PreSonus Blog

Mark and Johnny are on the east coast of the US spreading the good PreSonus word. To find out when clinics and events are coming to your town, click here and view our events page!

We were incredibly lucky to have John Storyk from WSDG Design Group speak at PreSonuSphere 2013. John designed Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland Studios in New York, as well as the recording studio in our brand-new PreSonus HQ.

For more on John’s impressive career, click here:
http://www.wsdg.com/dynamic.asp?id=company/team/usa/johnstoryk

John’s presentation slides from this show can be obtained from the WSDG website. Click here and scroll down: http://www.wsdg.com/dynamic.asp?id=events/past

[This just in from producer Guy Perchard! He recently contacted us about his experience with Studio One, and we just had to share. ]

Hi PreSonus!

I recorded Steve Heron’s song “I Swear Blind” after-hours at Red Dog Music, the instrument shop I work at in Edinburgh, Scotland. I was an early adopter of Studio One. In more than two years of using it to track bands and songwriters, I’ve never experienced a glitch, crash or artifact in the recorded audio. I’ve worked with Steve before on full-band productions (the usual four-piece plus backing vocals and a horn section) but for this B-side track, he wanted something a little more raw and natural. Everything on this session was tracked in one take, with minimal editing.

I’m a huge fan of the in-house effects built in to Studio One. Pro EQ is ludicrously useful for subtractive EQ and I apply it as an insert to every track on the mix; its interface makes finding the mud and taming it a doddle. The Compressor plug-in is also a mighty beast! The knee parameter is really useful for making the compression a little more transparent and subtle. The Room Reverb plug-in also used regularly;  I send the vocal, guitar and Fender Bass VI all to a slightly tweaked version of the “medium studio” preset.

One element that has a bit more going on is the ghostly sounding guitar, played with an E-bow. The E-bow guitar was processed via an insert chain consisting of: Autofilter, Compressor, Pro EQ, Beat Delay, Analog Delay, and finally Binaural Pan. Even though it sounds pretty extreme when you solo it, it works well as a subtle element in the whole mix. The whole master buss is then running through the awesome RedLightDist valve-sim plug-in on a very gentle setting to knock-off a little of the clarity and to excite the mids.  The only non-PreSonus plug-in on the mix is iZotope Ozone, to provide some subtle multi-band compression and a few dB of loudness.

I find working in Studio One is an absolute joy, but it has slightly ruined me for any other DAW software on the market. I frequently face-palm when I see people fumbling around with the clunky menus in Pro Tools… If they only knew they could make things so much easier for themselves!

Well done, PreSonus! You’ve made producing music as fun and intuitive as playing it.

[This just in from Jessica Ramsey of Moon Honey! She offered some insights on using the FireStudio Mobile for memory loss aversion. ]

I suffer from melody-idea-loss-aphobia: the common fear that a melody will be lost forever if not immediately recorded. That said, the FireStudio Mobile was an invaluable tool for writing vocals on my new record. In two snaps, I’d hook it up to my laptop and lay down vocal demos. Thanks to Studio One I was able to try out my ideas, mixing lead and back up vocals on top of rough instrumental tracks the boys had already recorded.

I wrote and recorded a four-part vocal harmony for “The Ship” on my own bed at 3 a.m. I exported each harmony individually, so that when it came time to officially record the seven-minute-long epic of a song, I could play them back individually and nail them in one take… almost. The tracks were also extremely helpful when it came time to perform; I had four choir singers on stage with me at our last Manship Theatre show, and they learned/practiced their parts with the demo harmonies!

Here’s “The Ship:”

We’ve got a new album in the works, if you like what you hear in “The Ship,” why not throw in a little bit over at Kickstarter? You can pre-order the dreamy rock & roll album, or even have me cook a vegan dinner for you!

[This just in from Ilias Gogakis, who recently produced an entry in the Eurovision Song Contest using Studio One!]

Hello PreSonus! Anna Capone Papas is a Spinto Soprano vocalist with many years of studies in classic music, piano and opera. She wrote melodies for the song “A Glimpse of Heaven,” with her friend S.Rhodes. In the beginning, the song was a ballad with only piano and vocals.

