Mixdown #264

M A D E B Y M U S I C I A N S F O R M U S I C I A N S

#264 APRIL 2016

FREE!

GIVEAWAYS! Hermida Zendrive Pedal & Tycoon 24 Series Box Cajon.

See Pg. 6 for details.

VIOLENT SOHO

THE DANDY WARHOLS

WHITE LUNG

PLUS: THE GROVE STUDIOS, WAYNE JONES AUDIO, DALE SHERLOCK OF SHERLOCK AMPLIFIERS + LOADS MORE BLUEGUITAR AMP1, DV MARK MICRO 50, KLON KTR, SOUNDCRAFT SIGNATURE 12, NEUMANN KMS 105BK, ROAD T E S T E D : LANEY TI SERIES, ALESIS SAMPLEPAD 4, MARSHALL CODE + LOADS MORE

TRADE-IN ANY KEYBOARD AND

RECEIVE

Compose. Arrange. Perform.

YAMAHA EVENTS & PROMOTIONS yamahabackstage.com.au/promotions

$2000

OFF*

A YAMAHA TYROS 5 SEE PG. 3 FOR MORE INFO

* $2,000 trade-in value is off the Recommended Retail Price.

Compose. Arrange. Perform.

2000 ANY YAMAHA TYROS 5 TRADE-IN ANY KEYBOARD AND RECEIVE

$

OFF* * $2,000 trade-in value is off the RRP Recommended Retail Price.

MODEL

Tyros5-61 XL

Tyros5-76 76-note keyboard

76-note w/ speaker system

RRP

$7,995

$7,995

$8,495

PROMO RRP

$5,995

$5,995

$6,495

61-note w/ speaker system

TERMS & CONDITIONS

Tyros5-76 XL

• Any fully functioning musical type keyboard instrument is eligible for trade-in to qualify for the promotional price.

• *$2,000 trade-in value is off the RRP Recommended Retail Price.

• Included Tyros 5 models are TYROS561XL, TYROS576 and TYROS576XL. • Promotional offer is part of a national sales program conducted by the distributor, Yamaha Music Australia Pty Ltd and is valid from 1st April 2016 at participating Tyros

• At the time of purchase, the participating dealer will take ownership of your exchange instrument and will be responsible for any associated requirements as pursuant to The Second-Hand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act 1989.

• The Authorised Yamaha Dealer participating in this promotion may not have sold one of the

dealers. The promotion will end on 31st May 2016.

• Final purchase price is determined by the participating dealer.

included Tyros 5 models in the past and where it has sold them, they may have sold them at

• Offer is limited to one Tyros 5 per customer.

less than RRP.

• The promotional reduced RRP price applies only to included Tyros 5 models when providing your exchange keyboard to the participating dealer at the time of purchase.

VISIT US ONLINE au.yamaha.com

EVENTS & PROMOTIONS yamahabackstage.com.au

LIKE US ON FACEBOOK facebook.com/yamahabackstagepass

WATCH US ON YOUTUBE youtube.com/yamahaaustralia

CONTENTS

FORE WORD

6

GIVEAWAY

8

INDUSTRIALIST

10

NEWS AND TOURS

12

PRODUCT NEWS

18

BLACK SABBATH

20

DANDY WARHOLS, PRIMAL SCREAM

21

VIOLENT SOHO

22

WHITE LUNG, DEFTONES

24

THE BENNIES, TRIVIUM

26

MILLENCOLIN, ASKING ALEXANDRIA

28

ADVICE COLUMNS

34

DALE SHERLOCK OF SHERLOCK

35

AUSSIE BASS CAB BUILDER WAYNE

DANDY WARHOLS PAGE 20 MILLENCOLIN PAGE 26

AMPLIFIERS, THE GROVE STUDIOS JONES, THE PEOPLE BEHIND SONG CONTEST, THE ALMOST EUROVISION EXPERIENCE

PRIMAL SCREAM PAGE 20

36

ROAD TESTS

FOR BREAKING NEWS, NEW CONTENT AND MORE GIVEAWAYS VISIT

52

SHOW AND TELL

54

DIRECTORY

WWW.MIXDOWNMAG.COM.AU

PUBLISHER Furst Media EDITOR Keats Mulligan mixdown@beat.com.au EDITORIAL COORDINATOR Michael Edney michael@furstmedia.com.au EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS Elijah Hawkins, Phoebe Robertson, Chris Scott and Kate Eardley

MANAGING DIRECTOR Patrick Carr ART DIRECTOR Michael Cusack COVER ART Michael Cusack COVER PHOTOGRAPHY Ross Halfin GRAPHIC DESIGN Michael Cusack, Andrew Rozen

PG.4 // MIXDOWN #262 // FEBRUARY 2016

CONTRIBUTORS Rob Gee, Peter Hodgson, Christie Elizer, Nick Brown, Elijah Hawkins, Phoebe Robertson, Chris Scott, David James Young, Sarah Bryant, Adam Norris, Joe Hansen, Jaques Nugent, Conrad Tracey, Adrian Violi and Aaron Streatfeild PRODUCTION MANAGER Michael Cusack ADVERTISING Patrick Carr

patrick@furstmedia.com.au MIXDOWN OFFICE Level 1, No. 3 Newton Street, Richmond VIC 3121.

Phone: (03) 9428 3600

As a small child I remember being afraid of Black Sabbath, and the hordes of long haired, flannelette clad fanatics that worshipped them. The gothic, nihilistic imagery they inspired haunted me in my sleep. It was a far cry from the Cat Stevens and James Taylor that my Dad listened to. Then, as I stumbled into my teenage years, I found that I’d become one of the flannelette-clad figures that I used to be scared of, and it felt bloody good!

Few artists have left a mark on music quite as deep and dark as Black Sabbath. Whilst they’re arguably the most influential metal act of all time, they also had a hand in inspiring plenty of heritage garage, punk and psychedelic bands. Their music is seminal, and their notorious performances are etched into music folklore. You could mount a serious case for them being the most influential act that we’ve ever had grace the cover of Mixdown!

A good deal of the content of this issue has been inspired by the cover stars. We’ll be featuring some awesome new amplifiers, guitars and various other products that fall under the broader rock and roll umbrella. Further, we’ll chat with Wayne Jones and Dale Sherlock, two of Australia’s premier figures in the world of amplification. On top of that we have a great selection of new product announcements and reviews that aren’t so Sabbath inspired. Beyond that we’ll chat to a host of awesome bands and figures in the music community, bring you some great product announcements and road test some quality bits of gear. |m| KEATS MULLIGAN, EDITOR

www.mixdownmag.com.au

THIS IS THE BEGINNING OF THE END...

THE FINAL TOUR BY THE GREATEST METAL BAND OF ALL TIME

OZZY OSBOURNE TONY IOMMI GEEZER BUTLER PERTH ARENA FRI APR 15 I ADELAIDE ENT. CENTRE SUN APR 17 MELBOURNE ROD LAVER ARENA TUE APR 19 SYDNEY ALLPHONES ARENA SAT APR 23 I BRISBANE ENT. CENTRE MON APR 25 blacksabbath.com

GO TO LIVENATION.COM.AU

GIVEAWAYS HERMIDA ZENDRIVE GIVEAWAY It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to build a guitar pedal, does it? Well, no, but what would it look like if a rocket scientist did build a guitar pedal? The Hermida Zendrive is an overdrive pedal designed by Alfonso Hermida, who spent 12 years working for NASA as an aerospace and electrical engineer. There are some amazing tones lurking within this pedal, and they could all be yours this month! We’re giving away one of these amazing pedals, courtesy of our good pals over at Gladesville Guitar Factory!

TP4005 24 SERIES BOX CAJON GIVEAWAY

Last Month’s Giveaway Winner ERNIE BALL ACOUSTIC STRINGS

This month we’re pleased to announce that we’ll also be giving away this awesome Tycoon TP4005 24 Series Box Cajon courtesy of the legends over at Dynamic Music. These awesome percussive numbers have been taking the world by storm. They offer a unique drumming experience, with a host of unique tones in one portable and very user friendly package. The TP4005 24 Series is built out of environmentally friendly siam oak and hardwood. It gives a deep bass tone as well as a bright cutting high tone, allowing you to put together a more diverse drum pattern in situations where you couldn’t have done so before!

Last month we were thrilled to announce that we were giving away an awesome Ernie Ball acoustic strings pack. No selfrespecting guitarist should go on playing with tired old strings, but sadly, with the seemingly endless flow of awesome guitar gear that comes through, strings seem to sometimes take a back seat.

Well, today we’re pleased to say that this will not be the case for

For your chance to take home one of these awesome prizes, head to our giveaways page at www.mixdownmag.com.au/giveaway and follow the instructions.

Congratulations Karl, you’ll be taking home this awesome assortment of Ernie Ball acoustic strings courtesy of our great mates over at CMC Music. As Peter Hodgson said when he reviewed them last issue, “Ernie Ball is king when it comes to the string game, and they offer a comprehensive range of different acoustic strings for different situations”. We hope they serve you well Karl. Huge thanks to everyone who entered. We’ll have plenty of awesome giveaways for you in the coming months, so keep on trying!

For full terms and conditions visit www.mixdownmag.com.au/terms-and-conditions.

*These giveaways is for Australian residents only and one entry per person.

For more awesome monthly Mixdown Giveaways, be sure to LIKE our Mixdown Magazine facebook page at www.facebook.com/mixdownmagazine and regularly check our Giveaways page on www.mixdownmag.com.au/giveaways for your chance to win.

Karl Hüttenmeister of Melbourne, Victoria.

The original line-up reunited for the first time in 45 years! Carlos Santana (guitar, vocals), Gregg Rolie (keyboards, lead vocals), Neal Schon (guitar, vocals), Michael Carabello (percussion) and Michael Shrieve (drums).

ALBUM OUT APRIL 15 CD / DIGITAL / 2LP

INDUSTRIALIST STUDY #1: AUSSIES SPEND $2.5B ON ENTERTAINMENT TICKETS

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LOCKOUTS UPDATE

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SYDNEY TO HOST EUROVISION ASIA

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PG.8 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

www.mixdownmag.com.au

PERTH CONCERT HALL 25 SEPTEMBER QUEENSLAND PAC 28 SEPTEMBER SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE 30 SEPTEMBER THEBARTON THEATRE 02 OCTOBER PALAIS THEATRE 05 OCTOBER

TICKETS AVAILABLE AT J BONAM A S S A . CO M

NEWS & TOURS Frenzal Rhomb and Clowns

Goatsound Records Does Hard-Ons’ Dickcheese

Babymetal

Future of the Left

Aussie punk rock outfit Frenzal Rhomb and Melbourne’s much loved Clowns have announced the supports for the final leg of their conjoined ‘Friendless Summer’ tour.

This Summer, Frenzal Rhomb and Clowns embarked on their extensive ‘Friendless Summer’ tour which saw the duo hit up a bunch of major and regional locations throughout Australia. Now, as the tour is coming to an end, the outfits are pumped to announce the supports for their final dates. They’ll be sharing the stage with Spooked in Warnambool, Frankston’s own The Maggot Men at Pelly Bar, pop punk outfit Agent 37 in Ballarat, Urge To Kill in Canberra and Hostile Objects in Parramatta.

In the second edition of their reinterpretation series, Goatsound Records enlisted the help of 18 bands to reinterpret the classic Hard-Ons’ album, Dickcheese. Bands involved include Sun Go Replica, Drifter and Spacejunk. The recording took place at Goatsound Studios over a single day, with bands given 30 minutes to complete their allocated track.

This follows 2015’s volume 1, which reinterpreted Black Flag’s Damaged, with the bands taking part including Flour, Sea Shepherd, Daniel Tucceri and Acid Vain. It coincided with the release of a documentary featuring the participating bands, and some of their performances.

In Babymetal’s single ‘Karate’, from their brand new album Metal Resistance, we hear furious guitar leads, meteoric breakdowns and a J-pop inspired melody.

Matching this intensity is the track’s new video, which features heavy-hitting karate moves from the three Japanese girls that front the band. The J-pop and heavy metal hybrid is an incredible combination, one difficult to ignore. What was once thought to be an extreme example of metal’s gimmicky side – an ironic product of the overly obscure genres and subgenres that have come to populate the heavier side of music – is now garnering huge industry and fan appeal. ‘Karate’ currently holds the #1 spot on the iTunes Australian Metal Charts. The video received 1.1 million views in 48 hours time. This is a genuine act on a path to musical glory.

Explosive alternative rock band Future of the Left will soon release their fifth studio album, The Peace & Truce of Future of the Left, following another successful crowd-funding campaign. The intenselybacked Welsh rockers have long been a no-nonsense band, letting the crunch and grind of their propulsive guitarbased songs do the talking. And this new album looks no different, its first single ‘The Limits of Battleships’ compounding with rage and an unforgiving onslaught on contemporary rock. The three-piece are rewarding fans for supporting their pledgemusic campaign with exclusive access to an accompanying mini album, To Failed States and Forest Clearings, just as they did on their last crowdfunding campaign. Although this time around three and half hours was all they needed to meet their target. The new release, recorded by Anthony Chapman at Monnow Valley Studios in Monmouth, stretches across thirteen songs, showcasing the band’s innate ability in creating music with blistering immediacy and lasting impact.

TOUR DATES APRIL 8 – BASEMENT, CANBERRA ACT APRIL 9 – COLLECTOR HOTEL, PARRAMATTA NSW

The Hard-Ons – Dickcheese Reinterpretation Album is out now through Goatsound Records.

For more information visit www.goatsound.com.

Metal Resistance is out now through RAL / Sony Music. For more information visit www. babymetal.jp.

The Peace & Truce of Future of the Left is out April 8 through Remote Control Records. For more information visit www.futureoftheleft.net.

Loose Tooth

Northlane and In Hearts Wake

Carlos Santana

Steel Panther

Song after song, as we get to know Loose Tooth a little better they only become more likeable. The latest track to come from their debut EP Saturn Returns, ‘Sherry’ is about a binding friendship and the moments that matter most: swigging down Sherry like there’s no tomorrow.

Bassist Luc Dawson tries his hand at vocals in this one, with Etta and Nellie laying down infectious harmonies. All three members of Loose Tooth are on point – they’re a supremely talented Melbourne bunch. Their forthcoming EP was mixed by Paul Maybury (Rocket Science, Pink Tiles) and mastered by Mikey Young, and will be released by Milk!

Records.

Northlane and In Hearts Wake are just about as big as it gets in Australian metalcore right now, and the announcement that they will both embark on a joint Equinox national tour is music to our ears. In 2015 Northlane’s third studio album Node confirmed the band’s heavyweight status, landing them a #1 on the ARIA Chart. Close behind was In Hearts Wake with their album Skydancer making its way to #2. The ARIA awards were a similar affair, with Northlane taking home the goods, and In Hearts Wake hot on their tale with the nomination. The two heavy-hitting live acts, now both at the height of their powers, have long been great mates hitting the road together for the first time in 2011 with the Discoveries Australian tour. Providing support will be Canberra’s Hands Like Houses, and Melbourne’s Ocean Grove. It’s a local collaboration on a scale quite unlike anything we’ve seen before.

One of the icons of modern guitar, Carlos Santana, has reunited with the classic 70’s lineup that helped launch him into legendary status to release Santana IV, his latest studio album. Santana IV features 16 brand new tracks and oozes the same unbridled energy and musicianship that earned Santana his reputation as one of the most innovative and hypnotic forces in music. “It was magical,” Santana says. “We didn’t have to try to force the vibe – it was immense.

From there, we then needed to come up with a balance of songs and jams that people would immediately identify as Santana.” The album is sure to be a treat for all those out there that have been taken by Santana’s signature Latin-infused shredding, as musically, this is one of his most energetic and vibrant records to date.

Steel Panther have announced an Australian tour, and are due to hit our shores in June. In the country to promote their new feature film and acoustic record Live From Lexxi’s Mom’s Garage, the band will play shows in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Live From Lexxi’s Mom’s Garage is the band’s first full length film, and features a ten song concert, interspersed with comedic vignettes showing the true hilarity of the band. Despite being around since 2000, the band is showing no signs of stopping any time soon, with lead singer Michael Starr saying that “Our drive to bring heavy metal back has not lessened. It’s actually gotten stronger. We’re not going to stop.

I look forward to our continued world domination.”

For more information about Loose Tooth, or to hear their debut EP Saturn Returns, head to www.milkrecords.com.au.

TOUR DATES

TOUR DATES

JUNE 10 – METRO CITY, PERTH WA JUNE 11 – THEBARTON, ADELAIDE SA JUNE 12 – FESTIVAL HALL, MELBOURNE VIC JUNE 17 – THE TIVOLI, BRISBANE QLD JUNE 18 – LUNA PARK, SYDNEY NSW

JUNE 17 – BIG TOP, SYDNEY NSW JUNE 18 – FESTIVAL HALL, MELBOURNE VIC JUNE 20 – EATONS HILL HOTEL, BRISBANE QLD JUNE 22 – THEBARTON THEATRE, ADELAIDE SA JUNE 23 – METRO CITY, PERTH WA

PG.10 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

For more information about Santana IV, head to www.cookingvinylaustralia.com.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

NEWS & TOURS

The Drones

Tuka

Aussie superstars The Drones have finally announced the supports for their upcoming ‘Feelin’ Kinda Free’ national tour, which is taking place in light of their album of the same name. With their national tour set to kick off at the end of April, The Drones are pumped to announce that they’ll be sharing the stage with some of Australia’s finest up and comers. Melbourne’s Harmony will be joining them everywhere except Perth and Wollongong, while electro trash masters EXEK will be on the 170 Russell bill, Benjamin Witt will be joining the band in Perth, Wollongong will be treated to You Beauty’s raw energy and young maniacs White Vans will be tearing down The Tote in Melbourne.

Hitting the road next month on the ‘Don’t Wait Up’ tour, Thundermental’s own Tuka has today announced supports for his national tour. Celebrating the release of his Alive Death Time Eternal EP, Tuka will be joined by Melbourne Ecca Vandal, aside from in Canberra and Newcastle, where the massively talented Soul Benefits will be stepping in, and Perth, where Silvertongue will support. The seriously soulful Alphamama will be warming things up around the country and also appearing in Tuka’s band for the first time. For ticket info, visit www.tuka.net.au.

TOUR DATES APRIL 29 – THE GOV, ADELAIDE SA APRIL 30 – ROSEMOUNT HOTEL, PERTH WA MAY 6 – THE TRIFFID, BRISBANE QLD MAY 7 – THE NORTHERN, BYRON BAY NSW MAY 12 – WOLLONGONG UNI BAR, WOLLONGONG NSW MAY 13 – THE CAMBRIDGE, NEWCASTLE NSW MAY 14 – THE METRO, SYDNEY NSW MAY 20 – 170 RUSSELL, MELBOURNE VIC MAY 21 – BRISBANE HOTEL, HOBART TAS MAY 28 – THE TOTE, MELBOURNE VIC

The Vanns

Aussie indie rockers The Vanns have just announced an extensive thirteen date national tour that’ll be commencing this April. Since their formation back in 2012, The Vanns have released a steady stream of catchy singles that have impressed the tastemakers at both Triple J and Triple M. Their newest single ‘Sunday To Sunday’, produced by the ultra talented Nathan Sheeby, certainly follows suit with their earlier work. Its infectiously catchy melodies are infused with soulful vocals and summery, surf rock-esce riffs.

Our boys, who hail from the small New South Wales town of Kiama, are quickly developing a reputation as one of the hardest working young bands in Australia.

They’ve already supported the likes of British India, Tired Lion, Sticky Fingers, The Delta Riggs, Kingswood and Griswolds.

TOUR DATES APRIL 8 - MANNING BAR, SYDNEY NSW APRIL 15 - ANU BAR, CANBERRA ACT APRIL 16 - THE TRIFFID, BRISBANE QLD APRIL 22 - CAPITOL, PERTH WA APRIL 23 - FAT CONTROLLER, ADELAIDE SA For ticket info, visit www.tuka.net.au.

The Murlocs

Melbourne via Geelong’s The Murlocs have released their second album, and are celebrating by hitting the road. Young Blindness is the follow up to the band’s 2014 debut Loopholes, and is full of themes of paranoia and self-doubt on top of fuzzed out riffs and the harmonica of frontman Ambrose Kenny-Smith. Having developed a solid touring work ethic through trips alongside Mac DeMarco, Ty Segall, Stephen Malkmus and Gary Clarke Jr., the band’s set to head off on their own headline tour, hitting Adelaide, Perth, Fremantle, Melbourne, Sydney, Wollongong and Brisbane.

TOUR DATES APRIL 18 – RAD BAR, WOLLONGONG NSW APRIL 22 – FLINDERS SOCIAL, TOWNSVILLE QLD APRIL 28 – MILK FACTORY, BRISBANE QLD APRIL 29 – BEACH HOTEL, BYRON BAY NSW MAY 4 – BIRD HOUSE, WAGGA WAGGA NSW MAY 5 – FRANKIE’S PIZZA, SYDNEY NSW MAY 6 – UNI BAR, WOLLONGONG NSW MAY 7 – MOONSHINE BAR, MANLY NSW MAY 14 – THE EVELYN, MELBOURNE VIC MAY 15 – THE EVELYN, MELBOURNE VIC JUNE 2 – ODD FELLOW, FREMANTLE WA JUNE 3 – SETTLER’S TAVERN, MARGARET RIVER WA JUNE 4 – FOUR5NINE, PERTH WA

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TOUR DATES APRIL 8 – THE TOTE, MELBOURNE VIC APRIL 9 – CURTIN BANDROOM, MELBOURNE VIC APRIL 14 – OXFORD ART FACTORY, SYDNEY NSW APRIL 15 – RAD, WOLLONGONG NSW APRIL 16 – BLURST OF TIMES, BRISBANE QLD

The New Album - 1st April 2016 MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.11

PRODUCT NEWS Hear More of Your Music With Lola by Blue Headphones Amber Technology | 1800 251 367 | www.ambertech.com.au

Lola is a completely reimagined headphone that reveals new levels of detail in your favourite music.

Everything from Lola’s revolutionary ergonomics to its massive custom drivers IS designed for the true music listener.

It all starts with acoustics! Blue has optimised every aspect of Lola’s design for performance—from large 50mm premium drivers, to the large enclosures that maximize the volume of air around the drivers.

The airtight, 100% sealed enclosure consists of a thick wall that’s heavily reinforced. This makes the enclosures extremely strong and resistant to vibration and flexing. It’s a stable platform for the drivers to deliver accurate and inspiring sound. Lola’s holistic design delivers full-range sound that’s tight and powerful in the low end, articulate and warm in the mids, and extended, with accurate high-frequency response that is never harsh or fatiguing.

Solid State Logic Reinvents An Old Classic Drum Mic Compressor Amber Technology | 1800 251 367 | www.ambertech.com.au

The LMC+ Module brings a new and significantly enhanced version of the classic SSL Listen Mic Compressor to 500 format racks.

This famous processor from the legendary SL4000E console was the secret weapon in many producers sonic arsenal of recording techniques. Originally designed to prevent overloading the return feed from a studio communications mic, its fixed attack and release curves were eminently suitable for use on ambient drums mics. This all-new version includes individual classic SSL high pass and low pass filters to allow targeting of a specific frequency range, a ‘filters to compressor side chain’ option and a wet/dry blend control. Two additional superb new tools are added to give the LMC+ a distinctive sonic twist: a ‘scoop’ button phase inverts the wet signal, and a unique ‘split’ button engages a bandpass subtraction mode. Used together and separately and in conjunction with the filters and sidechain, the new controls give LMC+ a distinctive tonal edge with a range of creative possibilities.

