Blog

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  Drum & Cave Samples Vol.1 • Royalty free Drum Samples on 08/03/12

  This is a collection of Kick, Snare, Hi Hat & Rim single hits. Some of them are recorded with different velocity. The beauty of those is in the ambiance. A drier overhead cardioid and room AB omni perspectives are available. I find the samples very useful when Snare/Kick sample doubling in a song is needed. Compress or Envelope manipulate in your sampler for more punch or ambiance. All samples are 24bit/44KHz WAV files. As a bonus I’ve included some heavily processed files too. The samples were recorded with a pair of AKG C414 XLS mics and Grace Design Preamps/ADC. The place was a stone tunnel – cave near the Bulgarian border with Serbia.

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  Re-amping as a creative tool, Part I • Introduction on 26/12/10

  I. The common case. Re-amping electric guitar.
  II. Re-amping in the time of low budget productions.

  …The advent of modern computer music has changed our reality of music making for good and for bad. We pay for our comfy low budget bedroom freedom with the lack of real space in our mixes…
  I have found that re-amping is a partial solution to many of those problems and can give back a lot from what’s missing in our modern productions. The following article will discuss the use of re-amping as a powerful and creative acoustic tool which could deliver a new degree of spaciousness and uniqueness and some of that old school analogue feel to our contemporary “bedroom projects”.

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  Re-amping, Part III • Mixing with a Speaker & 2 x mics on 26/12/10

  The concept of the experiment was very simple and straight forward. The omni pair of DPA’s in combination with a Jecklin Disk represents the listener head and ears. It delivers a very natural sound with no lost of low frequencies when recording sources at a greater distance. The localization within the stereo picture is improved by the shadowing effect of the disk. Keeping the mics at the same position and the preamps at the same gain level, but moving the speaker around, helped me to create the illusion of a single listener’s position-perspective and a whole room full of different sounds at various positions around it.

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  Recording Philosophy on 01/11/10

  Our experience in the concert hall during a performance is always unique and subjective and there is no recording which can fully replicate it. Every recording by it’s nature is an interpretation and as such can not claim to represent the musical event objectively. Despite this fact it is possible to distinguish two major recording philosophies, which are opposed to each other. Those I have formally chosen to name “the transparent approach” and “the creative approach”. As such they are just idealised concepts and in most cases the actual production will be somewhere in between them and not at their very extremes.

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  Why location recording? The importance of space. on 08/10/10

  Obviously if you are after a recording of your concert this question is irrelevant – location recording is the only way for you to do it. But what if you just want to record your classical, jazz or acoustic performance? And what about modern productions which rely mostly on electronic or amplified electric instruments? Sound samples included.

  • Classical and all acoustic music • The importance of space • The disadvantages of the budget studio • The alternative and the benefits of a good space • Space and modern productions.

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  2 in 1 DIY: Jecklin disk & Snare/HH isolation baffle on 01/10/10

  Have you had the nightmare of too much hi-hat bleed in the snare mic? There is a quite an easy way to minimize it! Compact, easy to do and functional DIY: a Snare/HH bleed isolator which alternatively can be used as a Jeckin disk (shadowing acoustic baffle) – a useful tool for those who love the sound of natural stereophony. Sound samples included.