Performer Magazine: December/January 2019 Issue

THE MUSICIAN ’S RESO URCE

DEC./JAN. ‘19 FREE

7 TIPS TO BOOST FAN ENGAGEMENT INSIDE THE MUSIC MODERNIZATION ACT

JOHN5

Veteran axe-slinger on turning your stage show into a killer live experience

HOW TO AVOID OVER-EDITING YOUR TRACKS ADVICE FOR REMOTE RECORDING SESSIONS

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

VOLUME 28, ISSUE 6

TABLE OF

cover story

CONTENTS YOUTUBER AGUFISH (HUNTER ENGEL)

20

DEPARTMENTS 4. LETTER FROM THE EDITOR 5. Book Review: Jeff Tweedy’s new memoir 6. How to Attract Sponsors to Your Music 9. Seven Tips to Boost Fan Engagement 10. Feature.fm: Marketing Your Streams 12. The Difference Between Insurance Claims & Lawsuits 14. Tips for Remote Recording Sessions 16. Technique vs. Technology 18. Inside the Music Modernization Act 34. GEAR REVIEWS: PreSonus, Yamaha, Akai, Korg, Electro-Voice, UK Sound and more…

JOHN 5 Cover

Stephanie Cabral

24

ERIC ASTOR OF FURNACE RECORD PRESSING

28

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 3

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

LETTER

from the editor

Volume 28, Issue 6 PO BOX 348 Somerville, MA 02143 CONTACT

Phone: 617-627-9200 Fax: 617-627-9930 PUBLISHER

William House Phone: 617-627-9919 bill@performermag.com EDITOR

Benjamin Ricci ben@performermag.com DESIGN & ART DIRECTION

Cristian Iancu

Howdy, y’all.

EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

Bob Dobalina editorial@performermag.com

Welcome to our first issue of 2019.

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

As I write this, we’ve just heard of the passing of Stan Lee, a monumental figure in the world of the creative arts (to say the least) and a huge influence on my life, personally. Lee’s work has not only inspired generations of kids (and adults) to lose themselves in the wonderment of storytelling, but the many inventive characters and stories he’s come up with over the years have also inspired their fair share of musical moments.

Benjamin Ricci, Chris Devine, Dan Hawkins, Jason Peterson, Josh Carlyle, Lindsay O’Connor, Michael St. James, Serena Dorf

Just think of Joe Satriani’s album cover for Surfing with the Alien. Would we even have “Iron Man” without Iron Man? There’s even an entire song cycle from Prince dedicated to the caped crusader.

OK, I know that last one’s not a Lee creation, but Lee’s spirit and constant cheerleading for the comics industry made it possible for films like 1989’s Batman to enter the mainstream. And for us all to do the Bat Dance. OK, if you don’t buy that, how about Wesley Willis’ classic “I Whipped Spiderman’s Ass” – does that work for you?

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Lee was not only a crusader for the comics industry, and its chief figurehead for decades, he was also a crusader for justice. He penned many columns in Marvel books throughout the years championing civil rights, speaking out against racism and prejudice, and making sure that his readers fought for what was right.

Lee’s 1968 essay, in particular, rings as true today as it did 50 years ago, when he wrote in Stan’s Soapbox:

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS

Nicholas Tolson, Stephanie Cabral, Hunter Engel William House Phone: 617-627-9919 bill@performermag.com © 2018 by Performer Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced by any method whatsoever without the written permission of the publisher.

The magazine accepts no responsibility for unsolicited recordings, manuscripts, artwork or photographs and will not return such materials unless requested and accompanied by a SASE. Annual Subscription Rate is $30 in the U.S.; $45 outside the U.S.

“Bigotry and racism are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today. But, unlike a team of costumed super-villains, they can’t be halted with a punch in the snoot, or a zap from a ray gun. The only way to destroy them is to expose them—to reveal them for the insidious evils they really are…although anyone has the right to dislike another individual, it’s totally irrational, patently insane to condemn an entire race—to despise an entire nation—to vilify an entire religion. Sooner or later, we must learn to judge each other on our own merits. Sooner or later, if man is ever to be worthy of his destiny, we must fill out hearts with tolerance.”

If I was given only one word to say to Stan Lee, it would have to be this, good sir: Excelsior! Excelsior, indeed.

Benjamin Ricci ABOUT US / Performer Magazine, a nationally distributed musician’s trade publication, focuses on independent musicians, those unsigned and on small labels, and their success in a DIY environment. We’re dedicated to promoting lesser-known talent and being the first to introduce you to artists you should know about.

MUSIC SUBMISSIONS / We listen to everything that comes into the office. We prefer physical CDs, cassettes and vinyl over downloads. If you do not have a physical copy, send download links to editorial@performermag.com. No attachments, please.

Send CDs to: Performer Magazine, Attn: Reviews, PO BOX 348, Somerville, MA 02143 CORRECTIONS / Did we make a heinous blunder, factual error or just spell your name wrong? Contact editorial@ performermag.com and let us know, cuz we’re big enough to say, “Baby, I was wrong.”

EDITORIAL SUBMISSIONS / In the words of our esteemed forefathers at CREEM: “NOBODY WHO WRITES FOR THIS RAG’S GOT ANYTHING YOU AIN’T GOT, at least in the way of credentials. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t be sending us your stuff: reviews, features, photos, recording tips, DIY advice or whatever else you have in mind that might be interesting to our readers: independent and DIY musicians. Who else do ya know who’ll publish you? We really will...ask any of our dozens of satisfied customers. Just bop it along to us to editorial@performermag.com and see what comes back your way. If you have eyes to be in print, this just might be the place. Whaddya got to lose? Whaddya got?”

BE SOCIAL! FOLLOW US: PERFORMERMAG.COM

4 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

PERFORMERMAGAZINE

PERFORMERMAG

Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc.

BOOK REVIEW

JEFF TWEEDY

Jason Peterson

(Penguin Random House) Wilco’s frontman goes deep on the band, family, and the importance of a creative life Anyone who has heard a Jeff Tweedy interview or listened to one of his records knows the Wilco frontman is introspective, clever, and dryly funny. That his new memoir shares these traits is no surprise.

What is surprising, based on the somewhat cold exterior Tweedy has projected in Greg Kot’s excellent Wilco: Learning How to Die as well as the two Wilco/Tweedy documentaries, is how much passion (for music, family, and – above all – creativity) bleeds through.

This passion is as illuminating as it is contagious, especially for fellow musicians.

His insights on the value of making art are the backbone of his memoir, featuring heartfelt tales of how music saved his own damaged life and of witnessing the power of art therapy on hardcore drug addicts while in rehab. Tweedy makes a compelling case that everyone has a spark of creativity that can – and should – be ignited.

While this might sound like a cheesy Ted Talk gone alt-country, Tweedy grounds his motivation in thoughtful, self-deprecating stories about music’s outsized impact on his life, along with Wilco’s unique trajectory in the music business.

These stories examine the collaborations and fallouts that have marked Wilco since its inception, and Tweedy doesn’t gloss over the painful moments peppered throughout his life and career, particularly in his relationships with the two Jays (Farrar and Bennett).

Tweedy also sheds light on his own songwriting process, and anyone who has poured over his often cryptic lyrics will be fascinated by his methods. (One particularly interesting passage deep dives into the “I assassin down the avenue” line from “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart”). Songwriters can learn from his songa-day discipline and unconventional writing exercises.

It’s no coincidence that Tweedy’s new solo album – a companion piece to this memoir – is titled WARM. The album’s

lyrics, included at the end of Let’s Go…, show a writer comfortable, perhaps for the first time, with laying his emotions on the table.

Let’s Go… strips away the cryptic and cold in

favor of the straightforward and warm, and it’s a welcome, inspiring place to be.

For more info, head to wilcoworld.net.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 5

MUSIC BUSINESS

How to Present Your Music Ideas Creatively to Attract Sponsors ideas to sponsors is to be creative! Nobody likes boring presentations, you’ll agree, especially for the music industry. There are so many ways to present your ideas creatively.

Here are a few.

T

here are many ways to attract sponsors. You can directly contact them, or you can attract them through your online presence. Yet, it’s easy to say, but how to do it?! How to reach sponsors and where to find them? How to present your music ideas creatively to attract sponsors?

Don’t worry, here’s a couple of tips.

Create a compelling proposal to present your music ideas to sponsors If you decide to directly contact the sponsor, you need to create a really powerful presentation that will leave a great first impression. Don’t forget that sponsors get a lot of proposals competing for their dollars. Therefore, your presentation must be really exceptional. It’s very likely that you will have only one opportunity to present your music ideas to draw their attention to take you into consideration for sponsoring.

If you succeed in that, everything else is much easier.

The more appealing presentation you create, the more likely sponsors will select you. But, how to create an appealing presentation? It’s not easy, indeed, but, with little effort and creativity, you will surely succeed. If you still need a writing service to create compelling presentations for music sponsors – check out Handmade Writing.

They are professionals in this field. The first impression is the most important. Keep that in mind!

Present your music ideas creatively The golden rule in presenting your music 6 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

For example, you can combine written and video content for better effects. You can present your band and music at the same time. Say a few words about your band while your music plays in the background. You can also present your new song, or you can make a mix of your tracks and/or upload images from your concerts.

If you are planning to organize a live event, explain all the details - where and when it will take place, what the event will look like, emphasize benefits for sponsors, and what you expect from them. If you plan to demo music equipment, make sure you can coherently explain the product benefits and why sponsors should choose to work with you instead of other artists.

Be concise, but direct, yet creative!

Of course, don’t forget to encourage sponsors to get in touch with you, even if they don’t want to cooperate with you at the moment. You may still be able to persuade them to change their minds later. For the beginning - establish communication! Later it will be much easier to contact them again when they know who you are.

Use your website and social media to present your music ideas Although producing good music is your main priority, you need to use content marketing to promote your music and attract new sponsors.

Keep in mind - if you are not present online, it’s like you don’t exist at all. So, start writing content at once, and tell a compelling story or provide relevant information for others in your field.

As your music should speak instead of you, be sure to utilize video-based content. This is one of the best ways to present your musical ideas creatively to attract sponsors and leads. Through video, you can say much more than by mere words alone.

Also, use infographics and visual aids whenever possible. You can, for example, post photos with your fans, images from your concerts

or your rehearsal sessions. You can also present your content in an infographic by giving your audience information about you, your music, and your concerts, or by producing infographics about other interesting topics that you’ve researched, even if they aren’t directly related to your band. Show them how to play an instrument, for example, or help them to record music or give a history lesson in pictures. Become an expert and you’ll become an indispensable resource.

Don’t forget to share your content on social media. Not only will you attract sponsors and an audience in this way, but you will also increase your organic traffic and your rankings on search engines. Thus, you will get more inbound leads.

This is a sure path to attract more sponsors.

Engage with your followers. Your followers will further share your content and you will leverage their amplification of your brand and content to position you better when it comes to approaching endorsement deals or reaching out to potential sponsors.

Final Thoughts Keep in mind – it’s not enough to have great music, it’s also important how you will present your band and brand to your audience and sponsors. Given the large competition in the music industry, you simply must be unique. Who are you? Why do you stand out? What’s in it for the sponsor to begin a relationship with you?

If you already have some sponsors, you should stay in touch with them, of course, but this doesn’t prevent you from seeking new partners to work with. If you are not sure where to find sponsors, check what your competitors (aka other bands vying for the spotlight) are doing.

Their partners might be interested in sponsoring you as well. You never know.

Good luck out there, and be sure to write in and share your success stories!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Josh Carlyle is a music enthusiast and experienced writer, who is creating and editing content at Writing Guru. He covers different topics lying in the convergence of music, business strategies, and educational innovations.

