The Main Mixer:

Behringer Eurodesk MX-9000 Mixing Console

The core mixer was a 24/48 channel 8 bus Behringer MX9000 with meter bridge. At one point in the overdub process the board died and had to be sent in for repair. For a few weeks we dusted off the old Bi-Amp 1621 mixer and pressed it back into service.
 

The basic tracks:

Tascam 388 (studio 8)

Basic tracks were recorded on a Tascam 388 (Studio 8), analog 8 track, 1/4" tape format, with DBX noise reduction and built in mixer. We patched the outputs of the Behringer MX-9000 into the tape inputs on the Studio 8.

Basic tracks consisted of 4 tracks of drums; kick, snare, and 2 over head channels with toms pre mixed into the over head channels. Also, one track of bass, one track of guitar, one scratch vocal  and a click track.

• What a machine! Love that thick analog sound.
• It's in the Will for Dyson.

We got the perfect drum track and moved on to the next song when the problem raised it's ugly head. We set the tape aside, cleaned the machine and put on another tape of known age. As it turns out, we were able to salvage the perfect take and bring it into Protools for some magic doings. We will never fess up as to which tune was involved, and only the most serious student will ever spot the fix. Ha! Thank you ProTools.

A valuable lesson was learned. NEVER reuse an old tape if you don't know when it was made. Not worth loosing a great take. And NEVER place a critical track like drum over head on an outside track (where "sticky shed syndrome" is worse or where mechanical damage to an analog tape is more likely).

Read more about the syndrome below.

If I Knew You Were Coming I'd Have Baked A Tape! (A Recipe for Tape Restoration)

Other gear used in basic tracks:

Used on all drum tracks.

• Audix F15's on over heads
• F10's on toms and snare
• F12 on kick.

Oktava MK-319 Large Diaphragm Condenser Microphone
Used to close mic the cabinet on electric bass parts, and used on some stand up bass parts. Also used on scratch guitar parts mic'd on John's Fender amp.

AKG Solid Tube Condenser Mic
Used on scratch vocal parts. There was far too much leakage to use the raw vocal parts and those parts were later replaced (we expected that).

Alesis SR-16 16-Bit Stereo Drum Machine

Used for click tracks and the drum part on "Puritan Porn".
 

Alesis 3630 Dual Channel Compressor/Limiter with Gate

Used mainly on kick during basic tracks. Also used on some rough vocals in gate mode, some bass, and snare on a track or two (as I recall).

Enter the digital realm:

Sony Vaio - ProTools system.

• 1.4Ghz P4
• 512 MB Ram bus ram
• 260G byte in total hard drive, 7200 RPM

Digidesign Digi-001 Computer Recording System

The digital heart of the system. We patched the Behringer MX-9000 8 bus board into the Digi-001. The Digi-001 was also routed back to the MX-9000 to deal with headphone mixes, and sends to the Antares and Midi Verb. The Digi-001 MIDI interface was connected to the MotorMix and dedicated to that control function.

Digidesign Motor Mix
The MotorMix provided a user interface for hands on mixing with ProTools. No mouse needed! Cool! Love those flying faders.
 
 

The overdubs and Microphones:

John playing a 1950 Rosewood Martin D28.

• Nady 1050 tube on the fret board
• Audix F15 at the body
• AKG solidtube near the bridge.

Nady TCM 1050 Tube Condenser Mic
This microphone was used on the Martin D28 and several vocal and backup vocal parts throughout the album Also used to mic several electric guitar parts. We liked the sound from the Nady. A bit more sizzle than is needed on some songs or performances, but pops out of the mix on the right songs. A good example of the sizzle is in the vocal from "Vikings (Mystical Hangout)", or in "October Gold" . Pow. Right in your face and through the guitars.

We tried to use the right mic to get the right sound to start with and not apply EQ. Overall, this Nady has an amazing blend of performance and price. Not the right mic for everything but a great player and deserves a close look. Additionally, this thing has 9 polar patterns, and increases it's possible applications beyond the uses we had envisioned for it in this project. Sadly, we only used the Cardoid pattern.

Oktava MK-319 Large Diaphragm Condenser Microphone
This microphone was used for vocal on "I don't live today" and several electric guitar parts including slide guitar. As noted above, it provided great results on the electric bass. Also used for the "wall of Ebbage" backup vocal section from "Crawl Space".

I liked this mic in general but for much of this project it just wasn't "the cat's meow". However, on a later project it provided stellar results on a B3 running through a Leslie. Man, what a sound on those tracks. All in all, a good value. No complaints from here and worth having.

AKG Solid Tube Condenser Mic
The AKG solid tube proved quite versatile and was used on female vocals, trumpet, flugal horn, some electric guitars, acoustic guitar, viola and acoustic bass. But, it just didn't sound like John on vocal tracks. That's why we went on the search for the perfect mic for John's voice, and ended up with the Rode NTK for that application. On a later project we used this mic for an amazingly massive kick drum sound. A bit over kill but sounded great for that too.

Audix Fusion 15 Mic
The Audix mic was mainly used for drum overheads but was also used for acoustic guitar parts either at the neck or near the body to catch some finger action and crisp pick action. Good detail as you would expect from a small diaphragm condenser.
 

Shure SM57 Instrument Mic
Yes, we even used the old standby SM57 on some electric guitar parts, either John's Fender or Ehren's Rivara amp. Shove one of these right up your speaker cone if you want some crunch. It's sound has been done before, but is right sometimes.
 

John and the Rode NTK tube mic

We really liked the sound of the Nady 1050 which had a sizzle that jumped out in the mix and we used it on several songs. But this Rode NTK is fantastically smooth and realistic!

