AT 1
The RØDECaster Pro is designed to simplify podcast production whilst delivering superb audio quality. It supports up to four presenters/guests, as well as offering easy connection to phone, USB and Bluetooth™ sources. Eight programmable pads offer instant playback of sound effects and jingles. Podcasts can be recorded directly to microSD™ card, or to a computer via USB. Ease of use is assured, with intuitive controls and large full-colour touchscreen.
The Cho oice off Toda ay’s Crea ative Ge ene erattion.™ AT 2
Editor Mark Davie mark@audiotechnology.com.au Publisher Philip Spencer philip@alchemedia.com.au Editorial Director Christopher Holder chris@audiotechnology.com.au Assistant Editor Preshan John preshan@alchemedia.com.au
Regular Contributors Martin Walker Paul Tingen Brad Watts Greg Walker Andy Szikla Andrew Bencina Jason Hearn Greg Simmons Mark Woods Ewan McDonald Guy Harrison
Art Direction Dominic Carey dominic@alchemedia.com.au Graphic Designer Daniel Howard daniel@alchemedia.com.au Advertising Philip Spencer philip@alchemedia.com.au Accounts Jaedd Asthana jaedd@alchemedia.com.au Subscriptions Sophie Spencer subscriptions@alchemedia.com.au Proofreading Andrew Bencina
AudioTechnology magazine (ISSN 1440-2432) is published by Alchemedia Publishing Pty Ltd (ABN 34 074 431 628). Contact +61 3 5331 4949 info@alchemedia.com.au www.audiotechnology.com.au PO Box 295, Ballarat VIC 3353, Australia.
All material in this magazine is copyright Š 2019 Alchemedia Publishing Pty Ltd. Apart from any fair dealing permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process with out written permission. The publishers believe all information supplied in this magazine to be correct at the time of publication. They are not in a position to make a guarantee to this effect and accept no liability in the event of any information proving inaccurate. After investigation and to the best of our knowledge and belief, prices, addresses and phone numbers were up to date at the time of publication. It is not possible for the publishers to ensure that advertisements appearing in this publication comply with the Trade Practices Act, 1974. The responsibility is on the person, company or advertising agency submitting or directing the advertisement for publication. The publishers cannot be held responsible for any errors or omissions, although every endeavour has been made to ensure complete accuracy. 5/2/2019.
AT 3
AUSTRALIA’S LEADING SUPPLIERS OF PROFESSIONAL AUDIO EQUIPMENT SINCE 1976 BEST PRICES • BEST SERVICE • BEST ADVICE • LARGEST STOCK • NATIONAL DELIVERY EDUCATION SPECIALISTS – TERTIARY, SECONDARY & STUDENT PRICING AVAILABLE ONLINE STORE www.turramusic.com.au
Expert advice on Education licensing for Institutions, Students and Teachers
Turramurra Music
Celebrates in the Music
42
Industry this Year
YEARS
Thank you to all our loyal customers! We look forward to extending our hand to all of our future customers.
PRO TOOLS HD: Full range of high quality Avid HD interfaces available – enquire now for expert advice on you Pro Tools set up
Software
LATEST VERSIONS OF THE FOLLOWING SOFTWARE AVAILABLE: Steinberg – Cubase, Wavelab + Nuendo, NEW Dorico (scoring and notation program) Avid Pro Tools + Sibelius, MOTU Digital Performer, Ableton Live, Propellerhead Reason, PreSonus Studio One + Notion CONFUSED AS TO WHAT SOFTWARE TO BUY? CONTACT OUR EXPERIENCED STAFF FOR ASSISTANCE.
Virtual Synth Heaven SOLE AUSTRALIAN AGENTS FOR SYNTHOGY IVORY PIANO SERIES
Audio Interfaces & Control Surfaces
ARTURIA / BEST SERVICE / EAST WEST / MOOG / MOTU / NATIVE INSTRUMENTS INCLUDING KOMPLETE 12 & KOMPLETE 12 ULTIMATE / SPECTRASONICS / STEINBERG / TOONTRACK / UVI / VIENNA INSTRUMENTS / & MANY MORE!
THE MOST POWERFUL AUDIO COMPUTER INTERFACES ON THE MARKET ANTELOPE / APOGEE / AUDIENT / AVID / M-AUDIO / MOTU / PRESONUS / PRISM / ROLAND / RME / TC / YAMAHA FOCUSRITE, SCARLETT & CLARETT INTERFACES AVAILABLE PRISM SOUND LYRA 2
Avid S3 – Compact, 16-Fader, EUCON-enabled, ergonomic desktop control surface that offers a streamlined yet versatile mixing solution. KOMPLETE 12 KOMPLETE 12 ULTIMATE
SPECTRASONICS KEYSCAPE OMNISPHERE AND TRILIAN
Plug-ins ANTARES / AVID / CELEMONY MELODYNE / IZOTOPE / LEXICON / MCDSP / SOFTUBE / SONNOX / SOUND TOYS / WAVES / & MANY MORE! SOFTUBE CONSOLE 1
ANTELOPE ORION 32+
FOCUSRITE REDNET 8PRE
DSP Power UAD Satellite Now Available with Thunderbolt
RME FIREFACE UFX II
NEW
UA APOLLO X SERIES
UAD-2 OCTO CARD More DSP power and Includes Analogue Classic Bundle
AUDIENT ASP880
Studio Microphones
APOGEE SYMPHONY 2
AEA / AKG / ASTON / AUDIO-TECHNICA / BEYER / BLUE / DPA / EARTHWORKS / MOJAVE / NEUMANN / RØDE / ROYER RIBBON / SE ELECTRONICS / SENNHEISER / SHURE / SLATE / TELEFUNKEN / & MANY MORE! SE ELECTRONICS TOWNSEND LABS ASTON ORIGIN RUPERT NEVE RNT TL SPHERE L22
SLATE DIGITAL RAVEN MTI
Now you can purchase Pro Tools HD software or HD native Thunderbolt with or without Pro Tools SW HD NATIVE THUNDERBOLT
HD NATIVE PCIE CARD + PRO TOOLS HD SOFTWARE
HD NATIVE THUNDERBOLT + PRO TOOLS HD SOFTWARE
HDX CORE
HD NATIVE PCIE CARD
HDX – when only the best will do. Unrivalled DSP power. THUNDERBOLT HD NATIVE AVAILABLE ENQUIRE NOW PCIe and Thunderbolt versions available with choice of high quality Avid professional interface
PRESONUS QUANTUM
PRESONUS FADERPORT 8
HDX CORE + PRO TOOLS HD SOFTWARE
PRESONUS STUDIO 26
NEW
AVID MTRX
ONE MIC GETS YOU A VIRTUAL UAD MIC LOCKER
PRESONUS STUDIO 1810 SLATE DIGITAL VRS-8 A hybrid microphone and 8 channel preamp modeling system that gives you access to virtually any signal path tone you can imagine. AT 4
CONTACT OUR PROFESSIONAL SALES TEAM FOR MORE DETAILS ON MTRX SYSTEMS, AND PRO TOOLS LICENSING OPTIONS FOR STANDARD AND PROFESSIONAL HD SYSTEMS LATEST VERSION OF AVID PRO TOOLS OR PRO TOOLS HD AVAILABLE
TURRAMURRA PROFESSIONAL STUDIO DIVISION 1263 PACIFIC HIGHWAY, TURRAMURRA, NSW. TEL: (02) 9449 8487 FAX: (02) 9449 3293 WEB: www.turramusic.com.au EMAIL: hitech_sales@turramusic.com.au
Keyboards & Sound Modules AUSTRALIA’S LARGEST STOCKIST OF KEYBOARDS ACCESS VIRUS / AKAI PRO / ALESIS / CME / DAVE SMITH INSTRUMENTS / ELEKTRON / KORG / KURZWEIL / M-AUDIO / MOOG / NORD / NOVATION / ROLAND / WALDORF / YAMAHA EURORACK MODULAR MADNESS INCLUDING:
pittsburgh modular
Metro Modular
Studio Outboard Processors & Effects WE STOCK THE BEST OF THE BEST APHEX / ART / AVALON / DANGEROUS / DRAWMER / DBX / EMPERICAL LABS / FOCUSRITE / GRACE DESIGNS / JOE MEEK / KUSH / LEXICON / MANLEY / NEVE / PRESONUS / RUPERT NEVE PORTICO / SLATE / SMART RESEARCH / SPL / SSL / TC ELECTRONICS / TOFT / UNIVERSAL AUDIO / & MANY MORE! SPL TUBE VITALIZER
MADE IN MARRICKVILLE
Studio Monitors
TIP TOP / CAT FULL OF GHOSTS / SYSTEM 80 / & MORE KORG MONOLOGUE
FULL RANGE OF 500 SERIES STUDIO PROCESSORS AVAILABLE
Studio Monitoring & Summing NEW
YAMAHA MODX8
PRESONUS ERIS SERIES AFFORDABLE STUDIO MONITORING
ANTELOPE AUDIO SATORI
High end monitoring controller. True analog monitoring and summing system.
SPL SMC 5.1
Surround sound monitor controller.
IN STORE NOW & ON DISPLAY FOR PREVIEW BAREFOOT FOOTPRINT 01 ATC SCM25
DANGEROUS MUSIC D-BOX DAVE SMITH SEQUENTIAL PROPHET X NOW AVAILABLE AND ON DISPLAY
HUGE RANGE IN STOCK AND ON SHOW! ADAM / ALESIS / ATC / BEHRINGER / DYNAUDIO / EVENT / FOCAL / FOSTEX / GENELEC / JBL / MACKIE / M AUDIO / PRESONUS / TANNOY / YAMAHA / & MANY MORE!
Analog Summing, monitor control, on-board D/A conversion, talkback, headphone cue, simultaneous input monitoring.
SPL MTC
Monitor & Talkback controller.
Analogue & Digital Mixers
ROLAND SE02
FULL RANGE OF: MACKIE MIXERS / ALLEN & HEATH /SOUNDCRAFT / TASCAM / MIDAS / YAMAHA / BEHRINGER / TOFT – NEW TOFT TRIDENT MIXERS COMING SOON WE CARRY A RANGE OF USB + DANTE COMPATIBLE MIXERS THAT INTERFACE DIRECTLY TO YOUR COMPUTER. YAMAHA TF SERIES NEW PRESONUS SL16 AFFORDABLE QUALITY
Digital Media Recorders ZOOM H1N, H2N, H4N, H5, H6, Q2N ,Q4N, Q8, F4 & F8 / MARANTZ PMD SERIES / FOSTEX FR2LE / ROLAND / TASCAM / & MANY MORE! COMPACT FLASH RANGE & MANY MORE! NEW
TASCAM DR60D
ZOOM F8N
ROLAND VR-730 Complete Mix Control: StudioLive Mixers is a compact, intuitive mixing solution for the StudioLive Mixers rackmount digital mixers and Studio One digital audio workstation.
Wide Range of Midi Controllers NOVATION PEAK
AKAI / ARTURIA / ALESIS / ICON / IK MULTIMEDIA / KORG / M AUDIO / NATIVE INSTRUMENTS / NEKTAR / NOVATION / ROLAND / ROLI / STUDIOLOGIC / WALDORF NEKTAR PANORAMA T4
Headphones AUDIO TECHNICA / BEYER / DIRECTSOUND / FOSTEX / SENNHEISER / SHURE / SONY / & MANY MORE! SENNHIESER HD280 PRO AUDIO TECHNICA ATHM50
IK MULTIMEDIA KEYS I/O HEADPHONE DISTRIBUTION AMPS AVAILABLE INCLUDING: APHEX / ART / AVENSON / BEHRINGER / FOSTEX / GRACE DESIGNS / MOTU / PRESONUS / PURPLE AUDIO / RANE / SAMSON / SPL / ETC.
NORD STAGE 3
Deep instrument control in any DAW ROLI REVOLUTIONARY with VST/AU support. Load patches directly from the keyboard and start controlling parameters immediately.
