Many of you will know the name Bobby Owsinski from the several recording and production books he has authored over the years. His texts are common resources at recording schools. I’ve used some of his writing in my own production courses, at the high-school level.
Not surprisingly Owsinski, has a blog, well worth reading regularly:
http://bobbyowsinski.blogspot.com/
A very cool video showing how one of my favorite microphones, the Royer R-121, is made. Makes me understand why they aren’t inexpensive. Enjoy.
Tchad Blake, in the old days
“If I have to flip flop more than three times in an A/B test to figure out what the difference is, I lose interest in that difference.”
— Tchad Blake
My buddy Keller Glass recently posted an amusing reaction on his blog to a December NPR piece on the Loudness War. In his post, Keller offered a succinct differentiation of dynamic-range compression and digital compression—two often-confused audio concepts. (The part where he compares encoding MP3s to excoriating flesh is especially nice.)
I’d actually heard the NPR essay and had planned on writing something in response. What follows, then, might be considered a companion piece to Keller’s writing, and perhaps the beginning of a friendly dialog between blogs on this and other subjects.
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There is a penchant in popular discourse for using language of conflict to characterize our reaction to any pervasive cultural affliction. It’s a tendency shared by politicians, pundits, and common individuals. We’ve embarked famously on a “war on drugs,” a “war on poverty,” a “war on terror,” and now (with appropriate anticlimax) a war on…“loudness”?
Such phrases are supposed to be inspiring, as they tacitly cast us in a heroic struggle against an insidious—if frustratingly abstract—foe. The problem with such rhetoric, however rousing, is that it isn’t particularly useful: How exactly do you wage a war on poverty—or loudness for that matter—anyway?
Calling all ProTools users, there’s a new (well, to me, at least) blog out there dedicated to Digidesign’s (err, Avid’s) “Advanced Instrument Research” group—the folks responsible for designing and updating the company’s latest virtual instruments and plug-ins.
Here’s their home-page greetings:
Welcome to the AIR Users Blog, a huge community for users of Pro Tools and AIR. Over the last months it has grown to bring an even greater remit and advice to the community, expanding into other areas of software and instruments used by the music community.
We get around 40,000 visitors a month checking out over 500 free patches for Structure, over 100 HD FREE videos and much more, so welcome.
Go check it out.
Jon Pareles, one of the fine music critics at the Old Gray Lady, has a concise, astute retrospective in today’s Times on the the digital revolution underpinning the music of the “aughts.” Enjoy.
In today’s music-making climate, to suggest that the recording studio should be considered an “instrument”—no less a compositional tool than the piano or guitar—is a bit like saying the world is round, digital files will supplant CDs, and the demise of the traditional record industry is imminent. It’s one of those blithe claims someone makes at a cocktail party—like “isn’t it cold of late”—to which everyone within earshot inanely nods.
I mean, who wouldn’t want one of these?
If you’re like me, the gear you desire can be divided into two discrete groups: The stuff that will add functionality in some way to your studio (like, that second small-diaphragm condenser that will enable you to have another pair of overhead drum microphones) and the toys you don’t really need, but which are so resolutely cool that you must. have. them.
Sorry for the late-December hiatus in posts. I’ve been fraught with holiday mirth and merriment. However, it’s the cusp of the new year, so I’d better get back to business.
Tonight’s nugget: This wonderful graphic illustration of the evolution of digital storage I found while slumming about the web. Zoom in as needed. Enjoy.
