I take my Analogue roots to the Digital realm. I mix rock, metal old school style preserving space, balance, punch and dynamics. I will work with you to create a no nonsense mix of your project using skills I acquired in analogue studios and built on by digital techniques over the course of 30 years.
I'm offering my mix skills to balance your multitrack recordings. I specialise in Rock, Metal and acoustic genres bringing my analogue training and digital practice from 3 decades in music production. I have experience in more spatial and ambient settings recording and mixing classical ensembles which has additionally informed my practice.
I believe that music should have sense of space, presence and dynamic punch. when discussing with clients I like to talk about reference to other artists as far as sound scape. I like to develop rapid mixes to get a handle on what the client wants and is wanting to achieve. I am happy to take stems but I may ask for effects to be stripped off in some cases. In many cases raw multitracks are easier and quicker to work with. partially mixed stems can help to 'visualise' clients expectations but can cause issues when balancing.
Click the 'Contact' above to get in touch. Looking forward to hearing from you.
Credits
Interview with Unhindered Audio
Q: What do you like most about your job?
A: I love working with audio and making it all come together to become bigger than the sum of its parts
Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?
A: Gear Acquisition Syndrome. You need expensive kit to do it well. With skills and good ears most things can be achieved on modest kit. Expensive stuff is only worth the money if it speeds up the process enough to justify the expense.
Q: Tell us about a project you worked on you are especially proud of and why. What was your role?
A: I co produced an indie band CD using studio down time and favours. We took it through recording, mixing and mastering through to a full release. The whole project took 18 months and generated over 60gb of audio. It was an emotional rollercoaster of logistics and burnout management. I learned a lot about making decisions early to help the album flow. I feel the mix still stands up after more than a decade.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: A very tidy hard rock / punk band. Bucca Dhu are a great bunch of guys, I have so much fun working with them. Album coming soon!
Q: Is there anyone on SoundBetter you know and would recommend to your clients?
A: No not yet
Q: Analog or digital and why?
A: Both, analogue has a great way of defining what is important in a mix and what is superfluous. Digital’s repeatability alows for fine adjustment and more complex mixes. Someplace in the middle is where I stand
Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?
A: I trained in west Cornwall in the mid 1990s in a purely analogue commercial studio. This led to being offered a teaching job in music production. Whilst teaching I would lecture on music analysis, music production techniques and I even qualified as a protools instructor. I continued to freelance as a studio and live engineer. More recently I partnered with an ex BBC engineer to record a a vibrant classical scene back in West Cornwall with some clients being of international standard. This furthered my love of capturing and reproducing space.
Q: How would you describe your style?
A: I trained with analogue tape and outboard hardware but I have embraced digital systems. I bring an old school production with with the best bits of Digital Audio techniques
Q: Can you share one music production tip?
A: Regular changes to environment will make issues clearer. I often stand outside of my room to spot issues and solution can present themselves.
Q: What type of music do you usually work on?
A: Rock, metal and punk mainly but a close second is classical ensembles
Q: What's your strongest skill?
A: Preserving impact through dynamics, balance and most of all space
Q: What do you bring to a song?
A: I bring space, balance and dynamics reminiscent of older analogue recordings, I am mindful of humanity and I avoid over polishing a mix to the detriment of feel and natural human made music.
Q: What's your typical work process?
A: I always start with a reference track to set my ears, I’ll very quickly through a rough mix together to establish what is present and identify and problems that need fixing with the source. Once I’m happy with soured issues I’ll strip back the mix to typically drums setting a frame for the track as well as a space. Next I’ll get bass to sit with kick drum and later I’ll build on to the rhythm section cavas setting an ambient space working as soon as possible. Next it bringing in other elements and refining the balance, space and dynamics until the client is satisfied.
Q: Tell us about your studio setup.
A: I’m mostly digital based with Kali Audio IN 8 v2 monitors fed from my Focusrite interface in my small room which I have gotten to know over the last 10 years. I back this up with AKG headphones that I’ve used since 2009. In preference I use Reaper to mix on as it allows an unprecedented level of routing options. I always reference mixes in my home theatre set up, kitchen stereo as well as my little car.
Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?
A: For the precise control I’ve looked to Trevor Horn and Chris Goss for the loser energy. Tony Platt and his work with AC/DC and later his work with SellABand project was an eye opener.
Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.
A: Location recording and mixing mainly but I offer services around production and mastering for different platforms and formats
I was the Producer, Recording and Mix engineer in this production
- Mixing EngineerAverage price - $100 per song
- ProducerAverage price - $250 per song
- Dialogue EditingAverage price - $100 per minute