AT 5
COVER STORY
K is the New J: We Fly to Germany for the Scoop on d&b’s New PA
20
ISSUE 54 CONTENTS
26
Playing in the Wet: Darren Middleton’s Tides
On The Go: Moving from Laptop to iPad
32
Yamaha’s DZR Tops Powered Speaker Lineup
Zoom F1 Portable Recorder 18 AT 6
APRA Songhubs: Time to Collaborate, Mate
48
36
QSC CP Powered Speakers 52
Arturia Keylab Mk II Controller
28 18
Musos Corner Celebrating 50+ Years in the Music Industry
Pro Audio Interfaces
Outboard
PreSonus Studio 192 Audio Interface
BAE 10DCF Single Channel Filter Compressor
Steinberg UR-RT4 Interface Rupert Neve Design
BAE 1073MPF Dual Channel Mic Pre with Filter
Control Surfaces
Icon QCON ProX USB DAW Controller
Antelope Audio Zen Tour - Thunderbolt & USB Interface Focusrite ISA430 MKII Producer Pack Focusrite Red 4 Pre Thunderbolt Interface with Dante
RME Fireface UCX Audio Midi Interface
AVID Pro Tools Dock Media Controller AVID S3 - Pro Tools Control Surface
Avalon VT-737SP Silver 737 Channel Strip
API 2500 Stereo Compressor Rack Unit
API 3124+ Four Channel Preamp
SSL Nucleus 2 Dark DAW Controller with Mic Pre’s Monitor Control & Dante Yamaha Nuage Control Surface
Antelope Audio Discrete 4 & Edge Modelling Mic
Neve AMS 1073DPA Dual Mic Pre
500 Series
Converters
IGS Audio iQ. Inductor Equalizer
Antelope Audio Pure2 Mastering Converter
SSL Super Analogue XRack
Antelope Audio Orion 32 HD for ProTools HD
IGS Audio ONE LA 500 (1LA500) “LA2A Clone” IGS Audio RB 500 ME Stereo Pultec style EQ IGS Audio 576 Blue Stripe Rev A - Fet Compressor Warm Audio TB12-500 Tone Beast 500 Mic Pre & DI API 550B 4 Band EQ for 500 Series SSL Solid State Logic VHD Pre Module - 500 Series SSL Solid State Logic Stereo Bus Compressor Module (500 Series) G Comp
Summing Focusrite RedNet HD32R Pro Tools HDX Dante
Shadow Hills Equinox Mic Pre & Summing Mixer SSL Sigma Delta - Analogue Summing Mixer Neve AMS 8816 Summing Mixer SPL MixDream XP Analog Summing Mixer 2591 Antelope Satori Monitoring Controller + R4S Remote Bundle
50 YEARS WWW.MUSOSCORNER.COM.AU
Musos Corner
Neve AMS 1073LB Mono Mic/Pre 500 Series Neve AMS 2264ALB mono limiter/compressor Rupert Neve Designs 535 Diode Bridge Comp Meris Mercury7 500 Series Digital Reverb Radial Engineering Jensen Twin Servo Mic Pre
www.musoscorner.com.au
Newcastle West NSW 2302
02 4929 2829 AT 7
GENERAL NEWS
NEUMANN’S FIRST HEADPHONE NAMM saw Neumann release its first ever pair of headphones. The NDH 20 is a closed-back headphone designed for tracking and mixing. Memory foam earcups provide comfort over long periods of wear and the foldable design means they’ll collapse into a smaller size for transport. The new KH 750 subwoofer was also seen for the first time, with a Neumann-designed 10-inch long-throw driver in a short sealed cabinet for big punch in a small package. On the Sennheiser side, it started with the tiny SK6212 bodypack for 6000 series digital and moved onto its 400 and 500 Pro IEMs which use a single 7mm dynamic driver
to cover the audible frequency spectrum instead of multiple balanced armatures. But the biggest news was the XSW Digital range. Instead of packs and cables, the 2.4GHz range of products all plug directly in. For instance, the instrument set comprises two quarter-inch jacks connected to rotatable transmitters and receivers the size of a thumb. Sennheiser: (02) 9910 6700 or sales@sennheiser.com.au
THE RODE HOUSE IN ARKANSAS Rode Microphones is opening The Rode House, a state-of-theart live music and art space in the Momentary – a contemporary arts satellite to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. The Rode House will showcase Australian artists to American audiences in one of the fastest growing and most vibrant art precincts in the world. Rode Founder and Chairman Peter Freedman AM has committed an initial US$1m, becoming a founding partner of the Momentary. Announced in the presence of Australian Ambassador to the United States, The Hon. Joe Hockey. Mr. Freedman sealed the
AT 8
partnership with members of the Walton Family, founding owners of Walmart and benefactors of the Momentary and Crystal Bridges Museum. Construction of the Momentary and Rode House has begun, and both are scheduled to open to the public in early 2020, with a preview concert slated for late 2019. Rode: (02) 9648 5855 or info@rode.com
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
TASCAM INTRODUCES DR-X SERIES Tascam introduces the DR-X Series, the next generation of its line of professional grade handheld recorders. The DR-40X features integrated unidirectional stereo mics with scalable A/B or X/Y configuration, dual XLR/quarter-inch combo inputs, built-in phantom power for condenser mics, integrated four-track capability, and wired remote control option, as well as Tascam’s Auto-Tone function, providing an audio cue tone identifying each recording take. The DR-40X will be joined by the affordable DR-07X, which, with the same mic configuration, Tascam claims will deliver ‘professional performance’ for
musicians and voiceover artists. Finally, the DR-05X is equipped with a pair of omnidirectional condenser mics, making it better suited to recording music, meetings and dictation. Each unit incorporates 2-in/2-out USB audio interface, microSDXC storage up to 128GB and a daylight-viewable white backlit display, along with an Overwrite mode with one level of undo. CMI Music & Audio: (03) 9315 2244 or www.cmi.com.au
ASTON’S STEALTHY ENTRANCE Stealth is the newest mic from Aston Microphones, and is unique in a number of ways. Similar to the Origin, Stealth was developed in partnership with more than 90 top engineers, producers and artists on the Aston 33 development panel who participated in a series of blind listening tests designed to create the best possible sound. The fixed cardioid mic features four switchable voices to suit different situations — Vocal 1, Vocal 2, Guitar, and Dark. Aston says Stealth is fit for both studio and stage applications and can work in both passive and active modes. An autodetect function senses 48V phantom power and
switches the mic to active mode which activates a built-in Class A mic preamp to boost the output, as indicated by the built-in purple LED (which can be turned off). Other unique features include a Sorbothane internal shock mount system and Aston’s near-indestructible build quality. Stealth ships with a quick release stand mount. Link Audio: (03) 8373 4817 or info@linkaudio.com.au
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
AT 9
DYNAUDIO CORE REFERENCE MONITORS Dynaudio has launched Core – its latest high-end professional reference speakers. The series comprises a three-way monitor (Core 59) and a two-way monitor (Core 7), both of which introduce new technologies in all areas, focusing entirely on ‘reproducing the best and most accurate sound possible’, to deliver everything producers and engineers need to hear. The Core 7 and Core 59 feature Pascal class-D amplifiers and have both digital (AES3), supporting up to 24-bit/192kHz signals, and analogue inputs, which the internal DSP acts on at the same high resolution. Physically, the units are designed for flexible
positioning, with pad-mounts on each side for equal surface contact, and the Core 59s feature a rotation flex system — the Orbit — letting you rotate the plate holding the mid/woofer and tweeter to adapt to vertical and horizontal orientations. Amber Technology: 1800 251 367 or sales@ambertech.com.au
MICROFREAK IS SUPER FREAKY Nothing ‘me-too’ about this new Arturia release. Say hello to the MicroFreak, Arturia’s first digital hardware synthesizer. Combining the best of both worlds, MicroFreak includes a multi-mode digital oscillator with an Oberheim SEM-inspired analogue filter. Seven of the oscillator modes are the result of a collaboration between Arturia and Eurorack specialists Mutable Instruments, and hence let users control the sound of its Plaits module in the comfort of an all-in-one hardware synth. One of the most striking features of MicroFreak is its PCB keyboard. Despite having no moving parts, it’s pressure
AT 10
sensitive and, according to Arturia, lightning-fast, and also offers poly-aftertouch, making the ‘Freak a more than capable MIDI polyphonic expression controller when connected with USB-MIDI. At its price, MicroFreak is a worthy “my first synth” contender, as well as a ‘what the heck, I’ll take it’ 2nd, 3rd, or 15th synth for the collector or experimental sound designer. CMI Music & Audio: (03) 9315 2244 or www.cmi.com.au
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
AT 11
LIVE NEWS
AKG DMS SERIES At NAMM, AKG released the DMS100 and DMS300 professional digital wireless systems. The 2.4GHz system provides ‘advanced security features’, extended battery life and ease-of-use. The eight-channel DMS300 and four-channel DMS100 are available in two configurations: an AKG handheld microphone or an instrument- or headset-ready bodypack. DMS digital wireless systems offer 24-bit/48kHz uncompressed audio coding, ‘ultra-low’ latency and signal security provided by AES 256-bit encryption. DMS systems were designed from the ground up for intuitive operation, with push-button channel pairing and
colour-coding for easy identification. Adaptive channel selection takes the guesswork out of locating available wireless channels, and DMS300 features a high-resolution front-panel LCD screen that allows for even easier setup, monitoring and control. Up to four DMS100 and up to eight DMS300 systems can be synced and used simultaneously. CMI Music & Audio: (03) 9315 2244 or www.cmi.com.au
DBTECHNOLOGIES RS16000 TOURING RACK The new RS16000 Touring Rack from dBTechnologies made its official debut at this year’s Winter NAMM. Operable within the UHF spectrum between 470-870MHz, the digital, 24-bit, true diversity microphone system offers up to 400MHz of tuning bandwidth across six channels. A total of 16,000 frequencies are available to users, which can be selected in manual mode within 25kHz increments to meet the needs of application across the globe. The RS16000 system includes six RS16000R receivers, a model AS6W antenna splitter with 9V phantom power, its own active cooling system, an RPS10 power supply, and a HUB800
AT 12
network hub, which facilitates use of dBTechnologies’ proprietary Wireless Manager software via a front-panel USB port. An Ethernet port is also provided in the back panel for building and managing multiple systems, each of which can virtually support more than 60 transmitters simultaneously. Handheld and bodypack transmitters are available for use with the system. NAS Solutions: (03) 8756 2600 or sales@nas.solutions
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
A journey of 10,000 gigs begins with the very ďŹ rst one. Make it count.
CP SERIES POWERED LOUDSPEAKERS
Distributed by
www.jands.com.au
qsc.com AT 13
NEW MICS FROM EV Electro-Voice launched new wired and wireless microphones at NAMM, producing the RE3 UHF wireless system, the RE420 cardioid and the RE520 supercardioid vocal microphones. EV claims ‘best-in-class sound quality, wireless flexibility and overall ease of use in alignment’ for its RE3 system which is available in 10 pre-packaged sets, containing a diversity receiver each with antennas, universal power supply, rack mount kit, transmitter, batteries and an input device. Additionally, the RE3 portfolio contains a comprehensive assortment of accessories to aid in the creation of large, multi-channel systems. The new wired RE420
and RE520 vocal microphones are the next generations of EV’s RE410 and RE510, featuring an updated design with multi-stage pop filters, selectable high-pass filters and internal shock mounts. Bosch Communications: 1300 026 724 or stsales@au.bosch.com
MACKIE’S NEW FLAGSHIP PA Mackie’s all-new flagship DRM Professional Powered Loudspeakers are packed with up to 2300W of power, DSP and full colour displays. Mackie promises the DRM Loudspeakers offer ‘incredible sound quality and reliability’ for a wide range of install and production applications suiting houses of worship and rental systems. Five models comprise the Mackie DRM series, including a 2000W 18-inch subwoofer. All models are available in passive boxes. At the heart of every DRM Series loudspeaker, is Mackie’s Advanced Impulse DSP module with precision crossovers, transducer time-alignment, and FIR filters.
AT 14
Mackie reports that the result is ‘crystal clear, punchy audio typically experienced only with massive touring systems’. The DRM Control Dashboard features an intuitive high-contrast, full-colour display on the back panel for quick and easy setup. To complement the DRM passive loudspeakers, Mackie also released the MX Series power amplifiers and SP260 loudspeaker processor. Amber Technology: 1800 251 367 or www.ambertech.com.au
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
AT 15
SOFTWARE NEWS
BITWIG STUDIO 3 Building on the Nested Device Chains of version 1 and version 2’s modulation slots, the developers of Bitwig Studio 3 have added a whole new paradigm — The Grid, allowing all-out modular routing and patch building. The Grid is broken up into three types of Grids — Poly Grid for polyphonic synthesis; Mono Grid for monophonic; and FX Grid for churning up and spitting out audio. The Grid environment is a node-based patch builder feeling like something in-between the standard NI Reaktor and its Blocks layout. You insert a Grid device and then work in the Grid environment, where you’re free to connect,
tweak, and combine little modules to build your patch. Unlike Reaktor, where you’re either in its very plain aesthetic or its pre-determined Block paradigm, all the Bitwig modules look like part of the DAW, with all their functions on display. Bitwig Studio 3 was debuted at NAMM 2019. Innovative Music: (03) 9540 0658 or info@innovativemusic.com.au
NEW PLUG-INS FROM UAD Universal Audio has released a number of new plug-ins for its hardware and interfaces. The Lexicon 480L plug-in is a Lexiconendorsed emulation of the classic studio reverb that captures its unique, infinitely moldable ambience. The new Softube Vocoder plug-in takes its sonic cues from the best analogue vocoders of the past, while adding new features to take the iconic effect into the future. Available exclusively for UAD-2 and UA Audio Interfaces, the AMS Neve DFC Channel Strip plug-in offers access to the exact same DSP algorithms from the AMS Neve Digital Film Console. Developed by Brainworx, the Suhr SE100
AT 16
Amplifier plug-in captures the original amplifier’s tonal array, emulating its custom ‘plexi-style’ transformers and EL34powered output section. Lastly, the bx_masterdesk mastering plug-in from Brainworx offers powerful controls in a selfcontained mastering environment. CMI Music & Audio: (03) 9315 2244 or www.cmi.com.au
MORE NEWS AT www.audiotechnology.com.au
7
ART 7
STILL THE FIRST CHOICE OF AUDIO PROFESSIONALS THE WORLD OVER, RCF INTRODUCES THE ART 7 MK4 SERIES. THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A BETTER TIME TO HEAR THE DIFFERENCE FOR YOURSELF. PRODUCTION GRADE BUILD QUALITY. SEVERAL SYSTEM CONFIGURATIONS (UP TO 4” VC). PROPRIETARY FIR-PHASE TECHNOLOGY. FIVE YEAR AUSTRALIAN WARRANTY. MADE IN ITALY.
TO FIND YOUR NEAREST RCF PROFESSIONAL DEALER, VISIT: WWW.RCFAUDIO.COM.AU
AT 17
REVIEW
ARTURIA KEYLAB MK II Keyboard Controller Review: Preshan John CONTACT CMI Music & Audio: (03) 9315 2244 or www.cmi.com.au
Arturia’s original KeyLab range featured some of the best and most comprehensive MIDI controllers for their price. Yet Arturia ups the ante with KeyLab Mk II. What’s new? In short, quality and control — there’s more of both. Not only is KeyLab Mk II’s chassis made out of metal but so are the pitch and mod wheels. The keyboard looks especially sleek in the brushed black finish and I wouldn’t hesitate repping it on stage. The 16 multi-purpose RGB-backlit pads feel as good as Maschine’s. The keybed has a nice fast action. Plus you get a slather of DAW control with both Transport- and Track-specific buttons, and a helping of MIDI geekery like Chord mode and MIDI channel selection In keeping with Arturia’s dedication to merging the analogue and digital domains, KeyLab Mk
II adds CV In as well as four CV outputs (Pitch, Gate, Mod 1 & 2) for controlling synth hardware. It also adds two more Aux pedal connections to complement the existing Aux, Sustain and Expression inputs. Under the screen (which now sits in the centre) is a row of buttons which select the KeyLab’s mode — Analog Lab, DAW and User. The latter lets you treat the board as a blank canvas of assignable control. Arturia MIDI Control Centre software makes it super easy to assign specific parameters to each hardware button, fader, pad or knob. Of course, the perfect pairing for KeyLab Mk II is Arturia’s own Analog Lab virtual instrument. I was caught out when I fired up an outdated version of the software sending the KeyLab into a weird semi-control mode. A quick update saw the
two come together like a dovetail joint. You can scroll through Analog Lab’s sounds by either Category or Preset, with sufficient visual feedback on the screen to keep your head down. The row of nine faders with knobs atop link directly to the corresponding controls in Analog Lab. The cool part is you can have both Analog Lab and a DAW running simultaneously on your computer and easily switch control between the two using just the onboard buttons. Ableton Live Lite is bundled with a KeyLab Mk II purchase, as is Analog Lab and Piano V from Arturia’s V Collection suite. For a first-time foray into the world of virtual instruments, KeyLab Mk II won’t disappoint. Neither will it let down a seasoned producer seeking a roadworthy and functional workhorse controller.
REVIEW
ZOOM F1
Portable Recorder
CONTACT Dynamic Music: (02) 9939 1299 or info@dynamicmusic.com.au PRICE F1 with SGH-6: Expect to pay $369
Review: Preshan John
The Zoom F1 is a palm-sized recorder with the ability to slot six different modular microphone options onto it thanks to Zoom’s proprietary 10-pin connector. The unit can sit on a tripod, clip to your talent’s belt or slide onto a camera’s hot-shoe. The F1 records two channels of audio at up to 24-bit/96k resolution in BWF-compliant, WAV or MP3 formats. Two AAA batteries will give you a maximum of 10 hours operation and it records directly to microSD or SDHC cards. A headphone output provides real-time monitoring or an audio feed for your camera, while a line input lets you connect an external source — such as a lavalier mic or even a wireless mic receiver. We received an F1 with the SGH-6 shotgun mic. Recording with the SGH-6 was a breeze. There’s plenty of gain, not much noise, and it sounds good for dialogue. Off-axis rejection is best when the source is within a couple of metres and your mindful of the rear lobes with the shotgun polar pattern. Down the side of the unit are larger Record, Play/ Pause and Stop buttons. The backlit screen gives you a highly visible readout of record level, time, AT 18
PRICE 49-key: Expect to pay $599 61-key: Expect to pay $699
battery level and the four functions dictated by the buttons directly underneath: Rec Format, Lo Cut, Limiter, and Rec Level. These buttons toggle through their respective options (e.g. Lo Cut cycles between Off/80Hz/120Hz/180Hz), saving you the hassle of peering through menus. In use, I noticed the microphone isn’t isolated so well from the F1 unit meaning a button press is audible in the recording. Other handy features include a sound marker function to aid audio/video sync in post, a tone generator for level calibration, audio level control, and a pre-record function. Press Stop and the corresponding menu button to access these features and other utilities. For cinematographers who shoot weddings, events, corporate jobs and anything run ’n’ gun, the F1 is a fantastic choice. With Zoom’s swappable mic capsules, you can go from shotgun, to capturing stereo ambience in a jiffy. Then whack in a lavalier mic for some quick interview audio. The F1’s power is it’s ability to go anywhere, and cover any source.
& FREE EVENT
A
exploring the new
A RT IST IC FRONTIER S
of
IMMERSIV E AU DIO
featuring
SUN 3 FEB, FROM 1PM MPAVILLION
SPOONBILL COOKIN’ ON 3 BURNERS NEW PALM COURT ORCHESTRA LAPKAT PHILIP BROPHY OK EG TWO4K
QUEEN VIC GARDENS S T K I L D A R D (OPPOSITE NGV) MELBOURNE
Spatia l Audio represents t he next qua ntum leap beyond stereo a nd mu lticha nnel surround sound for composers, musicia ns a nd sound designers. This specia l public event is powered by a custom-built wave-f ield synt hesis audio s y s t e m f r o m Ya m a h a Mu s i c A u s t r a l i a , a n d w i l l s h o w c a s e s o m e o f A u s t r a l i a ’s m o s t r e s p e c t e d musicia ns a nd composers.
