MIX 568 - April 2024

MUSIC

12 Score Mixer Laurence Anslow: The LondonL.A. Connection

16 Classic Tracks: ‘Free Man in Paris,’ Joni Mitchell

BY ROBYN FLANS

TECHNOLOGY

34 New Products: Studio and Live

36 Review: LD Systems MON 10 A G3 Wedge

LA CERRA

38 Review: Newfangled Audio Recirculate Plug-in

40 Review: Brainworx bx_enhancer Plug-in BY

41 Review: Audeze Filter Speakerphone

LIVE SOUND

18 Mixing Mitski’s Ever-Expanding Tour

20 FCC Enacts WMAS Rules for Spectrally Efficient RF Mics

20 News & Notes: Mixing Stranger Things Onstage; Seminary Updates Audio with A&H

32

Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

PHOTO:

PHOTO:

Vol. 48 Number 4 April 2024 mixonline.com

FOLLOW US

twitter.com/Mix_Magazine facebook/MixMagazine instagram/mixonlineig

CONTENT

Content Directors Tom Kenny, thomas.kenny@futurenet.com

Clive Young, clive.young@futurenet.com

Senior Content Producer Steve Harvey, sharvey.prosound@gmail.com

Technology Editor, Studio Mike Levine, techeditormike@gmail.com

Technology Editor, Live Steve La Cerra, stevelacerra@verizon.net

Contributors: Craig Anderton, Barbara Schultz, Barry Rudolph, Robyn Flans, Rob Tavaglione, Jennifer Walden, Tamara Starr

Production Manager Nicole Schilling

Design Directors Lisa McIntosh and Will Shum

ADVERTISING SALES

Managing Vice President of Sales, B2B Tech Adam Goldstein, adam.goldstein@futurenet.com, 212-378-0465

Janis Crowley, janis.crowley@futurenet.com

Debbie Rosenthal, debbie.rosenthal@futurenet.com

Zahra Majma, zahra.majma@futurenet.com

SUBSCRIBER CUSTOMER SERVICE

To subscribe, change your address, or check on your current account status, go to mixonline.com and click on About Us, email futureplc@computerfulfillment.com, call 888-266-5828, or write P.O. Box 8518, Lowell, MA 01853.

LICENSING/REPRINTS/PERMISSIONS

Mix is available for licensing.

Contact the Licensing team to discuss partnership opportunities.

Head of Print Licensing: Rachel Shaw, licensing@futurenet.com

MANAGEMENT

SVP, MD, B2B Amanda Darman-Allen

VP, Global Head of Content, B2B Carmel King

MD, Content, AV Anthony Savona

VP, Global Head of Sales, B2B John Sellazzo

Managing VP of Sales, B2B Tech Adam Goldstein

VP, Global Head of Strategy & Ops, B2B Allison Markert, VP, Product & Marketing, B2B Scott Lowe

Head of Production US & UK Mark Constance

Head of Design, B2B Nicole Cobban

FUTURE US, INC. Future

Current From the Editor You Gotta Push Some Air

I went to see Dune: Part Two last Sunday afternoon, and I had a blast. Like most of the movie-going public, I saw the first Dune at home on HBO Max (now just Max) because it opened in the middle of the pandemic and WB had made the decision to release new films simultaneously to theaters and streamers. I have a decent TV with a better-than-most soundbar, and I loved the movie! But I knew something was missing.

So for Part Two, my buddy Jason and I headed down to the Dolby Cinema at AMC BayStreet in Emeryville, Calif., Theater 9. We wanted the big screen, with Vision and Atmos, comfy recliners and wide aisles. I even brought in a pint to go with my popcorn. We were like a couple of teenage boys, and we wanted SPL! Size and scale! The desert is big, and we wanted big! If you’re going to watch someone ride a sandworm, well, it should be a big sandworm!

It was awesome. The three hours didn’t feel like three hours. At home, I might have paused at some point and taken a call. I might have stepped out to feed the dog or order dinner. But not here. Not when I’m completely immersed, sound and image, in a dark room with a bunch of other people. You don’t hit pause when the worm is two minutes away and you can see the swirling cloud of sand approaching.

I’d nearly forgotten what it was like to feel huge low end thump you in the chest. I’m guessing that there were supplemental vibrators in the floor or seat, but maybe not. When the Harkonnen attack the Fremen sietch, or the spice harvester hits the surface, or the thumpers start calling for the sandworms, you feel it. When the Bene Gesserit voices start swirling around the room, with multiple echoes and delays, you become lost in your own head, within the cavernous hallways.

Then there’s the constantly shifting surfaces, with our heroes sandwalking/dancing across the desert. Howling winds and intimate dialog. Hans Zimmer’s rhythmic and pulsing, sometimes voluptuous, score. Headroom and dynamics. The total frequency range. The balance in the overall track and the movement of sound through space. The ability to hear as close as you can get to what the director and sound team intended. I could go on and on. The point is: I just can’t get that at home.

The music industry has no equivalent to the Dolby Cinema for playback. We now have Atmos and 360RA and Spatial, but rather than the playback target being a cinema, home theater or soundbar, the audience is primarily listening on headphones or in the background, rarely sitting down in a sweet spot of jockeying for the best seat. But it can happen.

At the recent Mix LA: Immersive Music Production event, we had a series called “Breaking It Down,” where we played back an Atmos track in the 13.1.10 L-Acoustics performance stage at UMG’s 21Fifteen Studios,

followed by a discussion between UMG director of engineering Nick Rives and the mix engineer on the track. There were 80 seats for the audience and standing-room-only to the sides, so not everyone had a perfect “Atmos seat,” of course, but they all got a taste.

Bob Clearmountain talked about Roxy Music’s “Avalon” first, and I quickly realized by reading the crowd that when the discussion was over, they’d want to hear more, so I asked DJ Meadows at front of house to play it again at the end. Same for David Rideau on Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue and Ryan Ulyate’s “Dreamland,” from this year’s Grammy-nominated (Best Immersive Audio Album) Act 3. Everyone in the audience was rapt, swept up in the music.

Ulyate, who wrote, produced, sang and played on his independently produced record with Atmos in mind, told an interesting story of how, just for kicks, he held a record release party for family and friends at the Vine Theater in Hollywood, renting out an Atmos room for the night. About 60 people showed up and listened to 50 minutes of music—in the dark, no screen. The audience was completely engaged, he said, and came away from it raving about what a great experience it was to sit down and listen to music how the artist intended it to be heard.

That is a unique event, obviously; most consumers will experience music through headphones or soundbars. We know that, and they’re getting better, but from the creative side, speakers and rooms and space still matter. For balance decisions, panning moves, delays and reverb, compression and effects—and just for the feel of the song—every engineer at the event agreed: At some point in your Atmos music production process, you must listen to speakers. That’s not to say that headphones and binaural and stereo folddowns can’t play a crucial role at all phases, to fine-tune edits and QC deliverables. It’s just to say that speakers still rule.

After I got home from Dune: Part Two, while still basking in the overall experience, I recalled a conversation I had a few years ago with Andy Nelson, Oscar-winning re-recording mixer and an SVP at Fox Studio Lot Post Production, while he was working on Batman on the Hawks Stage at Fox. We were chatting about the new wave of versatile, mid-sized, Atmos mix rooms springing up all over Hollywood. He loves them, he said, and they are a perfect fit for the new style of production that had to meet the needs of both theatrical and home delivery. Then he paused and said, “But when it comes to the big movies, you still gotta push some air.”

Tom Kenny, Co-Editor

Current // news & notes

Mix LA: Immersive Music Production Is a Hit!

The event, filled with brilliant insights and innovative mixes, drew a sold-out crowd to UMG’s 21Fifteen Studios.

Photos by Dajuana Jones

More than 250 audio engineers, producers, musicians and executives braved the early morning rains on Saturday, March 2, and walked through the doors of Host Partner Universal Music Group’s 21Fifteen Studios in Santa Monica for the first annual Mix L.A.: Immersive Music Production.

Inside, attendees were treated to an opening Keynote Conversation titled “Immersive Music: The Artist and the Engineer,” with legendary producer/artist Jimmy Jam and 19-time Grammywinning engineer Manny Marroquin, held in the studio’s stunning 13.1.10 Dolby Atmos Live performance stage.

A series of expert panels and one-on-one discussions followed throughout the day, along with programming and technology demonstrations from sponsors set up throughout the multi-studio facility.

Studio Sponsors included PMC, Avid and RSPE playing back Atmos sessions in The Mailroom, featuring an Avid S6 console and a PMC 11.1.6 monitor system, with the mix engineer at the board; SSL and Kali Audio in Studio 1, with a System T 500 console positioned inside a 7.1.4

monitor system; and Sony in Studio 4, measuring more than 50 engineers’ ears with the company’s Virtual Mix Environment technology, while also showcasing the open-back MV1 headphones, designed for immersive playback

Other sponsors included API in the Studio 1 control room; Neumann/Sennheiser showing headphones and binaural playback; DPA Microphones with a “mic tree” for tracking with immersive in mind; NTP Technology showing DAD; Voyage Audio demoing its 8-capsule Dante mic, alongside Aspire Sound; ASG displaying its

projects and services; and Alcons Audio taking over the Studio 1 Lounge to play music through its new M3 studio speakers.

Following the full day of events, attendees re-gathered a half-mile down Colorado Avenue at Host Partner Apogee Studio for an afterparty, where they were treated to David Williams on piano from the live performance stage, as well as curated Atmos playback listening sessions in three different immersive environments.

Mix Nashville: Immersive Music Production II will take place on May 11, 2024. ■

The event kicked off with a Keynote Conversation between Jimmy Jam and Manny Marroquin.

The first Mix Panel of the day was titled “Creative Intent: The Stereo and Immersive Mixes,” featuring, from left: Moderator Tom Kenny, with engineer/producers Dennis “ROC.am” Jones, Dave Way, Steve Genewick and Eric Schilling.

Sony showed its VME (Virtual Mixing Environment) technology in the PMC 7.1.4 Studio 4, where it tested and captured more than 50 sets of attendee ears for individualized room simulation and immersive mixing in headphones.

The Mix Panel on “Monitoring the Mix: Speakers and Headphones” included, from left: Moderator Clive Young (co-editor of Mix), mastering/mix engineer J Clark, film and TV music mixer Eva Reistad, engineer/ mixer Adam Loeffler, and engineer/mixer Alex Solano.

Moderator Nick Rives, UMG Director of Engineering, at left, with producer/engineer David Rideau.

The Mailroom Sessions, sponsored by PMC, Avid and RSPE, were packed all day as engineers detailed their Atmos mixes in the 11.1.6 PMC monitoring environment, with a custom Avid S6 console.

Legendary mixer Bob Clearmountain (upper right corner) hosted and played back stellar Dolby Atmos mixes in Apogee Studio’s Control Room during the Apogee Afterparty.