Laney Launch GHR Series Amplifiers Australasian Music Supplies | (03) 9549 1500 | www.austmusic.com.au

Dixon Release Artists Profile Gregg Bissonette Signature Kit Dynamic Music | (02) 9939 1299 | www.dynamicmusic.com.au

Dixon has really put the foot on the gas in 2016. With the goal of ‘exceeding the expectations of drummers’, expect to see plenty more from Dixon this year.

In a market place with no shortage of options, it is refreshing to see a percussion brand that is pushing the boundaries, employing new technologies and delivering change while keeping affordability at the forefront.

The soon to arrive Artists Profile Kit is inspired by Gregg Bissonette’s tour configuration and it’s great to see a brand break ranks with the mundane and offer a bold 24” model.

If you’re wanting something different or maybe you just desire for a huge powerful sound, the Artists Profile maple/mahogany by Dixon is worth a try.

The recent NAMM conference in Anaheim, California saw the introduction of the new GHR Series to Laney’s range of valve guitar amplifiers. GHR is the product of Laney’s ongoing study of how guitar players interact with tube amps. Tube tone is composed of what Laney has come to identify as ‘red’ and ‘black’ tone elements: red is tube preamp distortion, while black is output tube distortion which increases as the power tubes are driven harder. GHR allows the player to balance red and black elements to seek the sweet spot. While not an entirely new concept, Laney has distilled nearly fifty years of amplifier design into the GHR series.

The results are stunning with a vast palette of tones and textures available. Capable of sparkling, wide cleans through to thick rhythm chunk and creamy, fuzzed-out lead tones, the GHR Series is tonally reminiscent of the amps of the past while being featurepacked for the modern age.

Sterling by Music Man Release The Maple Quilt Top Ray34 CMC Music Australia | (02) 9905 2511 | www.cmcmusic.com.au

Ernie Ball PolyLock Strap Now Shipping To Australia CMC Music Australia | (02) 9905 2511 | www.cmcmusic.com.au

After announcing its release last year, Ernie Ball’s new PolyLock guitar strap with inbuilt locking mechanism is now shipping to Australian music stores. You’d prefer not to snap the neck of your guitar at your next gig right? Once you’ve spun your guitar around your neck, you’d like to continue playing the song, rather than go search through the audience for guitar pieces? You’d like not to have to modify your favourite instrument with chunky hardware or drill holes into it? That’s where Ernie Ball’s new patent pending PolyLock strap comes to the rescue.

Based on their super comfortable, super long Polypro webbing strap, the PolyLock’s locking strap design makes it easy to securely attach the strap to your electric guitar or bass, without the need for any modification or bulky hardware. Simply fasten your Ernie Ball PolyLock Strap to the existing strap buttons on virtually any electric guitar or bass and you’re set.

PG.12 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

There can be no denying the impact that the StingRay bass has had on bassists and music in general. The no-nonsense design, the tones from its 3-band preamp and pickup, the ash body, the familiar oval pickguard has put the bottom end into some of the most important music of the last 40 years.

For several years now, Music Man has offered an accessibly priced offshore version of the StingRay – the Ray34. Celebrating the 40th anniversary of the StingRay, Sterling by Music Man has re-released a beautiful quilt top finish that has not been available for the StingRay for many years. The Ray34Q series features a beautiful, highly figured maple top over an African mahogany body, resulting in a striking and tuneful instrument.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

PRODUCT NEWS

Fishman Introduce New Fluence Signature Pickups Dynamic Music | (02) 9939 1299 | www.dynamicmusic.com.au

Tony Iommi Teams Up With Laney For New Signature Amp Australasian Music Supplies | (03) 9549 1500 | www.austmusic.com.au

With a history going back to the dawn of heavy metal and the birth of Laney Amplifiers, it is fitting Tony Iommi and Laney Amps are together at The End. Iommi’s sound is synonymous with heavy rock, having more or less invented the genre single-handedly with the dark and doom of Black Sabbath in the late 60s. The partnership with Laney has existed since this time, and Laney amps were used to create the now legendary tones on the bands eponymous debut album.

Fast-forward nearly fifty years and Black Sabbath are touring the world for the last time – with a swag of Laney amps in tow just like in the old days. In addition to his TI100 Signature rig for the more modern sounds, Laney have recreated the original Supergroup LA100BLS used by Tony in the early days to authentically reproduce tones from that era.

In 2014, Fishman introduced Fluence multi-voice pickups, challenging the archetype that had existed for over 80 years. Fluence technology cast off the common knowledge of what pickups were, how they were made and how they could sound and operate.

Fishman Fluence pickups are free from the hum, noise and frustrating inductance issues that plague even the most coveted wire-wound pickups – revealing pure, uncorrupted and musical tone. New from Fishman are three new pickups designed in close collaboration with each artist respectively to deliver the spirit and essence of their individual tone. The signature series includes models from guitar virtuoso Devin Townsend, lead guitarist of Deftones Stephen Carpenter and unsung guitar hero Greg Koch.

Australian Manufacturer Gas Drums Introduces The Gas Bass MCM Gas Drums Australia | 0414 933 598 | www. gascustomdrums.com

There is a lot to love about local drum manufacturer Gas Drums. Hand made in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, owner Scott Green builds each kit with precision, using only the highest quality materials to ensure a superior sound. In 2016, the Australian manufacturer has expanded their market, introducing the all-new Gas Bass MCM. If you’re unsure exactly what an MCM is, it is basically a type of microphone where sound striking a diaphragm causes a coil to vibrate within a magnetic field, thus creating an electrical impulse - basically the reverse operation of a loud speaker. The Gas Bass MCM is ideal for bass drums, as its frequency range can deliver huge amounts of bottom end and fills in all the missing lows the conventional bass drum mic will not pick up. Built into a 10” acrylic shell, mounting comes through the form of a single floor tom block on the shell that slots into a removable bass drum hoop mounted L arm. The mounting on the Gas MCM is designed to have less weight and less hardware to carry around and also less floor space taken up to create ease of use and positioning. Gas Drums can also customise the casing, adding brand or band logos on the front mesh head, just contact Scott at gascustomdrums@gmail.com for a quote.

Alesis Introduces New Electronic Drum Kits Electric Factory | (03) 9474 1000 | www.elfa.com.au

Unveiled recently at NAMM and now arriving in Australia, Alesis has unveiled three new electronic drum kits – Nitro, Forge and Command. The Nitro is a 5-piece entry-level electronic kit with crash, ride, hi-hat and kick drum pedal all for an affordable price.

Unlike many other kits at this price point, the Alesis Nitro comes in a standard drum rack configuration – which is essential in learning your way around the kit and playing in comfort. The snare drum is dual zone, meaning you have an active rim and head, just like a real snare, and the Crash cymbal is chokable, just like a real cymbal.

The Forge Kit features the new advanced drum module that is found on the Forge, Command and Crimson kits – it’s a sleek, sexy and powerful module. The Alesis Forge Kit is also a 5-piece, but with the upgraded module, polished chrome rack and improved drum heads. Stepping up from the Forge is the new Command Kit. All the toms get an upgrade to a better quality drum head, the cymbals get ‘hideaway’ booms and all drums get an upgraded rack clamp system.

In A Snapshot: Keeley Arlon Prince Red Dirt Overdrive Limited Edition Gladesville Guitar Factory | (02) 9817 2173 | www.guitarfactory.net

Free Extra Voices Made Available For Hammond SK Keyboards Musico | (03) 9872 5127 | www.musico.com

Hammond SK keyboards are really taking off in Australia, and Hammond wants to make it even easier to keep your keyboard up to date. You can now download (for free) a sensational library of extra sounds from the Hammond website (www.hammondorganco. com) to whack into your SK keyboard. Just download them to a USB stick and pop it in to your keyboard. The range includes an awesome ‘symphonic strings’, a cool new ‘bass’ and extra ‘ethnic’ sound. Check out the sound library at on the Hammond website or drop a line to the local representatives at Musico if you have any enquiries.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

Arlon Prince has been hand-painting some of the most unique pedal cases in the business for many years, and his latest collaborations with Keeley pedals are a work of art. Each pedal is completely unique and has it’s own combinations of details and tones.

The Red Dirt overdrive began from a quest to find the perfect classic drive sound while also offering new levels of sonic versatility to satisfy a wider range of musical styles.

Founder and head engineer Robert Keeley took this idea and combined the great sounds found within his original ‘Mod Plus’ and ‘Baked’ modified pedals and added refinements found exclusively in his custom pedal line.

By incorporating these tones along with the Keeley standard of U.S.A. hand-built quality using premium components, the Red Dirt overdrive aims to become an indispensable part of any pedal chain.

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.13

PRODUCT NEWS

Sakae Endorsees Tyler Greenwell and JJ Johnson Tear It Up At Bluesfest Hot Apple Distribution | www.hotapple.com.au

If you missed out on going to Bluesfest 2016, well we hate to break it to you but you missed out on one incredible festival. Punters who attended may have caught a set from The Tedeschi Trucks Band – the all-star eleven-piece unit featuring Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks. One of the highlights of the eleven-piece’s performance was undoubtedly the drumming duo of Tyler Greenwell and JJ Johnson – two of Sakae’s most prized endorsees. Although they seamlessly intertwine on stage, both drummers had a different path to becoming a drummer for The Tedeschi Trucks Band. Growing up in Austin, Texas, JJ was surrounded by a variety of music from the very beginning. He has worked with many notable artist including Charlie Sexton, Doyle Bramhall, Boz Scaggs and John Mayer – who he teamed up with in 2003 for a 7-year stint before working with TTTB. On the other hand, Tyler Greenwell grew up in Pensacola, Florida playing in many cover and original bands. He started touring right out of high school, eventually landing a gig with Col. Bruce Hampton, which to led to him moving to Atlanta, GA in the early 2000’s. Through Bruce, Tyler was introduced to Mrs Susan Tedeschi and shortly thereafter began playing with Susan. After many years with Susan, she and husband Derek Trucks formed the Tedeschi Trucks Band, which Tyler has been a member of since 2010. If one thing is certain, it’s both drummers admiration for Sakae drums. “My choice for teaming with Sakae was plain and simple,” explains Johnson. “The Trilogy series is the exact sound that I’ve been looking for in a modern drum company. Aside from that, there is strong sense of family and dedication.” Greenwell adds, “I am very excited to be working with the Sakae family. To be able to work with these artisans – drum makers of the highest calibre – is an honour to say the least. The craftsmanship is exquisite, very subtle and very clean. The sound is everything I’ve ever wanted in a drum, timeless, classic and true. How they’ve achieved this in a new drum is truly a mystery to me, yet they’ve done just that.”

New MasterCraft Electronic Drum Kit and Amplifier Arrive In Australia Dynamic Music | (02) 9939 1299 | www.dynamicmusic.com.au

2016 is set to be a big year for Mastercraft, with the electronic kit company unveiling the MCSKD131 electronic drum kit and MCDS50 Electronic Drum Kit Amplifier to Australian audiences.

The MCSKD131 is an all-round performer that is feature packed for it’s class with fantastic sounds, a unique look and a great feel. The kit features 250 high-quality percussion voices, 20 pre-set kits, 10 user- defined kits as well as all of the expected features such as a USB interface for MIDI, headphone output and an AUX input and output. The MCDS50 is a professional grade amp, perfect for performance. With 50 watts of power, it is sure to provide users with grade-A sound quality. The amp is loaded with 2 channel inputs, 3-band equalisers, an aux input and a 10” driver for optimal functionality. Whether you are after a rehearsal kit, performance kit or want something at hand for quick recording without breaking the bank, you can rely on the trusted quality of Mastercraft percussion.

Introducing the New 2.4 Ghz Wireless Systems from Soundart

Ferrofish A32 32 Channel AD/DA Converter

Jade Australia | 1800 144 120 |

The ultimate way to get loads of analogue audio to and from your digital audio system, the A32 provides pristine audio quality. The Ferrofish A32 is the powerful new 32 in, 32 out AD/DA converter from the company that brought us the extremely successful A16 MK-II. This time around Ferrofish have managed to go even further, cramming a hugely impressive amount of I/O into 1U of rack-space whilst keeping the price-point extremely competitive. Featuring both MADI and ADAT functionality, the Ferrofish A32 also boasts powerful routing capabilities plus detailed channel metering across its 4 eye-catching TFT displays. The A32 is designed for MADI – the digital audio interface for professionals. Up to 64 channels can be transferred using a simple pair of glass fiber cables (or coaxial cable) spanning a distance of up to 1.2 miles. Thanks to the MIDI over MADI feature, the A32 can be remote controlled using MIDI data embedded in the same MADI cable. The audio transfer between the MADI input and MADI output is done with zero latency, so you can daisy chain multiple A32 without any added latency or delay compensation. This is what we call plug-and-play.

www.musocity.com.au

Soundart have now entered the 2.4ghz market with a range of affordable microphone, guitar and lapel single and double wireless outfits. Don’t get caught out by the recent digital transmission laws; 2.4ghz systems provide a convenient ‘use anywhere’ option as opposed to sourcing a UHF system in a frequency suited to your particular area of operation. The new SoundArt wireless systems feature quality mic capsules, simple mic to receiver syncing, whilst all enclosed in a sturdy case. These units are easy to set up, and can meet the demands of professional use, delivering exceptional results.

Mogami Introduce Ruggedised Cables - The Overdrive Series Innovative Music | (03) 9540 0658 | www.innovativemusic.com.au

Mogami has added a ruggedised Platinum-level cable series to meet the unique demands of electric guitarists. The new Overdrive Series includes guitar and speaker cables, designed to work separately or in combination with synergistic results.

Mogami Platinum guitar cable is recognised as being among the finest instrument cables on the planet, exhibiting extraordinarily neutral, extended, and detailed sound from any instrument. However it was designed for careful stage and studio use where cables can be handled with professional care. Mogami overdrive guitar cable, while being more rugged, reveals even more presence, dynamics and upper frequency definition. For tone purists who make the most of the stage, this is your cable. Overdrive cables contain no electronics, just pure copper. Following the guiding principal of Mogami cable, these cables are designed to deliver the original sound of the instrument with no colouration.

Complementing the Overdrive guitar cables are speaker cables designed for sonic synergy, yielding even more midrange energy and punch. Overdrive speaker cables and Overdrive guitar cables work well independently of one another, but the combination ensures maximum, uninhibited performance from both.

PG.14 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

Innovative Music | (03) 9540 0658 | www.innovativemusic.com.au

Record On-The-Go With The New Audio-Technica USB Microphone Technical Audio Group | (02) 9519 0900 | www.tag.com.au

The most recent addition to the USB microphone range offers easy connectivity to your PC for an affordable price.

Whether you’re into gaming or a regular podcaster, the AT9934USB’s newly designed microphone circuit enables exceptional audio transmission with less noise. It is also great for demoing in your home studio with an output built into the body for monitoring. An LED display for the volume/mute switch gives you easy access control.

The growth of online content and gaming communities has created a demand for reliable tools to communicate online. The AT9934USB can be easily plugged into your PC to record high quality audio on the go. The microphone thrives in a fast environment, making it the perfect companion for presenters, musicians, gamers and creatives. And the best part is that it is compatible with Windows and Mac OSX.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

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PRODUCT NEWS

Introducing the 1000-Watt Studio Monitors

by Wayne Jones Audio Wayne Jones Audio | 0411 862 366 | www.waynejonesaudio.com

Wayne Jones, premier Australian bass player, producer and international charting recording artist, is a name that all bass players know for his outstanding high-end and high-powered bass cabinets. Now, the Australian-based manufacturer has been working on brand new studio monitors, which you can expect to see released later this year. The new 1000-watt monitors are built with the same philosophy as all Wayne Jones products, with a goal of finding the perfect sound. These monitor speakers are built using a 10” driver (which is also featured in the 1x10 bass cabs) with the highly acclaimed Italian Faital tweeter. They’re made from 19mm MDF due to its high-density properties and the results are stunning, with Wayne Jones Audio constructing a pair of monitors that produce an accurate representation of bass & drums unlike any other monitor. The 1000-watt studio monitors are now in the final testing stage, so it won’t be too long until you can get your hands on these amazing speakers. Head to the Wayne Jones Audio website to stay up-to-date with the latest news.

Steinberg WaveLab Pro 9 and WaveLab Elements 9 Released Yamaha Music Australia | (03) 9693 5111 | www.au.yamaha.com

Wavelab, one of Steinberg’s finest software applications now presents itself in two versions: Pro and Elements. WaveLab Pro is designed for world-class audio engineering, featuring up to 384 kHz sample rate support, an all new master section with 12 effect slots plus extended monitoring and processing functions and a revolutionary new interface with an innovative windows docking system. Elements is a more stripped back version, tailored to hobby musicians, podcasters, journalists and home studio owners.

Both WaveLab Pro 9 and WaveLab Elements 9 full retail versions are available from authorised Steinberg resellers. WaveLab Elements 9, plus all updates and upgrades are available as downloads through the Steinberg Online Shop. Customers who have activated WaveLab versions 7, 8 and 8.5 or WaveLab Elements versions 7 and 8 since February 2, 2016, are eligible for a free, downloadable Grace Period update to the latest version.

Sennheiser Add New Lightweight Headphone Options Sennheiser Australia | (02) 9910 6700 | www.sennheiser.com.au

Audio specialist Sennheiser has steamlined its classic HD 25 pro headphones portfolio to make product selection easier. Now on offer from Sennheiser is their classic HD 25 with two sister models – the HD 25 LIGHT, with has slightly different features and accessories, and the HD 25 PLUS, which adds additional accessories to further enhance the classic. The new versions can be easily recognised by the compact Sennheiser logo on the earpieces, with the version and impedance information now provided on the headband.

The HD 25 LIGHT is the entry-level version for demanding consumers and cost-sensitive pro users who are looking for a good pair of mixing and monitoring headphones. The HD 25 LIGHT features a simpler headband design and slightly different drivers but brings a well-defined bass and detailed treble to any monitoring task. The HD 25 PLUS is identical in design to the HD 25 but spoils its users with extra accessories and two included cables. Users can choose between a coiled steel cable (3m/1m) and a straight 1.5m steel cable. The PLUS version also comes with a handy storage pouch and a second set of ear pads in a soft velour version.

Build Your Creative Future At JMC Academy JMC Academy | 1300 410 311 | www.jmcacademy.edu.au

Are you still undecided about how you want to spend the next one to two years of your study time? Do you want a preview of what the next two years might hold?

Then this is your opportunity to get to know JMC Academy. Beginning at the end of this month, the Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane campuses will open their doors to the public for their annual Open Day. On the day you will take a campus tour, undertake a focused overview on your course of interest, speak first-hand with current students, scholarship winners and the Heads of JMC Academy’s Music, Audio, Animation, Game Design, Film and Television, Digital Design (Sydney and Melbourne only) and Entertainment Business Management departments. The Sydney campus will open their doors on April 30, Melbourne on May 14 and Brisbane on May 21. To register for the JMC Academy open day, visit www. jmcacademy.edu.au/events/open-days/ or call JMC on 1300 410 311.

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JBL Add Monitoring System Controllers To Line-up Jands | (02) 9582 0909 | www.jands.com.au

At NAMM 2016, JBL Professional by HARMAN showcased a new line-up of monitor system controllers designed to enhance workflow in music recording, post-production and broadcast control rooms. The new controllers are ideal for use with JBL’s successful 3 Series Studio Monitors, and can be used with any studio speaker system.

In a compact desktop form factor, the Nano Patch+ serves as the volume control between the output of the production system and a pair of studio monitors. The unit features balanced combo XLR/TRS and stereo mini TRS input connectors, balanced TRS and stereo mini TRS outputs, and an all-passive circuitry for a high-quality signal path. The M-Patch 2 stereo controller and switch box can be placed on the desktop and is rack-mountable to provide versatile switching and dedicated level controls for two stereo input sources. Signals are routed to two sets of balanced outputs with A/B selection and selectable stereo-to-mono summing.

JBL also announced the Active Speaker Starter Pack as the ideal add-on to JBL 3 Series Studio Monitors. The pack bundles two studio monitor isolation pads with the Nano Patch+ volume controller and four 3-meter male XLR-to-TRS cables. The pack makes it easy to connect a computer audio system to a pair of powered studio monitors, providing a clean monitoring path and volume control for an efficient workflow.

Kick Start Your Career At The Grove Studios The Grove Studios | (02) 4362 3299 | www.thegrovestudios.com

For prospective students looking for a career in sound, look no further than The Grove Studios, located just one hour north of the Sydney CBD. The Grove Studios and RMI in partnership offer a fully enrolled three day-a-week Diploma of Sound Production, designed to provide practical industry based learning using the latest technology. Due to its success, the nine month Diploma commenced again earlier this year, alongside the newly developed two day-aweek nine month Advanced Diploma of Sound Production. The Diploma and Advanced Diploma are suitable for all age ranges and allows students to learn from professionals with decades of experience – including teachers and guest speakers – in a purpose built classroom, and to study within the grounds of a world-class working studio. Discussion and collaboration is what sets the Diploma of Sound Production apart from other similar courses, and VET Fee-Help is available. Anybody interested in applying for the courses can get in touch via The Grove Studios website at, or the RMI website. Enrolment is still open for the Advanced Diploma, beginning April 18, however spaces are limited.

Commencement for the next Diploma course begins July 11.

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C O V E R

S T O R Y

BLACK SABBATH November 29, 1969. That’s the day music changed forever. That’s when Black Sabbath appeared on John Peel’s Top Gear radio program, performing ‘NIB’, ‘Behind The Wall of Sleep’ and the ominous, devilish song that started it all, ‘Black Sabbath’. In the 47 years since, Black Sabbath has done it all: blockbuster tours, epoch-defining albums, rejuvenating line-up changes, reunions and rebirths. When Tony Iommi, Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler reconvened for 2013’s 13 album, it looked like Sabbath wanted to prove one last time that they could still write compelling, important material. The subsequent tour (which included a live DVD that was recorded in Melbourne) was notable for the power of its performances and the ease with which new tracks like ‘God Is Dead?’ and ‘End Of The Beginning’ integrated with original-era classics like ‘War Pigs’ and ‘Snow Blind’. Now, with Iommi in treatment for lymphoma (he’s generally keeping on top of the disease but treatment and recovery makes touring an exhausting proposition), Sabbath has decided to call time on their days as a touring entity.

The appropriately named The End tour rolls into Australia this month, and available exclusively at shows is a CD, also titled The End, which is a must-have for fans.

“When we recorded the 13 album we recorded 16 tracks - 16 songs,” Iommi says. “[Producer] Rick Rubin put eight on the album and then we had some bonus tracks that went out with the album as well, but we had these other songs left over. I thought we were going to add some other songs to those to make another album. But we all decided at the end of the day to not do it, and to tour. So we had these tracks and we thought we should put them out. It’s mad to just leave them. So we had the idea to sell them at the shows to do something different.” The four new tracks were combined with four songs recorded during the 13 world tour. “We did do that but of course it’s always difficult playing so many new songs because people really want to hear the old songs, but they want to hear new songs too. You’d be playing three or four hours if you played everything everyone wanted you to play. For this show we mainly do stuff that people want to hear.”

