Principal Audio

17/06/2024

Another fix, quick one this time. The tweeter on this Mackie Thump 215 wasn't working. I removed the board and tested the speaker cable on my multimeter (resistance mode) to check for continuity, but there was nothing - open circuit.

Just on the off chance, I checked whether the cables were properly plugged into the tweeter. Low and behold, one of the cables had come loose. A pretty loose fit from the factory, as the unit wasn't very old. I crimped the connector and plugged it back in solid. Working perfectly. 👌

16/06/2024

Soundcraft Signature 16 mixing console. The lever on the master fader was broken so the fader needs replacing. Not something that can be glued back together because it'll just break again.

Found a supplier in the Netherlands (Pro Audio Parts), so going to order a new 100mm stereo fader from there. Also going to order 4 k***s (1 red, 3 yellow) to replace the missing ones, because they're only €1 each and delivery is quite expensive. May as well fix everything at once.

06/06/2024

Short demo of some things I've been working on recently (mixing, mastering, editing and production work). 😊

This video is to showcase some recent mixes and masters I've been working on. https://sharmainewebster.com/://bandoffrie...

21/05/2024

PA Speaker fixed. Had some poor solder joints which was likely why the charging circuit wasn't working, leading to the internal battery not maintaining charge. It kept turning onto standby as the battery voltage kept dropping below 10V.

The power resistors (picture 3) had been pumping heat into the board over years, causing poor solder joints on the opposite side.

Sometimes it's the simplest fix.

08/05/2024

A quick example of the end result (of my previous post).

If you like what you hear and want to support the band, it's Band Of Friends. Link is below. :)

https://bandoffriends.co.uk/

08/05/2024

What a project looks like when you have 36 tracks from a live set to mix.

1st image:
The overall track structure after all the editing and automation has been done. This isn't a "large" project, per se, but it's quite big when it comes to mixing albums. Usually albums are 74-80 mins max (CD compatibility), but this one has just shy of 4 hours of audio. The band will choose the best tracks from two identical sets and I'll merge those together into a final CD-length feature for them.

2nd image:
Close-up of tom (drum) edits to remove any unwanted noises. There's additional stuff going on behind the scenes, like multiband expansion to prevent unwanted cymbals from interfering with the tom sound. For those that don't know, "toms" are the "doofy" sounding drums lol. Doof doof doof doof snap boom tssss...

3rd image:
This shows the drum overhead mics that have been split into two separate tracks using AI to give "Drums" + "Other". The overheads mics give a nice overall drum sound you can mix into the individual mics like the Kick, Snare Top, Snare Bottom, Toms, Hihats, Cymbals, etc. The AI processing allows me to (1) Reduce the amount of spill from other sources in the drum mics (guitars/vocals), as well as (2) automate some audience spill louder where necessary, so it increases the ambience of the piece.

4th image:
Main channel mix, with all insert effects (EQ, compression, saturation, and effects like reverbs, delays, etc.) This is the part of the mix that is generally done first, to get a decent mix balance.

5th image:
"Buss" channel mix. This is the stage where I do the final balancing of elements like: Drums, Bass, Instruments, Guitars, Vocals, Effects, etc. It's the final polish and rebalance of the mix. All the separate channels get sent to specific busses so they can be blended together through extra EQ and compression to make them sound a tiny bit better. The final "mix buss" processing adds the final layer on top, to finish off the sound.

6th image:
This is the volume automation. One of the most important parts of mixing, where I change the levels of different elements vs each other so I can choose what to make the primary focus at each moment. Without it, mixes sound flat as f***. They have no life in them. i.e. When someone does a guitar solo, it'd just blend in unless I turned it up for the solo and turned other elements down to make room.

29/04/2024

Guitar cab has some vocals on it for some reason. Think some routing went wrong half way through the live recording.

Thankfully, A.I. comes to the rescue. I can simply "turn off" the vocal bleed, bass bleed, and drums bleed, and leave nice clean guitars for the mix. Same with the vocal tracks - removing 99.9% of the spill with little effort. 👌

29/04/2024

Another live project on the go for Band of Friends. About 4 hours of audio (two identical sets).

Half way through the editing, then onto automation. Trying to get it done before Gerry is back and surprise him with all the files. 😂

24/04/2024

Bit of a quirky Shadowfoam video. 😂

Here's me just shadowfoaming my portable recorder box. Nothing much to see, really.Here's where you can get shadowfoam from the wonderful Jonathan:https://sh...