SSL set up its System T 500 console in the Studio 1 live room, with a Kali Audio 7.1.4 monitor system on stands and tuned the night before.

Music Score Mixer Laurence Anslow

Perspectives From the Stage, London to Los Angeles

By Steve Harvey

Laurence Anslow came up in the business the old-fashioned way, which is to say, through hard work, long hours and perseverance. After graduating from the University of Surrey’s prestigious Tonmeister program, he spent a decade working his way through the ranks at AIR Studios in London, frequently on scoring sessions.

It was on one of those sessions, for 2020’s Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Story, that he met Harvey Mason, Jr., the film’s executive music producer. They hit it off, and before he knew it, Anslow was jetting off to Los Angeles, midpandemic, to help Mason prepare his Evergreen Studios to handle large orchestral and bigband recordings when it opened for business, scheduled for late 2021.

Evergreen is now Anslow’s home base, but he has the freedom to work with his own film and TV composer clients at other Hollywood scoring stages. His most high-powered project since relocating, he says, was recording the score for Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire with composer Dario Marianelli, who usually works with AIR’s Nick Wollage.

“I never thought I’d get to record with Dario; he’s a legend,” Anslow says. “Nick was kind of a mentor to me. I recorded the score at the legendary Streisand Scoring Stage on the Sony lot, then sent it back to Nick to mix it, so that was a lovely collaboration.”

His biggest ensemble to date was with composer Lorne Balfe on Black Adam, also at the Sony scoring stage, with 107 musicians. Recent projects with Mason at Evergreen have included songs for the French animated musical Miraculous: Ladybug & Cat Noir, The Movie Last year, Anslow recorded and mixed Marcus Miller’s score for Candy Cane Lane at Sony and

the Village, which he says was one of those happy accidents you sometimes run across: “As a bassist, Marcus was one of my heroes when I was growing up.”

ROOTS IN LONDON

Back in England, Anslow worked on sessions with some of the biggest names in film music, though not as the mixer, he hastens to add. “I’ve not done any recording directly for Hans Zimmer, but I was the Pro Tools recordist on a lot of his scores, like Dunkirk and Boss Baby. No Time to Die was the last thing I did with him.

On one of my first sessions, when I was 24 years old, they moved me to the Pro Tools chair on Interstellar. I was doing the percussion overdubs in AIR’s Studio 1—and Hans Zimmer, [director] Christopher Nolan and [scoring mixer] Alan Meyerson walked in. It was really high-pressure, but I got through it.”

Anslow joined AIR Studios in 2011 after four years in Surrey’s Tonmeister program. “I should talk about that course more often. We take it for granted in the U.K., but it really is extremely high-powered,” he says, noting that the course accepts only 25 students each year and places

PHOTO: Courtesy of Laurence Anslow.

Engineer Laurence Anslow at the console in Evergreen Studios, Burbank, Calif.

an emphasis on mathematics and physics as much as music. “For the first year, I was only allowed to assist in the studio. The first week was an introduction to the decibel and all the mathematics behind it. It gives you that foundation; I think it’s the best in the world.”

Interestingly, of his entire class, there are only three or so people still actively recording. Everyone else is still in the industry, working with equipment manufacturers and broadcast organizations: “Just not messing around in studios!” he chuckles.

LONDON TO LOS ANGELES

Working on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean has given Anslow some perspective on the differences between U.S. and U.K. scoring sessions. That’s not to suggest the audio gear or production techniques are that different; far from it. But behind the scenes, he says, there are observable differences where staffing and workflows are concerned.

“In the U.K., it’s still very much an oldschool, teaboy progression,” he says, using the traditional British job title for someone just starting out at a studio. “[At AIR], I started out as a runner for two or three years, then I started assisting on sessions, then I was a Pro Tools recordist. After about 10 years, one of the engineers turned around and said, ‘You’re going to record this, and I’m going to go upstairs and mix it.’ So after 10 years, I got thrown in the chair. I’d done every job. I’d done board setups; I had to learn Pro Tools on huge, high-pressure sessions—but it was all a stepping-stone to get to that mix position.”

Working on the big Hollywood scoring stages at Fox, Sony and Warner Bros. after relocating, he soon noticed that things were a little different. Rather than advancing from one role to the next, individuals typically stayed in one job for years, developing tremendous expertise as a result. “In the States, everybody seems to have their role on the stage,” he says. “Nobody’s chomping at the bit to get in the mix position, but they’re just as important as the engineer—and that’s the nice part about it.

“For example, when I first did a session at Warner Bros., the two guys assisting me were in their 50s and 60s,” he notes, “and here I was, this 32-year-old, fresh off the boat. It felt strange because in the U.K., you’re used to having 22-year-olds and a 27-year-olds under your command.” In contrast, recording studios

in the U.S. typically offer an upward career path from starting as a runner, but on the film scoring stage, he says, every engineer on the stage is a seasoned IATSE veteran with a dedicated role.

BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

When he first started in the U.K., Anslow recalls, “I was working under Chris Barrett [AIR’s senior recordist]. There would be just the two of us on a session. We would set up the floor, then Chris would disappear off to the control room and I’d finish up the floor. We’d scratch all of the mics and he’d build the Pro Tools sessions while I rigged the headphones. [In Hollywood] in the control room, your recordist will take care of the console, your preamps, the patching, and the Pro Tools operator is in a separate department.”

There are also differences in the workflows on the scoring stage, he discovered. “In the U.K., the engineer does all the headphones; in the U.S., there’s a separate monitor mixer. I really like the U.S. way because it takes that responsibility away from the engineer, so you can concentrate—and it stops you from having to use that awful cue section on most consoles,” he laughs.

Mixing monitors from the recording console necessitates using panpots, which can be far

from precise, he explains. Using a dedicated monitor console, “You can do it on faders. It’s way easier to balance, far more responsive, plus you can concentrate on riding the click. It also opens communications between the musicians and the engineer on the floor. It’s easier for the musicians to just wave at the monitor engineer” to get levels adjusted.

“The other thing about the U.S. is that you’ll see stage crew working at their home stage, but they also take work at other union stages in town. In the U.K., the mixer tends to be freelance, but everybody else tends to be employed by the studio, including the Pro Tools operator,” with a couple of exceptions, he says. “Here, there will be a set of Pro Tools operators or a set of monitor engineers that work on all the stages, so it’s more like a freelance group.”

There are pros and cons to the staffing methods on both sides of the Pond, Anslow says. “In the U.K., the training and mentoring approach forces you to do every job in the studio and on both sides of the glass. In the U.S., there isn’t as rigid a training and mentoring approach, so engineers tend to be more specialized and less general. I’ve been fortunate to experience both.” n

PHOTO: Courtesy of Laurence Anslow.

Laurence Anslow setting up mics for an orchestral session at Evergreen Studios in Burbank, Calif.

Classic Tracks

‘Free Man in Paris’

1974 found Joni Mitchell in complete control of her music and sound

By Robyn Flans

Ellis Sorkin had never intended on becoming an audio engineer, but luckily his father, who wrote the insurance for A&M Studios, envisioned it. He had taken his 14-yearold son on a tour of the studios and witnessed the impression that an Andy Williams/Claudine Longet recording session made on his son. Unbeknownst to the teenager, his father placed him on the long waiting list for the studio’s apprenticeship program.

Four years later, in 1973, a then 18-year-old Sorkin picked up a call from Larry Levine, chief engineer at A&M, asking if he would like to come in for an interview. Sorkin, who had just graduated high school, asked, “For what?”

He was hired and rose fast, from cleaning up and wrapping cables to assisting on demos within two months. He learned the studio equipment—HAECO consoles in all the rooms at the time—and he quickly became an in-demand assistant to such A&M greats as Hank Cicalo, Dick Bogert and Ray Gerhardt, along with independents such as Al Schmitt, Phil Ramone and Bill Schnee. Cicalo, he says, was the most technical of them all, and when engineer Henty Lewy became aware of how well Sorkin worked with him on sessions, he wanted Sorkin’s assistance as well.

THAT JONI VOCAL...

The next thing Sorkin knew, he was sitting beside Lewy, assisting the engineer midway into Joni Mitchell’s legendary album Court and Spark, working on the hit “Free Man in Paris.”

Mitchell was a night owl. Sessions were called for 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. and she might show up then, but according to Sorkin, she mostly arrived around 9:00 or 10:00, and once in a while, 11:00. And Mitchell was a chain smoker.

“When one was going out, another was being lit by that one,” Sorkin recalls. “I don’t remember anybody I worked with who smoked as much as she did. My clothes, my hair, everything reeked!”

Mitchell rarely sang with the band (unlike Joan Baez, whose Diamonds and Rust Sorkin engineered and says was tracked entirely live). “Once in a while, Joni sang a scratch vocal with the band, but not all the time by any means,” Sorkin says, adding that she would have used a Neumann U 87 mic at that time, but later switched to a Shure SM 7 because she wanted to be in the control room for some vocals. “She never would have done a live vocal completely that would have been a keeper. Never. Every vocal was almost to the degree of Karen Carpenter—maybe even more— where everything was surgically looked at. I remember punching in breaths with Karen, where I don’t remember that so much with Joni, but it was takes or parts of takes that would get comped together.”

The utter clarity of the vocal on “Free Man in Paris” is astounding. Aside from Mitchell’s own Godgiven gift, Sorkin attributes some of it to the Scully 16-track, 2-inch tape machines, saying, “Those machines were just wonderful. Nothing sounded like that.”

...AND THE AMAZING MUSICIANS

Mitchell was not as meticulous about her guitar playing as she was about her vocals, Sorkin notes, so sometimes she would play live with the other

Joni Mitchell performs at the Community Center in Berkeley, California on March 1, 1974.

Photo by Larry Hulst/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

Live

PRESENTED BY

Mixing Mitski’s Ever-Expanding Tour

By Clive Young

Amelodic, multi-genre presence on the indie rock scene for more than a decade, singer/songwriter Mitski is on the road touring behind 2023’s The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We album—and it’s a journey that has become as unconventional as her music. Originally envisioned as a simple string of 19 large-theater dates in 12 cities, the jaunt has nearly doubled in size, expanding to 36 concerts after performances kept selling out.

“Whenever they announce shows, tickets go pretty quickly and they add more, which turns it from a tour into a series of residencies,” said FOH engineer Patrick Scott. Case in point: He

was speaking before the sixth of seven New York City shows in eight days, with four at Manhattan’s Beacon Theatre and another three at Brooklyn’s Kings Theatre.

“It’s helpful being in the same space for a while,” added monitor engineer Ashoka Kanungo. “We get to really nail it. I think the biggest challenge initially was load-ins and loadouts, just getting into that rhythm of what needs to happen, because you camp out for a few days and you forget, but we got it down quickly.”

While venues on the tour range from 2,500to 6,000-plus seats, each concert finds the artist pulling the audience in close, drawing it into the drama of the music—a vibe created through

radical new song arrangements that are then bolstered by Scott’s work at front-of-house.

