Sun, 26 March 2006
On this week's show we feature some ProTools updates, a recommendation for a great online service and an interview with an Oscar-winning computer animator. Al begins with a couple of ProTools updates concerning recent versions Mac OSX Tiger and their compatibility with recent versions of ProTools, as well as a heads up on a potential technical issue with the Digi 002R. Next, Mike shares a great online service for sending large files (up to one gig) without any charge. Here's the link: Celebrity Interview: We're proud and privileged to interview Oscar-winning computer key frame animator, Mr. Jeremy Bolan. His latest project was the blockbuster King Kong, which just happens to have been released on DVD today. Jeremy Bolan Here are the links we talked about in the interview:
Tippett Studio Peter Jackson's Weta Digital Ltd Rhythm & Hues Studio Our New Frappr Map Is Up! Come on over and put in a virtual push pin. Show us where you're listening from and what you look like! Here's the link: Answer To Last Week's Trivia Question: Q: There was a special guitar sound, often referred to as "the talking guitar" used by artists like Peter Frampton in the song Show Me The Way, Joe Walsh in his song Rocky Mountain Way and Richie Samborra on the latest Bon Jovi hit It's My Life. How'd They Do That? Congratulations to the following listeners that got the right answer!
This Week's Trivia Question: Q: What was the first commercial music CD released in the US that was also manufactured in the US? All CDs sold in the US previously had been import titles pressed for overseas labels. These were still manufactured overseas, but for US labels. See you next week! Tags: music recording studio home studio mixing peter frampton joe walsh richie samborra guitar king kong constantine starship troopers stepford wives garfield computer animation heil talkbox bob heil pete drake frappr digidesign oscar phil tippett tippett studio key frame animator motion capture weta digital peter jackson rhythm hues |
Sun, 19 March 2006
Mike opens the show by thanking everyone for their continued communication. Al asks a favor - help us out by posting a review of our show in the iTunes music store. Here's a link that will take you to our page where you can write a review: Joe Satriani Update: Joe just keeps getting cooler and cooler lately. On his web site you can now listen to his new album Super Colossal in its entirety...f.r.e.e! You can also watch the new video of the title track as well as a 27-minute video feature of band rehearsals for the upcoming Super Colossal tour. Great behind the scenes stuff! As an added bonus you get to see Joe Riverdance! Here's the link to the page on satriani.com where you can access all of this cool content: Viewer Mail: Grae Smart writes: "I know that to send two tracks to a reverb, you put the reverb on an aux track and then send the tracks to it. You can control the amount with the send fader. However, when I want to compress two tracks, say two vocal tracks while recording, I don't think it works the same way. I think you need to send each track through its own compressor. Otherwise transients from one would affect compression on the other. What's your opinion?" Celebrity Interview: Al explains that a while back he found another podcast about home recording that he really enjoyed called Home Studio And Audio Review. Unfortunately, it's no longer being produced, but all of the shows are still available for download. Mike and Al caught up with one of the hosts of the show, Mr. Matt Long. In the interview Matt passes the torch to PSN for a new style of Trivia Question he used to feature on his podcast. Gear Review: Mike reviews two new interesting guitar pre-amps/recording interfaces from Damage Control. They are both based on a dual 12AX7 tube design. They both feature:
Several demo clips are presented for your listening pleasure. Answer To Last Week's Trivia Question: Due to our tenth anniversay show last week, there was no trivia question. This Week's Trivia Question: As you heard in the interview with Matt Long, this week is the first of a special How'd They Do That? edition of the trivia question. Q: There was a special guitar sound, often referred to as "the talking guitar" used by artists like Peter Frampton in the song Show Me The Way, Joe Walsh in his song Rocky Mountain Way and Richie Samborra on the latest Bon Jovi hit It's My Life. How'd They Do That? Send us your answers! Don't forget you can also send us your audio comments in MP3 format. Mike recommends checking out a relatively new star on the scene, James Blunt and his album Back To Bedlam. "Interesting sound. He really rocked the house on Oprah last week!" He currently has the #6 Single and #3 Album in the iTunes Music Store. See you next week! Tags: music recording studio mixing james blunt peter frampton joe walsh richie samborra oprah guitar home studio joe satriani itunes 12ax7 bon jovi |