AU.YA M A H A .COM
MPAVILION.ORG
AT 19
FEATURE
In a secret September Stuttgart meet up, d&b showcased the successor to J. AudioTechnology was there for the big reveal. Story: Mark Davie
AT 20
Over a tall glass of weissbier in Stuttgart, d&b’s Head of R&D Acoustics (née prophet), Mathias Christener, tells me he saw this day coming a good 12 years ago. Not that he’d be downing a few frothies with some Aussie in a hotel bar, but that way back in 2006 — just after he, and his team, delivered the J series line array — he could already see exactly where they needed to go next. J series was, of course, a massive success for d&b. Engineers loved how it sounded, but crucially, it made investment sense. It was light — about half the weight of V-DOSC — and its passive crossover network only required a single amp channel to operate. All great stuff, but Matthias’ mind was already looking over the horizon at the defining feature of d&b’s next large format line array — immaculate directivity. He could envision a future where pattern control didn’t have to be limited to the mid range and top end of the frequency spectrum. That it could extend down to the last two octaves of human hearing. Having an idea is one thing, achieving it was going to take time and laying a number of stepping stones along the way. The first step wasn’t hardware at all, it was software. R1 and ArrayCalc arrived around the same time as J. As well as being a onestop shop for designing, simulating and fine-tuning a system, it provided d&b with an expandable environment to grow its DSP control. In 2013, d&b added matching hardware. The D80 amplifier had enough DSP power to make external processing redundant and paved the way for enhanced software features. The Power Factor Correction, which decouples the amplifier’s output capability from any voltage variations also increased audio quality and stability. Crucially, putting the focus on output voltage (a measurement that marries better with the unpredictable nature of music than continuous output power) opened up the door to higher-efficiency speaker designs, enhancing the ability to shape system directivity even further. In 2014, the standardisation of OCA as AES70, foreshadowed the debut of ArrayProcessing the following year; a huge leap forward in line array control. It basically turned d&b PAs into the best possible versions of themselves through infinitesimal filter optimisation. It meant increased linearity over distance, and greater control over dispersion patterns and level in the target area. In 2016, NoizCalc added to d&b’s elaborate computation arsenal, allowing system techs to plot noise emissions and adhere to local standards anywhere in the world. A byproduct simulation, but one informed by ArrayCalc and ArrayProcessing with its success being heavily dependent on the ability to control dispersion. SETTING A NEW ISOBAR
All of these layers set the stage. The software begat the amplifier and DSP, which begat the fine control of ArrayProcessing and NoizCalc. But the promise of these higher-efficiency, more controlled speaker designs — the ones Matthias conceived way back when — hadn’t yet been fulfilled. The time had
come for new speakers. Boxes that would natively deliver immaculate directivity. Full-bandwidth directivity has a number of instant benefits. The obvious one is that sound stays out of the places you don’t want it. Indoors, this means quieter stages behind the PA, and there’s less off-axis sound to excite the reverberant field — excitation that translates into low-end rumble and increased reverb times indoors. Bad news. Outdoors, all that sub-400Hz directionless spill is like a PTSD trigger for noise meters. With noise pollution standards only getting more stringent, it’s a problem big gigs can’t afford to have anymore. Full-range directivity also translates into a better experience in the desired coverage area. You get a wider ‘usable’ coverage; it retains clarity and frequency balance at lower levels; and horizontal arraying is far easier when you don’t have to worry about low-mid, off-axis creep. When the new SL series debuted with the flagship GSL8 and GSL12 speakers, their defining feature was immaculate directivity. Isobar plots of line arrays, even J, usually show a concentration of energy that starts to relax and bloom outwards below 3-400Hz. Not so with GSL. The red hot areas stay tight like a laser all the way down to 45Hz. It beggars belief, until you walk behind an array of GSL going full tilt and experience the dearth of noise back there. GSL also arrived with a companion, the natively cardioid SL-Sub, which ALTOGETHER KILLED OFF THE NOTION OF DIRECTIONLESS SOUND IN A CONCERT RIG FOR D&B.
In a similar way to J, GSL also managed to do more for less. While GSL is up against boxes like L-Acoustics K1, it shaves off 25kg per box and is a tad smaller in every dimension. Also, while K1 is a three-way, quad-amplified box; the GSL is a three-way, dual-amplified box courtesy of d&b’s adherence to passive crossovers. SMALLER SIBLING
But GSL wasn’t the final step in Matthias’ vision. It also wasn’t the reason I was over in Stuttgart for a sneak peak of a new mystery PA. The flagship GSL is a marvel, and necessary for festivals and stadiums. However, in the world of touring, bigger isn’t always better. For the majority of gigs, a box that’s lighter and more compact, without sacrificing on sound, is ideal. It’s why J was a huge success for d&b. They needed another speaker to fill the gap it would eventually leave. One that had the same immaculate directivity as GSL, would fall within the weight limit of the J series (60kg), have plenty of headroom (especially down low), use the same D80 amplifier, and work seamlessly as a fill and delay system for GSL. When we arrived in Stuttgart, there were hundreds of customers from around the globe and four members of the international press. The first day was straight down to business. Stuttgart is the automotive capital of Europe, home to the Daimler group (Mercedes, Chrysler) and the birth of the modern automobile. It’s also Porsche’s home turf. d&b had parked us right in the middle of it all. Passing both Mercedes Stadium and Porsche Arena
as we walked down the road to Hanns-MartinSchleyer-Halle, the 15,500 pax arena where the mystery PA was ready to fire. Schleyer-Halle isn’t a perfect venue, and there’s nothing special about the tiered seating or the makeup of the walls, but it is the place where every d&b line array is rigorously tested during the development phase. If a d&b PA sounds bad in Schleyer-Halle, then something’s gone horribly wrong.
Sound from the FOH PA leaking onstage is officially a vestige of the past
K, HERE ’TIS
We’re soon introduced to the star of this particular show, KSL. It’s a big deal for d&b. This is the missing piece in the SL series; the speaker designed to replace the J. Apparently the K stands for ‘Kleine’, which translates as ‘smaller’ in German. Product manager, Werner ‘Vier’ Bayer, explained KSL is designed to be the technically equivalent, smaller brother of GSL. If you’re thinking in box sizes. The width and height of a J top box sits in between the bigger GSL and smaller KSL. A hang of 12 GSL is slightly longer than 14 KSL, and KSL is also lighter than J. While GSL has done and will do well, d&b would expect to sell loads more KSL, so IT’S IMPORTANT THE LITTLE BROTHER DOESN’T BECOME A SIDE SHOW TO GSL’S IMPRESSIVE FEATURE SET.
From the outside, KSL really does look like a smaller GSL. It has the same grilles for the sidefiring drivers, the same forked handles on the rear, and the same core driver layout. Two front-firing LF drivers, the two side-firing LF drivers, and a centrally-placed MF driver attached to a split waveguide that skirts round the edges of the similarly centrally-placed array of HF compression drivers. Naturally, every component is just a little smaller than its GSL equivalent. The LF drivers are 10-inch on the front, and eight-inch on the sides (14 and 10-inches on GSL), the MF driver is eight inches, and the two compression drivers have three-inch voice coils. IMMACULATE DIRECTIVITY EXPLAINED
So, how did d&b achieve this miraculous immaculate directivity? Well, with directivity already sorted above 400Hz, the main point of attack was obviously down low. Using side-firing woofers to achieve directivity is not entirely new. In principle, by spacing the woofers a quarter of a AT 21
J8 TOP isobars (3dB / div)
Angle / º
DIRECT YOU TO THE SCREEN Here we compare the horizontal directivity of the J8 and KSL8. The bulk of the energy (orange and yellow) across the frequency range should ideally be located within the 80° horizontal spread (40° each side). As you can see, things get a little loose below 300Hz with the J8, and completely omnidirectional below 125Hz. The KSL holds its line right up to that point, with a slow easing of directivity all the way down to 50Hz.
180 º 170 º 160 º 150 º 140 º 130 º 120 º 110 º 100 º 90 º 80 º 70 º 60 º 50 º 40 º 30 º 20 º 10 º 0º -10 º -20 º -30 º -40 º -50 º -60 º -70 º -80 º -90 º -100 º -110 º -120 º -130 º -140 º -150 º -160 º -170 º -180 º
0.1
1
10
f / Hz
He could envision a future where directivity control didn’t have to be limited to the mid range and top end of the frequency spectrum
wavelength apart you get a 90-degree phase shift, creating summation in the front and cancellation in the rear. Sounds easy. And it is, for a single frequency sine wave. But music, over two octaves from 50-200Hz? Not so much. Having successfully relied on passive crossover networks with J, d&b played the same tune with its core drivers again. The side-firing LF drivers, MF driver and HF compression drivers are all passively crossed over and driven by a single amp channel. The front-firing LF woofers get their own channel. d&b then packaged the side-firing woofers into separate bass reflex chambers to the front-firing ones. It meant the bass reflex systems could be tuned differently. With GSL/KSL, the higher octave is emitted by the speaker cones, and the lower octave by the ports. Then d&b was able to apply frequency dependent delay with all-pass filtering to make them sum and cancel across multiple octaves. Common sense dictates the extra directivity should result in a reduction of output power, especially headroom in the low end. It’s the common knock on cardioid subwoofers. As it happens, d&b found that wasn’t the case with the side-firing woofer configuration. Instead, if you do it right, you can achieve full coherency AT 22
Angle / º
KSL8 TOP isobars (3dB / div) 180 º 170 º 160 º 150 º 140 º 130 º 120 º 110 º 100 º 90 º 80 º 70 º 60 º 50 º 40 º 30 º 20 º 10 º 0º -10 º -20 º -30 º -40 º -50 º -60 º -70 º -80 º -90 º -100 º -110 º -120 º -130 º -140 º -150 º -160 º -170 º -180 º
0.1
with the front-firing woofers. IT’S AS IF THE BAFFLE SIZE AND CONE AREA OF THE FRONT BASS REFLEX HAS BEEN VIRTUALLY INCREASED, NETTING A 9DB BUMP IN HEADROOM.
Another issue with arrays is the drop in high frequency information over longer distances. While 125Hz will easily carry over 120m when unprocessed, information at 8kHz drops dramatically over distance. Unfortunately, that 9dB bump in low frequency headroom can’t be distributed to higher up in the frequency range. The only answer is to add more components up top. Again, it sounds relatively simple, but with space at a premium — and most of it taken up by LF woofers and bass reflex chambers — there’s not much wriggle room. Also, with directivity the main concern, all the drivers have to be symmetrically placed for the system to function properly. Adding two HF compression drivers with large three-inch voice coils left no room to squeeze the mid driver into the central axis. INSTEAD, D&B BORROWED THE SPLIT EXIT HORN FROM THE V SERIES POINT SOURCE SPEAKERS, WHICH WAS A DRY RUN FOR THIS DESIGN IN SL. It allowed d&b to stick a whopping eight-inch mid driver on a dual-channel waveguide that wrapped around both sides of the HF drivers.
1
10
The bipolar radiation also helps achieve a narrower, more controlled dispersion. By placing the MF driver further back into the box, it nearly lines up perfectly with the sidefiring woofers, setting a common time alignment baseline. There’s also a frequency band gap between the low frequency range of the side-firing woofers and the midrange driver. So even though they’re connected to the same amplifier channel, it means the processing can target each more accurately and focus in on their task; one to enhance directivity, the other to produce mid range. PRACTISE MAKES PERFECT
All this would mean nothing if the KSL didn’t have the same amazing full-range directivity as GSL. But, gasp… it does. The isobars are impressive enough [see sidebar], with laser-like focus down to 50Hz, but in action, the rear rejection is equally as impressive as GSL. Sound from the FOH PA leaking onstage is officially a vestige of the past. It also plays its part perfectly when hung as sidefill next to a GSL main array. Walking from side to side, and around the corner of the two arrays, it was impossible to distinguish where one overlapped the other. You can sometimes
It doesn’t matter if you’re setting up your first remote live stream session, DJing your hundredth party, or mastering your twelfth studio album—the Studioseries has got you covered. All of these interfaces boast as much I/O as we could
Studio 24: 2x2 USB-C audio interface
squeeze into their sturdy chassis. But robust hardware is only half the package. The included Studio One® Artist
Studio 26: 2x4 USB 2.0 audio interface
DAW lets you record and mix with unlimited tracks and effects in an intuitive UI that stays out of your way. And the Studio Magic Plug-in Suite expands your sonic palette with powerful VSTs from the best developers in the business.
Studio 68: 6x6 USB 2.0 audio interface
Meet the family.
Regardless of what your musical passion is or where you make it happen—we’ve got the right interface for both your workflow and workspace. Learn more at www.presonus.com.
STUDIO-SERIES RECORDING SYSTEMS
Studio 1810: 18x8 USB 2.0 audio interface
Studio 1824: 18x18 USB 2.0 audio interface
192 kHz, USB 2.0 Recording Systems Studio 192: 26x32 USB 3.0 audio interface and command center
ALL STUDIO-SERIES USB INTERFACES INCLUDE
Ph: 03 8373 4817 www.linkaudio.com.au
OVER $400 VALUE INCLUDED FREE AT 23
sense a tonal shift or low-end blurring where the two overlap, or a different voicing of the smaller model sidefill. You could stand directly in the gap between the two, and in full-range mode, from top to bottom the frequency spectrum and voicing remained completely intact when transitioning from GSL to KSL. Showcasing mainsto-sidefill continuity is not a common test at PA demonstrations, manifesting d&b’s trust in the SL series’ directivity. KSL TO STAY
Throughout the day, there was plenty of time to experience the KSL in different configurations, including ground-stacked beside a cart of J series. While the incumbent sounded great, and familiar. There was an undeniable increase in clarity at all levels with the KSL, with a noticeable lack of power compression. Snares cracked harder, and kicks were delivered more consistently. In some ways it was sad to see J like that. It’s been such a solid performer for so many years. However, there is such a difference out front, and an incredible shift behind with KSL, that there’s no doubt… immaculate directivity will soon be everywhere. Well, it’ll be exactly where you want it.
TENSION RIGGING, BUT NO STRESS Rigging has always been a priority, but d&b is really getting this down to a fine art, doing everything it can to alleviate stress and protect its customers’ investment. To that end, d&b decided to offer both tension and compression rigging modes. Tension rigging allows you to set splay angles as you’re flying it — without requiring any compression frames, chains or lever hoists. Compression rigging allows you to fly the array straight, then curve it when it’s in the air. Thoughtfully, the KSL tension rigging cart is 78cm deep, the same depth as the GSL cart. It makes truck packs more predictable, especially when you’re combining systems. If you’re looking for the smallest footprint, you can grab the 60cm deep compact cart instead, with only compression mode available. KSL boxes allow a 0-10° splay (up to 7° on GSL) between cabinets, which makes it ideal for fill and delay. However, there isn’t any rigging to combine GSL and KSL, which would defeat the point of ArrayProcessing anyway, as it relies on the same headroom to contribute to the entire output. There are a few clever little helpers in d&b’s rigging arsenal, too. ArraySight not only helps you angle the array, but also gives you temperature and humidity readouts at the array. The mechanical pin tolerances are also calculated differently for the most accurate acoustic output, depending on whether you fly in tension or compression mode. You can also verify that your cabling is spot on by using ArrayCalc. It puts a burst of noise through each speaker, using the speakers either side of it as microphones to detect its position in the array. With such precise directivity, d&b now allows you to set up different throw settings for soundcheck and the show. It automatically reduces the throw, while keeping the level at FOH consistent.