On drums again for the final tour is Tommy Clufetos (original drummer Bill Ward refused to play over a contract dispute). It’s a tough gig for any drummer, but Tommy won over the doubtful, and even earned a standing ovation after his drum solo on the night this writer them play on their last tour. “It’s difficult for a drummer to do a solo and hold peoples’ attention but I must say, Tommy is such an exceptional player. I’m amazed every night. I’m backstage in my dressing room tent and I hear him and he never ceases to amaze me.”

There isn’t a rock or metal guitarist alive who isn’t influenced by Iommi, whether they know it or not. He pioneered not just a style of playing but also a whole library of techniques to use in the studio: for instance, his method of having two separate guitar solos playing off each other at once, as heard on ‘Iron Man’ and ‘Killing Yourself To Live’. “I suppose that was an accident, really,” Iommi says. “I just liked the idea of having two guitars at the same time playing slightly different things. And so we kept it but it was a bit of a fluke. We’d do the track and I’d play the solo and then try another solo and we’d happen to play them back at the same time and think ‘Ooh, that’s a good effect.’ I always like to experiment and try different things.”

Iommi’s current live guitar collection includes instruments by Gibson and JayDee. “I’ve also got a new Epiphone out at the moment,” he says. “It’s getting some fabulous, fabulous reviews. I’m really pleased with it. I haven’t used it on stage yet because it still needs a bit of fine-tuning. By the time we left England, I didn’t have time to get

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I just liked the idea of having two guitars at the same time playing slightly different things. And so we kept it but it was a bit of a fluke.

anybody to work on it. But I’m using the JayDees and Gibsons.”

Iommi’s SGs feature his signature Gibson humbuckers, high-powered units which combine Alnico II and Ceramic magnets for a focusedyet-gritty tone. “We worked on those quite a long time ago,” Iommi says. “It did take quite a bit of time to get them right. I stayed in Nashville for a couple of weeks, going in to the factory every day and working with the guys on them. They’d wind one and I’d try it, say ‘no, no,’ try another one and so on. Then I’d go on the road and test them.”

Iommi has been a longtime Laney amplifier user, with a current signature model. “They started roughly the same time we did, really, so we started off with Laney, and built them up. I’ve gone away from Laney and come back, gone away again and come back… at one point Laney stopped doing tube amps and started doing transistor stuff and that’s when I stopped. And then eventually Lyndon Laney came to me and said ‘I’d love to build some tube amps again.’ So we started doing them. I’ve got a set on the road with me now of ‘new old amps’, if you know what I mean. I’ve got an original Laney, which was very difficult to get a hold of, and we’ve rebuilt the thing – I had a guy do it – and then Laney copied them from the original design. At that point nobody at Laney had seen them because they were too young! So it was exciting for them. I’ve got them on the road at the moment and I’m testing them. It’s right back to basics, the regular amp, no preamps and nothing like that, just the straight amp like I used to have it in the early days, and then I use a little treble booster like I did in the early days, to drive the input.”

It’s a good point, along with inventing the musical vocabulary of metal, Sabbath and especially Iommi also invented the sonic presentation; there was no rulebook for how metal was supposed to sound back then. “That’s right, you had to do everything,” Iommi says. “You just couldn’t buy the things that exist today, so you had to make your own sound with the way you used it, and you had to make the amp adjust to you. Today, you can go out and buy all these things with different sounds, and some of them are really good, but I still like the sound from the actual tubes as opposed to a gadget making the sound.”

So what’s next for Tony Iommi? First there’s the possibility of recording some bonus tracks with another Sabbath vocalist, Tony Martin (who recorded five albums with the band). “After this Sabbath tour I’m not going to be doing tours again,” Iommi says.

“I might do occasional shows but I’m not going to be going on tour like this again. If I were I’d be doing it with these guys! But that’s the plan, to basically retire from touring. I’d still like to record, but touring for me is… I get very tired.”

“I’ve got, honestly, hundreds and thousands of riffs and songs that I just never got round to using, really,” he says. “It’ll be interesting to have the time to sift through the stuff and see what I’d like to use. But what I tend to do is not go back on stuff; I tend to start writing new stuff, so it accumulates more that way!”

BY PETER HODGSON

TOUR DATES April 15 – Perth Arena, Perth, WA April 17 – Adelaide Entertainment Centre, Hindmarsh, SA April 19 – Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne, VIC April 23 – Allphones Arena Sydney, Olympic Park, NSW April 25 – Brisbane Entertainment Centre, Boondall, QLD

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TONY IOMMI’S TONE CHOICE

SINCE 1970

FROM BACK STAGE TO THE WORLD STAGE

TI15-112 15 watts of pure Iommi high gain valve tone.

austmusic.com.au/laney PROUDLY DISTRIBUTED BY AUSTRALASIAN MUSIC SUPPLIES

I N T E R V I E W S

DANDY WARHOLS Courtney Taylor-Taylor appears to be a man of many traits. In between renovating his self-designed recording studio, running errands, and as he put it, ‘putting out fires’, he is one quarter of infamous Portland outfit The Dandy Warhols. For the last two decades, The Dandy Warhols have solidified themselves as a veteran rock act that just keeps on producing.

They’ve delivered yet again with their latest piece Distortland, which is set to be released April 8.

Distortland is the Dandy’s ninth studio record. Taylor has expressed that he is experiencing a rare feeling of obsession with the material.

“I can’t stop listening and smoking to it. I’ve never had this happen to me. Usually I need a year or at least nine months to leave it alone and not hear it. This one I seriously became a gothic teenager, I would just go and sit in my room with my headphones on and play this album three times in a row minimum. This has only really happened maybe on our first record, I remember getting wasted with my friends and cranking it over and over again, but never on this level.”

A slightly different approach to their other records, Dandy Warhol’s enlisted the services of producer, mixer and Grammy award winning engineer Jim Lowe. “We’ve never really done it this way before.

Normally I just fly out and do it. You email them, you get a mix, you listen to it and email it back and offer suggestions and then you

PRIMAL SCREAM Motivated by a pending eviction notice that saw the band ejected from their North London studio, legendary rock outfit Primal Scream concocted the latest effort Chaosmosis; a record swimming with synth pop sensibilities. Mixdown sat down with guitarist Andrew Innes to lament on the golden age of synthesisers, drum machines and the process of writing the band’s 11th studio album.

“I guess it started when we got the eviction notice to our studio.

We’ve had it for a good few years up in North London; they had been threatening eviction for years. It’s the usual story, everything they can find in London they’re turning it into luxury flats and kicking out small businesses and low rent places,” says Andrew, one half - along with lead singer Bobby Gillespie - of the band’s creative driving force.

With the eviction at their heels, the pair began writing what was soon to be Chaosmosis. “The eviction inspired us and got us moving because we realised we only had six months left in the place, we thought we better use it as this is the last chance we’re going to get.”

“We’ve been in that complex since 1994, and the studio we were in presently since 1998, so we have done about seven LPs in there, well, various bits of them. It was a real ‘gang hut’ as we use to call it. You know you could just go there and pass the days away,” says Innes.

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go to bed. Then the next day you get an hour or two when you get up to check mixes, make a few adjustments and then he goes to bed. So you have fucking nothing to do. It’s crazy. It’s hard but it also gives you a little distance. And because you’ve had that distance and you haven’t heard that song in five days, when you listen to it again, you’re a little blown away.” In terms on the albums content, Taylor expresses no favouritism towards any particular track. They are all equally as personal to the band and have their own place, their own world. “Emotionally – It’s an interesting record. I can’t believe how it just turned out to be everything I wanted I guess, or close enough that I just don’t care about any more details I just love it. It makes me feel better.”

Their latest single release, ‘You Are Killing Me,’ is self-explanatory, but also opens a dialogue for its listeners. “People are big mistake makers, and we are fucked in the head. It’s a phrase that is there to open a discussion. It’s about being open ended. Lyrically there are admissions of your own shortcomings, but without abusing yourself too much. It calls for admission to yourself.”

“It really seems like, maybe it’s just me. But the idea of when you’re in a relationship what is ruining it is not the shit you do but the shit you don’t do. The shit you forget to do. That seems to be what’s intolerable about me, that and a lot of ill-considered jocularity.”

Taylor finds himself in the lull that is just before the tour. Gagging to get on the road and promote this new record…it’s what they do best. Touring is what Taylor loves. Every part of it, like the lack of sleep, the party, the long flights and, of course, the shows. “We haven’t toured since December.

Three months is a really long time for us to have not been on the road, but I guess not for anyone else in the world. It’s too long for me, I should have been on tour 2-3 weeks ago. Touring is

According to Innes, Chaosmosis was the most freeflowing album the band have written in years. “It only took a couple of months to write the songs.

It didn’t seem like it at the time, but I think the impending eviction had a lot to do with it. Instead of just taking our time with it, we got working straight away.”

Drenched in pop-savvy synths and electronica, Chaosmosis demonstrates, even after all this time, the talent that saw the band’s name etched into British folklore as they rode the wave of Acid-House in the mid ‘80s.

“Some songs we write, we write using keyboards and synths, and some songs we write using guitars.

It is just a different way to approach song writing, because if you approach every song with a guitar, you would end up playing the same chord all the time.”

“I bought a new GForce Imposcar plugin and it’s brilliant. It’s all over the record. Sometimes it happens that way, you buy a new bit of equipment and you write a song because you just start playing around with it, and usually the first thing you get out of it is pretty good.”

The album features a number of collaborations including the likes of Sky Ferreira, Haim and Bjorn Yttling of Peter Bjorn and John, with the latter cowriting three tracks for Choasmosis.

“On the ‘More Light’ tour, we played a gig in Stockholm and Bjorn Yttling came to the gig and approached us about writing songs together. We had worked with him on Beautiful Future, he’s got a studio in Stockholm, and so we spent a week there.”

“He has quite a selection of cheesy 80s Roland and Casio synths that aren’t the good ones [Laughs], they weren’t the Jupiter-8 or the Juno-106, they were the cheaper ones. But each of these cheaper synths had at least one great preset.”

“We were also using an old LinnDrum as well, you forget how good they sound. The TR-808, the TR-

serious work, but it’s also a touch of vacation, which I like.” Although dates haven’t been announced yet, touring Australia is the plan. “We love Australia it’s part of our family, it’s part of our body. We did AUS – UK as one tour with a 34 hour flight in between. I actually quite enjoyed it.

I love that floating in space jetlag feeling where your time is all distorted. And then I can’t go to sleep, so you have to party. It’s the party plane.

You got to drink a lot of water during the party plane. You could forget and you could ruin your life. It’s hard to remember shit when you’re drunk.

That’s why we do it. Live in the moment, right?”

Throughout his time making these nine records, Courtney has seen plenty of highs and lows, but you can’t mistake how proud he is of the Dandy’s achievements. “Every record is what we are. Every record is definitely a milestone. They are two-four years apart. Certainly no record is more valuable than others. They are an emotional, physiological document in a lot of ways, that only the four of us can truly interpret what they mean. And then, of course, they are also open for interpretation for everyone else. They’re all milestones for us.

Whether they’re big milestones, it’s up to other people to make that decision. This one could be a huge record or, it could be the flop that ended the Dandy Warhols. We don’t know, but I guess we will wait and see but of the day. I just put it on and it makes me fucking feel better.”

BY SARAH BRYANT

Distortland is out April 8 via Dine Alone/Cooking Vinyl Australia.

909 and the LinnDrum — they are all classic drum machines and they haven’t really been beaten. I don’t know why they made them so well then, but there was a period in the early 80s when they made great drum machines, that was the peak of it. I suppose the great guitars were made in the late 50s and the early 60s. And the peak for great drum machines is the late 70s and early 80s.”

Polarising our discussions of all things 70s and 80s electronics, Innes changes focus to the current state of music production equipment. “I have recently moved up to Logic Pro and the amp simulators and effects are great. I’ve got a lot of vintage guitar gear and to be honest it’s getting hard to tell the difference, the amp simulators in today’s computers are getting good and it’s silly to pretend it’s not.”

“Just imagine, what use to take up two whole rooms full of equipment is now in a laptop, it is incredible. For example, in the old days if you used time stretch, you would set it off, go away and make a cup of tea, only to return 20 minutes later with the process incomplete. And when it eventually finished, it would be wrong. These days you can just hit time stretch and it’s done and sounds good, it’s in time and it’s in tune. All these advances are great now for making your life easier,” says Innes.

With plans of touring the album in April, Innes confesses his favourite part of the writing process is preparing the songs for a live context, “that’s the bit I like, sorting it out for the live show, because sometimes you have to change how you deliver it live, and I find that exciting.”

BY AARON STREATFEILD Chaosmosis is out now via First International/ Ignition Records.

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I N T E R V I E W S

VIOLENT SOHO Mansfield’s biggest export, Violent Soho, had a huge start to 2016. Not only did they stake out a top 20 position on the 2015 Triple J Hottest 100 with their lead single ‘Like Soda’, they did the rounds nationally as a part of the Laneway Festival. Despite the array of notable international acts on the bill, Soho were a major drawcard – they even drew the largest crowd of the entire day in their native Brisbane. “They were some of the best sets we’ve played,” affirms Luke Boerdam, the band’s lead singer and rhythm guitarist.

“At the Melbourne leg, we played the Dean Turner stage. That meant a great deal to us, as Dean was such a huge supporter of this band really early on. It meant so much to pay tribute to him that way.

The line-up was fucking amazing too. Usually, we feel like the real outliers at festivals like this – it’s a lot of electronic acts and then us and maybe two other token guitar bands. This time around, there were acts like DIIV, METZ, The Smith Street Band – who we’ve toured with – and Courtney Barnett did the New Zealand one too. We got along really well with everyone, just talking gear and hanging out.

It really is the best festival in Australia. We played it back when we started out, just some scruffy kids from Brisbane, and they gave us a chance when no-one else would. It was an honour to be asked back.”

Violent Soho’s third album, WACO, follows on from Hungry Ghost,

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their 2013 breakthrough that saw them elevated to being potentially the biggest name in contemporary Australian rock; cracking the ARIA charts and selling out national tours. For a band that existed on the fringe for nearly a decade, it was a big-time payoff – and songs from that album, such as ‘Covered in Chrome’ and ‘In the Aisle’, have remained rock radio staples since their release. When it came to WACO, the elephant in the room had to be acknowledged – just how do you follow up on what is ostensibly one of the biggest Australian rock records of the 2010s?

“I was so confident,” says Boerdam. “I thought that I’d be able to finish writing for the album in four months. When that was up, I realised that I had two songs – and I wasn’t confident enough in either to show to the rest of the band. I remembered Hungry Ghost took three years to write, and I decided to start fresh. I guess what I’ve found is that I never make a single song in the one go. I’m always scrapping together bits from three or four different ideas. I tend to work in fragments – a riff here, a sound idea here, some lyrics there.

You mix and match, you collate until you have something cohesive. It’s about the gut feeling, really – it’s about knowing what direction you want the songs to take. We got stuck into it every day and we came out of the process with something we were really happy with.”

WACO was recorded throughout 2015 at The Shed in Brisbane by Bryce Moorhead, a long-time friend of the band who has worked on several of their releases in the past. Mixing and mastering was completed in Moorhead’s basement, and the end result is an expansion of the mane-thrashing, abrasive alt-rock that the band has cemented their name with across the 12 years they have been together. “I guess the foundation of this band is those three-chord/four-chord heavy pop songs,”

says Boerdam. “We wanted to see what would happen if we explored away from that.” Sonically, too, it has given the chance for the band to expand their horizons – as Boerdam explains, it all comes down to getting the balance just right.

“When we’re doing demos, it’s all just clean guitar, clean bass... I’ve even used shitty little drum machines when I’ve been making demos by myself,” he says. “When it comes to actually laying things down, we have to figure out what flourishes work where. How do we dress this song up? We all have our go-to pedals – I’ve even got two delays in my set-up now, which sounds really cool. There was a part on Hungry Ghost that I got to use an Eventide Space pedal. It’s a classic rackmount that’s been converted into a stompbox – super-wet reverb, super-sheeny. I wanted to keep following it down the rabbit hole, so to speak, on WACO. There was also a point when we were recording that Bryce pulled out an EXH Deluxe Memory Man from the 80s. They literally can’t make them anymore – I read that one of the actual metals inside of the pedal doesn’t exist anymore or something along those lines. That made its way onto the album, too. There was this Tubescreamer mod that we used – it was a clone that this guy made by ordering all the original parts individually and then adding a few parts of his own. It sounded really big and really awesome – just this rich, saturated sound.

Once you’ve found your sound – the right pedal, the right tone – it makes everything so much easier.”

BY DAVID JAMES YOUNG Violent Soho will be touring nationally throughout May. For more information head to www.mixdownmag.com.au. WACO is out now via I Oh You.

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I N T E R V I E W S

WHITE LUNG Since the release of their 2010 album It’s the Evil, Canada’s White Lung have established themselves as one of the most important bands in modern punk rock. Eschewing any sense of moderation or subtlety in their sound, White Lung’s three LPs and soon to be released Paradise are a rapid fire assault of frantic guitar lines and melodic yet fierce and controlling lyrics. With a sense of vision and focus unseen in punk rock since the likes of Fugazi and Refused, White Lung continues to evolve and push the boundaries of what they can musically achieve. Talking with guitarist Kenneth William, it is clear that the band’s ethic of pushing things forward and eschewing tradition and expectation is a clear foundation for the band’s originality and importance.

In recent interviews, the band has explained that they aimed for Paradise to sound like a record for 2016. “I find a lot of rock bands in general look into the past, recording with all analogue gear and pretending they’re Led Zeppelin,” explains William. “We wanted to do something completely different to that and make it sound very unnatural and very modern. We approached it the same way that a lot of people record electronic music; we recorded a bunch of little parts and stuck them together without recording anything together

DEFTONES Aside from having the kind of kick-arse name straight from Streetfighter II, Sergio Vega also happens to be part of seminal metal gods, Deftones. Though not an original member of the Californian band, Vega’s association stretches over two decades when his first band, Quicksand, was still fresh on the scene.

Following the untimely departure of Chi Cheng, he became the band’s bass player in 2009 and ever since has been a fundamental part of their ever-evolving sound. With the release of album #8, Gore, Vega looks back on their entwined history, and why this latest album shows Deftones revelling in all their strange glory.

“Quicksand and Deftones go back to like 1995,” he recalls. “We met back then and hit it off because even though we were from different … well, different subscenes I guess, we weren’t from entirely different worlds. We had a real mutual taste in a lot of bands, and had a similar energy we were putting into everything. We really clicked on our first Warped tour. Quicksilver had formed a while before we opened for that tour, but we’d been kind of bumming around but not really. We’d been working on a record for a long time, and we wound up touring with them and that kind of wove us all together. After that we just stayed friends. I filed in for Chi in ‘99, and it’s really because we’d always been around each other and knew each other so well musically.”

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as a band live off the floor at all. A lot of the song arrangements and structures ended up being a lot different to how we originally wrote them. We cut and pasted a lot of things, if someone had a new idea in the studio we could make it happen instantly.”

Marked by a competing interplay between William’s guitar and Mish Barber-Way’s vocal melodies and patterns, the band’s songwriting quality and chemistry on Paradise takes a step beyond the harsh onslaught of much of 2014’s Deep Fantasy, and introduces a new element of locking in together as a tight melodic unit. “Mish has gotten better at writing melodies, this is the best she’s ever done. Even though we try to make everything work together melodically, this album is unique as we both worked completely separately. With Deep Fantasy, we worked together in Los Angeles for most of the time. This time we actually worked completely separately with me writing in Vancouver and Mish writing in Los Angeles. We barely even worked in the studio together. I would go in and do guitar on my own for a few days, then Mish would come in and record her vocals. Working with Pro Tools we had the ability to cut and move things around a lot so there was never really any issue of things not sticking together in a way that worked.”

Deciding to focus more on the recording and technical production aspect of the album, the band enlisted the expertise of producer Lars Stalfors, known for his work with Cold War Kids, Alice Glass and HEALTH, among others. “He was really good working with Pro Tools and helping out with guitar pedals I used. He has a lot of great suggestions for gear that we could use to push our sound further.

I’m not really much of a gear guy. Normally I’ve just used a distortion and delay pedal, but he had a lot of crazy equipment that we messed around with and got some interesting sounds.” Uncommon for punk rock, William plans to take much of what was Although Vega has been embraced whole-heartedly by both the band and fans, his introduction to the line-up was born of a tragic accident when Chi Cheng was left comatosed after a car accident in 2008; he passed away five years later. Vega’s reflections on the band and the way they sound today are peppered with references to Cheng, and while he is in no way trying to emulate his friend’s playing style, the essence of his influence is worn quite proudly.

“I think there’s definitely …” Vega pauses, searching for words. “I mean, even the way I play bass to the way I play guitar is way different. With Deftones, there were more similarities between Chi’s approach and my approach, as far as modality goes.

Not so much tone, but we had a similar pattern where we’re both really cheating off a lot of reggae, leading with melodic rhythm lines, cutting across things and doing things that are really cool without being flashy. I think that our friendship was the foundation for that, and made that crossover to the Deftones stylistically feel a lot more natural.

I’d be playing stuff traditionally but also thinking, well, how would Chi play a riff? Trying to imagine ideas that would be coming from the way that they play. But again, it all felt really natural, it wasn’t something that I really set out to do. It’s something that I noticed just happened, which I think comes from just wanting to make people excited by what you’re playing.”

I admit I was late coming to the Deftones game, only really catching onto the band around the time of Diamond Eyes in 2010. That said, even without being a devout fan, that sense of excitement about their new material is clearly evidenced here. It is a varied, heavier beast, and is legitimately showing a band at the height of their strengths. First single ‘Prayers/Triangles’ has already begun doing the rounds and has led to great anticipation for the shape of Gore, but my own money is on the song, ‘Doomed User’.

used in the studio to successfully reproduce such a dense sound live. “I’ve integrated a MIDI pedal and a sampler that I’ll be incorporating into our live show, so I can record samples and trigger them live with my guitar. In the past, I wouldn’t do many overdubs and double tracking on guitar, but Lars helped me achieve new ways of being able to play crazy new sounds live on stage. One of our rules as a band is that we won’t record anything that we can’t play live.”

Comparing Paradise to previous records, it is clear that the frantic speed, focus and energy has combined better than ever before with the band’s melodic aspect. Vocalist Mish Way-Barber has explained previously that “we just play pop songs, they’re just really fast,” and this methodology, albeit simplified, is a testament to the songwriting quality and musicianship of the band. “I think that it’s definitely a step up. I remember every time you finish a record, one of the feelings is that you can never imagine yourself writing another song. I feel like on this new record we definitely broke a lot of new ground, and I can actually see where there’s more areas now where we could go and try new things.” Looking beyond the new release and how the record fits into the White Lung discography, but also towards the album succeeding in his ambition to make a record that represents music and the band in 2016, Kenneth simply believes that “it’s exciting and I think it points to new ways we can write songs and push things forward.”

BY JOE HANSEN

Paradise is set to be released on May 6th via Domino Recording Company “Something that happened with this process was that we had a lot more material. We had a lot of things that didn’t really qualify as a true song; they didn’t have beginnings, middles and ends. ‘Doomed User’ developed a while back. We went out to go visit Stephen’s studio. Abe and I were jamming on, so we’d kind of started writing for the album before we’d started really writing. Then Stephen was adding to it, we’d all take ideas and make alternate versions, different riffs. From there we put it on ice for a long time, and later it just popped back up when we were scanning over old ideas. We had a nice playlist of all these bits and pieces and that was one of them, this song that was only halfway there. But it had something we all liked, so we brought it home.”

