Headliner Magazine Issue 34

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SUPPORTING THE CREATIVE COMMUNITY

MAGAZINE / 34

ZULU MAN WITH SOME POWER

NASTY C IDLES

ROUGH AND READY

REBECCA FERGUSON

NOTHING LEFT BUT FAMILY

GUY CHAMBERS THEARTOFSONGWRITING

Destino, Ibiza with the d&b GSL System

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At home in the most demanding club applications, a d&b system brings market-leading software and hardware to every performance. Night after night, this easy-to-use audio toolkit helps bring dancefloors to life. And, as d&b works hand in hand with the industry on innovative, patented technologies, the boundaries of what’s possible evolve. So, in shaping what’s coming next, the now becomes even more exciting. More than a sound system.

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ISSUE 34

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34 Welcome to Issue 34 of Headliner.

This month’s cover star is South Africa’s most streamed rapper, Nasty C, who is back with his third album, Zulu Man With Some Power – and international success set firmly in his sights. Already hitting the number one spot in South Africa, the record is making waves globally, and is his boldest work to date. We chat to Nasty about African music culture, and how rap music in this emerging territory is well and truly on the rise.

We’re also locked down with Guy Chambers who reflects on meeting Robbie Williams in 1997, and how their unique songwriting partnership may never have materialised had it not been for the wise words of his mum.

Owen chats immersive audio, and how d&b’s Soundscape saved Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Starlight Express; and Hans Zimmer’s FOH engineer, Colin Pink, talks us through his dos and don’ts in the live arena.

Meanwhile IDLES frontman, Joe Talbot discusses the band’s new material, and how he’s been keeping himself busy throughout lockdown; and songwriter Jamie Scott takes a break from working with the likes of Adele and One Direction to create his own solo album. Furthermore, a decade after her success on The X Factor, Rebecca Ferguson reflects on her audition, and how Nile Rodgers has reignited her love for music.

In the studio, former Razorlight drummer, Andy Burrows takes us through the process of scoring Ricky Gervais’ much-loved Netflix series, After Life 2; and we chat to accomplished producers, DJ Meme and Caesar Edmunds about their favourite audio kit, and adapting their workflow as they come out of lockdown.

As #WeMakeEvents continues to gain traction on a global scale, we chat to a couple of top-end live sound experts whose tour schedules are currently on hold: eight-time Tony and Olivier Award-winning/ nominated sound designer, Gareth

This issue also sees the launch of our brand new Spotlight Review section: see what our sound specialist makes of Korg’s new SoundLink console range, AMS Neve’s RMX16 500, UAD’s Apollo x8p interface, and the Dangerous Music Compressor.

Enjoy the issue!

Paul Watson Editor-in-Chief, Headliner Group HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

20 / MABES 14 / IDLES 08 / TYGERMYLK

30 / MELBOURNE CRICKET GROUND 34 / GUY CHAMBERS

26 / CAESAR EDMUNDS

52 / AFTER LIFE 2

40/ NASTY C

46 / REBECCA FERGUSON

62 / EVA GARDNER

66 / RICARDO RYAN

58 / DJ MEME

78 / TECH SPOTLIGHT 72 / BARRY GRINT 104 / GARETH OWEN

118 / KARLSRUHE 114 / BLOOD RED SHOES 110 / JAMIE SCOTT

122 / BEL

132 / ALT-J

138 / COLIN PINK

126 / TWO WEEKS IN NASHVILLE

146 / BEHIND THE BRAND 142 / MATOMA

150 / PARA LIA

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TYGERMYLK

Behind the Mask

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BEHIND THE MASK

TYGERMYLK Singer-songwriter turned mask-maker Hayley Harland is one half of indie-folk duo, TYGERMYLK, and made a habit of cramming herself into a tiny old Kia during lockdown to perform gigs. Headliner catches up with her in between serenading fans in the back of her car.

Hayley Harland used to write songs, but now she makes masks. One half of Brighton-based indie-folk duo, TYGERMYLK (derived from the nickname of her childhood park ‘Milky Tigers’ and the 1996 Belle and Sebastian album), Harland and Aurora Bennett surfaced last year with debut single, What God Would Keep Us Apart – a heartbreaking song about Harland’s first love, whose parents locked away for two weeks after discovering their daughter was gay.

their first record, although the lockdown period hasn’t resulted in epic studio hours, as mask-making has taken over for Harland: “Basically I make a face mask with tigers on it, and then for every face mask that is bought, one then gets donated to a key worker,” she says, speaking to Headliner from inside a tiny old Kia that used to belong to her grandad. She has recently been using the car as a makeshift live gig venue.

Since releasing their debut single, Harland and Bennett set to work on HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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TYGERMYLK

Behind the Mask

the two people that were driving it forward. So we kind of just got rid of the other members and carried on.”

Currently staying with her parents in the land of no signal, Harland regularly drives to the top of the hill behind their house, parking right next to a mobile phone mast to ensure ultimate connectivity for gigs – and phone interviews.

“We’re in quite a rural area and the Wi-Fi comes down a little telephone line – and it is very rubbish,” she explains, admitting that she feels slightly guilty for feeling surprisingly upbeat despite the global pandemic.

“I think it’s just because I’ve done one of those personality tests, and every time I do it, I come off as an introvert.

And although I don’t feel like an introvert, I actually really prefer being alone and isolated and all of that stuff. Not having to go out and have social engagements suits me really well!”

Elaborating about performing from “the tiniest car in the word,” she says that although no one in her family wants to actually drive it, they can’t bear to let it go: “I have to put down all the seats to be able to fit me and a guitar in. It was my grandpa’s. He sadly passed away a year ago, and he loved his car so much that no one wanted to get rid of it. But no one in the family wanted HEADLINER MAGAZINE

it because it is this shitty little Kia,” she laughs. “It is so small; my uncle was driving it around for months before, and he just hated it because he couldn’t properly fit his whole body in it. It’s perfect for me because I’m small! I mean, I’m an average sized woman,” she corrects herself. “I’m small enough to fit in the car. I love it and it reminds me of him – and it’s very easy to drive!”

Meeting Bennett at BIMM Brighton music collage, Harland knew she wanted to work with her when she first saw her playing the drums.

Immediately deciding to form a band, it went through various different incarnations – which meant losing a few other members along the way.

“We just found that the two of us shared a really similar vision,” she says. “It just worked better when it was just the two of us – we were

“I DREAD TO THINK OF THE SUFFERING LGBT+ PEOPLE WITH UNACCEPTING FAMILIES MUST BE GOING THROUGH IN LOCKDOWN.”

Bennett plays drums on their records, sometimes bolstered by cellist, Rachel - “all cellists are in high demand, so she can’t be a permanent member,” Harland points out, while Harland plays “pretty much all of the instruments that I can make a justifiable noise on”.

What God Would Keep Us Apart What God Would Keep Us Apart is an open letter to a girl Harland loved as a teenager, and says all the things she wished she should have said at the time. The track’s narrative of love and loss in the face of inescapable homophobia is nonetheless given an optimistic ending. Harland hopes the single – released to coincide with Brighton Pride – will help those struggling through similar experiences.

“I dread to think of the suffering LGBT+ people with unaccepting families must be going through in lockdown. If you are having a hard time at the moment, you are not alone and you are not forgotten,” she says.

“When I was 16 I had a relationship with a girl. Her parents found out about it and basically locked her away. I thought she’d gone on holiday and I was like, ‘this is weird that she’s not getting in touch with

ASPIRING HEADLINER

me’. When they finally let her out, she was like, ‘I’ve just had the worst couple of weeks of my life and I have to break up with you’. But she sort of wanted to keep the relationship going, and I didn’t want to risk her getting kicked out of her house. Looking back on it, there’s so many different things I could have done and I could have said to make the situation better,” she reflects.

Much later, inspiration struck when Harland was on a train: “I wanted to put all of those thoughts into a song, and it all spilled out of me. As soon as I got to my destination, I got in a room and just picked up a guitar. The song was written within a couple of hours – pretty much fully formed. It was an amazing thing to release that, and to release it during Pride in Brighton. It was our first release as a band and it got the most amazing response. It was such a humbling, lovely thing to do – all of these people just started hugging each other in the audience.”

The duo’s new project has been completed thanks to crowdfunding, which although has been effective, took a lot more work than expected: “It was a really great thing to do,” she clarifies, “and I’m really glad that I did it, but it was one of the most exhausting things I’ve ever done! Before doing it, I didn’t quite believe it or get it. Only do it if you have to. It’s a

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really incredible thing, and I do feel like I’m in closer touch with my fans and my audience now. I’m delivering them a product that they feel they’re more of a part of, and it’s been nice knowing that a finished product was actively paid for by all of these lovely people who pledged their support and put their faith in you.”

Harland says that people can donate any amount they choose, and can choose a reward – including the option of a hand-pressed CD. “I think I hand-pressed 200 CDs! My friend, Martha St. Arthur is an artist-songwriter, but she’s also an incredible crafter. She helped me come up with this template to hand-press on CDs with ink. Then I also wrote and illustrated a lyric book, and we had t-shirts made, and prints and all sorts of things. I think I could have made it easier for myself...” she realises.

You’d expect a song titled I Killed the Bees to have an interesting story behind it, and Harland doesn’t disappoint: “I had a dream that there was a hive of bees and I killed them all because I ate too much honey. I woke up from the dream feeling so sad, so I just decided to write a song about it. This one is probably the quickest song I’ve ever written. It just happened. It just fell out after a dream.”

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The duo played around with the acoustic version of the track for a year – something just didn’t feel right about it. Although at first sceptical about crowdfunding, it ultimately is what made this track what it was – paying for engineer and producer, Toby May to complete the mixing and mastering process.

“He’s an incredible brain,” she says.

“They’re actual wizards. You have to pay for each track, so obviously if you’re on your own and you don’t have a label, it’s very difficult to fund that. He was twiddling knobs and asking me what I thought. It was actually a really educational process and it was really collaborative. We were there for hours until we got it right. We didn’t add anything – we just sort of made it sound palatable I guess.”

Harland’s favourite opening song from her busking days is a cover of The Who’s Baba O’Riley, which she most recently has been playing in her car, rather than on the streets of London.

“I just love this song. I’ve played it probably thousands of times when I was a busker on the South Bank.

It just reminds me of a good time.

Because I didn’t write it, it’s something that I never really tire of. Every time I hear [our version], I’m really proud of the way it sounds.”

The release just before Christmas wasn’t a happy accident: “I sort of released it on the 20th hoping that by some miracle it might get to Christmas number one,” she confesses with a wicked laugh. “It’s quite a summery song, but then at the same time you could see it on a John Lewis advert – there’s something quite festive about it...” she insists.

London’s South Bank will not be open for the foreseeable future and any crowd gathering activity will not be permitted. Like so many other musicians, live performance – including busking – makes up the bulk of Harland’s income, meaning for the past few months, she has had to completely rethink the way she puts food on the table – hence staying with her parents at the moment to avoid London’s high rent costs.

Although she misses it now, Harland’s first intro to busking did not go smoothly: “I had a terrible gig – I can’t remember what happened but it was just one of those gigs where no one shows up to see you and everyone’s talking over you. So I went along to the [busking] auditions and it was kind of like an X Factor-style panel where you audition in front of the public in the Southbank Centre. I got stopped in the middle of my song and I went home and cried on the phone to my mum. I was like, ‘I’m gonna give all of this up, this is so awful!’ – after my shit gig and the rubbish audition. And then I got the call a few days later saying, ‘you’ve got a license’. I found out that the reason they stopped me is because all four judges had given me a tick, so they didn’t need to see any more – they had a lot of people to get through!”

The busking community soon became some of Harland’s closest friends:

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– I don’t see it coming back much before the end of the year.”

You have to have a thick skin to make it in the busking world, and although not all of Harland’s experiences have been positive, she credits it with shaping her into a better performer: “It’s not always lovely, but it’s a good way to get an official pitch that is reliable,” she confirms. “There are people who I know who have never – and will never – tire of it, and they love it. I think I’ve reached my expiry date with busking. I’ve done it too much! So I cut down my hours a little bit, but I do think it’s probably the best thing you could do if you’re trying to become a performer.

“You just show up and practice, and you get automatic feedback from your audience. It is pretty much the thing that taught me the most about performing. I was a lot more introverted before, and I’ve just learned to relax and sit in front of the audience, because I’ve been in front of one every single day for three hours a day for four years, come rain or shine!”

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“It’s a lovely little supportive community. Those buskers on the South Bank also do the London Underground stations as well. That’s all run by a company called Busk In London. Busking is probably cancelled for the foreseeable future

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JOE TALBOT

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Rough and Ready

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JOE TALBOT: IDLES Joe Talbot has been the lead vocalist for rock outfit Idles since the band’s inception in 2009. We caught up recently to discuss new music, the creative process, and how he’s been keeping himself busy throughout lockdown and beyond.

As a self employed musician, Joe Talbot is used to working from home while not on tour. The Idles frontman has remained productive through these otherwise strange times, using it as a good time to reflect, regroup and get organised in his work.

“I spent most of my time focusing on Idles as a band, processing all the art and music together for six or so years,” says Talbot. “I had the freedom but sometimes I didn’t leave the house for five days at a time, and I think it’s at times like this

with isolation and restriction when creative thinking flourishes. It’s a tool and a weapon for the people, and they’re starting to understand just how freeing it is to only have your family and your imagination to work with. People will learn a lot about themselves and discover just how much of a capacity they have to be brilliant without buckling.”

Like many, Talbot sees the pandemic as a dire situation for the industry, and is disappointed with how the UK Government has responded.

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“It’s times like this where we realise how important the arts are and how important music is,” he says. “We’ve had no work for three months now, and are instead trying to make money through merchandising.

However, a lot of people don’t have that luxury. The venues are shutting down and half of our booking agency have unfortunately lost their jobs. This is a time where we need stimulation through art and music, and we need that connection with the rest of the world and with ourselves. We’re at the mercy of something that could either be very enlightening for the people, or more likely devastating ideologically and logistically.”

Notwithstanding the doom and gloom of the situation, the band (at the time of this interview) had just finished mastering their third studio album, Ultra Mono), which was released on September 25.

“With the last album I tried to be as instinctive as possible,” Talbot explains. “I don’t write lyrics until the song’s completely finished. I’ll listen to it quite a few times and then something clicks and I’ll write the song in one go - that’s the way I’ve always done it. I find that the more I liberate thought processes around the song, the more diluted it becomes. There’s usually a feeling to the music. It will either sound huge or small, intimate or violent, angry or sad. Writing it often just comes as instinct, and I think the closer I get to writing the lyrics to the music as instantaneously as possible, the more right it will be for me.”

As well as working on the album, Talbot has also been writing and collaborating with a bunch of other artists and musicians, including English singer-songwriter Anna Calvi.

Talbot appears on the track Wish on

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Calvi’s fourth full-length album, Hunted, which was released earlier this year.

“There was a connection there in that Nick Launay produced both our album Joy as an Act of Resistance and the latest album, along with Anna Calvi’s Hunter record. I think she’s incredible, and it was her who offered the idea that I could interpret her music. I basically ended up doing the vocal on top of a more raw, and perhaps intimate version of the track Wish.

It just sits really nicely and I like to sing which is a rare thing for me, so it’s a real privilege to work with someone like that.”

Talbot and Idles’ musical journey has been eventful to say the least, and they’ve seen a substantial growth of their fan base of late, for which Talbot is very grateful: “For us, it was about building something. Our music has always been about inclusivity. I started the band because I didn’t feel like I fitted in within the whole music thing. I love going to gigs, but it was all too much about me. I feel like there’s just a real kind of pompous nature to that, and so I just wanted to introduce a bit of uncanniness through our music, and make it feel like you could do it yourself.

“I never thought I could do music; I just wanted to get involved to feel part of something bigger than myself again. It goes beyond this pandemic, and with that in mind, I want more people to feel like they can do it themselves and feel included in a world that’s more and more isolated, which is especially relevant at the moment!”

Staying active in the branding and merchandise side is one way that Talbot has been keeping himself busy throughout this isolated period. He designs everything himself, from band artwork and posters, to T-shirts and album covers - clearly serving as an extension of his personality.

“I wanted to make a clothing label before I started the band many years ago, and so to do it for the band itself is just a great opportunity. It’s part of my language and of the band’s language. I wanted to do it with the videos as well but it ended up being too stressful. I think it’s important to keep a tight ship as much as you can, and keep it within the realms of your own art, because people read everything you do and it becomes part of who you are as an entity and

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an artist and a musician. To control it is to be way more fluent than if you have Chinese whispers and someone designing all your T-shirts and your gig posters and your album covers, you know?

“We’ve built something beautiful, and now when we go to a show we all feel connected, and like we are part of something bigger than ourselves. There’s purpose to everything we do now, and that’s something that we’ve strengthened with our community over the years.”

For Idles, live shows have always been the focus of their efforts, providing a way of connecting with the fans through impassioned and often intense performances. Establishing that connection with audiences is clearly the band’s priority, and it’s evident from their shows that they do just that — they’re as much a joy to watch as they are to listen to.

“We wanted to make our album sound and feel like a live show this time round, and tried to embody a full, unified sound around the idea that the album can actually feel like you’re in it live,” says Talbot. “For a live album to work, the most important thing is to capture the energy of it, in the same way that you would at one of your best shows. I think a live album is a gift for people that want to get into that world and see what we’re like or relive it, or simply to take themselves back to a particular show. Performing is just the best feeling in the world and there’s something really magical about it - I actually miss it a lot at the moment.”

“LIVE SHOWS ARE ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL EXCHANGES OF HUMANITY...”

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get back out there, but when we do it’s because we can and that’s a privilege in itself.”

Despite this sentiment, Talbot is of the opinion that live shows should not return until they have been made safe and people fully understand the risk: “If I’m not playing shows by October or

Unsurprisingly, channeling that raw, live energy into tracks on a recorded studio album comes naturally for Talbot and the band, and so their methods are simple: “There’s no tracking involved,” he says. “All the songs are recorded live. We give ourselves three takes for each song and then add some texture afterwards, that’s it. It’s a method that our first producer Paul Fraser kind of pushed on us to create that do or die energy, and it works.”

When things finally start to return to normal, the hope for Talbot is that communities stick by the small venues and small bands that do manage to survive: “It’s important that we support them by going out and watching small shows and buying their albums instead of just streaming,” Talbot remarks.

“I can tell you now that loads of small venues are going to shut down and the vultures, the hedge funders, the bankers and the private investors are going to buy up all the properties and turn them into flats - and there’s definitely not going to be any new music venues opening.

November then fine, it’s for the safety of other people and it doesn’t matter. There’s a line and you just don’t cross it, because we’ve got the gift and the privilege of listening to music, watching films, reading books, and spending time with our loved ones in our own homes.

“Live shows are one of the most amazing exchanges of humanity that we have as people, but that needs to be respected when they come back. It’s going to be the best feeling in the world when we can

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helped us out and is helping us now, and we’re grateful for it. We’re of course trying to support our crew as well because they were going to be touring with us this whole time, so it’s nice that we can do that. But there’s a lot of people who can’t, and they’re just stuck in a kind of limbo now, hoping that this gets fixed. Maybe when all this finishes, the people who have been completely stripped of an opportunity to earn money and who are going to be given sweet fuck all by the government will be remembered in this time.”

IDLESBAND.COM

“Firstly what needs to happen is there needs to be more protection,” he continues. “The smaller venues simply cannot be sold off to some property developer who wants to build flats and isn’t happy with the noise levels coming from a venue that’s been there for over 20 years. It will eventually mean that all these heritage sites will be shut down, and then that’s the end of it - there’ll be no more culture in the area and that’s quite a dangerous thing indeed. Not to mention the cultural worth of new bands, which is astronomical, and which people sometimes don’t fully appreciate.

“As a band, we’re lucky to have the merchandise side that has always HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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MABES

Keeping the Noise Down

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KEEPING THE NOISE DOWN

Channeling her experiences of feeling “like a bit of a loser” when she was a teenager into her new EP, Keeping The Noise Down has helped Mabes learn to love herself.

“My mum’s always said I was a bit of an attention seeker when I was a little one,” confesses Mabes in an unmistakable Essex accent. “I was always putting on shows for the family and was always very, ‘look at me, look at me!’ So she very quickly sent me off to stage school to get it all out of my system. From there I just realised that I had this passion for performing.”

Before attending Sylvia Young, Mabes was convinced that her future lay in musical theatre, although it didn’t take her long to figure out that treading the boards wasn’t her forte.

What did hold an irresistible pull for her, however, was songwriting.

Encouraged by her “fan-girling” over John Mayer and Laura Marling, Mabes started to explore her own songwriting:

The Billericay-born singer is unguarded and refreshingly honest in her approach to songwriting and when recalling tales from her life – which are often painful ones that have shaped her into the young woman she is today – and has the kind of personality you can’t help but instantly warm to. We’ve just met, and she’s delving headfirst into some of her most traumatic experiences, albeit in a way that you can tell has seen her come out the other side all the stronger.

“It was the first time I’d really appreciated something outside of the pop genre,” she recalls. “It got me more interested in the cleverness of lyrics and words, double meanings, metaphors, and how they suggest things without being completely in your face. I found it completely enchanting. I wanted to be Laura Marling – I still kind of do!” she laughs.

Leaving stage school at 16 and going to a sixth form state school was

hard on Mabes, and she struggled to fit in as the ‘new girl’ among peers that didn’t get her. In fact, they seemed shallow, and none of them questioned the world the way Mabes did: “I just didn’t seem to relate to anyone,” she says, sadly. “I remember I used to sit in the communal area where everyone would meet in the morning, and I’d be on my own, and everyone else would be in their groups and cliques. It was this weird feeling of desperately wanting to belong, but also not relating to any of the people around me. It was really difficult for me to basically realise that it was normal to feel that way, and that it was actually okay to feel weird.”

Mabes turned to songwriting as a form of therapy and comfort during those years, which is something that just happened naturally, she says: HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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“WHY IS IT WE JUDGE SOMEONE PURELY ON THE WAY THEY LOOK, WHEN THAT’S THE ONE THING THEY CAN’T CONTROL?”

“It just sort of happened. It’s not a sob story, but I didn’t have many friends and I never got invited to the parties, and when I did, it was such a big deal that I was there because I was so desperate to fit in.

“You see so many videos of young people in the club, or drinking,

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dancing and having a great time, but actually, there are people that don’t enjoy that.

“Why is it that we judge someone purely on the way that they look, when that’s the one thing that they can’t control? Nobody else thought that way, so that struggle that I went

through has come good. I don’t ever look back and regret anything or feel sorry for myself for the way I felt, because I truly believe that every stepping stone is there for a reason.

That experience that I went through as a teenager was meant to happen to make me a better person, and it obviously helped me write songs. So there’s a silver lining.”

“LILY WOULD SAY IT”

The most recent offering from Mabes is EP, Keeping The Noise Down, which follows her debut mini-album Wait & See – echoing the acoustic-country vibe that she is synonymous for. For the EP, Mabes says that it was time to start a new chapter: “I have grown and developed as a songwriter, and so have the kind of things I want to talk about. I’m now addressing real life, and young people’s struggles and issues,” she points out.

Keeping The Noise Down is a mini-manifesto for Mabes’ warm, open approach, and deals with social anxiety amid some irresistible electronics. Bubbling with pop potential, Mabes’ delivery is born from a real-life event – a party gone awry amid rising consternation. The EP is led by its title track, which was co-written with Jonny Latimer (Ellie Goulding / Rag ‘N’ Bone Man).

“It’s the first and only time I’ve worked with Johnny actually! I was meant to get back in the studio with him, and then lockdown happened. We were catching up over coffee before we were going to write songs, and he was telling me how he had been working with Lily Allen the week before. I am an absolute massive fan; I grew up listening to her music.”

Latimer asked Mabes to open up her lyric book to find some inspiration for a song, and she opened the page to find the words ‘keeping the noise down’ jotted down in her handwriting. They ended up going with that.

“It came about so easily. We just wrote it because it was documenting a young girl being at a party, and I was just going through all of the monotonous social awkwardness and struggles that I would feel back then – and sometimes still feel.”

Although the song took shape fairly quickly, there was one particular line that Mabes was hesitant about: “We got to the line, ‘Not even dark out, Sam’s got the coke out’. I told him I wasn’t sure... I don’t think I can really get away with that; I can’t say that! He looked at me and he went: ‘Lily would say it’. That was it. I was like, ‘Right, we’re putting it in!’ I had to be brave to put that line in, but I think it’s worked out well. My writing has definitely evolved and I’m able to find a tongue-in-cheek vibe in my writing at the moment. Hopefully they portray a little bit more of my personality as well. It’s really humbling actually to be able to write such an honest song about me basically being a bit of a loser when I was a teenager,” she laughs. “For people to like them and relate to them, it’s amazing.”

once upon a time in america

That reminds her suddenly: have I heard about what happened with her song on TikTok recently? It turns out one of Mabes’ older tracks, America, suddenly went viral after someone used the music in the background of a video of them making a biscuit with the American flag on it. The Internet works in mysterious ways.

“I’ve just about got my head around Instagram to be honest, and then they go and bring out another one,” she laughs. “Somehow it went viral on TikTok. Don’t ask me how – I don’t understand how it works! It’s actually been quite funny watching it all unfold, because at the start, people love to hate on something and they were all hating on this song. I’ve not got upset about it and I started to take it as a joke, and they’ve all gone, ‘Oh, you’re actually maybe quite a laugh’ – and then they’ve all converted into fans. It’s been a very mad experience.”

She can’t help but note the irony that this is all happening at a time when she’s releasing an EP about teenage insecurities and the pressures of being a young person: “Hopefully some of those kids will take something from the EP. It’s weird timing considering the vibe and the mood of the EP. I just try not to give a shit anymore about what people say, and just to do it for the people that do like [the music] and do like me.”

On the EP’s second track, Stuck In The Rain, Mabes says she turned to one of the UK’s great philosophers to encapsulate how to live for the now: “In the words of Ronan Keating – the great Ronan Keating,” she corrects herself, “life is a roller coaster – you can have good times and you can have bad times. If you

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MABES

Keeping the Noise Down

let the bad times affect you and you dwell on those, and you don’t look forward, then you’re just gonna ruin life yourself, really. It’s always good to keep hope and think that there are better times to come.

“I believe in light and shade, and obviously I have a deep – and at times – darker side to me, but I also have a fun, hopeful and positive side. I always come back round to, ‘It’s all gonna be okay’. This song I wrote for myself on a good day to bottle that up in a song form for the days when I’m not doing so great. Tough times don’t last, only tough people last – and that’s so true.”

During the lockdown period, Mabes has been getting to

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grips with producing, believing that it will only enhance her songwriting, and perhaps most importantly, she’s not putting pressure on herself anymore: “I’m not going to force myself. If I don’t finish the song or write my next single, it’s fine. It’ll happen when it happens.