“Mitski wanted to do more of a theatrical, seated, intimate show,” said Scott. “One of the big draws is that everyone connects with the lyrics, and with Mitski’s voice and personality. A big part of it for me, then, is to make it feel like she’s speaking to them, and that affects the way I mix—for instance, how I treat compression and EQ. I keep the vocal front and center, but also let the band show off because they’re all incredibly talented players. As a unit, there’s something pretty special about what they’re doing.

“A lot of the older songs have been rearranged to fit into the instrumentation of the last

PHOTO: Kimberly Craven/Craven & Co.

Mitski, seen here at Kings Theatre in Brooklyn, NY, belts nightly into a Shure Axient Wireless mic with an Austrian Audio OD505 capsule.

record,” he explained. “Where there might have been a lot more synthesizers or drum machines before, now there’s auxiliary percussion, B3 organ, fiddle, acoustic guitars, instruments like that. The aesthetic that’s happening is definitely a more timeless feeling—a lot warmer, more analog, more acoustic. I want to convey that feel, but in a way where the people who are coming to the show can still connect with the songs that they know.”

The audio team’s tools for making that connection—all provided by Nashville-based Worley Sound—center around DiGiCo Quantum 225 consoles at both FOH and monitor mix positions, adjoined by SD racks with 32-bit cards. Both engineers opt for onboard effects or outboard rack gear. “I tend to not do too much with plug-ins,” said Kanungo. “I think it adds in a lot of latency, especially for in-ears.”

Likewise, both engineers use Rupert Neve Designs 5045 Primary Source Enhancers on Mitski’s vocal, with Scott additionally running the result through an Empirical Labs Distressor. Also in the racks at FOH is a Handsome Audio Zulu passive analog tape simulator, used on all acoustic guitars. “It’s a bit more of a studio piece,” Scott admitted. “One of the benefits of having a musical director on the tour who also produces most of Mitski’s records, is that he’s a bit of a studio nerd, so we get into the nitty gritty on that stuff and some studio pieces find their way into the live setup. The Zulu is pretty magical—I really like what it does for my DI’d acoustic guitars; it takes a bit of the edge off of them and warms them up.”

A band bus feeds into an Empirical Labs Fatso to gently congeal things together, and similarly, the master bus leads into a Rupert Neve Designs Master Buss Processor, he said: “It connects the band bus with where the vocal is sitting and makes it all feel like it’s happening in the same space.”

The musicians performing in that same space onstage hear Kanungo’s monitor mixes via Shure PSM 1000 wireless packs and a variety of JH Audio in-ear monitors, with everyone on JH16s except Mitski and the musical director who opted for Roxannes.

“There’s eight people, so there’s always going to be a couple of interesting mixes,” she said. “Some people just want to hear what they’re playing or whatever they’re cueing off of, but then others want a totally balanced mix where they can hear everything. It’s great

being on the Quantum 225, because I’m able to EQ things differently, compress things differently for people, and that’s been such a game changer.”

Also at the monitor mix position is a Shure AXT600 Axient Spectrum Manager and two channels of Axient wireless mics for Mitski, each outfitted with an Austrian Audio OD505 WL1 mic capsule. “Tom Worley put us on to the OD505 for Mitski’s vocal, which neither of us had ever used,” said Kanungo. “We decided to try it because he said the rejection was great; we did a shoot-out in rehearsals, and it’s true. The rejection is amazing while also still being

smooth as can be.”

Many of the microphones in use are owned by the bandmembers themselves, so there’s rarely seen choices like Josephson e22 side-address cardioid condensers used on the snare top and the pedal steel. Radial JDI boxes are dotted around the stage, while acoustic instruments go through a mixture of Radial PZ-Pre and PZPro preamp/DIs. The bass DI setup, however, is slightly unorthodox, with a Black Tape Wiretap unit placed between the amplifier and DI to provide the amp sound as well as the sound of the instrument itself.

Elsewhere, the electric guitar and pedal steel amps are in ISO cabinets, and a Leslie speaker is kept on the sidelines, so between them, the DIs and the in-ears, it’s a relatively quiet stage—which is crucial for conveying Mitski’s vocals. “Mitski is a really dynamic singer,” said Scott. “She can go from whisper-quiet to full-diaphragm singing in the same song, so keeping the whisper-quiet parts clear and above everything while there’s drums getting leaned into three feet away from her is probably one of the bigger challenges. A lot of it is about finding the space for everything so that the detail is there. Every instrument has a different role in every song, so it’s a matter of listening and considering where to put them in the mix, so that it all supports what Mitski is doing with her voice.”

While the current tour leg and a spring European run have the singer and her band working their intimate magic in large theaters, another U.S. leg starting in late summer will add amphitheaters into the mix, culminating with a show at the 17,500-seat Hollywood Bowl. The land may be inhospitable, but they’ll be covering a lot of it this year. ■

PHOTO: Kimberly Craven/Craven & Co.

PHOTO: Kimberly Craven/Craven & Co.

Patrick Scott’s FOH position centers around a DiGiCo Quantum 225 console.

Monitor engineer Ashoka Kanungo provides in-ear mixes at stageside.

Live // news & notes // presented by

FCC Enacts WMAS Rules for Spectrally Efficient RF Mics, IEMs

By Clive Young

Washington, D.C.—In a move that will affect thousands of wireless microphone users across the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission has enacted new rules allowing for the use of Wireless Multi-Channel Audio Systems (WMAS). The protocol, which the FCC defined as “a new, more spectrally efficient wireless microphone technology,” uses spectrum more efficiently than existing narrowband RF mics, allowing more wireless mics to be used at the same level of performance without having to change current frequency allocations.

Crucially, the new rules permit licensed and unlicensed WMAS mics to operate in the broadcast TV bands and 600 MHz duplex gap, while use in other Part 74 LPAS frequency bands will be permitted on a licensed basis. Since there are far more unlicensed users than licensed ones, making WMAS use available to unlicensed users is expected to result in less spectrum being used overall, since the protocol is more efficient, resulting in less Power Spectral Density.

WMAS uses a single RF carrier, which means in-ear monitors will be

able to use the same block of spectrum as wireless mics due to that spectral efficiency—a factor that will likely result in single-pack RF units that can simultaneously be both a wireless mic transmitter and IEM receiver.

For international productions—such as world tours, news gathering services and other efforts where wireless mics would be used here and abroad—the FCC decision is also good news, as it lines up with similar WMAS updates from the European Telecommunications Standards Institute.

The move also allows the FCC to avoid spectrum reallocation—a thorny process it’s had to slog through multiple times in the last 15 years. Existing spectrum rights and spectrum access expectations remain unchanged. The FCC’s announcement acknowledged the varied applications of wireless microphones, noting their daily use in settings such as theaters and music venues, TV and film studios, educational institutions, conventions, corporate events, houses of worship and more. ■

Mixing ‘Stranger Things’ Onstage

London, UK—The world may be patiently waiting for the final season of Stranger Things on Netflix, but those who can’t get enough of the upsidedown may want to head not to Hawkins, Indiana, but instead to London’s West End. A theatrical prequel, Stranger Things: The First Shadow, set in 1959, has been both scaring and enthralling audiences inside the Phoenix Theatre, thanks in part to a sound design by Paul Arditti with associate sound designers Rob Bettle (handling the system design) and Christopher Reid (developing the audio content).

“We knew from the outset that we needed to give the show the visceral power of the Netflix series,” Arditti explains. “We wanted to deliver incredible illusions, horror and stage magic, backed up with a wall-to-wall sound and music score.”

In addition to using sounds from vintage electrical and electronic sources, Arditti and composer DJ Walde also employed ring modulators, tape echoes, oscillators and theremins to craft space-age effects. Many of those elements come into play in “the Black Void,” he noted: “It’s our version of the silent, watery, black emptiness Eleven goes to when, either forcibly or voluntarily, she undergoes sensory deprivation. For me, the utter silence of this dimension is key to its weird power, but utter silence is neither exciting nor achievable in

a theater, so we had to find ways of implying that silence through the use of low-frequency soundscape beds, moving water sounds and curious echoes.”

Providing audio for the production is Stage Sound Services, which has in turn employed a sizable Meyer Sound system to surround the audience. The team provided specifications for Meyer Sound’s low-profile Ultra-X20, Ultra-X40, Ultra-X42, and UP-4slim loudspeakers. Arditti shared, “The UltraXs sound like giants but look like near fills. They are super-flexible—we use them in single point-source portrait orientation on the proscenium and also in landscape orientation in splays of two and three speakers above the pros.”

Meanwhile, UP-4slim ultracompact installation loudspeakers are used for delays, front fills, and side fills. “They complement the Ultra-Xs perfectly, with that same crisp voicing and wide dispersion. They are also capable of very high SPLs without any apparent effort,” said Arditti.

Stage Sound Services also provided the production with the first 2100-LFCs in the West End—a turn of events that met the audio team’s approval. “The 2100s are mind-blowing,” said Bettle. “I have never heard a sub that is so precise at delivering the sub-50Hz range. They offer unbelievable power and speed in a relatively small format.” ■

In the theatrical 1950s prequel, Stranger Things: The First Shadow, vintage sound effects are heard via a Meyer Sound-based audio system.

Seminary Updates Audio With A&H

New York, NY—When you think of houses of worship that offer services with modern music, a traditional chapel built in 1886 probably isn’t the style that first comes to mind. It is, however, exactly what the Chapel of the General Theological Seminary in Manhattan is, and the worship facility recently upgraded its audio with the help of Philadelphia-based Legend Sound Systems, which put together an audio system based around an Allen & Heath AHM-64 system.

The chapel offers simple daily services that need only basic audio that can be handled by volunteer engineers, but holds modern services with a full band on weekends, requiring a trained audio pro. Looking to accommodate both experience levels, Bill Lyle, President of Legend Sound, ultimately spec’d the AHM platform for its combination of audio processing, multi-zone routing and, importantly, variety of simplified control options.

“Using an AHM-64 processor with a Dante module to feed directly to the amps, we had our traditional services covered,” said Lyle. For the modern weekend services, Lyle’s team added a fully-featured 48-channel SQ-5 mixing console, which connected to the same Dante network using its own Dante module. An Allen & Heath AR2412 stagebox feeds inputs to both the AHM and SQ.

Lyle used Allen & Heath’s Custom Control editor to create a custom mobile application to control the various microphones during daily services. “The app interface only shows seven faders,” explained Lyle. “We also set it up so that each fader is limited to prevent the mics from being set too loud and creating feedback problems. It really worked out well.”

The AHM is set so that each Zone output feeds a different speaker, which allows for precise tuning in a difficult acoustic environment. “The

walls are stone and the ceilings are 40 feet high,” explained Lyle. “There was a lot of careful tailoring required to get the sound right.”