Before we go our separate ways, I have to ask Vega about the cover art for Gore. It is an incongruous image – a flock of flamingos against a pale grey sky – yet resonates quite deeply with Deftones’ character. “It’s about an emotional reaction, it’s not something that should be too cerebral. The birds are kind of beautiful but also kind of mean, and sitting in the centre – and it’s really because of the balance, having a four-letter word sitting there, Gore – having that word and what it means up against that imagery, that movement. I think it really represented what the Deftones are. It’s not something you can directly explain, but it is something you can feel quite clearly. Things can be heavy and pretty at the same time, things can be fast and extreme but also seem very smooth.

It plays with extremes, which I think is really a detail of ourselves and our music. That image really captures that in a way.”

BY ADAM NORRIS

Gore is set to be released on April 8 via Warner Music.

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I N T E R V I E W S

THE BENNIES For Anty Horgan, Craig Selak, David “Bowie” Beaumont and “King” Jules Rozenbergs – collectively known as The Bennies – January 26 was just another day.

“Anty was asleep, Jules was playing video games and I was out playing golf with my dad,” begins Selak, who serves as the band’s bassist and one of its three utilised vocalists. It was early afternoon when news broke: ‘Party Machine’, the lead single from the band’s third studio album Wisdom Machine, had entered the Triple J Hottest 100 at 88. “I think we were about to tee off on the second hole when suddenly my phone started ringing off the hook,” adds Selak with a laugh.

“I don’t think we even thought we’d get into the Hottest 200! It was such a thrill, even just to know that the hard work that we had put in meant that people outside of our friends and families had been listening to us and were getting behind the band.”

‘Party Machine’ features the use of a few new toys in the recording process for The Bennies. The first of which is a vocoder, implemented by drummer Beaumont in a call-and-response backing vocal. “We call it the Beaucoder!” quips Selak. “We’ve only ever gotten him to do vocals on a song twice – and both were using this vocoder! The other one was ‘Sky High’ from our last album [2013’s Rainbows in Space].

TRIVIUM Guitar lord and centerpiece for metal’s hardest working band, Trivium’s Matt Heafy talks of his struggles with the harsher side of vocals, a revolving door of drummers and the band’s 2015 release Silence in the Snow. Mixdown caught up with the full battlejacket wearing frontman in the lead up to the band’s April Australian tour.

Our interview finds Heafy residing in his Orlando home off the back of a lengthy US tour. A man of regiment, Heafy, despite earning time off from the grind, is preparing himself for the next tour. “When I’m home from tour, I try to make sure I spend seven days a week keeping up my chops. I spend at least an hour a day practicing vocals and guitar,” says Heafy. “I try to keep very productive during my downtime. In between preparing for tour, I spend six days a week doing Brazilian Jujitsu, and I try and do Yoga and weightlifting as well.”

Along for the return trip to Australia will be drummer Paul Wandtke.

The newcomer is the forth replacement since the band’s inception.

On the topic of Wandtke’s induction into the Trivium family, Heafy is quick to reassure that the accumulating tally of ex-drummers is not a move courtesy of stereotypical rockstardom. “I do truly feel that maybe some of the Trivium fans don’t understand why we do it. It’s not the result of a Spinal Tap moment. We do it out of necessity.

PG.24 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

It’s got such a cool sound to it, and it suited ‘Party Machine’ so well.” The single also prominently features a new bit of gear for Selak, a Boss basssynth pedal, which sends the song into overdrive during its raving final minute. While many musicians will often venture out of their way to seek out new gear – Selak included – this was a special case of serendipity and happenstance.

“Our friend Brock was nice enough to pick us up from the airport in Sydney,” says Selak. “As we were loading all of our stuff into the car, I noticed this pedal in the boot. It turns out it belonged to Brock’s housemate, and she was actually trying to get rid of it. One text later and it was all mine – but I had no idea what to do with it. I even tried playing with it live a couple of times, and it just sounded terrible. Thankfully, I gave it another go when we were recording ‘Party Machine’. Our producer, Sammy [Johnson], helped me to dial in something really filthy for that last bit on the song. It was a nice bit of dumb luck coming across it, that’s for sure.”

Selak’s current live set-up does not include the pedal, but now incorporates an octave pedal in order to replicate the sound and hit a few lower notes in heavier moments. His current touring bass is a Gibson Thunderbird which he has nicknamed Ronda Rousey because, so he says, “She’s beautiful – but she’ll also kick your arse!” The bass does not make an appearance on Wisdom Machine, however, as it was picked up after the record was completed. “On Rainbows, pretty much everything was played on Beyoncé, my Fender Precision Bass,” says Selak, enlisting yet another perfect instrument name. “I ran it all through my Markbass amp, which I use on everything. I couldn’t imagine using another amp – it’s exactly how I want my bass to sound. I still use that amp, of course, but for this album I found that my Fender Jazz Bass ended up sounding better up against Jules’ guitars – so that’s what we went with.” One can safely assume the J-Bass has a killer name, too? “Yep!” says Selak. “Stevie Nicks In The 70s!”

Fans have already heard a few singles from the record – ‘Party Machine’, a sublime pastiche of Sublime in ‘Legalise (But Don’t Tax)’ and the punslinging skate-punk of ‘Detroit Rock Ciggies’. There’s plenty more where that came from, too, as Wisdom Machine ensures that these stoners leave no stone unturned in their quest. ‘Corruption’, for instance, is one of the slowest and heaviest tracks that the band has ever committed to wax, stemming from two quite different but notable musical influences.

“We’d always had this idea of doing a song like Rage Against the Machine,” explains Selak. “They have the same set up as us – vocals, one guitar, drums, bass. Their songs are angry and punchy, but they’ve got so much groove to them. Though it’s a different groove, you can say the same thing about Black Sabbath, who I’ve always loved. That’s kind of where the idea behind that song came from – doing something really heavy, but then switching it up with kind of a reggae feel.”

If that wasn’t enough, Wisdom Machine also features both the shortest and the longest Bennies songs yet. ‘West Memphis Three Paper’ is all over in 21 seconds, while closer ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’ clocks in at the ten-minute mark. “I honestly think it’s the best song we’ve ever recorded,” he says of the latter. “It’s a really personal one – especially for Anty, who wrote all of the lyrics himself about his brother. The one thing we knew we couldn’t do was hold back – when it came together finally, it was such a huge moment for all of us.”

We’re hoping this will be the last time. With Paul, we’re finally able to play any song from our back catalogue. We haven’t been able to do that for a while.”

The new addition coincides with Heafy’s return to full strength at the vocal helm. After a performance at US festival, Rock on the Range, in 2014 cost him his voice; Heafy was left in recovery mode and with his screaming duties sidelined indefinitely. “It came down to my screaming technique. A little bit of the singing technique, but a 100% of the screaming technique was completely incorrect. The way I was screaming, I was just shattering my vocal chords.

After I lost my voice at Rock on the Range festival, I had to fly home and go to the doctor to find out what the problem was. Thankfully I didn’t do any permanent damage, but I was close. Matthew Sanders [aka M. Shadows, vocals] of Avenged Sevenfold put me in touch with Ron Anderson, a vocal coach he has worked with for the last 10 years. Through working with Ron in the background over last few years, I have finally started to scream again and did so on the last eight-week tour. The Ascendency stuff sounds exactly like it use to.

It’s the same sound, but a completely different technique. And it just took me a long time to learn how to do it. I’m glad, I did miss doing it, but I didn’t miss hurting myself. So now I am singing and screaming and doing it correctly and now it sounds right.”

Working for the first time with producer and fellow Orlando resident, Elvis Baskette, Silence in the Snow was an attempt to revisit the band’s initial writing process, a band in a room jamming, improvising and allowing the magic to happen. “We wanted to go back to how we used to write as a band,” says Heafy, “On Ascendency we didn’t really have fans and we didn’t have laptops to record with. We would just play in a room and it would

develop from there.”

Making a prominent appearance on the record, Heafy says his Les Paul Epiphone Custom Signature series guitars were his go to axes of choice when tracking the album. “A lot of my fans still ask me why I have a signature Epiphone and not a signature Gibson, or why would you record on your Epiphone and not your Gibson? For me, I wanted to make a signature guitar that was good enough for me to play live and good enough for me to play in the studio. The exact same guitar I play live and in the studio is the same guitar anybody can go buy for a reasonable price. I remember being a kid and wanting to buy many of my favourite guitar players’ signature guitars. I would go to the store and be like ‘oh, I can afford that’, only to find out that the real version is $10,000, compared to the $500 version that I’ve got. I tested out a bunch of custom guitars during the recording process and they sounded great. But I also tried my signature series and to me, it sounded a little better.”

BY DAVID JAMES YOUNG

Wisdom Machine is out now via Poison City Records. The Bennies will be touring throughout April, for more information head to www.mixdownmag.com.au.

BY AARON STREATFEILD

Silence in the Snow is out now via Deathproof.

Trivium will be touring throughout April. For more info head to www.mixdownmag.com.au.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

I N T E R V I E W S

MILLENCOLIN Scratching a seven-year itch, Swedish skate-punk outfit Millencolin emerged from its hometown studio to grant followers new material in the form of True Brew; a record that saw the band revive its So Cal roots in lieu of the experimental discourse of 2008’s Machine 15. Charged by social commentary, politics and a love for Bad Religion, True Brew marks a return to form for Millencolin. Bassist and vocalist Nikola Sarcevic talks of the lessons learnt from previous releases and why the band opted for self-production this time around.

“The ideas of what we wanted [True Brew] to sound like, those ideas came right after we finished the album Machine 15. Even before we released Machine 15, I said to Mathias [Färm, guitar], ‘The next album, we’re just going to have 12 songs, and they are going to be Bad Religion songs’,” says Sarcevic.

“For me, I guess every album you do is sort of a reaction to what you have done before it. And we just felt like with Machine 15 we didn’t take our sound as far as we could have. With True Brew, we wanted to go back to where we started and dig a little deeper. It wasn’t a conscious decision to go back to our roots. We just felt like we needed to just make a Bad Religion album. But for me it was just a reaction to the previous album.”

ASKING ALEXANDRIA

Asking Alexandria has had a massive year of change.

Following the departure of founding member Danny Worsnop, many fans feared this to be the end. However, in 2016 they’re set to release their ‘rawest’ album to date. The Black is a unique record that reflects both where the band have been, and where they’re looking to go. I had the pleasure of speaking with Benjamin Bruce, who was audibly ill. They’re currently touring ‘in America’ with good friends Bullet for my Valentine in the lead up to their Australian tour.

“It defiantly feels like a fresh start. I feel like that every time we sit down to write a record, and this one’s no different. We always try and be completely true and honest with ourselves, what we’ve actually been through and what we have experienced. We are not some top forty pop act that just sings about break ups, a random girl or shaking your ass in someone’s face. We have always represented ourselves in a truthful manor, so it was the same with this record.”

The band soon went to work after welcoming their new member, Denis Stoff. Having an already existing appreciation for the band, Stoff was discovered doing covers of Asking Alexandria songs on YouTube four years ago. Fast forward a little bit and he has found himself in the passenger seat of a well established band. Stoff has given Asking Alexandria a burst of positive creativity, and it’s a breath of fresh air. “Denis had a lot to write about because of what

PG.26 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

True Brew is by no means a reinvention of the wheel. The album clings to the staple elements of the band’s signature sound, with sing-a-long choruses and punk rock abandon galore. It is a re-ignition of the fire that burned bright in the band’s beginning years. It is the best studio sound the band has achieved to date, owed to the band taking the production into its own hands. Recorded in the same studio that captured Machine 15, the band once again made use of its very own Soundlab Studios, outsourcing the mixing duties to famed metal producer, Jens Bogren. “On previous albums we wanted a producer to come in and do miraculous things, like come up with genius ideas for vocal harmonies or other ways to sing a song.

This time we thought, why not do it ourselves?

With all the experience we have from recording albums together, and the experience Mathias has as a producer and working with the Soundlab studio – we didn’t see any reasons as to why we would pay a lot of money for something we can do ourselves.

For the first three albums we were all living in our hometown. We were rehearsing and jamming on the songs regularly in the same room and that’s how the songs would develop. With True Brew, no one was ever in the same room at any one time [laughs].”

Traditionally, Millencolin’s songs were a collaborative effort, with Sarcevic and Färm bringing song sketches to the rest of the band as a starting point. For True Brew however, Sarcevic crafted would-be songs on acoustic guitar, sending the early incarnations to Färm to reproduce in the studio. “I sent over a demo to him with like 17 songs with just acoustic guitar and vocals. Färm added another two songs, and we then boiled the lot down to 15 tracks we were happy with.” Färm spent the next six months developing the demos in the studio, creating prototypes of what would soon be True Brew. Once completed the remaining

members, one by one, tracked their parts in the studio. The result ending in 12 punk rock bangers, direct and to the point, with little time spared for filler.

Social commentary makes up the bulk of the lyrical content. In particular, the increase of political opinion online, courtesy of the advances in social media and the recent political climate in both his homeland and the world. “Usually the lyrics are the last thing I write. But during the time of writing these songs, we had the elections here in Sweden,” says Sarcevic. “I was inspired by things I saw on the news, and on social media among people I know. With Facebook and social media, everyone is expressing so many opinions. There is this pressure for people to have an opinion on everything.

Before you really didn’t, people were just living, now everyone has an opinion online. Some of those opinions got me inspired to write some of those songs. Before I was writing about things going on in my head and what I was doing, and now it’s less about what I am thinking and more about how a community is thinking and working together as a society. And I think that is the reason this album is more political, because I’m talking more about society than my own mental state.”

April 26th will see the Swedes back on Australian soil. The Australian leg will see the beginning of the True Brew world tour. With the band’s visit down under only a few weeks away, Sarcevic laments his Australian tour preparations. “You have to do a lot of training to look good on the beach.

We’re not 20 years old anymore, so staying in good physical shape is a big part of it. Being on tour it’s very easy to gain weight and on stage you want to be as light as possible.”

he’s been through. It feels good again now. It feels like it should have always been.”

Off the back of releasing the title track off the latest album, the band wanted to release a video that reflected how they feel, and to tell the world that they’re back. “We wanted all the imagery that was used for the video to be crisp and powerful. We wanted a modern video but also for it to be black and white to match the album artwork. Everything that flashes represents power, and it really hammers home the force that we are intending to come back with.”

The Black can be described as their most mature record to date with a clear direction, as the band has found themselves without the roadblocks that they have previously had with Warsnop. “Danny’s only response to everything is ‘nah that’s shit, I don’t like it, I don’t want to play heavy music’ or ‘I want to write country songs’. It was really difficult and I had to reinforce that we aren’t a country band, and I guess that’s where creativity clashed.

It’s just so stressful. Whereas this time Denis got involved. It was a completely different vibe and he was suggestive in trying new things, and since he’s been a fan of the band for so long he demanded more. He actually pushed really hard. He would pipe in with ‘that’s cool but I’ve heard you do better in the past’. It made me realise that this has to be our best record and he really pushed me.”

Lyrically, Bruce is the primary writer. Bruce’s writing process however, has been much the same with previous records. “I’ll sit down on my own, normally in my bedroom, or on the bus, and I’ll write the basis for a song and when it’s coming along I then send it across to James. He’s the first person I’ll send it to and he’ll tweak it and then we will head into the studio and add the final touches.”

One song in particular that is incredibly personal to Bruce is ‘Gone’, a touching four-minute tribute to the bands guitar technician and Bruce’s best friend

who tragically passed away last year. “The guys gave me a whole song on the record; I dedicated a song to Chris and about him leaving me and the world behind. I definitely have a strong connection with that song. All the songs are extremely personal to us because we write about experiences that we have been through. That one makes me sad but it’s a good song.”

Asking Alexandria have announced extensive tour dates and look to be on the road for some time, but it’s hard to miss the excitement in Bruce’s voice about a return visit to Australia this month.

It’ll be Stoffs first Australian visit and it will be a brief one. “I know we aren’t here for very long, but we always want to come out here and have a bit of a holiday but we never have enough time. We do nothing but talk about touring Australia just because we love it so much. I fell like in Denis’ mind he feels like it can’t be as good as we say it is. I’m so excited to get there, I don’t think he really realises how much fun it actually is, so we just can’t wait to get there with him. But first, I have to get through this tour because normally we just tour with each other for like three weeks and this has been a six and a half week tour. It’s alright, ill survive and if not you won’t see me in April.”

BY AARON STREATFEILD True Brew is out now via Epitaph Records.

BY SARAH BRYANT

TOUR DATES APRIL 7 - 170 RUSSELL, MELBOURNE VIC APRIL 8 - 170 RUSSELL, MELBOURNE VIC APRIL 9 - THE MET, BRISBANE QLD APRIL 10 - HQ COMPLEX, ADELAIDE SA APRIL 13 - ASTOR THEATRE, PERTH WA APRIL 15 - UNSW ROUNDHOUSE, SYDNEY NSW The Black is out now via Sumerian Records.

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A D V I C E

C O L U M N S

Know Your Arpeggios BASS Knowing the actual chord quality is a big plus for bass players. Sure there are lots of times where you need to keep it simple by just pumping away on the root note or root and 5th, but there’s so much more to work with when you know whether it’s Major, Minor, Dominant 7th or Diminished (just to name a few). I don’t know if this is a result of being scared of the unknown or laziness, but a lot of bass players don’t really seem to know the actual chord progressions of the tunes that they’re playing. In my mind, there’s nothing wrong with a little extra knowledge. Whether you actually get around to using your newfound knowledge or not, what’s the worst that can happen? An arpeggio is just the notes of a chord played in sequence rather than all at once.

Get to know some Major and Minor arpeggios and fingerings as a start. Figure A shows a few common patterns for each.

A Major and Minor can be moved up or down a string for E and D arpeggios, whilst the beauty of the G Major and Minor examples is that you can move the same shape anywhere up the neck, staying on the top E string, or move it down to the A string. Whatever note you start on is the name of the according arpeggio.

Figure B starts to use some additional arpeggio sounds. Typical for rock and blues use your imagination to come up with more variations - remember that a lot of these shapes are movable around the fretboard.

Figure C highlights some of these sounds a little further with Dominant 7, Major 7, 6 and Minor 7.

Add rhythmic variation to these arpeggios and you start to develop some cool sounds.

Figure D shows some different examples.

Obviously, there are lots of chord types and literally hundreds of voicings and fingerings. When you factor in the rhythms used in different styles of music, you’ve got a lot of options. Don’t get overwhelmed though – start with a few and try and incorporate them into your playing. For examples, there may be a song that stays on C Major for 24 bars for example. Why not try adding in some other notes (Major 7 or 6) and see how it sounds? Everyone from the Beatles to Led Zeppelin to Metallica to Bloc Party have created bass lines from arpeggios so there’s plenty of great music to listen to and absorb. And the best bit is they’re used in almost all styles of music so there should be an application to suit everyone! Watch out for more examples next lesson.

BY NICK BROWN

PG.28 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

www.mixdownmag.com.au

A D V I C E

C O L U M N S

A Lesson In Legato GUITAR Meaning ‘smooth and connected’, legato technique on guitar typically involves lots of left hand work and minimal picking with the right hand. Used by players such as Joe Satriani, Allan Holdsworth, Brett Garsed and Steve Vai to name a few, the development of legato technique results in fast, smooth runs that sound like a constant flow of notes.

Try starting with a 3 note per string major scale such as Figure A. Pick the first note on each string and hammer-on the second and third notes. Naturally this works well as triplets, thanks to the 3 notes on each string.

The next step is to play the scale as quavers (Figure B). As a starting point, try and get all notes in the scale to sound at the same volume. This can be trickier than it seems, especially with the first note on each string being picked and then the varying levels of strength in your other fretting fingers controlling the rest of the dynamics.

From there, move on to Figure C, which accents beats 1 and 3 of each bar. You’ll quickly notice that these accents fall on different fingers on each string. Balancing the picked dynamics and volume with the legato sections are the key to getting an even sound. Try softening your attack with the picked notes or go one step further and try using your second finger, à la Tom Quayle.

Figure D jumps up a little in difficulty.

Start slowly, focussing on balancing the

volume of the picked notes and hammerons and then gradually increase the tempo once you’re feeling comfortable. Adding some gain to your tone can be fun for increased sustain, but don’t overlook practicing them clean as well – distortion can often hide sloppy technique.

Experiment with other scales and modes and remember they don’t have to be limited to 3 notes per string. With practice, you’ll get used to different fingerings and hopefully in time be able to incorporate various shapes and patterns all over the neck at will.

Finally, don’t overlook your picking technique. Whilst legato lines can sound great and be fun to work on, you still need good control of the pick for with these exercises (and in general for improvising, rhythm playing and loads more).

Create your own licks, try it all over the fretboard and in various styles. For more ideas, check out Michael Dolce, Frank Gambale and Tom Quayle.

BY NICK BROWN

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www.guitarfactory.net MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.29

1/04/2016

A D V I C E

C O L U M N S

A Guide To Recording Harmonica STUDIO Right, enough harping on about bad puns, I’ll get that out of my system nice and early so we can look at a few methods for successfully recording the harmonica at home. Funnily enough, this is something that often isn’t given a lot of thought. Even though the harmonica finds its way into plenty of live musical performances, it seems to be left out of recording conversations far too often. The fact is, you can get a great harmonica sound from your home recording setup if you put a little time and consideration into your technique and microphone choice. The first thing to remember is that a great harmonica sound has that raw, live performance grit to it, so you need to be sure to stay true to that in the recording process and try not to overproduce it or make it sound too sparkling and clean.

The Distant Microphone

The first way to consider capturing your harmonic sound is with a microphone placement that considers how the instrument would sound to someone else in the room hearing it as it’s played, and not amplified in any way.

Essentially, you want to capture the sound as it is heard naturally, so using a large diaphragm condenser microphone is going to offer you the best option, enabling all the dynamic control of the instrument and the brilliant high frequencies to shine through. Setting this up about a foot away from the player will enable you to find a good balance between getting too much breathiness from the sound and getting lost in room noise. If you get too close

with a condenser microphone, it is going to start sounding like the reeds are rattling in your ears, too far away and you will end up with a noisy take, especially considering that home studios don’t always offer the best acoustics. It’s important to achieve a constant distance from the microphone.

So, if your harmonic player likes to move around when they play, mark out two spots on the floor with gaffer tape and have them keep their toes on these spots. This will ensure they don’t step away from the microphone or approach it as can often be the natural behaviour of the performer.

The Direct Line

As most harmonica players will use a dedicated microphone on stage for their

instrument, this is the next best way to consider capturing their sound. The Green Bullet is by far the most common and well-known microphone for this purpose, but many harmonica players use other microphones for various reasons; predominantly comfort and sound. So, use what your harmonica player has in their kit. If no dedicated harmonica microphone is available, a sturdy instrument microphone like an SM57 is going to deliver a good result in this instance.

You’re not going to need to run the gain up very high; the harmonica is going to give you plenty of volume, especially considering the proximity to the capsule. If anything, a lower gain setting with a high pass filter engaged is going to be best, as it will reduce any handling noise. I like to keep compression to a minimum at this stage in the recording process, preferring to keep the gain down to ensure the peaks aren’t too high, rather than squeezing all the dynamics out of the performance right from the get-go. Remember, it’s a direct line-in essentially, so everything is going to stand out and there is no need to be too precious or you’ll run the risk of it sounding manufactured.