Putting pressure on yourself to do things can sometimes be counterproductive. I’m very content; I don’t feel the need to be liked by everyone anymore.”

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CAESAR EDMUNDS

Caesar the Conquerer

ICE GUST A AL

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PRODUCER

Scooping up Grammy and MPG Awards in quick succession, Caesar Edmunds is on something of a winning streak. The engineer, mixer and record producer reflects on his whirlwind journey through the ranks at Miloco, which began with him hanging out with Led Zeppelin in his first month of work experience.

Caesar Edmunds’ enthusiasm is infectious – and why shouldn’t it be? He engineered St. Vincent’s Masseduction, which won the award for Best Rock Song at the 61st Annual Grammy Awards, followed by winning Breakthrough Engineer Of The Year at 2020’s MPG Awards.

Speaking to him at Assault & Battery studio 2 in London – which is officially now a Miloco space – the Singaporean native’s cup runneth over with excitement, and he is nothing but humble and grateful for his recent wins: “For Best Rock Song, unfortunately I didn’t get a trophy with it, so there’s still something to work for,” he laughs good naturedly. “As for the MPG Awards, to win this is an incredible feeling that I don’t quite understand! It’s crazy to win. To be voted by your peers is a massive honour, and I was in a category with Billy Halliday in it! I have known him for so long; we both started out doing the Miloco rounds together.

It’s an honour to be nominated alongside people like him – he’s done great things.”

Edmunds went to university at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts where he did a one-year course in music and sound technology, which led him to pursue a degree in the subject.

“I didn’t quite know where I wanted to go in life at that point in time, so I thought, ‘You know what, I’ll just

give it a try – you never know!’ Once I stepped into the studio, that was it really – I just knew that this is what I wanted to do.”

During his studies, he started work experience with legendary record producers and mix engineers, Alan Moulder and Flood after emailing them asking for an opportunity to learn from them.

“I just emailed them and said, ‘Hi, can I come into the studio making teas and coffees and do work experience? Please, please?’ And they were like, ‘Yeah, sure – let’s throw you in for two weeks’. That was eight years ago, and I have not left!”

The now London-based Edmunds soaked up any knowledge like a sponge, and is well known for his incredible work ethic. He works tirelessly in the studio; he is the first in and the last to leave – and nobody can fault his can-do attitude. This has paid in dividends: He has worked with artists including Foals, Queens of the Stone Age, PJ Harvey, The Killers, St Vincent, Ride, Beach House, HMLTD, Palace, The Amazons, FEET, Two Door Cinema Club and Circa Waves.

Edmunds recalls the first time he stepped into Assault & Battery studios on his first day of work experience: “Foals were working on their Holy Fire album, and Alan and Flood were mixing Inhaler. I just went, ‘What the hell is going on? This is a dream come true!’ I listened to their productions and remember thinking, ‘Oh my God, this is amazing!’ Then hearing it coming through our speakers… That’s why I worked harder to see where it leads, because it was a dream situation. And then weeks later, Led

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Zeppelin came in to hang out with Jimmy Page. I was like, ‘Oh my God!!

Where do I go from here?’ I still sometimes turn around and pinch my cheeks!”

Even now, years on, Edmunds has not lost the wonder for the job.

He recently wrapped up Ozzy Osbourne’s new album, who he was a big fan of when he was approaching his teenage years: “Just hearing all of his stories – oh goodness! I remember being a 12 year old kid watching Ozzy’s Live at Budokan. That DVD was constantly on repeat. It’s so cliché to say it, but I’ve been so blessed to have people like Alan Moulder and Flood as mentors – these are some of my favourite producers ever. Not to mention my first month in the studio hanging out was with Jimmy Page, Robert Plant and John Paul Jones – it’s so cool!”

Although he almost missed them when trying to cram in some muchneeded sleep: “We were doing crazy hours where I would finish at 1am and then I’d stem from 1am to 8am,” he remembers. “Then I’d go to bed and wake up at around 1pm to get everybody’s lunch, but one day I just decided to sleep a bit more... just a bit more sleep! An engineer came in going, ‘Wake up, wake up! They’re all coming in!’ I said, ‘Who??’ It was Robert, Jimmy and John Paul Jones. They were all coming into the lounge to have some tea and just chill out. I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ I was just taking a nap in the lounge – it was crazy!” he laughs.

As of March 2020, Miloco is the proud, exclusive manager of the legendary Assault & Battery 2 studio in Willesden, London. Although still owned by Flood and Moulder, the HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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CAESAR EDMUNDS

Caesar the Conquerer

studio will now be fully available for commercial bookings via Miloco.

“It’s a positive thing,” says Edmunds. “Miloco and Assault & Battery have been working together for quite a long time.

This arrangement just feels natural – it feels right.”

Edmunds finds himself doing almost everything in the box these days due to speed and ease of recall: “I’ve got a lot of hardware and a few bits of outboard gear to run things through, but I don’t actually have a console,” he admits. “I am definitely working more in the box because nowadays, everything is running so quickly, so when you’re jumping between two or three songs, it is just kind of impossible to use a console. Although if it feels like it’s the right project, we would use a console,” he points out.

Edmunds couldn’t be without his Waves plugins, which he says are essential to every project: “You just can’t do it without, unless you’re recording on tape, I guess! I’ve been using [Waves] Abbey Road Chambers, which I know is not new, but it’s great. I’ve HEADLINER MAGAZINE

used Waves since I was a student. I remember first using the SSL channel strips and compressors, and I remember looking at photos of Chris Lord-Alge and Alan with an SSL, or they’d be talking about the SSL bus compressor. Just to be using something similar to what they were using in real life…” he trails off. “They were using it and are carrying on using it. It’s a staple now compared to… I don’t know, compared to everything!”

One of Edmunds’ go-tos is the Waves Abbey Road J37 tape emulation plugin, known for bringing an analogue warmth to digital recordings.

“It’s one of those plugins that I got into using for its distortion. You can do the basic core thing, and the delay – it’s just one of those tools that is worth so much more than for just the tape saturation. It’s a real tape plugin you can do everything with.”

Another favourite of Edmunds is the Waves Abbey Road EMI TG12345 channel strip, which captures the celebrated features of the TG12345, the first-ever solid-state console from EMI which epitomised the sound evolution of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s - and helped shape recordings by The Beatles and Pink Floyd.

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“so RATHER THAN SPENDING A LOT OF TIME TRYING TO RECREATE THE FEELING OF THE ROUGH MIX, PEOPLE JUST SPEND MORE TIME NOW BEING CREATIVE, RATHER THAN TRYING TO RECREATE SOMETHING THATS’S ALREADY BEEN CREATED.”

“It’s great, and it includes TG12345’s famous compressor/limiter – I love the tone of it and what it gives to drums and vocals. Another one I love to use is the Waves Kramer PIE Compressor – it’s one of those weird things where even though I have the real thing, I still use the plugins! I’ve got the actual Pye compressor right in front of me, but I still prefer to use the plugin. I’ve been using Waves for over 11 years and their plugins are an integral part of my production and my mixes. I would feel weird if I didn’t have any Waves plugins; it would be like chopping off a limb!”

things, they do it as they go along.

About seven years ago you’d get the tracks with no plugins – everything would be on the desk and then you’d spend a lot of time trying to recreate the rough mix. Then you start mixing from there to beat the rough mix. So rather than spending a lot of time trying to recreate the feeling of the rough mix, people just spend more time now being creative, rather than trying to recreate something that’s already been created.”

Edmunds notes that his role has changed slightly over the past few years:

It’s clear that whichever way technology shifts in music production, Edmunds is just happy to be doing what he does, and he’s holding out a (quiet) hope that he gets to work with his all time favourite band one day:

“Nowadays mixing is such a big thing, that when people start recording

“Without being too ‘Kumbaya’ about it, I think you work with and attract

similar-minded people. I have to say that working with Nine Inch Nails will always be my dream. I already hang out with half of them, so one day it’s gonna happen. My God, that would always be the number one dream!”

WAVES.COM MILOCOSTUDIOS.COM

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THE MCG

Going All Out

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GOING ALL OUT

@THEMCG Munich-based Optocore has been providing fibre optic based networks for the transmission of audio, video and data for over 20 years, setting new standards in digital network technology. We discovered how the manufacturer has brought true connectivity to The Melbourne Cricket Ground following a substantial upgrade to the 100,000 seat stadium.

A major Australian cricket venue recently saw its PA system completely overhauled as part of a AUD$50m revamp, with a number of pro audio brands — including fibre network specialists Optocore — serving a vital role in the implementation. To give an idea of scale, more than 3,000 speakers now populate the seating bowl, function rooms and VIP suites, atria, internal concourse areas and exit gates.

The overall budget included an AUD$25m contract for the new sitewide PA, transport and connectivity,

spearheaded by Australian sound and AV consultants Auditoria, who conceived the system, and Diversified, who undertook the complex integration at the MCG. Conversations with Auditoria began after it was decided that the 14-yearold existing PA system no longer met audience expectations. Diversified then provided the winning bid for the tender of the new design’s integration, and following a yearlong project, the installation was completed in time for the first Test Match on Boxing Day 2019.

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THE MCG

Going All Out

The design uses two signal transport systems — one for DiGiCo and one for Q-SYS. The mixing system for the seating bowl comprises a DiGiCo SD9 with two 4REA4 mix engines.

The local I/Os in the control room are connected to an SD Rack and the interface to the broadcast is via Optocore devices for MADI and AESEBU connectivity, while the additional I/O is provided by Optocore X6R-FX16AE-SRC (AES/EBU) and DD4MR-FX (MADI) interfaces.

On top of that, portable DiGiCo input frames can be deployed around the stadium for live entertainment, and in three locations are connected back to the control room via a pair of Optocore AutoRouter 5 intelligent fibre patchbays. Auditoria co-designers Scott Willsallen and Luis Miranda designed and engineered the systems and specified all componentry and connectivity, with the latter managing the project and being joined later on

by Justin Arthur for the commissioning process.

“The racks can be deployed as needed and connected to the local connection point,” explains Willsallen.

“The AutoRouter makes the link to the network and the racks appear on the console. It’s flexible and easy to use.”

While the Q-SYS environment uses

the proprietary Q-LAN networking over the stadium infrastructure, lack of MADI connectivity resulted in the designers turning to the Optocore solution. The maximum 504 channels available on the DiGiCo / Optocore loop are all in use: “This expanded the DiGiCo capacity and the Optocore network devices gave us huge scope for inputs and outputs that could easily be patched from the console with the final link to Q-SYS via dual redundant AES/EBU connections,” Willsallen adds.

The Optocore DD4MR-FX also provides interconnectivity with the video screen systems for audio from video playback machines, as well as providing MADI connectivity for overlay systems.

“The inclusion of the Optocore devices allowed us to interface with the broadcaster’s video and audio system

“the autorouter is a particularly elegant device for variable digico networks...”

via MADI and AES. It also allowed us to expand the system and tie setup and operation into one streamlined system,” says project manager Daniel Woodward.

Optocore’s AutoRouter had only become available after the systems had been designed, and according to Woodward replaced the original patch bay for connectivity to the portable DiGiCo SD rack field locations: “It made sense to include the Optocore router to automate the switching, which has proved faultless and a lot more convenient so far.”

It was a late decision to redesign the broadcast audio interface that had brought the AutoRouter into play: “It is intended to be invisible within the design; the user simply deploys the racks in the field, connects to the HMA connector and the SD rack appears on the desk,” Willsallen explains. “The DiGiCo / Optocore production system provides the operator with all the flexibility needed to manage any type of event in the stadium.”

Auditoria are big fans of Optocore and have deployed many of the manufacturer’s devices on various projects over the years: “The beauty of their products is the elegant interface with lots of other protocols like MADI, AES and the direct availability on the DiGiCo consoles giving the control of the system to the operator,” Willsallen concludes. “The AutoRouter is a particularly elegant device for variable DiGiCo networks where racks can be deployed in multiple locations at different times.”

Woodward agrees that the Optocore implementation has successfully established connectivity between the broadcast video and audio equipment, and the DiGiCo system: “This is provided across multiple audio platforms and simplifies setup and configuration, which in turn assists in the game day operations.”

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GUY CHAMBERS

The Art of Songwriting

After successful stints in World Party and The Waterboys, it was a memorable meeting with Robbie Williams in 1997 that would serve as the turning point for Guy Chambers, lifting his career to stratospheric heights. Here, the accomplished composer and songwriter tells us about his recent work, the Robbie years, and reveals how this unique partnership may never have HEADLINER MAGAZINE

materialised had it not been for the wise words of his mum.

It wasn’t a bad start for Guy Chambers and Robbie Williams when the pair first started working together.

Undoubtedly a musical relationship that will go down in history, Chambers co-wrote an extensive and amazing list of tracks including Rock DJ, Feel, Millennium, Let Me Entertain

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You, and Angels, as well as working on Williams’ first five solo albums, which all reached number one.

Following 2002’s Escapology, Williams and Chambers went separate ways, with the latter going on to collaborate with other writers and artists for the next 10 years. They eventually reunited for 2013’s Swings Both Ways, 2017’s The Heavy Entertainment

ARTIST

Show and 2019’s The Christmas Present, which, including Greatest Hits, brought the tally of number one albums that the pair have collaborated on to an incredible total of nine. Surely it makes sense then to make it a round number with 10?

“He does want to do another record, but obviously we can’t because of the situation,” says Chambers. “He’s in Los Angeles and no one can fly to America. Our relationship doesn’t work in different countries - we actually have to be in the same room together to create.

Chambers now wears many musical

hats, but it was during his time with Karl Wallinger’s band World Party in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s when he discovered his love for writing: “I would present songs to Karl and they’d often get rejected, but we did end up collaborating a bit,” he explains. “It was only when I formed my own band The Lemon Trees in 1992, with the first album Open Book, when I really got enough confidence to present them my songs and say this is what we’re going to do.

“I was about 28 or 29 by then so I was a late developer in pop music terms to be honest. It took me a long

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time to have the confidence, because you really need to have that if you’re going to be a good songwriter, going into a room with a stranger and co-writing or being on your own and presenting your songs to other musicians. You have to stand up for your work, and if someone knocks it, you’ve got to be able to take those knocks.

It was also during the ‘90s when Chambers wrote with the likes of Cathy Dennis, best known for her work with Britney Spears. However, it wasn’t until Chambers met Robbie Williams in 1997 that his career really took off: HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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GUY CHAMBERS

The Art of Songwriting

“I was earning a living before then, but I was really scratching around to be honest. It was very up and down,” he recalls. “I definitely knew straight away that it was going to work though.

We wrote a song called South of the Border on the first day, which was one of the singles on the first album, and then on the second day we wrote Angels. The second day session was actually very short because I had a terrible sinus infection, and so we ended up writing Angels in an hour because I was in so much pain.”

Chambers is a strong believer of the showbiz adage “the show must go on”, and has subsequently never missed a show in his life. “I’ve been in all sorts of trouble with viruses and whatnot over the years, but we call it Dr. Showbiz - once you get on the stage to do it somehow he lifts you, and you just get through it.”

In fact, it was a twist of fate that caused Chambers and Williams’ paths to cross in the first place: “Something I would say to young songwriters is, if you’ve got a date with destiny like with somebody you’re going to be writing with, don’t cancel on that person unless you have a really, really good excuse.

I wanted to cancel that day, but my mum fortunately intervened. I phoned her up before Rob arrived and I said, ‘I really want to cancel because I felt that terrible.’ She said to me ‘look Guy, I’ve got a good feeling about today.

Whatever you do, don’t cancel - just get through it.’ And she was right.

“Angels started with him walking in the room and singing this beautiful melody and beautiful words. I just sat at the piano and guessed the key because I’m normally quite good at that. I just dived in and it was in E major so I started playing the chords, and then somehow when he went to the next section he just kept on singing without any gaps. It was really weird - I think he had all of the words of the verse HEADLINER MAGAZINE

already written in his head.

“He’d been to Ireland for New Year, and I think he’d had some deep spiritual conversations with people about angels, so those chats probably suggested some of the lyrics. I came up with the chords because at that point he didn’t play anything at all, so he was very reliant on a musician in the room to lead him.

“I’m quite old fashioned in that I like progression and storytelling in songs.

Like in the song Feel; it has the bleakest possible verse you could imagine, but then in the chorus it goes to the major key and it’s like the sun coming out.”

It was after making Escapology, Williams’ fifth album, that the pair had their first ‘breakup’ of sorts. Chambers remembers Escapology as a very difficult record to make, primarily because Williams’ moods were moving so drastically up and down at the time.

“Our relationship was starting to deteriorate because we’d had disagreements about various songs, and I think some of the darkness in that music is through the pain of knowing my days were numbered in his world by that point,” reveals Chambers.

Thankfully, the pair rekindled their close partnership, and eventually went on to work on another three chart-topping albums together.

“When it broke down it was very painful, but I do believe that people shouldn’t be scared of pain. Look at the success of Adele for example - she’s not scared of emoting her pain, and people really relate to that. Rob is also very, very good at sharing how he’s feeling through his music, and I think that’s a very underrated thing.”

Some of Chambers’ more recent work however has been in theatre, which he says has proved to be an entirely

different beast altogether. In 2016, he collaborated with Williams on the music and lyrics for Mark Ravenhill’s RSC stage show The Boy in the Dress — the stage adaptation of David Walliams’ book of the same name — which came about through his and Walliams’ already existing friendship.

“He came to the studio for a project we were working on, and he mentioned that the Royal Shakespeare Company was doing The Boy in the Dress,” says Chambers. “He asked if I’d be interested in doing the music and I said sure. Initially they commissioned me to

“i’M QUITE OLD FASHIONED IN THAT I LIKE PROGRESSION ANd STORYTELLING IN SONGS.”

do it on my own, and while I was very flattered, I didn’t think I could do it, not least because there’s a lot of football in the story and I am absolutely clueless when it comes to football. Now Rob knows a lot about a lot of subjects, but one subject he really is an expert on is football.”

Chambers recalls how the pair waited six months for the script to be written for the stage play, following which they flew to LA to write the songs, which took just two weeks. Three of the songs that ended up being in the show were existing Robbie Williams tracks, including Disco Symphony, a previously unreleased disco number that Williams recorded with Kylie Minogue for The Heavy Entertainment Show, but never made the final cut.

ARTIST

“That was a real blessing to be honest,” remarks Chambers. “Because then it was just a case of rewriting the words to suit the story, which wasn’t easy. We had those initial two weeks, but then over the next two and a half years I think nearly every song got rewritten, plus we wrote another two new songs further down the line that were needed for the story. We were pretty much making changes right up to the previews.”

While there is a plan in place for The Boy in the Dress to come to London, these plans have been put on hold due to the Coronavirus pandemic, which has of course thrown up a massive bout of uncertainty for theatres who must be eager to reopen their doors.

In 2018, Chambers wrote a children’s folk opera based on the Oscar Wilde short story The Selfish Giant, a personal project on which he had much more freedom to express his musical creativity: “I was writing this piece when my mother died,” he recollects. “Losing someone hits different people in different ways; the grief gave me a tremendous amount of energy, which I basically channelled entirely into that piece.”

In Chambers’ own words, he considers himself firstly a composer, then an instrumentalist, and then a producer, “but the thing I enjoy the most is writing,” he reveals.

“That’s where I get my biggest buzz, and I get a similarly amazing buzz from performing - I really like the one-off nature of a performance. I’m missing that side of it quite a lot at the moment.”

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Before Coronavirus struck, the last show that Chambers was scheduled to do with Robbie Williams was the opening of the Formula One tour in Melbourne: “We flew all the way to Melbourne, were there for two nights and then had to fly all the way back because it all got cancelled after we landed. I flew back via Los Angeles and I managed to get through the day before Trump closed the border. If I was a day later, I would have been sent back to Melbourne, so I felt unbelievably lucky to get home!

“I haven’t actually performed for quite a while now, which feels very unnatural. I’m either doing my own gigs, or I’m playing with Rob who does quite a lot of gigs in a typical year anyway, but not this year of course.”

During Chambers’ solo piano gigs, he often interacts with his audience and tells the stories behind some of his songs, “and I wasn’t sure that I would be any good at that,” he admits. “But I’ve managed to make people laugh, and I seem to have quite a good comic relationship with the audience. I’ve surprised myself and I’ve been finding out how wonderful it is to make people laugh. I’ve really enjoyed it and while I’ve only done about 10 gigs so far, I was meant to be doing a bigger tour in the autumn - but it doesn’t look like gigs are going to happen this year at all now.”

Chambers released his debut solo piano album Go Gentle Into the Light in May 2019: “I deliberately made the album one mood, which is why it’s so unbelievably chilled out,” he explains.

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GUY CHAMBERS

The Art of Songwriting

“I wanted it to be healing music that would help people who are struggling, and hopefully it will be helpful to people during this horrible time we’re in now. I did it on my birthday at Abbey Road - I tried all three of their Steinways and settled on Studio One. It was really in tune and we just put it in the middle of this enormous room where they normally have orchestras, put up a load of microphones, turned most of the lights off and it was a lovely way to spend a cold winter’s day.”

Like many, Chambers is a firm believer that Abbey Road has magic in its walls: “I do think certain places have a vibrational energy about them and you can pick up on that energy and be guided by it,” he concludes. “Now I just have to work out what else I’m going to do for the rest of the year - I want to do another project like The Selfish Giant, something for children that has real depth to it, and so I’m currently reading quite a lot and looking for the right subject matter.”

Given his track record, it’s fair to say that whatever Chambers decides to turn his focus towards next will be another successful, inspiring musical project.

GUYCHAMBERS.COM

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NASTY C

Unshakeable

NASTY C HEADLINER MAGAZINE

HEADLINER

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UNSHAKEABLE From Durban, South Africa, to Def Jam Records, multi-platinum selling South African superstar rapper Nasty C is back with his fifth album, Zulu Man With Some Power, and international success set firmly in his sights. With his name fully established in his native country, Nasty C has been steadily expanding his horizons with collaborations with the likes of Major Lazer, his hero T.I., A$AP Ferg, French Montana, and several other major names from the USA.

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“I really started taking this seriously when I started getting paid as little as 70 or 100 bucks,” Nasty C says, from his home in Johannesburg. “And then things really started to take off for me when I released Juice Back.

People started recognising me and calling me by my artist name, even when I was still in school. I moved from Durban to Jo’burg, and things just changed for me forever.”

“We started travelling more to try and establish a global footprint,” Nasty C says with regards to seeking recognition beyond the African continent. “Anywhere we could beyond Africa — we went to Japan, the States. In the States, we would always be networking and trying to link up with people. A lot of dinners with different people to try and figure out a strategy.”

And things would only change further when behemoth record label Def Jam Recordings added Nasty C to a roster that already includes Justin Bieber, Kanye West, Rihanna, and several more of the biggest names in music.

When I ask for Nasty C’s inspirations, it’s many of the usual suspects such as Kendrick Lamar and T.I., but I do manage to get him to pay homage to some of the UK rappers who have been giving the American heads a run for their money.

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NASTY C

Unshakeable

“My favourite UK artist is Octavian,” he says. “But of course I love Skepta, Giggs — I actually got to meet one of the O.Gs, Dizzee Rascal; we played a lot of music and talked about South Africa and the UK.” We then discuss how rap is so dominated internationally by the United States and the United Kingdom respectively: the former pumping out so much hip hop and trap; the latter the birthplace of grime music. We agree that more cultures becoming involved can only be a beneficial thing. And with several South African rappers like Nasty C, Moonchild Sanelly and Yugen Blakrok announcing themselves on

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the international stage, it’s about time that rap became more represented.

“Yeah man,” he agrees. “We’re just trying to take South African rap to as many places around the world that we can. A lot of people think that all we, and Africa in general, have to offer is afrobeats — we’re trying to change that stereotype.”

The singles leading up to the release of Zulu Man With Some Power have ranged from club banger Palm Trees to the link-up with hero T.I. on They Don’t, a song with a deeper message about race relations, prophetically written some time before this year’s global #BlackLivesMatter protests.

“The first time I worked with T.I., he just sent me a DM on Instagram because my name had come up a few times for him,” Nasty C says. “And with They Don’t, which I wrote about a year ago - and this year, when the topic was relevant again, we thought ‘yo, we should put this out.’ Because this is a healing song. It speaks about what’s going on, but in a more sympathetic point of view. It’s very mellow and is meant to heal. And T.I. is someone who really stands for the culture and doesn’t shy away from it.

Every day he’s preaching to us to take our power back - it’s really uplifting. I thought he was the perfect person for the track.”

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After watching Netflix’s masterful series When They See Us, Nasty C started digging deeper into the issues surrounding life as an African American, including the depressing abundance of smartphone-filmed racial incidents in everyday situations.

And despite growing up in South Africa, with all its problems revolving around apartheid and beyond, he feels it’s definitely way worse in America: “The stuff we go through here, it’s nowhere near as heated as it is in the States. Not even worth catching on camera, half of the time. Just petty racism, where someone will say something a little offensive. They don’t shoot you in front of your family, you know what I mean? That stuff is crazy. Racism here is very mild, you just shrug your shoulders and move on. Over there, if you step outside and you’re between the ages of 10, 30, 40, you’re a victim, a suspect.”

Nasty C also added acting to his CV recently, appearing in the South African Netflix original Blood and Water. The highly popular series revolves around a Cape Town teen who meets a private-school swimming star at a party and becomes convinced she is her sister who was abducted at birth.

“It’s one of the first script-to-screen shows in South Africa, so it’s very big for us,” he explains. “They thought it would be dope to have the new young wave in there. They could have gone with the established actors, but they’ve chosen to go with the young actors that they see as the future.”

“I’d be lying if I said that it wasn’t nerve-wracking! I didn’t know what to expect, but they held my hand pretty much throughout the whole thing.

My part was similar to what I do for a living [he plays a music producer], so that made it much easier.” And with this being his first ever foray into acting, Nasty C “took a few private acting classes with a lady called Kate;

she’s an actress also. She gave me a few pointers, and I went through a few Denzel [Washington] roles as practice, it was pretty cool.”

Nasty C’s role in the show goes beyond just his cameo role; he also penned the song I Need You for the series. I ask him which came first, the song or the filming.

At the time, when they pitched the whole idea to me, we didn’t know if I was going to take it or not,” he says.

“My schedule was crazy, back and forth — it was looking like I’d have to shuffle things on the music side. So I actually made the song while I was waiting to confirm if I was going to take the role or not. The song was just an idea, before they’d asked me. They’d actually just wanted to sync some of my songs that were already out there!

But then we got talking about how cool it would be if I could write something.”

