifestyles, before joining the marketing/public relations staff of Kurzweil Music Systems. I used to get phone calls from her while she was there–evidently she had a card in her Rolodex, filed under the heading “Answer Man,” with my name and number under it. She (and a lot of us at that time, around 1986) were pretty new to MIDI and electronic music technologies and she would occasionally call me, asking me to explain terms and concepts used in their advertisements and promo materials.
A couple years later, in 1988, she made a “few months” trip to the San Francisco Bay Area to help a friend relocate, yet ended up remaining in Northern California, met Electronic Musician publisher Peter Hirschfeld, who saw her potential and offered Carrie a job as EM’s advertising manager. Carrie thoroughly enjoyed the work. Her creative and organizational skills, combined with her bubbling personality, easygoing nature and love of music all contributed to her success. A few years later, she was promoted to EM’s associate publisher, a position she held until 1997. She loved living in San Francisco, and delved into Italian cooking, going so far as taking Italian language lessons for total immersion, which returned me to “answer man” status, asking me to clarify grammar, phrases, punctuation and vocabulary—all in Italian, my other native language.
About this time, Carrie met David “DK” Sweet—an industry consultant who worked with clients such as Mackie, E-mu Systems, Line 6, AKG, Neumann and Capitol Records. Soon, the two were inseparable, with Carrie having finally found the perfect guy. They married in 1999—surrounded by friends in a wonderful ceremony in a winery during a snowstorm—a rare event here in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Seeking new challenges, Carrie moved to Acoustic Guitar magazine, then later to Mix followed by the CMP group (Guitar Player, Keyboard, etc.), but the long commutes from her new home in San Jose led her to try something new. In 2005, Carrie began working as a personal assistant to Silicon Valley entrepreneur/philanthropist Steve Kirsch, who used his fortunes from founding Infoseek and Propel into creating a charitable foundation.
Carrie Anderson had many friends within and outside the industry and was loved by all. She will long be remembered for her intelligence, generosity, sense of humor and infectious smile.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE “COMMENTS” LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
LAST WEEK’S MIX NASHVILLE EVENT WAS AWESOME. Two jam-packed days of seminars, panel discussions, hands-on product demos, music performances and fun. Interestingly, one of the more unexpected highlights was a mostly informal get-together party after the first day’s conclusion. With free beer, food and cookies, it was a great chance for all the attendees to talk, do a little networking, make a few industry contacts and check out some great local talent. One of the more unexpected things was that for a “local” event, I talked to people who had come from Colorado, New England, Atlanta, New Mexico, Los Angeles and even Indonesia–and all of them said the trip was most worthwhile. For some highlights, click on MIX NASHVILLE and check it out, but the bottom line was everybody said the event was great. It’s definitely gonna happen again next year–be there.
If you wanted solid advice on recording and live sound, there was plenty to be heard at the Mix Nashville seminars. I was hosting three different panels —on using plug-ins live, studio design/speaker optimization and placement and “Recording the Band,” a panel about tracking during live shows. During the latter, veteran Robert Scovill offered this suggestion: When you’re on tour and recording lots of shows, make sure that along with your multitrack files, also include a 2-track mix with your archive. This way, weeks, months or years later, someone who may be going through dozens of shows (or more) won’t have to load and re-create an entire mix session just to determine which song performances to use. Even if you’re pressed for time, a board mix on CD-R will do as a quick reference. And make sure you label and document everything.
Sometimes it’s the little touches that can make your life a lot easier down the road–even when you’re off the road.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE “COMMENTS” LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
THERE’S SOMETHING COOL, HIP AND INHERENTLY GREEN about recycling and every now and then I go by this very cool (and very Berkeley) place called Urban Ore, which is just a couple blocks away from the Mix offices. This is a locale where people bring old furniture, leftover building materials and obsolete technology stuff to be resold, reused and otherwise redistributed to people in the know. It’s essentially a huge old warehouse and outdoor sales area brimming full of STUFF of every sort (and well sorted), ranging from consumer electronics, plumbing/electrical supplies, picture frames, desks, sinks, tubs, windows, doors, slightly overused–meaning really beat up–musical instruments and occasionally (but alas, not too frequently) even PRO AUDIO.
But today in the electronics section–among the piles of Kodak Ektagraphic slide projectors, 1970s-era slide programmers/dissolve units (in case anybody is old enough to remember olde-style multimedia/multimage), Mac 8600s, vintage PCs, turntables, cassette decks and piles of Jaz/Zip/Bernoulli drives–was a more unusual item.