Tue, 14 March 2006
Yay! We made it! It's show #10 and we're feeling stronger than ever. We review some of what has gone into our first ten shows and how we're just not going to stop! We're already planning what we're going to do to make our 100th show special. Today's show is a tasty grab bag of tidbits that were planned for earlier shows but never made it for one reason or another. CONGRATULATIONS TO JOHN DAVIDSON! John and his lovely wife just welcomed a new addition to the family with a healthy baby boy! He was born at 12:11 AM on Saturday March 11, 2006. He's 6 pounds, 9 ounces, and 20 1/2" long. Al points out that he believes John brought in a surround sound crew to record the birth and that he managed to get a small sample from the scratch track already in 5.1. Al plays the clip and everyone is amazed by the "you are there" realism! A Minor Correction: Just a minor correction from last week's trivia question. We spoke with Charles Dye, and while the Ricky Martin song, Livin' La Vida Loca was recorded and mixed entirely inside the box with Pro Tools, it wasn't mastered that way. It was mastered by Ted Jensen at Sterling Sound in New York, New York. Here's the link to the awesome Sterling Sound web site: Ted and Sterling Sound has done some great work with artists like: John Mayer, Destiny's Child, Nickelback, Ozzy Osbourne, Green Day, Santana, Bare Naked Ladies, Billy Joel, Chris Botti and a host of others.
Andy Diekroger (800) 222-4700 Extension: 1273 Mike highly recommends a DVD titled, Steely Dan - Aja. This is a vivid portrait of the making of the canonical 1970s record AJA by Steely Dan. Band members Walter Becker and Donald Fagen recall the history of an album that was a year in the making, but rewarded with a Grammy Award and three hit singles. British songwriter Ian Dury, the Doobie Brothers' Michael McDonald, and music producer Gary Katz all add their fascinating anecdotes to this highly involving rockumentary. Many of the mixes are dissected and studio sessions are detailed. Al recommends a DVD by Eric Johnson titled Total Guitar. This is an opportunity to study with one of the electric guitar's true virtuosos. This lesson encompasses all styles and includes advanced picking for speed and accuracy, left and right hand muting, various blues bends, country "pedal steel" bends, using different positions for sound and more! Mike shares web site that details the acoustic guitar setups of many famous players like: James Taylor, Mary-Chapin Carpenter, Alex de Grassi, Michael Hedges, Leo Kottke, Adrian Legg, Paul Simon and more. Next, Al says that if you're a Comcast Cable subscriber with On Demand service, dig into the menus. There's all kinds of free video music tutorials and gear reviews that are a lot of fun to watch. Mike encourages trying to play as many parts live in your project as possible. Break out of the sequencer and samples and discover something new! Al details solving a sampled bass challenge by running it through Amplitube (a digital guitar amp simulator). How do you pronounce the word spelled P - I - E - Z - O? The Online American Heritage Dictionary sets us all straight. Here's the audio pronunciation from their site. Click here to hear it! Al mentions a recent gear find that looks very promising. It's dual-tube guitar pre-amps from a relatively new company founded by some ex-Line6 (Pod XT) folks. Here's a link to their site: Viewer Mail: "Big Al, I picked up the BBE acoustic pre-amp you recommended on ebay for $72. Just got it yesterday, tried it out, and you were right. It works great. Nice sweetening effect, even on my Neve-equipped Taylor. Begs a question, however. What's your opinion on piggy-backing pre's?"I'm not a big fan of stacking up pre's. That said, it can work with careful monitoring. The problems that often crop up are distortion and phase-like anomalies. If you're using a unit with an effects loop that you can use it to insert the BBE. If you're using a mixing console, you could also insert the BBE in the channel there. If the only choice is to stack the pre's, I think I'd go through the BBE last. It's usually not a good effect to equalize the BBE process. It lives best at the end of the chain. Hollywood, California Q: Starting on August 25, 1970, who became an overnight sensation after playing only seven consecutive nights at the Troubadour in