While there’s a huge international exposure element to some of the collabs Nasty C has done with the likes of Major Lazer, he explains that “with people like A$AP Ferg, it’s so much more than a territory thing. It’s not just me trying to enter a certain market. It’s also because I really like their music and I play their music. Working with Ferg was really dope — he was here in South Africa for a show that we were co-headlining, and we exchanged contacts when we were hyping up the show. He sent me a verse for one song, and I actually took the a cappella and placed it on another song and sped it up, which is what people know today!

The original was way slower. But he is a cool guy, he definitely showed love.”

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NASTY C

Unshakeable

Of course, in current conditions, the promotion for Zulu Man With Some Power has looked very different to how it normally would.

“It would be shows, popups, activations, interviews, all that type of thing! It’s very tricky now, everything is digital. It’s not like I have 10 social media platforms, I only have three.

Once you start repeating things, people catch on, however many different ways you try to say it. But I’m finding a way around it. I’m not focussing too much on the numbers right now — I’m hoping the music speaks for itself. This album really is something special, in my eyes.

“I’m not even supposed to be here right now, I was all set to move to L.A.!

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But yeah, I would have been doing shows and festivals like crazy, so who knows where I’m meant to be in the world at this point (according to the cancelled schedule). Because it’s album time, and normally we travel like crazy to spread the word out there. I would have been all over the place!

“The move to Los Angeles was all locked in; I was already starting to get my bank account, all that type of stuff.

I was damn near packing [laughs].

Now that I’ve been picked up by a label in the States, I need to be there for them to take me to all the places — the face has to meet the name at some point.”

With such a statement of a title as

Zulu Man With Some Power, I cant help but ask for the story behind the name.

“That’s just about me owning up to my power and influence over my generation,” he replies.

Indeed, his social media following spans three million, and he’s the most streamed artist in South Africa.

“I felt it was time for me to take more pride in my culture and make it cool again. Now I’m taking these more global steps, I want people to know what I stand for and what I represent.

I don’t want to be another artist with no backstory or substance. I have to be me in a way that’s unshakeable.”

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REBECCA FERGUSON

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NOTHING LEFT BUT FAMILY

REBECCA FERGUSON Being catapulted into the spotlight via reality TV can take its toll on a person, and after 10 years in the biz, X Factor sensation Rebecca Ferguson became disillusioned with music. The Liverpudlian singer explains how Nile Rodgers reignited her love for music and helped her re-find the balance.

Ten years ago, a shy singer from Liverpool forced herself to step onto The X Factor audition stage, putting her fate into the hands of Simon Cowell, Louis Walsh and Nicole Scherzinger. Eyes down, Rebecca Ferguson’s version of A Change Is Gonna Come may have been hindered slightly by nerves, but what shone through was her unmistakable smoky tone, which Cowell praised as sounding like a true “recording voice”. It was enough to see Ferguson all the way through to runner up of the series, which went on to change the course of her life.

“It’s mad! I’ve changed so much since then,” says Ferguson in her unmistakable Liverpudlian accent. “I feel more settled now. I look at that Rebecca, and I can’t relate to it no more. I wasn’t that mature, and I was trying to be mature, but really I had a lot of growing to do. When I look at that [audition], I just think I needed to have an injection of self confidence and self love. I’m just not that person anymore.”

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REBECCA FERGUSON

Nothing Left But Family

Unpretentious and completely unchanged by fame, Ferguson is down to earth and unguarded on the phone, often starting sentences with “to be honest,” regularly poking fun at herself, and laughing heartily.

Despite her success and the number of critically-acclaimed albums under her belt, you can’t help but feel that you’re speaking to a woman who still can’t quite believe her luck.

“I was so skinny then!” she laughs, thinking back to her audition. “Do you know what? I’ve still got the dress hanging up in my wardrobe. I don’t think I’d get it on one leg now! But I do look back and I’m proud of it and how far I’ve come. I’m not gonna lie, it was really scary – but I knew it was one of these opportunities that I needed to just get on with and get over the nerves.”

Admitting that she had “the worst stage fright ever,” at the audition, Ferguson was determined to see it through: “I tried my best but actually I was looking down. As the show went on I started to believe in myself more and more, but it was a process. It’s absolutely petrifying getting on that stage, but I literally just told myself: get on there and face it. Because if you don’t, you’re going to get kicked off the show.”

The X Factor final saw her duet with a vocally intimidating Christina Aguilera on a rendition of Beautiful – probably the only time Aguilera had been introduced so endearingly in a thick, Scouse accent.

“I remember it actually!” she laughs.

“At the rehearsals, they were like, ‘Rebecca, sing!’ But I was too busy staring at her like a super-fan.

Sometimes you see those duets – which is the right way to duet – but they seem like they’re having a singHEADLINER MAGAZINE

off. I just thought, ‘I can’t compete; there’s no way I’m about to start trying to do this.”

Winning the X Factor does not a lasting recording career make, and coming second certainly didn’t put Ferguson at a disadvantage. Her

debut album, Heaven was released in December 2011 and sold 128,000 copies in its first week alone, peaking at No.3 in the UK Official Charts, followed by a further three Top 10 album releases in the space of just five years.

For Ferguson, the first few weeks following her debut launch were exciting times; she travelled all over the UK performing to huge crowds – and the money wasn’t bad either.

“I was making money that I had never, ever seen before in my whole entire life! I went from digging around the side of the couch to look for a pound, to all of a sudden earning money I couldn’t have imagined. The first few weeks were fine, but after a while, I couldn’t go anywhere. I’d try and go shopping in Liverpool and I’d be mobbed, so if I’m honest, it was an adjustment going from being a normal girl to this sudden fame.

Although it was really amazing and exciting,” she adds.

“I was like a deer in the headlights because it was new to me. I couldn’t have ever imagined that type of fame or success, so it just took me a little minute to process it. Over time I

learned to deal with it and I learned to get a good, balanced life.”

As a child, Ferguson says she was singing “from day one,” and that her family had a hard time keeping her quiet. Her earliest memory is of her family trying to keep her occupied during a family party: “I was singing away and my auntie Jan gave me a piece of paper to keep me busy,” she remembers. “Most kids would draw little pictures and things, but I drew squiggly lines. My auntie came over and said, ‘Rebecca, what are you doing?’ I said, ‘I’m writing a song’. I remember the whole room being like, this is weird... you can’t even write! There was just a need to sing from day one.”

A lot of people don’t know that Ferguson is a qualified legal secretary, although she can’t hide the fact that she’s relieved she made it as a singer: “I used to sit there when I was studying saying, ‘please God, don’t let this be my life!’” she laughs. “I was actually quite good – I got a distinction, but you wouldn’t think it now if you got an email off me.

My spelling is terrible! It’s actually a sound job that makes good money, but I’m too much of a creative for it. I always wanted to sing.”

Ferguson has now settled into a comfortable lockdown routine of looking after her three children and doing some gardening and DIY: “I’ve got into a bit of a routine of staying in and now I don’t know how to get me out! I’ll have a Mrs. Hinch page next I think,” she jokes. “I’d done two months of touring just before lockdown, so I was actually due a break. I do miss singing; I’m thinking, ‘will I even be able to sing at the end of lockdown?’”

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TV interviews have been replaced with Skype or Zoom calls, and Ferguson is adjusting to working from home along with everyone else: “I keep having visions of the Amazon man knocking on the door mid Holly and Phil asking me questions, so I was trying to keep one eye on the window. Or what if my little girl storms in while I’m on Sky News or like that man that had it happen to him?!”

Shopping on Amazon aside, the lockdown period has also seen Ferguson take more of an interest in astronomy, using a telescope she bought for her son to examine the skies. She suddenly remembers a prank her son played on her a few months ago:

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“We took pictures of the moon and all these things, and one of Saturn. I posted it on Instagram (the day after April fool’s) – I was so proud of this image, like ‘Oh my God, look what we’ve managed to capture’. Anyway, all of a sudden I was getting this abuse online saying, ‘you’re lying, that’s a NASA picture’. So I’m arguing back to them saying, ‘No my son wouldn’t lie,’ and I’m proper having it with people – adamant that we took the picture. They were laughing at me saying, ‘Rebecca have you got NASA’s Hubble in your backyard?’ I nearly fell out with a fan over it, and the next day my son said, ‘Oh sorry mum, that was an April fool’s’. It’s the first picture that comes up on Google when you type in Saturn!” she giggles.

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REBECCA FERGUSON

Nothing Left But Family

REAL LIFE Some of Ferguson’s best-loved songs draw from everyday scenarios, echoing her sentiments about the importance of love and family – “No money, no house, no car, can beat love,” she sings on debut single, Nothing’s Real but Love.

“Most of the music that I write is really heartfelt,” she agrees. “I’m very honest with my lyrics and how I am with people. I like to make music that makes people reflect on what I think is important in life.”

Her last album, Superwoman was released in 2016, and aside from the odd feature, Ferguson has mostly stepped back from the music industry – fully focusing on raising her family.

Now, she is ready to get back in the studio to work on her next album, and recently released new single, Nothing Left But Family – recorded at Abbey Road Studios with their chief creative advisor and legendary hit-maker, Nile Rodgers, who co-wrote, produced and features on the track. The song also saw her collaborate with prolific hitmakers EG White, (co-writer of Nothing’s Real But Love, Adele’s Chasing Pavements and Duffy’s Warwick Avenue), and Jonny Coffer (the man who helped craft Beyoncé’s Freedom, Panic At The Disco’s High Hopes, and Naughty Boy’s La La La).

“I had been wanting to work with Nile for a long time, and I got to meet him because I had a meeting in Abbey Road. He called me into the studio and said, ‘Rebecca, come in and listen to this!’ He was making this really lovely song about bringing people together – it was really positive, and I gave my input. He must have liked the melody or whatever I sang and said, ‘Oh, can you go in the studio and sing it in for me?’ So I went from having a meeting that day, to recording with Nile. I was so excited; I was messaging my brother and my friends in the booth saying, ‘Oh my god, I’m HEADLINER MAGAZINE

recording with Nile!’”

Rodgers was so impressed that he asked if he could record and executive produce Ferguson’s next album, which she is happy to report that she will be working on as soon as it is safe to return to the studio.

Best known as being the co-founder of Chic, Rodgers is of course also a prolific producer, working with artists including David Bowie, Madonna, Lady Gaga, Christina Aguilera, Mick Jagger and Diana Ross. Ferguson was nervous and old self confidence issues resurfaced, but she was not going to let this opportunity pass her by: “I was really nervous because of those big names that you hear,” she admits. “I needed to get a bit of self confidence. I felt inferior, if I’m honest.

But he is one of those people that just really puts you at ease. I’ve found it a real compliment that he wanted to work with me and that he had that belief in me.”

Ferguson says that as well as finding Nile “lovely,” above all else, he is humble: “I think that most of the people that are really successful tend to be the most humble. I’ve worked with Lionel Richie and Andrea Bocelli and they are completely humble, and Nile falls in that category.”

Nothing Left But Family saw Ferguson draw inspiration from everyday events, whether it’s picking up Corn Flakes from the floor, forgetting to set her alarm, or getting stuck in traffic on the school run.

“To be honest, on the day I wrote this song, I was feeling a little bit…” she trails off. “The kids were obviously having me up the wall and stressing me out,” she laughs. “I was sorting the family out, and it was that feeling of never being enough, you know?

You do everything, but it feels like it’s never enough: you try to be a perfect mum, a perfect girlfriend. When you say the lyrics are relatable, it’s probably because as I was writing it, I was honestly saying that I woke up in a storm; I’m sure I set the alarm.

When Nile heard it, he said, ‘Right, we need some soul on it now!’ – and he injected his lovely guitars and his lovely production on it.”

In terms of the production process, Ferguson says that she has never had a song go back and forth as many times before.

“There must have been about 60 emails and 60 different mixes. It was a real process. We fine-tuned it to be honest. It was something that took a lot of loving care.”

Despite recording at Abbey Road numerous times before, the iconic London studio never ceases to amaze Ferguson: “It’s one of the best studios you’ll ever walk into,” she enthuses. “It’s just the way it’s built; it’s so classy. It’s just got a feel about it. A lot of the pianos are the ones The Beatles used to play on, and Paul McCartney has still got a lot of instruments there, so it does have a bit of a magical feel. Every time I’ve gone and recorded there, we always come up with something productive. I don’t know if it’s all the history behind it for musicians when they go in there, but for whatever reason, you always feel happy with the song.”

Rodgers was so pleased with what he’s calling “a monster track” that he played it to friends in the studio, who burst into tears upon listening to it.

“I wasn’t there when he did that but he messaged me and said he’d just played it to his friends, and he said they were crying! I thought, well, that’s either a good sign or a bad sign, but I think it was a good sign!”

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whole lotta love The fast paced nature of a reality TV jumpstart saw Ferguson become disillusioned with the industry, and she credits Rodgers with helping her ignite that love for music again.

The way Rodgers speaks about music and the excitement he still has for it changed the way Ferguson looks at crafting songs, and her approach to work:

“Sometimes the creation of music is about hitting a target: ‘you need to get the album out at this time,’ and so you get one out, and then you need another album out. So it’s just nice to be around people that yes – they make albums – but they’re making music purely for fun. They could stay in the studio until one o’clock in the morning and the music might never be a hit, but they just thoroughly enjoy creating that music. It was a lightbulb moment.”

“I had lost that excitement because I had about two days off in nine years, and so all of a sudden I’m with Nile and I just got this spark back.

It reminded me of what music was about. He brought that joy in music back for me and reminded me about keeping it real and keeping it about the people that are listening to it, and not the business – because sometimes the business can take over. So now when I’m creating music, it’s just about the people and who’s going to listen

to it. I’m not thinking ‘I need to hit this target’. I’m just like: this is a song. I like it. If you like it, great. If not, I enjoyed making it.”

Not that she wants to make music that isn’t good, or that people won’t enjoy: “It’s just now I’m going with the flow of music and I’m not trying to please anyone,” she clarifies. “The music is made with love, and I’m much happier as well. I think when you’re happy you make good music. Well, sometimes if you’re sad you can too,” she laughs.

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ANDY BURROWS

Scoring After Life 2

Photography within this feature: Ray Burmiston

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Andy Burrows explains how he added his golden touch to the score for Ricky Gervais’ Netflix series, After Life.

Andy Burrows is enjoying some peanuts washed down with a well earned beer while recalling working on the scores for both seasons of Ricky Gervais’ hugely popular Netflix series, After Life. Admitting that he rarely has time to stop and talk about his career these days now that he’s swapped touring and all-nighters for the school run, Burrows is pausing to take a moment to reflect on his latest project, whilst taking in some rare UK sunshine: “I’m just looking out of the window, and it’s beautiful weather at the moment, which I think is confusing the crap out of everyone,” he says, speaking to Headliner from his Hackney home during the lockdown period – which he’s dealing with in his own way. “If you open yourself a can of beer and a packet of peanuts, close your eyes, and start talking about something else, you’d be amazed where you can take yourself…”

The former Razorlight drummer and We are Scientists band member’s wild touring days are now far behind him, (“I feel like that was a different person!”). Burrows is now very comfortable spending most of his time at home with his wife and two daughters – although he does make time to play the piano and guitar when he can.

“I hardly ever stop and talk about my career, so whenever I do get the chance to talk about it, I feel so lucky because of everything I’ve done from Razorlight onward. I almost forget, because a lot of my days now are spent making sandwiches for the girls, cooking dinner for my family, or doing quite mundane things at home. I’m just a human in the world doing my thing, but I’ve met so many amazing people who I have become so close to. I do genuinely feel like a really lucky bugger!”

There’s no reason why he shouldn’t.

Season two of Gervais’ devastating, yet wickedly funny series, After Life landed on Netflix following the staggering success of season one.

The TV equivalent of a sad banger, After Life took its (as it turned out, very emotional) audience by surprise by being at once cynical and sentimental, cruel and heartwarming, sad yet uplifting – yet ultimately showing them that hope is everything.

After season one aired, something extraordinary happened: people fresh off a binge-watch session flocked to Twitter to express how the series had made them feel less alone, reminded them of a loved one that had passed away, or acknowledged their feelings of depression and grief. The usually razor-tongued Gervais was touched with the unexpected outpouring, taking to social media himself to thank people for their heartfelt messages.

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ANDY BURROWS

Scoring After Life 2

IT’S ABOUT HUMAN BEINGS, IT’S ABOUT LOVE, AND IT’S ABOUT INTERACTION, AND THAT’S SOMETHING WE COULD ALL DO WITH A HEAVY DOSE OF RIGHT NOW

Having tapped into something that strongly resonated with so many, Gervais knew there were other stages of grief left to explore, and a second season was swiftly commissioned.

Viewers knew that they were ready to get hurt again, and with series two offering up lines like, “It is everything.

Being in love, I mean. You just don’t need anything else. You realise that even more when they’re not around,” – even the steeliest of viewers found that they mysteriously had something in their eye while watching [lead character] Tony try to come to terms with the loss of his wife.

Burrows was delighted to work on the second installment following the success of the first. However, the release date coinciding with a worldwide pandemic could not have been predicted, and reached an audience teetering closer than they usually would be on an emotional edge: “I think the sheer emotion of it all is pretty powerful for all of us,” he acknowledges. “It’s something that we’re all going through together, and I think everybody wants something to absorb to take their mind off this surreal situation, but at the same time allow themselves to actually feel and react.

“I think that music and art really allow you to let it out, but without dwelling only on real life. The thing about After Life is it’s very sad, and it will make you cry – a lot. But there is something HEADLINER MAGAZINE

exceptionally uplifting and positive about it. It’s about human beings, it’s about love, and it’s about interaction, and I think that that’s something that we could all really do with a heavy dose of at the moment.”

FOREGONE CONCLUSION Burrows began working with Gervais when he co-produced the soundtrack for David Brent: Life On The Road, also appearing in the film as Brent’s drummer in the reluctant fictional band, Foregone Conclusion.

“This was genuinely the funniest experience of my life; I’ve never laughed so much,” he recalls.

“I’m sure that’s what it’s like for everybody on every set he has ever worked on, but I’ve never done it.

Every scene took so long, and there were so many takes because no one could hold it together.

“We filmed so much of it around the venues in Camden, which is very bizarre for me and my band because we spent all of our late teens and early twenties playing those venues trying to get record deals. Not long after that had trailed off, Ricky started talking about this idea he had…”

Before he was aware he was being asked to flex his musical muscles for another Gervais project, Burrows

thought they were just chatting about their mutual love of music: “He started talking to me about the kind of music he was listening to at the moment. It was a lot of Scandinavian bands, an American band, Hammock – quite soundscapey and very beautiful – but he was also sending me all these cool bands with quite a dirty guitar kind of vibe. I remember thinking, ‘why does he keep sending me all of this music?’ It wasn’t until he started sending through bits of ideas for the script [for After Life] that I started to get the point of what was going on.”

Burrows was astonished to be invited to the first read-throughs of the script, but knowing how important music is to a Gervais project, he realised it made perfect sense: “I don’t think it’s totally normal for a composer to be involved with a director and the actors so early on in a project, but I think it’s because he’s so passionate about music,” he reasons. “Mine and his relationship is very much based on the fact that we think we’re in the band together and we like talking about records that we like. He bases a lot of his projects around the music that he might use.”

Long before the project started shooting, Burrows and Gervais would spend hours talking about the music used in the series and the concept for the score, which led to the approach Burrows took:

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“I think one of the nice things about After Life is that in some ways, you don’t notice the score. I feel like that’s been a real task that I’ve had to get my head around because I hadn’t ever done anything like that before – where it’s supposed to almost just sit there, and it’s part of the look, the sound and the feel. It comes together to make After Life what it is.”

Recording took place over the course of approximately two and a half months at London’s Air-Edel recording studio – a favourite of Gervais’ – where Burrows likes to start early after dropping his kids off at school.

“I just get into it; I like to work fast! I usually worked just with the engineer, Nick Taylor, in quite a fast and spontaneous way. Sometimes Ricky might pop along at some point – it would always be varied.”

One thing that Burrows makes sure to do these days is finish work at a sensible time: “I like to try and keep business hours, as it were,” he clarifies. “I like to go in early, start, work as fast as I can, not fall out with anybody, crack on, and then just knock it on the head for the evening – and everyone stays sane. I’m used to being in bands where you’re working all hours and going all through the night. I like to keep it civilised and

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go to the pub after work and have a pint now. And I’m not comparing myself to the genius that is Ricky Gervais in any way, but I saw that his work ethic was very similar.

“It made me feel less weird, because I always used to think, ‘why do I not like doing work through the night? Maybe I’m the weird one! Why don’t I like sitting up and working on a new take at 3am?’ I hated that vibe. So anyway, it was quite reassuring to see that Ricky likes to start dead early and get done as soon as he possibly can and go: bosh, bosh, bosh, bosh, creative, creative, creative, keep going, and then stop. For me that works: start early, do as much as you can, clock off, get your pub hours in and your dad hours in.”

The new season sees Tony move into a different stage of grief, where he’s less numb and in denial, and is now negotiating with himself whilst trying to be more sensitive to other peoples’ pain: “This new series has him take on a new – not a new persona – but it’s him trying to be more positive about the world, given that he’s been so struck by the loss of his wife,” Burrows explains.

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“The first series is all about him having pretty much given up, and this series has a little bit more positivity to it in terms of his character, and that is reflected in some of these audio cues. One of the things Ricky said to me is that he feels like I’m interpreting what he wants very well.

And I don’t mean that in a self-congratulating way.

“The thing that’s working for me and him is that he says things that don’t quite make sense, or he might sing a little something that doesn’t quite sound right, and somehow I’m getting it. Whether it’s making him feel warm and fuzzy, or it’s making him cry...I think that’s the thing at the moment – touch wood – that is going well for us. We’re in sync with each other in terms of the mood.”

One haunting piano piece Burrows composed named For Lisa impressed Gervais, but they couldn’t find the right spot for it in this series.

“I’m gutted it hasn’t made it! Ricky loves it, but sometimes things just don’t quite fit, even if we love them. Maybe it will end up in the next one if there’s a series three…” (There will be).

Burrows likes to keep it spontaneous in the studio, and keeps his Electro-Harmonix Memory Man analogue delay unit close by at all times, along with his collection of old delay pedals.

“We had them all plugged in at the studio; we were trying to get as wide a reverb as possible and were trying to HEADLINER MAGAZINE

really lose ourselves in that kind of magic. I never like to be too specific about what I’m using and I quite like to shut my eyes and have as many of them lined up around me. I like having to mess around, come back the next morning and kind of forget what I did. And sometimes that method absolutely doesn’t work, but sometimes it does,” he laughs. “I love never quite knowing. I don’t really want to be able to replicate something. Every time I come back to it, I want it to be the same magical process.”

Working on After Life has been nothing but a joy for Burrows, who is endlessly grateful to Gervais for giving him the opportunity to create the score for both seasons: “Working on these bits of music, the production, the instrumentation and the little motifs is such an elating joy – even though there’s a lot of melancholy. Even though it’s quite sad, it’s such a lovely world to lose yourself in. It’s staggeringly brilliant. I feel like he has surpassed himself in this. Like everybody, I didn’t know what to expect.

“Then as soon as you’re reintroduced to the characters and you’re back in that world again, it takes you on this journey. By episodes three and four, you’re in tears, then you’re laughing again, then you’re in tears. I’d say it’s even more teary! It’s one of the most welcome things to hit our screens in some time - and at such a crucial time. It’s got this incredible ability to be uplifting while making us all bawl our eyes out! It’s amazing how Ricky does that...”

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DJ MEME

Latin Innovation

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LATIN INNOVATION

DJ MEME A key figure in Brazil’s electronic music scene, DJ meme is widely considered to be one of the most successful Brazilian DJs and producers outside of his home country, with a staggering collection of accolades to his name including 23 gold, 15 platinum, and three diamond records.

Headliner recently spoke to DJ Meme about his musical life during lockdown, the mega-shows he is used to playing compared to the 50 people shows he is now performing online, remixing and collaborations, and how his 20-year relationship with Genelec has been second to none.

“While my studio is not at home, it’s just a five minute walk away from here, so not much has really changed for me,” responds DJ Meme when asked about how he’s had to adapt throughout lockdown. “I go there two or three times a week, and it keeps me sane - in fact I would probably go crazy without it.”

This summer would have seen DJ Meme doing his usual tours throughout Europe and beyond, including playing at a club in Italy where he’s held a residency for a number of years.

“I’ve got some things to keep me busy in the studio, and some projects

that provide me with the inspiration to start working on other things,” he explains. “I’ve been DJ’ing since I was 11 years old, so essentially my whole life! I’m really missing the people at the moment - I’m not into playing sets on the internet or on social media.”

This doesn’t come as too much of a surprise, as DJ Meme is used to playing to massive audiences in equally massive venues: “I don’t want to get used to playing to just 40 or 50 people online,” he says.

“I like staying at home because I travel a lot, and every weekend I’m usually somewhere playing. Being at home for me now is not a problem not working is the problem.”

The last time DJ Meme was out gigging before Coronavirus struck was in Sao Paulo, where he played two shows before everything was cancelled and had no choice but to return home.

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DJ MEME

Latin Innovation

and has been using the company’s 1037B and 8331 monitors in his relatively new recording studio.

“Twenty years ago I bought my first pair of Genelecs, which are still with me,” he reveals. “They have worked perfectly and I’ve never had a problem with them during that whole time.

Being a footballing nation, most kids growing up in Brazil immerse themselves in the sport from a young age. DJ Meme’s passion however was always music.

“I started to play with the records in my block, and it was just for fun, but it was something I liked and something I could do easily. I also like food, and I think if I were not a DJ or music producer, I could have been a chef!”

Around the age of 20, DJ Meme started working in a local radio station, and really became serious about music as a career.

He gained recognition early on in his career through his remixes of tracks from the likes of The Bee Gees, New Order and The Pet Shop Boys, among other artists who were big on the music scene during the ‘80s and ‘90s.

“Everybody is amazed when they see and hear them. I remember when David Guetta was in Brazil - we worked together for four days in my studio. The first thing he noticed was that I had a pair of Genelecs just like in his studio in Ibiza, so he was very comfortable because of the sound of the monitors.

“when i maKE DANCE MUSIC, I NEED TO HEAR IT LOUD, AND SO THE LOW FREQUENCY OF THE 1037B WORKS FOR ME EVERY TIME.”

sure,” he recalls. “She is a Colombian artist but it was Sony Music in America who asked me to produce the remix.

When Shakira became big, they didn’t play the original version on the radio, so people started looking to me to produce more remixes for international labels. It was a time when people used to pay you good fees for your work, which is all different now.

Things really changed for DJ Meme in 1996 when he remixed a song for then unknown artist Shakira, which exploded onto the club scene and became a worldwide hit. Suddenly in high demand from labels, he went on to produce remixes with Mariah Carey, Toni Braxton, Ricky Martin and Des’ree.

“Recently I did a remix for Mario Biondi, who is a big Italian artist. He recorded a track called Incognito with Chaka Khan and I did the remix for that last month. There’s always something coming up whether it’s from major companies or independent dance music labels.”