AT 24
AT 25
Steven Schram was getting so carried away mixing Darren Middleton’s new album, he didn’t realise he was sitting in an inch of water. Story & Photos: Mark Davie
Artist: Darren Middleton Album: Tides AT 26
Steven Schram was two hours into a mix that was coming together swimmingly when he found himself in deep water. “Things were really cooking, then I heard a squishy sound. I looked behind the screen and there was an inch of water coming through the studio wall. I was thinking, ‘I can still finish this mix. Just 10 more minutes!’ When the power board started to lift off the floor, I figured it was time to get out.” The top of the hot water service had blown off, but with the screen in his way, he’d been sitting there mixing not realising he was slowly sinking. He quickly shut down the studio and turfed all his gear out the door, managing to save everything except the acoustic treatment and rugs. Fittingly, the record he’d been so wrapped up in that he almost floated away was Darren Middleton’s new album… called Tides. KEEPING THE POWDER DRY
Things were a lot drier at Middleton’s studio in Melbourne. His single-room studio is a guitar haven, as you’d expect from the ex-Powderfinger guitarist. He’s got a selection of esoteric gear and pragmatic devices — from the vintage Roland GR-500 guitar synth and accompanying GS-500 guitar controller, to his diminutive board of Chase Bliss digitallycontrolled, analogue pedals — but it’s all functional, and all used. His studio is nestled at the back of the Revolver building. On the ground floor, thankfully, escaping Revolver’s dreaded stair load in. He’s been in this location for a few years now, having taken over the lease when Something For Kate’s Paul Dempsey moved his studio back home. Amps and guitars stretch out down one wall, and there’s enough room to set up a drum kit when he needs to bash out some demos. Though he’s just on the cusp of releasing Tides, which is what I’m there to talk about, he’s also working on the soundtrack for a local independent film. He keeps a pretty full calendar these days, but it looks a lot different from the long album cycle blocks of his Powderfinger days. “That’s the thing with being in a big, successful band,” recalled Darren. “Obviously, it’s amazing, but because there are so many big things involved — big record companies, long timelines — everything moves very slowly.” He’s always been a prolific songwriter, but couldn’t open the shutters during those Powderfinger cycles. Occasionally they’d take a break so they could flex their muscles — Darren did an EP and album with his side project, Drag — but these days he sees it less like blocks of time, and more like one long road where there are no side projects, and solo albums are interspersed with film scores. “Keeping busy and practising your craft, you learn different ways of doing things, you also
meet people and form different relationships and partnerships,” he explained, plus “I’m not really the kind of artist who’s content with privately making music in my bedroom. I actually want people to hear it.” CHANGING TIDES
For Tides, Middleton’s main ambition was to capture more grit and energy, “because my other records are more neat and tidy.” He asked good friend, musician and producer Davey Lane (You Am I) to help him pull the pieces together. Lane helped with pre-production, then assembled a rhythm section, which included drummer Graeme Pogson from The Bamboos, and bassist Luke Hodgson (Megan Washington). Both were unknown to Middleton before the sessions, but he trusted Lane’s judgement, and thought that level of unknown would add to the vibe. “If I was morally opposed to one of them or if I just hated them, I’d cancel it straight away,” disclaimed Middleton. “But we got on, and I really want people’s character. I don’t want to tell people what to play, I give guidelines and ideas, then choose what I like at the end. Music is about people. It’s the story of our lives. I certainly want them to impart a sense of who they are onto that instrument.” He’d never met string arranger Xani Kolac either, but she also nailed the brief. With all the songs demoed up in his own studio, they went to Head Gap studios in two different blocks to lay down live beds. Although he wasn’t there for the tracking, Schram was happy about that choice at his end: “Anything that comes out of Head Gap is really malleable. They give you so many options that are all usable. I can grab just one mic and get the whole drum sound out of that. They also have the close mics aligned with the closer overheads, then they’ll have another combination of mics that seem to fit well together. That’s been consistent the whole time, just constant quality — a great-sounding room and they treat it professionally. If they’re not mixing it, they don’t paint anybody into a corner.”
I heard a squishy sound. I looked behind the screen and there was an inch of water coming through the studio wall
SUBMERGED IN GUITAR HEAVEN
After the main beds were down, Middleton retired to his studio to overdub the guitars and vocals. “The philosophy was lets work out what we’re doing, record it a few times and just pick a take that feels the best,” said Middleton. “If it wavers a bit, that’s fine. I still carried that philosophy back here. I worked out roughly what I wanted to do then recorded a few times. There’s no copying and pasting, and as much as possible, it’s a whole take.” Middleton’s recording ethos likewise limits the amount of meddling: “Put a good signal into a good mic and it should be a f**king good result if you’re playing well.” He’s definitely got the guitar
sounds nailed. Middleton talked us through how he recorded the second song on the album, In Record Time, which drops down from the big beat, wall-of-sound opener to a more intricatelyarranged, tight-sounding track. While other songs are more straight out, ‘Vox in one ear, Fender in the other’ rock tunes, there’s less guitar on In Record Time, but it’s more specifically arranged. The main verse guitar is Middleton vamping along on his Diamond Anniversary Gretsch. “On top of that, there’s a counter guitar,” said Middleton, demonstrating a technique where you flick the whammy as you play to create a flutter sound. Another sound he makes is with a Boss Tera Echo pedal. “It’s not that popular, but it’s very good,” said Middleton. “It’s kind of a delay/ reverb in one pedal. I’LL RUN IT A LOT, BECAUSE IT JUST FLOATS AROUND AND MAKES IT SOUND A BIT BRIT POP-PY, BUT WHEN YOU STRIKE IT REALLY HARD IT SOUNDS LIKE PHASER-Y DELAY REPEATS.”
On the solo, he broke out his Roland guitar synth. It’s a huge floor-bound synth linked to a controller guitar with all manner of knobs and switches. “I pulled it out of storage for this record, and used it a few times because it’s a secret weapon. The module has three sections; a bass section, a poly ensemble and a solo/melody. You can switch them on and off as well as blend the volumes of each section to create the sound. It’s got infinite sustain, too. It sounds like a guitar, but a bit special.” His go-to guitar mic is a Royer R-121 ribbon mic sat half a foot away from the cone and occasionally accompanied by a Shure SM57 or ’50s Neumann CMV-551 condenser with an M7 capsule, which he also used a lot to mic his Gibson J-45 acoustic. LINKING UP SECTIONS
On the way in, he uses his pair of Aurora Audio GTQ-2 Neve-style preamps built by Neve alumni, Geoff Tanner. “They’re really good and reliable, unlike half of the old school Neve stuff.” In his rack he’s also got a collection of outboard reverb and delay units, including a Real D spring reverb he uses a lot. “Whenever I would use any analogue effects, I would do it live and record the dry signal alongside the effected signal. I double tracked the solo and sent the left side into the Space Echo with a certain delay speed, then sent the other side into it with a different delay time to create movement, then bounced it all back in. I also grabbed little bits of the delay and reversed them.” At the end of the chain, Middleton uses an iZ RADAR system. “It’s about 12 years old, and it’s just a multi-track recorder. It was the first one the pros were using around the transition from tape to digital, because it sounds amazing. The drums and bass and guide guitar went via tape, and everything else went through that to maintain that level of quality. Nick Didia still hassles me to buy it, but I’m not letting go of it.” It all goes into Presonus’ Studio One DAW because “Pro Tools expired and I didn’t bother renewing it. I GOT ONTO STUDIO ONE A YEAR AND A HALF AGO AND MUCH PREFER IT. I FIND IT REALLY ACCURATE, EASY TO USE, AND AS COMPLICATED AS IT NEEDS TO BE.”
AT 27
There’s no copying and pasting, and as much as possible, it’s a whole take
LIFTING THE ARIA CURSE
Back at Schram’s place, he’s dry and hearing his Kii Three cardioid monitor speakers better than ever courtesy of some new acoustic treatment from Chris Fatouros at Exponential Acoustics (see box item). It doesn’t mean he’s settled though, after our conversation he’s due to pack up the last bits of his studio and ship them off to Byron. He’ll be living near and working out of the newly revamped Rocking Horse Studios, which we covered in Issue 129. “I’ve been working out of there quite a bit with a band called Wharves and it’s been fun,” he said. “I like the Workshop a lot.” Everything’s been really humming along since the ARIA curse lifted, said Schram. Hold on… ARIA curse? “You don’t want to win those f**kin’ things, they’re the kiss of death,” he said of his Engineer of the Year ARIA for Paul Kelly’s Life Is Fine. “You don’t work for a year after you get it.” He’s not sure exactly why that is — whether people think you’re too expensive now — but he’s sure it’s a real curse. “There was nothing in my calendar, then all of sudden it was booked until March. I thought, ‘maybe the curse has lifted.’ Sure enough, that morning they’d announced all the new nominations. “Chris Thompson, another ARIA winner, rang me two hours later to say, ‘congratulations on getting nowhere near the nominations this year.’ It’s legit, you don’t want those pointy things. They’re a poisoned chalice. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. Now Burke [Reid]’s got one, he can be miserable for a year until the curse moves onto somebody else.” LOOSE LEASH
Schram hadn’t mixed any of Middleton’s or Powderfinger’s records before, except a “live recording from a tour in Sydney once, but not major releases. Not guilty… wasn’t me.” But Middleton knew all about Schram’s tendency to completely shake mixes up, and was happy to let him run with that. “I gave him free will,” he said. “I wanted his character in there, which is what he does. When he sent the mixes back, I was like, ‘holy s**t!’ I was genuinely pumped.” “I felt I was off the leash and could push things as hard as I felt necessary,” said Schram, who prefers “to push it a little too far, then rein it in, rather than getting halfway to something.” Adam Ayan from Gateway Mastering actually sent back a “mini essay pointing out a buzz here, a clip there, and something else was too bright, and you’re hitting this too hard. Adam’s great, he lets me know if I’ve missed things, though not too often, which is nice.” AT 28
(left) Middleton pulled his chunky Roland GR-500 guitar synth and accompanying GS-500 guitar controller out of storage as his secret guitar solo weapon. (right) Middleton’s rack includes a lot of hardware effects and a pair of Aurora GTQ-2 Neve-style preamps. It’s all about great gear, capturing great sounds, including his RADAR recording system.
RESOUNDING FLOOD REPAIRS After the flood, Chris Fatouros from Exponential Acoustics completely re-treated Schram’s Bangkok Ninja Academy studio with all new acoustic treatments. Here’s Chris: “We repositioned Steve’s DIY broadband absorbing panels to optimise their performance among the new set of treatments. “We added six custom-tuned, corner membrane absorber bass traps with three different centre tunings — 35, 50 and 75Hz — with an effective absorption about one octave either side of the centre frequency. When used as a set, the different tunings cross over to cover a wide low frequency bandwidth. “They absorb much lower frequencies than bass traps using only porous absorption. They’re targeted at reducing the effects of modal problems, and evening out the bass response around the room. They also improve low end transient response as the modal frequencies don’t hang around in the room for very long after the initial impulse. “The 10 fractal quadratic residue diffusers have high frequency diffusers nested inside a low-mid frequency diffuser, so they operate over a much larger bandwidth using the same space. The diffusers spread the energy of the reflected sound in both space and time making the reflections less coherent, giving a sense of increased space, as well as reducing comb filtering and flutter echo. The overall effect is a more natural, larger sounding space with more clarity.” Exponential Acoustics: www.exponentialacoustics.com
IE 40 PRO
More me. When the show is underway, your monitoring is crucial. It keeps you connected with the others — but above all: with yourself. We have further developed dynamic drivers that fit the smallest of spaces. Powerful monitoring sound for loud stages remains precise with solid bass whatever the sound level. Sounds like more — like much more. www.sennheiser.com/moreme
AT 29
THE MIX FOR IN RECORD TIME SOOTHE-ING VOCALS The first move Schram makes with vocals is to make it pink so he can find it. For the lead vocal he had a high pass going into an LA3A, then made a ‘pretty standard’ move on a Pultec EQ. After that, he used one of his favourite plug-ins, Oeksound’s Soothe. “I can’t live without it now. Especially across violins and acoustic guitars, it’s just incredible.” It’s designed to dynamically smooth out any harshness while bringing out clarity. It also works down low. Basically, magic. Schram set it to work on the low mid 250-300Hz area and the 6-7kHz ‘ess’ band. It’s followed by
another LA3A (“because one’s never enough”) into a dynamic EQ doing a similar thing as Soothe to keep it from having to do all the heavy lifting. There was also a vocal double treated almost completely the opposite and sounded bizarre on first listen. Schram laughed as he went through the settings. “I’m whipping it with Kaya from Sly-Fi. I’ve got a really bizarre EQ here, a high pass above 300Hz, then an 8dB boost at 750Hz… what is that?! Then a 2.5dB reduction at 13kHz. Oh, that’s really cool — one’s real smooth, and the double’s really honky.”
DUCKING VOCAL FX The main vocal effects are the UAD EP34 tape echo into the MXR Flanger and Doubler. A common combo for Schram. He also has a Cooper Time Cube short delay with Micro Shift on it, for a bit of moving width. “With the echo on the main vocal, I’ve got a compressor after the flanger and it’s using the send as a key, so every time he sings, the echo is down, and it comes off the back gently.” The honky double went to the Soundtoys Primal Tap, which he rarely uses. “I just sold the real one I had.” Again, next in the chain is a Devil-Loc hitting pretty hard, “SO
DIGITAL TAPE RANDOMNESS Schram loves it when music is unpredictable, and tries to incorporate as much randomness into his mixes as he can. One of his tools for that is a cheap Reaktor plug-in called Sound Chateau UltraTape. Among other things, it does random panning. Not that computers can truly do random. “You could have billions of combination that never come around for a billion years,” said Schram, but it would still return. As close to random as he can get is good enough. He used UltraTape on the outro synth, “All of a sudden it goes to the left, then it wobbles its way back to the centre.” He says it occasionally gets him into trouble when people like the panning effect better from one mix revision to the next. But he’d rather have the problem, than abandon the movement.
YOU’RE HEARING THE REVERB WHEN HE’S SINGING, BUT AS SOON AS HE STOPS IT COMES SHOOTING FORWARD AT YOU.
MASTERING COMPRESSION “This is like therapy,” Schram said as he opened up the mix on his system to go back through it. Schram is a mixer that goes completely by feel, which means that although he’s been mixing in the box for almost a decade, he doesn’t use any templates. He prefers to layer up the colour on a record, starting with the first compressor on his master bus. By the end of his first play back of a song, he’s picked which flavour will go first in line. “It’s like walking in to a café,” he explained. “Today I feel like a chicken schnitzel sandwich. I DON’T GO, ‘OH WELL, THE PUNCHY 2.4K ON THE API IS BLAH BLAH BLAH.’ IT’S MORE LIKE, THIS IS A SQUISHY SONG, SO I MIGHT USE THE NOVATRON FROM KUSH. I knew I was going to be going to town on the drums and bass, so something that was going to weave in and out nicely like the Manley Vari-Mu would be spot on.”
REAL DRUMS MADE FAKE Middleton originally demoed In Record Time with a drum machine. During the beds, “Graeme ended up putting the demo style drums on tape, then playing along with it for a blend.” When it got to Schram, he took the real drums and squeezed them into the shape of electronic ones, “so they’re not rubbing up against each other.” He uses his favourite weapon the BOZ SASQUATCH KICK MACHINE. “IT’S NOT LIKE A STATIC SAMPLE, IT REACTS DIFFERENTLY TO THE ENVELOPES OF EACH KICK OR SNARE. I’m using the ‘Oomph’ part of the processor to add low end, and that’s going straight to the mix bus.” He also automated the effect to create downward movement on certain kicks, like tuning an 808 hit. He separately processes a version of the kick and snare that’s “wickety wack”, then the rest of the sound is made up of a single overhead mic, and two room mics. “I’m hitting those as hard as I can with the Eventide Omnipressor in the expansion mode going crazy, bouncing all over the place. Then the bus is the Decapitator, into the Devil-Loc, with a bit of saturation from the Sly-Fi Axis EQ. Then into the Sonnox Inflator running at maximum. “I try not to let one plug-in do all the heavy lifting. A little from each. I don’t want something to sound stupidly distorted, unless that’s what’s called for.”
AT 30
ZLX
is now streaming on Bluetooth
Introducing two new members of the ZLX series: ZLX-12BT & ZLX-15BT. The superior components, coverage and clarity of the world's best-selling portable PA speakers, combined with the latest Bluetooth technology to deliver the lowest-noise, highest-fidelity audio streaming experience in their class. Wireless convenience with Electro-Voice sound quality.
3+2 YEAR EXTENDED WARRANTY with product registration
ZLX-12BT ZLX-15BT Ph: 1300 026 724 | Fax: (02) 8850-2230
| Email: boschcomms@au.bosch.com | www.boschcommunications.com.au
AT 31
TUTORIAL
Greg Simmons is a writer, educator and sound engineer who is 20 months into his quest to spend the rest of his life travelling and recording music.