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s a musician, you probably already use social media to promote your songs, invite people to your gigs, and grab the attention of new fans.

MUSIC BUSINESS

7 Tips For Boosting Social Media Engagement for Musicians But, are you satisfied with your performance on social media? Does it help you sell more tickets to your concerts or gain more fans? Does it help you build the relationship with people from the music industry?

If not, then it’s time to change the strategy and drive more engagement to your social networks which will help you grow your career and build a strong relationship with more fans.

Here are seven actionable tips that you can apply right away.

1. Ask questions or take polls This tactic for boosting social media engagement is so simple, and probably that’s the reason why it’s often overlooked.

Ask your fans a question, for example: - What song are you listening now? I need some inspiration.

Also, you can create a poll and ask your followers what song they would like to hear at your concert, for instance.

However, try to sound natural as if you were chatting with your old friends because otherwise, people will sniff out artificiality, or that you’re pretending to care.

2. Keep your fans posted Don’t be shy to share the good and exciting news with your fans. After all, self-promotion is the main reason musicians use social media.

So, make sure you share the dates of your next tours and concerts or updates on your new song or album. Likewise, you can create posts with posters of your tour or cover of your album.

Your fans will appreciate keeping them in the loop and keep coming back for more news.

3. Share the content of your fans Not only will this strategy increase your engagement on social networks, but it will also drive worth of mouth, which is the best promotion.

Share photos from your fans from concerts or covers of your songs on your Facebook page. That way, you’ll show appreciation to your fans.

You’ll also further encourage your followers

to create content around your act, and share their photos and videos from gigs or anything else related to your music.

4. Take advantage of pinned posts It’s surprising how few musicians use pinned posts when it’s an excellent tool for driving engagement.

Depending on your goal, choose a post you’d like to pin. For instance, if you’re looking for a new manager pin a video from your concert or if you think that one of your posts went unnoticed, pin it and increase its exposure. Also, announcements of your gigs or upcoming albums are perfect for pinned posts so they remain at the top of your feed.

In other words, pin news that is important to you so that anybody who visits your page for the first time (or even repeat visitors) has a chance to see it.

forget to write a description for each video and add links and tags. No video? No problem; upload a slideshow set to your track or create a lyric video that doesn’t require any filmed footage.

Your music needs to be searchable on YouTube, so make it happen any way you can.

This is a great avenue for cross promotion and driving engagement to a specific channel.

5. Behind-the-scenes content Your fans love behinds-the-scenes posts!

That way, they can have a sneak peek at your life and current events. Also, it’s a great way to show your personality and for fans to get to know the real you.

Simply take a photo when you’re working on a new song in the studio or record the preparations for your gig.

This type of post will not only save you when you don’t have anything ready to publish, but it will boost your social media engagement as well.

7. Share your events Last but not least, Anne from EssayOnTime adds useful advice for boosting your social media engagement: “Don’t only create posts, it can be timeconsuming for a busy musician. Instead, share your shows or events you’ve published on Facebook. It’s a fantastic reminder that won’t be buried under tons of other posts. Also, don’t forget to tag all the people involved in that manifestation and in that way increase its visibility.”

In the end, choose the strategy that suits best your personality and brand.

Whether you opt for sharing some behindthe-scenes posts or the content of your fans, or you go for interacting with your followers and keeping them in the loop with a pinned post, you’ll most certainly notice a drastic increase in your social media engagement. Also, make sure you optimize your YouTube page and share your events with the world for a complete success.

People already love your music, they’ll be looking forward to getting to know you better and communicate with you on social networks.

6. Optimize your YouTube channel People are usually more familiar with YouTube than any other music-specific platform.

That’s why you should be present on the platform, even if you don’t have a slick music video.

That said, make sure you upload all your videos and organize playlists. Likewise, don’t

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Serena Dorf is an enthusiastic content writer. She is passionate about writing, personal development, psychology, and productivity. In her free time, she is reading classic American literature and learning Swedish. Feel free to connect with her on Twitter @DorfSerena.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 9

MUSIC BUSINESS

M

u s i c streaming has changed the landscape of the music business greatly for consumers, labels, and for artists too. Obviously, for consumers it’s an amazing way to have the world’s music at their fingertips, in their pockets, accessible from basically anywhere in the world they may go. But, if your band doesn’t come up as recommended or playlisted, how do you stand out? This is especially true when bands are trying to push a new release rather than an established track already on the platform that has been gobbled up by the algorithm and regurgitated into those coveted playlists and “Play Next” spots.

The old way of releasing music used to provide a lead time of six months, mostly for

printing and some for marketing, and then getting singles to radio, review copies to press outlets, and pushing pre-orders; but those days are gone, which is actually a good thing.

The new way of releasing music for many artists is by just finishing their tracks, mastering them (hopefully), then uploading to a distributor who can ensure those tracks are live within a day, sometimes even quicker than that. As cool as that sounds, your band is being thrown into the sea of 40 million tracks, and with the hundreds -or even thousands - of new releases that same week.

A few years ago, Forbes estimated that number topped over 3,000 new albums per week being ingested into Spotify alone.

Another issue is that bands used to make a statement that the album was publicly available on a certain date. This worked in a world where fans could just go to their local record shop, big box store, or even pick up a physical copy at your show. That’s also changed. Some of your fans only

use Spotify, some are on Apple Music, some are on Deezer, some only buy from Bandcamp, and so on.

So, how can you make your release stand out in a digital world, cater to different fans on different platforms, and generate a little magic before your music drops?

These are the challenges that Feature.fm - a music-marketing startup - is designed to address.

The company has worked with many major labels and acts, but is free to try and their monthly subscriptions are priced affordably enough for independents, too.

It is free to join, and I’ll give you a link at the bottom of this article for a free 14 day trial of Marketing Pro. Just like bit.ly, Smart Links is a function that gives you a way to organize and direct your fans to their favorite streaming service by using a

Feature.fm - M YOUR STREAM 10 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

MUSIC BUSINESS customized link that connects to a landing page displaying multiple click-throughs.

Spotify as they are logged in directly through the API.

Artists can create a Smart Link Standard Landing page for music you have already released, a Scheduled Release page for music that is not released yet triggered by a date of release, and Pre-Save Pre-Order page to be shared prior to your release.

You have the option to reward fans with exclusive content, contest entries, and more that gets unlocked after they click the action.

All the major services have their own PreSave function, but Feature.fm makes it easy to create one page called the Ultimate Pre-Save which works for all of them. Again, this is so important to make sure you capture all of your existing fans on the platforms they already subscribe to.

Through Action Pages, you can combine Smart Links and the Pre-Save function within a landing page that goes even further. Entice your fans to pre-save, pre-add, follow, or take other cool actions directly in Apple Music or

Here’s where is gets good -- when your fans or strangers click Pre-Save, Save, or Follow Playlist, they will also follow your artist profile; so, you not only capture them for streams but also gain in the coveted followers count without spamming. If you want to go a little deeper into marketing, Feature.fm also allows you to gain insights into your audience with analytics such as Location, Age, Spotify Profiles, Follower Numbers and more.

These tools are great for any artist at any level, and can be accomplished with no money in most cases, and very little monthly fees for more robust data.

Feature.fm also has deeper marketing services like Ad Campaigns, but a word of caution. I am all for trying everything you can do to get in front of listeners, but the best way to do it is organically. If you pay for a music marketing ad campaign (through any company, including Feature.fm), start small with less than $100 for the campaign and measure it before you go any further. Depending on your genre and the release itself, it might be a good thing for your situation.

Just don’t go spending 100s or 1000s of dollars and expect it to make you a hit; it rarely if ever does so.

Here is the link - give the free tools a try, and here’s to a happy release! http://bit.ly/featurefmperformermag ABOUT THE AUTHOR Michael St. James is the founder and creative director of St. James Media, specializing in music licensing, publishing, production and artist development.

- MARKETING AMS PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 11

MUSIC BUSINESS

INSURANCE BASICS: WH BETWEEN A CLAIM AND

A

few months back, we posed a question to our readership, asking if they had any entertainment insura nce-related questions that they wanted answered in the pages of Performer. In our last two installments, we tried to break down a number of insurance terms with examples that any musician could understand. In this installment, we’re tackling a very specific question we received enough times to warrant its own response: what exactly is the difference between an insurance claim and a lawsuit? In both cases, someone’s “claiming” I’m responsible for damages and they want restitution, right? Well, let’s take a look at the basic definitions of each, how they differ, and how they apply to live musicians.

agreement. They cannot settle the claim, as it were. That’s not good. That’s when courts and lawyers may get involved, and a lawsuit may ensue. Put simply, a lawsuit arises when the two parties aren’t able to come to an amicable agreement on their own.

What’s a Claim?

The best place to start is to define “claim” when it comes to the world of entertainment insurance. A claim is basically a request. That’s all, just think of it as someone asking the insurer for payment to make them whole again after a loss. Now, that loss could be property damage, injury, what have you. But a claim is made and then processed by the insurance provider based upon whether they feel the policy they provided covers the actual inciting event. Now, that’s an oversimplification, and processing claims is an entirely different matter (whether the claim gets paid or not may take some time and effort on both sides), but right now we’re just interested in what the claim actually is.

Next, you’d hope that the club owner and your insurance provider can settle that claim, and everyone can move on with their lives and put this in the rearview mirror. If that doesn’t happen, you might be facing phase two: lawsuit time.

What’s a Lawsuit?

Here’s where things get more complicated and can escalate to the next level. Let’s say the party who suffered the loss wants to be compensated for their damages. OK, fair enough.

A claim is probably filed. Simple, right? That gets processed by the insurance provider in question (let’s go back to the simple example of you, the artist, being the insured party who caused property damage to a club on stage, and your insurance company is the one providing you with a policy with certain coverage options).

It would need to get pretty bad, in most cases, to get to a courtroom trial. They carry a lot of risk, a lot of headaches and a LOT of expenses. Hourly rates for lawyers add up quickly, so if you’re in the defendant’s seat, you must have done something REALLY wrong for the club owner to shell out all those fees to see you in court.

Now, for the sake of argument, let’s say the wronged party (the club’s owner) and the insurance company cannot come to an 12 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

The ideal result, usually, is to have the claim settled before it reaches that point. As a musician, you don’t want to get dragged into a legal battle in front of a judge when you’d rather be spending time on your career. That’s why you opted for insurance in the first place.

First Things First So, let’s get the order of things straight.

First, let’s assume some form of damage occurs.

Maybe you injure a fan due to reckless on-stage behavior, or maybe you bust up the floorboards of the stage. Doesn’t matter. Either way, a claim is going to be filed. That’s the first step.

Key Differences and Risks Involved The key difference here is that claims don’t involve judges, juries, courthouses, or anything like that. A judge isn’t presiding over any of the proceedings, juries aren’t making any decisions as to the merits of the case, or guilt and innocence, and typically you’re not dealing with attorneys building cases against you in open court.

The risk here is that a lawsuit can get thrown out, and there’s still legal fees to pay on both sides. Claims don’t come with the same risks attached. There’s no real risk in filing a claim. It might get rejected and not get paid, but those are the breaks. In certain instances, if the club owner decides to file a lawsuit against you and LOSES, then they may be responsible for certain legal

fees you’ve incurred as part of the process. That doesn’t exist in the claims phase, so bringing about a lawsuit carries serious financial risks that must be taken into account.

There’s also the risk that higher courts could overturn rulings on appeal. And the risks to reputations when lawsuits are filed, and so on… the point is that lawsuits come with their own

Benjamin Ricci

baggage that claims do not. Which is why, in a lot of cases, it’s beneficial for everyone to try their best to address and settle claims and not let things escalate if they don’t need to.