“That was a turning point in my life for

DJ Meme is a long-time Genelec user,

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“When I make dance music, I need to hear it loud, and so the low frequency of the 1037B works for me every time.”

DJ Meme has also made use of Genelec’s GLM calibration software in his studio.

“When I calibrated everything, I started to hear things I hadn’t before,” he remembers. “It was magical; and I could really notice the difference.

My mixes started to receive more and more compliments after that.

“I was already blown away by the sound of the Genelec 8331s, which are fantastic, but after the calibration it really changed my life, and now I have a perfect sounding studio.

And DJ Meme is in no hurry to stop creating any time soon: “I’m just going to keep making music,” he declares. “Because that’s what I do, even if it’s just for my sanity! [laughs]” GENELEC.COM

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EVA GARDNER

All About That Bass

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all about that bass

EVA GARDNER Eva Gardner and her custom Fender bass are responsible for carrying the bottom end of P!nk’s epic touring productions, using Lectrosonics wireless kit to ensure her tone and the integrity of her sound is always perfectly captured.

“My dad opened up a British pub in LA – bringing a bit of home to Hollywood, so I grew up in a pub around a bunch of musicians and entertainers. I just knew from an early age that that’s what I wanted to do as well,” says bassist Eva Gardner, who’s currently locked down in LA. Her father was an integral part of the British Invasion in the ‘60s and ‘70s, and was the bassist in The Creation, The Birds, and Ashton, Gardner and Dyke. When engineer and producer Andy Johns (Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton) brought a Pignose amplifier and bass

guitar over to the family home, it only seemed natural to pass the bassshaped torch onto a 14 year old Eva. “I never had any doubt about which instrument I wanted to play,” she asserts, adding that she thinks the bass is an underrated instrument. “A lot of times people start on guitar and then they move to the bass, but I went straight to the bass.”

Deciding to further her musical studies, Eva attended the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts, later graduating from UCLA with honours with a degree in Ethnomusicology.

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EVA GARDNER

All About That Bass

Her professional career began when she toured and recorded as the original bassist in The Mars Volta.

Since then, Eva has performed and toured with numerous artists worldwide – notably with P!nk when she became her touring bassist from 2007 onwards.

Eva remembers her P!nk audition vividly: “I was working at the pub and I got a call from a musical director. I was working with my mum that day and I said, ‘Hey mum, I have an audition across the road. Can I take off for about half an hour? Will you watch the bar for me?’ I slung my bass around my back and ran across the street and did the audition. I got a call the next day, and I happened to be in a movie when the musical director called me, so I was in there for a couple of hours.

“I had this message when I got out of the film that said, ‘Hey Eva, great news – you’ve got the gig. But if you don’t call me back within the next 10 minutes, I’m giving it to the next person’. I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I’ve been in a movie for two hours, did I just totally blow this?’ So of course I rang them up as quickly as my

fingers would allow, and he picked up and he said, ‘Hey, what’s up? I was just messing with you. You got the gig’. I think I had a bit of a heart attack!”

Eva was promptly sent four albums worth of material to learn and was told to pack for three months for the summer tour – that kicked off just three days later. “[P!nk] is just unparalleled as a person as she is a performer; she’s just one of a kind. What an honour to be to be sharing a stage with her...just to be part of her team has been nothing but a gift.”

Due to fortunate scheduling, P!nk did not have to cancel any tour dates this year, with her two-and-a-half year tour wrapping up at the end of 2019.

“We did two nights at Wembley Stadium last year – that was actually this time last year!” she realises. “It was incredible, but luckily we got to finish up the tour last year. We didn’t have anything on the books with her this year so...phew!”

According to Eva, the force is strong in the bass community – especially now that lockdown has brought a swift halt to all live gigs and meet-ups: “We’ve got a bass player hang, because we were like, ‘drummers do this all the time, so why can’t bass players?’ I was organising bass player hangouts at the pub and we were all coming into the bar, and then it just started to grow. We did a few of them in person, and then when this started happening, it became a Zoom bass hang.”

During lockdown, this sense of community has felt more important than ever:

“being able to develop an instrument with them was an incredible honour.”

“We’re all in the exact same boat right now so we’re all partially commiserating, supporting each other and lifting each other up. It’s really been fun for us also, because bass players are never on the same gig – there’s usually only one bass player! So it’s been cool for us to get to know each other as well.”

In 2014, Eva became the first female artist to have a signature bass with Fender. Her Precision bass in rosewood board black gloss features a tortoise shell scratch plate.

“Being able to develop an instrument with them was an incredible honour – Fender was a household name when I was growing up! To me, it was a ‘why reinvent the wheel?’ kind of a situation – it’s just solid as a rock and it’s super versatile. It’s what I grew up

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playing; I have explored other instruments from other other brands and I just keep coming back home.

I wanted to make it a conglomeration of all my favourite basses and honour some vintage specs, but also modernising it a little bit. It’s a solid Precision with a twist.”

On stage, Eva is a long time Lectrosonics user after needing to go wireless due to the epic nature of P!nk’s touring productions: “There’s so many moving parts on the stage, between the stage props, the set, the dancers, acrobats, the artist herself – there’s lots of stuff moving around, and we move around as well. I needed to get rid of the cables and I needed to have something that was wireless. I’ve been using wireless systems for a long, long time and then it got to a point where what I was using wasn’t cutting it. I was having issues with it not really getting my tone and losing the integrity of my sound, so that’s when I came across Lectrosonics.”

Eva remembers the exact moment she tried Lectrosonics out: “The band even noticed! They said, ‘Oh, there you are! Great to have you back!’ – because when you’re playing bass, so much of your sound is you carrying that bottom end. You’re supposed to be the glue for the band. It’s funny because they say that the bass is the instrument you don’t know is there until it’s gone, so you really need to have that bottom end and that presence. A lot of that is having those frequencies intact and having that really nice tone that you can lose when you go off the wire.

To be able to have that back and maintain the integrity of my sound was a big deal. There’s not a lot of room for error. Actually, none probably,” she laughs.

EVAGARDNER.COM LECTROSONICS.COM

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RICARDO RYAN

HEADLINER MAGAZINE

On A Mission

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RICARDO RYAN Merging Technologies’ Anubis music product manager by day, songwriter and artist by night – Ricardo Ryan discusses the surprising use cases that have emerged from locked down Anubis users, and how he is using the interface to record his solo material.

Ricardo Ryan is not a regular music product manager; he’s a cool music product manager. When he’s not heading up Merging Technologies’ Anubis division as well as serving as the manufacturer’s product and QA manager, you’ll find Ryan performing with his band, Sonic Rade – or more recently – using the lockdown period to work on his solo album in his Anubis-equipped home studio.

“Now that we are all confined at home, I work all day helping Merging clients all around the world,” he answers when asked what a typical day looks like for him at the moment.

“A few people that are normally working in big studios have managed to grab their Anubis, which acts as the controller, and bring it home for lockdown. We have mastering clients and every kind of audio professional working in recording studios remotely; a lot of productions are halted, but many people work from home. So during the daytime, along with our team, I help people who are working from home! Then every night I work on my personal projects – writing music, recording guitars, programming drums and keyboards, or writing lyrics. And the rest of the time I sleep!”.

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RICARDO RYAN

On A Mission

Ryan was interested in pursuing music from a young age, and later in life, spent many an evening playing “Beatles wannabe-type music” in bars in Quebec, going on to tour across Canada and America. Studying audio engineering in Montreal led to a successful stint at animation and visual effects company, Autodesk (much of Avatar’s visual effects were created with Autodesk media and entertainment software, that were at the time running alongside Sonic Solution hardware), but soon Ryan sought a new challenge, moving to Switzerland to work for Merging Technologies 14 years ago.

As Anubis product manager, Ryan says it’s all about the missions: “Actually, as I speak to you, I have an Anubis in my hand!” he points out. “We are trying to evolve these ‘missions’ and bring new features to our users.”

Anubis is a compact AD/DA interface boasting four analogue inputs, four analogue outputs, two independent headphone outs, GPIO and MIDI. Its internal low latency mixing engine operates through a large touch monitor

– giving access to multiple upgradable software applications – not to mention it’s I/O expandable up to 256 inputs and 256 outputs through an AES67/ RAVENNA network connection.

From the initial recording through to the final master, Merging has identified that there are specific ‘missions’ that require precision and control. If the user’s ‘mission of the day’ is to create a great mix, they need to be in complete control of their monitoring: main monitors, nearfields, headphones, sources, surround mix, downmix, and so on. Anubis gives its users the control needed in a single, compact device – aided by a Mission Controller app that puts users in control of the tasks they need to accomplish.

Booting up between missions completely changes the user interface and the function of Anubis, which can be put to use in a control room, or as an on-location monitor controller, or as a music studio or live event interface.

“It has the perfect I/O count for people currently working from home as they’re not really recording multi channel drums and stuff like that – it’s

more overdubs and recording stereo instruments,” Ryan clarifies.

“Software-wise, it has so many possibilities. For instance, the ‘Monitoring Mission’ is aimed towards monitoring control for studios, productions and broadcasters – from home studios, to the biggest broadcaster, to a live recording of a big concert. Now of course, it’s a bit halted in that sense at the minute, but people use Anubis to monitor stage boxes on stage, or to monitor in their studio.”

The concept of Anubis’ softwarebased ‘missions’ allows for designing very versatile and highly dedicated applications – fully upgradable – and precisely targeting the requirements of today’s professionals. It is this flexibility that makes Anubis just as at home in a music recording studio as it is in a mastering space, film or TV post production studio, broadcast studio, OB van, editing room (thanks to its AoIP standards support), or a viable choice for location recording and live events monitoring.

“One mission that we’re focusing on at the moment is orientated towards musicians recording at home, or just doing home production where you have enough I/O counts to do your production without going in the studio,” Ryan shares.

“Then the next mission will be more of a mixing view topology, so it’s more like a mixing control table with a mixing

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console where you have low latency cues,” he says, adding that in the last few days he has received a lot of queries about using Anubis for mastering sessions: “A mastering mission would be different, with different monitoring features because they want to monitor the sides, mids, and then have different behaviour for the monitoring engine,” he explains.

“One of the great features is the mix engine inside that we can control without an iPad, or you can put it on the mic stand and do your mix – so it becomes like a mixing console that can even operate without any network connection if users are wanting to mix the built-in I/O.” During the lockdown period, some surprising use cases have emerged, in particular in the world of gaming: “That’s the great thing about Anubis – the potential is so large,” Ryan enthuses. “At a big gaming convention last year we had five of them for networking, because Anubis is also a networking device, but it also has a built-in mixer so the gamers can have their headset and their mixer, and they can monitor their PCs. It’s a really good professional interface for pro-gaming!

“Yesterday somebody wanted to use it for a live, confined performance where there were musicians all around the world in different homes,” he adds. “They wanted to use an Anubis to plot the system with GPS clocking and have everybody play using a metronome at the same time, and somebody else in another location around the world would mix it. We have such a demand for this at the moment, so have been looking into solutions.”

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RICARDO RYAN

On A Mission

Being an end user and a product specialist, Ryan truly knows how to make the most out of Anubis’ feature set – his favourite feature being the quality of the preamps on board: “Also, what I really appreciate is the built-in mixer that’s within Anubis. It can be controlled from the Anubis itself, which is something pretty marvellous. When you plug your source directly into Anubis, you can monitor from it and mix the DAW signal with the source signal. This gives you ultra low latency mixing, and the ability to hear how the plugins are affecting the sonics.

“In summary, Anubis is a very versatile product. The entire Merging team has put a lot of effort into

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making it what it is today, and we are not done yet. It’s still evolving.”

Ryan is currently working on a solo album, and at the time of writing, has just finished a pre-production mix of new song, Sorry To Say, which he recorded using his Anubis.

“When I start a song, often what I do is just have an acoustic guitar, or even my daughter’s classical guitar – because I don’t want to be disturbed by electric effects. I write the song, the basic structure and melody, then I do the drums and put them in my timeline, and then I record the bass through Anubis. Then I record the guitars, the synths, then the vocals – it’s important that the guitar replies to the voice. Everybody has their

workflow, and this is mine.

“I have written about 20 songs in the last few months or so – I record a lot of stuff! I really like the idea of putting together a whole body of work, so I will make a selection of songs that have some type of similitude. I have too many songs – that’s the problem!

So actually, if anyone out there is in need of a few songs, feel free to get in contact with me!”

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BARRY GRINT Up in the AIR

up in the air

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The last few months have been an interesting time for Barry “Bazza” Grint and his business of 22 years, Alchemy Mastering. We caught up with the accomplished mastering engineer who gave us his take on the digitisation of the music industry and Alchemy’s recent acquisition by legendary London recording facility, AIR Studios.

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“Like everybody else, I was quite worried, and thought the work was just going to fall off a cliff,” admits Grint when initially asked about how his business — the highend Alchemy Mastering based in London’s Hammersmith — has been coping throughout the Coronavirus pandemic. “The labels have always had a certain amount of back catalogue that they can rely on to keep products going through the door, and lots of mix engineers and studios were really quick at figuring out how to record in isolation.”

Grint tells us he is amazed by the quality of work that’s been recorded behind closed studio doors, surely serving as testament to the ingenuity of people to come up with ideas and deliver them when their back is to the wall. While it’s true that big releases from the major labels were scarce over the lockdown period, this clearly provided a great opportunity for smaller independent labels to push on and release music: “For a while, stuff that was already recorded and was in-mixing carried on coming through, but after that there was a bit of a lull,” Grint reveals.

“The majors focused on putting out

re-releases and revisiting their back catalogue which helped everything tick through, and then once people got their heads around how to do isolation recordings, it sort of picked up and it’s been pretty good since. It really would be fantastic if we can find something like this that corresponds to the live sector.”

It has of course been a tough time for studios due to the fact that they were shut for several months with no way of getting artists in to record, coupled with the lack of relief on rates and rent, or any real support from the UK government. Grint has found that the work has been reasonably solid over the last four to six weeks however.

“Strangely, we’re already mastering for Christmas, because there’s such a long lead time of around three months on the vinyl element,” says Grint. “So there’s been that slight uptick because you have to do the mastering for digital in order to get to the point where you can then master for the vinyl.”

As a mastering engineer since 1984, Grint has seen almost every aspect of the business evolve over those three and a half decades, having worked on

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over 20 UK Number One records and more than 100 UK Top Ten hits with artists including Madonna, Prince, Puff Daddy, Eric Clapton, David Bowie, The Beatles, Oasis, Keane, Beach Boys, Jessie J, Rod Stewart, Paul Simon, Van Halen and many more.

“It’s pretty much chalk and cheese to how it used to be,” he reminisces. “Vinyl was the main release format, followed by cassettes. That was it for a while until you had the Walkman, which was the first time you could listen to music on the move, and the big break for cassette.

“All of the people working in the recording business at that time had received some sort of training from their peers or their predecessors, so by the time things were coming through to mastering, you had people with years of experience sending a mix. Generally, everything was done really, really well — There were so few studios and a few independents but a lot of them were tied to labels, and so for me to have somebody come in off the street and have a recording that they wanted mastering was really quite rare.”

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BARRY GRINT Up in the AIR

Nowadays, the democratisation of the industry means more people can record and make music themselves in versatile recording spaces that were simply not available two or three decades ago, as Grint discusses: “When I started, if you wanted to record on location, a dirty great big articulated lorry rolled up with a studio built inside the trailer.

Now you rock up with Pro Tools on a laptop and a small mixer and you’re away. It’s far more liberating and creates way more opportunity, but then not everybody who’s making music has had the chance to get that formal training.

And so sometimes mixes that come through the door require more from the mastering engineer than used to be the case, which is just a fact of where we’re at now and isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”

Before mastering and cutting vinyl, Grint translated his love of music into spinning discs in various clubs, yet admits that he always wanted to work in a studio as a sound engineer: “A friend of mine Al Clay got a job as a runner at Trident Studios in Soho,” he explains. “When they were looking for someone else, Al put my name forward, and while I was a bit old to be doing that at the time, they decided to take a chance on me. Myself and another guy were constantly working 24-hour shifts, one on one off. If the sessions finished early, you could go home, but if they went through the night as they often did, you went through the night as well.

I decided I didn’t want to work such gruelling hours, so I opted to go down the mastering route with Ray Staff — who has been a stalwart of AIR Studios for many years now — up on the third floor.”

Fast forward to the tumultuous year of 2020.

The decision was made recently that AIR Studios — arguably one of the world’s most iconic recording facilities founded by legendary Beatles producer Sir George Martin — is acquiring Alchemy Mastering. While Grint has

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maintained a strong core outfit and gleaned a massive reputation for his business, surely this exciting move is the recipe for a match made in heaven, not to mention some good news relief.

“Labels need to have studios of substance in order to provide the facilities that they need to work,” remarks Grint. “AIR is known for its world-renowned recording studios and incredible sounding live rooms, and it was in fact Ray Staff who came up with the idea. He was working with another of AIR’s mastering engineers, John Webber at the time, and he suggested to the new owners of AIR that they should look to see if something can be done with Alchemy.”

Before Grint and co-owner Phil Kinrade make the physical move themselves however, they have been tasked with using their decades of combined experience to assemble and train a young, exciting team of mastering engineers for the next generation. The pair will remain at their current Hammersmith location, eventually moving to a base within the AIR Studios building.

AIR’s state-of-the-art facility at Lyndhurst Hall in Hampstead, North London has delivered Oscar-winning scores for Atonement and Grand Budapest Hotel, as well as countless other film and TV productions including Love Actually, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Darkest Hour, Wonder Woman, Interstellar, Casino Royale, Doctor Who, Sherlock and Black Mirror.

Meanwhile, AIR Mastering has worked on projects with artists including David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, George Michael, John Coltrante, and Echo & The Bunnymen. These credits, along with Grint’s own work on so many UK Number One records and Top Ten hits makes for quite the partnership.

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BARRY GRINT Up in the AIR

“...MY LEGACY IS THAT I CAN LOOK BACK AT THIS NEW GENERATION OF FANTASTIC MASTERING ENGINEERS AND RECOGNISE THAT THEY ARE THE PEOPLE THAT THE RECORD COMPANIES WANT TO WORK WITH...“

“Having new mastering rooms with an owner who’s prepared to put in the investment is absolutely key,” says Grint. “It all makes sense because of AIR’s reputation and the huge potential to expand with our new team. They can see that we’ve got balanced power supplies, we’ve had the lathes overhauled, we’ve been doing half speed mastering; and that’s something we can really work together on.

“That’s the excitement for me, so when I get to the point that it’s time to retire, my legacy is that I can HEADLINER MAGAZINE

look back at this new generation of fantastic mastering engineers and recognise that they are the people that the record companies want to work with, and that we have a brilliant facility to boot.”

With many of the major labels now relocating their operations from West London to areas like King’s Cross, the new mastering facilities at AIR will be very well placed. As Grint’s career is already very well-established, he is looking forward to supporting that of the new Alchemy Mastering at AIR team as thoroughly as possible.

“It’s quite difficult running a business being a mastering engineer, so this is going to be something of a sea change for me and will be one of the things that I’ll have to get used to,” he admits. “Of course I will be taking the guys out, introducing them to the clients, getting their faces out there and promoting the work that they’ve done. There’s going to be some huge talent, and they need somebody to help them deliver on their potential, which is exactly what I want to do.”

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KORG

SoundLink

REVIEW

Korg making mixers? That’s a bit like Dyson making cars, isn’t it? Rick Dickerson takes a deep dive, and finds out what’s so special about the brand’s new SoundLink series.

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I’m a desk guy. I love desks of all shapes and sizes, but obviously some I love more than others. So when I see yet another small analogue desk with digital FX onboard, I wonder if we’re not already a little spoilt for choice. Even with my poor memory, I remember soon after I started hooking up my Korg M1 and S3 to my Atari ST 1040 running C-labs Creator software, Korg brought out a product bearing the SoundLink name, but that was a DAW with a fader surface and 8-bit processing. So when a company like Korg - a pioneer in the digital instrument and effects market - suddenly turns tail and releases an analogue desk, there has to be a reason.

THE ENGLISH CHANNEL I’ve made no secret of my love for analogue equipment, especially vintage analogue; and while I have placed a few small-frame analogue desks into pubs, clubs, and dance studios, most of my work is in digital.

Having said that, there is something good about being able to simply plug it in, turn it up, and route it where you need it - all without having to delve into a complicated and on occasion unfamiliar menu structure. Just looking at this little board, it’s obvious a lot of thought and time has been spent making it as flexible and as comprehensive as possible.

No surprises then to find out that the desk was designed by a couple of legends of the audio world: Greg Mackie and Peter Watts. The former is one of those people who pretty much started the rush in small format sound desks. The latter started work at Trident in 1976 at just 16-yearsold, and was responsible for early forays into computer automation of analogue Trident recording consoles, namely the Di An; then later as chief engineer on the Vector series desks after Malcolm Toft left the company. In 1995, Watts became VP of engineering at Mackie Designs.

During the ‘90s and early noughties, Mackie became known as the

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brand offering a certain quality at an attractive price. One of its most successful products - and the only one I have used and know anything about - was the Mackie 8-Bus: a desk which had no particular outstanding feature, except for the price. I also remember a session I did on one of these consoles where, after managing to go through two power supplies in a little over three weeks (they had five on rotation), I put the engineer in touch with a guy who built them a more reliable PSU. It’s still working to this day – and so is the desk.

There are 16- and 24-channel versions of SoundLink, and I am reviewing the smaller of the two (the MW1608). I took a photo with my hand over the front (see overleaf) so you can get a true idea of just how small this desk is.

It’s described as a Analogue/Digital Hybrid, but in reality it’s an analogue board with a digital effects processor.

Looking at the front, it’s obvious a lot has been shoehorned into this board.

There are eight mono channels and four stereo channels: the four stereo

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channels have a pair of TRS balanced jacks, but there is also a single XLR, should you prefer or need further mono mic channels. The mono channels all feature a gain pot, a high-pass filter, and a compressor, which is dialled in with a pot – and there’s an amber LED built in to show when it’s active. This is something you do find on some small desks – Soundcraft, for example - but it’s normally only the first two or four channels, not all your mic channels.

There is also a dedicated post-fader FX send pot to the onboard FX processor, and below this, the pan pot. Now here’s something I don’t recall seeing on a small format analogue board before: a mute button, assignable to up to four mute groups; just keep the mute group button of your choice depressed then tap the corresponding channel’s mute button(s) to assign them to the group.

Next is the EQ section which provides a high cut and boost at 12kHz, a sweepable mid with cut and boost, and a low cut and boost at 100Hz (all cut and boost +/–15dB). Following this are four aux sends - all on XLR – and it’s worth mentioning that many aux sends on small desk are TRS jack which can be frustrating, as all pro multicores and theatre-installed multis are XLR. The first and second aux sends are fixed pre-fader, while auxes three and four are switchable pre/post. All four aux busses have a master bus pot controlling overall level to the XLR outs, and a handy AFL button so you can monitor that aux send in your headphones.

Auxes three and four are also bussed directly to a pot control for ‘phones out’ on stereo jacks on the back of the desk.

Next, we have the group assign and master L/R assign buttons, and the channel fader, making this also an eight-bus mixer. I checked on the back, and there are indeed eight TRS outs from the group out assigns via four stereo group faders. Just above each channel fader is a green and red LED: the green reads channel signal at -20dB, so is pretty active the moment it sees signal; the red just says OL, and is the overload indicator. Just below the fader is the PFL button which has its own orange LED to show it’s active. The stereo channels are very similar, but don’t feature the compressor pot, and have four fixed frequencies in their EQ sections instead of the sweepable midrange.

These frequencies are 12kHz, 2.5kHz, 250Hz and 100Hz, all +/–15dB.

Furthermore, there’s a clever blend pot for each of these outputs which allows you to send the stereo master to the phones along with audio from aux three or four. Although it’s the same as having the aux send on the master bus, it does look a lot tidier this way; and finding a direct to aux send from a L/R bus is not a feature I’ve seen on an analogue desk for some time. So this gives you a total of six auxes: four mono, two stereo.

The last stereo channel strip [15/16] also acts as a return for the USB computer interface. When I connected it to my Mac, core audio made it available as ‘Basic Korg Interface’, and it is a stereo I/O. The USB output from the desk to computer is a digital copy of the desk’s main output, while the return appears on 15/16, and is subject to all EQ and routing of that channel – absolutely perfect for a backing track.

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"THE COMPRESSOR MOVES THE AUDIO CLOSER TO YOU IN A VERY MUSICAL AND ALMOST TRANSPARENT WAY..."

“I WAS QUITE TAKEN ABACK AT HOW SWEET THE CHANNEL PREAMPS SOUNDED...”

“THE FX LIBRARY BOASTS A WIDE RANGE OF USEFUL REVERBS AND DELAYS...”

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Mastermind On the analogue master section is a dedicated FX return fader which is always a nice touch – and feels more ‘pro’ - as onboard FX returns on so many smaller desks tend to return on a pot. The FX return has its own mute and PFL, and also the provision of two pots to send it: prefader to aux one and two. Beside the FX fader are the four stereo subgroup faders, each with their own PFL and ‘Assign to Master’ button.

This is helpful for grouping when recording as well as some clever matrixing, should you so wish. Then to the right again is the master fader.

Above the group faders are the four ‘Mute Group’ buttons, and above those a talkback mic level pot with ‘Assign to L/R’ and ‘Assign to Aux’ buttons. And above the master fader is a pot return for stereo channels 17/18 which is on a stereo mini jack top-right of the console next to the large headphone jack socket - very useful for interval playback via your iPhone/iPod, for example.

Below that is a monitor pot which is designed to feed a set of control room monitors; further down is the headphones level pot; and below

that, a button which says ‘Break’ on it, which mutes everything except channels 17/18 mentioned above.

Furthermore, there is a a very nicesized double row of LEDs which displays your master output levels, and will assist you in setting up the correct gain structure. This is actually as important today with digital as it ever has been - maintaining a good signal to noise ratio that wraps up the analogue side of things nicely.

HYBRID DIGITAL Back in the days when analogue ruled the world, a few clever Trevors invented the digital FX unit - and then another, and another... And that’s essentially what we have here: a bunch of digital FX available from within the console. It sure beats carting around all those FX racks and outboard control we got used to in the ‘80s and ‘90s. Ironically, I still have a Korg SDE3000 kicking around with a couple of other nostalgic bits of kit I just couldn’t bring myself to get rid of. So while this is nothing new, again, it’s a welcome addition to have graphic EQs, dynamics, and an FX engine together with a feedback destroyer all available from within this compact board.