The staff at the Seminary are delighted with the installation and its interface. “We’ve been thrilled by the setup,” said Michael DeLashmutt, Senior Vice President of the Seminary. “We don’t have a professional AV team or even a single person who we can rely on for AV support from one semester to the next. The setup that [Legend Sound] provided for us, with the simplified tablet interface, gives us the sound quality that we needed, but without the complexity that would make running it unfeasible for our students, staff or volunteers.” ■

The new audio system at the Chapel of the General Theological Seminary in Manhattan includes a 48-channel Allen & Heath SQ-5 mixing console.

on the cover

THE ‘NEW’ FOX STUDIO LOT

Past becomes present as the independent facility revamps for an all-in, theatricalmeets-home, post-production future

By Steve Harvey

The Fox Studio Lot is iconic, the first complete facility built specifically for motion picture production and one of the cornerstone movie studios of the Golden Age of Hollywood. The studio’s roots go back to 1924, when co-founder William Fox purchased the land on which the lot sits. In 1935, Fox Films merged with Darryl F. Zanuck’s 20th Century Pictures to create 20th Century Fox. This is the studio that gave the world such classics as Miracle on 34th Street, The Seven Year Itch and The Sound of Music. The facility subsequently became a television powerhouse as well, spawning The Simpsons and hosting productions for some of the most-watched shows in primetime, including M*A*S*H and 9-1-1

In 2019, Fox Corporation sold 20th Century Fox along with other film and TV assets to Walt Disney Co. and retained ownership of the Fox Studio. Last year, Fox announced that it would embark on a long-term project on the Lot dubbed Fox Future, to invest in new and improved facilities, attract more production work and create more jobs.

The centerpiece of the plan is a buildout of new soundstages to meet the seemingly insatiable demand for film and TV production. Fox Future also calls for an expansion of the lot’s post production facilities and other amenities. The Barbara McLean

Stage, which opened just prior to the plan’s announcement, is pictured on this month’s cover.

Today, the entire studio lot, not just the postproduction sound department, has become a creative hub, says 24-time Oscar nominee Andy Nelson, SVP of Sound Operations and re-recording mixer with Fox Studio Lot Post Production Services. Sitting at the console in one of the lot’s main mixing stages, Nelson, who won Best Sound Oscars for Saving Private Ryan and Les Misérables, says, “When it was 20th Century Fox, there was a natural pipeline through this building, so in some ways it’s very freeing for us now to be independent. I think of it as a real campus where anyone can come and do anything associated with making a film or a TV show. We’re just one part of that, but we’re an important part, because we can provide all the sound work that anyone needs to finish their picture.”

FOUNDATION OF FOX SOUND

When Nelson arrived from Todd-AO in the late 1990s to work at Fox, the 1930s-vintage shooting stages that now house the mix rooms were being used for storage and wardrobe. At the time, the huge, old-fashioned movie theaters, both for post-production and exhibition, were fading away and being replaced by smaller cinemas. During the transition, Fox built two stages,

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for Fox

The McLean Stage on the Fox Studio Lot, featuring a semi-modular, dual-operator Avid S6 control surface and Meyer Sound Bluehorn-based Dolby Atmos monitor system.

identical but with mirror-image layouts and each with a floorplan of about 2,300 square feet. They were named in honor of film directors Howard Hawks and John Ford.

“I loved the size of these rooms,” Nelson recalls. “When I saw the graphs from the acousticians, I said, ‘These are going to be great,’ and they were. They had to put very little EQ into the rooms to make them play. We’ve had soundtracks come out of these rooms year after year and I’ve heard them all over the world—and they play really well.”

A slightly smaller room, named for director Robert Wise, was built upstairs, initially to support the two larger stages. “I always envisioned it would be for pre-mixing,” Nelson notes, “but it’s ended up being a catch-all for everything

because it’s great for final mixing as well. We had sound transfer here, and it went away when everything went digital, so we had extra space at the end of the corridor. Recently, I said, ‘This would be great for a smaller, streaming-style room.’ That’s when we conceived the McLean stage. It’s not like a living room, but it’s certainly closer to the dimensions that you’d expect.”

INSIDE THE MCLEAN STAGE

Named for film editor Barbara McLean, who was chief picture editor under Daryl F. Zanuck, the stage is appropriately sized for mixing streaming and television shows for the home environment. It includes both Dolby Atmos theatrical and home entertainment RMUs, and is also used for theatrical pre-dubbing and music mixing.

Peter Grueneisen, founder of nonzero\ architecture, oversaw the architectural design for the entire sound department refurbishment. “Working together with Peter and Dolby [on the McLean], we came up with the layout for the speakers, the acoustical treatment and isolation,” chief engineer Marc Gebauer explains. “Then we brought in Salter and Associates. They shot the Hawks, Ford and Wise Stages, which are all very popular rooms for us, and came up with some acoustic changes for us to make in the McLean,” to ensure consistency and translation between the rooms.

Gebauer also consulted with renowned Oscar-winning score mixer Shawn Murphy. The pair have known each other, and worked together, for decades.

“I said that if the budget allows, it would be great to have it be a proper music mix facility,” Murphy says. To that end, the room is set up for multiple Atmos formats, as well as 7.1

and 5.1 and the high resolutions—96 kHz and above—favored by music engineers. “Marc did a really good job of making the McLean the most flexible, adaptable and great-sounding space. I have nothing but good things to say about the tuning and the way the room sounds.”

The McLean features Meyer Bluehorn speakers behind the screen, a decision encouraged by Murphy, who has been using the monitors for several years. “I think they’re the best tool we have in our kit, totally accurate and translatable,” he comments.

The hybrid console on the Howard Hawks Stage, where sections of the 96-fader AMS Neve DFC-3D Gemini mixing consoles—with 1,000-path dual engine—can be swapped out with Avid S6 surfaces according to a mixer’s preference.

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for Fox

Andy Nelson, Oscar-winning re-recording mixer and SVP of Sound Operations at Fox Studio Lot Post Production Services.

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for Fox

The familiar entrance to the John Ford and Howard Hawks Stages on the Fox Studio Lot.

Marc Gebauer, chief engineer, Fox Studio Lot Post Production Services.

PHOTO: Dawn Rosenquist

Gebauer elaborates, “We first started evaluating them on the Newman Scoring Stage and were just amazed with the clarity. We installed the Bluehorns on the Newman in early 2020, and they just seemed to take a layer away between what’s on the stage and what you hear in the control room.” All four stages feature Meyer Sound HMS cinema surround speakers on the ceilings and walls.

Gebauer’s team installed a BSS system to manage the surround and height speakers via Dante in the McLean. They also integrated an Avid MTRX supporting 800-plus I/O to act as the central router and interface to the master recorder. The stage sports two playback and two record Pro Tools HDX rigs.

The stage came online during the mixing of West Side Story, Murphy reports. “We did all the finals there, and all the Indiana Jones mixes, as well. I’ve probably done a dozen projects in there, both for film and for audio-only Atmos.”

AVID? NEVE? BOTH?

In the three larger dub stages, sections of the AMS Neve DFC-3D Gemini mixing consoles—96-fader surfaces in the Ford and Hawks, 64-faders in the Wise, all with 1,000-path dual engines—can also be swapped out with Avid S6 surfaces according to a mixer’s preference. Nelson knows which he

McLean Producer’s Lounge

“The biggest problem with a small room is not the acoustics but where do you put everybody?”

Andy Nelson says. Before Fox built the McLean Stage, a party of about 10 people from a streaming company visited. “They all walked into my room and said, ‘This is a fantastic room. But we’ll never use it; it’s too big.’”

Fox subsequently built the McLean to accommodate nearfield monitoring for home entertainment mixing. “They came back and said, ‘Oh, this is perfect—but we can’t all fit in here now!’” Nelson laughs.

To solve the problem, Fox’s engineering team put together a lounge area just outside the stage door with a large video screen, 5.1 Genelec speaker system, soundbar, intercom and some comfy seating. “The producers can sit in that lounge, watch the mix taking place and talk to the mixers; they don’t have to go into the mix room,” Nelson says. “It’s a great standalone feature that occupies a lovely corner of this building. After I finished Babylon in my room, we even did the small home theater mix in that room, and Damien Chazelle, the director, loved it.”

prefers when he’s mixing dialog and music: “I still use the traditional Neve DFC console, which has been my baby from the beginning. They are still the most magnificent consoles in the world.”

It’s unusual to see only a DFC on a Fox stage, he continues: “More and more people are using the S6s and in-the-box tools, but I’d rather stick with what I know. I’m fast on it, it’s reliable and it sounds like nothing else on Earth—why change?”

The three larger stages each include a Stagetec Nexus audio router with a 4,096 x 4,096 I/O matrix. “It wraps itself around all the players and recorders and the DFC,” Gebauer explains. The Ford and Hawks each house five playback and three record Pro Tools HDX systems; the Wise has one fewer record machine. All three stages were upgraded to 4K projection this year and can play video out of an R&S Clipster machine or via an AJA card in Pro Tools.

The Ford and Hawks Stages can handle a variety of playback formats, from Atmos to IMAX to Barco. The Wise Stage is equipped for Atmos and 7.1 surround monitoring and can be set up for 7.1.6 nearfield monitoring with JBL 7 Series speakers on stands. “We added six nearfield speakers on the ceiling, and I’ve just integrated the Avid MTRX, so now they can control the monitoring directly from the S6 master section,” Gebauer says. He plans to integrate the MTRX on the Ford and Hawks Stages next.

SCORING ADDS ATMOS

The most recent audio update on the lot took place at the Newman Scoring Stage, which has been outfitted for Dolby Atmos monitoring and playback. The room’s 96-channel AMS Neve 88RS console supports 7.1 mixing, so Gebauer is currently custom-engineering an Atmos

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for FOX

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for Fox

monitoring, metering and management interface solution. “I contacted Meyer Sound, and they gave me their protocols for controlling the Bluehorns and the surround speakers,” says Gebauer, who also programmed the BSS unit to switch the surrounds between 79 dB, 82 dB or 85 dB.

“You don’t even have to ask Marc to do this stuff; he just figures out ways to do it before you even ask,” Murphy remarks. “He’s a really clever guy.”

“When I watch an orchestra in there, that’s the heart and soul of the movie,” says Nelson of the Newman Scoring Stage. Early in his career, in London, he worked for a small production company, and during quiet periods, he would listen to music library tracks, which would conjure images in his imagination. “I fell in love with movies through the transportation effect of what music brings to a movie,” he says, “and I’ve never lost that feeling.”

Now, Nelson says, to have orchestral tracks from the Newman brought to his stage, where he can make them even more special, is a dream come true. By adding Atmos capabilities on the scoring stage, music mixers such as Murphy can now deliver their vision to the dub stage.

“When I did West Side Story, for instance, Shawn gave me Atmos music tracks,” Nelson says. “I think the beauty of what we’ve done in the Newman is to give him, or anybody, the opportunity to hear what it’s going to sound like before giving it to me, and to make adjustments accordingly.”