Totally Amped

My favourite method for recording the harmonica is to send it through a small valve amplifier, and capture that sound on a microphone like a Sennheiser e609 up close. The little valve amp really gives the harmonica’s tone a whole new life.

You get grit, dirt and sparkling brilliance all combined for a really raw bluesy sound that simply cannot be achieved with just a harmonica and a microphone alone.

Something like the VHT Special 6 combo is a really cool option for just this purpose.

It can run at a low power setting for when you’re recording at home and can’t make too much noise, but it will handle a Green Bullet superbly and deliver a rocking blues tone from a harmonica. Think about small valve amps that offer a clean channel which breaks up nicely; these are going to work a treat with your harmonica recording. The way in which you want to go with it is, ultimately, up to you.

BY ROB GEE

Interfacing the DJ DJ Today there are all manner of options for DJs looking to mix with or without the use of a computer. I still remember when home audio recording was just becoming a financially viable option and many DJs, myself included, were getting to grips with recording directly into a computer system and not relying on a tape deck. With this new technology came a world of new possibilities, and a range of technical hurdles that needed to be dealt with. That was twenty years ago, and now we have an even greater array of digital recording options and software packages that integrate with the DJ set. Has all this new technology made it easier? Or is it just complicating a process that was so simple and so organic to begin with?

The Analogue Archive

There are, of course, two very distinct methods in which a DJ can play music these days. One’s a digital approach, working within the computer software with an external controller, and the other is more in line with traditional DJ methods and still works at mixing a series analogue music streams. This may not mean a completely analogue signal path, for instance, two CD players using digital audio on compact discs. Although the media is digital, it’s still an analogue mixing process that brings these elements together. So, mixing CDs, cassettes and vinyl records requires an analogue signal path at some point, even if the original recording and the ultimate result is a digital process. In this instance, we need to be mindful of our audio signal and how it might get corrupted in both the mixing

and amplification process. Unfortunately, most devices used for this purpose feature unbalanced audio outputs, quite often on RCA connectors, which tend to attract noise and interference from other audio and power cables. The worst part of this is that the back of any of these mixers is usually a mess of audio and power cables, creating the perfect environment for unwanted noise to flourish.

Because of this cable conundrum, it’s imperative that we keep our unbalanced cables to as short a length as possible, reducing the possibility of earth hum or interference getting into the signal chain.

At the same time, one needs to consider the power cables in this mix and try their hardest to keep them isolated from the audio cables. Keeping this as clean as possible will ensure the good quality audio reaching the computer. It’s at this point

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that we need to consider AD conversion.

Going Digital

As we get the output of our analogue sources to our computer, we need to consider how to convert it and integrate it with our recording or performance software. Many modern DJ controllers also feature built in audio interfaces. Native instruments’ Traktor series and most Pioneer and Numark DJ controllers allow for external signals to be brought into the mixing software. This makes it very easy to bring those analogue audio sources into the mix and often negates the need for a dedicated analogue DJ mixer. But, if you’re looking to keep your mixing as a largely organic process to then simply record the finished product, the right interface is needed to do the job.

Don‘t get carried away with fancy specifications and large channel counts.

There’s no need to be able to record 16 inputs at once when all you need is a pair for the left and right outputs of your DJ mixer. At the same time, fancy microphone preamps and designer valve gain stages are not at all a necessity, and can in fact be a hindrance in getting a good, clean recording. You aren’t looking for a microphone preamp. What’s required for

this purpose is a stereo, or dual mono, line level analogue to digital converter.

This could be a simple AD device or a more conventional USB or Thunderbolt audio interface. So a Steinberg UR22, an M-Audio M-Track or a Focusrite Scarlett will do the trick as long as you use the 6.5mm connectors to go into the unit at line level and not the XLR as these are usually hardwired to the microphone preamp. It is important that you match the impedance on the audio interface to the output of you mixer, so as to not overcook the signal.

When you choose a completely digital mixing process, this task is dramatically simplified, until your drivers fail or your computer need updating or any other number of issues arises. You still need to consider the audio output and think about how you want to hear to sounds generated within your software that make up you DJ mixes. It all comes down to good quality DA conversion and at this stage, it’s always best to use a device that offers balanced outputs so as to eliminate any noise that the computers power supply might create.

You want your music to sound its best, so give it the best chance to do just that.

BY ROB GEE

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A D V I C E

C O L U M N S

The Yamaha PSR legacy KEYS I can remember being taken by my parents into a music store in Melbourne when I was younger, and being shown a keyboard that did wondrous things. This store had a room set up which was filled with all sorts of incredible technological gadgets and devices, and even one of those very cool Atari ST computer systems with a notation program running on it. This was my first introduction to the world of MIDI and an eye opener that developed a lifelong fascination with computer music.

The Heavens Sung

So, in this very cool hi-tech room, in this very cool music store, I was introduced to the Yamaha PSR-6. I know, it seems a little laughable now, thinking back on all the hi-tech synthesizers I have owned and used over the years. It’s funny to think that the initial spark, the beginning of it all came from the PSR-6 is quite funny. Here was a keyboard that offered a tremendous selection of 16 sounds, all of which sound like they were never fully completed. This is not just my memory telling me this, the PSR-6 still lives on today and I’m able to hear how those sounds compare to modern equivalents.

My mobile phone has a better sound engine than this old beast did, but it had its place at the time. Actually, it was pretty darn special back in nineteeneighty-something. The fact that it is still going strong today is a testament to Yamaha’s ability to build quality keyboards. Sure, it came with a one year

warranty, but I never had to use it, and thirty years on I still haven’t had an issue with it, aside from the dated sounds.

At the time, when I was first introduced to the PSR-6, it took me by complete surprise how a keyboard that sounded like a piano could, at just the press of a button suddenly sound like an entire orchestra had entered the room. The heavens sung when this thing was connected to the Atari - a serious engine that was far beyond my understanding at that point. But, the fact remained that this keyboard had made that sound possible, so I was determined to make the most of it. Sadly, that sound did not come home with the keyboard, just the 16 bad tones and a hilarious samba beat that would drive my parents crazy.

Bringing It Forward

So, now that we are a few years forward in time and the PSR-6 still hasn’t failed me, it is worth considering what Yamaha

have done with the PSR range since then.

As many of you would know, the team at Yamaha tends to upgrade their keyboard ranges every 18 to 24 months to ensure that the latest technology is present in the flagship model and that this technology is passed down through all the lower priced models as they progress.

This means that the modern PSR range, even the most humble beginners model, far outweighs the capabilities of the flagship Yamaha from 20 years ago. In fact, the beginning model in the range now resembles something that might have cost thousands of dollars back then and is available for only a couple of hundred.

This also means that the range has grown significantly, and now the PSR series is not just a learning tool or beginner’s keyboard but a very usable tool for performance keyboard players. The current flagship model, the PSR-S970, takes its voices from the legendary Yamaha Tyros

including Yamaha’s Super Articulation Voices that sound and behave just like the instrument they are emulating. Providing USB connectivity and a host of rhythm and recording options,it’s easy to see how the PSR range really covers it all from the ground up.

Yamaha have even gone one step further with the PSR range, introducing an Oriental model some years back, which includes Arabic and Oriental sounds and styles that are practically impossible to recreate faithfully with an ordinary keyboard and a standard A440 scale.

It’s nice to think that, from the humble beginnings of the PSR, the series has continued to grow and become a significant part of the Yamaha keyboard line-up.

BY ROB GEE

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A D V I C E

C O L U M N S

Multiple Stroke Finger Warm Ups PERCUSSION I was having lessons with a great teacher some years back, and he gave me the realisation that pretty much everything we play on the drums, when it comes to the hands at least, can be traced back to our three basic rudiments – Single Stroke Roll, Double Stroke Roll and Single Paradiddle.

I was also shown to use multiple strokes in each hand as a great way to develop the muscles, memory and technique to be able to play the basic rudiments more effectively, which would then lead to being more comfortable on the drums as a whole. I thought I would share some basic exercises that I’ve used in the past – and still use today.

To Be Noted

Depending on the school of thought you’ve come from, you’ll have an opinion on how this next part works. Some will say that you should always use the bounce coming from the drum or surface you’re playing. Others will say that sometimes the surface you’re playing on may not have much rebound so therefore, the hands should do all the work at all times. My opinion is smack in the middle of this. If you’re playing on a pad or snare drum, the rebound will be plentiful so you might as well use it! This said, if you move to the floor tom, you’re likely to have a much lower-tuned head that offers less rebound. You’ll have to work harder here.

Fortunately, practicing on both surfaces develops muscles and technique accordingly.

Finger Control

When you play a multiple stroke exercise, initially you will have three basic motions – Wrist (the initial stroke), Bounce (the stroke that results from the inertia of the first

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stroke) and any number of finger strokes – to keep the roll going as long as you need. See Figure A. Finger strokes are literally only the back fingers flicking the stick whilst the thumb and the first finger are stationary, acting as the fulcrum or balance point. As you progress and depending on the surface area you’re playing on, you may be able to eliminate the bounce stroke and go straight into finger strokes but regardless, you need to have the wrist or initial stroke to create enough movement to allow the stick to get moving.

Exercises

Now bear in mind that there are many different approaches to this and as you try some of these exercises, you’ll come up with your own for sure. Check out Figures B – G for some initial exercises playing multiple strokes, adding a stroke each time. The basic goal here is to keep the strokes going without having to play each one individually with the wrist itself. If you can use your

fingers, you’re essentially playing the first stroke (flick!) and the stick rebounds back – half the work basically! Finally, remember to practice these exercises with both hands.

Figure H is just an extension of the first exercises but uses the opposite hand to fill the gap in the rhythm. This makes the exercise a bit more musical and is better fun to move onto the drums. For example you could play all the multiple strokes on the snare and the single stroke over the toms or vice versa.

I’ve used figures B, C and G for this. You can experiment further though.

The last exercise (FIG I) is a cool one to get happening. It uses multiple strokes in each hand and increases by one stroke each bar.

I’ve only notated to 4 strokes per hand but you should continue onwards maintaining the 16th stroke subdivision. There will be odd time signatures. Don’t be afraid!

Apply Technique To Rudiments

The last point to note here relates to my initial opening statement about rudiments.

How’s it related you ask? If you can play multiple strokes in each hand and you can maintain finger control, you’re essentially just doing one side of a single stroke roll.

Doing the same technique with both hands alternating gives you a single stroke roll that can be played at a variety of dynamic levels. Further, if you’re so good now at playing four, five, eight strokes a bar etc. then two should be a breeze and you’ll find your double stroke roll is not only more even but also less labouring. Then by adding that little finger stroke technique into the middle of the paradiddle (on the double stroke) you’ll be able to speed this up too. Winning!

BY ADRIAN VIOLI

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S P E C I A L

F E A T U R E

DALE SHERLOCK THE GOLD STANDARD IN TUBE AMPLIFIERS An early start in electronics saw amp builder Dale Sherlock introduced to tubes at a young age. Through both work and an avid personal interest in building and designing, Dale developed a deeper understanding that then turned into a fulltime career in the music industry. Specifically working with guitar equipment and amplifiers, he has continued to refine his line of gear covering a range of sounds and settings. An undeniable wealth of knowledge, he is a valuable source of information and his amps deserve a listen when you get the chance. Mixdown sits down with the man behind Sherlock Amplifiers to find out more about what goes into building a world-class amplifier.

Are you constantly designing and refining your amps? How do you develop and settle on new models?

Most definitely. My mind is always in that design and refine mode! I receive feedback from players that use Sherlock Amps, who help point out any bugs or irregularities, and I find myself continually modifying the amps to perfect the designs. I feel that this is the only way to stay ahead of the ‘technological market’. Regarding the development of new models, I look at what’s trending or required in the market and from my resource of knowledge, I create something that will work with the upcoming trends and playing styles and the criteria of the musicians that come my way.

I’d imagine that the term ‘boutique amplifier’ has created many misnomers about the production process – can you tell us a little about your construction/ build methods?

Firstly the term ‘Boutique Amplifier’ is a description of how amplifiers really

should be built, i.e, the state of the art amplifiers. The reason that the common off-the-shelf amplifier cannot be made to this standard, or ‘the state of the art standard’, is because of financial and time restraints. These typically cheaper amplifiers are produced in factories on production lines by machines and assemblers, not highly skilled technicians.

A Boutique amplifier is built from scratch, mostly by one person who is the master of his craft. I have an avionics background where it is paramount that the construction of all equipment is to be correct and reliable (otherwise planes fall out of the air!). I’ve used the same techniques in my amplifiers to produce high quality, beautifully laid out and extremely reliable amplifiers. I either use tag boards, tag strips or PCBs depending on the complexity of the amplifier. I use quality and sonically superior components throughout. I also minimise the number of internal connectors because these are a common source of failure regarding amplifiers, and I hardwire most sections.

All of my PCBs are ‘over soldered’, so Sherlock Amplifiers are extremely reliable.

The Fat Head has been the mainstay of your amp line for many years – what were the original design thoughts behind it?

After working for many years on an array of amplifiers from the high quality state of the art to the mass produced, I witnessed both the best ways of doing things and the design faults and inadequacies of these amplifiers. I then decided to build something that both harboured the great design features that I was now aware of, and had a broad array of sounds that would cater to all music styles. That was the inspiration behind the Fat Head; to accumulate all the knowledge that I had processed over the years and produce a high-quality amplifier in Australia at an affordable price for musicians. The Fat Head’s far superior manufacturing and tonal qualities is a magnificent piece of work. In fact, speaking of refinement – the Fat Head has had seven years of refinement!

Any new amps currently in the pipeline for future release?

Now you’ve excited me! I’m so happy that you have mentioned this – I have a brand new partner for the Buddy and it’s called the Bender. It’s modelled on a 1964 Fender Deluxe, featuring 6V6 tubes and again it’s a low powered amp of about 15 watts. I am also producing a companion to the Angry Ant, part of my tiny amp series, which will be modelled on the Fat Head’s high gain sounds with a basic clean channel. This Tiny Head will be a two-channel, EL 84 15W baby shredder.

I will do a tamer version next. Both of the new amps will be showcased at the Melbourne Guitar Show/

BY NICK BROWN For more information on Sherlock Amplifiers, visit www.sherlockamps.com

SCOTT HORSCROFT of THE GROVE STUDIOS THEGROVESTUDIOS.COM If you speak with enough people who work behind the scenes in the music industry, there’s a strong probability you’ll walk away a disillusioned husk. That might be laying it on a little thick, but with rapid changes in not only music consumption, but in production opportunities, studio confidence and the dwindling prospects for emerging musicians to get ahead, the industry landscape seems uncertain terrain.

It is reassuring, then, to find a studio like The Grove who are legitimately passionate about maintaining traditional strengths whilst still eager to embrace the shape of a new digital era. Owner-producer Scott Horscroft talks all things music, education and the shape of things to come.

“I’m a big believer in recording studios having great producers as the backbone,” he explains from L.A., where he is currently working with Empire of the Sun on their new album. “There are still service studios, which are basically recording spaces that you hire, whereas at places like The Grove we’ve always been focused on a team of great producers who bring that space to life and drive the vision of the studio. We have myself and Burke Reid, one of my best friends and a fantastic producer, Andy Mac and Jackson Barclay. Between the four of us, we’ve been able to bring a lot of great artists into the studio, and build on the history of what the studio was before I owned it as well. Burke has worked with Olympia, Sarah Blasko, Courtney Barnett

and DZ Deathrays in the last year. In my spare time I did Oh Mercy, and it was just fantastic winning the ARIA for that. It’s really somethingspecial when you get to see artists come up to spend some time away from the world, to immerse themselves in making music.”

The sense of history that Horscroft touches on makes for an interesting segue into the world of music recording today. Chatting with him, it is immediately clear that this is more than a job; he is earnest in his support for providing a space for musicians to thrive.

“Right now, I’m standing in Henson Studios, a very famous studio that was built over 100 years ago by Charlie Chaplin and was eventually bought out by Jim Henson. It’s the room that ‘We Are the World’ was recorded in. There’s a historical run-through of where I’m standing at the moment. There’s a really interesting argument that’s been going on for a long time in audio, and that’s the question, ‘can great music be made on laptops in

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bedrooms’, and why are studios shutting down all around the world? I was mixing a track while I was on the plane over here, so I’m across both. I have the laptop and a world class studio, but being in this place has absolutely reinforced the idea that when you’ve got six people all energised in a space that’s purpose built, with all the best gear in the world, magic happens.

This isn’t just for your premier artists. We have a lot of young bands come along, and that’s totally inspirational, watching artists put their heart and soul into their first recording. The enthusiasm and energy that comes out of that process is really special.”

Horscroft’s emphasis on encouraging and training emerging artists – be they producers, musicians or engineers – is at the core of The Grove’s philosophy. Having recently partnered with the Regional Music Institute, they are offering a variety of courses to anyone who is passionate about music production and is searching for that next crucial step.

“I’ve always had a vision to create a school. We’ve got such a great facility across 27 acres, such a great array of people who are very experienced and we

wanted to pass that knowledge on. For people who are really enthusiastic about creating careers in the music industry as producers, engineers and musicians, we thought we’d build a school. We’ve joined up with TAFE to provide the accreditation, so we’ve taken their curriculum and built on that. We’ve incorporated all of our facilities and engineers to be a part of that learning journey. We’re offering a diploma in sound production, which is the first step, and we’re currently looking for intake into an advanced diploma, which starts in April. We really want students to have a full understanding of what it takes to become a successful producer or engineer.”

“What we’re truly offering is a duty of care to involve people and show them what it takes to move forward. It’s not easy. It’s really not. In Australia, there are only a small number of people that break through. But there have always been incredible shining artists here, and providing them with those next steps, that’s what The Grove is all about.”

BY ADAM NORRIS

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S P E C I A L

F E A T U R E

WAYNE JONES AUSTRALIA’S PREMIER BASS CAB BUILDER Wayne Jones is a working bass player, sideman, writer and producer.

His original foray into the equipment side of things involved building a bass cab with his father, and that sparked a curiosity that’s led him to design and refine his own ideas and improve on what most people understand to be the standard in the bass cab market.

He’s collaborated on a 10” speaker design with Lorantz Audio in Melbourne that has become the backbone of Wayne Jones Audio’s Active and Passive Bass Cabinets - considered widely to be some of the most detailed and balanced in the world today. Add in a studio quality valve preamp and you can start to get a better idea about the quality of these cabs, and what goes in to getting the best audio quality possible.

You talk about a lot of amps not being a true representation of your bass tone – for example running through an Avalon DI in the studio etc?

It’s the never ending quest for the perfect sound! I’ve got over 45 years experience in all sorts of music related activities. I run my own record label and I have and played and recorded with all types of local and international musicians, so experience is really how all this has come about — by a bass player for the bass player. As bass players, we want one thing, we want it to shine though. You can do that in the studio where you’re subject to monitors and the engineer, but with a great DI like an Avalon U5 or 737, you can get the sound of your bass as it is as long as the pre amp is setup correctly. So in simple terms, no one has so far been able to do this for two reasons. One, they haven’t

had the knowledge and two, it’s too costly.

So these 10” speakers are your favourite then?

Yes, with 10” they have attack, but they can lack in bottom end. Or if it has bottom end, it lacks in tops or might have muddy mid-range. Essentially a lot of companies can voice speakers with highs or lows but it’s a trade-off. So Michail (Barabasz) from Lorantz Audio in Melbourne and I worked on a 10” speaker for two years that could handle an extended range, and we did it.

You’ve taken these concepts into the production of your amp as well?

You’ll notice often with an amp, the frequency points are set at the wrong spots. You’ll turn up the low mid and it’ll

work for one thing, but affect something else. With our amp, we’ve actually tuned each EQ knob to essentially work with each string. The bass control is set to your low E string, low mid is your A, mid is the D, high mid is G, treble is the C string on a 6-string bass. The separation and clarity lets you really tune each string without affecting the others much at all.

It must make things easier if you don’t have to compensate and can just focus on the best sound replication possible.

A lot of companies have to work on business decisions and mass produce for certain needs. This is a passion for me firstly as a bass player, so everything comes from that in building the best quality possible. It’s a people thing, it’s a fellow bass player thing and it’s a business – it’s a real joy.

them together. The carpet comes from China – it’s actually a much higher quality UV rating and more expensive, our premise is quality not quantity. The covers are made in Pennsylvania, the power amps come from Denmark, so we’ve got stuff going everywhere! I spent time in Kentucky and built cabinets with the factory. I then sat back and watched them build them to see that they were doing it to spec so the quality is controlled too.

They store and ship for me, so everything works nicely for now, and further to that we’ve started getting rigs into backline and venues around the world like The Blue Note in Nagoya and SIR Studios in Nashville, so we can support our endorsees but also provide for other players.

BY NICK BROWN

How do you manage production with overseas markets?

Our speakers are made in Melbourne, there’s a factory in Kentucky that puts

For more information about Wayne Jones and his products, visit www.waynejonesaudio.com

creators a level of expression that is as colourful as it is varied. The Frankel Brothers’ association with Mikelangelo proved particularly fortuitous, since Glynn himself had seen the renowned crooner in action and had hoped to entice him on board.

“When we first met Glynn to discuss the concept, we immediately thought of Mikelangelo,” Gideon recalls. “We love collaborating with him. We thought he’d be great to be involved, but independent of us Glynn had seen Mikelangelo’s Balkan Elvis show and wanted to get him involved, so it was very serendipitous. He penned these great lyrics, we set it to music, and now it’s the song for Iceland, this very tonguein-cheek anthem. It begins with a wolf howl. I mean, look, it has everything,” he laughs.

From last year’s winners, (the discotawdry Come Alive in Belarus!), to Norwegian punk-rock (Haircut for a Revolution) to quirky Irish folk (Plastic Heart), Song Contest will be a grand showcase of genre and exaggerated patriotism. Much like Eurovision itself,

it is a celebration of difference, but also of the musical ties that connect people regardless of border or distance.

“I think the perception of Eurovision has changed, particularly in the last couple of years now that Australia competes,” Glynn muses. “Last year with Guy Sebastian, 4.7 million people watched, and this year I think it could be more again. There’s something slightly altruistic about it.

The whole purpose initially was to bring together post-war Europe, where you had people who were competing on the battlefield now competing in song. To mend these broken countries. I love that idea of community coming together through music, which is an aspect of Song Contest as well. That for me is very important.”

SONG CONTEST – THE ALMOST EUROVISION EXPERIENCE WWW.SONGCONTEST-MUSICAL.COM Eurovision is a beautiful, if beguiling beast. Premiering back in 1956, it has developed into the longest running televised competition of its kind, and has launched the careers of such luminaries as Celine Dion, Dustin the Turkey, and Engelbert Humperdinck. Australia’s own fascination has led to our involvement both this year and last, and with interest in the competition at an all-time high it seems all but guaranteed that Song Contest – the Almost Eurovision Experience will prove equally seductive. Director Glynn Nicholas and music producers Daniel & Gideon Frankel ponder the enviable challenges that have brought this musical to life.

“I think that when you get material on the floor is when things tend to come to life,” Glynn suggests as he prepares himself for their first full rehearsals.

“That process is always about discovery, particularly with a show like this. It’s determined a great deal by the content of the music and the way that we interpret the songs in a Eurovision-esque way.

That comes down to not just the songs themselves, but the people who are performing the numbers. They have their idiosyncrasies, and that can affect the way they work with the choreographers.