It's got just the right amount of presence without exaggerating the high end.
You can hear the spit on John's teeth, and the air passing by his tonsils with this thing even when belting out levels that would shatter your good wine glasses!
This is a fantastic Microphone. A must have, and worth 3 times the price IMHO.

R0DE NTK Tube Condenser Mic

This mic proved to be very versatile and is one of our favorites. A few months into the project, John and Bryan went down to try out a Blue Dragon Fly and while there fell in love with the NTK. It sounded great on John's voice so it was added to the arsenal. We used it on all kinds of things including vocals and backup vocals. One song (I can't remember which) we ended up using it on all vocals including John, Dyson, Ehren and Jessica. The scribble displays on the MotorMix for that song read Rode, Rode, Rode, Rode, Rode, Rode and Rode.

For those who are interested, there is a great review of the NTK microphone at this link: RØDE NT1000 and NTK Microphones review

Don't count out the NT1000 (we don't have one but tried it out), it's the FET version and uses the same capsule as the NTK and it's father the NTV. A yummy sound, not quite as full in the lower mid's as the tube version (the NTk) but lovely sounding with exacting detail and at about $200 less than the NTK it is worth a close listen!

Outboard Gear used:

Antares ATR-1A Auto Tune Intonation Processor

We actually used an ATR-1 with the ATR-1A ROM upgrade.

We tried to minimize use of pitch correction, but there are applications. A great example was when Dyson finished backup vocals and moved to California. Unfortunately the backup vocals were done to rough vocal tracks which were not in tune and not all the instruments were recorded at the time as pitch references when the backup vocals were recorded. So, we fixed a few Dyson parts. Magic. There were also a few notes in a acoustic bass part that Jerry tracked early on. The new 1A rom includes a "bass mode" which proved useful. At the time Jerry recorded the string bass parts, he had actually only been playing that instrument for a few months. So, we fixed a few notes. Magic again.
 

Alesis MidiVerb 4 Digital Effects Processor

We used 2 MidiVerbs as we worked on the project. We found that John liked to have a bit of reverb on his voice in his headphones while tracking and it helped him stay on pitch when it was just him and a guitar or two.
 

Behringer HA4600 Powerplay Pro Headphone Amp
Everyone got their own headphone mix! Subs were fed from The MX-9000.

Sonic Foundry Acid Pro 3 Remix Software
We actually used Acid pro 2.0 but that is no longer available. Acid was used to compose several sections in the song "In God we thrust" and we synced Acid to Protools using MTC (midi time code) through the MidiMan Midisport 2x2
 

Sonic Foundry SIGNALS 2 (Loops FOR ACID)
We used several loops from this library in the song "In God we thrust".

Behringer VAMP 2

We used a V-amp 1 with the version 2 upgrade.

The V-amp saved our recording schedule for sure. The project was recorded in a warehouse in an industrial location with businesses on both sides. During the day it was not possible to crank an amp full blast to drive the 6L6GC's until they glowed red, or the 12AU7A's until they introduced that desirable blend of harmonics. At night we could do anything we wanted and blast amps until ear plugs provided little protection but what about all that lost daylight time?.

The V-amp added several hours of available recording time each day without blasting the neighbors. It also provided a way to find new sound mixes from simulated amp models and cabinet models quickly without needing to have all the physical combinations of amps on hand. A real money saver when searching for a cool new sound. Love that thing! It rocks! But let us stress, most guitar parts were done the old fashioned way - what did you say, I can't hear you!
 
 
 

Behringer Beat counter BC100
This gizmo was helpful in determining the tempo in the song "In God We Thrust" which had to be synched with Acid music for some of the sections.

Midiman USB Midisport 2x2 MIDI Interface
Midiman Portman PC/P - MIDI Interface with Parallel Port - PC

Other odd stuff:

What about that scratchy record sound in "I don't live today"?

Well, it really was a record! No joke. We took the pristine 24 bit audio, and cut a mono record on a 1953 Presto K11 record cutting lathe. Then we trashed the fragile grooves on the acetate by scratching it with a business card with a bunch of radial scuffs.
 

Presto K11 record cutting lathe. Dates from 1953.

Playback of the trashed disc. With a brand new needle no less. What were we thinking?

How did you get that record spindown sound at the end of "In god We Thrust"?

Our first attempt was to dump the tracks to an Analog mastering deck, an Otari 5050 drive, place it in "cue mode" to disable the capstan motor and manually slow down the tape at the end and re-record it back into ProTools. (Drive shown on the left) Close, but no cigar.

We also looked at cutting a record on a Scully lathe with a Westrex 3D stereo head, play it back and slip the disc. A good option, expensive but an option. No wonder we are over budget on this project!

In the end, we used Syntrillium Software's Cool Edit Pro to do the magic. we will never spill the beans on how it was done, but that's what we used. Cool edit came with a Darla multi channel recording board which is no longer used, but it's a good program if you can afford it. And has some useful tricks that ProTools doesn't have.
 
 
 

Post production and mix down:

Sticky Note Studios, San Jose, CA.

Chris Beveridge owner and operator.

The Digidesign Control24 control surface at Sticky Note Studios.

Chris from his days in the band Giraffe.

• Chris Beveridge is on the right, next to the late Kevin Gilbert.
• Other members of the band were Michael Abowd (left),  J. Scott Smith (bottom) and Stan Cotey.
• Michael and Stan are now with Digidesign, providing powerful recording, mixing and editing solutions to the world!
• Scott is the owner of TRS, The Recording Studio in Sunnyvale, CA.