The really great thing about this digital add-on is most of it is actually really useful. So let’s start with the Dynamics. There is a little screen at the top right of the surface, below which are nine buttons - these are

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your prompts to select the type of effect and the parameters to adjust within each effect. Below this are six buttons: three are dynamics for the L/R Aux 1 and Aux 2 buses, and the next three are EQs for the same.

I found these really easy to use; in every case I was able to select a narrow band which gave me the ability to EQ up to nine bands within a 31-band graphic EQ. In nearly all cases, if you’re finding yourself needing to adjust more than this, then there’s probably something wrong with your PA! All the dynamics programs only feature two parameters, so they’re quick and easy to use. The Limiter and Soft Knee Compressor are both very smooth, and actually the same can also be said for the whole FX library which boasts a wide range of useful reverbs and delay programs - given the two parameter situation,

users are pretty much restricted to length and brightness of the tail for the verbs, or length and feedback for the delays, together with a tap button to tap in the delay time but it’s all great sounding stuff, and for the target market which is presumably the aspiring musician/ engineer, if anything, this is actually an advantage: it keeps it simple.

There’s also a chorus and exciter together with a tone and noise generator. An Overview button shows you what’s engaged where, and an Analyser button provides you with a graphical representation of the audio in the L/R bus.

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MAGIC TOUCH I’m a bit limited at the moment in terms of what I can do or who’s in my little studio from a test point of view due to the ongoing Covid restrictions in West Yorkshire, but I was able to run audio from a couple of fairly recent projects to get an idea of what we have here. I also do the odd test of playing some electric and acoustic guitar through the desk using a trusty old AKG C414, and out through the group buses to my interface.

I was quite taken aback by how sweet the channel preamps sounded. It would be nice to have an EQ cut button, as I suspect the channels are a little presence heavy, but then if that’s a characteristic of these channels, it’s certainly not unpleasant – and if anything, I would describe it as pleasantly musical.

I was always drawn to Soundcraft consoles back in the ‘90s for the very same reason.

Likewise, the other permanently engaged circuit is the compressor - but again, to my surprise, this is a really clever circuit which simply moves the audio closer to you in a very musical and almost transparent way. I can see this being a key feature of this desk in helping to reign in unruly and inexperienced singers! And furthermore, I’ve heard equally strange noises from engineers who simply couldn’t seem to get their compressors to do what they wanted - and ended up just overcompensating, so the full range of the vocal would be choked and lose its depth and warmth. No such chance here: this compressor really is lovely for a single pot compressor.

Well done Korg.

The next really noticeable thing was noise: there wasn’t any! I really had to push some faders before it became anywhere near noticeable, and that’s the tell of any quality

console over something that’s been constructed for functionality over quality. In this particular instance, it’s great to see that Mackie and Watts have not compromised one for the other.

I can’t wait to take this little desk out and do a gig with it. Sadly, there are no financially viable gigs around at the moment, so it’ll have to wait, but it didn’t stop me checking to see if I still had my drum of 16-way and four returns, which of course would do the trick perfectly. The FX, too, are really very nice and clean; as I said earlier, my only slight criticism is that all the reverbs start off a little on the long side, and there’s nothing that really falls into the ambient category - but this really is a minor thing, and just my personal preference - and for live work, that’s not something that would be a problem.

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sUMMING UP

When it comes to analogue, there’s something inherently simple about the audio signal path which suits it to a pub or club, an open mic night, in a church, a conference hall - the list just keeps growing. But more importantly, this Korg mixer could do all of it - and do it quicker, with no pre-programing and no iPad to go missing by the end of the night!

It’s also the perfect feature set for an install board with enough quality to keep the experienced happy, and enough simplicity to keep the less experienced up to speed with the live action as it happens. For small bands that only need a couple of wedge mixes and a couple of mono headphone feeds then this desk might well also be the answer; and more importantly, no learning curve of menus and layers, just everything in front of you all at the same time.

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So it would seem those crazy people at Korg are not quite so crazy after all.

I for one am very impressed with this compact desk - and while it has the look of a Mackie-designed board, this one is not just about gimmicks and gizmos, it’s about quality audio.

I’m particularly impressed with the mic pre / compressor combo on the mono mic channel. Providing you set your gain structure correctly, this combination is a winner; and everything I was able to put through it sounded natural and alive, and right there in front of you.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a speedy return to a time when we can go back to what we do best: entertaining, and all that entails! This would have been the perfect product to take out with my friend’s blues band.

Equally, there’s a theatre show I tour with that this little desk could also work very well on.

It’s kind of because analogue had to be big to accommodate all the facilities you need to get the sound you want that has spurred on the mass move to digital, because in the early days I wouldn’t have said it was sound quality - however, this is a very musical little desk with everything on board you need to do a first class job. Assuming, of course, you have something musical to put through it..!

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AMS NEVE

RMX16 500 Review

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AMSNEVE RMX16500 In a previous review, I touched on Lexicon and how it was responsible for the sound of the ‘80s; but where the Lex was known for vocals with big plate and big spacey reverbs, the RMX was most definitely better known for its shorter Ambient, Room and Non Linear Programs, perfectly suited to big drum sounds. So the fact AMS Neve were bringing this unit back – in 500 format – was extremely exciting to me.

In 1981, AMS, (Advance Music Systems) launched the RMX-16 after already making a name for themselves with the DMX 15-80 - the world’s first 15-bit digital delay line.

But the thing is, this new reverb unit had an algorithm in it called non linear which sounded just like gated reverb. Every studio engineer wanted some of this new sound, and pretty soon every studio had one – and for good reason! Being that these algorithms were a simulation, and not based on sampled environments

like today’s modern reverbs, they had space around them, they were based on the idea of what reflections might do in a given room or hall - but above all, they were all incredibly musical. And just like Lexicon, the AMS had its own characteristics and admirers.

During the ‘80s when I was on the road for the most part, this unit would sometimes find its way into touring FOH outboard racks and, provided the headline band’s engineer was HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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okay with me stealing a preset or two (there were only nine storage slots on the original unit), I would have yet more opportunity to play. Sadly, they were built for studio use, and didn’t adapt well to life on the road, often suffering cracked boards and dry joints - which is a huge pity because nothing ever sounded the same as an RMX-16 - and up until recently, nothing ever had.

I recently changed my audio interface to a UAD Apollo, and have some very useful UAD plugins at my disposal including the brand’s AMS RMX-16 plugin which I spent

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far more time playing with than I should have, when I was suppose to be writing a review! The plugin is good - very good - and I could have written a review of that plugin alone, but there is something to be said for actually pressing the buttons and turning the dials.

Clicking your mouse to engage the rotary encoder and then trying to drag it around is not quite the same as the original! Having said that, it did sound lovely and a really accurate substitution for this all time classic.

But what of my review box, how does it fair against the original rack unit and UAD’s plugin?

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Installing The Unit I have a Cranborne 500ADAT lunchbox style housing which is a handy bit of kit for 500 series modules as an analogue summing box. You can get into the Cranborne either through a couple of TOSLink cables in and out or directly from the back of the unit via XLR; in my case, XLR to D-Sub 8-way cables attached to the Apollo insert and line-in D-Subs. After much searching, I could only find one of my optical cables so I hooked it up via the XLRs. After replacing the plugin in the FX bus with Logic’s I/O plugin from the utility menu, it was simple to just select the correct line out and returns back in to the Apollo and then press the ping button. In Logic, just remember to go to preferences, audio, and then in the audio: general, and page, making sure compensation is set to ‘all’ so

everything will be in sync. Also, very important is that you set the mix value to zero, otherwise the ping is subject to whatever effect is currently on the screen, so will not give a true compensation value for the round trip signal path.

The RMX - like the original - is mono in, and left/right out. The 500 module is three units wide and uses the first slot for the mono input and left out, and the third slot for the right out. With four small crosshead retaining screws to hold it in place, that was pretty much it. Plugging it up just like the original unit was very satisfying, and I could feel my cheeks aching from all the incessant smiling. I powered up the Cranborne!

A Nod to the Old In a complete twist of irony, the 500 module is actually far easier to use than the original rack unit: just press the program button and turn the dial to the desired program, and then press one of the parameter buttons to alter that, again with the rotary. It actually feels more logical and obvious - especially with the key parameters displayed next to their corresponding labels on the retro style red LCD screen. Also a nice touch that the in, out, and mix levels are on a second screen, as in most instances, if you’re inserting this unit on an effects bus, those values are unlikely to change.

My earliest recollection of the original unit was the slightly confusing Echo programme, and I remember having to ask how you got into the different delay times between left and right, as entering a time delay value in pre-delay appeared on the left side of the stereo spectrum only. And then it came back to me. Its a left bus (A) value and a right bus (B) which you just page between from the keypad.

When I first encountered this unit I think my only experience of microprocessors was Space Invaders and Pacman. At this point as I’m writing, I just looked up and noticed the AMS logo playing ping pong with itself on the screen; that’s so very ‘80s! As is still the case, the keypad is pretty redundant bar the A/B buttons, as unless you knew exactly what range of delay or reverb parameter you wanted, it was always much easier to turn the dial and listen to the subtle changes as you went. The exception to this is the pre-delay which on the nudge and rotary knob is in 10ms steps, but you can enter a custom value, press pre-delay a second time, and it will change to that value. In reality, the keypad will now enter values for all the available parameters. Back in the day it was the nudge buttons (up or down) that changed from program to program, and adjusted the decay Low and High filters. But now it’s easy to dial everything in with the rotary.

A nod to the old, but I kind of found my way around the new unit in a couple of minutes.

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AMS NEVE

RMX16 500 Review

THE POWER OF NINE The RMX had nine programs when it first appeared, all of which were groundbreaking - and they’re all here. Each program algorithm has a maximum of four parameters: Pre Delay, Decay Time, and Low & High Decay Filters. These original programs are: Ambience, with control over all four parameters; Room A1, with just three parameters; Hall C1, with all four again; Plate (four); Hall B3, this time a smaller hall reverb with all 4 parameters; Chorus (three); Echo (four); Nonlin (three); and Reverse, with just two parameters.

What’s rather nice about all the preset programs is that they’re very useable off the bat - but even some extreme tweaking of parameters still leaves you with an appealing result.

When you select echo, there is no value in any parameter, and to create an echo you first need to enter the time using the pre-delay button, then how often the echo repeats using the decay time. Just remember there are A and B channels, left and right, so you can set independent echoes for each side. ‘A’ gives you delays up

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to 400ms, and ‘B’ up to 1200ms. The chorus program is also an incredibly good algorithm, and can fatten up any sound: make a six-string a 12-string, and it just sounds great.

The Ambient programme has a huge range from a real in your face, sharp reflection through to chamber type sounds which, with a reduction of the high and increase in low parameter, can sound very cathedral nave-like, to big thunderous, and out and out preposterous!

The room programme was a particular favourite of mine, as it’s probably the first time I remember being able to place a drum kit in a precise location within a mix. What I mean is that with the use of the level you set each drum, hi-hat, and overhead together with their placement in the stereo field by the pan pot. If you closed your eyes, you knew exactly where each drum was on the stage in front of you; it was so good, in fact, that you could watch the drummer playing while your ears were listening! Bit of a eureka moment for me, this was, while

recording a demo for Polydor back in 1983.

Then we have the legendary programme 8, Nonlinear Reverb.

Just listen to Phil Collins’ No Jacket Required if you’re not sure what I’m on about - this programme is on everything including some of the programmed drums. Just check out tracks like Don’t Lose my Number and Sussudio - but it’s pretty much on everything! The 2 Hall and Plate programmes are amazing examples of their intended environments and are just as hard to better today as they were groundbreaking in 1981.

3, Hall C1 is the smaller of the two halls, and has some lovely defineable bright reflections which give you a lovely mental picture of the hall you might be playing in. 5 Hall B3 is a little taller and wider and has a generally smoother spread of reflections.

There is also a programme which introduced an effect only previously available by some clever manipulation of tape, 9 Reverse, which found its way onto a number of Trevor Horn recordings.

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and nine more!

The original unit only had nine program algorithms when it was first released, but they produced a remote control unit and a bar code reader and booklet of bar codes which provided additional programmes that could be swapped in and out of the mainframe as required. I’m sketchy at best on how these additional programmes were exactly loaded and saved, as unfortunately I only ever saw the remote a couple of times, and never got to use it. Our modern unit comes with the best of these additional programmes, giving you a total of 18. Programme 10 is a second Reverse algorithm which smooths out some of the differences that the original programme had from left to right and gives a less electronic stutter to the reverb. There are also two additional Room programmes (12 and 13). 12 (Room A0) is a brighter more obviously reflective space like a mirror, windows, or other hard shiny surfaces. 13 (Room B1) gives the feel of a higher ceiling and a warmer space. Programme 14 (Hall A1) is an even larger hall and much more intense than 5 (Hall B3). 15 (Plate B1) is again a more intense programme than Plate A1 which emphasises the shimmering high end plate character with the added bonus of pre-delay, something not available on original plate reverbs.

16 (Delay) is a mono version of Echo giving you a delay of up to 810ms, but this is only available from the second output, right hand side. Programme 18 is another great nonlinear algorithm that produces different reverb characteristics in the left and right channels, so this is one you can blend, pick one side or the other, and generally experiment with. New program 11 (Freeze) is a continuous reverb of whatever you feed it, so needs to be planned on how how it receives source audio as well as how you bring it in and out of your mix, but it’s a very interesting effect and I would say this was also a first for this unit’s original counterpart. Lastly, 17 (Image) is a non-linear type reverb that appears first in the right side of the stereo image and then in the left, thus giving the impression of moving across the stereo image. I’ve numbered the programs as these were the original numbers on the rack unit, and have also been carried across to the UA plugin versions. The AMS Neve RMX-16 500 doesn’t have program numbers, but the programs occupy the same physical slots - or to put it simply, are in the same order.

PROMISES, PROMISES I always promised myself that if I got into a position where I stopped touring and could afford to set up a small commercial studio, the RMX-16 would be one of the first things I would buy after a new Mac. Well, now that wait is over and I have one. It might not be the original but it sounds every bit the original, with some really nice touches that make it look distinctly like the original but are even more user friendly and fit into today’s microprocessor-driven world perfectly. It’s intuitive to use, and anyone can find their way around this new unit in seconds rather than minutes. The decision to re-issue this unit as a 500 module is genius. Most modern studios have a hybrid analogue component to them, and many I’ve been into have 500 series lunchbox style racks for those special modules of analogue kit they simply can’t live without. And I should imagine the RMX16 500 will fall firmly into that category.

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REVIEW

UAD Apollo x8p

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Online, there is a wealth of reviews and technical information about UAD’s Apollo x8p, but it was the list of plugins that initially caught my eye: suddenly I was back in the ‘80s at Master Rock Studios in Kilburn where a brief career as tea boy and cleaner introduced me to the world of high end gadgets. I must have driven Steve Flood mad with questions about how to use the Urie, Fairchild, and dbx 160 compressors; the SSL desk, not to mention the plate and spring reverbs, and perhaps my favourite toy of all, the Lexicon 244. I longed for the day when I could take one of those on tour. So having played with a whole host of gear in the studio environment as opposed to the more inconsistent live arena (I’m experienced in both worlds), I’m well aware of how these original devices sounded and behaved in their analogue form.

The measure of any piece of equipment for me has to fill two criteria in this order: sounds great; easy to use. Anything else is down to aesthetics. Unboxing the x8p was easy: unit, power supply, mains cable, and a small card which simply says visit www.uaudio.com/register. So I created my account, connected to my MacBook Pro via thunderbolt 3, turned it on, and proceeded to

download the UAD software. Once it was all done, I restarted my mac, and opened up Logic. There was a period while it initialised all the 200+ plugins, and I couldn’t help but smile as their names, most of which are very familiar, flashed in front of my eyes. It came to a stop, and there was the interface in Logic preferences.

How easy was that? I swapped my XLR cables out for a pair of jack to

XLRs for my monitors, loaded a recent project which I had to copy across from my old cheesegrater, and hit the space bar on my laptop. Instant audio! I’ve had a fair few interfaces over the years, and I have to say things just keep getting easier and easier to install and set up. The whole process from box opening to audio at speakers took under 20 minutes.

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REVIEW

UAD Apollo x8p

PLUGGED IN

A compressor is one of those devices that you can never truly appreciate until you spend some time in a sealed control room just listening and playing. There is no right or wrong way to use a compressor or limiter – just do what sounds good. My all time favourite, luckily for me, was in most studios in London through the ‘80s, and was the Urie 1176. This box of tricks has a magic about it.

Technically it’s a limiter; there’s no threshold, just an input control that you use to drive the level up against the limiter, and output level, attack, and release - plus a number of push buttons by the VU which need to be played with as the various combinations produce a cacophony of effects.

The first time I heard one of these inserted on a vocal, the warmth of the low mid and the way in which the vocal came so close you could almost feel the spit in your face is unforgettable. The way it can turn an average drab snare into a

powerful thing of beauty by opening up the attack speed is the other application for which this gem is truly memorable. I’ve used a couple of other emulations of this box, and while some are better than others, none have quite had that original magic. The UAD 1176 has the Bluestripe (Rev A), the Blackface (Rev E), and a modern 40th anniversary model with additional stuff I’ve never seen before. And it wasn’t long before I was running out of tracks to try this on. The Blackface is genuinely difficult to tell apart from its original, and I couldn’t stop grinning.

The next plugin on my list was the Teletronix LA2A Silver - another legendary iconic compressor, this time optical in design, which Bill Putnam later refined by updating valves with solid state circuitry to produce the LA-3A. Both units are here, together with a legacy version that is not as DSP hungry, but is very good. It isn’t until you try to crank it into distortion that you spot the

difference. It makes perfect sense that Universal Audio wouldn’t emulate one of its own iconic products without it being accurate, enjoyable, and the best. I can’t understand how it took me so long to try these out.

All these UAD plugins are special, and I’ve just spent the best part of a day listening to them. It was also good building a compression chain - something I used to see back in the day - to sit that vocal right in front of the band. The 1176 to control the harsh peaks, and the LA-2A to smooth out the rest. Magic! I can almost imagine myself physically turning the dials on those old masterpieces; these plugins are hugely impressive, and thoroughly authentic sounding.

And this is just my preference, of course; there are other great iconic comp and limiter plugins in the Universal Audio arsenal: Fairchild 670, SSL G-bus, Manley MU, API 2500, and dbx160 to name but a few.

echoes of th e past

The Lexicon 224 and 224XL were the sound of the ‘80s; it’s almost impossible to find a chart hit that doesn’t feature one. But interestingly, it’s never gone away, unlike some fashionable accessories. Again, there are plenty of good Lexicon emulations out there: working in live sound, you find many that mention either the 224 or 480L. The 224 always looked complicated until you actually got hold of the controller and realised that it had only nine programs, a couple of which are based on the HEADLINER MAGAZINE

same Lexicon preset, but with some parameter changes. For example, the Small Hall B and Large Hall B are the same preset [1 and 3] bus with different parameters. What makes this reverb so special and iconic is the way in which you can control the reverb tail in different frequency ranges. The first four faders control how much, and in what frequency your reverb tail sits, together with the crossover slider, which alters the frequency between the bass and midrange faders. The UAD 480L

Lexicon delivers all of this functionality seamlessly, and the creativity you can inspire with this alone - at a fraction of the cost of the original hardware unit - is staggering. I could spend days going through all of the options in the 480L plugin, but the experience is really all about exploring and using your ears; it can enhance any work you’ve done prior, or inspire you to alter something new in a pretty dramatic way.

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INSPIRATIONAL “These UAD guitar modelling plugins are really quite inspirational...”

“The Apollo’s mic pres are incredibly clean & whisper-quiet...”

INCREDIBLY CLEAN

“I now want to go back and remix every project I’ve ever been involved with using this setup...”

GO BACK AND REMIX

in unison Now on to a number of key components that come with the x8p that offer both flexibility as well as a massive range of tonal options.

First up, the Console application. In a nutshell, think of your DAW as your audio recorder, and Console as your mixing desk, in which you can prepare your recording and monitoring, with all the power of UAD plugins. And without using any of your computer processing, at near zero latency. Extremely impressive.

Also, although I haven’t referred to the manual once during this review, I needed to understand the technologies going on, so there are two terms worth pointing out which you will hear while watching any Apollo x hardware and software tutorials on YouTube that make everything fall into place: UAD-2 and UNISON. UAD-2 refers to the actual computer processing within

your Apollo x device. Besides the Apollo x8p I have here, there are, of course, other UAD-2 devices in the range which feature additional cores of UAD-2 processing, and these handle the processing of your UAD-2 plugins.

And UNISON is the marriage of digital mic pre and instrument amp plugins with the analogue mic preamp hardware - all of which is controlled from within Console. This accurate emulation is achieved by a component level alteration of the physical mic pres’ impedance to match more closely that of the original mic pre hardware. This is a bit of a revelation, as I don’t know firstly how they do it; and lastly, anyone else who is using this mix and match technology in this way.

So in Logic I created a new project with eight mono audio tracks and opened Console. I plugged my Strat into the first Hi Z input on the front panel - channel one automatically gave a reassuring relay click and switched HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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the Hi Z input into the signal path. I inserted an old [AKG] C414 into the second channel via the rear panel XLR. I also plugged in a pair of 451s, as I thought I might record my Martin acoustic as well. There are a whole bunch of guitar and bass plugins that come with UAD interfaces, and I was eager to find out how they stacked up.

I’ve used untold amps and FX over the years, and still being a bit of a bedroom guitarist when I find the time, I have my trusty Line 6 HD500. I kind of settled on this because it was easy to use, and represented a consistent result at low latency compared to computer-based modelling. I tried Guitar Rig, but had issues with latency, so it just didn’t feel right. These UAD guitar modelling plugins, however, are really very good, and quite inspirational; they feel and sound just like the response of the real amp - right up there with the Kemper Profiler and the Fractal Axe. But this is where UAD-2 onboard processing takes over. Hey, as I’m writing this, I’m aware

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that as I touch the keys with the fingers of my left hand, there’s pain in my finger tips - that’s how much I’ve enjoyed playing again, and putting the x8p through its paces!

In the late ‘70s I bought my first Marshall JMP 2204 and 4 x 12, as well as the 2104 combo version, so it was an interesting exercise recording with the UAD JMP 2203 plugin, modelled on the 100W version of my amp. I’d always thought the 100w model was too loud, over the top, and aggressive – but I must have mellowed somewhat, because this was just like sitting in a control room with the head, and the cab in the next room doing its thing! There are four plugin slots per channel in Console, but if you fancy going hybrid, there’s nothing to stop you wheeling out your Crybaby and your Tonebender and attempting to sound like Ronson!

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TAKE YOUR PICK And now to the age old debate, which console is best: Neve, Helios, API, Trident, or SSL? Well, with the x8p, you can record using them all: just select input two as the input source on a bunch of channels in your DAW and run a take or two using each mic pre in Console’s channel two. Some years ago, I owned my own Avalon 737, so I threw this into the mix as well, along with the Manley VoxBox - another great channel strip I’ve been lucky enough to use on a number of occasions.

Now anyone can join the debate, as the range of tonal colour within these plugins is chalk and cheese, and it’s easy to see why engineers have all grown to favour one over the other – and that’s why particular

engineers and producers were often associated with the same studios.

My personal favourite plugin in this test was the Helios - a console I’d seen in situ, but never actually heard in action. It’s almost like there’s a little bit of something in the phase of the mid-range that sits the audio closer to you, incredible to listen to.

The Neve 1073 has been around in various guises over the years, and never fails to please – it’s one of those musical preamps that beautifies anything it touches, and these are in every top studio for good reason. If you’re losing something in the mix and you want it to sit up without making it louder,

UAD’s 1073 is your go-to line level legacy plugin, as opposed to a stock EQ provided with your DAW. Hell, it’s worth buying the Apollo x8p for the interface and this plugin alone!

The Avalon 737 and the Manley VoxBox are again, both very faithful to their analogue counterparts. I use the Avalon all the time for female vocals as it has such a rich, warm depth that really works live without getting lost in the mix – and the Manley, more on a male vocal for similar reasons, but this time in the mid range where it would enhance the presence of the vocal and bring it forward in the mix. Both boxes also benefit from excellent compression; in UAD plugin form, they’re spot on.

VISIONARY Next, I crossed my 451s and put them through UAD API Vision channels. I wanted to see if I could get anything like that lush acoustic guitar sound that I remember from Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours - specifically Never Going Back Again - sadly let down by the fact I hadn’t played it in years and it took my ages to work it out again... And I still couldn’t play it!

But even in my little mix room, it was easy to get lost and imagine I was somewhere far more salubrious.

It’s worth mentioning that I also had a listen to the Apollo’s mic pres without plugins, and found them to be incredibly clean and whisperquiet - until you put signal into the mic, of course. And it suddenly

dawned on me that if you added another unit with eight or more preamps, you could box it all up in a 2U rack case, and with a bunch of your preferred mics, pick which room or studio you wanted to record in for that ideal drum sound. Suddenly, the idea of being able to quickly set up a session in advance, or even save a snapshot of that magic moment and all that went with it for future use becomes an unbelievably attractive proposition. Saved sessions of preferred kit, channel plugins and settings to match a particular drummer’s style ready for any future session... the ideas and possibilities are genuinely endless with the x8p.

Going back to that age old debate about which classic album was recorded or mixed in which studio with this or that console rather seems meaningless when the x8p is sitting in front of you, because essentially you have all those resources in front of you.

I always remember commenting to Stuart Colman at Master Rock about what a beautiful studio he’d built, and how all the equipment was top class and would make great records.

He kind of smiled and grimaced at the same time and said: “Great musicians and great engineers make great records.”

HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

DANGEROUS MUSIC

by R EW ic VI

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DANGEROUS COMPRESSOR

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I make no secret for my love of all things analogue, but at the same time I really appreciate that digital has opened the doors to realms in days of old, reserved only for the chosen few.

Musicians now have the ability to nurture their recordings from conception through the birthing stage all the way to masterable product. It’s also great that there are emulations out there for every conceivable piece of analogue equipment you ever wanted, and many are so good, unless you’re of a more mature time of life or you’re a bit of an analogue boffin, or you own a successful studio you would never know the difference. However there is always a difference - however slight - and there’s something very tactile about a piece of analogue equipment. Something beautiful about dialling in a little of this and a little more of that. Something about sliding that fader, turning that dial! So you may ask yourself: if digital is so accurate, why would anyone design a new high-spec piece of analogue sound gear ever again?

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Well, we’re on Dangerous ground here! Dangerous Music, to be precise. The company was founded nearly 20 years ago with the launch of the 2 Bus Summing Amplifier, a product which ironically brings that analogue digital debate full circle and takes digital instruments and buses out of the box and mixes them together again in the analogue domain. In fact, nearly every pro studio you walk into these days has one! So who are Dangerous Music? In their own words, they are a team of musicians, studio owners, producers and engineers who conceive, design and build the products they want to use; and it was this recognition that the hybrid studio was here to stay and that there will always be a place and a need for both analogue and digital to work together side by side.