It’s very much an interactive experience which can change a lot depending on who is in the room. As the director, my job is to hopefully lead everyone in a certain direction, but give everybody the opportunity to express their own

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creativity.”

“There’s an energy you can’t fake when you have people in one place working together,” agrees Daniel. “Fortunately we’ve already been able to meet and work with a lot of the cast already and workshop the songs, so it feels a bit like family. We’ve produced an album for Mikelangelo, City of Dreams, and that was a collaboration with a lot of local musicians, bringing together a lot of different strands, genres and creators. So we feel like we’re definitely prepared to do something like this. We like working across different ideas and finding new approaches – it’s very gratifying.”

Given the timbre of the production – eleven different nationalities competing for glory, each with their own unique style and appearance – it allows the

BY ADAM NORRIS For more information about Song Contest – the Almost Eurovision Experience, visit www.songcontestmusical.com

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.35

ROAD TESTS Marshall Code Series Amplifiers Electric Factory | (03) 9474 1000 | www.elfa.com.au RRP: Code25: $429 | Code50: $549 | Code100: $849 (combo) | Code100H: $649 (head) | Code412: $499

We all know Marshall amplifiers. We have seen the huge stacks on concert stages time and time again and for a very good reason. British amplifier manufacturing owes a lot to Marshall and the legendary models they have produced over the years. As does just about every other company that has brought out modelling amplifiers. Just about everyone has in some way or another, be it indirect or a not so subtle copy, drawn from the sounds of many great Marshall amps from over the years. So why then, in a marketplace where everyone got on the amp modelling bandwagon years ago has Marshall held back and not gone wild? Is it because they had the sounds people were wanting to model to begin with, or was it because they simply saw no value in the concept? That’s not for me to speculate, but what I can tell you is that now, after all these years, Marshall have finally gone into the amp modelling deep end, but they have gone about it in a very unique way. This is not just another ‘me too’ product, this is Marshall Code.

THE LINE-UP

This range of amplifiers certainly caused a stir at this year’s NAMM show, with everyone talking about it right from the release – and Marshall have been all over this. Not wanting to drag their heals in the wake of this buzz, stocks of the entire range have been shipping all over the world, including our little corner of it that so often gets left behind with new products. But what is on offer? Well, it all starts with the Code25, a small combo for practice purposes. Things get a little louder with the Code50, a larger combo that bridges the gap between some applications.

Then, the Code100 is available in a 2x12” combo or as a head for those looking for a larger rig.

Whilst the Code25 has a slightly cut down interface with fewer options on the control panel, the larger ones all have the same great array of controls and allow full editing of preset and features without the need to use a pedal or software platform.

WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT

What best describes how Marshall have gone about this venture into the amp modelling

world is to say that they have gone and copied the amps that they most like, their own.

And who better to release an amp with a preset model of a JTM45 than Marshall. After all, if anyone is going to know the Marshall sound and know how to recreate it, it surely has to be Marshall themselves. They have teamed up with Softube, the well-respected software manufacturer, to create a digital platform within these amplifiers that delivers an extremely realistic replica of all the Marshall tones from over the years. And best of all, they have not just limited it to complete amplifiers, but approached it in a preamp, power amp and speaker cabinet build, so you can mix and match from all your favourite Marshall models over the years and build a new rig in moments. On top of this, you also get a whole range of digital effects to compliment you amp sound, making this an all-in-one package.

As for the controls, you get the standard looking gold and brown Marshall knobs with the essential adjustments available all the time. Gain, bass, mid, treble,

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volume and master controls are present for quick and easy adjustment over each patch, without needing to dig around in menus to dial in a tone every time you change to a new patch.

The intuitive design does make it pretty simple to get around the internal architecture when you do want to adjust effects, amp models or cabinets. This is where Marshall have again been clever, because although you are running somewhat of a supercomputer inside this amplifier, it still feels and behaves like a typical amp would, with you only needing to adjust a few things to dial in a tone.

ALL THE TRIMMINGS

Now, this isn’t going to tickle the fancy of all the valve purists out there, that much I can be certain of. But, I would hazard a guess that many are going to want to at least have a listen to these amps before turning their noses up at them, as they do have plenty to offer. Beyond the amp and cabinet modelling, there is a Bluetooth connection that allows you to stream music form an iOS device straight to

your Code amp of choice. If you are like me and prefer to keep your music housed securely within cables, and not let it fly around in the air as it pleases, you can always run music in through the auxiliary audio input instead from any device and use that to jam along with.

If you still want to plug in more devices to your amp, then a USB connection is going to get you interested as well. This allows you to treat the Code just like an audio interface to your computer and record directly through it using the amp modelling and effects on your guitar signal on the way in, making it an ideal home recording tool with all the Marshall sounds ready at your fingertips.

Having seen the Code25 and the Code100H so far, I can honestly say that Marshall have done the right thing in waiting so long to tackle the world of modelling amplifiers. If you are looking for a thousand presets with every amplifier known to man in it, this may not be the amp modeller for you. But, if you want to access what is essentially a library of Marshall amp sounds bundled into one

box, then this is going to be the next amp for you. After all, who is more qualified to build modelling of Marshall amps than Marshall themselves?

They have the access to all the original designs and know the sound better than anyone else does and it shows in the tone that these amps deliver. Every Marshall fan is going to find some joy in these amps and it may just turn a few too.

BY ROB GEE

HITS t All the Marshall tone you know and love t USB recording capabilities t Plenty of great effects on board t Easy to navigate and build new patches

MISSES t We’ve all had to wait too long for this

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godinaus.com.au/seagull Proudly distributed by Dynamic Music www.dynamicmusic.com.au

ROAD TESTS BluGuitar AMP1

devices – and suddenly your sound options are increased tenfold. By simply using a standard jack lead, the REMOTE1 connects to the AMP1 – now a fully programmable amp system.

This design is going to change the way a lot of guitar players look at the head and box setups.

Still usable as a head on its own with any cabinet, or worked into a pedalboard for a more portable option, the AMP1 delivers like no other. You need to hear it to understand. It isn’t a pedal, it is a 100-watt, four channel guitar amplifier… just squeezed into something that resembles a pedal.

EGM Distribution | (03) 9817 7222 | www.egm.net.au | RRP: Contact for Pricing

AMP1 is a new take on the guitar amplifier, crammed into what is seemingly an effects pedal on the surface, but is so much more inside.

The AMP 1 is the brainchild of German guitarist and amp designer Thomas Blug who is renowned for his past work with another wellknown German guitar amplifier manufacturer in Hughes and Kettner.

Now, he has built an amp that delivers the sounds he wants in a portable design that will change the way on which you think about guitar amp heads.

ON THE BOARD

So many guitarists these days complain about the size of their amplifiers and how they would like a more portable option.

This is where AMP1 is going to change the way a lot of people look at guitar amplification. It is a 100-watt guitar amplifier with a valve driven front-end that fits onto a pedalboard. Yes, you read that right, it will fit on your pedalboard taking up not much more space than your big amp head’s footswitch would have.

It has four separate channels, each with a selection of tone shaping options available on the side panel of the unit, a built in reverb circuit and boost too.

Best of all, it does not need to be used with a cabinet, so you can use it direct into a PA or as a recording solution just as

easily as you can set it up with a speaker box and fill a stage with its volume.

PLENTY TO WORK WITH

The clean channel is a great starting point for this amp. It sings sweet and gets a little gritty when you kick in the boost over the top. Best of all, it handles pedals perfectly, so an overdrive in front of this simply compliments the sound and makes it very easy to run this unit in line in your existing pedal setup. All you need is your pedalboard and a single 12” cabinet and you’re set for a gig! Three overdrive channels are also included, offering vintage, classic and modern options, with both the vintage and modern instantly standing out as recognisable tones from

BY JACQUES NUGENT well-known amplifiers. Then, each has a little twist with the tone shaping controls on the side panel. I’d spend some time dialling in the tone to get the best results, but once you’re found it, they will probably be set once and left alone.

The AMP1 hinges on flexibility, convenience and functionality.

But for guitarists that desire an even greater breadth of sound and versatility, Blug has also developed the REMOTE1. It’s a nine-switch foot pedal that

acts as a direct extension of the AMP1, navigating all of its functions, while also offering the ability to store presets in four different banks (each one containing nine presets). This enables you to directly switch between the clean, vintage, classic and modern channels, while also ensuring control of the boost, reverb and FX-loop settings. Add to that the MIDI out – which means it can be used to switch programmes on external MIDI-capable effect

HITS t Lightweight, compact, clever design t Works as an amp head, a pedal or a recording stage t Great range of sound across the four channels t Handles pedals very nicely

MISSES t Side panel controls are perhaps too small to make constant adjustments

VHT Special 12/20 RT Tube Amp Combo Innovative Music | (03) 9540 0658 | www.innovativemusic.com.au | RRP: $1429

I am sure most of you have heard or used a VHT amp at some stage.

They have been around for longer than I care to remember, and have been delivering the goods since they first appeared. In recent times we’ve seen a shake-up of the VHT amp range, and a new breed of compact amps are really starting to get people listening again. The Special Series from VHT holds true to its name with a great selection of amps that hide a lot more under the surface than what they might give away at first glance. Having already played a few amps from the Special Series, this month, I got to have a good run through with the Special 12/20RT, a guitar amp combo that delivers a lot from what is seemingly very little.

SPECIAL TUBE DESIGN

What sets this amp apart from so many others on the market today is the variable voltage that allows it to operate with a variety of power tubes. The 12 or 20-watt switching option allows you to easily set the amp up to behave very differently. In 12-watt mode, it will work with the supplied pair 6V6 tubes or with a pair of EL84 tubes for a very different tone indeed. This is made possible with the use of VHTs optional EL84 adaptors to allow the smaller tubes to be used in this amp. At 20-watts, you can run 6L6 or EL34 tubes for a higher powered amp with a whole new character. So, you can see how under the surface, there is a lot more going on with this amp that meets the

eye. But, for the 6V6 sound that it comes set up stock as, you won’t be looking to change that immediately any way. It has a great, rich tone with a smooth boost setting that is perfect for running pedals in front of.

INTO YOUR SIGNAL CHAIN

The 12/20RT has been built to fit into your existing guitar and pedal signal chain with maximum efficiency. This amp loves taking pedals; it sings with a tube screamer in front of it and should work well with just about any overdrive or boost pedal. The adjustable effects loop means that all the pedals you want to place in the signal chain after the preamp can be matched to ensure no sudden drop in volume or tonal characteristics from

PG.38 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

the amp appears when engaged.

And, in an engineering stroke of genius, there is a 9-volt DC output on the rear of the amp so you can power your pedals directly off the amp with a daisy chain lead, keeping your effects loop pedals all nice and close with the shortest signal path possible.

For those of you looking for a truly versatile amplifier in a

single 12” speaker configuration, this is a healthy starting point.

From there, you can change it up in flavour and volume with the valves of your choice later down the track. The Special 12/20RT is the amp that suits all occasions.

BY ROB GEE

HITS t Great clean and boosted tones t Clever power tube options t DC output for powering pedal board from one device

MISSES t Unlike most of the Special Series, this one has a bit of weight to her

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ROAD TESTS

Bogner Goldfinger 45 Combo EGM Distribution | (03) 9817 7222 | www.egm.net.au | RRP: Contact for Pricing

Reinhold Bogner has long been at the forefront of ‘boutique’ amplifiers, designing and building a range of models from their California base. Players of all styles and abilities have taken the plunge and been super impressed with the flexibility and downright killer tones for everything from country to metal.

YOU ARE GOLD

Vintage voiced, the 2-channel Goldfinger 45 combo has individual EQ, gain and loudness controls for each channel (named ‘alpha’ and ‘omega’), a global reverb and presence control and a post FX knob. loaded with four 6V6 tubes, the amp has a myriad of further settings for full or half power, post or pre effects loop with options for series and parallel, loop gain levels and then multiple speaker outs if you want to run extra cabs. A 1x12 combo with a Celestion V30, the Goldfinger comes housed in a funky black patterned cab with a salt and pepper type basket weave grille. The control panel is a cool gold colour (of course!) and the actual knobs and switches look like something out of a vintage airplane or submarine – big and retro. The whole package looks great, and as is often the way with Bogner gear there’s quite a bit more than meets the eye, meaning

you can plug in a get going or really settle in and investigate all the possibilities.

VINTAGE

Jumping into the clean ‘alpha’, channel you’re instantly hit with big fat lush clean tones. Setting the EQ flat and working the gain and loudness controls gives you some seriously juicy sounds.

Adding a hint of reverb and you really are in vintage blackface territory – great with single coils or humbuckers. You can really run the gamut from rock and blues to country or jazz. The presence control adds some extra snap and sparkle which can be handy for brightening up rounder humbuckers a touch. At 45 watts there seems to be plenty of clean headroom, making it a great gigging amp that can be straight plug and play or more of a pedal platform. Flicking across to the ‘omega’ dirty channel and you can get that tasty, on the edge of breakup, tone and just

pump up the loudness to really make it sing. From there, adding more gain takes you well into saturated distortion tones. Thick and dirty with humbuckers and rocky and slightly compressed when pushed with single coils.

The Goldfinger really works well on both channels and, straddles that vintage vibe with some modern-ish Bogner flavour.

channels are super sweet and super usable. A lot of amps suffer from a good clean channel and a slightly ho hum dirty channel (or vice versa) whereas the Goldfinger 45 nails both. Big juicy cleans with verb and then broken on the edge gain through to more saturation – just lovely.

A killer amp from a killer brand name, I want one.

WRAPPED AROUND YOUR FINGER

BY NICK BROWN

Man, the Goldfinger 45 combo really sounds good. Both

HITS t Great clean AND dirty channels t Juicy, juicy tones! t Reverb sounds killer

MISSES t None

Fuchs Blackjack 21 MKII Combo Amplifier EGM Distribution | (03) 9817 7222 | www.egm.net.au | RRP: Contact for Pricing

There is a long list of heralded guitar players around the world using Fuchs guitar amps and delivering results with them every day. But, as I well know, a lot of people here in our remote continent shrug their shoulders and look at you like you’ve just bit your tongue midsentence when you mention this esteemed amplifier brand. So, let me introduce you all to Fuchs guitar amplifiers and more specifically to the Blackjack 21 MKII combo. Don’t worry, I am sure you’re all going to get along, especially when you hear what this amp can do. You can read what I have to say, but you really must hear one of these amps to truly understand what they have to deliver.

STRAIGHT UP TONE

This two-channel, single 12” combo is not hiding behind any special tricks or fancy gimmicks.

It is all about delivering tone and plenty of it. The first channel has no master volume and only features a gain control, delivering a beautifully warm and rich clean tone that relishes the built in boost controlled by the footswitch. Even with the boost engaged, the amp still cleans up nicely when you roll off the volume on your guitar, giving you ultimate dynamic control over every note as you see fit, right from the instrument at your fingertips. Blues guys are going to love how this channel responds and will surely want to drop a tube screamer in front of it, and that’s fine as it takes

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pedals like they were part of the original design.

PLENTY TO WORK WITH

The overdrive channel offers a gain control and master volume with an extra tone adjustment after the preamp for real presence in the mix. This channel will feed the inner rock god in all of you, as it leaves the clean far behind and screams. You can get a real crunchy sound running the gain low, pushing the master and pulling back on the tone control, or a brilliant overdrive when you ramp up the gain. Bring the tone control right up, and you’ll achieve an even more cutting sound. It takes on a whole new character when you push it, coming across like a bigger amp than it really is.

These two channels are aided by a digital reverb that doesn’t just offer a volume control, but allows you to adjust the decay length too for that perfect addition to the amps tone; tone which is brought to life by the Warehouse ET65 speaker that is very well matched for this openback combo. This killer classic rock speaker has the headroom and SPL to deliver what this amp gives it with a rich low end and punchy high frequency response.

Put simply, you need to hear this amp before you consider buying anything else.

BY JACQUES NUGENT

HITS t Lightweight, compact, clever design t Works as an amp head, a pedal or a recording stage t Great range of sound across the four channels t Handles pedals very nicely

MISSES t Side panel controls are too fiddly for easy adjustments

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.39

ROAD TESTS Laney GHR Series Amps Australasian Music Supplies | (03) 9549 1500 | www.austmusic.com.au RRP: GH50-212 (combo): $2295 | GH100R (head): $1995

Sporting a hip red and black, look the new GHR line of amps from Laney are the result of their research into what they call ‘Red and Black’ tone elements – ‘Red’ for tube preamp distortion and ‘Black’ for output distortion. The key is then the balance between these two to find the sweet spot for each individual player’s tone.

GH100R HEAD AND GS 412 VR CAB

100 watts with four 12AX7s and four EL34s, the GH100R features two channels with shared EQ for a straight-ahead tone-shaping amp. Channel 1 has a drive control with a ‘pull’ bright switch whilst channel 2 has drive and volume controls. The 3-band shared EQ consists of bass, mid with a ‘pull’ shift switch and treble. Rounding it out are master tone, output level and reverb controls.

As a clean platform, channel 1 was pristine and ‘chimey’, and I found the digital reverb to be quite nice and room-like – not too airy and washy. Great for blues, rock, funk, country and a host more, there’s tonnes of clean headroom, plus it’ll sit nicely as a basis for effects pedals. Switching across to channel 2 you can really arc up some gain thanks to the drive

and volume controls. Edgy and broken sit well with a Strat or Tele and you can then increase the gain to get into heavier rock and metal tones.

For balancing channel levels, it’s actually as easy as setting your clean sound on channel 1 with the channel drive control and master output to get your desired volume and gain. You can then set your dirty channel 2 via the channel drive and volume controls - voila! All the while the GS412VR 4x12 cab chugs along effortlessly. Closed back and loaded with Celestion V30 speakers it seems balanced and warm and a nice match for the GH100R head.

really let it scream on channel 2.

Tone-wise, you’re in the same league as the GH100R head with lots of chime and ‘spanky’ clean on channel 1 whilst channel 2 takes you from blues and rock to more saturated shred.

GH50R 212 COMBO

BACK IN BLACK... AND RED

Packing the same control layout into a 50-watt combo, the GH50R is still damn loud. Two Celestion V30s this time give you lots of clean headroom on channel 1 and the ability to

tonal options and the options of heads and combos give you some setup choice. The cabinet emulated DI out is a handy feature for live and recording too. Plenty of features, a reasonable price point and some good tones – worth a look.

HITS t Two channels t Onboard reverb t Classy look

These GHR amps from Laney are really cool. Good looking, the red and black tolex makes for a nice point of difference; the top edge handles are tough, the two channel setup gives you lots of

BY NICK BROWN

broad range of scope from on the edge through to saturation.

gives you lots of tone shaping and volume control, and with foot switching capabilities you’re getting a serious rig. If you want a little Iommi at a reduced size and price, the TI15 should quench your thirst as a starting point.

HITS

BY NICK BROWN

MISSES

MISSES t Shared EQ not as flexible t Digital reverb not for everyone

Laney Tony Iommi Signature Amps Australasian Music Supplies | (03) 9549 1500 | www.austmusic.com.au RRP: TI100 (head): $2995 | TI15-112 (combo): $969

Anthony Frank Iommi is one of the most recognisable and influential guitarists of all time. Where would rock and metal guitar (or guitar in general) be without songs like ‘War Pigs’, ‘Iron Man’ or ‘Paranoid’? His mark on electric guitar is immeasurable and his Black Sabbath tones have typically been big and ballsy. A long time Laney user, you can understand the thinking behind the signature line of TI amps.

TI100 HEAD STACK

Again utilising the tough recessed corner handles, the TI100 head is a decidedly black amp with cool red glowing internals. Touch black tolex meets a black metal grille complete with Iommi styled ‘cross’ cutouts. A two-channel amp, you get identical independent controls for each of the channels (marked as ‘lead’ and ‘rhythm’). Left to right they consist of pre-boost (switchable in and out), drive, bass, middle, treble, volume, enhance and presence. This signature amp is powered by four 6L6 power tubes and eight ECC83 preamp tubes. In the cab department the TI412S quad box comes loaded with Celestion Heritage G12H speakers and is rated 120 watts @ 16 ohms. Starting on the rhythm channel I was able to dial in a super tasty broken tone.

Throaty with lots of punch, it

handled power chords and single note riffs nicely and can then squish a bit extra with bigger voicings. The presence control can add some extra bite if needed and on the whole there’s plenty of volume to cut through a loud band. Jumping into the lead channel you get exactly what you’d think – lots of gain and big fat EQ. Lead lines love the sustain and lower chords and open string licks chug along beautifully.

TI15 112 COMBO

Want some Tony Iommi sounds but don’t have the budget, room or need for a 100-watt stack? Well maybe the TI15 combo would suit: 15 watts, EL84 tubes, single 12” speaker and a similar control layout (except for a dynamics control in place of ‘enhance’).

Obviously there’s lot of focus on the dirty tones here, and whilst it is a single channel amp, you get a

PG.40 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

DON’T BE PARANOID

A signature stack from one of rock and metal’s classic guitarists should be enough to sell more than a few units. The fact then that it sounds pretty damn good and would suit a host of rock and heavier styled players adds some extra cred. Two channels with independent EQ and levels

t Two rocking channels t Tony Iommi signature sounds t Lots of volume

t More dirt orientated than clean

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ROAD TESTS

Two Notes Torpedo Reload Innovative Music | (03) 9540 0658 | www.innovativemusic.com.au | RRP: $1299

In the last few years, we’ve seen a number of very innovative products coming from French company Two Notes, who have been focusing on speaker emulation and substitution like no other guitar technology company has before. They have delivered a range of load box products that are combined with their Wall of Sound software to perfectly recreate guitar speaker tone and behaviours to use with your favourite amplifiers, without the necessary volume that said amplifiers might demand. I think the most talked about of all these products has been the Torpedo Reload. It’s easy to see why as it’s a bit of a Swiss army knife when it comes to interfacing your guitar amp with your recording system.

LOAD IT UP

One of the main functions of the Reload is that it operates as a load box and attenuator.

Most of you who have thought about running an attenuator with your guitar rig will know that there are not a lot of worthwhile options available for this task, so it is great to see a well thought out build that accomplishes what guitarists need for this purpose. With a matched load impedance to suit just about any amplifier, you can pull back the volume to the speakers right down to total silence if you wish, and there are no noticeable negatives when it comes to your amp’s tone. Of course, when you get to very low volumes, the higher frequencies

do suffer a little, but that is the nature of the speakers themselves and not a result of the Reload affecting the signal.

SEND IT BACK

Being able to re-amp your rig is one of the great advantages of modern digital recording in that it allows you to easily record your guitar and then feed it back into an amp at a later stage to get your tone just right. This has always been a tricky task to get the signal impedance right.

Without the right tools you end up sending a signal back into your amp that in no way reflects the impedance of your original guitar, and so culminates in poor results at the amp. The Reload ensures this is a thing of the

past, as it analyses your guitar level as it is recorded, Therefore it can send the same impedance signal back out to the amplifier, resulting in a signal that sounds exactly the same as if you simply played the guitar again, but affording you the ability to replay your take over and over until you find the amp tone you want to fit in the mix and then record that final sound.

There is a lot to be said for having the right tools when recording guitar amplifiers. It

is not enough to think that a microphone preamp with the gain adjusted will work for a guitar input, nor is it the safe to assume that a line output will deliver the right level to your amplifier on the way back.

Getting the right tools for the right tone is what Two Notes is all about, and the Torpedo Reload offers guitarists and engineers the chance to find that tone every time.