MOVING FROM A LAPTOP TO AN IPAD Adopting an iPad for audio production means embracing a new mode of file management where cloud storage replaces hard disks, and wireless connections sub in for SD cards and USB sticks. Simmo explains how he moved his workflow over to the tablet. Tutorial: Greg Simmons
‘Why am I carrying around terabytes of stuff I’ve done nothing with?’ Was the question buzzing around my head last September as I panned across the hard drives in my backpack. There were umpteen sound recordings, videos and pics from dozens of forays through Asia and the Himalaya, all just a head crash from oblivion. It was time to do something with them. It was also time to change my approach, from ‘post-production when I get home’ — which had clearly failed — to ‘post-production on location’. I needed to break the stockpiling habit. I pictured myself trekking into a remote area with a lightweight high-quality rig, recording and AT 32
filming an elderly villager playing endangered music, and leaving behind a finished copy. That wasn’t going to happen with my Macbook Pro. It’s an early 2013 model with 15-inch Retina display; a wonderfully reliable machine that never cost a cent in repairs, but its trekking days are over. Apart from being too heavy for what I had in mind, its battery life had faded to a measly four hours and I hated working with iMovie. I wanted a lightweight DAW with a day’s worth of battery, and a video editing app I could relate to as an audio guy. A week later Apple released iOS 11, and reviewers asked “is it time to replace your laptop with an iPad?” Most concluded “Not yet”, but I’d
already done the numbers. An iPad Pro now serves all of my ‘post-production on location’ needs, saves two kilograms over my old Macbook Pro and over AU$2000 on upgrading to a new Macbook Pro. However, getting to that point was not easy. Here’s how I made it work. THE RECORDING RIG
I’ve got a few rigs at my disposal, but this story focuses on the lightweight high-quality rig I use for capturing endangered music in remote places. It’s a modern take on the classic ethnomusicologist’s rig: a pair of Sennheiser MKH800 microphones, a Nagra 7 field recorder, a pair of Etymotic ER4 microPro
the Macbook Pro for dead when it comes to YouTube, Instagram and Facebook — especially when using their dedicated iOS apps. Installing a SIM card for whatever country I’m in gives me internet wherever there’s a phone network, which is everywhere these days — including that remote village. Also, its tablet form makes displaying flight confirmations at airports, watching movies on overnight buses, and navigating new cities much easier than the Macbook Pro. APP STACK
Three apps form the core of my iOS post-production system: AudioShare, Auria Pro and LumaFusion. AudioShare is indispensable for organising audio files on iOS and offers duplicating, renaming, normalising, trimming, fading, and sample rate conversion. Most importantly, it’s a valuable conduit for sharing audio files from one app to another. It’s like the Photos app for audio. Auria Pro is a DAW that can mix dozens of tracks of mono or stereo 24-bit/96k audio with 64bit processing. It also supports MIDI, has a bunch of synth and drum machine add-ons, and videos can be inserted for scoring/mixing to. Each channel comes with a four-band parametric equaliser, sweepable high and low pass filters, comprehensive dynamics, and four plug-in slots. There’s a handful of built-in reverb and delay plug-ins from PSP, along with a growing number of plug-ins available as in-app purchases from FabFilter, Wavemachine Labs and others. No registration, no iLok nonsense, and nowhere near the price of their VST, AU, AAX and RTAS equivalents. Welcome to the mobile device economy! LumaFusion is a video editing app that makes sense to my ‘audio guy’ brain. It looks and feels like a DAW, with three dedicated video tracks (each with its own embedded audio), three dedicated audio tracks, stacks of titling and transition options, colour correction, audio processing and more. It was one of the major influencers in my move to iOS, after some nerve-racking experiences with iMovie and Final Cut Pro. IPAD’S CONS
in-ear monitors and a Sony RX100 MkIII pocket camera. I record 24-bit/96k wavs on the Nagra, capture 1080p HD video on the Sony, and do all the post-production on location with the iPad Pro. IPAD’S PROS
I’ve got the top-of-the-line 10.5-inch iPad Pro from 2017, with 512GB of storage and the cellular option. It uses Apple’s 64-bit A10X Fusion SoC (System On a Chip), which performs well in benchmark tests against the Macbook Pros of its generation, and has a default 120Hz screen refresh rate that adapts to the frame rate of whatever you’re viewing. It definitely feels faster and more
responsive than the old Macbook Pro it replaces. I use it with Apple’s Smart Keyboard and the Apple Pencil, and protect it with an Urban Armor Gear cover that integrates well with the Smart Keyboard. There are four speakers — one in each corner — with on-board sensors to adjust between landscape and portrait so you always get the proper stereo image. Apple has been criticised for dedicating so much internal space to speakers rather than a larger battery but, as a sound engineer, I don’t have a problem with that; the battery lasts long enough and the speakers sound remarkably good. My early-2013 Macbook Pro sounds like rubbish by comparison. Because it’s a post-social media design, it leaves
Apple launched iOS in June 2007. Originally called ‘iPhone OS’, it was designed for the first iPhone and iPod Touch. Managing the content of those new devices was done in the same way as the earlier iPods — via a USB connection to a computer running iTunes. That remains one of the common ways of getting files in and out of iOS devices, along with wireless connections and cloud storage; but none of that is any use when you’re in a remote village with SD cards in one hand and an iPad Pro in the other! The Nagra and Sony both use SD cards for storage, so transferring files into the iPad Pro should be as simple as connecting Apple’s SD card reader, inserting an SD card, and... No! Apple’s SD card reader only sees certain types of camera files, and only transfers them to the Photos app. It doesn’t see the Nagra’s 24-bit/96k wav files, and it doesn’t see the Sony’s XAVC-S video files. Strike two from two. I tried three SD card readers from funky brands I’d never heard of, with no joy. However, unlike AT 33
Apple’s SD card reader, each third-party reader came with its own app that served as a driver, a directory and a user interface. Some of those apps allowed files to be transferred to other third-party apps, but not the ones I was using. There was no evil plan by Apple to keep everyone on their products; the limitation was in the coding of the apps that accompanied the card readers. Encouraged by this realisation I pursued the more expensive options from the more familiar brands, hoping they had better apps. The following solutions transfer files from field recorders and cameras into iOS without going via iTunes or cloud storage.
Simmo’s iOS-based mobile recording and editing rig.
iOSOLUTIONS
Many cameras have built-in wireless for transferring pics and videos to mobile devices, but this consumes battery power — an important consideration in the field. The Sony camera I use has wireless, but the accompanying PlayMemories app allows everything except the XAVC-S files I use to be transferred. Inconceivable! Apple’s Lightning to USB 3 Camera Adaptor works as a direct connection into the Photos app from cameras that allow USB access, and will transfer jpeg and RAW files, along with SD and HD video formats including H.264 and MPEG-4. By setting my Sony camera’s USB port to MTP (Media Transfer Protocol), it will transfer XAVC-S files directly into the Photos app from where they can be accessed by other apps. It’s faster than the wireless options mentioned below, but does not transfer sound files. Toshiba’s FlashAir W-04 is straight out of Mission Impossible; an SDXC card with up to 64GB of storage, built-in wireless, and a pass-through connection to your existing Wi-Fi server so you’re not cut off from the internet while using it. There’s no room for a battery, so it must be inserted into an active SD card slot for power. The accompanying app is initially ambiguous, but works. The FlashAir can be inserted into a field recorder or camera to add wifi capability; however, there is no way to turn off the Wi-Fi, so it may consume battery life faster. Wireless transfers are slow (802.11b/g/n), so transferring large files will consume battery life in the field. SanDisk’s Connect is a USB 2.0 stick with up to 256GB of storage along with a built-in wireless connection and battery, in a package the size of a cigarette lighter. The accompanying app is good and allows files to be auditioned and shared. The internal battery allows four hours of continuous Wi-Fi use and recharges from a standard USB port in two hours. Wireless transfers are slow (802.11n) but its own battery means less drain on your field recorder or camera. As with the FlashAir, it offers a Wi-Fi pass-through mode. Unlike the FlashAir, it adds extra weight to your rig but at 22 grams, it’s hardly worth mentioning. If your field recorder or camera can write to a USB stick, the Connect provides wireless connectivity and data backup. At this point it’s worth warning about SanDisk’s iXpand; a tempting USB stick with a Lightning connector and a decent accompanying app. It uses a proprietary Apple format that’s only readable on OSX and iOS machines. A field recorder or camera that can write to a USB stick won’t see it, and AT 34
reformatting it to FAT32 or similar makes it invisible to iOS. It works well, but it’s only for external storage and transfer between OSX and iOS devices. Moving up from wireless SD cards and USB sticks is an emerging category of ‘hub’ products that combine an SD card reader, a USB port and a wireless connection with on-board storage and a power bank. These include Kingston’s MobileLite Wireless Pro, RAVPower’s FileHub and Western Digital’s My Passport Wireless Pro. The power bank in each of these makes them considerably larger and heavier than the FlashAir and Connect, but can be used to recharge your USB devices in the field. If you’re already carrying a power bank, one of these might replace it while adding the extra features with little change in overall weight or volume. I have not tried the Kingston or RAVPower products, but both have good reviews online. I’m using Western Digital’s My Passport Wireless Pro. It’s the size of a double CD case with all the features mentioned above, along with two wireless bands (802.11ac at 5GHz and 802.11n at 2.4GHz) and an excellent app with preview and sharing capabilities. A stand-alone copy feature transfers the contents of an inserted SD card onto its internal drive without requiring an iOS connection, and can be configured to transfer everything on the SD card or only what has been added since the previous transfer. It can also be used as a USB 3.0 external drive on OS X and Windows machines. A major selling point for my application is that it’s recognised by LumaFusion. Footage can be previewed and trimmed in LumaFusion directly from the Western Digital’s drive, with only the trimmed section imported to the iPad Pro. This saves Gigabytes of on-board memory when you only need a five-second segment from 10 minutes of B-Roll. Ruggedised SSD versions are available, but I opted for the 3TB spinning disk version because it doubles as a remote backup for all the other drives that were formerly in my backpack. MY CURRENT WORKFLOW
After recording and filming, the SD cards are inserted into the Western Digital and automatically copied to its internal drive for backup. A wireless connection to the iPad Pro allows auditioning, copying, renaming, moving and/or deleting files on
the hard drive. The Nagra’s 24-bit/96k wavs are transferred to AudioShare where starts and ends are trimmed if necessary before being transferred to AuriaPro for mixing, editing and mastering. From AuriaPro the 24-bit/96k mixes are bounced back into AudioShare, and a copy is converted to 48k and transferred to LumaFusion for syncing to video. The Sony’s XAVC-S video files are auditioned on the Western Digital drive from within LumaFusion, with only the desired segments transferred to the iPad Pro’s on-board storage. From there, they are synchronised with the audio files, edited and so on. The finished videos can be rendered to LumaFusion’s on-board storage, the Photos app, wireless drives, cloud storage services, or directly to YouTube or Vimeo. CONCLUSION: iOS FOR OS
The biggest challenge for anyone working on location with field recorders, cameras and iOS devices is getting the files into iOS. The products, apps and workflows described here overcome that challenge. Furthermore, the iPad Pro brings features that are not available with most laptops. It has the same camera as the iPhone 7 and, given sufficient light, captures very acceptable images for social media use; the Filmic Pro app turns it into an impressive backup video camera. Adding an iOS compatible microphone such as Rode’s iXY or Shure’s MV88 turns it into a backup stereo recorder. Sony’s PlayMemories app turns it into a comprehensive wireless remote control for my Sony camera. Adding Zoom’s F8 Control app brings Bluetooth remote control of my Zoom F8 (a fundamental part of the larger rig I use for my educational sound recording expeditions). And last, but certainly not least, the internal speakers provide a reasonable crossreference for any audio destined for social media. My transition from OS X to iOS has been so successful that my Macbook Pro and hard disks now live in a storage locker in Bangkok, coming out once a month to archive recent recordings and videos. My entire digital life takes place on the 10.5 inch iPad Pro. Even this story was written in the Notes app while staying in an artists’ village above Ubud, Bali. Not a bad way to go about it.
BRING YOUR CREATIVE PROJECT TO LIFE EARN YOUR MASTER OF CREATIVE INDUSTRIES ALONG THE WAY FIND OUT MORE jmc.academy/masteraudio
jmcacademy.edu.au jmcacademy AT 35
FEATURE
IT’S TIME TO COLLABORATE, MATE
Tia Gostelow throws out ideas while producer Mookhi gets to work making beats in a makeshift Heliport studio with a view. AT 36
How APRA AMCOS is helping Aussie songwriters and producers build global careers through its SongHubs songwriting camps. Story: Mark Davie Photos: Bobby Rein
You should heed the words of Vanilla Ice. It’s time to stop, collaborate and listen. Check this out. Ice was a suburban white boy who collaborated with an established black artist, DJ Earthquake. That pair then ‘collaborated’ a key riff from a hit ’80s collaboration between Bowie and Queen, into their own hit. They also ‘collaborated’ black hip hop and white washed it. And made millions doing it. Yes, yes, I’m misappropriating collaboration there like Ice vanilla-ising (icing?) the chocolate cake of hip hop, but you get the idea. Repurposing works, honing outside influences, buddying up, it’s all part of the hit-making process. THE HUB OF A SONG
Five years, 52 camps, over 100 songs released globally and $1.4m earned in performance royalties. Those are the numbers Milly Petriella, APRA AMCOS’s Director of Member Relations, lays out to describe the success of her baby — APRA AMCOS’s SongHubs. It’s not everything though, she points out. Firstly, that’s only the money APRA AMCOS can track, there have been sales and syncs to major ad campaigns that the collection agency doesn’t have figures on; but it’s a healthy chunk regardless. The other reason is that the goal of SongHubs goes way further than figures on a Spotify statement, it’s about propelling Australian and New Zealand artists’, producers’ and songwriters’ careers. “It goes far beyond the tracks written in those few days,” said Milly. “It’s changed careers.” Artists like Morgan Evans, who was desperate to work with Nashville songwriter/producer Chris DeStefano but couldn’t get in the door. Milly met Chris at the Bali Songwriting Invitational, then invited him to to the Sydney-based, APRA AMCOS-supported 50 Songs in 5 Days. Morgan finally gets to have a session with Chris, Chris becomes the executive producer on his album and he now has a number one hit, Kiss Somebody, on US country radio. Boom! Likewise, Jon Hume, previously of Evermore, attended the LA SongHubs with Mr. Hudson, who invited him to a session with JP Cooper. It turned into JP’s biggest hit September Song, and Jon sold his country property to move to LA. Kapow! AUSSIES INVITED
Songwriting camps aren’t new, the Bali Songwriting Invitational is in its 10th year. But early on, Milly says the Australian attendance had been proportionately low. There were a smattering of high profile Aussies; Guy Sebastian, Delta Goodrem, but not many others. She wanted to upend those numbers, and APRA AMCOS eventually pitched SongHubs to the Federal government. With half a million dollars funding to run the first three years, APRA AMCOS matched the income and they were away. The first SongHubs kicked off in August, 2013. It went for 10 days back then, a facsimile of the Bali Invitational format, but it’s now come down to three to five days. The idea is to find Australian talent with mid-to-high level careers and mix
them with some international guests to increase collaboration. “It’s also targeted at commercial outcomes,” said Milly. “Increasing the percentage of Australian ownership in works around the world.” In the early days, trying to convince international artists to come out to Australia for a week was tough. “It was such a difficult ask to get people on a 15-hour flight,” said Milly. “It was always a ‘no’.” Five years on and now labels are flying internationals out to Australia to work with multiple artists in batches. A couple of years ago, Milly begged the APRA AMCOS CEO to transform their empty fourstory office in Ultimo, Sydney into a songwriting camp over Easter. She was able to turn the empty building into eight studios, and flew in 12 internationals for what has become their flagship event, called The Tower. “Five years ago, asking 12 internationals to fly over to Australia for Easter… they would have laughed at me,” she said. “It’s getting easier because of the program’s reputation and success. Over those few days Ricki Lee made her single Not Too Late, Ainslie Wills wrote her single that’s just been released Society, and a track called Warpaint is being synced to an Air Asia global campaign.” FIVE-YEAR ANNIVERSARY
The latest camp, celebrating the fifth anniversary of SongHubs was held in Queensland at Heliport Studios. It was over the weekend prior to Bigsound Festival, Australia’s premiere music industry event. The international artists were songwriter/producer Yves and top-liner Maize, from the US. Locally, Tom Busby, from Busby Marou, was the guest Australian writer. The rest of the attendees included artists like Tia Gostelow, Timothy Morrisey from John Steel Singers, and producers like Konstantin Kersting and Mookhi. There were 15 attendees in all, a mixture of local Queensland artists and those on their way to showcase at Bigsound. While everyone is well-catered for, including accommodation, food and drink, one lucky APRA AMCOS member gets their entire trip fully funded. In this case, it was Bri Clark from Perth. While it’s invitation only, any APRA AMCOS member can apply to participate, but you can only be granted one residence, and one fullyfunded position within an 18-month period. On average, Milly gets between 50 and 200 applicants depending on the genre and territory. She got a boatload more for the LA and Nashville camps, especially given there was a fully-funded double pass up for grabs to celebrate SongHubs’ fifth anniversary. CURATED WORKS
While Milly and her team organise the SongHubs, the actual attendees and makeup of the camp is decided by an external curator. This year, Milly asked Robert Conley back, who was the first ever SongHubs curator. For the last 20 years Robert made his living writing and producing, but four years ago started his own publishing company, Specific Music, which he runs through Kobalt. He’s having particular success with Dean Lewis, who
just eclipsed half a billion streams. In the last year, he was also approached by Universal to establish a joint label. “Narrowing down about 80 people to the 15 people involved was more challenging than I thought,” said Robert. “They had to provide three links to songs they’d written. I try to find the people I think are going to be the next-level writers who
Collaborate, as much as possible, with as many people as possible, across as many genres as possible, for as long as you can do it
haven’t broken through yet. The goal is always to discover some people who have potential and put them in with established artists.” Robert has his own songwriting camp, 50 Songs in 5 Days, which has over 100 people involved across 22 studios. He’s been running it for the last six years, so he reckons he’s got a handle on how to pick a fake from a true songwriter, though “sometimes you get it wrong or are tricked by people with good songs who are average writers.” Once the camp starts, Robert takes a fairly hands-off approach. Each day, he groups them into five parties of three, comprising an artist who’s looking to release material, a producer and a top liner. Each day, the makeup of the groups change, so everyone gets three unique chances to make a song. After a morning pow-wow, a few coffees and the occasional morning meditation routine, Robert lets them know who they’ll be partnering with, and five minutes later at 10am, they’re writing a song with two relative strangers. By 5pm they need to turn in a demo. While he says the environment can be confronting for some, typically the guns show what they’re made of. MOOKHI MAKER
One of those guns is Mookhi, real name Olympia Henshaw. She’s a young producer from Sydney, who’s already done one SongHubs in London. This time, she was thrown in the deep end straight away, partnered up with international guest Maize and Tia Gostelow. It all went swimmingly, said Mookhi, “we got into that flow state and it came seamlessly.” The next day she was grouped with Tim from John Steel Singers and Natasha Shanks from the Little Lord Street Band. “I’m an electronic, poppy producer and she’s a folky singer, so I was a little out of my depth,” said Mookhi. “But we managed to pull it together and come up with a beautiful AT 37
WHERE & WHEN APRA AMCOS’s SongHubs is a global program. As well as Australia’s capital cities, invitees can find themselves flying across oceans to hubs like LA, Nashville and London, or India, Toronto, and the latest addition, Brazil. Milly Petriella, APRA AMCOS Director of Member Relations, said APRA AMCOS’s songwriting camps often happen in conjunction with a partner, like a festival, or existing camp, to spread the funding resources and manpower. Milly: “We often tag onto festivals, so we host SongHubs in London when Great Escape is on and there’s already 30-40 Australian bands attending.