Hollywood, California? The club only held 600 people, but by the end of that week everyone in Los Angeles was talking about this person, who went on to become a multi-platinum, multi-Grammy winning recording artist. A: Sir Elton John! Double Bonus Points Question: A: Neil Diamond! The Los Angeles Times raved: "Rejoice. Rock music ... has a new star. he's Elton John ... whose debut ... was, in almost every way, magnificent. His music is so staggeringly original ... [his] songs so varied in texture that his work defies classification ... He's going to be one of rock's biggest and most important stars."In that same year, John Lennon and his friend, Harry Nilsson, were ejected from the club for heckling the Smothers Brothers. Randy Newman started out at the club and comics Cheech & Chong were discovered there. In 1975, Elton John returned to do a series of special anniversary concerts. Mike was there for one night of this legendary performance and shares his memories of the experience. This Week's Trivia Question: In honor of our tenth show, we're taking a trivia break this week! Al mentions our new Listener Feedback Line: (928) 395-1343 Give us a call and be sure to leave your name and e-mail address! We forgot to mention it again, but don't miss the Joe Satriani podcast leading up to the release of his new album Super Colossal. See you next week! Tags: music recording studio surround sound cabo charles dye mixing ricky martin livin la vida loca charles dye john mayer destinys child nickelback ozzie osbourne green day santana bare naked ladies billy joel chris botti steeley dan walter becker doobie brothers michael mcdonald eric johnson elton john neil diamond john lennon randy newman cheech chong joe satriani james taylor mary chapin carpenter alex de grassi michael hedges leo kottke adrian legg paul simon ozzy osbourne hollywood troubadour sweetwater sound |
Mon, 6 March 2006
Mike and Al open the show with a recommendation of another podcast that's worth subscribing to. It's the Super Colossal Podcast by Joe Satriani himself. Here's the link to the subscription page on Joe's web site: Spotlight: PSN correspondent and 5-time Emmy winner John Davidson presents his latest installment in the his series. "The Art & Tech Of Surround Sound Mixing." This week John breaks down the walls of mystery surrounding (pardon the pun) phase. Are you in phase or out of phase? Is it good or bad? Does it matter? Listen and find out! (Pssssst! In this segment John also gives away one the coolest live mixing secrets that engineers usually won't share with you. Watch out for any black helicopters hovering over your house John!) Celebrity Interview: This is the latest update in our ongoing production diary coverage of the Cabo Project, which follows the life of a song from its composition through its final mastering. In previous shows you've heard about how the song was conceived and written and you've heard the initial scratch tracks of the song. In our last segment, you heard the addition of mariachi style trumpets to the scratch track. The musician brought in to lay down these parts was the incomparable Mike Lenke. Last week we interviewed Mike about his background and his career as a performing and recording horn player. This week, we're talking with Mike specifically about his work on the Cabo Project. Answer To Last Week's Trivia Question: Q: What was the first #1 record in history to be created, start to finish, completely within a hard disk system? (No outboard gear, or outboard consoles, etc.) A: Livin' La Vida Loca by Ricky Martin, released May 11, 1999. It was #1 for 5 weeks. Double Bonus Points Question: Q: Who was the multi-platinum, Grammy award winning mixer/engineer that was responsible for this historic mix? A: Charles Dye! He won a Grammy for Best Engineered Album in 2001 and has been nominated six more times. Some of the artists he's worked with include Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, Julio Iglesias, Gloria Estefan, Sammy Hagar and Bon Jovi. Learn more about him on his personal web site: This Week's Trivia Question: Q: Starting on August 25, 1970, who became an overnight sensation after playing only seven consecutive nights at the Troubadour night club in Hollywood, California? The club only held 600 people, but by the end of that week everyone in Los Angeles was talking about this person, who went on to become a multi-platinum, multi-Grammy winning recording artist. Double Bonus Points Question: Q: Who introduced this artist on the opening night? See you next week! Tags: music recording studio surround sound cabo charles dye trumpet ricky martin hollywood troubadour mariachi |