BY ROB GEE

HITS • Operates as a load box and attenuator • Analyses your guitar levels as it is recorded • Perfect recreation of amplifier tones

MISSES • None

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2 0 1 6com // PG.41

ROAD TESTS DV Mark Micro 50 Amp Head CMC Music Australia | (02) 9905 2511 | www.cmcmusic.com.au | RRP: $750

The first thing I thought when taking this unit out of its box is that it looks like a compact bass head. Funny that, the concept that a company could go and steal its own ideas and deliver them in a whole new light. Well, that is exactly what DV Mark have down very successfully with the DV Micro 50, taking their trendsetting compact bass head design and bringing that to a guitar amp. Seriously, this was staring us all in the face for some time, yet the Italians beat off all the imitators to deliver their very own imitation of their very own product for a very different player.

GOOD THINGS IN SMALL PACKAGES

DV Mark has cleverly put together this ultra-compact design to offer a great range of versatility to guitar players of all styles. The DV Micro 50 isn’t going to be type casted into any one genre, offering great clean and drive channels as the building blocks for a versatile sound. Although the front panel is laid out in a somewhat unique manner, you soon figure out the signal flow and it begins to make sense.

PLENTY TO WORK WITH

In a rather unconventional twist, DV Mark has included some features on this amplifier you wouldn’t normally expect

to find on a guitar amp head, including a headphone output and an auxiliary input. Both are very handy for rehearsal and recording applications and make a nice touch to this little amp.

Plus, in true bass amp inspired fashion, you get a direct output supplied on XLR on the rear of the head too for live and recording applications.

Fired up, there is plenty of headroom on this little box. It has the volume needed to stand up on any stage and offers a great range of tones, capable of handling all number of pedals without sounding like you are melting the input section. Sure, the overall richness isn’t quite that which is delivered with a quad of valves pushed to their

limits, but it doesn’t require the space these would either.

Good things can come in small packages, and deliver plenty of great tone and punch at the same time. An amp that you can carry into a gig with all your other gear at the same time, it is a real little gem.

HITS • Huge sound and power from a miniature amp • Takes pedals and effects brilliantly • Recording/DI output extends applications

MISSES

BY ROB GEE

• Slightly confusing front panel layout

Strauss Superblues SSB-30 Combo Jade Australia | 1800 144 120 | www.musocity.com.au | RRP: $699

Rekindling thoughts of Aussie rock, big festival gigs and loud jangly guitars, Strauss have enjoyed a resurgence of sorts lately, thanks to a solid range of heads and combos. Whilst the monster column speaker type cabinets have disappeared, the Strauss name is still proudly emblazoned on their wares from 5-watt portable combos through to 50-watt heads.

SUPER

Rated at 30 watts, the 6L6 equipped 1x12 combo is quite a manageable package. Relatively light and not overly big in size, the Superblues comes in a range of colours – this particular version is the damn fine looking Surf Green. There’s something about Surf Green for both amps and guitars that I seriously dig, and this Strauss number keeps in line with that thinking.

Alternatively, you can opt for Navy Blue, Black, Tweed or Violet if the Surf Green isn’t your thing.

A single channel amp, the SB-30 features the standard treble, middle and bass with master volume and gain and a ‘fat’ switch. Under the hood we’re talking 12AX7 preamp tubes and 6L6’s for power. Did I mention that this amp was Surf Green in colour? Just had to get that in again!

SPANK

Going with a strat as a starting point, the SuperBlues reacted well. Clean and brightish, you can get some classic blues tones and chirpy second and fourth position sounds. Chords ring out clearly, and pumping the gain control will get you some edge and warmness if you want to get into vintage rock territory. The fat switch adds a thickened type EQ that really adds that front pickup spank and punchy blues licks and riffs. With a tele the SB30 chimes through open string rolls and chromatic lines. Again balancing the volume and gain lets you get into creamy breakup that’ll do Rolling Stones or maybe even early Kings of Leon.

I love the inclusion of the reverb tank, the control however gets a little washy at higher settings.

Cool for psychedelic surf and madness, but really only useable at lower settings.

PG.42 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

UBER BLUES

It’s cool to see the Strauss name kicking around again, and with a range of amps on offer they’re hitting a few different targets. The Super Blues isn’t a 3 channel, super switching boutique amp, but it doesn’t purport to be either. Straight ahead valve tone that works for rock, blues, indie and plenty

more at a good price means it should work for many a guitarist looking for a reasonably priced smaller wattage combo.

BY NICK BROWN

HITS • Clean and some grit if needed • Onboard reverb • Vintage-ish vibes

MISSES • Verb a little touchy at higher settings

www.mixdownmag.com.au

ROAD TESTS

Blue Bluebird Condenser Microphone

of condenser microphones. It will work well with just about every application in your studio from drums to guitars, as well as vocals and even piano or drums.

Amber Technology | 1800 251 367 | www.ambertech.com.au | RRP: $439

HERE, THERE AND EVERYWHERE

Blue microphones have become as well known for their quality sound over the years as they have for their somewhat unconventional designs. That said, Blue have now spent so long with a presence this strong in the recording world, that their designs are starting to become commonplace, or are even imitated by others. So, I am always delighted to open up a package from Blue for a test drive, knowing that what I’m going to get is going to sound great and offer some inspiration in design.

BY NAME AND BY COLOUR

The Bluebird really takes the whole Blue name to a new level, like their very early microphones, this one is delivered in one colour and one colour only, and you guessed it, its blue!

Standing proud in a lovely powder blue finish with nickel appointments and grill, which match the supplied nickel

suspension mount; this certainly is a showpiece for any studio, even before you get to hear it.

It’s assembled beautifully, and ships in a plywood storage box to ensure it gets looked after when not in use. But, with the way this microphone performs, there will be very little time in which you will not be using it.

This is Blue’s Swiss army knife

Shure KSM8/N Dualdyne Dynamic Microphone Jands | (02) 9582 0909 | www.jands.com.au | RRP: $949

One name has been at the forefront of microphone design and use in the live arena for longer than most of our readers have been alive.

It’s hard to imagine any musician today not having used a Shure microphone at some point, and quite understandable why so many use them as a regular tool in their live performance rig. With the SM58 being an industry stalwart for vocal performance microphones and the BETA58 taking that sound one step further, Shure have now gone and raised the bar once again with a revolutionary new dual diaphragm design in the KSM8, the first of its kind and a bold step forward in hand-held microphone design.

SLICK NEW LOOK

To say that I instantly thought of German design when I took this microphone from its rigid zippered pouch is an understatement. This microphone looks like a leap ahead for Shure, and a step away from

their classic shapes into a more refined, streamlined look to the housing for their new KSM8. The fact that I had been sent the nickel-cased model even further emphasised this point, giving the microphone a very bold, yet sophisticated look. This is

and pop filter that mounts directly to it for vocal use. Once set up on a sturdy stand that can hold the weight, you will most likely leave it set up and use it time and time again. This is going to be a microphone you’ll want to have on display, and one you’ll want to have ready for recordings most of the time.

To say this microphone is versatile would be an understatement.

The only thing that leaves it out from being used in most studio applications is the size, shape and side address design that might not allow for some closemic applications with certain instruments. But aside from the housing, the capsule is ready for just about anything. The brilliant high frequency response of this microphone means you can gain a new perspective on many of your instruments. Best of all, it can handle high SPLs so you can even get inventive with drum applications. The Bluebird comes with a solidly built shock mount

the standout model, with the brush-finished black version a little more subtle in appearance.

But, it’s not really the looks that make this microphone so special, it’s the sound. A sound that is derived from a very clever dual diaphragm design that completely changes how we will consider microphone choice for live performance in the future.

TWICE AS NICE

This new DualDyne design from Shure takes the dynamic microphone into new sonic territory and opens up a wide range of applications and uses for a hand-held dynamic microphone. The clever design drastically alters the proximity effect that dynamic microphones suffer from and introduces a

BY ROB GEE

HITS t Solid construction, with rugged suspension mount and pop filter t Capable of very high SPLs t Suitable for a wide range of instrument and vocal applications

MISSES t It’s very Blue. You’ll need to co-ordinate your wardrobe each time you go into the studio

new level of dynamic control to the singer’s voice. No longer do you need to swallow the microphone to get a consistent sound; you can finally make use of a wider sweet spot and get greater control without the need to use a condenser microphone on stage. Yet, with this added range that it offers, the cardioid pickup pattern still holds true, and the KSM8 offers great side rejection as you would expect of a microphone that is going to be worked heavily in very loud environments.

The dual diaphragm also offers an extended high frequency response, with a little more air to the signal than you might have expected from a dynamic microphone. This is coupled with a smoother low frequency

Gas Custom Drums Gas Bass MCM Scott Greene has been tinkering with drums since 2002, and launched Gas Custom Drums in 2007. Scott is a highly respected auto electrician, and his work on high-performance show cars has gained him a reputation for finesse and attention to detail. These skills have seen Scott become a leader in the design and manufacture of world class acrylic drums. Scott is a recording enthusiast and Beatles Fan. He drew inspiration from the bands use of Reverse diaphragm speaker technology to capture some of their most prolific work. This led him to develop and build the Gas Bass MCM.

Without getting too technical the Gas Bass MCM is a low-frequency capture device. It helps to capture and enhance the low-end frequency of your kick drum.

Here's how it works. The sound from your kick drum strikes

www.mixdownmag.com.au

the diaphragm. The concave nature of the cone creates a smooth response (sensitivity of 89db). This causes the coil to vibrate within a magnetic field, thus creating an electrical impulse. The 6.5" MCM (Moving Coil Microphone) captures the low-end frequencies that fall in

BY ROB GEE

HITS t Solid construction, ready for rugged stage use t Eliminated proximity effect for greater dynamic range t Excellent frequency response across the board t This may become the new standard in live vocal microphones

MISSES t It might carry a price tag beyond some singers’ budget

it. I loved the way it sounded, and started to see the value in the unit and the technology.

The unit offers something uniquely different for drummers, studio engineers and recording artists. Its amazing looks adds an exciting visual element to any drum kit, and your kick drum will never sound so good!

Gas Drums Australia | 0414 933 598 | www.gascustomdrums.com | RRP: $695

THE RUN DOWN

response than many of you would be used to when using Shure microphones. The overall result is a microphone that needs very little work at the mixing desk, it simply behaves the way you want it to and sounds the way you expect it to by simply plugging it in.

BY CONRAD TRACEY

HITS the 44hz - 7khz range. These are not traditionally captured by the a normal kick drum microphone.

You then blend this with your other microphones and your kick drum sounds AMAZING!

HOW DOES IT GO?

We road tested the Gas Bass MCM at Head Gap studios over

the weekend and got some great results. We tested it on a 22" kick drum tuned for commercial playing. It produced an almost 808 like sound gave the kick drum sound so much more depth of character and low-end. The sound was rewarding and full and was so easy to achieve. As soon as we removed it we missed

t Looks incredible t Priced Well t Durable t Sounds Great t Australian made

MISSES t Would prefer it if the mount was free standing and not attached to the hoop. Scott tells us this is possible with a tom arm and a base of a cymbal stand.

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.43

ROAD TESTS Carl Martin Andy Timmons Signature Compressor/Limiter Innovative Music | (03) 9540 0658 | www.innovativemusic.com.au | RRP: $549

Carl Martin continues to give us some great pedal designs that are well thought out and offer tonal options and audio solutions that guitarists actually want. That’s why he was happy to seek suggestions from Andy Timmons in the newly designed format of the ever popular Compressor/Limiter pedal.

TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE

Essentially, what this pedal offers you is two compressors in one chassis. And wouldn’t it be nice if you had all the flexibility and control of two totally independent compressors in one small bow, but that isn’t really going to happen due to size constraints. So, what you get is a single compressor/limiter with a switchable section that allows you to jump between two preset

variations with differing levels of compression and make-up gain.

Personally, I would have loved to have seen a threshold setting for both of the two variations, as you can dramatically change the behaviour of a compressor when dialling in a different threshold. But, you can’t have everything on one pedal, and the fact that the threshold and response controls are supplied on 6mm miniature pots give you

an indication that the space is pretty tight in there already.

So, let’s not get too fussy here, especially given that many other popular compressors don’t even offer this much level of control for a signal setting option.

PULLING IT BACK

With an appropriate threshold setting to suit your playing needs, you can now start to squeeze the dynamics as you need for the two separate presets. This is a really nifty concept, as it allows you to find one setting that is going to be better suited to rhythm work, and another that really makes your solo and lead work jump right out, and brings a little extra sustain into your notes too. There is plenty of make-up gain available in this little unit, so if you do want to get carried away and really squeeze your sound for one of the presets, getting the volume back up to

Klon KTR Overdrive Gladesville Guitar Factory | (02) 9817 2173 | www.guitarfactory.net | RRP: $469

In this line of work, from time to time you come across an instrument that amuses you. Klon’s KTR Overdrive is the successor to their famed Centaur Professional Overdrive; a pedal that amassed such critical acclaim, that the good folk over at Klon felt it was necessary to reference it in the next incarnation of the unit. The top side of this unit doesn’t have any labels or instructions. It simply reads “Kindly remember: the ridiculous hype that offends so many is not of my making.” A clever nod to the dizzying heights, and inevitable lows that come with going through the hype cycle, but enough about the gags, there’s a pedal here to review!

THE SET

Aesthetically, this pedal is on point. It’s clean, of approximate average size, and only really adorned with the aforementioned statement. On top you’ll find a footswitch and three knobs: one for gain, one for treble and one for output. Both the in and out jacks are found on the same side,

along with the 9-volt power jack.

Around the other side of the pedal is a small switch, which is simply labelled ‘Almost always better’ on one side, and ‘Almost always worse’ on the other. This switch is actually a buffer switch, allowing the user to switch between a buffered output and a true bypass output; a luxury that

Neumann KMS105 Condenser Microphone Sennheiser Australia | (02) 9910 6700 | www.sennheiser.com.au | RRP: $959

When you think of quality and excellence in microphone design and performance, I don’t know what comes to mind for you, but for myself, I instantly think of Neumann. The German stalwart of microphone engineering, Neumann continues to deliver microphones of excellence for both studio and stage. With their history in studio microphones, it is no wonder that when they began developing microphones for the stage use that they sought to reproduce that studio quality and clarity in a different environment. Because of this, we are afforded a number of hand-held condenser microphones that surpass the expectations of many users and deliver on results time and time again. That is what the Neumann name is all about and that is just what they have delivered with the KMS105 as I discovered this month.

GERMAN ENGINEERING

Let’s face it, the Germans do know how to design and build something truly special, which is just what they have done with the KMS105. This sleek looking design is not only lightweight, but very comfortable in the

hands. It almost feels like you are holding a prop and not the real thing, but the sound it delivers lets you know just what is in your hands. As per usual, the first thing I did when I got my hands on this microphone was to screw it apart and see

PG.44 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

users of the Centaur Overdrive were never afforded. When Klon first put the Centaur together, they opted for a buffered output to solve any signal degradation problems. While they’re offering the choice to the user now, evidently they still stand by their decision, labelling the buffered side of the switch ‘Almost always better’.

THE FORGET

Plugging the KTR in, it’s easy to see what all the hype is about.

From the outset it offers a really

where it needs to be isn’t an issue. These run on a standard 9-volt power supply, but there is some new Carl Martin circuitry inside this beast that ramps it up and allows it to operate at 12 volts to ensure the headroom is there. What you will notice with this pedal is that it is not just one of those single knob wonders that decide all the settings for you. So, a heavy abuse of the threshold will bring the input volume right back, as it starts compressing very early and riding the compression control will keep your sound very tight and without dynamic variance at all. A softer approach with a slower response setting will deliver a more natural, organic compression that subtly rolls off any harsh peaks, but still presents all the feeling and emotions that you want in your playing.

BY ROB GEE

decent amount of gain, amp-like gain at that. One of the strengths of not only this pedal, but its predecessor, is that it won’t muck around too much with the voice of your amp. To really get the best use of this pedal as a garden variety overdrive, you really need to have the output set at least above ten to really drive the signal. The gain moves from subtle and dirty, all the way up to a pretty gnarly high gain tone. There are a lot of nuances within these controls.

Though they may be simple, take some time to work out where the treble and output needs to be to get the best out of the relationship between this pedal and your amp. Another of the real strengths of the KTR overdrive, and indeed one of the reasons it’s become so popular, is the fact that it can effortlessly double as a super effective boost. With the gain setting dialled right back, this

t Two separate compression settings in one pedal t High headroom in a pedal that runs on 4 volt power t Great control in taming dynamic response

MISSES t Shared threshold control

circuit has loads of headroom, so by cranking up the output and using it as a boost, you won’t generate any unwanted noise or distortion that you might with other overdrives. Better still, pull up the gain a fraction and play around with the treble to give your boosted signal a character of its own.

BY JAQUES NUGENT

HITS t Great looking t Appreciate the wit that’s found on the pedal, and throughout the instructions t Great breadth of gain tone

MISSES t Lack of labelling might make this a hard pedal to use for people with an awful memory.

loud stages just because you are using a condenser microphone.

The KMS105 gives you all the benefits of a condenser in sound reproduction, but doesn’t seem to have the negatives that can be associated with similar microphones. Put simply, using this microphone is going to be a tribute to your voice and your audience should be very grateful when you do.

how she was constructed. Well, no worries here, the capsule is very well suspended within the grill housing so you can be a little rough with it and not be too concerned about excessive handling noise. The grille itself is very firm and looks ready to handle all the usual bumps and scratches without giving way or coming apart from the frame.

IN OPERATION

When fired up, this microphone delivers on a promise to keep your voice sounding as natural and clear as possible. Dynamic control is the key with the KKMS105, as it allows you to control your voice and not have to scream into the capsule to do so. It responds beautifully to changes in dynamics, yet it still offers plenty of side rejection from unwanted sound sources on a noisy stage. The good thing is that although it is

HITS

BY ROB GEE

HITS sensitive enough to capture the dynamic phrasing in your voice, it doesn’t have a reach that extends its capabilities to other instruments around the stage, keeping a very tight isolated sweet spot. What this means is that you don’t need to worry about excessive environmental noise or nasty feedback traps on

t Beautiful, precise German engineering t Lightweight and compact t Truthful sound capture t It’s a Neumann

MISSES t None.

www.mixdownmag.com.au

ROAD TESTS

Alesis Sample Pad 4 Electric Factory | (03) 9474 1000 | www.elfa.com.au | RRP: $299

Alesis have been changing the face of electronic percussion over the last 18 months. Their new lines of innovative, affordable and easy to use electronic drumkits, sample racks and portable sample pads have been winning the hearts of consumers worldwide. The Alesis Sample Pad Pro hit Australian shores in July 2015 and was an instant success.

The unit offered a huge range of features, was slick looking, easy to use and affordable. 2016 has seen the release of the Alesis Sample Pad 4. This 4 pad version of the Sample Pad Pro is a compact and powerful tool that makes it even easier for musicians to enjoy unlimited sound potential live and in the studio. Last week mine arrived. The phrase “good things come in small packages” sprang to mind straight away. I took the unit out of the box and was immediately impressed by the compact, sleek and modern looking unit. It felt solid, but not heavy.

THE LOOK

The Sample Pad 4 was well labelled and gave me a clear idea of the unit’s capabilities as soon as I took it out of the box. Straight away I noticed that the unit had an SD card slot, USB and MIDI in, trigger in, L/R mains, separate volume controls for the main and headphones out and a simple screen and four button interface. It looked great and easy to use. I was excited to start exploring. I turned the unit on and was immediately taken by the dynamic blue LED lighting

which looked great and would certainly help for use in a dark setting. I flicked through the 10 preset kits and found everything I would expect in percussion and electronic drum sounds. The samples were clear, well recorded and could be tuned for pitch and reverb. The pads were responsive to different touch and stick velocities. So good!

THE FEEL

The next step was to connect it to my computer, get my own samples onto it and configure

my sound. A solid, fun and completely affordable offering from the team at Alesis. my own user kit. I did this all without looking at the instruction manual once. I’m happy to say it was easy. The Sample Pad 4 plugged directly into my Mac via USB, and allowed me to drag and drop my samples onto the SD card through an easy to use interface.

No formatting of SD cards, no dicking around with file types and no complicated sub-folders.

The whole process took less than ten minutes, it was intuitive and user-friendly.

THE VERDICT

The Sample Pad 4 is a powerful tool, and suitable for musicians who are looking to expand their sound potential. This awesome offering from Alesis makes it easy for people to customise, perform and play music that is truly unique and innovative. I was blown away by how easy the unit was to use, and the quality and consistency of their sounds.

The Sample Pad 4 gave me the impression that it had unlimited potential to help me realise

AVAILABLE FOR WRITING, PRODUCTION, RECORDING & MIXING YOUR NEXT CREATIVE PROJECT

BY CONRAD TRACEY

HITS t Intuitive t Well recorded sounds t Great value

MISSES t None

info@thegrovestudios.com www.thegrovestudios.com

ROAD TESTS Yamaha Revstar Series Yamaha Music Australia | (03) 9693 5111 | www.au.yamaha.com

Throughout its 50-year history of guitar making, Yamaha has long been a viable alternative to major manufacturers. The original SG Series put its own spin on Fender’s Jazzmaster, the RGX and RGZ series have always looked to challenge Ibanez’s RG series, and their RGZ series offered a point of difference to Fender’s household Stratocaster. As a Japanese manufacturer, it exemplifies the country’s renowned make and quality of guitar, while also utilising multinational reaches to produce guitars specced with desirable custom-shop parts. All of which make the Revstar series – a completely new range of guitars designed and assembled from scratch – a rather exciting prospect.

RS320 RRP: $599.99

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RS420 RRP: $699.99

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RS502 RRP: $899.99

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PG.46 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

LIFE’S SIMPLE PLEASURES

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BY CHRIS SCOTT

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SWITCHING GEARS

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BY CHRIS SCOTT

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BY CHRIS SCOTT

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ROAD TESTS

Yamaha Revstar Series Yamaha Music Australia | (03) 9693 5111| www.au.yamaha.com

RS 620 RRP: $1099

As we’ve seen, Yamaha’s Revstar guitars are quite the cool collection.

A combination of modern and vintage looks with new Yamaha design features, they’ve gone all out to produce a line of guitars that are different enough to generate some interest and contrast whilst still retaining that feeling of some familiarity.

ANOTHER BRICK

Taking some cues from the suitably obscure Yamaha 1974 model ‘Super Flighter’, the Revstar 620 again features a double cut look, this time with a Mahogany body with flame maple top. Colour-wise you can pick from Burnt Charcoal or Brick Burst (this particular review model), which has a great amber/orange/brown burst to it. Yamaha’s own VH5+ pickups

come standard with the satin nickel covers adding to the warm and homely look of the guitar.

YOU’RE A STAR

As a double-cut double humbucker guitar, a few classic tone assumptions might be made in advance with the RS 620. Big chords and fat lead lines are all possible for everything from rock and blues to pseudo jazz.

And whilst it does do some great

thick neck and bridge tones, Yamaha’s ‘dry switch’ located in the push pull tone pot also gives you very single coil like sounds also. For the tech-minded out there, it’s actually a passive filter that cuts low frequencies.

The resulting option is brighter single coil type tones with the benefit of noise free humbucker operation.

REV IT UP

I really dig the look of the RS 620. The general Revstar shape is a great mix of new and old.

