Reviews
Firewire Audio Interface & Control Surface Audio interface, control surface, monitor controller — the Alesis Master Control does it all. Could it be the perfect companion to your DAW?
Condenser Microphones Industry stalwarts Audio-Technica introduce two new microphones that offer a similar character to their popular AT2020, but with better performance and additional features.
Software Synth [Mac/PC] Truly original and innovative software is a rare thing these days, but Camel Audio’s latest is exactly that. Find out what it is that sets Alchemy apart from the soft-synth crowd...
Active Nearfield Monitors Focal control everything from design to manufacture in their factory in France — and this approach appears to be paying off.
Master Processing Suite [Mac/PC] IK’s original T-Racks invented the idea of ‘one-stop shop’ software for master processing. Do the improvements in version 3 keep it ahead of its rivals?
Piano Sample Library The inaugural product from Imperfect Samples is a sampled piano with a difference...
Modelling Guitar Processor
Bass-guitar Amp Emulation
Multi-pattern Condenser Microphone Small size and a choice of polar patterns make this mid-priced, large-diaphragm mic a very versatile performer.
Virtual Drum Instrument Ocean Way Drums offers 19 drum kits, recorded in a world-famous studio by a world-renowned engineer. Is this the best drum sample library money can buy?
Digital Audio Workstation Software For Windows Acid Pro has always offered a fabulous environment for loop-based music creation, but version 7 sees it making a bid for fully fledged DAW status.
Hybrid Microphone Preamplifier Which is best, tube or solid state? When it comes to investing in a preamp, that’s a question you may no longer need to ask...
Digital Synthesizer Waldorf build on the success of their Blofeld synth by adding not only a keyboard, but also sample RAM.
Plug-in Bundle [Mac/PC] Most of us cannot afford to have Tony Maserati mix our tracks — but thanks to Waves, we can now use his personal effects and processing chains in our own mixes.
Competition
Deadline: 2009-04-30 Prize kindly donated by Audient
 +44 (0)1256 381944
Deadline: 2009-05-31 Prize kindly donated by Gibson/Epiphone
Sound Advice
| People + Opinion
Christmas In Transylvania For most bands and most record labels, trekking to the wilds of Eastern Europe to record a Christmas album would be a project that would remain filed under ‘Nice idea, but...’ Glasvegas, however, are not your ordinary guitar band.
Readers’ Music Reviewed The editorial team audition another crop of your submitted tracks.
Seal: Soul 'A Change Is Gonna Come' When Seal decided to pay tribute to classic soul records on his album Soul, he turned to legendary producer David Foster — and his right-hand man, Jochem van der Saag, who was responsible for mixing and much more.
David Glasper What can we do to save ourselves from the misery and bathos of 21st century culture? Simple: hide in the past.
Leader Editor-In-Chief Paul White likes dreaming up April Fool's blue-sky products, but with the unveiling of MOTU's Volta and Microsoft's Songsmith, fact is indeed becoming stranger than fiction!
Technique
Logic Notes & Techniques A professional producer and mixer passes on his favourite Logic mixing methods, starting this month at the bottom, with tips for bass and drums.
Tips, Techniques & News With the increasing size of audio files and high-quality sample libraries, a Apple MacBook hard drive that seemed capacious just a couple of years ago may now be straining at the seams — but swapping it for a bigger one is easier than you might think.
Ableton Live Notes & Techniques We show you how to make Live emulate an MPC-style workflow for composing rhythm tracks.
Producer: Heavy Zebra • Engineer: Kevin Byrne Blighted by drug abuse and mental illness, Heavy Zebra never fulfilled their early promise. Nevertheless, the deranged majesty of their 1972 single ‘Karla’ makes it a bona fide classic track.
Cubase Notes & Techniques We explore some of the advanced parallel compression techniques used by top mix engineer Michael Brauer — and how you can recreate them using Cubase.
Hear For Yourself We explore some of the advanced parallel compression techniques used by top mix engineer Michael Brauer — and how you can recreate them using Cubase.
Sound Techniques Whether you want to do it for real or fake it, double tracking can add very effective texture to vocal parts.
Recording simple ideas quickly Recording simple ideas quickly often helps you to capture a good, fresh-sounding performance — but it can also leave you with frustrating technical problems in the mix. This month, we tackle just such a recording...
Hear For Yourself Links to the MP3 preview and high-resolution WAV files that accompany the SOS APRIL 2009 Mix Rescue article for our newsstand/bookstore readers who do not have eSub-access to the main web article.
Non-Windows hard drives If you’re under the impression that installing your audio apps on a non-Windows drive will lead to better performance, you’re in for a surprise. Recording audio tracks to such a drive, though, is a different matter...
Miking Techniques & Recording Tips We’ve discussed how to record grand pianos in some depth in past issues, but miking an upright piano can present a very different challenge.
Hear For Yourself We've discussed how to record grand pianos in some depth in past issues, but miking an upright piano can present a very different challenge... Here are links to MP3 and WAV files to accompany April's recording workshop.
Early Genesis for the modern keyboardist Forming a tribute act can be challenging when it comes to getting the sound as close to the original band as possible, and approaching the keyboard rig for a Genesis tribute certainly proved tricky.
Sonar Notes & Techniques Is it time to lighten the load on your CPU and put that outboard signal processing hardware to work inside your DAW? We explain how...
Making the most of your studio space We turn a less-than-ideal square rented room into a workable recording and mixing space.
Plug & Play No longer the preserve of men in laboratories or capes, the modular synth business is thriving, and it’s now easier to go modular than ever before. Read on and we’ll show you how...
Pro Tools Notes & Techniques One of the major new features in Pro Tools 8 is a system for easily assembling 'comp' tracks from multiple takes. We explain how it all works.
Music Business
TV Music From The Inside Your showreel can say a lot about you. And if it’s going to get you work, what it needs to say is: trust me.
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Gear Reviews