But, you’re not going to do anything that would bring about damages in the first place.

Right?

FOR MORE INFO… You’ve heard us repeat it a million times, but to be sure, always check over your policy and ask your provider to answer any questions you may have. The best policy (no pun intended) is consult a professional whenever you’re in doubt. Stay safe out there

MUSIC BUSINESS

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE ND A LAWSUIT?

and look for more tips in the months ahead.

In the meantime, if you’re shopping around for entertainment insurance, check out kandkinsurance.com – you may qualify to get a quote or even purchase insurance online.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 13

MUSIC BUSINESS

GETTING STARTE REMOTE RECORD

I

’ve been recording bass guitar and double bass remotely for nearly ten years and what I’ve noticed is that more and more people are using these kinds of services every year. It used to be that even pro musicians I work with were surprised about remote sessions but, now, many talented musicians 14 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

across the world offer their services online. This article explains some of the key tips to doing it successfully as well as what clients are generally looking for.

Remote session services are incredibly useful for library, TV and film composers who need recordings quickly and within budget. Since they don’t need to hire a studio and deal with all

the associated costs, they can get the musician to work whilst they continue to work against their deadlines. Amateur and hobby musicians are a huge market. They get to have world class performances on their projects in a way that would have been prohibitive a few years ago.

Clients generally look for a few things; communication and trust being very important.

MUSIC BUSINESS

TED WITH RDING SESSIONS Learn How to Succeed and Know What Clients Want be especially aware of what the client wants from you and when they want it by. I had a situation where a producer was presenting a song to a record company in the afternoon and needed a very last-minute bass line to add some life to a demo. I needed to record and send the bass line within an hour for him to be able to add it to his mix and being easily contactable allowed me to do that.

Offering a wide choice of gear to get a specific tone is important. I use what I think will be the best gear for the job but clients sometimes like having a choice. It goes without saying that the gear should be well maintained and ready to go.

I find my 1978 Fender Precision Bass works for many jobs, but I own a range of bass instruments of one kind or another. That enables me to offer double bass, electric upright, fretless, 6 string, acoustic bass guitar or a particular vintage tone.

The point is that, as a session player, you need to be able to play a lot of styles and sound authentic at the same time.

Being easily contactable at all times gives the client peace of mind. It sounds obvious but getting back to a client quickly is also vital. As you are obviously not physically with them, you need them to trust that you will be professional. Time keeping (in the non-playing sense!) is perhaps the easiest way to show that you are someone to be taken seriously. You are also part of an important musical collaboration and - being remote - need to

You need to be prepared to morph into different working situations to suit a project and be able to adapt to different personalities and ways of working. You can find yourself working with top professionals as well as hobby musicians. The latter can be the most inspiring to work with as they are extremely passionate about their projects. But they may not always be able to communicate what they want you to play as well as the pros can, and their backing tracks may not be as polished. You have to adapt to the different situations you are presented with. A film composer once sent me a 3000 bar Logic file with an accompanying PDF of the score; scary looking but extremely useful and therefore relatively straightforward. I’ve also received backing tracks that were played more

or less completely free form, without a click and lacking in harmonic content. You have to get the job done regardless.

You never want to rush a session, but people want their audio files quickly, so they can get on with the production of their tracks. This is especially true of the TV, film and library composers I work with. Being able to record to a very high standard and get the files across in a short time period is essential. This is very convenient for clients in places like America and the Far East (I’m in London) as they can wake up with a new recording in their inbox to approve and suggest amendments.

Finally, treat it like a business. Whilst the process is undoubtedly creative and fun, as an online session player you are the engineer, player, fixer, coder, web designer, manager and sometimes producer. You are involved in every step from securing the work in the first place to getting paid, offering discounts, working on the SEO of the site, etc. You must be prepared to work at it, learn new skills you never thought you would need (or even knew existed!) and be passionate about giving it your very best each and every time you hit record.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dan Hawkins has been recording bass guitar and double bass remotely (online) since 2010.

He has played on over 1000 tracks for hundreds of clients all over the world. Online Bass Player is a quick, pain free and affordable way to get professionally recorded bass on your music. All kinds of people use the service and Dan’s bass has been heard on TV, films, jingles, EPs, albums and demos from enthusiastic home studio musicians to top industry professionals. For more info, head to www.onlinebassplayer.com.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 15

MUSIC BUSINESS

TECHNIQUE VS. TECHNOLOGY HOW TO AVOID OVEREDITING YOUR TUNES

M

usic and technolog y are not exactly s t r a n g e bedfellows - after all, instr uments are a type of technology themselves, and innovations in the last century or so has made it possible for creatives from all disciplines to capture their ideas faster and share them with bigger audiences.

The last couple of decades have seen the way we record sound, and what we’re able to do with it after, evolve dramatically. While some will argue in favor of analog over digital recording, certainly, cutting tape with razor blades and splicing it back together with adhesive is something of a relic.

Now, thanks to digital, we’re able to quickly nip and tuck recordings, arrange songs in seconds, 16 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

and write entire albums using only virtual instruments. But, with all of the time stretching, autotuning, pitch shifting, and quantizing going on, one has to wonder if recorded music is becoming a little too perfect.

“There was definitely a period in the mid 2000s when music sounded overly edited,” says producer and owner of Flatline Audio, Dave Otero (pictured, opposite page). “[Recording] technology has gone through a large arch of possibilities, and the increased affordability of these options has seen music change in reactive ways.”

Otero, who has produced a number of benchmark metal albums from the likes of Cattle Decapitation, Cephalic Carnage, Archspire, and others, says that while the increased horsepower in recording tech allows bands to innovate and helps producers provide a more polished product, there’s also a flipside: “Technology has [also made some bands] lazy - they started coming into my

studio a little less prepared to record, thinking they could just fix mistakes later.”

When “Fixing It in the Mix” Goes Wrong “The mindset has shifted to people expecting there to be trickery and ‘studio magic’ from the get-go,” says Berlin-based producer and Defeated Sanity guitarist Tom Geldschläger (pictured above). “The thought of five people playing together in a room with no overdubs is completely alien to many metal musicians. I feel this leads to an over-reliance on studio technology.”

Geldschläger adds that the “just fix it in the mix” mentality is one of the main reasons that modern music, especially Hard Rock and Heavy Metal, is starting to sound inauthentic. “When I listen to what gets released nowadays, maybe one band in ten sounds even remotely like human beings.”

Although the use of studio tech can be used to refine imperfect performances, Geldschläger

MUSIC BUSINESS

and Otero both agree that a primary reason for its overuse boils down to musicians simply being unprepared to record in the first place.

“I’m always surprised at the fact that a lot of people are going into the studio not being able to play their own songs from start to finish,” confesses Geldschläger.

“These days, it’s more common than not that bands have never even played their parts together,” Otero adds. “People live across the world from each other and share files, and may have never played in the same room -- that’s not an optimal way to record.”

The Solution “Pretend these tools don’t exist,” Otero says. “Rehearse and prepare as if the recording depended on you for the whole song.”

Geldschläger also explains that bands should “play together as often as possible and work on [their] overall performance, instead of leaving it up to the engineer to ‘make it work.’ An overedited and lifeless performance as a result of insufficient preparation will always drag the overall product down, no matter how good the mix is.”

But responsibility doesn’t lie solely with the band - producers and engineers have to step up and clearly communicate their expectations.

“I have a chat with bands the first time I work with them. I discuss what I expect them to be able to do,” Otero says. “And when I’ve worked with a band multiple times, I’ll give them feedback based on the last session. For example, one band I worked with recorded guitar solos, but never bothered to learn to play them. The result was really sterile recording. So, I said, ‘next time, you have to be able to play your solos all the way through, without looking at your music.’”

Adds Geldschläger: “I think both [producer and band] have to respect each other and value what the other brings to the table...The best and most rewarding projects for me have been those where artist, producer, and engineers were working together with a shared vision.”

What about bands that record on their own - how can they avoid over editing their music?

“Try and consider your performance and engineering as two separate roles,” Otero suggests. “If you’re doing it yourself, you want your notes to be clean and your set to be clean, but you also need to be able to zoom out and listen to the whole thing in context, and make sure it sounds cohesive.”

Otero also adds that “when you’re recording and you’re trying to get the perfect take, you’re

hypersensitive to everything, and the smallest mistake will be amplified. You have to remember, however, that the people listening to your music aren’t all musicians or producers - they’re not going to hear all of the things that producers are going to hear.”

I miss hearing singers gasp for breath in between verses and sweaty palms sweep up and down guitar necks - is there still room for quirks like these on modern recordings?

“Yes, of course. You’re always going to want those quirks,” Otero says. “Those moments where the high hat stays open just a little longer, or the guitar player bends a note a little longer... those sorts of things are special moments.”

“Personally, I try to keep the performances as pure as possible and only use editing, samples or pitch-correction when it’s really necessary or the client is insisting on it,” Geldschläger says.

“What tends to happen if you use too much studio magic too often is that everything ends up sounding the same, but it’s precisely our little quirks and inconsistencies as human beings that make a record sound unique and timeless.”

Tools of the Trade When it comes to “gearing up” for recording, both Otero and Geldschläger cite Cubase as a

preferred DAW: “I exclusively use Steinberg Cubase and Wavelab on all my projects, alongside some hardware gear like DAW controllers, pre-amps and interfaces,” says Geldschläger. “I worked with most other DAWs in different studios over the years, but Cubase is where I feel most ‘at home’ and have the fastest workflow.”

“All of the professional tools out there... they’re all pretty standard. But, whenever I can, I stay in Cubase,” Otero adds.

And as far as plug-ins, go, “I pretty much go for whatever gets the job done, no matter whether that is stuff that I paid for (like the Waves, Fabfilter or Slate plug-in suites, which I use daily) or free tools like Nova or SlickEQ,” Geldschläger says. “I will spend a lot of time trying to get the cleanest, biggest-sounding and emotionally engaging mix that I can, usually using tons of automation, active EQ and sidechain compression to make sure everything has space in the mix and every detail is audible. I’ve never been big on high-end recording gear – it’s nice to have it, but in my personal experience, a great-sounding product depends much more on the arrangement and on the mix than on fancy preamps and expensive microphones.”

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MUSIC BUSINESS

The Metadata Modernization Act (Yes, You Read That Right)

B

y now, I’m hoping you know that the most comprehensive overhaul of music copyright law and licensing in a generation is now the law of the land.

Officially, it is called the Orrin G. Hatch–Bob Goodlatte Music Modernization Act, or Music Modernization Act, or simply MMA (no, not that MMA).

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I know that this legal stuff can be as boring as 7-hour drive on a summer tour through West Texas with a broken air conditioner, and especially when Congress gets involved it can be hard to keep apprised of what was actually passed.

Here’s a primer: The MMA encompasses three pieces of legislation. First, the CLASSICS act, which now ensures that songwriters and artists will receive royalties on songs recorded before 1972. Second, the AMP Act, which

improves royalty payouts for producers and engineers from SoundExchange when their recordings are used on satellite and online radio. And lastly, the MMA will improve how songwriters are paid by streaming services through a single mechanical licensing database overseen by the Music Licensing Collective (MLC) offering a publishing-side blanket license.

Now, it’s far more complicated than all of that.

However, there are plenty of lawyers and industry players who have written more extensively about

That’s right, how the MMA will affect you and your career will depend on your Metadata - which is why I call it the Metadata Modernization Act. Now, I can see you cringe, “Spreadsheets?

C’mon man, I just want to jam! I’m a musician.”