I like the headstock; the Brick Burst on this particular model is well done and the fretboard

the backing and nous of a serious maker in Yamaha – good stuff. inlays are something different without looking too modern or super custom. As a player the guitar is comfy and reasonably weighted – not super light but definitely not a shoulder breaker like some other double bucker guitars. The neck is thin yet has a little added width, which lets you grab onto chord shapes easily and still jump around the fretboard. I’m really interested to see how the Revstar line fares as they look cool, feel good and have

BY NICK BROWN

HITS t Looks t ‘Dry’ switch gives some added tonal variation t Versatile

MISSES t Individual pickup volume and tone controls would add some flexibility

RS 720B RRP: $1399

More Revstar action this time in the form of the 720B. The B stands for Bigsby, that same name that produced a slew of classic guitars and perhaps even more importantly the famed Bigsby tremolo system that has graced many instruments worldwide. Let’s check it out.

TREMOLO

In the same Revstar double cut shape, the RS 720B again combines a mahogany body with flame maple top and a nahogany neck with rosewood fingerboard.

Yamaha’s finishes across the entire Revstar range seem to be top notch and the 720B is no exception. A choice of Ash Gray or Wall Fade is available, with this example being the latter – an amber, honey-ish yellow with some nice flame maple grain

underneath bursting into slightly orange edges. Pairing nicely with the Bigsby are the set of Yamaha VT5+ pickups, which are a Tron style vintage output.

MR BIGS

The Bigsby arm gives the strings a slinkier feel tension-wise, which allows a little bit more bending, vibrato and general slipping and sliding (in a good way), with the locking machine heads still holding everything

nicely in tune. As a tremolo device the Bigsby can also be super responsive and often easier to manage at first thanks to the spring loaded arm. The first bit of movement only lightly affects the pitch making it easy to be super subtle. Once you’re leaning in further, the spring really comes into play and you can warble all you like – there’s even a little bit of upward movement if you want get go sharp instead of just flat.

FUNK OR COUNTRY? RHYTHM AND/OR BLUES? All of them! Some down low Country picking action or big deep dives into notes can really sing. Quick dips for some

thinner single coil type sounds and you’ve got quite the flexible little guitar. motown open chords or funky higher octave stabs – the RS 720B can really hold the fort.

The VT5+ pickups add some sparkle and can handle distortion for that twangy breakup rock and roll and rockabilly tone. Bigsby aside, the humbuckers will give you big clean tones that could run through quite a few genres.

Add in the ‘dry’ push/pull pot for some slightly brighter and

BY NICK BROWN

HITS t Bigsby is a cool addition t More good looking finishes t Well priced

MISSES t More tone and volume control would open up tonal possibilities

RS 820CR RRP: $1399

STRIPES

Yamaha cite the influence of Japanese and London vintage street racing motorbikes in the design of the Revstar series. There definitely is a certain ‘cool’ factor on board and it’s interesting to see the background and subtle differences between each model. Coming from the ‘Café Racer’ aesthetic that saw high performance racing bikes stripped down to bare essentials with style we get the RS 820CR.

RUSTY

A mahogany body with Maple top, mahogany neck, rosewood fingerboard and a set of Yamaha VH5+ pickups are the go for the newly released RS 820CR. Our review model came in a great looking ‘Steel Rust’ colour with a copper coloured anodised pickguard. A browny purple, the ‘Steel Rust’ is a satin type finish with two stripes of sparkle up the centre of the guitar. Again this retro tinge is added to with

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the satin looking nickel pickup covers, bridge, control knobs and tuners. And if the ‘Steel Rust’ isn’t your thing, the RS 820CR also comes in a colour called ‘Rusty Rat’, which is more of a grey/silver vibe. I must also mention the contoured top that adds a little extra resting angle for your forearm, and the nicely shaped heel joint and deep cutaway which gives good access to the upper registers.

So cosmetically the RS 820CR is a beaut. The good news is that plugged in she fits the bill too.

Like its other twin humbucker buddies, it can do big rock chords in all 3 pickup positions, with the extra bite of the bridge pickup lending itself to sharper sounding lead tones. Yamaha have again incorporated their ‘dry’ push/pull switchm which adds that quasi single coil sound and would be handy for some brighter chicken picking or middle position quack.

CHOICES

Rock, blues, indie, funk, punk, pop and plenty more are fair game for the RS 820CR. The ‘dry’ switch gives you more tonal scope and as an easy player you

won’t be fighting to feel at home with it. Price-wise Yamaha are onto a good thing, also making the Revstar series achievable options for bedroom players and giggers alike. So for something that looks a little different and conjures up anything from Bowie, Kravitz or Daft Punk to Foo Fighters, Mars Volta and beyond check out the Revstar 820 CR.

BY NICK BROWN

HITS t Feel and tone t Looks t Interesting take on the double cut double humbucker styled guitar

MISSES t Individual pickup volume and tone controls would add some flexibility

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.47

ROAD TESTS Ormsby Guitars Hypemachine Copper Top Multiscale Ormsby Guitars | 0410 540 327 | www.ormsbyguitars.com | Contact For Pricing

I was quite excited when I was asked to write a review for this guitar — a one-off custom — because I was already quite familiar with it.

Having played it on a number of different occasions including at an ‘Ormsby Meat-up,’ (a bunch of dudes showing off their guitars and eating lots of manly stuff), at the Melbourne Guitar Makers Festival and at the NAMM Show (where it impressed Ola Englund, a man who knows a good guitar when he sees it), it was nice to finally get some on-on-one time.

COPPER FEEL

This particular guitar was built

by Perry Ormsby in 2014, and it’s truly stunning in person. The top is an actual sheet of oxidised copper, which gives it a really striking look especially alongside the ‘Pale Moon’ ebony fretboard.

The body itself is made of swamp ash, thinner than usual and chambered, giving this guitar an incredibly light feel. It feels like it’s practically floating on air, and has tremendous sustain and resonance. The set neck is made of Tasmanian black wood with ebony slices, and the side dots are aluminium rings with blue glow resin inside to make it easy to figure out where you are on a dark stage.

The pickups are a pair of Ormsby humbuckers: a Nunchucker with an Alnico 8 magnet in the bridge position, and a De La Creme with an Alnico 2 magnet in the neck.

The controls and tuners are by Hipshot, and there’s a coil split for when you need it. The frets are jumbo stainless steel, and they’re fanned — in other words the scale length on the lowest string is longer for a tighter feel and punchier tone, while the scale of the thinnest string is the shortest for slinkier bends.

This also lets you intonate the guitar better, and although it may look odd if you’re not used to it, your hands will adjust in a matter of minutes. You’ll find that it’s extremely ergonomic: your hand naturally fits into the spread of the frets and it feels completely normal very quickly.

TONE TEST

The pickups sound great. The De La Creme has a PAF-like tone which responds with a vowellike sweep with heavy pick attack; dig in and you’ll get lots

of upper-midrange harmonics, but pick softer and the tone darkens up in a musical way.

Play clean and you’ll notice lots of character (notice how some humbuckers tend to get a bit ‘meh’ when you play them clean? Not this one). As for the Nunchucker, it’s powerful, fat and hot, but with plenty of attack, and while the low-end feels quite full, it’s still quite tight and chunky which is great for fast riffs. One of my favourite tricks with this pickup is to perform an oblique bend (where you hold one note steady while bending another) and hearing the shifting harmonic overtones screaming out. It’s addictive.

You can blast the gain through the roof, and the guitar’s voice is so bold and assertive that it’ll maintain its original character.

And again, the clean tones are distinctive and punchy, with

some nice upper-end chime in single coil mode. The tighter low-string scale length even makes it a great guitar for country licks.

MULTIPASS

This is a world-class guitar that provides a great example of what Perry Ormsby can do. It’s up to you whether you’re into the look and the multiscale design — although I’d highly recommend you try it if you’re on the fence, because it’ll win you over for sure — putting this guitar’s quirks aside and looking at it purely as an example of Ormsby craftsmanship, it’s flawless.

BY PETER HODGSON

HITS t Killer playability t Great clean and distorted tones t Very unique look

MISSES t None

Soundcraft Signature 12 Mixer Jands | (02) 9582 0909 | www.jands.com.au | RRP: $729

The Soundcraft Signature 12 is a high-performance small-footprint 12-input mixer for houses of worship, music venues, theatres, tour sound and for musicians and bands. It has an analog signal path with onboard effects and flexible routing and switching options so you can use it for all sorts of gigs with a short setup time.

THE CRAFT

There are eight XLR mic inputs, plus mono line inputs on all channels until 7/8 and 9/10 where you get left and right inputs. Inputs 1 and 2 have a switchable limiter and inputs 5 and 6 have a switchable Hi-Z mode for directly connecting guitars and basses. Channel 11/12 has phono line ins and there are three Aux jacks, a headphone jack, a footswitch jack for effects mute and even a USB power out for charging your devices and what have you. Soundcraft’s Ghost mic preamps are employed: these are directly drawn from their top-of-the-line consoles and are designed to give you high headroom, wide dynamic range, exceptional clarity and very low noise. Effects include Lexicon studio-grade reverb, chorus, modulation and other effects, and there are dbx limiters on the input channels too. The effects

are separated into two chains, reverb and delay/mod. The channels have 15dB of boost/ cut at 60Hz and 12kHz, and 15dB of boost and cut on the sweepable midrange from 140Hz to 3kHz (except for 11/12 which has a three-band EQ with 60Hz, 1kHz and 12kHz). Each channel has two aux send levels and an effect send, pan pot, fader and mute. There’s also a 2-in/2-out USB interface which you can use for limited live recording, and accompanying the console are free downloads of the Lexicon MPX-L native plugin and Ableton Live 9 Lite. If you need to do multitrack recording, there’s a model called the Signature 12 MTK which can do that too, which would be my personal choice. Other models in the line are the Signature 10, Signature 16, Signature 22 and Signature 22 MTK.

PG.48 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

THE SOUND

While it’s great that there are pro-level effects built into this console, the real standouts are the Ghost mic preamps. They give you a very clear sound that you’re then free to treat and twist however you want with EQ and effects — be it a raging guitar amp, a delicate vocal or pounding drums — or to leave utterly pristine. There’s something very liberating about the simplicity and quality of this system, and the layout is very intuitive. The effects are useful but they don’t give you a huge range of control over the parameters; it’s pretty basic, but still quite powerful in broad strokes.

This is a great console for those who need an easy-to-learn desk for live sound and could use a few handy effects. There are other more advanced systems out there, and if you’re a home recordist, then the full multitrack

MTK version makes a little more sense as an investment. But the Signature 12 is full of great features, and most importantly awesome-sounding mic preamps to get the job done in live applications.

BY PETER HODGSON

HITS t Transparent mic pres t Great sounding EQ t Handy effects

MISSES t Multitrack is only on a different model

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ROAD TESTS

Audio-Technica ATH-R70x Open-Back Reference Headphones Technical Audio Group | (02) 9519 0900 | www.audio-technica.com.au | RRP: $499

The ATH-R70x is Audio-Technica’s first foray into open back reference monitor headphones territory, and stands as their flagship professional headphone model — and what an entrance it is. Designed in partnership with Parisian product design specialist studio Arro, upon whipping them out of the box you’re greeted with a gorgeous balance of aesthetics and function, with distinctly premium materials.

IN THE BOX

It’s a pretty no nonsense package here. Included is the headphones, a single 3-metre cord (with TRS connector) and a small carry bag. The cord is an interesting point of difference to competitors, with dual outputs that connect directly to each ear cup. Not only that, each plug outputs a stereo signal, rather than only left or right, while the ear cups are wired so that they’re only capable of picking up the correct audio signals — right or left. Put simply, it’s impossible to muck up stereo orientation with these headphones, unless you manage to put them on backwards.

THAT WEIGHT THOUGH...

These headphones are astoundingly light. Really, really, really light. Constructed with

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aluminium mesh ear cups and a carbon resin composite, they weigh in at 210 grams, around 100 grams lighter than most of its competitors. Putting them on, it’s like you’re wearing nothing at all (insert sexy Flanders reference). Combined with breathable fabric pads, I could comfortably wear these headphones all day.

SOUND AU NATUREL

Generally speaking, one opts for open back headphones when looking for a more natural spacious sound, akin to listening with monitor speakers. Sound leakage and the complete absence of any noise cancelling make open back headphones strictly for reference and monitoring purposes — you’re not going to be able to hear much music if you use them on

a train. The sound is wonderfully natural, flat, but not lifeless.

There is no brain melting bass or screeching trebles, they’re not overly warm, nor do they feature that incredible clarity that sometimes comes with high-end closed-back headphones. The frequencies are just ‘there’ and beautifully balanced in a smooth and polite manner. Apparently Audio-Technica created the 45mm drivers specifically for this model, and it shows. I found using the R70x’s to be far less fatiguing than my usual headsets. A testiment to their sound quality and comfort, making them perfect for long sessions. It should also be noted, at 470 ohm impedance, you’ll need to use an audio interface or headphone amplifier to really drive these properly.

As far as high-end headphones

go, these are pretty damn good value price-wise, sitting around the middle of the open-back headphone price spectrum. I’d absolutely recommend anyone looking into their first or tenth pair of open-back headphones to check the R70x’s out, giving back the pair I reviewed after a few weeks was very difficult.

BY MICHAEL CUSACK

HITS t Did I mention they’re insanely light? t Beautiful, natural, spacious sound. t Super comfortable.

MISSES t Only a long 3m cable being included is a minor, but valid gripe.

MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016 // PG.49

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TC Helicon Perform V Amber Technology | 1800 251 367 | www.ambertech.com.au | RRP: $439

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Technical Audio Group | (02) 9519 0900 | www.tag.com.au | RRP: $1999

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PG.50 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

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BY PETER HODGSON

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QSC Touchmix-8 Digital Mixer

BACK ON THE HORSE

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CMC Music Australia | (02) 9905 2511 | www.cmcmusic.com.au | RRP: $1495

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HITS CLEVER BUILD

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MISSES t 4MJHIUMZ DSBNQFE UPVDITDSFFO XPSLTQBDF

www.mixdownmag.com.au

PRO-GO

MUSIC MOVES YOU

My instrument travels wherever I go inside a Gator PRO-GO gig bag.

I know that from work, to practice, to gigs, and back that my guitar will be protected, ready to perform, and still look good. The plush interior babies my guitar and the back-pack straps leave me hands-free!

Built-In Rain Cover Tablet Storage Body Block Protection System Sheet Music Storage

Distributed by

www.jands.com.au

SHOW & TELL

WE CHAT TO MUSOS ABOUT THEIR MOST TREASURED GEAR

JOSH CHUGG OF BAD VISION What piece of equipment do you have to show us today?

This is my candy apple Squier Stratocaster, circa early 2000s How did you come across this particular item?

I guess my folks realised that they would never hear the end of it otherwise, so they bought me the fabled ‘Strat Pack’ for my 13th birthday. It came replete with all kinds of gadgets and gizmos, including a much-cherished buzzy 15-watt amp that I’ve somehow lost over the years. Still got the gig bag though!

What is that you like so much about it?

In terms of bang-for-buck, it’s probably/definitely the best guitar going around. Yeah it’s a cheap knock-off of a classic, but it has all the right bits in all the right places. The action is great, it’s lightweight so you can throw it around a bit, and it has the classic strat shape

that makes it incredibly comfortable and feel a bit like an accessory rather than a musical instrument. Plus it’s (kinda) the same guitar that Dean Ween uses, which is really just great.

How do you use it, and how has it shaped the way you write music?

Well it was my stalwart guitar for a long time, but doesn’t come out too often nowadays.

It was the guitar I cut my teeth on as a young’un, so I guess it’s a bit special and sentimental. It’s super twangy and is most likely the reason that I love trebly surf/garage stuff.

PAlso the neck is quite thin so you can really shimmy around on there which is nice if you’re trying to knock out your own riffs.

pickguard. I suppose that I figured then that linking my two favourite things in the world couldn’t be such a bad idea. And probably to remind me to listen to Kiss more often.

Tell us a little bit about what you have coming up?

Bad Vision’s sophomore LP Turn Out Your Sockets will be available May 6th through Adagio830 records, and we’ll be launching it at the Old Bar on the 3rd of June with bestest buds Camp Cope, Cable Ties and The Tropes.

Any other interesting points/stories about it?

For some reason it has the price sticker from a Kiss Alive record I bought in my teens on the

PADDY HARROWSMITH OF GREEN BUZZARD What piece of equipment do you have to show us today?

My 1965 Airline BigHorn Guitar.

How did you come across this particular item?

I was in San Francisco and found it in a guitar store for $500.

What is it that you like so much about it?

I originally loved its green colour and strange shape. It was so striking. I’ve always liked weird guitars that aren’t your run of the mill brand or shape. Once I plugged it into an amp and started playing it, it sounded so amazing; I knew I had to buy it.

How do you use it, and how has it shaped the way that you write music?

I remember as soon as I bought it I began writing a song straight away with it in San Francisco. That song is called ‘Crystal Eyes’ and is actually going to be on Green Buzzard’s next release. I find whenever I buy a new guitar it inspires me right away to start writing something new on it.

Tell us a little about what you’ve got coming up.

We’ve just started a tour this week doing some shows around Australia, which is coinciding with the release of our first EP, then recording and another Australia tour with our mates DMA’s.

ADVANCED DIPLOMA IN SOUND PRODUCTION STUDY IN THE MOST UNIQUE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT IN AUSTRALIA

ENROL TODAY: INFO@THEGROVESTUDIOS.COM WWW.THEGROVESTUDIOS.COM PG.52 // MIXDOWN #264 // APRIL 2016

www.mixdownmag.com.au

It’s your career.

Make it with JMC. REGISTER NOW FOR APRIL/MAY OPEN DAYS! Degrees and Diplomas in Music, Songwriting, Audio, Entertainment Business Management, Film and Television, 3D Animation, Games and Digital Design.

The Australasian institutional partner school of

Your creative future starts today.

Visit jmcacademy.edu.au or call on 1300 410 311. facebook.com/jmcacademy

youtube.com/jmcacademy

June and Sept intakes.

Enrol Now.

DIRECTORY EVOLUTION MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

8/2 Northey Rd, Lynbrook VIC (03) 8787 8599 info@evolutionmusic.com.au evolutionmusic.com.au facebook.com/evolutionmusicaus

AA DUPLICATION

(PRINTING/CD & DVD DUPLICATION) A | P | E | W|

84 Nicholson St, Abbotsford VIC (03) 9416 2133 sales@aaduplication.com.au aaduplication.com.au facebook.com/AADuplicationServices

EASTGATE MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

1131 Burke Rd, Kew VIC (03) 9817 7000 sales@eastgatemusic.com eastgatemusic.com.au facebook.com/Eastgatemusic

JABEN AUDIO

(HEADPHONE SPECIALIST RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

Shop 2 398 Lonsdale St, Melbourne VIC (03) 9670 8231 info@jaben.com.au jaben.com.au facebook.com/jabenau

HYDRA REHEARSAL STUDIOS (REHEARSAL ROOMS) A | P | E | W|

18 Duffy Street, Burwood VIC (03) 9038 8101 hydrastudios@bigpond.com.au hydrastudios.com.au facebook.com/hydra.rehearsal.studios

FOR FULL S T ORE P ROFILES , HEA D T O MIX DOWNM A G. C O M . A U / DIREC T O RY

MELBOURNE MUSIC CENTRE

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

525 North Rd, Ormond, VIC (03) 9578 2426 info@melbournemusiccentre.com.au melbournemusiccentre.com.au facebook.com/melbournemusic.centre

SKY MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

4/2181 Princes Hwy, Clayton VIC (03) 9546 0188 info@skymusic.com.au skymusic.com.au facebook.com/skymusiconline

FIVE STAR MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

102 Maroondah Hwy, Ringwood VIC (03) 9870 4143 websales@fivestarmusic.com.au fivestarmusic.com.au facebook.com/fivestarmusicoz

MUSIC 440

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

1/30 Station Rd, Indooroopilly QLD (07) 3878 4566 info@music440.com.au music440.com.au facebook.com/music440

BINARY MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER & EDUCATION) A | P | E | W|

48 Bloomfield St, Cleveland QLD (07) 3488 2230 sales@binarydesigns.com.au binarydesigns.com.au @binarymusic

WILD HORSE GUITARS

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

Brumby Street Surry Hills NSW (02) 9690 0800 info@wildhorseguitars.com.au wildhorseguitars.com.au facebook.com/wildhorseguitars

REVOLVER DRUMS

MONA VALE MUSIC

A | 4a Izett St, Prahran 3181 P | (03) 9521 4644 E | sales@revolverdrums.com.au W | revolverdrums.com.au @revolverdrums

A | 55 Bassett Street, Mona Vale NSW P | (02) 9986 0589 E | info@mvmwarehouse.com W | www.monavalemusic.com facebook.com/monavalemusic

MODERN MUSICIAN

DAMIEN GERARD STUDIOS

(DRUMS SPECIALIST RETAILER)

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

106 Murray Street, Hobart TAS (03) 6234 5537 nick@modernmusician.com.au modernmusician.com.au facebook.com/modernmusician

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER)

ARCADE SCREENPRINTING

(SCREENPRINTING & DESIGN SERVICE) A | P | E | W|

15/17 Hutchinson St, St Peters NSW (02) 9550 6965 info@arcadescreenprinting.com.au arcadescreenprinting.com.au facebook.com/arcadescreenprinting

GLADESVILLE GUITAR FACTORY

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

280 Victoria Rd, Gladesville NSW (02) 9817 2173 mail@guitarfactory.net guitarfactory.net facebook.com/GladesvilleGuitarFactory

TURRAMURRA MUSIC (MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER) A | P | E | W|

1267 Pacific Hwy, Turramurra NSW (02) 9449 8487 general_sales@turramusic.com.au turramusic.com.au facebook.com/TurramurraMusic

COASTAL MUSIC

(MUSIC INSTRUMENTS RETAILER & REPAIRS) A | 5/148 Lake Road, Port Macquarie NSW P | (02) 6581 3016 E | sales@coastalmusic.com.au W | coastalmusic.com.au facebook.com/coastalmusic

(RECORDING STUDIOS)

A | 230 Crown St, Darlinghurst NSW P | (02) 9331 0666 E | bookings@damiengerard.net W | damiengerard.com.au facebook.com/damiengerardstudios

NOT IN THE DIRECTORY? CONTACT PATRICK@FURSTMEDIA.COM.AU TO SECURE YOUR PLACE

JOB VACANCY - MATON GUITARS Customer Service /Internal Sales

A fantastic opportunity exists for a self-motivated person The role entails retail customer service, distributor customer service, assistance to sales force with particular reference to receiving and processing purchase orders as well as direction of public information requests.

You would be a crucial intermediary, between the factory and the customer base in relation to lead times, customised options, pricing, linking customers to the most appropriate retailer, merchandise and parts / repair function.

Ultimately the role would progressively entail consolidating, invoicing orders and working with the administration function and despatch to consign domestic and international shipments.

A knowledge of and experience in guitar, sales and customer service and a willingness to learn, develop and improve yourself and the business is crucial.

If this sounds like you, email your resume and cover letter to info@maton.com.au

PG.54 // MIXDOWN #264 / APRIL 2016

www.mixdownmag.com.au

Focusrite is proudly represented in Australia by Electric Factory Pty Ltd 188 Plenty Road Preston VIC 3072 focusrite@elfa.com.au

Electric Factory Pty Ltd 188 Plenty Road Preston VIC 3072 03 9474 1000

focusrite@elfa.com.au

www.elfa.com.au