A Neve/Necam 96 power supply.
Unfortunately, no other Neve gear was lurking about, but at a mere $50 buckaroos, you could have this monster of monsters: About six rack spaces high, it must have weighed about 100 pounds–they just don’t make ‘em like this anymore. What awesome construction!!! I was even tempted to bring it home and adopt it myself for resale or some future project, but this was like the big one you toss back into the pond, hoping that it will make someone else’s day.
But the real mystery in the back of my mind was what tales this thing could tell. Where did it come from? What great projects did it once supply (pun intended) the juice for? Some things I may never know, so if anyone DOES know, let me know and help me finish this Unsolved Mystery for the rest of the world…
I hate telling you this, because, for one, I don’t want anyone to be misled and think that among the porcelain toilet tanks, printing presses and dictaphones that haunt this place, there are boxes of dusty Neumanns in every corner–which there aren’t, although today, they had a 15-inch Peavey Black Widow woofer (untested and missing its aluminum dust cap) for $12, a solid-looking single-15 cab in faux wood finish–empty, but sporting road handles and dual front ports for $25 and an empty (but extremely heavy) dual-12 cab–it was a generic roadcase-looking box (no handles)–for $20 or so. Yet at the same time, they were trying to sell some heavy black/chrome older steel Atlas speaker stands (NOT MIC STANDS) priced about $260–I’m not sure who came up with THAT price!
So you never know what to expect. Besides this week’s Neve PS, they also had a Sony SDDS 35mm projector soundhead for $25–not bad if you need one–and an Ampex 35mm mag stripe stereo reader (the “penthouse” style) also for $25, but it will be a while before that one moves… Oh, and if you happen to need to need some 35mm exhibition reels, they have both 6,000 and 13,000 foot versions in stock this week.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE “COMMENTS” LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
SOMETIMES THE SIMPLE TECHNIQUE WORKS BEST. Our senior editor Blair Jackson came to me with an age-old problem. One of his kids was doing a play in a high school gymnasium and the audio was terrible. Some well-intentioned person had evidently hung some dynamic mics over the stage, which helped, but added no intelligibility and when cranked up to provide more gain, created an awful feedback problem. Fortunately, in this case, they DIDN’T have the budget for wireless mics. For some reason, every amateur theater group thinks it’s some kind of panacea, even though wireless (especially cheap wireless) often creates more problems than it solves, unless your sound engineer is extremely astute.
To make matters worse, the entire sound system had floor-mount XLR mic jacks, which were hard wired to a PA head (of unknown brand/origin) that was located in a locked closet that now one seemed to have access to. The way the PA operated was simply to plug a mic(s) into a floor jack and it was live. Blair asked what I would recommend. I loaned him a couple of Rode NTG-2 shotgun mics (the ones that can be phantom powered or run from a single AA battery) and pre-set them in the bass rolloff position.
I figured this was probably the safest choice, and with the non-access to the mixer/PA head/whatever, would safely skirt any “but there’s no phantom power” issues. I suggested placing them on boom stands located just in front of the stage, and raised a couple feet above the floor level–to avoid emphasizing foot noise.
After the gig, I asked him how everything went, and he replied “it was fantastic” and mentioned that several people sitting in the back said it was the first time they could ever make out the dialog from the cheap seats. Anyway, it just goes to prove that sometimes a simple approach is best.
When not working on MIX stuff, George Peterse n records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________ What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE COMMENTS LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
I MET HIM ABOUT A YEAR AGO–FOR THE SECOND TIME. Actually, I wrote a blog in this space about 12 months ago about a wonderful coincidence that led me to rediscover Les Lewellyn, and now he’s gone, having passed away peacefully in his sleep on March 12. You see, I was originally searching on the web for his older brother Bob Lewellyn, a guitarist I was in a band with back in 1968–in Naples, Italy, my home town. The only reference I found to Bob was something about him playing a session on one of Les’ recording projects, for his band Preying Lizard, but I also discovered that Les was somewhat of a messiah for independent music, offering help, guidance and exposure through his #1 rated web music podcasts at PreyingLizardMusic.com.
Les loved music of all kinds and did much to help so many independent bands. He will certainly be missed, but I find at least some solace here in the knowledge that Bob Lewellyn will be taking over the site and podcasts, a lasting tribute to the great work begun by a true music hero named Les Lewellyn. He will not be forgotten.
When not working on MIX stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________ What do YOU think? CLICK ON THE COMMENTS LINK BELOW AND SPEAK OUT!
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