The Ford and Hawks Stages are each associated with suites of seven edit rooms and three change rooms, all networked. “When Baz

Marilyn Monroe ADR Stage

“I love working on a movie lot because when something doesn’t exist, you make it,” says Marc Gebauer, who served as chief engineer of the scoring stage at Todd-AO before arriving at Fox a decade ago. His first custom project at Fox was to design and build a digitally controlled ADR system into an SSL Duality 24-channel analog console, delivered with an additional, empty master section for the Marilyn Monroe Stage.

“After sitting with the ADR mixers for a while, I realized what was missing from off-the-shelf consoles was being able to manage all the cue mixes,” Gebauer says. He drew out the panel work and controls

Luhrman comes up from Australia, he moves in lock, stock and barrel,” Nelson says, and Michael Mann moved his sound and picture teams in during the mixing of Ferrari.

“When filmmakers come onto the lot, it’s a package deal,” Nelson says in summary. “There are so many things that make it an advantage for a film production to locate themselves here for post production.” n

to confirm the ergonomics after talking with the mixers about what features they needed. “My philosophy is that the equipment should be invisible to the creative process,” he stresses.

For the modular electronics, he consulted with Steve Drummond, SSL’s chief designer at the time, before building his own balanced M-DACs and FET switching: “Everything you hear through this panel is going to affect your overall sound. I didn’t want it to be the weak link, because I know how high-quality SSL is.”

Ultimately, the project took a year to complete, but it was worth the hard work: “It ended up getting a patent.”

PHOTO: Frank Micelotta for FOX

The custom Marc Gebauer–designed digitally controlled SSL Duality analog ADR console. At right: The sizable Marilyn Monroe Stage was built to handle solo and group ADR.

The control room for the Newman Scoring Stage was recently updated with a Meyer Sound Bluehorn-based Dolby Atmos monitor system.

PHOTO: Dawn Rosenquist

Background image: Chris Alack/Future PLC and Pattadis Walarput/Getty Images

Sandworms, epic battles and big low end dance alongside intimate dialog, shifting winds and voices from inside the head.

By Jennifer Walden

Amid a global pandemic, re-recording mixers Ron Bartlett and Doug Hemphill sat at the mixing console on Stage 9 at Warner Bros. Post Production Creative Services in Burbank, Calif., without their director. Denis Villeneuve was at home, trying to monitor the mix of Dune over headphones. “At some point, he said, ‘Gentlemen. I’m just going to have to trust you.’ That was tough, but we had his back,” Bartlett recalls. The trust was well placed; Dune won the Oscar for Best Sound in 2022.

PHOTO: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

Although Covid-19 restrictions are no longer an issue, to say that mixing Dune: Part Two was easier would be selling Bartlett and Hemphill’s efforts short. Mixing hundreds of tracks so many, in fact, that the Avid S6 consoles on Stage 9 needed to be supplemented with an Avid S3 for the end battle sequence required diligence, humility and espresso. Lots of espresso. “The espresso machine is the piece of equipment that Denis loves best about Stage 9,” jokes Hemphill.

How does a mix team replicate the sonic success of a franchise’s previous film? By sticking to what worked before. For them, that meant being creative without being insecure, knowing that not all

Finding the right path forward sometimes required making risky moves like taking out all sound and music so a line of dialog could play unimpeded. The arena fight culminates with Feyd’s line, “You fought well today Atreides.” But the line was lost in a wash of enthusiastic Harkonnen crowds and composer Hans Zimmer’s dense score.

“We were trying to figure out what to do,” says Hemphill. “Finally, somebody just came up with the idea to take absolutely everything out when he says the line. It worked creatively, but it was also by necessity. We made this creative decision because the line was very hard to hear. Now it works like gangbusters ”

RIDING A SANDWORM

Big risk can mean big rewards, but the bigger the scene, the bigger the risk of losing important storytelling sounds if tracks are simply muted. Paul Atreides’ first attempt at riding a sandworm is one such epic scene that has it all: densely layered sound effects and massive score. Bartlett, who mixed dialogue and music, notes, “When you throw everything and the kitchen sink in there, it becomes a big mess. The sound effects play the epic size of this worm and how difficult it is for Paul to jump on and ride it. The big music lands when he stands up, but it didn’t work together all the way, so we had to do dramatic mix moves in that sequence to make it play properly.

“It took a few tries,” he adds. “First, we tried lowering sounds to make room for the music entrance, but we went too far. The worm disappeared; the power disappeared. Then we

tried just having the wind, but it still lacked the power. It takes a lot of experimenting, sculpting and throwing ideas around to find what’s right. One idea can lead to another, and you ultimately find the right combination.”

On the effects side, Hemphill tried using a low-pass filter to take out high-end frequencies on the second wave of sand that engulfs Paul. “At that point, you’re ready for a sonic change, and it is here that Paul starts to subdue the worm and the music enters,” he explains. “Once we sculpted the moment that way taking off the high-end it was just a question of finding the degree to which we did it, then making a bridge to the music cue.”

The low-pass filter allowed the energy of the wind to be present, he adds, yet make room for the first synth note of the music coming in: “It transformed the sequence from being about the worm to being about Paul, who’s mastered riding it.”

Bartlett and Hemphill strove for dynamics in the mix, creating the contrast of quiet moments with powerful sonic events. For example, the lead-up scene to Paul’s sandworm ride is intimate and personal. The thumper (a device that summons the sandworms) has stopped, and it’s just the soft sound of Paul’s feet in the sand and the sound of his breathing as he anticipates its arrival.

“Doug [Hemphill] did a cool thing there,” Bartlett says “You see the worm in the distance; it creates a cloud of dust as it punches through the sand. Everyone on the stage wanted to hear

a bigger sound for the worm at that moment, but Doug was adamant about keeping what [supervising sound editor/sound designer] Richard King had done until the worm got closer. That sets up a great contrast of how big the worm sounds when it gets to Paul. If you played it loud when it’s distant, it takes away from that impact ”

Powerful sonic events don’t have to be painful ones, Bartlett adds, noting that it’s helpful to use the Dolby Atmos surround field to spread out some of the acoustic intensity of a big sequence like a squadron of ornithopters flying toward a fight with the Fremen as well as being conscious of brittle and painful high-end frequencies. “We will EQ those back and go for

the low end to create size. We want it to feel huge; that’s the goal. The big battle near the end is one of those moments where we found a balance of size versus sound pressure levels ”

Hemphill worked with King to craft different low-end-heavy booms. “We’d even tune the boom,” he notes “Sometimes we’d ride the boom frequency in the middle of a low-end event so it would change color.”

USING THE FULL ATMOS FIELD

While big action scenes may seem like the best opportunities for showcasing the Atmos format, Bartlett feels the quieter moments, with just ambience and a few specific sounds, work better for conveying space and depth. Hemphill

pressure level increases, imaging decreases. If you were to play something in Atmos that was really big, it would essentially just sound mono. As you get into these quieter sound levels, you can hear the imagery better.”

Atmos is especially useful in subjective moments when non-diegetic sounds can be moved around in space to create an intended feeling or emotion for a scene. For example, Feyd finds Lady Margot Fenring roaming an off-limits hallway of the palace, and when he confronts her, she casts her Bene Gesserit spell on him. Her voice feels as if it’s coming from everywhere and nowhere; it plays inside Feyd’s mind. Bartlett says, “I wanted to achieve that slowly, and not do it noticeably. Like a lobster in a pot of water, he’s slowly getting cooked.”

For Lady Margot’s vocal processing, Bartlett used The Cargo Cult’s Slapper for tight delays and added a bit of chorus effect so that her voice feels heady, yet close and intimate at times. Spatial panning in Atmos helped to detach the sound from the character, specifically during wide shots. And when they wanted it to feel like she was right next to Feyd’s ear, telling him to put his hand in the box, Bartlett pulled her voice into the front channels and removed her vocal processing.

“In the wider shots in the hallway, while she’s doing the snake charmer thing to Feyd, I used soft, long delays and long reverb from LiquidSonics Cinematic Rooms, but it was low in the mix,” he explains “It’s not a big room

you’ll hear it two or three times, but very subtly. I played with both of those constructs in the sequence ”

During another subjective sound sequence in which Lady Jessica, mother of Paul Atreides, drinks the Water of Life, Bartlett spread the music stems from scoring mixer Alan Meyerson into the surround field, giving Hemphill room up front for the effects. Hemphill says, “From Denis’ point of view, that needed to have a certain energy arc, so we were picking our moments within the scene.”

Bartlett elaborates: “When the blue fluid is moving through Jessica’s body, that’s a moment for effects. When she opens her eyes and they are blue, we really hit that. We try to find the signposts along the way and use those to shape our sounds. If Doug has this great low-end hit from Richard, I don’t need to double-hit that with music; it’s like a hat on a hat. Instead, I’ll pull the music back and let them hit that with effects, then I’ll come in with a crazy vocal or a distorted sound afterward.”

Lady Jessica (named Reverend Mother after surviving the Water of Life) unleashes her commanding Bene Gesserit voice at times, like when she orders the temple’s Maker Keeper to “Let him try!” To beef up her performance, Bartlett used his own voice, recorded at his home studio during the premix

“We were under the wire and had so much work to do, so I hung a mic and did some crazy voice work,” Bartlett says “Sometimes Jessica’s

PHOTO: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

PHOTO: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

Pro-Q 3. Martin Kwok, our dialog supervisor, and I then added in the witchy Bene Gesserit voices that we had from actress Charlotte Rampling (who plays Reverend Mother Mohiam), tailoring the performance and processing to what the scenes required.”

Some of the most powerful scenes in the film are on the quiet side, one example being when Paul is sent into the desert to prove that he can survive. He’s alone. The desert winds sing across the sand. Chani (played by Zendaya) follows him out there and teaches him how to sand walk like a native, not as he learned from old films

“That’s a delicate, beautiful sequence that I just love,” Hemphill says. “Denis was very

low, undulating sound of the sand shifting deep underneath them. Charlie and Eric also recorded sounds for the Fremen bursting through the sand.”

SOUND AS A TEAM APPROACH

Creating the sound of Dune: Part Two was a huge team effort. While there are too many people to name here, Hemphill and Bartlett note the contributions and support from team members such as sound designer Dave Whitehead and supervising dialogue/ADR editor Martin Kwok, working from New Zealand, who helped create the entire Fremen language of Chakobsa and all of the arena scene and crowds; first assistant

do what’s called a ‘crash and burn,’ which is playing everything once through straight the first time, to get a feel for what we’ve got,” says Hemphill “God willing, it gets better from there!”