Nope. You are a creator, and with that comes responsibility. You can do this! Buck up soldier, I’m going to give the answers to the test.

MUSIC BUSINESS

ISWC numbers, in short…. METADATA!

There are programs to do this for you.

Composer Catalog and Tunesmith.com among others, but honestly, they’re a bit pricey. So, open up Excel or Google Sheets and I’m going to give you the minimum columns you need, just copy and paste into the first row, put some pretty colors on it, and then fill it in accordingly.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

it than I have the space for here. In those articles you will read about how amazing this act is, how this fixes so many of the problems, how the MMA brings us into the 21st Century music business, and on and on.

That’s bullpucky. Do you feel richer yet? Are your PRO statements higher? How about your royalties? The fact is this: nothing has changed. Not yet, at least. The main part of the law that affects you and me - the independent songwriter/publisher/ label/band - is that last part about the database.

There are many of us concerned about the lack of price tag and planning for this database. Another aspect to mention is the MLC and its database will be overseen by a Board of Directors, and there is already in-fighting over exactly who will be and should be nominated to that entity. Also, that is not scheduled to begin until January 2021- at least

two years away! So, we’re a long way away from implementation, and that’s if a database can be agreed upon and built, if it can be budgeted for, if the MLC is seated in time, and so on.

Alright, enough with the inside baseball.

All of these things are still up in the air, but one thing is absolutely for certain: the monumental task of making sure your songs are registered properly and getting paid properly will now fall to you. Sure, there may be agencies who will do it for you, but you are the only one who has the information on your songs right now and it will be on you to get that information to an agent, in the database, etc. Trust me, as a music publisher and licensor, this is the stuff we deal with all day and I’d say that maybe 10% of bands/artists have this information ready right now. So, it’s time for you to get serious about spreadsheets, splits, about

• • • • •

Song (Track) Composition Title Alternative Title Artist/Band Name Contact Information (email/phone) Genre Subgenre 1 Composer (s) PRO info and % splits ISWC # Song blurb (what the song is about) Mood Keywords Sounds Like (three other artists that this could be paired with) Primary Instruments Instrumental tracks available (list stems) BPM/tempo Key Running time of song Lyrics Year of Copyright/year created Date recorded Date/Year of release publicly for sale or stream Current platforms Song is on Musicians / Instrumentation Producer(s) Mixer(s) Mastering

This is absolutely not an exhaustive list.

Many existing companies have their Excel files and fields they deem mandatory. SoundExchange, Music Data Exchange (MDX), dotBC, etc. There are entire agencies dedicated to data with names like: DDEX, MetaBrainz, and more.

No one knows for sure what this new database will require for minimum viable data, but this will get you started. And you MUST get started. The Metadata Modernization Act is upon us!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Michael St. James is the founder and creative director of St. James Media, specializing in music licensing, publishing, production and artist development.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 19

SPOTLIGHT

HOW TO GROW A SUCCESSFUL YOUTUBE CHANNEL WITH AGUFISH (AKA HUNTER ENGEL) Benjamin Ricci

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SPOTLIGHT

W

e recently worked with rising YouTube guitarist Agufish (real name Hunter Engel) for a promotion with Elixir Strings and their specially coated acoustic guitar strings.

Hunter produced some killer behind-the-scenes videos as he tested out the strings’ durability over the course of a few weeks, and we decided to sit down with him for a more extended chat about his background, his YouTube career and how to succeed at content creation in an influencerdominated social landscape.

When did you start playing guitar? What’s your background in music?

When I was 12, my music teacher told me that

music was definitely not my thing, and I should probably focus on subjects like math. A year later, I picked up guitar and a year after that, I was in my first band!

What music first inspired you to pick up the instrument?

Metallica. The first time I heard Master of Puppets I knew I had to pick up the guitar. I feel like that’s a pretty common story for metal fans.

How did you start learning your craft?

Metallica tabs on Ultimate Guitar. Later I moved on to Lamb of God tabs… on Ultimate Guitar. Ultimate Guitar was my life. I would just hear riffs I liked, look up the tabs, and learn them!

“The beauty of YouTube is that I’m not creating a one-way show…

I spend at least an hour a day interacting with guitar-loving viewers from all over the world.”

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What are your favorite types of guitars? And favorite features/specs that you look for in your own instruments?

I am an absolutely unapologetic diehard fanatic of single cut guitars. There’s something about the hefty chunk of Les Paul, and “inspiredby” Les Paul guitars, that speaks to me. Right now, I’m really into Fishman Fluence pickups; the technology behind them and the tonal possibilities that opens up are just incredible.

That being said, I’m also just a fan of good guitars, and there are some things that just can’t be explained on a spec sheet. If the guitar inspires me to write good riffs, I like it!

How did you get started on YouTube?

It actually started off as a challenge to myself to write and upload a song a week, which I would then upload to YouTube to share with friends.

The problem is, I have maybe three friends who were only sort of into metal. So, I started switching the titles to “gear demos,” immediately picked up about 100 views a day later (which is an incredible number compared to three) and I’ve been hooked ever since.

Where do you get all the guitars you demo on your channel?

Sam Ash has been a crucial partner in getting the channel to where it is today. They’ve been great in helping me showcase the guitars that viewers

What are your future career plans, as far as music and video production is concerned?

I have absolutely no idea, and that’s part of what’s so exciting, and terrifying, about doing the whole “social media influencer” thing. Doing YouTube has opened up so many possibilities in the industry, and opportunities to work with my favorite brands… maybe one day I’ll have my own guitar line!

We just wrapped up some work together on a project for Elixir Strings. How did you end up liking their coated acoustic strings?

You know what, I loved them! And I’m not just saying that because they gave me free stuff. They sound and feel just like acoustic strings, but they last so much longer. I’m mainly an electric player, and these strings have me picking up my acoustics way more often.

Any other info or advice you’d like to share?

A lot of people ask me if it’s too late to start creating content, and the answer is no. There are a lot of success stories, but no real blueprint for building a presence as a musician on social media yet. Start, experiment, find what works for you, and above all, just do it.

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really want to see. Nowadays I also work with brands I’m a fan of directly, which is really, really cool!

What tactics have you taken to grow your channel since its inception?

I focus on two main aspects, community and content. The beauty of the YouTube platform is that I’m not creating a one-way show, so I spend at least an hour a day interacting with guitarloving viewers from all over the world through the comments or other social media platforms.

Then I also try to incorporate elements from other non-guitar niches that I enjoy and have been successful on YouTube. For example, the format I use is very similar to what you’d see from a tech review channel rather than a guitar review channel. Building a sense of community and keeping the content fresh has really helped it grow.

Any tips for other content creators who might just be starting out?

It took me a long time to figure out when a video was “good enough” to go live. A lot of new creators (and this was me for a while) stress out about making sure everything is perfect before releasing it, which used to burn me out really quickly. Ironically, it’s actually the mistakes and imperfections that make you more personable and relatable on camera.

“If the guitar inspires me to write good riffs, I like it!”

Be sure to subscribe to Agufish’s YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/user/thirdykal

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 23

SPOTLIGHT

JOHN5 Stephanie Cabral

Benjamin Ricci

The Tele-Loving Veteran Returns With New LP, New Tour and Advice for Live Performers

G

uitarist John 5 is no stranger to touring, so when we got the news that the axe-slinger was hitting the road in support of a new record, we couldn’t contain our excitement. The Invasion tour kicks off next month in Vegas with special guest Jared James Nichols, and runs right through the spring.

John 5 is also releasing the album via a series of unique music videos, set to premiere on his YouTube channel later this month. We caught up with Mr. 5, as we like to call him, as he was preparing to rehearse for the upcoming first leg of the tour.

You’re obviously well-known for your work with Marilyn Manson and Rob Zombie, but I’d love to know how you approach the creative process when it comes to your own, original music.

I’m always honest with myself. So, what that means is…it’s hard to explain. I love to play a certain way, I love to sit on the couch and play guitar. That’s all that I do, and I love playing different styles of music. If something is done

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really well, I’m into it. So, that’s what keeps me always playing, and keeps me trying to master all these different styles.

So that’s what I do on my records. If I love Chet Atkins, I’m going to put that on my record. It’s a little unorthodox, with all these different kinds of styles, but I love it and it’s honest. And I think that’s what people enjoy about the records; it’s just who I am. I’m not trying to be something I’m not.

I think for a lot of us, that’s not unorthodox at all. We take what we love, and distill that into our own thing…

Sure. It’s good to surprise people, too. We already have a Steve Vai, and an Yngwie, guys who do those things so amazingly well. We don’t need another guy trying to come in and copy them. I would talk to guys when I was starting out and they’d say, ‘Do something that no one else is doing.’ And that’s the best advice anyone ever gave me. If I’m doing something that no one else is doing, people will want to check it out.

Who are some of the non-obvious influences that people might not associate you with?

Oh, boy. Scotty Anderson, who I love. Speedy West, who’s an amazing lap-steel player. Jimmy Bryant, Chet Atkins…

There’s a definite country feel to a lot of what you do, which might be unexpected for a lot of people.

Right, and it’s not just the bluegrass stuff. It’s also the Travis picking, or the Jerry Reed style.

It’s just…different. Which is a good thing.

Especially when it comes to concerts.

Exactly. Especially when you come to a concert.

It’s a real experience. I try to make it really special, and here’s the reason why. It looks like you’re walking into a haunted house. There’s all this stuff going on, and monsters come out, and my guitar cabs have TVs in them with all this weird stuff; it’s really fun.

And we’ll play this heavy music, and then knock into, you know, a bluegrass song. And people

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are like, ‘What the fuck is going on?’ And I love switching instruments, playing mandolin and banjo -- it’s such a well-rounded show because I want to keep the people who are dragged there [by significant others] entertained, as well. The people who have no idea who I am or what I’m doing, give them a real surprise. Something unexpected -- that’s what’s most interesting, I think.

And you hit upon an important word: entertaining. I think one of the problems a lot of inexperienced bands have is doing something on stage that’s not just standing still playing the record from front-to-back.

That’s one of the most difficult things to do, to translate music into a live show. What I’ve been doing is (and I don’t know if this is cheating), is writing these songs so that I can play them and perform them live. Which ain’t easy! I’m writing music, thinking that I’ll put a break inbetween songs knowing that I’m going to change instruments there. I can put a little drum solo or bass solo there, so that I can build in the time to take my guitar off and put on a banjo, you know?

So, you write it into the song, knowing what you’ll be able to do on stage?

Exactly! And because of the fact I want to keep it as real as possible, when I get to the live show, people aren’t saying, ‘Hey, that’s not how the record goes.’ It may sound strange, but it really works.

But you have to know what you’re doing. It’s unbelievably hard when you do it live, because there’s no stopping. If you get off by even a little, you’re fucked. You don’t know where to come back in; there’s so many notes going on.

My band is a bunch of terrible perfectionists.

So, here’s what happens. There’s a song called ‘Hell Haw’ from my last record; it’s a total Chet Atkins-style song. And we’ll play it live, and our bass player, Ian [Ross], he’s walking the whole time. And he never repeats himself. So, it’s really, really hard. If he’s having a weird night or something, he’ll be practicing the song after the show; it’s all completely mental. You know what’s going on, and you’ve done it a bunch of times, but it’s all mental.

You have to be prepared for people pounding on your foot, yelling things at you during a show, while you’re doing all these crazy things. It’s like juggling chainsaws.

never thought of. That’s why I work well with so many people, because if you don’t like one of my ideas, I have plenty of others that I can try for you, and I don’t have that ego to worry about.

How much rehearsal and preparation goes into your live show?