And a quote from their Philosophy & Goals section on their website states: “From the inception, building

to a price point was ignored in favour of audio quality first; sonic integrity is non-negotiable.” Cofounder, Bob Muller, originally opened Dangerous Music Recording Studio in 1992 in New York. In the mid ‘90s, Chris Muth turned up to produce and engineer a band, and the pair became good friends. Muth’s time had been spent almost exclusively designing custom equipment for many of the worlds preeminent mastering engineers and facilities - world class facilities like The Hit Factory, Masterdisk, and Absolute Music. In 1990, Muth went to work for Sterling Sound. Working with famed Sterling mastering engineers Ted Jenson, George Marino and Greg Calbi, Muth modified existing mastering gear, which led to designing new equipment to meet the challenge of the ever increasing levels and dynamic range of digital consumer playback devices.

Working with some of the best ears in the business, Muth was able

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to design gear up to the rigors of hybrid analogue/digital mastering.

So with that brief history of the company’s co-founders and their mission to build products that are both transparent and musical, when it comes to mastering, transparency and musicality are a must have in order to correctly do your job. As a live sound engineer who moved from rock and roll - where you were often creating or re-creating a band sound - into theatre, I was aware that if the audience could ‘hear’ the PA system then I wasn’t doing my job properly. I wanted the audience lost in the music, captivated by the dialogue. In other words, I wanted the audio as transparent as possible. With that said, it brings us nicely to a fairly recent addition to the Dangerous range: the Dangerous Compressor.

This is no ordinary compressor, and it is not just a high end, seriously good mastering tool either.

A soundscape evolution The first thing you notice when you look at the unit is the VUs with their amazing retro styling - and just to the right of these, the large ratio controls, one for each channel - with a ratio from 1:1 up to 20:1. Immediately, I can’t wait to hear how 20:1 sounds! More about this later. Let’s start at the far left next to the Dangerous logo. It’s great to see the in-out button called something different: ‘engage’ always reminds me of Star Trek Next Generation and Picard as they’re about to go into Warp Drive. I wonder if this was deliberate?

Next to this, we find a four-button side chain section; two of these options I don’t ever remember seeing on a side-chain circuit before. The first is a ‘Bass Cut’ which as a side-chain circuit doesn’t affect the audio in the signal path tonally, but tells the compressor not to react to the low end part of the original audio. Immediately I’m thinking you could wind this up without getting that over pumping effect that you get from a loud kick drum when what you really need is a smoother, gentler limiting style compression across the whole mix. Likewise the ‘Sibilance Boost’ tells the compressor to react more on those frequencies within that range

of the audio to be compressed. I can already think of some cases where this comp might have replaced two or more units or plugins. Some comps without this feature are just not usable on a bright vocal for the simple reason they create more problems than they solve. The third button control sends your audio to an ‘external sidechain’, again extremely useful for contouring the audio that triggers the way the compressor reacts to the source audio. And fourth, the ‘sidechain monitor’ allows you to listen to the audio content of your side-chain in isolation.

Next, we have the contour section. If none of the three contour buttons are lit, the compressor works in a dynamic way, setting its own attack and release times automatically with regard to the audio passing the threshold. The top button of the three is the ‘Smart Dyn’ control which is described by Dangerous as a dual slope detector circuit which tells the compressor to look at average as well as the audio exceeding the threshold and react accordingly. Dangerous claims that this contour control button gives a much smoother and HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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transparent response from the compressor. Again, this is a feature I personally have not seen on another comp - and I’m keen to hear just how it differs in operation.

The second button down selects the ‘Soft Knee’, which again gives you a gentler slope of attack; and by it’s very nature is generally more transparent in operation.

And lastly the ‘Manual Att/Rel’ which engages the attack and release rotaries. The meter section has the choice of VU/Comp which switches between level and

gain reduction (alight). When in level (unlit), the second meter button switches from input to output level.

The third button is to attenuate hot signals. In operation, the VU meters are quite slow and seem to hover at their average - I kind of found myself looking at the little green LEDs that light up every time the threshold is breached. They were very helpful in understanding exactly what was going on.

TRULY GENTLE

NEVER ONCE “Even at 20:1 ratio it still sounds like a truly gentle transparent compressor.”

“I never once felt the need to reach for the manual attack and release button...”

HUGELY IMPRESSIVE

“It’s hugely impressive that you can create compression effects but without any of the colouration you would normally expect...”

2 Bus or not 2 Bus? That is the Question The compressor is a two-channel comp and is highlighted as such by Dangerous - and as long as you don’t select any of the special buttons or the soft knee, it really is. You could use the side chain insert to affect different characteristics independently as you have full XLR side-chain in and outs for each channel. You could also use one channel on kick, for example, and the other HEADLINER MAGAZINE

on a vocal. With the stereo button in, only the top row (Left) Channel Gain and Threshold are active for the stereo bus, but the ability to set independent ratios for each channel seems like the ultimate control freak’s tool.

However, as a mastering tool I’m aware that the higher up the quality chain you go, control is your buzzword.

Should you have the attack and release active, these also

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remain independent for each channel. In stereo, as a bus compressor, it is really smooth and transparent. In fact, when I first started listening to mixes through it, it was only when I bypassed it for the first time that I realised how utterly transparent this comp really is. In reality, I struggled to hear what was actually happening; it wasn’t until I noticed how those tiny drops in the level of some instruments in a mix would just come back into focus and then drop away again when I disengaged. I can’t remember listening to a device that caused me to doubt my ability to spot the difference so much. I lost count of the times I punched it in and out! Oh, and remember that ratio that goes all the way up to 20:1? Well, it still sounds like a truly gentle transparent compressor, even though we’re now in the realms of serious limiting!

So this was where I formulated a cunning plan to create a short demo video of a recent songwriting project at Headliner HQ - a simple, two acoustic guitars and vocal arrangement left lots of scope for an example of use across the mix or mastering bus at a ratio of 2:1, engaging

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the Dangerous Music Compressor while the audio is running through it. That way it’s clear to hear what the compressor is doing without running multiple demo files off with before and afters. In stereo use, I didn’t come across a single incidence where I felt I needed to reach for the manual attack and release button. I deliberately picked a very dynamic recording, mixed to retain many of the dynamics of the guitars and as much warmth and depth as possible. It shows how significantly the audio is affected at a ratio of 2:1 which is enough to bring this great track into focus, while all the time maintaining a transparency and musicality all on its own.

The Dangerous Compressor worked flawlessly on many different genres of music, and yes I still found myself switching that engage button out and then back in again just to satisfy myself that it really is that transparent. So undoubtedly it’s to be expected, with a thoroughbred pedigree and a design ethos in mastering, that it’s a seriously good ‘mastering tool’ but a truly great compressor can do it all, right?

Drum and Bass Sometimes you want to use your compressor to get things noticed, to create those artifacts in the sound that sets something apart in your mix: those first strikes of the snare that blast through, then squashing down and producing that big snare sound of a drummer possessed. Just disengage the side chain mods, smart dyn, soft knee and stereo buttons and punch in your att/rel - and now you’re calling the shots. Again, it’s hugely impressive that you can create compression effects but without any of the colouration you would normally expect from this comp or that comp. It’s very nice indeed to have a tool that maintains that snare sound you worked so hard on in the studio before stepping back this side of the glass. Now you’re able to achieve the desired compression effect of making it sound louder while making it quieter. I’ll just bypass it again just to check I actually am correct in that rather bizarre statement I just made. [pauses...] Yep, thats correct! I also noticed that while I had the left channel inserted across a pre-recorded snare, I could not hear a sound from the right channel, which means that crosstalk is not an issue when using each channel as a mono compressor.

So this really is a great compressor. It’s a masteringquality flexible tool which I like a whole lot more the more I use it. It embraces a couple of new ideas which are no gimmicks, but well thought out, user-friendly additions to a really open, clean and musical product. I think if analogue outboard is your passion then you have to have this in your studio because it’s so much more than a mastering tool. And even if it isn’t, I can see this inserted across a mic pre or two as a serious addition to that vocal, acoustic or bass guitar take for additional control and presence. It’s the compressor that glues your mix together – and so much more transparent at higher ratios than anything I ever remember using. In fact, I would go so far as to say this is the only device you will need after your summing amp.

DANGEROUSMUSIC.COM

HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

Created in collaboration with legendary designers Greg Mackie and Peter Watts.

Featuring pristine, studio-grade DSP audio processing and instant analogue control, the KORG MW mixers will satisfy any audio mixing application.

The convenience of analogue.

The power of digital.

korg.com

104 GARETH OWEN

HEADLINER MAGAZINE

Right Place, Right Time

SOUND DESIGNER

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Right Place, Right Time

GARETH OWEN Eight-time Tony and Olivier Award-winning/nominated sound designer, Gareth Owen – whose company, Gareth Owen Sound, is now deploying d&b’s Soundscape on over half of its shows internationally – reflects on risking it all on the once unknown immersive audio system to save Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical, Starlight Express.

“One of my earliest memories is of my dad, who was a teacher at school.

He used to do the lighting, and I remember the lighting desk – which I thought at the time was absolutely huge, but I imagine actually must have been completely tiny,” recalls Gareth Owen.

“He would be pointing lights around and asking me to help with the faders. I never had any intention of getting into theatre or indeed sound

as a career. In fact, my parents were quite keen to dissuade me from that – they were, like ‘get a proper job; be a doctor!’”

Whilst at sixth form college, Owen began working in a nightclub, where he looked after the lighting – “just disco lights, mirror balls and pin spots” – and when a new owner took over the place, he wanted to put on live music two nights a week.

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“He said, ‘here’s a load of money to go and sort out whatever it is we need to do that’. I knew a little bit about speakers and amplifiers because as the lighting person in the nightclub I also looked after the speakers, but it was rudimentary knowledge to put it mildly! Suddenly I was tasked with the idea of mixing half a dozen bands every week. I didn’t know anything about it! So I went and bought a book called Live Sound and went from there. Nobody in there really had the first idea about what good live sound was supposed to be, which was good, because I didn’t,” he laughs. “So I got to learn in an environment with half a dozen different bands every week in an environment where nobody knew any better. So it didn’t really matter how bad it was! I just got all this practice time to learn to be a sound engineer.”

From here, he secured work experience with Birmingham’s SSE Audio Group which led to working at festivals such as Glastonbury, Reading, Party in the Park, and T4 on the Beach, and eventually mixing acts such as Def Leppard, The Stereophonics, B B King, The Spice Girls and The Rolling Stones. Owen’s theatre career began when he was invited to mix musical The Blues HEADLINER MAGAZINE

realised I enjoyed it a lot more than rock and roll.”

“THERE ARE FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE WAY THEATRE SOUND WORKS AND THE WAY ROCK AND ROLL SOUND WORKS”

Brothers, which was running at what is now Trafalgar Studios in London’s West End. “I didn’t have a lot of money at the time, and I didn’t know much about what I was being asked to do, but I said I’d do it,” he recalls. “I bought a tent from Argos and I lived in the band’s garden and paid them a sum of about £25 a week to use their toilet, the kitchen, and maybe watch their TV every now and again.

I spent the whole summer mixing The Blues Brothers as the head of sound in a West End musical, even though The Blues Brothers wasn’t really a musical, and even though I had absolutely zero credibility to be head of sound! Somehow – almost overnight - I became a musical theatre sound designer, and I

From here Owen was offered a job as sound designer for the UK tour of Stephen Schwartz’ musical Godspell, and then went on to design a number of shows in a freelance capacity (notably Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Show and Cole Porter’s High Society), before joining London’s Orbital Sound as a fulltime sound designer.

LINE-BY-LINE Reflecting on the difference between rock and roll sound and theatre sound, Owen says it’s a big topic that opens up a lot of questions: “There are fundamental differences between the way theatre sound works and the way rock and roll sound works. For rock and roll, the person who is responsible for the sound of the show is basically the person standing behind the mixing desk. They’re assisted by other people, but basically the person who is responsible for how everything sounds is that person standing behind the desk. Theatre isn’t like that. The person who’s responsible for the sound of everything, including

SOUND DESIGNER

the on-stage monitor mixing, the band and the cast is the sound designer. All of the cast members wear omnidirectional microphones generally hidden on their heads, or maybe they’ve got little mic spots on their mouths – but they’re all wearing a microphone.”

With 30 or 40 people on stage all wearing mics, it only takes a basic understanding of sound engineering to know that if you open up all of these microphones at once – problems can easily arise: “Exactly! You’re going to get this horrible, nasty cancelled sound with comb filtering all over the shop. So one of the earliest principles that musical theatre sound design developed is a concept called line-by-line mixing, which is where you programme the desk using extensive VCAs and you have to actually follow the script. The person behind the mixing desk is turning the microphones on and off in line with the script. So if characters are having a conversation and one speaks, their mic goes up, then down

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again – so it’s really important that everybody does what’s in the script. As a result of that, it’s a full time job for the person behind the desk.

“The sound designer works out how things are going to sound, and the sound operator makes that happen,” he clarifies. “That allows sound designers to do a lot more shows, because you can spend two-to-three months working on a show, creating it, rehearsing it, and then come opening night – which is the moment when the show is theoretically finished and signed off on – the sound operator stays and looks after the show as the head of sound, and the sound designer can move onto the next show.”

In late 2009, Owen parted ways with Orbital Sound and set out to form his own company, Gareth Owen Sound, which has gone on to entertain over 30 million people with its sound design across shows all over the world including on Broadway, in Las Vegas, and in London’s West End. HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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Today, Owen is an eight-time Tony and Olivier Award-winning/ nominated sound designer that has worked with a number of notable composers, including Alan Menken, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Stephen Schwartz.

He has always prided himself on being at the bleeding edge of technology – “for better or for worse!”

– and Gareth Owen Sound is now deploying d&b Soundscape on over half of its shows internationally.

“I’ve always been very nervous about being left behind and waking up one morning and discovering someone else is doing something really cool,” he admits. “To counter that, I have a pretty strict rule about only ever using one new piece of equipment or one new piece of technology at a time.”

Owen couldn’t help but pick up on the fact that his peers were talking about d&b’s immersive audio solution, and even though he wasn’t entirely convinced about it at the time, he couldn’t resist finding out more when he discover that Orbital’s Sebastian Frost was checking it out: “There’s a healthy competition between us, although I would hasten to point out I also consider myself to be an extremely good friend of his,” he adds. “He’s such a smart guy, so I thought, ‘okay, if he’s using this, I might need to sit up and take notice’. So we made what is arguably one of the bravest choices that I’ve made in my career, which was to do Soundscape for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s huge musical, Starlight Express in Germany. Even non-theatre people have heard of Starlight Express: everybody flies around on roller skates and the whole HEADLINER MAGAZINE

space is one huge racetrack.”

It turns out that the production in Bochum, Germany, was using the original 32-year old sound system, which when inspected by Owen, fell well below the required standard: “Bits had blown up or didn’t work properly anymore – it was a total hodgepodge of different stuff.

Andrew went to see the show and he got really cross about it, because he’s very particular about sound. He threatened to close the whole show down.

He told a wonderful story once about when he was listening to the songs: he didn’t recognise what they were playing. He said, ‘I don’t know what this is, but I didn’t write this’. So he went down to the orchestra pit at the intermission, and he said to the musicians, ‘Can I see the scores that you’re playing with please?’ They said, ‘we don’t know where they are; we’ve been playing the show for 30 years, so we don’t really need the score... they might be in storage somewhere.’ He said, ‘if you don’t have scores and you’ve been playing it from memory for 30 years, I think it’s reasonably safe to say you’re not playing my score anymore’. So he rebuilt the show, redid all the music, and redid the whole sound system.”

Owen was convinced that Soundscape in a semi-arena format would be the perfect solution for the refreshed production: “It made sense, but it was a very either brave or stupid choice, depending on your point of view!” he laughs. “With hindsight, it was great, but at the time, knowing how particular Andrew is about sound design and how we were basically going to use a completely new untried sound system design

- against the better judgement of all of my team, who told me I was absolutely insane, we made it work!”

At the time, Owen found that the control software for Soundscape wasn’t quite at the level required for the production, so the company’s software team – led by Russell Godwin - designed some custom software to make it work: “He is one of the greatest computer programmers you’ve ever come across to be quite honest, so why on earth he works for me in theatre, I question on an almost daily basis! But he sat down and he thought, ‘right, we’re going to write new control software for Soundscape to handle all of the positions and snapshots and timecode’.”

Godwin swiftly created the software and Starlight Express went into rehearsals using Soundscape.

“We had new orchestrations, a new cast, new songs on a new sound system that we’d never used before with a new control software that had never been used before, which of course completely undermines my theory of not going into a show with too many new variables! But we did it, and Andrew was completely blown away by Soundscape.

“One of the things Andrew likes to do is to stand in the orchestra pit to hear all of the sound coming from all of the musicians, so we will lay out the orchestra pit in such a way that if there are electronic instruments [in the pit] we’ll put speakers in there with them, pointing back at the conductor. So when Andrew stands in the middle of the pit, he can clearly hear all the musicians playing, and of course, that’s what Soundscape does – it allows you to pick out all the different instruments.”

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Soundscape was a huge success, and d&b was so impressed with the software that Gareth Owen Sound wrote: En-Snap, which boasts full scene management, timecode, integration, OSC control and MIDI control of all of the aspects of Soundscape – allowing for full creative control. Fresh off the success of Starlight Express, the team took Soundscape to Bat Out of Hell: The Musical in Germany, and then to Come From Away.

“Come From Away is based on the planes that landed on 9/11 when America closed its airspace, landing in this little village called Newfoundland. It’s incredibly wordy and complex, and there is so much detail – one person will say three words, another will say three words – it’s absolutely relentless!

“We’d probably done 10 productions of it by this point, and then we decided to put it onto Soundscape for the new London production. I think that was the moment where we really felt like, ‘okay, we’ve got it sussed now – we know what we’re doing’ – and that paid off come award season! I think we won pretty much every sound design award going that year from the Oliviers, to WhatsOnStage – so the proof was in the pudding.”

Owen says the more his team uses Soundscape, the closer they get to discovering its real potential: “It’s a big departure from what it is we’ve all been traditionally doing,” he acknowledges. “As an industry, it’s quite easy to get stuck in our ways. It requires a complete rethink about how you do your show, and that is a bold move for people to make. You have to do it on the right show, and you’ve got to have the right people around you, and the right support to make that happen. It’s really, really good technology for theatre; and we’re now using it on more than half of our shows, which kind of says it all, really.”

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JAMIE SCOTT

The Hit Maker

THE HIT MAKER

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Jamie Scott’s songwriting and production prowess has seen him achieve over 65 million streams through working with a massive roster of eclectic talent including One Direction, Niall Horan, Justin Bieber, Rag’n’Bone Man, Adele and many more. During lockdown, the multitalented creative flipped the creative process on its head and was busy creating an exciting new solo album, surely serving as the pinnacle of his incredible musical journey.

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Growing up listening to classic songwriters like Stevie Wonder and Joni Mitchell around the house, it’s really no surprise that Jamie Scott put pen to paper from a young age. A musician, producer and label owner amongst many other things, he only recently decided to launch his own artists career following a series of early solo projects and many years as an accomplished songwriter.

In a conceivable twist of fate, Scott has used the Coronavirus pandemic as an opportunity to lock himself away in his home studio and create his sophomore album, How Still The River, in just four to five weeks. He wrote, played and recorded everything himself, while the record features songs he had co-written a number of years ago with some big UK acts such as Birdy and Hurts.

Scott collaborated throughout the mixing process with his longtime friend Luke Potashnick, the ex-guitarist of his old band and a producer in his own right, “but it’s pretty much just me and my studio with a bit of downtime, and of course I’ve done everything remotely,” he reveals. “Most of the strings and horns have been played by a guy who’s also in lockdown in Sweden - it’s quite amazing what you can do with the technology now.”

The first song he made for the album — New York Nights — was as uplifting to write as it is to the ears. “It’s about the first time I went back to New York with my wife since we had kids,” Scott explains. “We used to live in LA when I was an artist, and I think that we hadn’t travelled for a long time because we had two kids by then, so it was incredible to go back, just the two of us, and get a little bit of freedom back!”

The first single from the record, Friendly Fire, was selected purely for its sonic quality, and instantly sounded like something worthy of leading the project: “I think I got a bit carried away with the fact that I had changed it

completely, because it was actually a piano ballad that I wrote with Hurts.

They didn’t want any more ballads on their record but I loved the song, so I decided to record it myself. Halfway through playing the piano I just told my engineer to stick some drums over it because I wasn’t feeling the vibe, and I started playing a Fleetwood Mac ‘70s groove which was a great fit. I didn’t look back and the rest of the album kind of fell into place really.”

There’s clearly no pressure when someone of Jamie Scott’s calibre as a songwriter decides to release a solo album. With countless hit singles under his belt, it almost feels like more of a labour of love, an organic culmination of his refined songwriting experience and huge reputation in the pop music industry. That being said, a career founded on a pipe dream of being an artist was never going to suffice, and rightfully so.

“I very much just wanted to record these songs to have them,” he says. “People are still streaming my music all the time, and I suppose I also wanted to give those people something different to listen to.

Songs you sometimes hear on the radio are unfortunately too perfect, and so having music that’s not so perfect is kind of a cool thing for me.

I really relished in the fact that I could just leave a piece of vocal or piano sounding slightly out of tune, a little bit untouched.”

It’s certainly nice to see that after more than a decade in the studio writing for others, Scott is finally garnering the traction he deserves as a recording artist, essentially rediscovering his artistic identity through the lockdown period.

Ironically enough, Scott wasn’t interested in becoming an artist when he first started writing, yet was always inquisitive about folk writing and storytelling through music. He was fluent in most instruments by his early teens, which brought about

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the desire to experiment and write original material not for himself but for other artists, instantly taking on a deep adoration for the craft.

“Those ‘70s records that I’d heard being played over and over again - I think I just had that in my blood and in my head from such an early age,” he says. “They resounded with me so much and in fact they did so all the way through to my pop songwriting career. If some of my songs were covered by different artists perhaps not in the pop genre, I think they could have easily become acoustic folk songs instead — it’s actually been inherent in my writing, whatever I do.

“I was in this duo when I was 17 or 18 and started writing different styles of music, but I was very specific about what style I wanted to write and I didn’t actually like the sound of my own voice. The guy that was looking after me at the time — who was just someone I met locally — sent my songs to a few publishing companies and record label heads and I just remember getting this mad reaction to this one song called Shameful, despite it not being a song I’d written for myself at all.”

Within four to five months of landing his first publishing deal, Scott signed to Sony records in 2002, soon teaming up with Jamiroquai keyboardist and co-songwriter Toby Smith with whom he became close friends: “He was really my mentor, and we ended up making a load of music that was kind of in the lane of Jamiroquai, that soul/ funky vibe,” he reveals.

Scott’s full-length album Soul Searching, which he had worked on with Smith, was scheduled to be out in early 2005. However, due to the merger between Sony and BMG, production got delayed.

“We put out two singles on Sony, but then I soon got my first experience of the ups and downs of the music

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industry. Sometimes you realise it’s not all roses, and when the merger happened I found myself in the middle of a storm of people who didn’t get me and basically didn’t want anything to do with me,” he recalls. “After a couple of years I eventually jumped ship from the label and took the album that I’d written across the road to Polydor and Colin Barlow, who I’ve now got my own label with. He absolutely loved the record, which became Park Bench Theories with my band Jamie Scott and The Town.

“I learnt most of what I know from Toby however. Later in our careers is when he became ill, but I was desperate to still work with him. I’d started writing with One Direction and I wanted to get him into that world too, so we flew to New York to record. We actually had a few Olly Murs cuts and One Direction songs together. In a way, it was a cool little circle of events that happened over the 10 years of our friendship.”

The list of artists that Scott has worked with over the years is truly impressive, and he cites Adele, Rag’n’Bone Man, and Ella Henderson as some of the best voices he’s ever heard and had the opportunity to work with.

He admits that half the reason his current album exists is because he decided to start recording songs that he had written with other artists, as well as some solo written songs that he had a particular fondness for. A track he had written with Birdy around five years ago for example — which hadn’t made it onto her record because she’d decided to change the sonic of her album — was one of the songs he recently recorded for How Still The River.

“I’ve worked with a lot of people but it’s something I feel very lucky about,” says Scott. “The minute I got any success and became someone that people wanted to write with, I pretty much ended up doing every session at my studio complex. Artists would come into HEADLINER MAGAZINE

the studio, we’d have a chat, sit down and start writing and collaborating together from scratch. There isn’t normally that much production involved on the demo and then obviously when I finish a song, it may warrant having bigger production on it, but if not, I’ll submit it as an acoustic song.”

Despite having worked with some of the biggest names in the business, Scott admits that he does sometimes still feel the pressure going into larger sessions. This wasn’t the case however when working with Niall Horan on his latest record, Put A Little Love On Me: “I had a piano riff and a little lyric ready to go and I thought that felt like something really good,” he recalls.

“When I played it to him he loved it and that happened quite easily, as it does with a lot of these songs - they just kind of happen in sessions. It’s important because a big part of writing a great song is about connecting with an artist or artists who are also doing an amazing job. You need them in the room to connect with them, which is often how you produce something great.”

And speaking of greatness, Scott actually co-wrote Cold Water — featuring Justin Bieber and MØ — with Ed Sheeran in Benny Blanco’s New York apartment two and a half years before the song was released. The track of course went in at No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart and around the world.

Meanwhile, These Days by Rudimental and Jess Glynne was written in Scott’s studio three years before its release, and it wasn’t until four years after that in 2019 that it won the PRS for Music Most Performed Work accolade at the Ivor Novello awards: “You never really know how long a song is going to be sitting around before it comes out in some way, shape or form,” says Scott. “If you’d have asked me 10 years ago what advice I would give to songwriters, I would have

told them the unfortunate but honest truth that they need to get their music in front of someone in a position of power who can take it forward and make a difference, be that a record label or a publishing company,” he continues.

“But now it’s completely different and my advice now would be: if you love what you do, believe in it and believe in your ability. Don’t give up, and jusr work hard, because there’s so many ways to get your music online and your material will eventually get spotted.”

In 2015, Scott founded his publishing company Catherine Songs and record label Catherine Records to facilitate up and coming songwriters and artists respectively, working with writers/ producers Mike Needle, Dan Bryer and Alex Charles, as well as Catherine Records’ first signing, singer/songwriter River Matthews.

“The world of music is now so huge, and despite being a very small record label, we have our own scout who is constantly searching Spotify and SoundCloud for the next generation of raw, undiscovered talent, which is always exciting.”

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Living on the Edge

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For the first time in nearly 15 years, Blood Red Shoes are missing out on their usual romp of the UK festival circuit. We recently caught up with the alternative rock duo from Brighton to learn about how they’re staying creative, what they’re missing at the moment, and the tours that pushed them to breaking point.