After Bartlett and Hemphill had completely worked out each scene detail by detail in the Dolby Atmos mix, there was still more work to do—namely downmixes. “There are about 20 masters of the film,” Bartlett explains “For theatrical release, we downmixed to IMAX 12.0 and 5.0, and then 5.1, 7.1, and two-track—and then we redid all of those in near-field, except IMAX, of course. The hardest thing is to crush a movie this big into near-field specs. Some of the near-field specs are insane ”

Hemphill adds, “Interestingly, Denis was very happy with the 5.1 mix. Ron and I are very proud that we got all of the Atmos bells and whistles down to the 5.1 mix and our director was still very pleased.”

Because the Covid-19 pandemic was still in full swing when Dune (2021) was released, it streamed on HBO Max on the same day it premiered in U.S. theaters. That’s not the ideal release schedule for such a cinematic sci-fi film. As Hemphill notes, Villeneuve’s goal is to get people into theaters, to have that collective experience of watching a story together. Fortunately, Dune: Part Two was released only in theaters with a streaming date yet to be set. Bartlett concludes, “We mixed for a theater experience; it’s really meant to play in the theater because it’s that epic of a film.” n

PHOTO: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

PHOTO: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

Tech new products

Adamson Systems Engineering VGt Line Array

Adamson Systems Engineering’s VGt is the company’s new flagship large-format line array, part of a comprehensive ecosystem that includes brackets, dollies, accessories and covers. The VGt loudspeaker includes eight transducers, amplification, a networked DSP endpoint and Autolock rigging, all placed into a lightweight, compact enclosure. New M140 MF compression drivers focused on mid-range and 3-inch HF compression drivers are housed within optimized sound chambers intended to produce a curved wavefront. Meanwhile, the box’s LF section is designed to achieve a “multi-mode low frequency dispersion pattern.” The result, says Adamson, is uniform 90-degree horizontal coverage across the frequency range, high SPLs and low distortion. The new line array also offers onboard class-D amplification, redundant and daisy-chainable Milan AVB, and extensive DSP.

oeksound Bloom Tone-Shaping Plug-In

oeksound’s new Bloom plug-in—the company’s first release in four years—is an adaptive tone-shaping plug-in with a straightforward interface that allows users to correct perceived tonal balances to fix and creatively sculpt a track’s sound. Bloom analyzes the character of a signal and applies corrections, letting the user shape the tone and character of a track by adding warmth, brightness or clarity, all

while retaining the material’s natural sound. The interface, while designed to resemble an EQ or multiband compressor, doesn’t actually use frequency bands or crossovers, instead making its continual adjustments based on the input signal. Rather than provide a static filter, Bloom calibrates boosts and cuts in real-time to match the actual need at that moment.

Midas HD-AIR Console

Midas’ latest addition to the Heritage-D series— the new HD-AIR console—aims to provide the same specs as the Heritage-D HD96-24 desk, but in a more portable, compact formfactor. Built in a lightweight, part-carbon fiber chassis, HD-AIR is able to handle up to 144

simultaneous input channels and offers a 96 kHz sample rate. The console also houses 123 time-aligned and phase-coherent mix buses, and is equipped with an ergonomically adjustable 21” full-color TFT high-brightness screen with capacitive touch sensing. Also onboard are eight XLR inputs and outputs featuring Midas mic preamps, which can be configured as AES3. The desk also sports dual redundant power supplies, snakes and built-in format converter slots. Adjoining the touchscreen are 24 user-assignable buttons supported by individual 240x240 HighResolution LCD Screens.

L-Acoustics Xi Series Coaxial Speakers

L-Acoustics’ new Xi Series coaxial speakers are intended for integration and installation applications; the new line, which debuted with the X6i and X8, is specifically tailored for short throw applications. The X6i and X8i sport streamlined designs to fit anonymously into

architectural settings. The passive loudspeakers feature a 1.5” neodymium compression driver coaxially loaded by a 6” or 8” low-frequency transducer in a bass reflex cabinet. The X6i has a maximum SPL of 123 dB and a frequency response down to 69 Hz, while the X8i features a maximum SPL of 129 dB and a frequency response down to 67 Hz.

Shure Axient Digital ADX3 Plug-On Transmitter

Shure’s new Axient Digital ADX3 plugon transmitter adapts the feature set and specs of the Axient line to a broadcast TV and location sound paradigm. Attaching an ADX3 plug-on transmitter on to any XLRterminated microphone essentially turns the

mic into an Axient Digital ADX Series wireless microphone, delivering the same audio quality, RF performance and wide tuning of the ADX3. It also allows real-time control of all transmitter parameters, including interference avoidance, via Shure’s proprietary ShowLink technology, which controls the ADX3 over a separate 2.4GHz diversity wireless connection. The ADX3 ships with two SB900 lithium-ion rechargeable batteries, with each battery reportedly providing more than six hours of continuous use, metering, and zero memory effect.

Solid State Logic PlateVerb Plug-In

Solid State Logic’s PlateVerb plug-in is the first in a new range of boutique reverb plug-ins with an effect pedal-style interface. PlateVerb emulates the sound of classic plate reverb within a DAW, combining two bespoke ‘SSL-crafted’ algorithms for Early Reflections and Late Reflections in an

effort to recreate the sonic, mechanical, and damping properties of a plate reverb. With reverb decay times ranging from a subtle 100 milliseconds to 3 seconds, PlateVerb can provide depth, dimension, and ambience to a variety of instruments and vocals. The plug-in features color adjustment, ducking with external sidechain, and freeze, as well as early/late reflections control, decay and room size customization, damping controls and more.

StageStrike RF Organization Tools

Live sound startup StageStrike has launched with the introduction of its MiQb and packHolder modular, stackable, inter-lockable organization systems for wireless packs and handheld microphones. Intended to help monitor engineers keep their RF systems tidy, the MiQb and packHolder stands and holders are created via industrial 3D printing technology, allowing for fast product development cycles as

well as user feedback-generated updates. The interlocking modules allow users to customize layouts for individual projects and workflows while ensuring a workspace is kept clean and organized.

Electro-Voice ZLX G2 Portable Loudspeakers

Electro-Voice has launched the ZLX G2 portable loudspeaker line, ushering in the second generation of the ZLX series with 8”, 12” and 15” two-way models in both powered and passive versions. Compared to the original line, the new ZLX G2 offerings have increased maximum SPL to 129 dB (ZLX-15P-G2). The woofer and compression driver in each ZLX G2 model are coupled to a patented SST (Signal Synchronized Transducers) ported waveguide, said to aid lowfrequency extension and deliver even vertical

and horizontal coverage across all frequencies. Efficient 1000 W Class-D power amplifier modules feature an integrated four-channel, three-input digital mixer with effects, two XLR/ TRS combo jacks, 24 V phantom power and Hi-Z compatibility.

Heil Sound RC 37 Wireless Capsule

Following up the release of its PR 37 handheld vocal mic, Heil Sound has created the RC 37 wireless microphone capsule, bringing something akin to a PR 27 to wireless users who want a similar sound on their current RF setup. The RC 37 capsule has sonic similarities to its wired PR 37 counterpart, according to Heil Sound, and is said to feature smooth lowmids and an enhanced upper midrange presence. n

Tech // reviews

LD Systems MON 10 A G3 Stage Monitor

New powered coaxial wedge gets the job done

By Steve La Cerra

LD Systems may not be a household name to Mix readers, but the brand, part of Adam Hall Group North America, produces a wide range of pro audio products, including high-performance line arrays, power amplifiers, in-ear monitors and stage monitors. The subject of this review—the MON 10 A G3—is aimed at the MI and DJ market, but it can also be used effectively in small touring or rental applications.

Part of LD Systems’ MON G3 Series, the MON 10 A G3 is a powered coaxial stage monitor based around a 10-inch low/mid-frequency driver with a 2.5-inch voice coil. The MON G3 Series also offers models employing 8-, 12and 15-inch woofers, with all models utilizing a coax 1 -inch-exit tweeter mounted on a constant-directivity horn with a dispersion pattern of 90 degrees vertical x 50 degrees horizontal.

The HF driver is custom-made with a ferrite magnet and features a 1.75-inch voice coil. The voice coil size allows the crossover point to be lowered to 1.7 kHz, which helps improve dispersion control and provides better coverage in the up/downstage direction, while reducing spill from one monitor into the area of an adjacent monitor mix. All MON G3 models employ Class-D amplification rated at 300 watts RMS/1200 watts peak.

The MON 10 A G3 cabinet is constructed from 15mm birch plywood coated with a good-looking, textured, polyurea finish, and has four thick rubber pads on the bottom. Die-cast aluminum handles are built into both sides of the cabinet, which I appreciated as the speaker weighs around 33 pounds.

CONNECT AND CONTROL

One side of the cabinet hosts the control panel, as well as audio and power connections. Combo jacks are provided for the two line-level audio inputs, each of which has a thru port for connection to another speaker. Each thru is linked to its respective input; i.e., input 1 feeds

thru 1, and input 2 feeds thru 2. These are passive connections that allow signal to pass through even when the MON 10 A G3 is powered down. An LCD display provides information regarding audio and system settings, while the companion rotary/push encoder is used to navigate menus and adjust parameters. AC power is supplied via twist-lock powerCON cable (included), and a powerCON output jack enables daisy-chaining multiple units. Located directly above the powerCON connectors is the mains on/off switch.

The opposite side panel features a 35mm pole flange, enabling the MON 10 A G3 to be pole-mounted for use as a P.A. speaker. This configuration turns the cabinet on its side, altering the dispersion pattern to 50 degrees vertical x 90 degrees horizontal—which is more appropriate for P.A. use. Both side panels are recessed to protect the connections, and a heat sink built into the rear panel keeps the electronics cool without need of a fan.

The MON 10 A G3 employs the latest generation of LD Systems’ DynX DSP, which handles EQ, presets and a tunable notch filter. Four presets are provided: Fullrange, Flat, Monitor and

Monitor/HPF. These are fairly self-explanatory, and graphics on the control panel illustrate the general frequency curves. Though not specified, it’s implied that the Monitor/HPF setting would be used when pairing the MON 10 A G3 with a subwoofer for sidefill or drumfill applications.

DynX DSP provides three-band EQ, each band having a range of ±10 dB. Unfortunately, the EQ frequency points are fixed and are not specified in the manual. Also available is a notch filter, which may be set to a variety of fixed frequencies ranging from 500 Hz to 10 kHz in 1/12-octave increments, with a gain range of 0 to -12 dB. A delay with a range from 0 to 10 meters (32 feet) in 0.1-meter (0.3 feet) increments is also provided, facilitating use of the MON 10 A G3 as a delay fill.

SOLID BUILD, SIMPLIFIED SIGNAL

Out of the box, the MON 10 A G3 inspires confidence. The construction looks and feels robust, and the cabinet is rather heavy, given its size. All connections are solid, and there’s no play in any of the fittings. The menu system is easy to navigate, with the main screen showing overall volume setting and input meters for channels 1 and 2. It’s here that we run into a divergence between the MON 10 A G3 and much of its competition.