LA and Nashville are a no-brainer. In Melbourne, we’re doing one or two a year with Creative Victoria, and host Brisbane in conjunction with Bigsound. The Bali Songwriting Invitational is a standalone camp we partner with. They provide the infrastructure, but our funding involvement allows 30% of the writers to be Australian. “We partner with 50 Songs in 5 Days in Sydney at the end of every year, which is owned and run by Robert Conley and his wife Leonie. We’re going to be working in Brazil for the first time in December. There’s a conference happening at that time called SIM, with
some Australians already there, and after hearing about the success of SongHubs the Brazilian society reached out. “That will definitely have a Latin feel to it. We try and cover different genres; pop, urban, jazz in conjunction with Reeperbahn Festival in Berlin. Stockholm is the centre of the music industry, so we’ve done SongHubs there three or four times now. I’m working on doing one in Atlanta, the epicentre of the urban scene. We’ve done India three times, and partnered with SOCAN in Canada twice.”
It goes far beyond the tracks written in those few days. It’s changed careers
cinematic, folky song with inspiration from Kate Bush and Fleetwood Mac.” Mookhi had her live rig — a collection of keyboard and pad controllers — with her for her upcoming Bigsound showcase, but didn’t need much other than her laptop and Ableton. Before jumping into any production, she got Tash to play some previous material, “so I could identify the limitations and strengths of her vocals, as well as the style she feels comfortable singing in,” she explained. “Then I looked at the space we were in and figured out what we could and couldn’t do. We weren’t going to record an acoustic drum kit, so I stripped it back to a downtempo beat and started with some melancholic chords. She wanted something sad, but with a hopeful resolution. We layered vocals and strings from there 1and 28/07/2015 it just EMA_AT111_[Print].pdf grew organically.”
While Mookhi says she’s often informally involved in collaboration, she finds it hard to penetrate the established Australian scene. “Established artists already have producers they prefer working with, and I’m the new kid on the block,” she said. SongHubs is a perfect way for her to get more credits and work her way into the mix. “You’re definitely running on fumes,” she said. “It’s still morning and I’ve had three coffees already. But the more I do it, I’m just so in love with how fast it is and how quickly you can put together a really promising track. You don’t need all the time in the world to create something beautiful.” HELIPORT TO PARADISE
Heliport Studios is the perfect place to host a songwriting camp. Set on 56 acres of sub-tropical 9:37 am rainforest, it’s a retreat for the senses. Studio
director James Russell had the job of setting up the five studios. Some were a no-brainer; there are three dedicated studios — A, B and C — on the property. Studio A is the largest space, with an SSL Duality console in the control room that didn’t see much use for this camp. One group camped in the control room, while another set up on the other side of the glass in the live room. Yves was stationed in Studio B, where he simply unplugged the Thunderbolt cable from the studio’s Mac Pro and stuck it into his laptop. He’s a UAD user, so Heliport’s Apollo 16 made for an easy transition. He was also able to use the SSL Sigma for his monitoring, and the Neve 1073 preamps and Retro Doublewide compressor in the 500 series rack. Studio B is designed as a writing and pre-production space, “we recently had The Brave in there to write their album,” said James. “It’s a big
“My EMA In Ears sound awesome and have never let me down over the last 10 years” - Shannon Noll
Custom Moulded and Generic Fit In-Ear Monitors
Ear Monitors Australia® 38 Hall Road, South Warrandyte VIC 3134 T: 03 9844 2524 www.earmonitorsaustralia.com
EMA Supporting Australian Touring Artists AUSTRALIA WIDE & INTL SERVICE
AT 38
AT 39
(clockwise from left) Tom Busby, the guest Australian writer laying down a track in a day; Heliport’s James Russell pulled together five different studio spaces across the 56-acre property; SongHubs organiser, Milly Petriella watching on as American producer Yves gets to work.
open-plan, acoustically treated room with a vocal booth attached. It really helps to not have a separate control room.” The rest of the spaces are adapted, which although James had to run out a bunch of monitors, and get the right sex changes for each interface, there wasn’t a lot of treatment required. “Alan, who built the studio, got addicted to building studios,” said James. “So all the recreational rooms have been acoustically treated and we’re able to adapt a lot of the spaces.” James had already put up a collection of Neumann U87s and AKG C414s for each of the groups, but when Yves got a sniff of the mic locker he had James pulling out pieces like the RCA 77 ribbon mic. He also liked working in Studio B so much, he decided to stay on for a couple of extra days to finish off some work, staying onsite in the Producer’s Cottage. Beyond the actual and makeshift studios, there’s a whole landscape to inspire artists. There are six separate outdoor decks on the property, prime for pulling up an acoustic guitar and hammering out some ideas. Another big benefit of Heliport is it can be literally ‘locked out’. James can close the front gates, turning the entire 56-acre property into a private retreat. Mookhi loved working in the studio. “I mean, who has a helipad in their backyard? It’s crazy. All the studios are so beautiful, the grounds themselves have been really well maintained. It’s been such a creative space to be in.” ELABORATING ON COLLABORATION
Robert doesn’t just extol the virtues of collaboration, he sees it as absolutely necessary for an artist’s and producer’s development. Not to mention increasing the chances of getting hit songs on the board. “I could not express how important it is for AT 40
up and coming writers to collaborate as much as possible,” said Robert. “That is the development process, and it’s the secret to writers getting to the next level; collaborate, as much as possible, with as many people as possible, across as many genres as possible, for as long as you can do it. Especially ones outside of your comfort zone, where you’re with a producer who does something you’re not used to.” It’s simple math really; “The more sessions you’re in, the more songs you write.” As well as his songwriting camp, he also owns a studio-equipped caravan on Fingal Head Beach. He sends his artists up there for a week or two at a time to “just live on the beach and do nothing but write songs,” he explained. “There’s no phone
reception there. They’re trapped. I give them enough food and alcohol, whatever they need to just relax and deliver songs. With Dean Lewis blowing up, suddenly people are more interested in my development process.” “It’s good practise for me,” concurred Mookhi. “Because you need to get your chops up to be quick, and be decisive. “It’s interesting watching them get thrown into a room together,” agreed James. “I’ve worked with Caitlyn Shadbolt before, and she’s more of a country artist. Seeing her thrown in a room with two more electronic producers, where they came up with a pop funk, country tune. It’s amazing the results of the collaboration.”
STUDIO MONITOR KH 310
THE EAR OPENER
»
It is extremely detailed and revealing, but remains unfatiguing, even after many hours of listening.
« »
sound on sound magazine
»
The broad horizontal dispersion is very impressive and ensures a virtually unchanging sound image across the entire stereo panorama.
« »
soundcheck magazin
»
To sum up, the Neumann KH 310 is an excellent loudspeaker (...) it should perform well under a wide variety of conditions. resolution magazine
« »
Neumann’s KH 310 is spot-on, definitely. These monitor speakers are convincing from A to Z. xound.com
Its workmanship and feature set are first class, and it will fulfill all professional criteria. bonedo.de
The workmanship, measurements, and listening impression are all completely convincing. sound & recording magazin
« »
This 3-way design is poised to open a lot of eyes – and ears. recording magazine
«
« « Also available with digital input and delay function AT 41
REPORT
The Ruben’s Story update
Fixing a Phantom Issue Report: Mark Davie
Last issue, I wrote an article about The Rubens’ recording in their own studio, which they built inside an old WWII bunker. The record, LO LA RU is a spectacular slice of Australian pop, and The Bunker’s semi-trailer-fitting, arched ceiling makes for a fascinating space. Bass player for the band, Will Zeglis doubles as the Bunker’s in-house engineer. It’s his Soundtracs console that went down with a noise issue, two weeks before Run The Jewels’ producers, Wilder Zoby and Torbitt Schwartz, were due to arrive from New York. It came right down to the wire, with the technician able to diagnose the issue and fix it the day before the sessions were due to start. Zeglis was so stressed about the incident, he got physically sick. Terry Demol was that tech and, as you can imagine, was more than a little bit stressed himself. Still, Terry powered on to get the job done. Anyone who operates vintage gear — especially pieces that are less common in their region — knows the importance of having a great relationship with a technician. I prefer to call them geniuses, personally. Whether it’s Terry, Rob, Joe, Gunter, Steve, Colin, Andy, Mark… you’ll want someone or your side. When Terry reached out to us to explain what the issue was, we thought it was important to recognise the work that goes into diagnosing and repairing something as complex as an analogue console. Especially when the world’s pre-eminent servicer of that brand can’t get to the bottom of it. Terry is a pro audio electronics technician and product designer. He takes care of warranty servicing for Marshall Amplification in NSW. He services valve and solid state pro audio and high end gear, not to mention building occasional custom-designed guitar amps, femto second master clocks and AD/DA converters. When Will got in touch with Terry, there weren’t many other techs willing to have a stab at the problem, including the technician who’d previously serviced it. “From the get-go, this job was looking like a real challenge,” explained Terry. “The console is old and not the best with regards to serviceability.” Studios are also not the easiest places to work. They’re usually crammed with gear, and dark. The Bunker is no different, so Will and Terry had to set up a makeshift repair space in the studio live room, with console circuit boards being transferred there for work then back to the AT 42
console, reattached and fired up. Rinse and repeat. With the impending session date, the pressure only continued to mount. “We worked through a lot of faults. I also completely removed an old, unused automation system which was tied in to every channel, and it actually improved the sound of the console” explained Terry. “The biggest problem was HF noise and interference in one side of the master bus. I had the number one expert on these consoles on the phone from the UK, advising every similar fault and fix he knew and none of them worked. The schematics also didn’t indicate the physical bus arrangement. “I tracked it down to noise bleed over from the +48V phantom supply bus. The console used ribbon cable for the main busing. There were
grounds separating every bus from it’s neighbour except for one — the RH bus and +48 phantom supply — hence noise from the phantom supply leaking over. Given that the master bus is a virtual ground, you can’t actually see the noise on the bus itself and leakage is occurring as a current. It then appears after the first bus amplifier. “I installed a noise filter network on the phantom and the problem was solved. The guy in UK had never encountered this problem and reckoned I did very well to solve it. He was a great guy, and we had a good laugh about it.” At the end of the day, the sessions went off without another technical hitch, and now we have The Rubens’ LO LA RU. Another success story from one our great Aussie techs. Hats off, Terry.
Designed for Excellence in Every Detail. Introducing Apollo X. UA’s new flagship interfaces, featuring elite-class A/D and D/A conversion, new HEXA Core UAD plug-in processing, Unison preamps, +24 dBu operation, Surround Sound,* and more. All in a sleek Thunderbolt 3 package for Mac and PC.
w w w.u a u d i o.c o m * Surround
Sound features coming Q4 2018.
Distributed Australia wide by CMI Music & Audio, find your nearest authorised dealer at cmi.com.au AT 43
COLUMN
How to Record Pop Vocals, Pt II — Editing JMC Academy alumnus, Peter Holtz, uses three tools to complete the triumvirate of pop vocal compiling, timing and tuning. Column: Peter Holz
Last issue, we went over what it took to get the best vocal takes for Peking Duk’s multi-platinum singles. In this part, we deal with the raw materials you’re left with once everybody else has walked out the studio door. During the tracking stage of a densely arranged pop song, it’s fairly common to frantically fly all over the place without finalising the comps or separating out all the layers for your stacks/ doubles. Sometimes you haven’t even put a comp together at all. You do need to be confident you’ve got everything before the artist leaves. If you’re tracking against a guide (usually from a song pitched by a publisher), always cross-check as you go to ensure you’ve nailed all the right parts, words and melodies. I usually break the editing part into three sections: 1. Compiling 2. Time adjusting/aligning 3. Tuning It is not uncommon for this entire editing process to take two to three times longer than it did to actually record the vocals. The key points to remember while editing is that on a modern pop vocal it is simply assumed the pitch should be ‘in’; the delivery and rhythm/timing are the most important. STEP 1: COMPILING
It may seem obvious, but compiling is the process of flicking between take playlists and putting together the best possible version. There is no set way to do this as it is extremely subjective. The main thing to watch out for is unnatural and unintentional overlaps. These often occur when you’ve recorded sections separately without the singer singing in and out of each section. It usually manifests as them breathing in to sing the next line as they are still finishing the previous line. I CIRCUMVENT THIS BY GETTING THE SINGER TO SING INTO THE NEXT SECTION, IF ONLY FOR A BAR OR SO, WHEN LOOPING TAKES.