We rehearse more than any band in the history of music [laughs]. You know why? Everybody has a cell phone, and everybody is recording now. But I encourage the crowd to do it; I’m not going to stop them from recording. I welcome it – they can do whatever they want with [the footage]. I like to have it out there, because it shows that we have it together. And my feeling is, maybe that will help get people to the shows, you know? Or, maybe if someone can’t get to a show, because they’re not well and can’t make it for whatever reason, we try to put on the best show possible so they can experience it, too. I love YouTube for that.

Listen, if I’m working for someone, it ain’t my gig. It’s their gig. If they’re really passionate about [how to play something], then that’s what I’m going to do. It doesn’t say Rob Zombie and John 5, you know? So, it’s their vision. With Rob, it’s the best collaboration ever, it really is. He’s one of the smartest people I know, and he’s so great to work with. He’ll let you do what you do, but if he doesn’t like something, he’ll let you know that, too. And he knows that I have so many other things I can show, and that’s why we’ve been working together for so long. Like 13 years.

We rehearse all the time, all the time, all the time. Real rehearsal, where it’s all on us [to deliver].

It’s interesting to bring up the YouTube thing. As a public figure, you’re now being filmed every single moment of your life, especially up on stage. That didn’t exist when you started out. Do you feel like fans are missing out on the experience when they’re spending time trying to capture the show on their phones?

It doesn’t bother me, and here’s why. These people who come out are watching the show, and 99% of them aren’t filming the entire [thing]. At least for us. They’re maybe taking the phone out for a few minutes, but for the most part, they’re taking it in as it’s happening.

Which is great.

We’ve been talking a lot about your own work. I’m curious as to how much creative freedom you’re given when working with other artists.

I love working with other artists. I do not have all the answers, that’s for sure. I have some ideas, but that doesn’t mean I have all the answers, by any means. I love to work with people who have great ideas that I would have

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“We rehearse all the time, all the time, all the time.”

When you tour, does anything change from the gear on the record to the gear you tour with?

No [laughs]. When I record, I try to record with the exact same stuff I’ll play with live, down to the same exact guitar I’ll be using [on the track]. Because of the fact that sometimes there’s a string tree that doesn’t sound good, or some other quirk that only that instrument has.

Same with pedals. People love those old pedals, but listen, I’m not gonna chance it to take a 30-year-old pedal out on the road. I’m going to take something new that I know is not gonna die on me. Same amps, same everything.

I’ll tell you, though, I use an iso-cab, so the sound man has 100% freedom to dial things in correctly. It sounds like a record each time, it sounds so good. You usually have a cabinet that’s screaming in your face, because you’re playing with a drummer, who’s also loud. But if you have an iso-cab, the sound man is like, ‘This is the greatest! I can dial this in perfectly.’

The only thing is, as far as vintage guitars go, I leave that stuff at home. I couldn’t do it. Never.

They stay home, and are treated nice, and put to bed, and spoken to gently [laughs]. Those guitars are so rare -- guys like [Joe] Bonamassa have the greatest collections in the world, and he actually uses them, which is great! But I just can’t do it! [laughs]

Follow on Twitter: @john5guitarist

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SPOTLIGHT

Inside Furnace Record Pressing An In-Depth Interview with President & CEO Eric Astor

F

urnace Record Pressing in Alexandria, VA is no newcomer to the vinyl game. Their owner has been in the business for 30 years, and they’ve been in the record pressing game since the mid-90s. Now, with an expanded 50,000 square foot facility and a thriving consumer base eager for new wax, it looks like the best days may just be ahead for Furnace and its crew. We recently sat down with President and CEO Eric Astor to discuss his company, the current state of the vinyl resurgence and where he sees things headed in the future.

Can we start with how the whole Furnace business came into being?

Well, I’ve been in the music industry since I was about 14 or 15, playing in bands and doing fanzines. I started by putting out 7-inches by local bands and friends’ bands. I grew up in Tempe, right outside of Phoenix, where there wasn’t a lot to do back then. I was out in the suburbs, so you kind of had to make your own fun.

Since ’86 or so, I’ve been getting records recorded, mastered and cut. I was putting lacquers on the back of a scooter and running

Benjamin Ricci

them over to the pressing plant. After I had a second record label once I moved out the East Coast – this was all punk rock and indie stuff – we were having a hard time distributing our products. So, we decided to handle our own distribution, as well. We started a distribution company called Lumberjack, which was mainly set up to get a bunch of record labels about our size that were in the same boat as we were, having a hard time distributing and getting paid. It was a strength in numbers things, and we quickly found out a lot of these labels were having trouble getting things manufactured, too. We started helping out by getting things press ready and print ready for these labels.

It turned out that I loved the manufacturing side of it more than distribution, so in 1996 I started a separate company, which was Furnace, and we’ve been in business ever since.

So, were you pressing vinyl at that point, or working with labels to broker pressing?

When we first started, we were brokering vinyl and that quickly went away when CDs and DVDs took over. And about 10 years ago, these companies came to me and said they liked how we handled all their weird releases, and approached us for [vinyl]. So, I reached out to Pallas in Germany who was really well known

for quality reissues – at the time there were only three plants in the world where people went for quality records. And I think because they were far away and maybe didn’t have the best English skills, they weren’t all booked up [by US labels].

We basically badgered them into working with us, and they didn’t have a whole lot of work to do since the European vinyl renaissance hadn’t really happened yet, so within three months we filled an entire first shift at their plant and became their biggest customer.

In time, we started building our own presses over there. We had five presses over there, and would bring vinyl back to the States. But about three or four years ago, we saw the demand for vinyl change a lot here. A lot more people were interested in colored vinyl, shorter runs, not as many 180-gram [releases]. That wasn’t our strong suit in Europe, which is when we started to look for equipment and space to expand what we had [here].

Unlike a lot of brokers, we were bringing sleeves back from Europe, and doing all the assembly and shipping from our location, whereas most companies were bringing in finished goods.

So, it was time to start pressing things yourself here. Where do you even start looking for equipment?

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 29

SPOTLIGHT

We found some Swedish machines down in Mexico that were in good shape, so we bought those. But we had to find someone in England to refurbish them, which took a long time. After we started doing that, a few companies started making new presses, so we found that we had people making spare parts for the old machines along with the new. Obviously, if we had started this a little later, we would have brought in all new machines, since the old ones are a pain in the ass!

How long did it take to plan out the new facility?

It took about three years to get everything conceptualized, rehab all the equipment and map out the facility. It’s not like there’s a template in place, or someone you can go to who’s built a pressing plant before to get a set of blueprints. It’s all very specialized, which took a lot longer and was very expensive.

We built up a team with people who’ve been in the pressing world for a long time, so we were able to go from starting up the presses and getting records done in about two days, as opposed to months. We’re still figuring it out, but we have a laser-focus on quality, making sure we’re pressing great records. Not just churning out volume and hoping for the best.

From the operations side of things, do you find there’s an interest in people wanting to come on board and learn these specialized skills? I would imaging it’s a big concern to have people who understand these machines in the years to come…

Sure, this isn’t easy work to do. Successful press operators have to know hydraulics, air, steam, cold water chillers and boilers…what we’re making a conscious effort to do is bring in people who’ve worked in our other areas to teach them this process. People are interested in seeing how it’s done, so we have people from all different backgrounds learning how these things are handled.

The old timers who’ve been in the industry for a long time, they’d love to retire. So, we’re trying to download all their experiences and knowhow to create the next generation of people to press good records and who can maintain and fix these machines. A lot of that just comes with experience; it’s not something you can read from a book.

Let’s switch back to bands – obviously there’s a lot of renewed interest there in pressing records. What advice can you give to artists looking to get into vinyl for the first time?

The biggest piece of advice is before you even record, talk to the person who’s going to cut the lacquer for your record. There are very, very few

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SPOTLIGHT PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 31

SPOTLIGHT

‘‘It all comes down to knowing what you can fit on the record, and getting the sequencing right.’’”

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people who do this. There’s an art and science to that process – the biggest thing we find is that bands go into the recording studio, and record things that are hard to transfer to vinyl.

You can only fit so much music on a record, and you have to take into account the physics of how a record plays back, since the inner grooves of the record play differently from the outer grooves. If you look back, bands used to have a plan. They’d go into the studio and sequence [albums] based on putting the louder songs toward the beginning of the side, and the softer side towards the end of the side. On the outside grooves, it’s still spinning at the same speed, but covering a lot more area. So those outer grooves are going to play back better and louder; there’s just more information there.

Where in the process does the lacquer cutting occur? Is that before the band approaches the you, the pressing plant?

You generally go into a pre-mastering or final mastering stage where you get all the EQ settings right where you want them, then you’ll

either have the lacquer cut then, or that might be a separate process handled by another company.

If you’re new to the process, we can help assist you with all of that. You can come to us with the master recording, and we can help you handle everything from the time the master’s done to the final artwork and pressing.

It all comes down to knowing what you can fit on the record, and getting the sequencing right.

Be prepared before you get into the process.

You guys are trying to do this in the most environmentally sound way possible, too. Can you touch on that aspect of the business?

I’m a big tree-hugger, I spend a lot of time outside. We’re in an industry that can be dirty -- we’re using gas, electricity, plastic and paper. If you do it right, you have a lot of quality control so you might typically end up throwing away [materials]. For us, about 90% of the discarded plastic/PVC can be reground and recycled, and we also heavily recycle cardboard and paper.

SPOTLIGHT

‘‘We have a laser-focus on quality, making sure we’re pressing great records. Not just churning out volume and hoping for the best.’’”

We have a closed-loop system for heating and cooling and chilling, so it decreases the amount of water we use. We’ve built up redundant systems that allow us to use fewer resources, and we’ve even put in check valves and systems on our boiler so we’re able to step down the boiler when we’re not using all the presses, in order to reduce the amount of steam we’re using at any one time.

We’re trying to do a lot of things like that.

In the long run, it saves you money as well. It’s all about not creating waste and as it happens, it helps the environment too. When we start making a profit [laughs], we’re also going to be donating 5% of our profits to environmental causes that will help negate our carbon footprint, plant more trees and eventually when you order from us, it’ll show you what your carbon footprint is for your order, what we’re doing to negate that and we’ll offer the customer an opportunity to donate as well to help bring that down even further.

For more info, please visit www.furnacemfg.com.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 33

GEAR REVIEWS

AKAI Fire FL Studio Controller

F

or beat makers and home studio enthusiasts, there is no shortage of great controllers on the market. Whether you’re crafting synth-based toplines or putting an entire EDM project together from scratch, having a physical, tactile control to play with enhances the creative flow. We recently got our hands on the new Fire unit from AKI Professional, which was designed specifically for FL Studio DAW users.

One of the first things you’ll notice is the big knobs placed in the “can’t miss zone” along the top row. You’ve got standard knobs for volume, panning and filters, but also a great Browser that makes cycling through your sessions and samples a snap. The rotary dial was definitely a smart touch, and makes things go pretty quickly.

Normally we abhor menu-diving on hardware units, but the OLED screen was clear as day and presented no issues.

The other obvious component to Fire is the large velocity-sensitive pattern grid, which is ideal for step sequencing and pattern development.

The RGB color palette is implemented nicely and makes crafting tracks or beats from scratch pretty easy. For anyone who’s used another similar tool, like Circuit from Novation, you’ll jump right in with ease. The pads are cushy, yet responsive, and there’s never any latency issues or “dead” spots when you’re punching out a sequence. Finger 34 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

drumming was no problem, and switching back and forth on the Fire between drums and ambient pads didn’t even require a trip to the manual. Now that’s nice.