The MON 10 A G3 inputs are fixed, linelevel, and lack any sort of gain control, whereas many multi-purpose speakers from other manufacturers provide at least one mic/ line input with gain control. These gain controls are not intended to be used to mix inputs—they are there to set input gain, the same as you’d use the trim control on a mixer. But many coffee-house performers eschew proper input gain structure and use the controls to mix (for example) a mic on input 1 with a keyboard on input 2.

Regardless, the MON 10 A G3 inputs are internally summed to mono, and the balance between them cannot be internally adjusted. The applications notes in the manual suggest an example whereby a guitar or bass player could patch the output from their amp simulator or preamp into one input on the MON 10 A G3, and an aux send from a mixer into the other, giving them control over a “more me” monitor mix. While this works electronically speaking, it completely ignores the fact that the amp sim or preamp would also need to feed the

PRODUCT SUMMARY

COMPANY: LD Systems

PRODUCT: MON 10 A G3

WEBSITE: www.ld-systems.com

PRICE: $559.99

PROS: Very good sound quality; compact footprint; robust construction; can be used for several different applications.

CONS: EQ points are fixed; no user presets for EQ; no control over input gain.

FOH mixer, resulting in one of two awkward scenarios: (1) the musician patches the respective thru connection from the input used for their preamp to the FOH mixer, and adjusts the output of the amp sim to satisfy their monitor mix, thereby changing the FOH mix any time they make an adjustment to their monitor mix; or (2) if the amp sim provides a secondary output, and the musician routes one output to the house mixer and the second output to the MON 10 A G3, it means they’ll probably be digging into menus on the amp simulator simply to change their monitor mix. It’s clumsy at best.

ON THE STAGE AND IN USE

The menu also provides access to the presets, which proved very useful, though I found an inconsistency between the Monitor settings on the two units supplied for the review. One unit recalled the Monitor preset with the LF EQ at +6

dB, while the other recalled the same preset with the LF EQ at +4 dB, even after defaulting both units to the factory settings. In any case, using the Monitor preset with the speaker deployed as a floor wedge, the LF response measured fairly flat down to around 65 Hz, though I’d probably set the LF EQ to +6 or +8 dB to deliver a bit more thump in this application.

Changing the preset to Fullrange yielded a +10 bump to the LF EQ and a +3 dB boost to the HF EQ, which maintains low-frequency response when the speaker is stand-mounted, while compensating for the loss of high frequencies typically suffered as listener distance from the P.A. increases. The MON 10 A G3 remembers the last EQ settings before shutdown, including any user modifications, but does not allow for storing any user presets, which is a bit of a drag. I was initially concerned about the notch-filter frequency not being continuously variable, but the 1/12-octave increments were narrow enough to be very useful.

Sound of the MON 10 A G3 is best described as smooth, which is one of the reasons I like coax drivers. A coaxial design enables the LF and HF drivers to behave as a single acoustical unit so that arrival times from the LF and the HF drivers remain the same regardless of listening position. This characteristic is evident in the MON 10 A G3; as you move around the monitor within the coverage pattern, response remains consistent, with vocals, in particular, sounding very natural. Vertical coverage is deep enough that when you step a few feet back from the monitor, you’re still in the coverage pattern—a trait that will be appreciated by performers who move around a lot on stage.

Semi-pro users may be put off by the MON 10 A G3’s inability to “mix” its two inputs, but pro users will find it to be an excellent monitor that ticks all of the boxes. It’d be nice if the user interface provided more info regarding EQ frequency points, or offered a few choices of EQ frequencies, even if only in the mid-band.

All in all, though, the MON 10 A G3 sounds good, is useful in a variety of applications, takes advantage of classic coaxial speaker attributes, plays plenty loud, and is reasonably priced. If you’re looking for a wedge monitor in this price range, I’d suggest you check out the MON 10 A G3. n

The LD Systems MON10 audio I/O on the side panel.

Newfangled Audio Recirculate

A delay with ultimate control and excellent sound shaping abilities

By Mike Levine

Newfangled Audio makes powerful and unique plug-ins, including equalizers, compressors, saturators, transient shapers and more, and the products have active-sounding names such as Punctuate, EQuivocate, Saturate and Elevate.

The company’s latest release is Recirculate (Mac/Windows), a digital delay plug-in that offers exceptional sound-shaping and control features. It lets you apply dynamic effects, distortion, noise, filtering, chorus and reverb to the delayed signal, while you can even use its effects to process the dry signal, which I’ll explain later.

Recirculate is not designed to emulate specific vintage hardware units, though it has sound-shaping features that can add analoglike characteristics to the delayed signal. First and foremost, Recirculate was designed to be a delay that provides maximum control and excellent sound quality.

The interface features a dark, modern-looking design consistent

with other Newfangled Audio plug-ins. The GUI is relatively large, and you can resize it up or down. If you want a different color scheme than the default, two alternate options are available in Settings.

The plug-in includes mono, mono-to-stereo, dual mono and stereo configurations, and all the delay controls reside in a single window. A drop-down near the top allows access to a substantial set of factory presets, including many from pro engineers and producers.

For observing levels, the plug-in features tall Input and Output meters on the extreme left and right, respectively, each with adjustable gain. I found the gain controls helpful for adjusting levels coming into the plug-in or going out. The Output control is particularly useful for reducing increased gain from the built-in effects.

IN GRID WE TRUST

A large window called the Grid dominates the middle of Recirculate’s GUI. It represents a timeline for the delay that can be adjusted by dragging stems left to right. The stems also have circular control points on the ends that you can drag up and down to change wet/dry or feedback levels, depending on the stem type.

The Dry signal is color-coded orange and is fixed in time on the far left. Because it represents the initial signal, it can’t be moved, but you can adjust its level relative to the Wet level. A yellow stem represents the initial tap, which Newfangled Audio calls The First Echo. It can be adjusted closer or further from the Dry signal. Feedback taps after the First Echo are blue and called Repeats.

You can set the timeline to display Notes (rhythmic values), Steps (from 1 to 16) or Milliseconds. The top half of the grid represents the left channel, and the lower half the right. The two can be locked together or set independently. In a mono instance of Recirculate, the Grid still has a right and left side and the same settings flexibility, but it ends up in a mono signal. One of the features that sets Recirculate apart from most other delays is the ability to configure the parameters for the First Echo and the Repeats separately.

The Grid also lets you turn on snapping to make it easy to drag the stems to specific rhythmic values or steps. You can set the Snap to fundamental

The color-coded Grid is both a control area for delay parameters and a helpful visual representation of how they’re set.

rhythmic values (half-note, quarter-note, eighth-note, etc.) and dotted and triplet variations. With Snap turned on, when you drag a stem over a beat subdivision, it clicks into place. You can Snap to the Step boundaries if you have set the Grid to Steps mode.

If you prefer to adjust your delay parameters with pull-down menus and buttons, use the Mixer and Delay Beats/ Delay Time sections below the Grid. When you make adjustments there, you’ll see them reflected in real-time in the Grid, and vice versa.

The Mixer offers two potent parameters that you can’t adjust from the Grid. The first is the Width control, which changes the stereo width of the delayed signal. The second, Dry FX, is one of Recirculate’s most powerful features. When you turn it up from its default at 0 percent, you add any effects that you’ve turned on to the dry signal. If you set it to 100 percent, the effects will get equally applied to the dry source and the echoes.

MODES AND DYNAMICS

between notes or beats. For example, you could set up a doubling effect by turning the Gate to about 50 percent, adjusting the delay time to a short value like 5 ms, and turning off the feedback.

CHARACTER AND SOUNDSTAGE

An effects module named Character has two components: Drive and Noise. Drive offers six distinct flavors of distortion that you can add to the signal using a knob that ranges from 0 to 30 dB. Depending on the Drive type, you can add tape-like, fuzzy, crunchy or complex distortion. They all sound good.

You can change the character of the delayed signal significantly depending on which of the four modes chosen under the Behavior menu. Standard provides straight-ahead performance; no artifacts are added when the delay time changes. Pitch Warp mode bends the pitch of the taps, giving them a warbly sound. They can be made even more extreme using the built-in Modulation effect.

Granular mode makes the delayed signal sound like it’s sliced up. You can adjust it from the Soundstage section with Spray and Size controls, which affect how large the grains are and the amount of randomization. The final mode is Ping Pong, which makes the delay taps alternate from one side to the other. Two controls in the Soundstage section, Mod and Pingpan, are available in Ping Pong, with Mod adding delay modulation and Pingpan determining the stereo placement of the first repeat tap.

Being able to create complex rhythmic delays is only one of the powerful aspects of Recirculate. Its effects lineup is impressively well-stocked, offering four different modular sections, with several effects in each.

The Dynamics section offers several different processors that allow you to manipulate the audio. The Transient knob works like a

conventional transient shaper: Positive values emphasize the transients, and negative values de-emphasize them. The Length knob adjusts how much of the transient will be able to pass.

The Compressor is a one-knob processor that Newfangled suggests using to add density to the delayed signal. It’s primarily meant for smoothing out the taps, but if you turn the Dry FX up, you’ll also be compressing the nondelayed signal.

Both a Gate and a Ducker are available. The Ducker reduces or completely mutes the delayed signal when the dry signal is present and releases when it’s not. It’s great for accentuating vocals and other melodic sources in a mix so that they poke through between the delay taps.

The Gate gives the opposite effect. It opens when dry signal is present and closes when it’s not, so you’ll only hear the delay when it appears simultaneous with the dry signal, but not

PRODUCT SUMMARY

COMPANY: Newfangled Audio (distributed by Eventide)

PRODUCT: Recirculate

WEBSITE: www.newfangledaudio.com

PRICE: $99

PROS: Facilitates creative delay settings. Four distinct delay Behaviors. The First Echo and Repeats can have different settings. Grid offers control and helpful visualization. Ducker and Gate. Six flavors of distortion Filter allows for frequency adjustments and resonant effects.

CONS: None.

The Noise effect lets you add one of four different noise types to the signal. Of the four noise types, Grit, Grime and Bit are program dependent. That is, you only hear them when there is signal present. The other, Hiss, is a steady sound that can be heard without any source signal hitting the input. It’s useful for tape emulations, in particular. You can have a lot or a little noise in the signal based on the percentage you set.

The Filter section contains low- and highpass filters, allowing frequency control and resonant filter effects. You drag around a pair of control points to change the filter shape. The initial shape depends on your selections for the low and high filter modes: Slope, Reso, Notch, Combo or Scoop.

Having some EQ control over the delayed signal is helpful for making the delayed signal sound significantly different than the dry. You can also use the Filters to create resonant effects.

The final module is called Soundstage. It offers multiple effects, which change depending on the selected Behavior mode. The only effect that’s constant in all four modes is Reverb, which has a single adjustable parameter: Decay (time).