Precise edits also help maintain the illusion of a consecutive take. The illusion will start
to disappear if the listener is distracted by an unnatural pause, a cut off breath, or a consonant at the end of a word that’s been trimmed. It is possible to perform edits that look like they shouldn’t work. Sometimes a sound taken from elsewhere in the song — commonly a ‘t’, ‘s’ or a breath — can paste in seamlessly. Just close your eyes or turn off the screen. If it sounds okay, then it is okay. When you’re staring at a bunch of heavily edited clips, you can often be fooled into thinking you can hear something that’s not actually there. STEP 2: TIME ADJUSTING/ALIGNING
Timing is paramount when laying vocals over tightened pop music. I’m not saying you need to quantise the vocals, but the groove and feel of the vocal need to be as ‘in’ as possible. It’s not just the drums and bass that need to be in the ‘pocket’. If your singer is perfect and hit every single part with the exact right groove then skip this section. Aim to get this sorted out as much as possible whilst recording, but you can always take it a step further with some editing. If the take is ‘pretty close’ then I will always try and perfect it. ONE CAVEAT: IT IS POSSIBLE FOR BADLY EXECUTED TIME EDITING TO MAKE THINGS SOUND
EXTREMELY ODD. Like compiling, the nuances of
timing are subjective. It’s not uncommon for me to spend 15 minutes working on the lead vocal timing over four bars. I do all of my timing adjustments by performing micro stretches with the time tool in Melodyne. The approach I use goes like this: 1. Get the lead vocal timing exactly as you want it. Print that and use it as your ‘guide’ in Vocalign. 3. Align all doubles, layers and harmonies to the lead vocal. 4. Bring all of those tracks back into Melodyne and finesse the timing even more. There is a little bit of a tonal difference between Melodyne and Autotune, but the reason
Apply for JMC Academy’s Audio Engineering and Sound Production, or Masters of Creative Industries courses, to get qualified with hands-on experience, study abroad options and internship opportunities. Intakes in February, June and September. Check the courses out online at jmc.academy/audioat AT 44
AUTOTUNE PRO TIPS 1. I will often ‘hard tune’ some of the doubles and layers in Autotune and slightly reduce or increase the scale offset amount for different layers. This gives them an incredible tightness with some width and depth due to the slight pitch offsets.
2. On doubles and layers, I also use the ‘create vibrato’ section in Autotune at a very slow rate to make sure it never holds a constant pitch offset. This acts like a slow phaser/flanger that’s ever so slowly modulating changes in pitch.
I use Melodyne in this stage is because it allows you to see and edit multiple tracks at once. Grabbing a stack of 16 vocals and adjusting them all together was a game changer for me. Another benefit is having your lead vocal as greyed out ‘guide’ blobs underneath any doubles or harmonies you are finessing. STEP 3: TUNING
If the word ‘tuning’ makes you baulk and instantly want to chastise someone about ‘getting it right during the take!’, then feel free to ignore this whole article; it probably doesn’t apply to the style of music you are making. The countless hours I’ve spent tuning vocals in Melodyne has made it almost automatic. I PRIMARILY ONLY USE THE PITCH AND PITCH DRIFT TOOLS, WHICH MEANS I’M RARELY CHANGING THE ACTUAL CURVE THE ARTIST SANG, JUST OFFSETTING IT. AS SOON AS YOU ADJUST OR FLATTEN THE CURVE, YOU WILL HEAR IT.
Occasionally, I’ll use the Pitch Modulation tool to limit vibrato. I will also use it to lock a quick passing note the singer may have pitch bent over. After the notes have been massaged with Melodyne I will usually feed that signal into Antares Autotune to give it a final squeeze and impart the tone Autotune seems to give. It’s something we’re all used to now! Importantly, I’m never using Autotune to correct or move any notes, it’s just swimming over the top. Also, make sure to keep each stage on a different playlist so you can always ‘go back’ if you need to. It’s basic house keeping. HORSES FOR COURSES
The groove and feel of the vocal need to be as ‘in’ as possible. It’s not just the drums and bass that need to be in the ‘pocket’
Most instrumental elements in a modern pop song are more or less perfectly in tune. For this reason, even the best singers will still benefit from some pitch correction. However, it’s still down to the actual song. Once, I recorded an extremely talented singer on two songs in the same day. One track was a modern electronic pop production which I rigorously layered, edited and tuned. The other was a more laid back soul tune with an acoustic piano as the main element. There was no need to tune anything on this second track as the natural tuning variations of the acoustic piano allowed the vocal performance to have more room to move in terms of pitch. It was a wider lane to move around in.
AT 45
REGULARS
Apple Notes How to skip the device upgrade if you just must use Mojave. Column: Brad Watts
Most would be aware that Apple has yet another operating system rolling out, this time under the moniker of macOS Mojave. As with every operating system there’s a cutoff point as to which machines are capable of taking on a system upgrade. In my case, it’s a MacBook Pro that’s been left out of the game. It turns out a MacBook Pro has to be at least a 2012 model. Mine is a 2011. Yeah, I know that’s old, but it’s an i7 with an SSD and all the ports I need, rather than a smattering of USB C ports with a parade of dongles and adaptors shackled to it. So, in order to have a look at what Mojave is like I used a clever workaround. ENTERING THE DESERT
If you’re brandishing a MacBook Pro older than the 2012 edition, or a MacBook made prior to 2015, head to the site dosdude1.com/mojave. This legend of a coder has built ‘macOS Mojave Patcher Tool for Unsupported Macs’ which will allow you to install Mojave on a host of Macs going as far back as early 2008. You’ll need to download a copy of the Mojave installer, which the site provides, a copy of the patcher tool, and a 16GB USB memory stick. There are a few caveats, however. You won’t get full graphics acceleration with AMD Radeon HD 5xxx or 6xxx GPUs, and without that Mojave will be extremely slow, if not unusable. Some Wi-Fi modules won’t function, and iSight cameras may not work on some machines. Early 2008 Mac Pros can’t use AMD GPUs at all, with the only option here being to replace your AMD GPU with an NVIDIA model. Mojave is extremely graphics intensive, with features such as Dynamic Desktops that alter the desktop picture to reflect the time of day from dawn to dusk. It’s quite cool seeing the shadows fall across an image of the Mojave desert as night falls in your timezone. If you think your machine can handle it, the installation process is fairly simple. The patcher rebuilds the Mojave installer application enabling the process to complete on your unsupported Mac, taking much the same time as a normal installation. I gave it a go, firstly as I was mildly
AT 46
incensed that my MacBook Pro wouldn’t support the new OS, and secondly because I wanted to have a crack at Mojave. BEAT BY THE HEAT
My initial experience with Mojave on my ageing lappy was that it was slow. Like… really slow. Because of the increased GPU requirements my Intel HD Graphics 3000 CPU-based graphics really took a beating. The good old multicoloured pinwheel reared its smug colourfield too often for me to consider staying in macOS 10.14. It’s possible 10.14 would be AOK on my 2011 MacBook Pro if I installed it on the SSD, but I used the secondary hard disk installed in the machine as a test. I wasn’t keen to overwrite my SSD operating system. Long story short – this laptop will be staying on High Sierra. That said, why do I need Mojave? Well I pretty much don’t, as I can’t find anything compelling enough to make me want to upgrade my MacBook, or indeed, my desktop machine. The dynamic desktop feature is kinda cool, but I don’t need it as I usually use a grey non-distracting desktop. I don’t need to alter the system to Dark Mode, and Stacks on the desktop isn’t anything I can’t do with a modicum of document housekeeping (well, maybe that would be ok), and 32 people in a FaceTime call? I doubt I know enough people who could be bothered. At the end of the day, for an audio-centric system I can’t see the point. My audio machine will sit happily on Sierra for some time, and my lappy works just fine on High Sierra. BREAKING REPAIR RELATIONSHIPS
In other news, there’s talk of Apple shutting thirdparty repairers out of the picture for Mac models sporting the T2 chip. With the 2018 MacBook Pro, any repairs done to the LCD, logic-board, Touch ID, upper case sections such as the keyboard, trackpad, speakers, even the battery, will result in an inoperative machine unless Apple Diagnostics software is run – only available to Authorised Apple repairers and Apple stores. No fair, I’m calling! I can’t replace a battery in a 2018 MacBook
Pro? However, it appears Apple’s trickery hasn’t been instigated as yet. The iFixit crew have replaced a display on a 2018 MacBook Pro, and swapped out a logic-board with no detrimental results — even with the devices running Mojave. At the moment the repair community isn’t overly upset, as there are millions of older machines to repair in the meantime. But in the long run the writing is clearly on the wall. Apple has set a course for a world where nobody can perform the simplest repair, such as a battery replacement, without the customer heading to an Apple store and copping an exorbitant bill.
AT 47
REVIEW
YAMAHA DZR SERIES Powered Speakers Yamaha’s top of the line powered speakers rev right to the limit. Big power with 96kHz DSP processing make these flexible beasts.
NEED TO KNOW
Review: Mark Woods
PRICE DZR10: $1999 DZR12: $2099 DZR15: $2199 DZR315: $2699 DXS15XLF Sub: $2499 DXS18XLF Sub: $2699
AT 48
CONTACT Yamaha: 1800 331 130 or au.yamaha.com
PROS Efficient, multi-use design Big volume numbers 96k DSP Performance
CONS No mic/RCA ins
SUMMARY Yamaha’s DZR speakers sit at the top of the company’s portable speaker range. Louder is better, even if you don’t use it, and Yamaha has these revved up to the max with sound quality to match. Loads of level, with effective 96kHz DSP processing to keep it all nice and tidy.
Yamaha’s always trying to go faster or louder, no matter if it’s speakers, motorbikes or jet-skis. Sitting squarely atop its portable speaker range is the new DZR series, which aims to be the loudest, deepest and best controlled speaker in its class. PURE POWER
Three of the four models in the DZR range are two-way designs with newly developed 10-, 12- and 15-inch woofers with three-inch voice coils, weight saving aluminium frames and neodymium magnets. High frequencies are produced by a two-inch voice coil and neodymium magnet with a titanium diaphragm into a one-inch throat compression driver and constant directivity horn, which is rotatable for flexible installations and stage monitor applications. The biggest and baddest model, the DZR315, is a three-way design with an eight-inch mid-driver as well as the 15-inch woofer and horn. The speakers are powered by new 2kW (peak) Class D amps specifically optimised for the DZR range with integrated DSP processing (there’s also a passive CZR series available). The DZR series is the first Yamaha portable speaker range to use 96kHz converters for higher resolution audio with low latency. Precise real-time control of amps, power supplies, drivers and output levels enables very high SPL levels without anything distorting or breaking. The specs are crazy. Pink noise @ 1m on the DRZ10 can reach 137dB, for the DRZ12 and DRZ15 that rises to 139dB, while the DRZ315 can output a blistering 143dB. QUALITY TO THE EDGE
Top of the line cabinets need to look the goods, and the DZR range achieves this without gimmicks. Wood helps, and the edges — especially the beveled front ones — come up nicely. It’s a deliberately simple cabinet design with classic shapes and strong surfaces. The Polyurea finishing surface is not only tough and resistant to marks, it’s also pleasantly textured to the touch and sparkles in the light. The front of the cabinet is covered by a perforated matte-black cloth in front of the steel grille, giving a more discreet look than if the arrangement was reversed. No lights or words, just Yamaha’s classic three-tuning-forks logo. The comfortable recessed aluminium handles have the word ‘Yamaha’ embossed on them but it’s subtle. They feel lighter than they look and the wellplaced handles on each side make carrying them easy. Mounting and placement options include M10 rigging points, an optional U-bracket, regular and angled pole-mounts and symmetrical 50-degree floor monitor angles. The DZR10 is smaller and a different shape so it gets one side handle and one handle on the top. At less than 18kg it’s the easiest to move around but the DZR12 (21.4kg) and the DZR15 (24.5kg) are both manageable. The DZR315 is nearly 42kg so you’re going to want strong stands for those. Taking the front cover off a DZR12 to rotate the horn for stage use gives you a good look inside the cabinet. Butterfly joints are used to give the 15mm plywood added rigidity and there’s internal bracing;
but there’s more air in there than I’d expected. The drivers are designed to keep weight down and they’ve only left the essential parts, by the look of them. The amp/processing is all hidden in an anonymous grey metal box. Rotating the horn is easy enough but takes a few minutes, there are eight hex-head bolts to remove the grille, then eight star-head bolts to free the horn to rotate. I wouldn’t do it in the middle of a sound check. The rear panel is spaciously laid out; LCD screen near the top with a rotary knob and Home button for navigation and selection. There are only two audio connections, both on combi XLR/1/4-inch sockets clearly labeled Line 1 and Line 2. Pro-users only here, there’s no Mic input or pair of RCA sockets. Thru sockets are provided next to both inputs and Line 2 can be switched to output the raw signal or the DSP signal if desired. PRO PROCESSING
The DSP processing plays a large part in the sound of the DZR range. It starts with precision 96kHz converters then moves to Yamaha’s Advanced FIR-X tuning, an updated version of their FIR-X technology that provides phase-coherent EQ for the crossovers and the overall frequency response. The speakers sound tuned and ready to go but there are some useful options in the DSP. There are controls for level, parametric EQ, delay, routing and factory presets. User presets can be stored and loaded via USB for fast setups, and internal tech info and log data can be exported for troubleshooting. The fairy-dust option is Yamaha’s D-Contour processing that combines overall EQ with multi-band compression. The FOH mode adds low frequencies for fullness, especially needed when the speakers are on stands. Monitor mode does the opposite and reduces the low frequencies that would otherwise be unnaturally boosted by reflections from the stage when used as floor monitors. Like digital mastering software, the compressor extracts every last dB out of the system by dividing the frequency spectrum into narrow bands and applying tight dynamic control to each band, forcing the frequency response to stay within limits and preventing overloads. The subs share the 96kHz processing and have their own version of the dynamic EQ. They also produce impressive volumes with maximum SPL quoted at 136dB with LF response quoted at -10dB @ 33Hz for the DXS15-XLF and -10dB at a rumbling 30Hz for the DXS18-XLF. A dualdamping system reduces unwanted vibration at high levels and they’re driven by a modified version of the amp used in the full-range speakers. The frequency response is close to flat between 50-150Hz with the option of Boost mode that focuses on and enhances the 50-60Hz region for more punch, or Xtended LF mode that pushes the boost down closer to 40Hz for some real pants-flapping action. The drivers have an aluminium frame, ferrite magnet and a 4-inch voice coil. Finished in the same Polyurea finish and grille cloth they look good on the floor with a serious port along the bottom. Handles on either side are well balanced for convenient lifting and there are optional castors and covers available.
DANTE COMING While not available at the time of writing, soon all DZR models including the subs will be available as extra-cost Dante-equipped versions. Dante I/O (two in/two out) enables integration with Yamaha CL/QL/TF digital consoles and other Dante devices to provide remote control of complex systems. Sample rate conversion allows it to work with 48kHz devices. Dante break-IN and break-OUT function allows analogue I/O to combine with Dante I/O for more flexibility while Yamaha’s ProVisionare software for iPad control is also Dante compatible. Simple patching with Yamaha consoles via Cat5 cable can save set up time and keeps the signal digital all the way to the speakers, avoiding an extra visit to the converters.