Blood Red Shoes were extremely lucky to have finished recording in the studio just two days before lockdown struck in the UK back in March.

Since then, the pair have been focusing their creative efforts on writing, “and having discussions about artwork and aesthetics and all the other things that go around an album,” explains Steven Ansell, who makes up one half of Blood Red Shoes.

The pandemic has given the pair a lot of time to think about the nonmusical side of things, combining all the elements to portray and contextualise their music in an artistic and expressive way.

“The whole universe going on pause for a while has given us more time to think about that than ever before,” adds Ansell. “So it’s been quite positive in a way It’s given us the option of doing something we don’t typically spend a lot of time on. I think using your creative energies is sort of like whack-a-mole: you smash it down in one place, and it will pop up somewhere else.”

Usually at this time of year, the band would be gracing the stages of festivals everywhere with their bold punk rock sound, something they have been doing religiously every summer since 2007.

“Obviously we can’t play which is really hard, but once you kind of accept that, I think you have to then find other ways to fulfil your creative energy,” says Laura-Mary Carter, the second half of the duo.

“I definitely miss it, but I just kind of feel like summer didn’t really happen - we’re living in a bit of a limbo right now but then everyone’s in the same boat.”

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The origins of Get Tragic — the band’s fifth studio album which they released in January 2019 — go back to when they were gigging relentlessly over a period of around six years, during which they almost exhausted themselves beyond repair.

“If I think about it now, the period from about 2007 or 2008 to 2014 is like one very blurry blob,” Ansell

breaking free In 2014 the band formed their own label Jazz Life, a decision that came about through feelings of disillusionment for the music industry. I asked the pair for their thoughts on the democratisation of music and the digitalisation of the industry in terms of putting control back into the hands of artists.

“After a while you realise that no one really cares as much as you do,” Ansell responds. “They take the thing that you’ve invested your heart and soul into and stick it on a big list of things for them to do. You’re not really looked after, and for that privilege they take 80% of the money. So us and a huge amount of other artists are now questioning this trade-off and asking what exactly are we getting out of it?

“Unless you’re in some sort of top tier, you get very little back for giving away the rights and ownership of your entire craft.

Increasingly everybody’s realising this and because it’s easier now to distribute your stuff digitally, artists can take a huge chunk back with regards to the control of their own income and decision making.”

recalls. “From 2007 onwards when we signed up record deals and got management and booking agents and started doing festivals, we threw everything we had into the band. It basically just kept expanding from there.

“Very quickly it goes from this thing that you create into something else entirely. It’s like you build a car, and you get in the car, and the car just goes, and you no longer have any say - the car is just going and it’s going fast. We made four albums and toured them back to back with no meaningful break until the end of 2014.”

The pair eventually hit a point where they no longer knew if they wanted to be a band anymore.

Ansell describes the period as a bit of an identity crisis, “and a bit of a car crash, where we just had to stop and reconfigure things to make it work.”

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Living on the Edge

“It was massively exhausting, but also amazing,” says Ansell. “We’ve learned things, discovered things and played in front of hundreds of thousands of people. It’s completely changed our lives but at the same time, no one gives you any advice or training for this stuff. No one thinks about your mental health; you’re just thrown into it and expected to cope.”

“It’s just so much constant stimulation; all those places, all those people,” Carter adds. “Because we were going so fast at the time, it was always a struggle to sort of actually take a moment to look around and really enjoy and embrace it. It was getting to the point where we weren’t able to do that anymore, but just spent most of the time trying to get through to the next day.

“It becomes normality because you’re on this constant rollercoaster of emotion, and so you don’t always appreciate the amazing things that are happening.

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It’s almost sinking in for me now - like I can feel and remember all the places and things we’ve done and the funny stories and all the rest of it.”

With the pandemic essentially causing the whole world to grind to halt, people have had a lot of time to consider their personal situations. Perhaps this has been a particularly good thing for non-stop touring musicians like Blood Red Shoes, who have been able to pause and belatedly absorb all their experiences of life on the road in a meaningful way.

The touring artists and musicians that I spoke to in lockdown have coped a lot better than all the nine to fivers that I’ve spoken to,” Ansell reveals. “We’re so used to instability and weirdness and chaos and uncertainty, and we just deal with it and get on with it, because that’s life.

It’s almost like we have had training for this year and now everything just feels a bit weird!”

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“IT’S SUCH A MAGIC COMBINATION THAT THERE’S NO POINT HAVING SOMEONE ELSE BRING IN A BUNCH OF GEAR WHEN WE KNOW IT SOUNDS SO GOOD...”

CLEVER COMBOS Blood Red Shoes have been relying on Sennheiser wireless in-ear monitoring systems and vocal mics — namely the e945 super-cardioid dynamic stage microphone — for a long time now.

“Earlier in our career we tried out loads and eventually settled on Sennheiser,” explains Carter. “They really are trustworthy mics; we’ve had them in every kind of tour we’ve done which has seen them get bashed around on flights and in the van and on stage and everything, and they’ve just always been really reliable.

“It’s such a magic combination that there’s no point having someone else bring in a bunch of different gear when we know it sounds good.”

The pair discovered that their voices blend together particularly well when they use the same mic simultaneously.

“I used to use this different Shure mic just because it was small, and I wouldn’t smash it when I was drumming, but I had to really learn to use a full size microphone and be careful not to whack it with my sticks, because it sounded better with our voices combined,” says Ansell.

“We’ve found that they’re much clearer than a lot of other dynamic

mics, especially when you’re looking for a bit more of that airy top end on the vocals. You can also hear things through the IEMs that you can’t hear in the stage wedges, which really helps. You can feel the openness and clarity and when we sing while really locked in together, we can hear the detail of each other a lot more clearly than with a lot of other mics.

“We always use an original 421 on the Fender Champ guitar amp,” Ansell reveals. “We’ve done sessions where it’s just that amp and that mic, and it sounds fucking amazing.”

While Blood Red Shoes’ gear selection is never up for debate, their latest album Get Tragic was somewhat of a leap into the unknown. The duo travelled to Los Angeles to record with sought after producer, composer and engineer Nick Launay — who has worked with some huge names in music — to do things slightly differently this time around.

“We’d just come out of that period where we nearly combusted and we wanted to change everything up,” says Carter. “We had a good thing and we could just keep doing it, or we could try and do something that pushed our abilities and was a bit different. We’re the sort of people who can’t just keep doing the same thing.”

The pair decided to try and make a record that explores different avenues, which wasn’t easy.

“We’ve always made records as a two-piece, and so it was kind of like, let’s try and make a record with other instruments and without those restrictions and see where we go with that. Once you start that process of trying to get out of your comfort zone, it’s hard because you just have to go on a bit of an adventure and try things.

“Most of the artists that we love always take risks, and so that’s who we look up to,” Ansell adds. “So we know that we should take risks when we can, and that’s what we did with this record and what we’re going to do again with the next record.”

Aside from all the risk-taking, it does seem like the last few months have served as a detox period for everyone, in all senses of the word: “As probably anyone will tell you, I’m a prolific drinker and I haven’t had a drink since April,” Ansell chuckles.

“We’ve barely seen anyone and I think we’re probably the healthiest we’ve ever been!”

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GLP

Shedding Some Light

Photography within this feature: Paul Gärtner

SHEDDING SOME LIGHT

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GLP - German Light Products is a chief developer of worldwide industry standards in lighting technologies for the touring, theatre and studio markets, consistently meeting the creative needs of lighting and stage designers for over two decades. We recently learned about one of the company’s outings this year at Germany’s Karlsruhe Trade Fair, where it provided a luxurious lighting rig for the openair cultural stage.

minded industry professionals to assemble the Karlsruhe Trade Fair’s cultural stage earlier this summer.

The live event industry may be struggling due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but that didn’t stop Florian Vitez from Reposit Entertainment teaming up with a number of like-

On June 12, the cultural stage opened with a concert by the Swiss pop singer Beatrice Egli. GLP, based in nearby Karlsbad, was swift to support this demanding project with

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Following a call to Michael Brombacher from Megaforce, the main stage was ready in no time.

Lars Wolf, from the company Hell, offered his lighting design expertise to the project, and was quickly able to bring the idea of the cultural stage to the local cooperation partner, the Karlsruhe Exhibition Center.

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professional lighting technology, providing and installing a wide range of its solutions including the impression X4, KNV Cube and Line, JDC1, Exobeam and Fusion Stick FS20.

Mitja Gleich, technical director of the newly founded Kulturbühne Karlsruhe GmbH, has been very happy with the equipment’s performance: “I think the Fusion Stick FS20s are fantastic,” he says. “The entire stage setting is perfectly framed, and particularly at the end of the show there are some fantastic stage set changes. The JDC1, as a matrix in front of the backdrop, is a stunner and, thanks to its flexibility and tilt, can of course be used in many different ways. The interaction of the KNV Cubes and Lines brings depth to the stage and can also be used creatively. They help us considerably in meeting the diverse requirements of the stage.”

“The Exobeams in the towers, on the other hand, make the stage really shine and are visible to our guests from afar,” adds Gleich. “They are extremely helpful in carrying the emotion we want to convey to the rear of the audience. But my personal highlight is the sudden very bright flash, which you can achieve when all the material is switched on at once.

The light output is enormous and has so far amazed every guest.”

The set-up, which in total features over 150 GLP fixtures for maximum versatility and possibility, is available to all performing artists.

In the stage roof itself there are 10 impression X4 Wash fixtures, as well as 15 additional X4 and 15 KNV Lines, which are used as front lights. A background matrix made up of 12 JDC1 hybrid strobes ensured there was impact from behind, while the side wings were also equipped with a total of 50 Fusion Stick FS20 from Fusion by GLP, 36 KNV Cube and 16 Exobeam.

“OVER THE YEARS, THE COMPANY HAS MANAGED TO REINVENT THE MOVING LIGHT AGAIN AND AGAIN AND TO CREATE MILESTONES IN LIGHTING TECHNOLOGY FOR EVENTS”

Gleich, who has relied on GLP solutions for many years now, bases his appreciation of the products on experience.

“At GLP I see creative and innovative products that are really well thought out,” he says. “Over the years, the company has managed to reinvent the moving light again and again and to create and establish milestones in lighting technology for events. We owe the technical possibilities we have at our events largely to the creativity and engineering of our colleagues at GLP.” Udo Künzler, managing director

of GLP, adds: “GLP has also been hit hard by the current restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The partnership-based cooperation with event technology companies, distributors and designers has always characterised us. We’re all sitting in the same boat. In this respect it was clear that we should do our utmost to support Mitja and his fellow campaigners in realising the Kulturbühne Karlsruhe and equipping it to a high standard. And besides, it’s just good to finally have GLP moving lights shining again and to see the enthusiasm in the eyes of the audience.”

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Shedding Some Light

In order to fund the project, the team of organisers attracted additional supporters in a bid to bring culture back to audiences. These included Schwitzer’s Hotel am Park, Stadtwerke Karlsruhe and Fiducia & GAD IT AG. Despite being hit hard by the global pandemic, GLP’s support in bringing the cultural stage to life was clearly vital, and a perfect demonstration of its ability to quickly provide high quality lighting solutions and enhance the experience of audiences even during the most uncertain of times. The company continues to develop new products at its headquarters in Karlsbad, BadenWürttemberg, steadily expanding its position as one of the world’s leading manufacturers of professional lighting technology for the entertainment industry.

Technical director Gleich is convinced that a project like the Kulturbühne would not have been possible before the pandemic. “We have only been able to stage and manage this project due to the support of countless partners who just love what we do,” he concludes.

“I would like to mention them all, but that would be impossible. It’s sufficient to simply say that I am very grateful to everyone.”

GERMANLIGHTPRODUCTS.COM

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BEL

Good News

Bel is not afraid to say what other people are thinking, even if it gets her into trouble: “Life is too short to beat around the bush, especially at the risk of your own integrity, safety and mental health, and for the sake of the people that are trying to step on me,” opens Bel. “So I figured, as long as I’m being HEADLINER MAGAZINE

respectful and truthful and never lie, how much trouble can I possibly get into telling the truth?”

So far, this approach has been working for Bel, whose willingness to push musical and visual boundaries has earnt her comparisons to BANKS, Lana Del Rey and FKA Twigs, and makes clear the link to her cited inspirations James Blake, Grimes, Sevdaliza and Caroline Polachek.

Bel kicked off 2020 with the release of Better Than Me – the track’s sleek production and syrupy charm made

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After years of being pushed around and emotionally mistreated, Melbourne-born experimental pop artist Bel is finally saying what’s really on her mind.

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it a song not just to be listened to, but one to be consumed through all the senses. The song follows the narrative of a girl who is going through various metamorphoses: from passive to assertive, teenager to adult, quiet to loud. Bel hopes that the lyrics provide solace to those who are wanting to scream out the same message to whomever or whatever made them feel like they are second best: “I kind of heard it as a nice, big ‘fuck you’ to the industry,” she admits. “It’s so formulaic and so built off of money – and not actually any artistry. As I’ve grown in my career, I’m starting to see the ridiculousness of it more and more. I think that particularly there are a lot of men that think they have a right to step on womens’ toes in a business front – and also in an artist front. Something I’ve been dealing a lot with in Australia is raising awareness about sexual misconduct and harassment in the industry. So basically, I wrote this as a nice big ‘fuck you’ to the men in the industry.”

After years of keeping a lid on her feelings, Bel is now embracing speaking out about the hypocrisies in life: “If no one else is going to do it, then how are we going to grow as an industry and make it a better place – particularly for females, non binary and trans folk? How are we going to achieve these goals if we don’t speak up about various injustices? That’s where I come from in regards to my songwriting as well – just trying to be really truthful – not only about things going on in the world, but also my experience and my own struggles.

I think the whole point of being an artist is to be relatable, authentic and honest. Otherwise, what are you doing? If you’re writing music, write truthfully. That’s my view anyway.”

Marrying the avant-pop and experimental realms, Bel’s second single of 2020, Spectre saw her blend

weaving synths with an RnB groove.

Marrying dark pop and experimental realms, the song displays a true fearlessness, and was written in order to metaphorically chronicle what it’s like to have an ominous presence circle and set foot in someone’s emotional, physical or spiritual safe

space.

Bel says this could represent anything or anyone – from a previous partner, to someone’s own inner-bully, and the effect that these unrelenting, negative and often intrusive shadows can have in a person’s life.

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liked the idea of introducing myself as an artist and introducing my ethos to the world. I wrote this spoken word piece as a way to help people who have never come across me at all, so they can understand exactly what I stand for in a five minute piece.”

T1 summarises and encapsulates Bel’s ethos, her view on the world, and her plans for the future: “I don’t think I’ve ever been as truthful in anything I’ve written,” she discloses.

“I wrote it in about 15 minutes – it was a stream of consciousness. I like the idea of doing things at the start, middle and end. A lot of the lyrics come from the depths of my soul and they speak my truth really loudly and clearly. I want anyone who comes across me for the first time to understand that I understand you, and that you have a home within my world – within my art.”

“I wrote Spectre about whatever that presence is – whether it’s about someone else or about your own inner demon circling you – and what it feels like to fight back,” she explains.

“It’s the narrative of someone trying to fight back against that.”

Completing the trilogy of singles is the haunting and experimental new single, Good News, which explores Bel’s once overwhelming and almost obsessive desire to escape a sense of helplessness. Writing the song with “six emotions in mind”, Bel explains that the idea for the song came from a very toxic working relationship:

A fashion-forward spoken word video titled T1 serves as an introduction to her upcoming Trilogy EP. The piece – written and co-produced by Bel – serves as an introduction to the EP, which includes Better Than Me, Spectre, and new single, Good News.

“All my self-belief was shattered by an emotionally manipulative man in the music industry,” she shares. “My goals felt impossible, and I drove myself insane fixating on all the things I wasn’t achieving. Being awake and being asleep were equally torturous.”

Describing T1 as her “purple cow”, Bel says that every word comes from the depth of her soul – and whilst admitting that that is terrifying, she is nonetheless excited to share her goals, incentives, plans and vulnerabilities:

To dramatise and heighten her own narrative, Good News encompasses all things obsession, paranoia, yearning, tunnel vision and mania.

“I have a quite an obsessive personality, and I really like the idea of doing things in threes. I also really

“I was in a really negative working relationship and this person was very emotionally manipulative and emotionally abusive towards me,” she explains. “He made me lose a lot of belief and faith in myself. I became so HEADLINERMAGAZINE.NET

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“It’s SO MUCH EASIER TO BE TRUTHFUL AND TO BE YOURSELF THAN TO PUT ON A SHOW AND PUT ON A CHARADE...”

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obsessed with momentum; I was resenting stagnation. I just felt so stuck, so I wrote this song as an utter cry and prayer for change and movement. The lyrics, ‘I need good news to continue’ were very literal to me. I heightened the narrative and made it more than just about feeling stuck: I made it paranoid, I made it obsessive. I really wanted to show that absolute paranoid obsession – when you want something more than anything in the world, and you can’t have it, and how crazy that makes you.”

Bel says that what the EP means to her doesn’t have to translate exactly to what the listener interprets its message to be, but feels that the three tracks do fit together cohesively in an overarching theme of the importance of self worth, growth, resilience and pushing back: “I suppose the only thing that I

would really want is for people to feel confident and like someone understands them. In my life in general, I’ve been forced to compromise – and not just in my music,” she adds. “So if anything, I came into this industry from the get go being unwilling to compromise on my art, and sometimes that was to my downfall. I have been pushed around, mistreated and emotionally manipulated by so many people in so many different areas of my life, and I think I’m at a point now where I’m just sick to death of it.

“I’ve grown so much as a person. A couple of years ago, I wouldn’t even be talking like this. I would be much more calculated, shy, and so concerned about what I was saying and what people think of me. Particularly within my career now, this is the one space where I get a say: it’s my art. So I’m pretty firm on that.”

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For Bel, there’s a freedom that comes with expressing her true self: “It’s so much easier to be truthful and to be yourself than to put on a show and put on a charade,” she agrees. “So even if I fuck up, even if I say the wrong thing, even if I make a mistake – it’s still so much easier just being yourself and being human as opposed to trying to control everything all the time. There are people out there that appreciate the truth, and I suppose that I am the way I am for them. There’s so much fuckery out there and so much fakery, and I just don’t want to be a part of that. There’s enough of that already.”

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Spending a couple of weeks in Nashville did wonders for UK-based Billy LeRiff, Jonny Faires, Marc De Luca and Ian Wilson, and would go on to inspire a lot more than their band’s name.

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Rising indie band, Two Weeks In Nashville, had hit a brick wall in terms of musical inspiration, and a trip to Tennessee’s capital turned out to be just the ticket for the group, who came together through their shared love of the sounds, energy and extravagance of the great rock bands of the ‘60s and ‘70s.

“We were lucky enough to go to Nashville just to experience life,” begins aptly-named lead guitarist and vocalist, LeRiff. “It was incredible, and we hadn’t experienced anything like it. It’s just so full of positive, really welcoming people: it’s Music City! It’s literally the music capital of the world, with music going on 24-7 right down the main strip. It really opened our eyes and ears to the other side of the world and gave us a different way to look at things. It essentially changed our music; the whole sound and everything came from the experience we had there. We spent two weeks on our first trip there and fell in love with it. So we had to call the band Two Weeks In Nashville!”

The band’s time overseas was well spent, and saw them work with a number of different writers that inspired fresh, new material. Consisting of members LeRiff, bassist Faires, guitarist De Luca and drummer Wilson, Two Weeks In Nashville’s work ethic is second to none, and they embody a rawness coupled with a dynamism and attitude that sets them apart from their counterparts.

Although this electric onstage presence has admittedly been harder to capture during the lockdown period, which has seen the band holed up in a house together doing a lot of online gigs.

“To be honest, the timing was quite good for us,” says LeRiff a little guiltily.

“Everyone had just moved in literally as lockdown was beginning, so it worked out quite well for us in that respect. It’s obviously been a very strange time for everyone though – particularly for the music industry, as we’ve not been able to play live shows and do what we had planned. But we’ve been very lucky in the way that we’ve been living together over lockdown, so we’ve been able to stay productive. We’ve got a little studio set up at home so we’ve been writing, recording and rehearsing a lot every day quite religiously, and producing music videos for a few songs we put out at the beginning of lockdown which [bassist] Johnny has been editing, which is pretty cool!”

And the productivity doesn’t just extend to their music: “Marc and Ian have been doing a lot of fitness workouts every morning.

Occasionally I’ve done my own little routine, but I’ll let them be them... they’re pretty intense! Marc fancies himself as a bit of a chef – being half French and half Italian – so it’s been Michelin star cooking throughout lockdown!”

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“We managed to play in prague, virtually, and we had another live stream for hamburg tv in germany...”

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The young indie rock collective spent the first part of 2020 honing their craft on stage with performances across the country, including shows at the O2 Academy Islington and the Camden Assembly – both selling out within a day of going on sale. What’s it like to suddenly adapt to virtual gigs?

“It’s strange,” he admits. “We’ve done it a few times. It was weird at first, but we’ve got used to it. We’ve been teaming up with a few different venues because obviously you can’t go out and play in the venues and play to new people, so we’ve had to find other ways of doing it. We managed to play in Prague, virtually, and we had another live stream for Hamburg TV in Germany. That was really cool and was a different way of reaching out to new audiences and new potential fans. Hopefully after lockdown people will want to come see an actual live show!”

The band were due to play their first European support tour this year, which was cancelled – although this hasn’t dampened their positive outlook: “It’s a shame, as that was our first proper tour with loads of shows,” he sighs. “We’re a bit of a positive band and we want to create a really positive message when we play live. We make sure people enjoy themselves, have a good time and get away from the stress of whatever might be going on in their lives by having them kick back and listen to some old school music.”

Inspired by The Who, The Stones and U2, Two Weeks In Nashville draw heavily on these ‘old school’ music inspirations, whilst injecting their own modern twist: “We’ve grown up listening to ‘60s and ‘70s rock, and we always fall back into playing that whenever we pick up our instruments. Our sound really came from the freedom they had back then

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for creating new sounds and making mistakes, which I think a lot of artists and bands are almost afraid to do at the moment.”

song is about people coming together and living in the moment, and was the first song and starting point for the album.

LeRiff is delighted to point out that there are “plenty of mistakes” on their records:

“It is all about people coming together and living in the moment,” LeRiff confirms. “We were in such a positive atmosphere when we wrote it, and we just wanted to capture that moment so that when people listen, they can be in that moment – whether they are just listening to music, commuting, or switching off from everything around them and just being present.”

“When we were recording, our producer and manager said, ‘The mistakes are staying. It’s all part of the sound; it’s character!’ That was his favourite word,” he laughs. “We take some of that rawness and edginess they had in the ‘60s and ‘70s and combine it with the sound of bands like U2 and Coldplay. We’re big fans – we love their positive outlook and the way they play shows.”

When it comes to writing songs, LeRiff says that they all “have a fair go at it,” and that they seek inspiration from a combination of their own experiences – with a touch of artistic license thrown in: “We’ll all write down our own ideas that could be the bare bones of something or a full song, and we bring it together in the rehearsal room. We just keep writing loads and hoping that every few songs, there will be one that’s tangible and worth working on.

I think it helps to write something that will connect with people, so that works if it’s an experience you’ve had, but obviously you’ve got to dramatise it.

Sometimes everyday things tend to be a little bit tame and boring, so we do spice them up a little bit,” he laughs.

The band have used lockdown to put the finishing production touches to their radio-friendly, upbeat new single, All About Now – which was recorded earlier this year in Nashville and is taken from their forthcoming debut album, Paper Planes And Razor Blades.

Inspired by their time in Nashville, the

The bones of the track were written in a day – the arrangement changed later as the demo was an acoustic version.

“It didn’t take too long at all,” LeRiff recalls. “We were just so in the moment with the lyrics and the positive feelings, so it was quite a quick one!”

All About Now is produced by record producer Brian Harris, who has a history of collaborations with a wide range of artists including Pink Floyd, Keisha White, as well as a current cut on the new Stormzy album, Heavy Is The Head.

“Brian is a good, fun guy – we do like to tease him. He started managing us and then he was like, ‘Right, I want to produce you’, which was cool for us because he’s worked with some cool artists in the past – and obviously presently with Stormzy.

“He has the experience of working with ‘60s and ‘70s music, and he wants to capture that with our sound.

I’m pretty sure it’s a lie, but he said he was a member of The Rolling Stones once, but I don’t believe him…”

As for the upcoming debut album, understandably a fixed release date is

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a bit up in the air at the moment, but what LeRiff can tell me is that it will capture the band’s positivity through and through: “It’s a bit of a rollercoaster of emotions and a bit of a journey, lyrically, but essentially, we’re trying to spread a positive message,” he discloses. “It’s about love, hate, being on your own and then being together with people you love. For the sadder songs on the album we’ve tried to put a positive spin on it, so it might give you the impression of being low, but it’s a positive message and hopefully everyone will be feeling positive at the end of the day.”

LeRiff can’t help but see the irony in the situation: when they started writing the album, the C-word had an entirely different meaning, but fast forward a little and Coronavirus would be wreaking havoc on an unsuspecting world: “Things were in such a positive spell for the band before it all happened, which is reflected in all the songs’ messages about positive feelings, so for there then to be such a negative thing going on across the whole world – particularly in the music scene, was a bit of a strange one,” he reflects.

“Hopefully we’re coming out the other end of it and everyone will start to appreciate the small things and start to feel a bit more positive about the world again.”

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ALT-J

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ALT-J Mercury Prize winners alt-J have been increasingly innovative with their live shows since their humble beginnings as students rehearsing in a basement. Here, the band’s manager Stephen Taverner and FOH engineer Lance Reynolds tell us how the experimental indie rockers have been pushing the boundaries of immersive audio over the years, and have no plans to stop there.

“The band literally just moved into their new studio; they were about a month in and had written a few songs - they’re very excited about this new material,” says Stephen ‘Tav’ Taverner, who has now managed the pioneering trio alt-J for the last decade.

With their huge fan base and constantly evolving live shows, alt-J usually like to keep busy, but since

Coronavirus came along and threw a spanner in the works, they have been somewhat disrupted on the creative side.

“They’ve been doing a bit of remote writing, but the way they write best is when all three of them are together,” says Tav. “They’ve been a bit down in the dumps because they were on such a roll, so I’m hopeful they can get back in the studio again soon.

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ALT-J

Production Values

“The first time I ever went to see them rehearse was in the tiny basement of their uni house, because they were still students at the time,” he recalls. “The drummer, Tom, just had two saucepans turned upside down and a floor tom, while the keyboardist, Gus, was playing a kid’s Casio keyboard. It was a bizarre and very rough and ready rehearsal, but clearly I was suitably impressed because I immediately said I wanted to work with them.”