I work on rock and metal music, and have worked with Anna Capone Papas before. Once I listened her demo, the first thing that hit my mind was to transform the song to a pop metal opera, without changing her original ideas. So, I added some heavy modern metal riffs and my friendly drummer wrote some groovy drum parts.

Because the Eurovision Song Contest needs a catchy song, we made a pop/symphonic metal song, which is catchy to all listeners in central and Northern Europe, where both styles of music are very popular.

We had a very little time to compose, mix and master the song in order to enter the Switzerland Song Contest for Eurovision. The whole song was ready in five days. We were working 13 hours every day for all five days at my studio, Master Sound Studio, located in Athens, Greece. It was a great experience!

With the song structure finalized, we tracks guitars, drums, vocals, and pianos. This was followed by adding full orchestra parts using PreSonus sound libraries and some other libraries.

Drums were recorded using Slate Digital SSD 4 and CLA Expansion Kit via a Roland TD 20 KX V-DRUM. The were all  recorded by me using Schecter Guitars though the Blackstar Amp Series One 6L6. All recordings, mixing and mastering sessions were made in Studio One 2 Professional.

You can hear “Glimpse of Heaven” below.

The link to vote for the song is www.eurovisionplattform.sf.tv/videos#A

Check out this talk with the drummer/producer of TOOMS, who leverage the the StudioLive 16.0.2 for integrating Ableton Live into their concerts.

WARNING: heavy heavy sounds ahead…

The new StudioLive AI PA Loudspeakers offer unparalleled sonic clarity and power with landmark DSP. Here’s Justin Spence and Wesley Smith revealing all the pertinent details at PreSonuSphere 2013 in this engaging (and funny!) demonstration.

For more on the StudioLive AI PA Loudspeakers, click here: http://www.presonus.com/products/StudioLive-328AI

[This just in from Julian Reaves, AKA Giuliani, of Architect Media Group!]

Hey PreSonus! I’m Julian. I run Architect Media, an independent entertainment company located in California. We have an in-house digital studio where we use PreSonus Studio One Professional as our main  DAW. We feel that Studio One gives us unlimited flexibility from producing and recording to mastering—all in one application! We used Studio One on Irban Jeter’s album  “I.R.B Hit The Spot,”released on Architect Media Group/ Interscope Digital Distribution, as well as on Ryan Goree’s single “Chocolate Teddy Bear,” that was released on Architect Media Group/ Def Jam Digital Distribution.

Architect Media Group is not just a music company. We are venturing into soundtracks, film, television, and video games, and we’re confident that Studio One Professional is going to play big part in recording, mastering and sound design.

[This just in from Jamie from the Kickin’ Cajuns!]

Hey PreSonus! Last year I purchased a Presonus StudioLive 24.4.2 board from a local dealer, and have nothing but great things to say. I’ve had a Midas board for seven years prior, and one night at a club gig a fight broke out, and the subsequently spilled drinks ended its poor li’l life beyond a worthy repair.

As the front man, I’m none too savvy on the technical aspects of the equipment, so I got some advice from my engineers and some other local sound companies. So we started looking and ended up going with the StudioLive. We used a 24.4.2 for front house initially, then added a 16.4.2 for in-ears. It’s not only a high-quality piece, but very affordable. I paid three times the amount for my other board, and this thing runs circles around it and the sound quality is unbelievable!

Well, all aside from the great sound we were getting as a band, we recently found ourselves overdue for a new CD. I had always talked about a Live album because I think our live show is killer; and have often heard that confirmed by our audiences! I started checking out prices pricing for someone to record the album. Days later my engineer said, “Jamie, we can record ourselves live with the PreSonus”. I was like, “well let’s get with it!”

Long story short, we recorded us where we thought we were getting the best sound quality as far as venue, crowd and band performance were concerned—and with a few tweaks here and there, Jamie Bergeron and the Kickin’ Cajuns “Live Like Dat” CD was born.

I’ve gotten numerous compliments in all aspects of this CD, which is our number six. Since then, I have seen some local competing bands switching to… guess who?

PRESONUS!!!!!

Thanks, Jamie

K.C. Entertainment Inc.,
www.kickincajuns.com