Everything else you’d want in a hardware controller is on tap, as well, and implemented in a way that’s intuitive, yet powerful. Transport controls were simple. Mixing with tactile controls was a welcome touch, and meant we could essentially ditch the mouse for almost the entire project, allowing us to focus exclusively on the song. Which is exactly what you want to do, forget that you’re even using a piece of hardware and getting lost in the process. The Fire never gets in the way, and we can’t recommend it highly enough for an FL Studio user.

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

Easy to use, great implementation with FL Studio, decent price.

CONS

None to speak of.

STREET PRICE

$199

I

For starters, you’ve got a killer 1000 watt Class-D power amp on board that makes clean headroom a thing of beauty. Our biggest beef with PA speakers is clipping and distortion in the upper volume levels. What good is having loud speakers when your event sounds like garbage the second you turn up the volume? Fortunately, even at ridiculous settings, the ZLX-12BT’s handled everything we threw at it with ease. Even deep Moog bass and shrill high-end triangle waves proved to be no obstacle.

GEAR REVIEWS

ELECTRO-VOICE ZLX-12BT PA Speakers

f you want watts, you got it! We recently got our hands on the new Bluetooth-enabled upgrades to the famed ZLX line from ElectroVoice, and we can definitely see these becoming the go-to solution for live events and rehearsal spaces around the world.

Of course, the main addition here is Bluetooth integration, which is simple to use and now enables you to rehearse or perform live with backing tracks streaming from your smartphone.

You can even stream music in-between set breaks.

Pairing is straightforward and there were no audio drop-outs in our testing.

The on-board DSP settings are simple to control with the included screen, and make volume monitoring and EQ on-the-fly an easy task. What’s nice is that for small combos or solo artists, you won’t even need to bring an additional mixer to the gig; the ZLX-12BT’s feature 2 combo XLR/1/4” inputs on the rear, which means you can plug in a vocal mic and acoustic guitar simultaneously and control the mix yourself right there, with no need for additional PA gear or front-of-house sound personnel.

With all the well-designed DSP settings, input options and Bluetooth capabilities on the check-list, this might be a great one-stop sound re-enforcement solution for a lot of bands and singer/songwriters hitting the stage and jam rooms. Highly recommended.

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

CONS

STREET PRICE

Excellent sound clarity, great on-board features and I/O, rugged as a tank.

Some might see it as an evolutionary step, not a revolutionary one.

$449/each

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 35

GEAR REVIEWS

W

e recently sent one of these to Tiny Dinosaurs (aka musician Julie Jay) to create some videos for our YouTube channel, but this is the first time outside of NAMM we’ve been able to get hands-on with the new iRig Keys I/O ourselves. And I must say, I can’t believe this hasn’t been brought to market earlier.

If you’re not familiar, the iRig Keys I/O is a MIDI controller and audio interface all-in-one.

Yeah, the perfect recording solution for home studios, bedroom producers, and just about anyone who uses MIDI and needs an audio recording solution, but doesn’t want a ton of cables and hardware boxes clogging up their precious desktop real estate.

Our unit features a 49-key MIDI controller, although a smaller version is available, which would be even more suitable for on-the-go or laptop sessions. But we prefer the 4-octave range for desktop scenarios and creating wide, lush pads. The MIDI controller worked great, the keys felt responsive and tracking virtual instrument parts and drum pads in multiple DAW’s proved to be no challenge; the unit simply worked with everything we tested.

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IK Multimedia iRig Keys I/O 49 On the interface side of things, we ran it over USB to desktop and laptop machines with ease, again trying out multiple DAWs in an effort to trip it up. It never faltered. You get hi-res 24bit / 96kHz audio coming into your session, plus phantom power on-board for your nicer compressor mics, which is a huge bonus (no additional outboard power supplies necessary, yay!). You can even run this thing on batteries, how awesome is that?

The only minor thing we could find was the limited number of inputs for audio devices. You can plug in an XLR mic and a 1/4” instrument cable, which will suit a lot of recording situations just fine. But it would be awesome to have a more “pro” model in the future that retains the MIDI controller but simply adds more I/O to the interface side of things. Then again, for all you get, and at the price point they’re hitting, it’s REALLY hard to find fault with what’s on offer. It even comes with a full complement of awesome IK software to check out, which makes it truly an allin-one recording solution, basically everything you’d need (minus headphones or monitors) to get a portable studio up-and-running in no time.

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

Super affordable unit combines everything you’d need to start recording right away.

CONS

More audio inputs would be nice in future iterations.

STREET PRICE

$299 ($199 for 25-key version)

GEAR REVIEWS

KORG Nano Controllers

W

hen KORG said they were going to send us a “little” something to check out for the mag, they weren’t kidding.

Here we have the new lineup of “nano” devices for your mobile recording rigs.

First up is the nanoKEY2, which is an ultracompact MIDI controller with a two-octave range. Of the three units we got, this was the one I wanted to love the most, and the one that left me most underwhelmed. Sure, it’s small and worked fine with our DAW. But being used to larger keys, going to these tiny little plastic buttons seemed like a major downgrade.

Now, I get that KORG’s going for portability and hitting a certain price point here, but I found trying to play any sort of bass line a challenge with my fat sausage fingers, an issue that doesn’t arise even on other ultra-small MIDI controllers we’ve tested. If you’re just banging out a few notes in a pinch, or absolutely need a MIDI controller that fits in your coat pocket, this will work (and it does send CC data, which was surprising). Otherwise, I can’t see this as a serious tool and you might want to invest in a better option for your needs.

Even the drum pad version (see below) might prove to be a more useful option. The keys felt

pretty cheap, too, and unfortunately it just came across as more of a novelty or toy as opposed to a real piece of gear.

We did like the nanoKONTROL2 much much better, though. And here I can definitely see this showing up on a lot of desktops where you’d want tactile control over a mix in your DAW, but real estate was at a premium. Surprisingly, even though it’s the same form factor and size as the nanoKEY2, the knobs, faders and controls felt way more solid and overall, it’s just a more useful tool if you don’t have any hardware-based DAW controller already. It’s ridiculously portable, inexpensive, and does a great job providing mix and transport controls at the push of a button (or slide of a fader). Really satisfying, and our favorite of the bunch. Totally recommended, and awesome at this price. Setting markers in your project was a super-nice bonus, and very useful.

Can’t say enough good things about this one.

and temper expectations), and along with the nanoKONTROL2 would make a nice 1-2 punch for a budget- and space-conscious beginning producer.

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

Inexpensive solutions, super-small and portable, good values all-around.

CONS

STREET PRICE

Some keys $65 (nanoPAD2); felt cheap and $55 (nanoKEY2); hollow. $65 (nanoKONTROL2)

The last one up is the nanoPAD2, which is a small drum controller, but also allows note and pad control, which had us gravitating towards it for our synth needs more than the nanoKEY2. The touch pads themselves are serviceable (again, keep in mind the price here PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 37

GEAR REVIEWS

PROS

lightweight, great sound, comfortable, no BT dropouts, wireless charging and nice touchsensitive controls.

CONS

battery life could be better.

STREET PRICE

$79 (through Indiegogo campaign page)

PAMU SCROLL Bluetooth Earbuds

I

f you’re like us, you’ve likely been bombarded with a never-ending barrage of the “latest and greatest” earbuds, headphones, and other such devices vying for your attention since the dawn of the iPod (who are we kidding, since the dawn of the Walkman for us old farts).

Now that we’re firmly entrenched in the tablet/ smartphone/brain-chip-implant era, Bluetooth is the standard of the day. So, it’s not that we weren’t excited to try out the new PaMu Scroll earbuds, it’s just that we’ve never really been impressed with Bluetooth-based earbuds in the past. That’s all changed.

For starters, the folks behind the new Scroll earbuds are working with the latest Bluetooth 5.0 standard, which virtually eliminates our biggest (and most annoying) gripe with Bluetooth enabled devices in general: audio dropout. It’s typically so bad that we’ve basically avoided wireless pairing for personal audio here in the office, preferring to stick with tried-and-true wired connections for just about everything besides pro audio gear like BT-enabled mixers and PA speakers that have worked solidly in our tests. Bluetooth headphones have just been super hit-or-miss for us.

38 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

The difference here is that even after 20+ hours of testing, we didn’t experience ONE single audio dropout from either our smartphones, Bluetooth-enabled Smart TVs or tablets. Now that’s a change that’s got our attention.

So great, no audio dropouts, but do these tiny little buds sound any good? The short answer is yes. Surprisingly good, in fact, considering you can snag these from their crowdfunding page for a ludicrously low $79. We had to check the page a few times to make sure that was right.

Bluetooth, at least for us, has been notoriously crummy when it came to bass, but these featured tight, decent bass reproduction in a comfortable, lightweight form factor that fit our ears perfectly on the first try. Are they as good as, say, our goto Audio-Technica ATH-M50x headphones or other similar studio monitors? No, but then again, I don’t think they’re meant to compete in that space. So just keep that in mind. This is consumer gear, not studio-grade kit.

After an initial reluctance to test yet another pair of earbuds, we were now very intrigued.

Great signal strength, great fit and feel, pretty decent sound for the price, and a cool carrying

case that doubles as a wireless charge station.

The only real bummer was battery life. We tested these (mostly) on full charges but decided to see how far they’d take us on a train ride from Boston to New York City for the recent AES Convention.

Well, they fought a mighty battle, but ultimately lost their charge about 3 hours and 15 minutes into the trip. Now, that’s not a terrible figure, but of course for long flights and other travel situations, it’s often difficult to find a charging port mid-trip. So, we’d love to see improved battery life in future iterations of the Scroll.

Having the ability to hear incoming phone calls in both ears was nice, as were the touch-sensitive controls; tapping the buds felt responsive and satisfying. Nothing beats a good “click” for your inner tactile-geek.

All that said, the battery life issue is really a minor quibble, especially if you’re simply looking to pop these in for everyday use (gym, morning commute, study breaks, etc.). All in all, considering all the checks in the positive column, it’s hard not to recommend these affordable earbuds for most average consumer situations.

Benjamin Ricci

GEAR REVIEWS

PHRED DockStar Koa

A

few years back we had an opportunity to review the Phred Ernesto VH3, which was a hollow-body thinline guitar reminiscent of the expensive, handcrafted instrument Trey Anastasio plays in Phish. While there’s a several-years long waiting period for one of THOSE guitars, and a starting price around $10,000, Phred offers guitars in the much more reasonable “sweet spot” of $500-800. We liked that Ernesto a lot, but felt that the on-board effects loop might (if you excuse the pun) throw some novices for a loop.

The neck itself features a dark ebony board and 24 nicely polished and crowned frets, so high octave tapping is possible whereas a lot of semi and full-hollow guitars top out at 21 or 22 frets. The bone nut is cut pretty well, no major issues there but you may need to file out a bit if you decide to string up with a heavier gauge (the DockStar ships with 10-46’s). It would have been nice to include locking tuners as a standard feature, but that’s really getting nit-picky. The stock tuners will serve you just fine and upgraded tuners are available as an add-on during ordering.

Luckily, you can get a Phred instrument with more traditional electronics, which is what we have here: the Phred DockStar Koa. The koa top and back are simply gorgeous, and we must admit that fit and finish are certainly improved over the Ernesto we checked out back in 2014 (not that that model was bad, per se). The DockStar also features a bit more of a traditional control layout, with 2 humbuckers, master tone and volume, and two discreet mini-switches for your coil splits.

So, how does it sound? Well, the stock humbuckers are surprisingly lively, responsive and sound great through a clean channel. Which, in turn, means they take to pedals incredibly well.