08/04/2024

I asked AI to make a Rock song about weapons.

POV - Asking AI to make a Rock song about weapons.

13/03/2024

Testing out my new oscilloscope. Arrived yesterday. Rigged up a pulse-width modulator circuit to give it a test out.

It's a 4-channel scope which means I can look at up to 4 analog inputs simultaneously. It also has the ability to decode parallel, RS232 serial, I²C, SPI, CAN bus, and Hexadecimal for work with microcontrollers and other such things (something I still need to learn about!)

It'll help me design, test, and evaluate any audio gear I make in the future. Hoping to make small modules to start with, like clean ultra-clean power supplies I can use in the gear, then moving onto making other modules like preamps, EQ modules, compressors, etc.

07/03/2024

Almost forgot! Thanks so much to Slim Chance for letting me mix and master their album, and thanks for the CD Charlie. :)

26/02/2024

A little addition to the studio so guests can have a whiskey. 🥃 Found the decanter in a charity shop for £6.40. Bargain!

02/02/2024

3am mastering vibes. ☺️

(Green tea with honey.)

29/01/2024

The band I’m proud to be part of...sounding better than ever! Thanks, ladz!

18/01/2024

Several hours of 3D printing later... Speaker spikes done for one monitor.

They do actually prevent most of the vibrations from hitting the desk, which great! I can get rid of that tatty acoustic foam underneath the monitors. 😂 I'm printing 3 per monitor* for good stability.

*Ignoring the Events as I hardly use those and need to replace with something much better.

12/01/2024

Really enjoyed last night. 👌

P.S. Sorry about the sloppy video recording. 😂

08/01/2024

Here's my final submission for the RateMyMix contest 2024.

I went for a Pop/Country vibe with it. Thought it would sound nice like that. Enjoy! (Hopefully!)

James Dupre - Another Love Song Contest 2024RateMyMix Contest 2024Here's my entry for the contest. Enjoy!

06/01/2024

Finally found a use for this 2nd monitor. All the metering stuff fits nicely on it.

It's Cubase's built-in metering plugin - SuperVision.

03/12/2023

Shamelessly stolen music meme. 😂

30/11/2023

Not too keen on the new Cubase 13 mixer. Looks like a "Cubase Kids®" version. 😂

20/11/2023

AI's imagination of a studio. 😂 It seems to love mixing consoles and speakers.

19/11/2023

One more live album fully mixed (18 tracks). This one took ages because of all the clicks/pops I had to remove manually, as auto declick plugins weren't doing a good enough job.

I also had to do spectral editing to manually remove guitar buzz on some parts where noise reduction algorithms just couldn't attack it without making it sound like poo.

I'm sure there are more noises and issues here and there, so just having a listen through to the album carefully to catch anything else.

11/11/2023

Just one way in which I can reduce spill in recordings (in this case 'everything but drums') using SpectraLayers in Cubase.

It allows me to clean up mixes in ways that were previously not possible. A.I. is amazing!

11/11/2023

WINTER GIG! As you know we are nutty about Christmas and winter in this band. It's the most wonderful time of the year for us. This year we'll be playing at The Collegiate Church of St Mary on November 25.

Opening the night for us will be friend of the band Chris Venables, then The Deacons follow with superb rootsy folk, a quick slice of proggy-jazzy goodness from Umbrellabird and then we'll close the night.

Music starts at 7pm on the nose. We are allowing people to 'pay what you want' for single tickets, so put in whatever you feel like...but remember super yachts don't buy themselves!

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/dont-call-me-ishmael-umbrellabird-chirs-venables-the-deacons-tickets-726746156317?aff=oddtdtcreator

08/11/2023

Since I've managed to restore this page, I've deleted the new one I made. Hopefully everyone can still see these posts.

07/11/2023

F**k's sake, Facebook. I just found this page hidden away in the back, deactivated.

24/05/2023

Just uploaded my showreel.

Principal Audio Showreel 2023-05.

05/03/2023

Another album almost done. Just the mastering to do now (with fresh ears, of course!)

Currently exporting the tracks without the limiter so I can reimport to a new project and do the final sequencing and add the secret mastering sauce. Then comes the DDP ("Disc Description Protocol") authoring ready for CD manufacture.