These days, alt-J’s production levels are worlds apart from what Tav describes, but it’s obvious that there’s never been any frills or ego in the band, even from their early days playing intimate gigs in Camden.

“We deliberately took our time, because they were such a unique sounding band and they were still figuring out how they wanted to perform live on stage,” remembers Tav. “They were still at university and I didn’t want to put pressure on them, so I didn’t take on a press plug or a radio person or anything like that. I asked their producer, Charlie Andrew, to record four songs which we put on SoundCloud as a free download.

People started downloading and sharing them with their friends and it just created this global word of mouth

following, which I think is the best way for an artist to get discovered.

They started doing gigs here, there and everywhere, and it was hilarious watching them run for the train with all their gear on their backs!”

Between the album coming out in May 2012 and the Mercurys later that year in the autumn, Tav and the band completed a licensing deal with Atlantic, who wanted them over for a club tour of the US and Canada.

Those four songs, which included the band’s mesmerising hit, Breezeblocks, indeed made it onto the first album and people soon started to discover them.

At this point, alt-J were introduced to Lance Reynolds, who would go on to work with them extensively at FOH over the years.

“We basically let the music do the heavy lifting,” says Tav. “When you’ve got a band or artist who can write such incredible songs and music, let that do the talking. For me, that’s how you create and develop a real audience.”

After the band comfortably bagged the Mercury Prize in 2012 for their album An Awesome Wave, things started to take off exponentially.

“WE STARTED TALKING ABOUT HOW WE COULD PUT ON MORE OF A SHOW EXPERIMENTING WITH LIGHT, AND LATER ON, SOUND, WHICH THEY WERE TOTALLY UP FOR...”

“We really got to know each other well on that first tour, and we just operated like a family from the beginning,” Reynolds recalls. “At that time everything was ‘production du jour’ - I remember buying a load of gear just so we would have a backline before they arrived. For half of the tour we were supporting another band, and it was very obvious that people were turning up just to see the support.”

As more people wanted to see the band, the venues started to grow in size, and so did the production values.

“The guys were always saying they wanted to do what was comfortable for them, and not go with the norm,” says Tav. “So for example, instead of lining up on the stage, they wanted to be in a V formation. We started talking about how we could put on more of a show by experimenting with light, and later on, sound, which they were totally up for.

“We met a guy called Jeremy Lechterman on Grouplove’s tour of the US and I was struck by his unique lighting designs. He ended up doing a design for alt-J which we all loved, and he’s been with us ever since.” alt-J have always tried to push the envelope on the visual side, and it has become a big part of their live trademark, even winning a Knight of

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Illumination Award in 2017 for their groundbreaking stage spectacles.

“I’ve always felt that they’re almost like the modern day Pink Floyd in a weird way, so the visual side is something that we’re going to take to another level entirely with the next album,” reveals Tav. Soon came the desire to offer a sonic experience that could match the stunning visuals, and so the band started experimenting with immersive audio, particularly L-ISA Immersive Hyperreal Sound technology from L-Acoustics “They’ve always treated me like a producer in the studio, and given me so much leeway in terms of how I present their sound,” explains Reynolds. “It’s very easy for me to give things a shot, and generally they’re really receptive.

“After doing a bunch of festivals and arenas where we were just carrying the front end and using house PA or whatever was available, I realised that — as [Spinal Tap’s] Nigel Tufnel would say — it goes to 11,” he laughs.

“I would come away from some shows having mixed on the flagship L-Acoustics system, and I remember thinking there’s just something else there that’s not quantifiable. I eventually became aware of L-ISA through developing a relationship with the company, and they invited me to do some test mixing on the new system in Los Angeles.

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“I was floored not only by what I was seeing, but by the clarity and the nuance that I was able to hear, and the ability to move things around like that. I immediately called Tav and said he needed to check it out, because they were building a duplicate facility in London at the time and the capabilities of the system were just staggering.

speakers pointing down, it sounded astounding, and I just couldn’t help but laugh,” Reynolds remembers.

“Usually you don’t want people to notice there’s something different with the sound, but with this I did. There were some effects flying around in the speakers and you could definitely tell the audience was listening for that, and interacting with it.”

“With L-ISA, the vocal that you put in the centre is right there in the centre, and that’s your perspective from wherever you stand. The tone of all the elements stays the same.”

Interestingly, Reynolds actually picked up mixing in this way pretty quickly:

alt-J were the first to use L-ISA for a fully immersive live show at Forest Hills Stadium in New York City. The setup was a staggering 23.1 mix with 18 surround speakers outdoors.

“I tried to prepare the mix in the studio, but when I first heard the sound coming from what seemed like the sky, with all these HEADLINER MAGAZINE

“I did spend a lot of time picking and choosing different parts to place around the arena and taking elements from what was already in the mix to recreate that in the L-ISA surround field. I could also move things around, which was incredible.

Nothing tops being inside the music.”

An immersive setup clearly lends itself well to alt-J in terms of how they present themselves as a band.

“The system by its nature is scalable, so there’s a lot of potential to have different versions of this in smaller venues,” says Reynolds. “The next thing for me would be to put this power into a smaller package, so I can take a piece out and work with it offline in between shows and get things the way I want them.”

“It took a little while for things to get off the ground in the beginning with alt-J, and every artist or band is different, but as a manager you’ve just got to take it day by day,” Tav concludes. “I’ve been really impressed with Imogen Heap and how she experiments with her live shows; I love the fact that she isn’t afraid to push the envelope, and the boys are the same in that respect.

Not many artists suit something like this, but it fits them and their level of creativity perfectly.”

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COLIN PINK

The Show Must Go On

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THE SHOW MUST GO ON

Having worked on both The BRIT Awards and MTV’s European Music Awards, as well as being Hans Zimmer’s FOH engineer, Colin Pink’s sound design has truly been heard all over the world. Here he talks to Headliner about how he started off working in sound, and how he’s adapting to the digital era.

Coming from a musical theatre background, it’s rather curious that sound designer Colin Pink has now HEADLINER MAGAZINE

become one of the go-to audio people for big live events, not to mention his extensive work with one of the greatest film score composers of all time, Hans Zimmer.

It was all the way back during his school years however that Pink first got into sound, passionate about the technical aspects of theatre and performance from a young age. After graduating from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and working

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in a few regional theatres, he found himself at The National in London, where he worked his way up to sound supervisor: “We did quite a few musicals, which is an invaluable experience obviously from a show mixing point of view,” reveals Pink. “There was lots of time spent mixing and playing around with how to make a band sound nice.”

It was here working with 24-piece

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orchestras that helped Pink to hone his craft. He soon ended up running audio in The Olivia, a 1,200 seat amphitheatre with an interesting acoustic character, and one of The National’s three stages where most of the big musicals are performed.

He held this position for around a decade, learning theatre sound design extensively before turning freelance: “Sound in musical theatre is very complex, simply because you’ve got so many points of reference,” Pink explains. “It’s all about time aligning microphones to be moving around on stage, keeping the image working so that the audience actually believes in

the actors. I always say if you can see or hear what the microphones are doing on a theatre show, the actors might as well stop acting, because as an audience member you have to believe what’s going on.”

Due to the amphitheatre shape of The Olivia, it contains around five times as much air volume than the average West End theatre, meaning it behaves very much like a concert hall and subsequently throws up a lot more challenges. This provided Pink with a steep learning curve, where he really got to grips with the physics and practicality of the space.

Adapting to the emerging digital era of consoles however proved to be

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much less of a system shock for Pink: “People in my age bracket started with analogue and very quickly and early on in our careers, things started to go digital,” says Pink. “So we’ve evolved with it, which I think in a way helps you understand workflow better than those who have solely used digital. The great thing about the early digital boards was the recallability. The National is quite unusual in that it’s got three theatres within it, but each normally has three different shows running, which means that one of your biggest problems is changing from one show to another — reliably — in half a day.

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“The concept of being able to have a snapshot recall of every parameter is a brilliant thing, especially in theatre, because each scene can be a completely different style depending on the show,” Pink continues. “There’s so much jumping around stylistically that it was very hard in the old days to keep up with that. I always remember you spent most of the show resetting the day, as opposed to listening to what you’re actually doing. So suddenly, all of that brain space was freed up.”

It was only after Pink left The National that he started working on more live events using a DiGiCo D5, the first large-format theatre desk that sought to push the boundaries of possibility in audio. Fortunately, Pink had gained enough experience doing system design effects and FOH in theatre that he was able to flit between the two, and adapt to the sound design side of things quite seamlessly: “Once I left The National, I did corporate shows and some music shows, and it was quite interesting to get into the bigger rooms. I’m always pushing to try and learn more, but it’s quite nice to keep grounded in the fact that everything you learn is so experienced-based.”

Pink soon found himself doing more orchestral work, completing a live arena tour with the BBC documentary Blue Planet, during which he “felt very comfy” putting a system together that worked for a live orchestra in an arena: “It’s all about speed because there’s a lot of people involved. With orchestras, you can’t do a regular soundcheck and listen to each individual instrument, or even sections. I find it much easier and in a way less pressured if you get everybody to consider it as a rehearsal, and I just play catch up and put the faders up as and when I’m ready.

“For Hans Zimmer he has 262 inputs, HEADLINER MAGAZINE

which obviously is the upper end, so it’s just about trying to get the workflow right. The beautiful thing about the DiGiCo SD7 is that you can throw anything at it simply because of the screen layout and the amount of fader banks, especially now with the Quantum. You don’t have to worry because if you’ve got some wacky 1950s keyboard set up, you’ll be able to do something with it. When you’re doing shows like The BRIT Awards or the EMAs, you never really know what an artist is going to want until they turn up.”

When preparing for these big shows, Pink prefers to dial in rather than use presets, safe in the knowledge that he’s not going to get bitten by something untoward upon loading up a previous show. His workflow on Hans Zimmer’s shows varies slightly however, depending on the venue. Arenas are generally poor environments for orchestras, so everything is close mic’d, although most orchestral instruments don’t sound as natural when recorded in this way, as Pink explains: “I actually think you need more compression than the norm here, but not in the standard way. Essentially I’m trying to just reduce all dynamics by moving the microphone a metre away.

The main thing I do is bus compression.

There are all the crazy effects; with keyboard players there’s normally about 100 layers in every score of keyboards on a Hans song, and there’s a load of that on the playback. So I effectively have a band or an orchestra and a playback bus, and I run a TC Electronic System 6000 mastering unit across those busses to try and pull them into the same world. It’s more about trying to get some air and openness and then fix any dynamic differences to make it all sit in the same space.”

More recently, Pink has designed audio for Derren Brown’s West End tour

shows, a far cry from Hans Zimmer’s huge orchestral ensembles. He reveals that these are the best shows to do tech and dress rehearsals, because the only people in the audience are the LD, the production manager, and himself.

“And of course, it’s all audience participation, so you just end up having weird things done to you the whole day!” Pink exclaims. “For obvious reasons he likes to keep his team small, but I sort of know 95% of how he does what he does, which makes the last 5% even more bonkers!”

“it’s quite nice to keep grounded in the fact that everything you learn is so experience-based...”

For Derren’s shows, it’s just one person on stage talking, yet because of the way his stories and magic intertwine, the audio needs to be of great natural quality and beautifully distributed.

What makes it all work is the intimacy between the performer and the audience. As he explained to Pink, he wants it to feel like he’s chatting to people in his living room, which can prove quite tricky: “The sonic excellence that you get with the DiGiCos with the onboard tools can achieve that,” remarks Pink. “I do it on an SD11 because I don’t need the channel count and processing power of an SD7. Those shows need that intimacy and clarity more so than the larger music shows. They have very different needs, but the fundamentals are the same: it needs to sound great.”

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Rytme Of The Night

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Rytme Of The Night

MATOMA Norwegian DJ and producer, Matoma explains how he reimagined Earth Wind & Fire’s iconic anthem, September for his 2020 EP, Rytme.

This time last year, Matoma was touring the globe while continuing to unleash a steady stream of new music. Currently “chilling” at home in Norway, the DJ and producer (real name Tom Lagergren) finds himself in a very different position in 2020 – although he’s grateful for the break in his normally relentless schedule: HEADLINER MAGAZINE

“In some ways it’s good for me because I have had about eight weeks off in the last seven or eight years, so I really felt like I needed it after this amazing tour – although I am still producing music every day.

Even though the current situation is such a tragedy and a lot of people have lost their loved ones, it has given me a new perspective on life, because it’s so easy to get caught up in your own little bubble. People are so consumed with pursuing success, a career, an apartment or a house in

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the city, or getting a vacation home.

All that time goes into making money to buy that, and now it’s all about the connection between people. I find it beautiful that people are the main thing that people are missing. It’s not driving or flying somewhere – it’s the simple things like going to the pub and having a beer with your friends, or having a barbecue and seeing your family members.”

Matoma was a music-oriented kid, learning to play classical piano,

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and then moving on to producing music on a laptop in his bedroom.

After a stint in the military, he went to university in Norway where he became a resident DJ, earned his bachelor’s degree in music production – and assumed he would become a music teacher.

However after his remixes on Soundcloud began to attract an army of listeners, he wanted to see where following that path would lead: “Remixing was a really good opportunity to show people my skills,” he says. “I did that for fun, and my Soundcloud profile started growing. I got really inspired and kept going.”

His 2015 Midnight Sun tour of the United States was largely sold-out and met with a rapturous reception, shortly followed by the RIAA gold certified single, Old Thing Back by Matoma & The Notorious B.I.G. Feat.

Ja Rule & Ralph Tresvant.

Since then, Matoma has busied himself by making waves with his own music, alongside cross-genre collaborations with the likes of Jennifer Lopez, Jason Derulo, Dua Lipa, and The Vamps, as well an array of remixes for Coldplay, One Direction, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and Sean Paul, among others.

“My career has been quite non stop,” he acknowledges. “I’ve non-stop released music for seven years and I’ve released something close to 60 records, but have only put out one album!”

The album in question, One In A Million includes a quartet of worldwide hit singles, including False Alarm (Feat. Becky Hill), Lonely (Feat.

MAX), Slow (Feat. Noah Cyrus) and All Night (Feat. The Vamps) – all of which have now amassed close to a billion total streams.

Matoma vividly remembers the first time he heard False Alarm: “I just remember listening to Becky Hill’s voice. I started crying because I was like, ‘wow, this is really, really special. Holy moly!’ She just opened up her voice, and I was pulled into the song. I wanted to put my touch on it – the Matoma flavour!”

Transfixed by the song and feeling inspired, what followed was an intense day tweaking the track: “The first demo that I did for this was done in a day,” he recalls. “I felt like I was hypnotised by the record!

Suddenly, it had been 24 hours, and I hadn’t eaten or slept; I was just constantly working.

We knew that this was special, and when I met Becky I knew that she was something special because she was so kind and so nice. She has worked so hard to get to the level where she is today.

“The music industry is strange in many ways - just take Billie Eilish: you didn’t know who she was not so long ago,” he points out. “Then in half a year, she was everywhere. When the industry decides they have a person they want to root for, the sky’s the limit!”

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MATOMA

Rytme Of The Night

“I JUST WANT PEOPLE TO LISTEN TO MY MUSIC, BE HAPPY AND FEEL MY LOVE THROUGH THE MUSIC...”

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ARTIST

the bender Recent single release, The Bender sees Matoma team up with singer/ songwriter Brando – reimagining Earth Wind & Fire’s iconic anthem, September. The song is the first track to come from Matoma’s eagerly anticipated new EP, Rytme – meaning ‘rhythm’ in Norwegian.

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years, or any concerts that had blown him away:

audiences feel the same infectious vibrancy instilled in his music:

“I specifically remember one concert,” he recalls. “It was Earth Wind & Fire at the Nobel peace prize concert in Norway. I remember thinking, ‘holy shit, this is so great!’ Brando’s dad knows one of the band members so we reached out to them and asked for their blessing, and that was it!”

“There’s too much shit going on in the world,” he says. “I just want people to listen to my music, be happy and feel my love through the music. My biggest inspiration and my biggest drive is seeing people genuinely having a good time. When I’m playing for people, It’s not the travelling, it’s not being away from home, it’s not the countless hours put into the project that makes me want to do it. It’s my fans and meeting all the people at a concert – I can’t describe it!”

Matoma isn’t too bothered about being stuck at home during lockdown, as he’s been busy in his loft studio – home to his favourite Focal studio monitors (“in terms of value for money, you can’t get any other monitors with that type of range,”) and his Cubase-equipped computer.

“I’m a huge fan of Earth Wind & Fire, and I was trying to schedule a session with Brando for quite some time because I had heard that he was a very talented songwriter, and I just wanted to work with him.”

“I made a decision to start producing when I was 16, and I read all about all the different DAWs. Norwegian production duo, Stargate were using Steinberg’s Cubase, and I wanted to be like them. I love the fact that everything runs so smoothly with Cubase – it’s very reliable. It’s easy to use, but I feel like it’s more accessible, and for me, the workflow is crucial.

It’s amazing and I’m super happy with it – I wouldn’t change it.”

They met up in LA, and Brando asked Matoma if he had any stand-out musical memories from his younger

For now, Matoma is looking forward to playing for crowds around the world again, and to make his

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MARTINS POPELIS

This Time It’s Personal

It’s been seven years since Sonarworks was founded in Riga, Latvia following a chance meeting between two entrepreneurs and HEADLINER MAGAZINE

an innovator. Martins Popelis and Helmuts Bems already shared a lot of history and were on a mission to build their next big, technology-based company when they were introduced to someone who had built a prototype for a speaker measurement and calibration software tool. Their shared passion for audio and music immediately struck some chords, and the rest is (fairly recent) history.

The company’s flagship product — Reference 4 — is a piece of studio monitor and headphone calibration

ey

Already an integral part of recording studios worldwide, Sonarworks is on a mission to revolutionise the sound experience, bridging the gap between music artists and listeners. We go behind the brand with one of the company’s co-founders, Martins Popelis, who brings us up to speed on the Sonarworks journey so far.

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software, designed to help music creators translate their mix in the most accurate way possible, serving as a powerful music making tool.

“The idea for this started when that entrepreneurial drive and passion collided with our vision to build a speaker measurement and calibration technology,” explains Popelis. “We love music and we play some instruments, but we’re not really creators of music in terms of our history. None of the core team members have ever been actively involved in the music creation scene as ex-engineers or producers, and so that kind of kept our minds fairly open about what we could do with it. We soon established that the most reasonable place to start would be with music creators, for which we could deliver the most value with the technology.”

Popelis doubled down on this fact, and during the company’s first year spent a significant amount of time living in New York and LA, observing how music creators work in the studio: “I listened to a lot of feedback from users to try and get beneath their skin, and really understand how to balance this potentially revolutionary product with

streamlining workflows, in order to position it in a way where it can be brought to the market,” says Popelis.

“At the time when we started this digital room tuning and speaker calibration, it was not something that was widely accepted, and was still a very new thing.”

The company subsequently developed Reference 2, but after some fine tuning and demoing through further engagement with end users, it was evident that the product was not fully ready for the masses.

“I think the actual turning point was when we met our head of design who is a UX/UI expert,” Popelis recalls. “He came with a very fresh and clean perspective on the user interface and after putting together all of those insights that we had learned from the market and the technology, we decided that this new version was actually so much better than the previous. We finally felt like we were onto something, so we made the decision to postpone our active push into the market for a few more months so that we could redo the user interface.”

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The decision proved to be the right one, because once the third version of Reference hit the market, it took off very quickly indeed. This was soon further developed into the current Reference 4 product, a patented data-driven technology that — based on the largest research project ever conducted — creates the most comprehensive user sound profile possible, which can be used across multiple devices and platforms.

“I think we have been quite lucky because of where we’re based in Northern Europe, and I believe Latvia has been among the top countries in terms of how well we’ve been coping during the pandemic,” says Popelis.

“We had a minor, pretty mild lockdown in the first month and now it’s kind of back to normal except for international travel. We’ve been doing really well as a team throughout lockdown, and I think with the type of people we have on board, we really caught on to this working from home and working over distance mode surprisingly quickly. “I was expecting it to be a lot harder, but now I think everybody has actually become more productive, and our teamwork has in many ways improved.”

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This Time It’s Personal

While the pandemic has suddenly forced music creators out of the studio, this seems to have worked in Sonarworks’ favour: “If you have to work from home or some environment that you’re not acoustically familiar with, a product like ours is a super helpful way of keeping your mixes and music productions up to scratch in terms of audio quality.”

In terms of new products, the company has something coming from its Reference product line, which it has been working on intensively since the beginning of this year as part of its push into the broader music lover and music listener market, as Popelis explains: “With the Reference product, we ultimately have solved the sound colouration problem in the music creator space, which really helps music creators across the globe create tracks that translate better - but when we talk about this term translate, this still means that it sounds different on all the separate devices out there. Our ultimate dream is to solve the problem of translation at its core, and to do that we understand that we need to bring the listener part of the equation into the picture as well.”

When it comes to listening to music, hearing ability of course differs from one person to the next, and therefore sound preferences tend to vary massively across the board.

“End listeners prefer different flavours in sound, so from that insight we have now built and launched SoundID, a personalisation technology product that uses a mobile app and smart algorithms to learn users’ individual sound preferences and create a unique sound profile for them, which can then be delivered on any SoundID enabled device eventually,” says Popelis.

Sonarworks first launched the SoundID product at last year’s CES, and has continued to work behind the scenes to integrate the technology into a range of different consumer audio products, some of which we will hopefully see on the market before the end of the year.

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“In a year’s time, I would love for us to have really established and demonstrated this use case of how the translation problem is removed from the music creation process altogether when you can create music on the reference sound in the studio, and then as a listener actually experience personalised sound across a range of different consumer products already on the market,” Popelis concedes. “I think being able to demonstrate that with an initial say, 10 products on the market would really be a nice achievement for the next year.

Aside from working tirelessly on a number of innovative new products, Sonarworks has been redefining its core company values and growing its team in a bid to maintain full efficiency throughout the pandemic.

“One of the core values that I think has always been at the very heart of Sonarworks is truthfulness - we always try to talk, understand, and see things as they are,” Popelis tells us.

“We prioritise truthfulness over just saying things for the sake of it. We have some fantastic people with great inter-team relationships; we always try to be politely honest with each other, and without being needlessly harsh of course! That’s one of the leading values that we’ve always been driven by.”

Rather fittingly, this sentiment coincides nicely with what the company is currently building - a product designed to bring out the truth in sound and music by removing some of its unwanted colouration.

“Another thing that we have always prided ourselves on is ambition,” Popelis concludes. “We’ve always wanted to build something big that can actually be used to help people all over the world, so I think that has also been driving us quite a bit in terms of our choices and vision behind the product.”

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Gone With The Flow

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Music meets art in an exciting new collaborative project which sees alternative rock duo, Para Lia partner with New York-based painter, Louis Renzoni to create an album that is intrinsically linked with the artist’s exploration of light and dark.

Growing up in Falkenberg in former East Germany, Para Lia’s Rene Methner dreamed of one day escaping his confines and getting his music to like-minded people in ‘The West’, but also working with them.

With new album Gone With The Flow – recorded with his fellow band member and wife, Cindy – he has done just that, but now unexpectedly finds himself locked down again.

Despite the current constraints, the alternative rock duo has teamed up with New York visual artist, Louis Renzoni on a joint project that sees not only a new album from Para Lia, but also an art exhibition. The exhibition was slated to open in gallery space in New York before transferring to Berlin and then London, but now a bespoke online set up will circumvent the current situation and make the work available globally.

For Methner, collaborating with artists from different corners of the world is a dream come true: “You have to imagine, I grew up in East Germany, so when I was a child I never dreamed I would come into contact with musicians from all over the word, or an artist from New York City,” he explains. “It just would not have seemed possible at that time – it’s very cool!”

Methner vividly remembers developing a strong passion for music from the age of 11, getting the musical bug after performing New Order’s Blue Monday on stage at a holiday camp – brandishing makeshift guitars made of paper.

Getting his hands on a real guitar of his own when he was 16, and inspired by The Pixies, Nirvana, Pearl Jam and The Smashing Pumpkins, he hasn’t put it down since.

Methner met his now-wife in 2014, and he soon discovered that their voices perfectly complemented one another: “If you want to light a fire, one spark is needed, and Cindy was the spark who came into my life,” he reminisces. “It was a few years until I asked her to sing into a mic though. I had this one song that I was working on and I wanted to try it out with her voice. From that moment on, Para Lia was born, because she was exactly what the song needed – and what the music needed. I also call her my muse; Cindy makes Para Lia complete and is the cherry on top of our music.”

Describing Para Lia as more of a studio band rather than a live one (for now, anyway), Methner says that the duo’s name takes its meaning from the greek word, Paralia – meaning beach or coastline.

“Greece is a special country; I always feel like I’m coming home when I go to Greece. Also, the band I was in when I was 18 needed a name,” he adds. “Me and the guys

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in the band had a discussion with a glass of German beer in hand about the name – we discussed it for

nights and nights, and we landed on The Shuttlecocks. It is one of the most stupid band names in history!” he laughs. “This is what happened when we discussed it for a very, very long time! So what I did with Cindy was, we were at the beach in the evening and we just said, ‘we have to give the band a name: Para Lia? Yes!’ And that was it!”

Upon discovering each other online, Para Lia and artist Renzoni quickly struck up a dialogue that set the scene for not only friendship, but also for collaboration. The plan was hatched for Renzoni’s next exhibition to be soundtracked by the music from Gone With The Flow, with the album itself also boasting images from him, as well as songs directly inspired from the visual art.

“Louis got in touch and said that he listened to our music and that he almost fell out of his chair because our music paints with these subtle layers and tones,” says Methner.

“He paints in the same way I paint with music, so we had conversations about art and music and about understanding philosophy. I was inspired by his work to write songs for the new album.”

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Gone With The Flow

The result is Gone With The Flow, which is the exploration between light and dark. Inspired by Renzoni’s work, the album weaves in the artist’s vision of complexity and layers, and hopes to encourage the listener to interpret its meaning, as people do with pieces of art.

Renzoni sowed the seed for the album’s lead track, Riders On The Dike with one of his exhibitions in New York – the track acting as the light to the dark of the accompanying album track, Children Of The Flood, which features singer Amanda Kim Sanderson.

Although Methner doesn’t have a favourite track on the new album, My Muse does hold a special place in his heart: “Louis painted a picture, which directly inspired this song – you can tell that the person who wrote this song really understands this painting, and there is a connection between the two artists expressing themselves. I wanted to express the importance of an artist having a muse too, because an artist without his own personal muse is

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nothing. Every song is something very personal. The most beautiful compliment I got is from Cindy, who after she listened to each song, said she can see us in each one.”

Gone With The Flow was formally released on 2 October 2020, one day before the 30th anniversary of Germany’s Reunification.

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