Chorus, phase, wah, overdrive, everything we threw at them came out clear and articulate. And of course, splitting the pickups thins things out to a more single-coil spank without sacrificing clarity ( just a small, expected drop in volume) so you can do more of those Strat-type things than on, say, a 2-humbucker guitar with no coil taps or splits. Dialing in a bit more drive, and things never muddied up, even on the neck pickup, which again was a pleasant surprise. Too many times we’ve loved the warm sound of a neck humbucker on a clean channel, only to find a big muddy swamp of tone awaiting us when things get a little dirty. Not the case here.

First thoughts: this guitar is light and a breeze to play. Fretwork has been improved over the years at the Phred finishing shop here in the States (the guitars themselves are constructed overseas and sent back for final setups), and the neck is nice and comfy. The floating bridge is solid, and the ebony tailpiece is better finished than we expected. A nice, classy touch for an instrument like this.

Phred does offer a few upgrades during the

ordering process, like improved electronics, wiring and Seymour Duncan pickups, and we do recommend that if you’re interested in any of those options, do it BEFORE you order the guitar. Modding the DockStar is its only real downside, as there’s no rear control plate to access the wiring, pots or pickups. We totally get it; it would look kind of tacky to have a big black plastic access plate covering up that gorgeous koa wood on the back, but it does make any repairs or electronics upgrades a bit of a pain.

That said, for this price point, the guitar looks stunning, feels great to play, is finished even better than previous models we’ve played, and ultimately sounds fantastic with a ton of versatile tons options on-board.

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

CONS

STREET PRICE

lightweight, better build quality than previous model years, versatile tone options, comfortable neck.

electronics difficult to access without rear control plate.

$690 (direct)

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 39

GEAR REVIEWS

YAMAHA EAD10 Drum Module

T

he common thought is that while home studio setups are great for singer/ songwriters and doing small demo projects, you need to haul all your drums and percussion gear to a “real” studio for proper recording. As evidenced by the small, yet powerful, Yamaha EAD10, that’s not true at all.

What the EAD10 aims to accomplish is giving the user an easy, affordable way to mic an entire drum kit, add fx, and output that to a DAW in a very seamless manner. In our tests, we purposefully decided to use the unit in a home studio setting to see how well the unit worked without the aid of precision mic setups and a commercial board and engineer on hand. And we must say, the results are striking. For starters, getting up and running is a snap. The main unit just sits next to your kit, and the kick sensor attaches easily to, well… exactly where you’d expect. The menu-based navigation is usually a turn off (we prefer knobper-function capabilities, especially on things like synths), but this was easy to dig into without being intimidating.

The mic/trigger combo just simply works. It works easily. It works well. And it sounds great with little effort. Even if you’ve never mic’d up a kit before, you’ll be getting useful drum tracks in no time, which is the entire purpose. We hate it when manufacturers can’t even deliver on the most basic premise of their gear, but thankfully that’s not the case with the EAD10.

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We found best results just using the default settings, and punching in smaller and smaller amounts of some of the onboard reverb and compression fx to round out the overall tone.

Seriously, getting a stereo drum track without overhead mics dangling above you and kick mics getting knocked over due to overzealous playing was a welcome relief. To be honest, we left the compressor on for the duration of our testing because it just seemed to glue everything together. Of course, you don’t have to use anything on-board, you can take the raw sound that the unit picks up and shoot that straight into your DAW of choice for later processing and editing. It’s nice to have options and not be locked into one setting.

One of the nice bonuses that you’ll get with this package is a useful app for your phone that allows you to play back to pre-recorded tracks and clicks, which can make YouTube performance clips a whole lot easier. It’s even got some smart tempo recognition that will come in handy for syncing things up properly.

The bottom line is this unit does what you’d need it to: namely, record a drum kit, in stereo, in CD-quality resolution, without the need for costly commercial studio time and setup headaches. It’s quite a technical achievement, and for bands on a budget who never thought of recording their entire album on their own, including DRUMS, this one’s for you.

The only two things we’d like to see included in the future are a snare trigger (to be fair, this is already available, just not included in the basic package), and perhaps more intuitive MIDI implementation. The unit does send MIDI and audio at the same time, but it’s not easy to find unless you go menu-diving. In fact, we missed it until Yamaha informed us how to set it up. In case you’re curious, here’s how: out of the USB, press Menu/Utility/General then arrow down three pages and select USB to Host/+ key to switch to “Audio and MIDI”.

But for $499, we can’t recommend it highly enough. We just have to be nitpicky, or else we wouldn’t be doing our jobs :)

Benjamin Ricci

PROS

CONS

STREET PRICE

easy to setup, great audio capture, many trigger options, multiple on-board output/DAW options.

DT50S snare trigger not included in basic package, MIDI capabilities are difficult to find in the menu system.

$499

Record

24 Track Digital Multitrack Recorder

Recording. Reinvented.

Mix

22 Channel Analog Mixer

Connect

24 Channel USB Audio Interface

GEAR REVIEWS

DECIBULLZ Professional Music Filters

R

egardless if you’re a musician or not, hearing is one of the senses that needs to be protected. Decibullz makes some interesting ear plugs that offer up a custom fit.

First off, it’s not one of those “open the bag, and insert in ear” type deal. Included are two sets of left and right moldable ear pieces, along with a pair of Decibullz ear filters. Included are six sets of ear inserts (3 foam sets, 3 silicone) of varying sizes for the individual to fit in their ear canal.

There’s a bit of a process to putting these all together. First, the ear pieces need to be molded to your specific ear shape. This involves boiling water to get the pieces pliable enough to insert into the outer ear. This is kind of a pain in the neck, considering all of the steps -- boiling water, letting them soak for 5 minutes, then waiting for them to cool down enough to mold them to your ear. The key is to make sure you have a good seal that’s comfortable, and molding these to your specific ear shape makes a difference.

Thank goodness we are given two sets of outer ear molds, because the first set turned

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into an unusable glob while we were trying to get them fitted, which was frustrating. They’re rated to handle 102dB, which should cover a lot of musical situations -- for reference a leaf blower is about that same level. These can certainly handle high sound level environments.

However, even after getting them into our reviewer’s ears, they were so distorted physically, and yet still didn’t feel comfortable no matter how many times we re-heated them to fit better. If they’re not comfortable, they’re not gonna get worn, which kind of defeats the purpose.

So, are they really worth it? Well, we have personal experience with inexpensive drug store bought ones, as well as some more expensive music-specific sets. With those kind of ear plugs it’s simple; find the right size, stick in the ear, and that’s it. The process to get these fitted just seems overly-complicated and overpriced when there are other options out there that are far simpler, cheaper, and more comfortable.

Chris Devine

PROS

CONS

STREET PRICE

moldable to individual outer ear

complicated process of fitting, expensive.

$99

ad

RapcoHorizon Vcable Review

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imply plug in an instrument, and this extra volume control is easily accessible right on your cable.

There are plenty of applications of one of these. There are some acoustic guitars that, amazingly, DON’T come with a piezo pickup installed. So, if a player decides to install one, it means a lot of work to not only get the pickup installed, but cutting a control panel into an acoustic is even more involved, never mind that it will more than likely affect the guitar’s sound. So, using one of these with a Piezo pickup without a preamp control offers up a much more reasonable option. Using it with a sound hole pickup works in a similar manner.

So, for inexpensive acoustics using an aftermarket pickup, this is a cheap and easy solution. Some more expensive acoustics may have a great piezo pickup installed, but may not come equipped with an on-board preamp, letting the player choose one of the many great external, floor based preamps out on the market. It still leaves the player with no on-board volume control.

This cable could solve those issues, as well.

Using it live is super easy, no having to look down at a dark control panel on the top of an acoustic, just reach for the cable, and it’s right there. Heck, using it with an acoustic that does have an onboard preamp and volume control isn’t a bad idea; crank up the on board preamp volume, and use the V cable control for an easily accessible volume knob or swells. It also has a detent, and clicking past it, mutes the signal. So, with the signal off, switching guitars is a silent affair, no pops, clicks and hums.

The volume pot is rated at 500K and there’s no tone loss.

GEAR REVIEWS

RAPCOHORIZON Specialty Guitar Cables

RAT Tail Distortion Cable Review

T cable.

he RAT Pedal has somehow never gone out of style; now that same sound is yes, in a

Bass players might like this for a fuzz bass option, without going down the pedalboard rabbit hole.

The big downside is the battery At the end of the 90 degree situation. It uses small 397 watch cable is a 3-position knob, with batteries to power the circuit true bypass, and two selectable that’s housed in the straight end of distorted modes. Now, there is no the cable. A player who finds the adjustability on the EQ, (or in RAT batteries dead before a gig might be terms, Filter) or volume or gain out of luck if their local convenience controls. So, it’s a bit limiting in a store doesn’t have this particular sense, but considering the circuit battery in stock. Overall, it’s not a is all jammed in the straight end of bad idea. But players looking for the cable it’s pretty cool. The true the adjustability of the classic RAT bypass mode makes the cable work might want to start clearing off The only other way to get a similar like a regular cable. Position one space on their pedalboards for one. performance is some external box adds in the first gain stage, which

Chris Devine or volume pedal, which means more is pretty cool for crunch rhythm, things to bring to a gig, and in some and going into the 2nd position cases more things to go wrong, or forget. it goes a bit louder, around 3db, It’s a super easy solution, and comes with some more gain. Chords highly recommended. sound pretty cool overall in both modes, but low end riffs on the low E string seem to feel a bit STREET STREET PROS CONS farty and glitchy, in kind of a cool PROS CONS PRICE PRICE way at times, and kind of weak not so $59 None.

10’:$59.99, at others. Using it in front of an RAT sound, Gives common easily 18’:$62.99, already distorted amp gives a bit acoustics an battery 25’:$67.99 of edge, and minimizes the low accessible. option for string issues. It does have the Great for Fuzz size, lack an external of controls bass. overall distortion character and volume makes it flavor of the RAT pedal, but the control and slightly lack of adjustability feels a bit mute, great limiting. limiting overall. quality cable.

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 43

GEAR REVIEWS

TONE.A.CANE Copper Guitar

W

ith few exceptions, the standard construction of electric guitars utilizes wood. Every now and then designers and creators come up with new materials, and new methods of construction, from hi-tech resins to composites. Tone.A.Cane has taken an old material, copper, and made a unique guitar that has a modern and interesting design, that still sounds like a guitar.

Most of the structure of the body is made from three copper tubes, soldered together, while a strip of copper wraps around forming the body’s overall shape. The lower bout that contains the traditional 2 volume, 2 tone, 3-way toggle switch and a standard 1/4” output jack, is boxed in with copper. A copper pipe neatly routes the humbucking pickups wires to the control box (can’t really call it a “cavity”). The pickups support is also again, made from copper and mounted to the tubing, along with the bridge/ tailpiece.

If you thought the body was uniquely constructed, wait. The neck is formed by two copper pipes that run from the body, and are connected by two elbow pieces at the headstock.

This gives it a minimalist steampunk look. The locking tuners are attached through holes in the tubing.

The fretboard is made from a composite 44 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

material called Richlite, which feels fantastic, while looking like ebony. Overall build quality is fantastic; there are no globs of solder or gunk, and the copper is clear coated to prevent any green oxidation.

Picking it up, its weight is noticeable, as our test guitar came in at just over 9lbs. It balanced well, though. As the back of the neck are two copper pipes with a gap between them, there’s no curved radius there that would be on a traditional guitar neck. This makes hand placement is a bit unusual. Depending on a player’s fretting hand technique, this may or may not be an issue. We had no problem adapting to it overall, and it’s truly a guitar that makes you approach your playing differently. Yes, we did have to make some adjustments, but nothing that felt limiting. Slide players may like this feel, though.

