I’ve updated The Charms section, it’s now a microsite. The video for Camden is a new addition. Thanks to Billy Kelleher for locating the only copy left! It’s on VHS but looks great. There’s a whole new gallery of pictures too.
Nostalgia…
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“accomadate the volume control for protected the sauna from pounding.”
Well, the ribbon mic is good, but the manual is hilarious! Working on a documentary sound track next week…
techy stuff…
• More new gear-
Fame ribbon mic (very well made apparently, will be interesting to compare it with the STC4038) Fame unidirectional condensers (an experiment, they’re really cheap)
12 way balanced multicore with 4 headphone returns
8 way balanced multicore
Behringer headphone amp (again, really cheap but useful)
• It’s holiday time in the music biz, so no new projects.
• We had James Perrett transfer all of our various reel to reel tapes to Pro Tools, with very positive results. A lot of old tunes and sounds have come back, which we will be using in new solo projects, such as Ken’s album. James of course did an excellent job with the transfers.
• Doing some rewiring to streamline the use of all the synths.
Misc.
• New gear- Tapco DI-1A active DI box. It has a 10Megohm input impedance. Haven’t tried it yet, but the spec is good.
• Animal Rescue is being rerun on Mondays at 8:30 pm (Tomás did “audio rescue” for the first four episodes)
• The Fuchsia band have finished their new song “Cad Fiú” for inclusion on the forthcoming SnaG Ceol ’07 CD.
nice one!
My upright pianos have been used in the latest project by Rich Aitken of Nimrod Productions: “They’re ace. Did the job wonderfully”.
at last…
I have ring tones for sale! Go here to buy them. I carefully sampled the bells of Shandon and tried different tunes on them. Not everything works, they’re in the key of C#, and even in the Emu sampler the transposing can take away the magic. Plus, they’re quite rough sounding bells, so almost everything polyphonic sounds too harsh. I chose tunes that retain the vibe of Shandon, even when playing back on the tiny speaker in a mobile phone. Perfect for expats!
studio fun…
• The Fuchsia Band were back, recording their song for the SnaG Ceol ’07 CD. This album went to number one in Ireland last year. We are trying to preserve the vibe and messiness of the demos but with classy performances and studio polish. It sounds like we’ve succeeded! They will be back after the hols for sweetening.
• Tomás has been delving deeply into the possibilites of the Peter Siedlaczek Advanced Orchestra sample collection. Combined with the Emu sample library, we now have a fantastic range of orchestral colours. (Tomás began studying orchestration in UCC. He’s still studying it to this day…)
• Ken is hard at work writing songs for his new solo album, produced by Tomás. He’s working on a Christmas song- he’s on a roll with those at the moment 🙂
it’s real…
• The Freakscene Christmas album “Happy Birthday Jesus” is in the shops now. Check out the packaging, it’s very tasty.
It’s been getting great airplay, including Tom Dunne’s Pet Sounds show. There’ll be a live promo Dec 15th on Red FM, and a gig Dec 17th in The Quad.
• Our boys, The Hopper Brothers, have their own myspace.
• Sales of Carols for Kenya have hit the 1000 mark! I knew I should have signed up for a royalty 🙂
• After a short absence, the Emu CD version of the upright pianos is back in the shop.
• Freakscene album is finished. Tomás mastered the whole thing, tracked one band, mixed another and recorded the drums on the SS800 track. Oh, and The Hoppers repurposed (what a silly word) “Days on the Mardyke” featuring the Bells of Shandon, carefully sampled by Bobby and Longlegs Hopper!
Misc.
• I’m mastering the Freakscene Christmas album.
• Check the equipment page. I’ve added a photo of a portion of the mic collection. If you need a specific mic, let us know in advance of the session in case it is out on hire.