ONE MIC, MANY BANJOS
These speakers are fun to use and I’ve had great results. The Guildford Banjo Jamboree is a unique boutique festival I do every year and a great test gig. Three venues in three days that — apart from all the banjos — are a typical hunting ground for this sized system. These acoustic shows don’t really test the volume limits but they do demonstrate a speaker’s fidelity and stability. The first night was in the historic Music Hall, out the back of the pub. I used a pair of DZR10s with DSX15 subs. Most of the acts played around a single condenser mic, no DIs allowed. Don’t try it at home but the idea is you put up a high-quality studio mic, and turn it up as loud as you can. The hard bit is keeping it nice and stable, and not feeding back. Minimal or no foldback helps, as does a steady hand on the controls, and good linear response from the PA. The reward is the purest sound you’ll ever hear from a PA and it’s pretty good when you can clearly hear an acoustic guitar playing a couple of metres off the mic. With D-Contour switched off, the DZR passed the volume test easily and I liked the sound quality from the first song. The high frequencies are particularly smooth and lacking the digital graininess I often notice with processed speakers. I’m crediting the 96kHz processing. The frequency response is neutral and remarkably flat between 50Hz–15kHz with just a couple of dB dip around 2-4kHz to reduce harshness. They’re crisp up high and they’ll sparkle if it’s in the source material but they’re almost mellow in overall nature, particularly at lower volumes. Not sharp, they don’t bite or bark unduly on peaks, and draw your ear to the instruments rather than the speakers. Hi-fi stuff. MONITORING THE OUTPUT
The next day we were in a typically boomy public hall with multiple mics and wedges for foldback. It’s a boxy stage that’s always challenging for the monitors, especially with lots of condenser mics open on stage. I used a pair of DZR12s instead of my usual four speakers across the front. Again, not a loud show but I had the chance to crank them up on stage setting up and got a taste of how loud they AT 49
can be; very loud and very resistant to feedback, with a good wide throw, too. It was the first year I can recall where no one on stage asked for more of anything all day. I guessed their levels and it seemed to work, which means they were hearing it clearly on stage. The same thing happened the next day for the outdoor concert, two DRZ12s covered the whole stage. Portable speakers that can be used for FOH and monitors are valuable to production companies and venues. With the D-Contour set to Monitor and the horn rotated, these make excellent wedges. I took them to The Theatre Royal in Castlemaine for a show and to explore what happens if you try and approach the claimed possible volume levels. I don’t take manufacturers claims about maximum volumes too seriously as I’ve found the sound usually starts to distort or deteriorate somewhere before their potential maximum level. Quality before quantity please. Rather than high volume my first impression of the DZRs was how quiet they are, the hiss at idle is studio-low and there’s no fan at start up. In my control room later I could hear the fan coming on and off again but it’s quiet and gentle compared to others I’ve reviewed. It might fire up after a few hours outdoors in the hot Aussie sun. I set up the DRZ10s and DRZ12s and listened to them as full-range boxes first. With D-Contour switched to FOH the frequency response gets a noticeable low-centred boost around 60Hz, and just a dB or so extra at 10kHz. Music playback produces instantly pleasing results with surprising depth and throw from both models on stands. At low-medium levels the response is balanced with a full bass. At increasing volumes the exaggerated low-end limits the maximum volume. Using the HPF allows significantly higher overall levels as the drivers can concentrate on the mids/highs instead of trying to make big long waves. These are very capable speakers and to get the most from them they should be used with a sub for anything above medium level. SUBBING IN
Using the subs transforms either model into a bigger deal, and if you’re going big then the DRZ12 is a great match with the 40kg DZR/XLF15 sub, either sitting on top or raised on poles if more height is needed. I found the combination offered a good balance between grunt and manageability but when more is more there’s always the 49kg DXS18XLF with an 18-inch driver. I didn’t get to hear it, but I bet it’s awesome. I did get to try a pair of subs in Cardioid mode and it’s a hit. Directivity is not really controllable with single subs and the amount of LF sound emanating from the sides and rear of your average sub is about the same as the amount coming out front. This can cause problems, particularly if the speakers are placed near the stage. To create a cardioid pattern two DXS subs can be placed beside each other, or stacked, with one pointing forwards towards the audience and the other pointing backwards. With Cardioid Mode 02 selected the coverage pattern magically becomes cardioid and greatly reduces the LF level at the back, maybe 20dB and worthwhile doing if you’ve got the numbers. The only downside is the sub showing its AT 50
back panel to the world. I was expecting someone from the audience to ask me if I knew one was the wrong way round. Cardioid Mode 03 does the same but with three DXS subs per side, the center sub pointing the ‘wrong’ way. REACHING A NEW LEVEL
The DZR12 plus DXS15-XLF combination makes a great pumping little EDM system that’s clean, deep and fills a room. Once you get to a certain level you can hear the processing working but it stays tidy and that’s where they want to stay. I’m waiting for the day one of these new portable systems to replace our house PA. This went a fair way even though it’s only about a tenth the physical size of the Theatre Royal’s ageing, but much larger, system. It was a good contest and I had a few disbelieving comments from the management, ’Is that really from the small system?’ Beyond that certain level they start to get harsh and lose their sweet quality, but it’s a high limit. I’m sure these are the loudest portable speakers I’ve reviewed and those crazy volume claims might be right. Live mics and loud bands need loud speakers with the ability to let the vocals stay in front of the mix, even when the band is clearly trying to drown
DZR passed the volume test easily and I liked the sound quality from the first song. Hi-fi stuff
them out. The DZR speakers can help by being louder. The real-time control of frequency as well as level prevents the drivers from being overwhelmed and keeps the mid-range and high frequencies clear so the vocal cuts through. The annual Spring Ball was on while I had the speakers at the Theatre Royal so I used the DZR12s on stage, as the horns were already rotated, and made a drumfill with a DXS15-XLF sub and a DZR10. It was way better than our usual two 15-inches-plus-horn box. Dance band The Sugar Fed Leopards were the main act and they had everything working. The DZR12s were great as wedges again, loud and clear with little or no external EQ and they really don’t want to feed back. On a stand the Monitor setting seems to cut off a lot of bass but on a stage the response is even from low to high. Compared to the DZR10, the DZR12 looks and sounds bigger than the difference in the size of the woofers suggests. It’s a wider cabinet that looks right sitting on a DLX/XLF15 sub plus it’s got dual monitor angles for mirror-image pairs of wedges. The DZR10 is more conveniently sized and easier to transport with a handle on the top but it’s only got the one monitor angle, and no feet on the angled panel, that made me reluctant to use it as a wedge on a hard stage.
I didn’t try them but also available is the bigger DZR15 that claims the same 139dB max volume as the DZR12 while it reaches down lower with a -10dB @ 34Hz LF response. I’m sure I’d like the hero DZR315 despite its 42kg. A three-way design, with the eight-inch mid-driver mounted on a big flare above and in front of the woofer. These boast 143dB max with a -10dB @ 31Hz LF response. POWER TO THRIVE
The DZR series achieves the conflicting aims of simultaneously being strong and light. The build quality is high and these come with a five-year warranty to match. There’s a lot of demand for point-and-shoot portable systems and it’s a hot marketplace. Louder is obviously better whether you use it or not; the same as speed in cars and motorbikes. Yamaha knows this. Volume with quality and flexibility is better still. Those 2kW amps and 96kHz processing help keep the DZR and DXS-XLF ranges ahead of the competition with a smooth, coherent sound quality and big volume numbers. Power and performance concisely delivered.
AT 51
REVIEW
QSC CP SERIES
Powered Loudspeakers QSC shook up the portable speaker market a decade ago with the K series. Can it do it again with the cheaper CP? Review: Mark Woods
It’s coming up to a decade since QSC’s original K series burst onto the scene with an impressive array of features that changed expectations for portable speakers. The coherent sound quality was the immediate attraction. Solo artists and small groups playing acoustic instruments took to them first, but their appeal quickly spread as their punchy bass response and ample DSP-controlled power worked well for pumped-up music playback, too. The packaging was equally good with distinctive professional looks, flexible and mixable inputs, good handles and the best tote bags. They were clean, loud and indestructible; a good combination. In 2016, they got even better. The totally reworked K.2 Series replaced the K Series. The cabinets were still made from polypropylene but more solidly constructed; the updated 2kW amps and improved drivers made them sound bigger and louder; and the introduction of an LED screen really enhanced the user’s control. The top of the line QSC KW Series features a texturepainted 15mm birch cabinet for ruggedness and the deadening benefits of the wood.
NEED TO KNOW
CP: COST VS PERFORMANCE
In the realm of powered boxes, the K and KW series sound great, but they are relatively upmarket. Could a cheaper QSC speaker shake up the market like the K did a decade ago? With QSC’s reputation established, the new CP Series looks to broaden the brand’s appeal with prices well below the AU$1k barrier. It positions them at about half the cost of the QSC KWs, and two-thirds of the K.2 Series. It also puts them right in the middle of a crowded field of bigname competitors.
It’s not much of a series at the moment. There are only two models, the diminutive CP8 and the average-sized CP12. They both get a new 1000W (peak) amp controlled by the same DSP that plays a big part in the sound of all QSC speakers by controlling the overall voicing, presets and dynamic behaviour. Proven technical features are also shared. Directivity Matched Transition (DMT) synchronises the HF and LF drivers to
PRICE CP8: $749 CP12: $949
CONS Mix out only, no thru Limited user controls
CONTACT Jands: (02) 9582 0909 or info@jands.com.au
AT 52
PROS Sound quality Conical horn Small & light Best bags
deliver an even frequency response across the listening area. Intrinsic Correction is a multi-band limiter that keeps the speakers tidy at high levels as well as providing effective overall limiting and overload protection. On the odd occasion, my pair of K10s have taken beyond normal abuse — screaming vocals, kick drums forced into them and cranked as loud as they’ll go — and they don’t complain or stop.
SUMMARY QSC’s K series altered what we expect from portable speakers. The CP series delivers that QSC sound for less; dropping a few external accoutrements like LCD screens, but keeping a lot of QSC’s DSP smarts inside. The CP series boxes are also smaller and lighter than their K siblings, but have the same rugged bags, making them winners on the portable scene.
AT 53
socket pair
increasingly common mini-jack (3.5mm) that’s trying to replace the once ubiquitous of RCAs. I was first pitched the benefits of mini-jacks by another manufacturer. It was sold as an alternative to Bluetooth. Knowing what the wireless connection does to the already compressed bits of digital fluff that pass for audio files these days, they figured it would be better if users plugged their phones in so the speakers wouldn’t get blamed for the poor quality audio. In practise, it’s not that simple. Firstly, normal headphone sockets are not a great interface, either physically or electrically. Then there’s the inconvenient fact a leading brand of mobile phone hasn’t got a headphone socket anymore, so you’re restricted to using Bluetooth anyway. THAT QSC SOUND
The CP12 looks like a QSC, with its familiar concave front and perforated steel grille. It’s a more compact design, with the horn offset from the centre and the port moved up beside it to save space. It makes the new CP12 about the same size as the old K10. It’s also 5kg lighter than the original K12, at just 13.7kg. The smaller CP8 is only 9.5kg… that’s very light. There are some noticeable cost-cutting differences. On close inspection, the finish on the CP Series polypropylene cabinets is a bit rough and uneven, making them look like cheaper speakers when compared to the smoother impact-resistant ABS finish used on the K Series. The top handle is good but the moulded half-handle on the side is not much use. JACK’S AROUND BACK
The rear panel harks back to the simplicity of the original K Series; all knobs and switches, no fancy screen or advanced user options. The presets are selected via a single six-position rotary knob with printed descriptions of the suggested applications. Connections include two combo XLR/jack inputs with gain knobs. Channel 2 has a sunken Mic Boost switch, which helps limit the number of times you accidentally engage 25dB of gain when you don’t want it. Another small saving is the single, postgain mix out socket, QSC’s more expensive series get additional thru outputs beside each input for greater routing flexibility. The other way to get signal in is via the AT 54
First impressions of the sound of the CP Series are positive and the overall voicing has a familiar, appealing QSC sound with no obvious shortcomings. The first time I used the CP12 was on a stage as a floor monitor. I had it positioned right beside an original K10 and I couldn’t hear any difference. Once I got to know the CP series and compared them directly to the originals I could hear some differences — and those differences would be magnified in a comparison with the K.2 Series — but I had to listen for them. The CP Series is all new with presumably cheaper drivers and while the 1/4-inch compression driver and flare is still smooth across the uppermid vocal range it’s a little grainy in the higher frequencies by comparison and more likely to emphasise sibilance than the original. The mids seem a little peaky around 400Hz but it could be cabinet resonance rather than the driver. The cabinet makes a distinct note in that region if you tap it in the right place on the side. In use the Default setting delivers a normal balanced frequency response suitable for FOH or general music playback. The presets are minimal but do more than they let on. The Monitor setting is straightforward and cuts the low frequencies where they would otherwise combine with reflections from the stage to cause muddiness. The Speech setting is more interesting. The original K Series has a Vocal Boost switch that boosts the high-mids, but there’s no equivalent on the CP Series. Instead, the Speech setting has been designed to eliminate microphone feedback close to the speaker. It’s done with what QSC describe as smart EQ filters that reduce the offending frequencies without taking too much of the rest of the sound with them and seems to be aimed at DJs talking over the music or between tracks. Instead of any boost it sounds slightly scooped around 2kHz but it’s effective at reducing feedback, even with an open mic right in front of the horn. Thoughtfully, the Speech setting only works on Channel 2 (with the 25dB mic boost button), leaving Channel 1 on the Default setting.
The Dance setting boosts the low frequencies and adds some high-mids and highs for some bass-heavy, party-time sounds. Although notably, the extra bass EQ does limit the overall volume and you may require a sub depending on the environment of the dance party. A lack of fine control or advanced functions like delay or detailed EQ options won’t be missed by casual users. Operating the speakers is kept simple, and eliminating the LCD screens stops errant settings from being hidden in menus. Music playback was my favourite application for these and they’re ideal party speakers; easy to use and they won’t overload. As a small FOH setup they’ll fill a room with strong, clear vocals and have a useful amount of LF grunt (the CP12’s LF response is quoted at a respectable -6dB at 49Hz) even when mounted on stands. They can also be yoke mounted for installations or flown from integral M10 installation points. Portable speakers are a handy size for floor monitor duties and often get the call. Typically I’d say they should have rotatable horns to avoid the compromise of the narrow horizontal throw of a speaker laid on its side. Importantly, the CP series has a 75-degree conical throw horn, so it provides even coverage over a wide enough area for the job, and wouldn’t make any difference if it was rotatable. The power and the DSP combine to ensure they’ll run loud on stage but remain stable without needing external EQ. That combination of conical horn and stable power makes them easy to use in a hurry if you decide to throw one on stage at the last minute. Both Default and Dance presets offer versions of their settings with an 80Hz crossover, for when they’re being used with a separate subwoofer. There’s no specific CP series subs, but the newly released QSC KS112 single 12-inch 1000W sub is a good match power-wise and it’s suitably compact. The equally new KS212C dual 12-inch 3600W cardioid sub is probably over the top. MEASURED AGAINST THE BENCHMARK
The QSC K10 tote bags are my benchmark for tote bags and the CP Series gets the same. Proper canvas with strong handles and easy to get the speakers in and out of. The worst I’ve done to mine in nearly 10 years is get them dirty. I’ve had cheaper polyester bags supplied with other brand speakers that have ripped in a matter of months. There’s a lot of products in this popular price range but the QSC CP Series speakers will compete with their high output-to-weight ratio, versatility and sound quality. QSC’s reputation will be maintained and more people will hear its products. The CP Series offers good value but the only slight worry I have is that the gap between the price of the CP Series and the K.2 Series is maybe less than the gap between the performance. They couldn’t make the CPs sound as good as the K.2s I know but the K.2 series speakers are exceptionally good and available for just a little bit more money. A budget is a budget though and if you’ve got a limited one, then it’s now likely enough to get you some of that renowned QSC sound.
FREQUENCY FOUND™ Audix Performance Series Wireless Audix 60 Series wireless offers 64 MHz of tunable bandwidth, true diversity receivers and an impressive operating range of 450 feet at a price point that is unmatched in the market today. Choose R61 single channel or R62 dual channel systems, available in multiple configurations including handheld, lavalier, headworn and instrument microphones. Learn more at audixusa.com.
Over 30 Years in Business To find your nearest Integrator/Reseller, please visit
www.pavt.com.au and click on ‘Where To Buy’
Production Audio Video Technology Pty Ltd 4/621 Whitehorse Road, Mitcham 3132, Victoria PH: 03 9264 8000 sales@pavt.com.au NEW ZEALAND OFFICE PH: +64 21 410 050 tim@productionaudio.co.nz AT 55 www.audixusa.com | 503.682.6933
THIS IS STATE-OF-THE-ART WIRELESS COMMUNICATION
TS
AT 56
PE N
5
NG DI
PA T E N
BOLERO WIRELESS INTERCOM • • • • • • • • • • •
Up to 10 beltpacks per antenna 100 antenna, 100 beltpack system capacity Best-in-class voice clarity “Touch&Go” beltpack registration 6-channel beltpack plus dedicated REPLY button Built-in microphone and speaker for Walkie-Talkie mode Smartphone integration via Bluetooth Ergonomic, robust beltpack design Sunlight-readable display with Gorilla Glass™ Decentralized AES67 IP networked antennas Seamless integration into RIEDEL‘S ARTIST intercom matrix
www.riedel.net