Plugging it in, the overall tone is big and chimey, with no lack of bottom end. Clean sounds are as you would expect from a two humbucker guitar. Nice and snappy tonal response that felt complete. When things get dirty, now that is where it gets interesting. The neck pickup really sings. There is a bit of top end here, but it is more than welcome, as it seems to round out the overall sound. Players who find neck pickups too dark, or lacking definition, this will really open up some new sonic doors. The bridge pickup doesn’t get too bright either, it sits where it needs to be.

Chords are nice and crunchy, while leads soar easily. The pair balances well together.

Tone.A.Cane is a small company, and that has some added cool factor. Each guitar is individually hand made. The starting price is $949. There are some tailpiece options, as well as gold or chrome hardware, which will change the price, depending on the player’s choices.

The only downside might be the neck, again, as it’s certainly non-traditional, but considering how some uniquely constructed guitars are usually flat-out unfunctional and fall into the “wall art” category, you might be able to adapt with no issues. The fact that this is a reasonably priced, handmade, unique and functional instrument is amazing. For players looking for the functionally untraditional, this is right up your alley.

Chris Devine

PROS

CONS

STREET PRICE

Unique, sounds fantastic, excellent craftsmanship

Neck might take some getting used to.

Starts at $949

G

etting a classic piece of gear in your hands means either investing in a time machine, or dropping a ton of money for an original that may or may not have seen better days. BAE has a new line of well-priced studio gear, under the UK Sound banner, that delivers big tone without the sticker shock.

ungainly and woofy signals, while maintaining clarity -- great on kick drums or bass guitars.

The overall response is excellent, and what you would expect of its more expensive cousins in the BAE lineup. It’s simplified to keep things musical and functional, without going too far.

BUT…

The single rack design of the new 176 unit has the usual input and output controls. The compression ratios are pre-set with 4:1, 8:1, 12:1 and 20:1. There’s also an “All Buttons In” switch that engages all of the compression ratios at the same time. The Side Chain filter switch engages a 100 Hz High Pass filter.

The attack and release controls have a nice wide sweep from fast to slow, and a large VU meter sits right in the middle. It’s also has a true bypass switch to engage or disengage the compressor. The rear panel is pretty simple, with XLR ins and outs, along with the usual IEC power cable connection and power switch.

For such an affordable unit, they certainly didn’t skimp on features or build quality.

Those classic compressors that this is based on had a “fault” -- if you engaged all of the compression ratios at once, as they were pushbuttons, things got really wild. The 176 has this designed into it, with the “all buttons in mode”. It gets really loud, with the VU meter hammering well into the red. It’s a harsher and more dramatic sounding overall. The initial hit of a sound is very prominent, but the decaying sound kind of sucks itself in.

Plugging it in, and connecting it to a few microphones yielded great results overall.

First up using it on acoustic guitars brought in that nice attack and overall thickness, as well as a great rounded depth. For bass guitars this is a heavy hitter, accuracy and punch was the name of the game. Electric guitars sweetened up nicely, especially with cleaner tones. The attack and release controls can really drive the tonal direction. If there’s too much high end wafting off, slow down the attack, and it pulls in nicely. The release control works much like what you would expect, with faster settings increasing the sustain. Engaging the Hi-Pass filter is also great for compressing those

So where would you use a “sucking” sound?

Well, a lot of classic British albums exploited this “fault” -- it does WONDERS on drums.

Compression is one of those great effects that makes cleaner tones sound bigger, warmer and more driven, without getting unmusically gritty, or gain-y. The 176 is a great example of what good analog compression delivers.

GEAR REVIEWS

UK SOUND 176 FET Compressor

PROS

Well made, excellent sound, great price.

CONS

None.

STREET PRICE

$674

This has all of the sound and flexibility of the BAE’s more expensive units with a more wallet friendly price under $700. Recommended for home and commercial studios alike.

Chris Devine

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 45

GEAR REVIEWS

PRESONUS Studio One 4

PROS

Chord Track and Ripple Editing functions are great for Creative songwriting applications, Import and exporting of song data.

CONS

None STREET PRICE

Studio One 4 $399, upgrade from Studio One 3 to Studio One 4 from $49 to $399 (depending on version of Studio One 3)

46 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

B

ack in August 2015, we reviewed PreSonus’s Studio One 3. Since that time our review team has used it as a go-to platform for some of our other review items, from studio mics and preamps to DAW plug-ins, with no issues. Now, PreSonus has rolled out Studio One 4, and we’ve made the upgrade, and explored its new features. While they have a plethora of new goodies under the hood, we wanted to go over some of the ones that really stand out.

The big thing with a lot of today’s artists is sharing work, but getting different studios and collaborators to use the same DAW software is at times impossible. With AAF importing, a session created in another DAW can be ported into SO4 easily; all of the tracks come in like they did from their original, and now they can live in the world of SO4. Want to re-mix that song that was done in Logic or Pro Tools? Look no further. Have a friend or bandmate who hasn’t seen the light and is still using some other prehistoric software? Well Studio One sessions can be exported for their use as well.

Getting things set up in a new session can be tiring, and takes up time when you just want to get to work. With the Import Song Data function, the user can now open a new session and select the specific session info from a different session. So, no need to create the same channels over again – it will give you the same track listing, tempos, etc.

It can also bring in the virtual instrumentation, inserts, and track layers and automations. So, if you’re doing a session with three songs, once one song is all structured, trackwise, setting the other two up for the next one can be done in seconds.

During a mix, wanting to bring in the same events,

it’s well worth it in the saved setup time.

The chord tracking, or harmonic editing is really exciting for songwriters. It detects the audio (or MIDI) and will outline the chords being played. Want to change that Dmajor to a Gmajor? No problem. It will re-harmonize the track to that chord. This is great for songwriters who might want to quickly transpose their music and give chord charts to other musicians.

Another great songwriting tool is ripple editing, which allows the user to actually re-arrange the overall track. Remember how easy you thought it was to cut and paste arrangements, and then realized it’s not that easy, with so much going into making everything sound natural? SO4 made it actually THAT easy. Kudos.

Doing MIDI drums in a DAW is old hat, but SO4 changed the interface a bit, going from a keyboard to a list of the actual drum bits. There’s no having to think of Middle C as a Snare, and B as the kick drum. Placement is just as easy and knowing where to put the desired beats on that particular drum makes it even easier. Among these lines, is their new pattern editing feature; it works like a step sequencer, and allows the user to input note patterns individually, but apply individual note velocity and effects to each note as well.

It changes a traditional piano or synth part from a canned bit to a very expressive way to tailor the patterns to your musical desires.

We found the MIDI editor in Studio

One much easier to use than other software packages we’ve tested in the past, and the crazy amount of great-sounding virtual instruments at your disposal in the side-panel selector are a blessing for any producer who just wants to sit down with a controller and start piecing a song together without a lot of hassle or menu-diving.

In seconds, we had a multi-track session going with killer drum patterns, analog audio from our office Moog, and a Les Paul-style guitar soft synth lead layered on top. All seamless, all easy, nothing in the way. As it should be!

There’s also a notepad feature included where in the console view, so specific notes can

be typed in. This is a great tool for reference, especially when mixing. During a long session where ear fatigue may make you chase audio ghosts, make a note such as “snare too tinny?”

Come back to it later on and re-listen. That note might make sense to either address the issue, or dismiss it. At the least it can provide some extra documentation in the actual session itself, and not on a post-it stuck to a monitor, or some notebook that’ll get forgotten or lost.

A small but notable adjustment now available is the ability to change the overall appearance of the interface, lightening things up where it can look a bit more like another

popular recording software interface. Working on a laptop remotely, this feature can come in handy to help prevent eye fatigue, and makes low-light or harsh light situations easy to adjust for.

Overall, it’s got a lot going on, and these features we’re outlining are the just some of our personal highlights. Any studio owner, producer, engineer, DIY recording situation could benefit from at least one of these from the standpoint of new creativity, as well as just workflow and productivity.

Chris Devine

PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 47

GEAR REVIEWS

YAMAHA FG-TA TransAcoustic Dreadnought

T

he dreadnought shape has the sound that most people think of when acoustic guitars are mentioned. Yamaha is no stranger to this design and sound, however they’ve added a special addition to this classic.

And it’s straight-up wizard sorcery. Or maybe not. But close.

What makes this so unique? With a solid spruce top, mahogany back and sides, there’s nothing really new there. The neck is shaped quite nicely. White binding ties in the beautiful rosewood fingerboard with nice smallish fret markers. A clear pickguard sits below the sound hole, and the entire instrument has a clear-asglass gloss finish. Overall, it’s well made with the quality that Yamaha’s known for.

Acoustically, it has an excellent balance, with plenty of low end that is big and rings true.

The mid-range is nice and tight, while very familiar in tone. It’s got that punch that D-style guitars are known for. It plays like a dream, with excellent fretwork, and an overall comfortable feel. Chords are big and rich, and there is plenty of cut when digging in single notes, without getting brittle.

So, here’s where it differs. It does have a Piezo pickup in the bridge, with a simple bespoke volume control. Push and hold it, and a little green LED inside the guitar lights up.

Beside the volume control is a reverb knob, and the other side, a chorus knob.

Yes, onboard effects, Plug it into the PA/mixer/ Acoustic amp and the acoustic signal now has some excellent effects. HOWEVER...

48 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2019 PERFORMER MAGAZINE

When it’s unplugged these effects are still available. YES, the reverb and chorus come through the sound hole. Magic. It’s like these little effect gnomes live in the guitar. Both the reverb and chorus are suited for the acoustic guitar areas, and using the guitar unplugged with them engaged makes you think you’re getting punked.

They don’t go anywhere into the ridiculous area, they’re calibrated to bring that extra dimension that makes sense to the instrument. Want that modulation to give that extra shimmer, without having to get a 12 string? Yep, it’s got that. A nice dimensional reverb that can give you that extra depth that works with an acoustic? It’s in there.

It is quite odd to hear these effects coming out of the sound hole in a truly acoustic setting. It’s a refreshing and overall excellent usable feature, that’s implemented tastefully well, either through the sound hole or a PA/acoustic amp.

For a singer/songwriter this plays and sounds fantastically, and the effects offer up an inspirational quality to make the player want to keep writing, because it sounds so good. Using this for gigs is a no brainer. Performers that lug around some effects box to add chorus and reverb, could easily dump that part of their rig with this guitar. Yamaha always builds well-crafted instruments, and the added effects take things to a new level on this guitar.

Chris Devine

PROS

straight up magic sorcery going on in the sound hole.

CONS

NONE. STREET PRICE

$599

D120SCE

D120S12SE

O120CESB

BEAUTY... more than skin deep The beauty of the new Mitchell 120 Series acoustic guitars is definitely more than meets the eye. With seven different models featuring scalloped bracing for enhanced resonance, ultra-thin finishes for improved volume and slim-tapered necks for superior playability, these guitars are unsurpassed in their class. Select 120 Series guitars feature solid Engelmann spruce tops, convenient cutaways and built-in electronics, resulting in superior stage-ready instruments that are within reach of anyone’s budget. Welcome to the new Mitchell 120 Series – beauty to the eyes and ears.

MitchellGuitars.com

F E E L I N G

T H E

CONFIDENCE TO PLAY AT YOUR BEST

Focus on your passion.

Knowing nothing will get in your way.

No endless string changes No retuning headaches No rough feel from sweaty hands No dead sounding strings …even after hours and hours of playing.

Once you’ve played them, there’s no looking back.

GREAT TONE . LONG LIFE

TM

GORE, Elixir, NANOWEB, POLYWEB, OPTIWEB, great tone-long life, “e” icon and other designs are trademarks of W. L. Gore & Associates. © 1997-2018 W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc.