Files from an SSL E WTF is this?

It's not the SSL. Every time I've been around one, its sound might be described as huge and muscular, with an extremely balanced sound at all frequencies. That might make it seem dull to some, because it's not hyping anything in particular, but dull would not be the way I'd describe it. I'd call it huge, with great detail and balance.

I haven't been around SSL's for any extended length of time though. Besides doing some of my own work, I was a guest on mixing sessions for James Blunt and Neo, and it was just spectacular, I can't think of a fault or complaint to voice.

I guess "dull" was a poor choice of words, but I did mean more like there was nothing in particular that stood out, unlike using something like an API or Neve, where the flavor of the console is readily apparent.

I worked on a 6000e for several years, the recording ability of those boards are not what they are great for. When you mix files from an API or Neve through it, that's when that console comes to life.

You have to qualify your statement...

Really hard to get a great drum sound in a basement or apartment. Although, I love me some Exile on Main Street.

And your stuff sounds great!

But as I’m sure you have noticed in your career, real studio live rooms are the business, and also tend to be home to great consoles.

FWIW, I mixed a great sounding record cut on the SSL at Different Fur, but I’m not sure how much of it used the console pres.

Funny story, the singer had a tremendous lisp and at first I was like, “darn the tracking engineer really de-essed the crap out of these vocals.”

First off all thanks for the answers. I guess they used the internal mic pres? I have to ask!

Steven Slate claims also to get the nonlinear distortions in the VCC right. It should be easy for long time SSL users to proof if they like what they hear.

All I can say sometimes pushing the mixbus works great with the VCC and other times it sounds like a circular saw. Sometimes it opens the mix up, the next time it makes it smaller....

I think they just aren’t known for their pres, which is a shame because the newer ones are quite good. The ones on the 9k, Duality, and AWS are fantastic preamps, and get a lot of flack, but I almost feel like people are listening with their eyes and not their ears.

No, they don’t sound like a Neve or an API, but that’s not the point. They aren’t supposed to sound like those things.

What they are is super high fi, deep, open, and clean. If you don’t want that sound, then you’ll have some issues with them. But if that’s the sound you want, you’re sure as hell not getting it from a Neve.

The Console 1 stuff is cool and does a pretty good emulation of the EQ. I don’t particularly dig the knobs, but that’s just me. It doesn’t however make it sound like you’re going through a console at mix time. So far the closest and cheapest thing I’ve heard is the Sigma (which I like a LOT).

I often come back to this thought: The Bends was recorded partly on an API and partly on an SSL.

All of it sounds like Radiohead.

Welcome to the SSL sound. It's a filter combined with a harmonic generator, a nice way of saying "fuzz tone". I recall one SSL I serviced 20 odd years ago. The owners were playing that Titanic song over the monitors. They had me mod one channel of the monitor path to "see" if it made any differences.

Then, all of a sudden a bell tree pops out of the modified channel. It was not there on the stock channel. The owner asks, "what's THAT"!

I told him that was the food your SSL has been chewing for you.

This one teached me something...thanks Jim and Happy Easter.

They don't bother my ears too much.

Also don't let Jims opinion sway you too much. The SSL consoles, even the older ones have plenty of bandwidth, into the 125khz+ range. They have good impulse response and low distortion. Plenty clean enough if you don't drive then hard into the mix bus.