DELAY POWERHOUSE

After using Recirculate for a couple of weeks, it’s become one of my “go-to” delay plug-ins for mixing. Its arsenal of effects and other handy features facilitate creativity in my delay settings. The option to add the effects to the dry signal is a big bonus.

The plug-in is well-designed and intuitive. The Grid, in particular, is quite helpful for visualizing and, therefore, better understanding how your settings affect the signal over time. If you want more than just the basics from a delay plug-in, Recirculate is a powerful tool. n

The Drive effect’s pull-down menu shows the various distortion flavors.

Tech // reviews

Brainworx bx_enhancer

Powerful, channel-strip-like plug-in with Saturation and Sculpting

By Mike Levine

MOST IMPRESSIVE FEATURE

Improves the sound of any track it’s inserted on.

Improving the sound of any source, whether an individual track or bus, is the modus operandi of the Brainworx bx_enhancer. Its one-window, easily navigable GUI is divided into sections. On the far left is the Input, which includes an Input level knob, an Input meter showing RMS and Peak readings, and a Tuner. I’m not usually fond of tuners in software apps because they’re generally too jittery, making them hard to use. However, this one is quite stable. It is beneficial not only for guitarists, bassists and other stringed instrument players, but also for tuning vintage synths.

The next section to the right is called Sculpt, and it’s here that you can adjust the overall frequency spectrum using the Basis knob, which toggles between being a Tilt Filter and a boost/cut for midrange. Depending on the setting of the A/B switch, the Boost knob either adds mixer-style saturation or controls a Clipper function for harmonic distortion. The Clipper, especially, is great for adding excitement to a track.

The Compressor section contains Mix, Threshold and Release knobs, a three-way Character selector that controls the intensity of the analogmodeled compression, a Slow/Fast attack switch and a Pre/Post position switch. The Compressor offers plenty of versatility and solid sound quality.

Next is the Colour section (Brainworx uses the British spelling), which provides EQ and filtering. It includes Low-Pass and High-Pass filters, a Bass knob offering three different filter curves, fixed Mid and High bands and an Exciter. The latter also provides three different curves that you can experiment with.

Brainworx did a good job choosing frequencies for the EQ bands, but if you need to zero in on narrow regions, you may need to insert a dedicated EQ before or after bx_enhancer.

On a stereo instance of bx_enhancer, you’ll find knobs for several image-related parameters. They include Stereo Width, Mono Maker (for keeping frequencies under a user-adjustable setting in mono), Pan and Mix. Be careful not turn the Stereo Width control too far or you may reduce the mono-compatibility of the signal. Fortunately, Brainworx included meters for Correlation and Balance just under the Output level meter.

Next to the Output knob is a button labeled Auto Level. If you turn it on, it gain-matches the processed output signal with the input. That makes it easy to accurately compare your track with the plug-in on and bypassed, avoiding the “louder is better” effect.

I found bx_enhancer useful for improving the sound of any track I inserted it on, including bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, drums, keyboards, vocals and more. I do wish the EQ was more adjustable, but on balance, it’s a powerful and handy plug-in that will appeal to both newbies and experienced studio users.

If you already have a compressor and EQ (or a channel strip) that you use regularly, you might assume that bx_enhancer is redundant. However, you’ll still benefit from its saturation and clipper functions, and its stereo utilities. It’s definitely worth a tryout. n

PRODUCT SUMMARY

COMPANY: Brainworx (Plugin Alliance)

PRODUCT: bx_enhancer

WEBSITE: www.pluginalliance.com

PRICE: $89.99 (introductory), $149 (list)

PROS: Full-featured channel adjustment tools. Compressor has three modes. Mono Maker and Stereo Width. Correlation meter. Tuner offers above-average stability. Input & output meters in Peak and RMS. Auto-Level.

CONS: Limited adjustability on EQ bands.

Audeze Filter

Speakerphone with noise suppression and clean, clear signal

By Barry Rudolph

Okay, I understand that this might not appear to be a typical “professional audio product” for review in Mix, but engineers and producers are regular people, too, and they need to communicate outside the studio more than ever—with clarity and a highquality signal. Toward that end, Audeze, now owned by Sony Corporation, has released Filter.

Filter is a battery-powered, Bluetooth-enabled speakerphone purpose-built for conference calls. It is the pro audio manufacturer’s first nonheadphone product and uses several advanced technologies that work in tandem to solve the typical audio problems with all speakerphones.

First is environmental noise interfering with the intelligibility of a voice because of the extra mic gain required to pick up distant or quiet voice(s) using an omni-directional microphone. Filter uses a process involving what’s called a Deep Neutral Network and a library of more than 500,000 noise samples to detect and accurately remove noise.

DNN has three levels of noise suppression— Low, Medium and High—selectable from the touch controls on the unit’s surface. (You can also turn noise suppression Off.) All of Filter’s adjustments and settings are accessed via touchsensitive controls. In general, I found myself using only enough noise reduction as required. With maximum noise reduction, there is some degradation to your voice’s quality, more similar to the sound quality of a cell phone. Still, DNN works amazingly well.

With background noise removed, Filter then uses variable-pattern microphone technology called Beamforming. The pickup pattern of the two microphones on either side of its flat speaker is adjustable from Off (or omnidirectional) to 70 degrees (Narrow), 90 degrees (Medium), or 105 degrees (Wide).

I found that the Wide pickup pattern worked fine in most rooms, though if the room you are

in is overly reverberant or if it is only you talking, you may want to use a narrower pickup. Beam Forming and DNN work well together; still it helps to experiment to get the best results in a particular room or office space, with or without colleagues.

When folded flat, Audeze Filter measures 76 mm wide x 152 mm tall x 11 mm thick—about the size, dimensions, weight and “feel” of a typical

PRODUCT SUMMARY

COMPANY: Audeze

PRODUCT: Filter

WEBSITE: www.audeze.com

PRICE: $250

PROS: Purpose-built for conference calls; multiple beamforming pickup patterns available.

CONS: Max. Noise Reduction setting can affect voice quality.

smartphone. Filter’s bifurcated design allows its touchscreen controller to lay flat on a desktop or table while Audeze’s flat 70 mm by 105 mm planar magnetic speaker can be aimed at the person using it.

You “audition” the pickup by recording and playing back a short 10-second audio clip to try different patterns. I’m using Filter over USB-C as an audio interface and sometimes just as a speakerphone connected to my iPhone via Bluetooth.

Audeze Filter is a modern version of a speakerphone, and I now use it every day. It has been designed and built for hybrid engineers who bounce back and forth between the office and studio or the busy studio professional who travels frequently.

It sells for $250 MSRP and comes with a deluxe carrying pouch and free app. n

Open Channel

Can You Negotiate With AI?

By Craig Anderton

It’s bad enough when an Amazon Prime package touts “millions of songs for free” but for videos, they increasingly expect you to pony up. Recorded music has been devalued, possibly past the point of no return. Fortunately, the recording industry is only one facet of the music industry. There’s still songwriting, scoring, live performances, theatrical productions, audiobooks and plenty more.

One of SAG/AFTRA’s main negotiation points during their recent strike was about protecting all industry people from the changes that AI will bring. The union was concerned about humans being cut out of their industry entirely—either because they are literally no longer needed, or because work they’d already done could be recycled.

If you’re hearing echoes of this in the music industry, well, you should.

COPYRIGHT, OR COPIED RIGHT?

But first, let’s zoom out. We already have some protection for our work. Copyright gives the creator the right to decide who will have the right to copy their work. However, digital technology shredded copyright laws by making it possible to create perfect copies of pretty much anything. In the music industry, that started more than 20 years ago with Napster, Limewire and others. Now, on top of that, we’re facing the same issues that confront Hollywood.

With the SAG/AFTRA contract, actors have control over how their performances are digitally altered. If you’re Harrison Ford, Disney can’t modify your part in Dial of Destiny with AI, then use it as a cameo for a Marvel Comic Universe movie—unless you give them permission. Presumably, that costs something.

We have similar safeguards for sampling. Aside from strict fair-use applications, you can’t just take part of a song and use it in something else without permission from the copyright holder.

SAG/AFTRA also negotiated compensation for digital likeness. If Disney uses an AI-generated version of Harrison Ford in an Indiana Jones sequel based around Phoebe Waller-Bridge, then he’ll be paid as if he was acting in the movie. Clearly, Disney would be trading on Ford’s image and likeness.

This also starts intersecting with the music business. Suppose someone has a concept of producing a song with Beyoncé and David Bowie, and there are enough David Bowie vocal tracks that AI can put together a convincing duet. In this case, Bowie’s estate would need to give permission and have the right to negotiate compensation. This is related to what KISS is doing, where they’ve basically licensed themselves to be their own avatars. Long after the members of KISS are gone, their heirs and assigns will have the rights to their digital likenesses, and can

continue generating KISS content.

The music industry desperately needs revisions to the copyright laws to take these changes into account, just as the movie industry negotiated contracts that now have the force of law. But it can’t just stop there.

PROTECTING THE UNSUNG HEROES

Much of SAG/AFTRA’s negotiations involved protecting those who don’t have star power leverage. Originally, the industry wanted to have an extra come by for a day, do a shoot, then recycle that extra in future movies with no additional payment. Thankfully, that got struck down.

But consider studio musicians. They could be hired for a day, record hours of playing scales and chords, be paid for their session, and…bye. AI could stitch together the needed notes and chords to play parts.

If studio musicians were negotiating with the record industry, plain language would need to specify what’s acceptable. For example, an agreement could allow material to be re-used on the same project for which the musician was hired. That would cover situations like when the producer decides to add a solo phrase later in the song.

What wouldn’t seem fair is the producer using the same notes and chords to create a solo on a different project. Here, we can follow SAG/ AFTRA’s lead and make permission essential. There’s precedent: Authors can give permission to reprint an article, with changes permitted by the author, typically for a lower price. Likewise, the studio musician could get paid for a solo on someone else’s project. But because they wouldn’t even need to show up, they’d probably accept a reduced rate. Problem solved: Musicians get income, producers save money.

SYNTHETIC PERFORMERS

Here’s where it gets dicey. In the previous examples, who did the work and who owned it was at least somewhat clear, as are ways to potentially protect those rights. But consumers vote with their dollars. No one can tell them “you can’t like that synthetic act; you need to support real humans.” That will trigger middle fingers going up at concerts, not lit phone screens.

What happens when musicians aren’t needed to compose? Or create an act that audiences like? Of course, at first, human coders will write the software, and artists will craft the synthetic performers’ visual look and sound…but for how long? Audience reactions will be tracked, fed to an algorithm and provide data points for automatically refining the act.

Our only hope is that the novelty of synthetic experiences will wear off. Machines might be able to write songs, but they may not be able to write standards. Some say the drive for perfection in music has backfired by creating “perfect” music that doesn’t grab people emotionally. The same might happen with synthetic artists and performances.

Would I bet that will happen? I’ll get back to you on that one. ■