AES NYC 2105 - Here's part of what I saw there.

AES NYC 2015 A Journeyman's Wandering #02


Javits Center
Nothing like a crisp and clear Fall day in NYC. Too bad I had to spend most of it inside the Javits Center for the 2015 Audio Engineers Association Convention.

Good news for future conventions at the Javits, NYC has just opened an extension of the 7 Train that runs from Main Street in Flushing, Queens on the East Side across Manhattan to 34th Street – Hudson Yards in Chelsea, a short block from the Javits Center.

The 7 Train crosses Manhattan near 42nd Street on its way West stopping at Grand Central Station and Times Square before turning South down to 34th Street just before 11th Avenue, where the Javits is.

Foot sore AES attendees or anyone attending a conference at the Javits who is staying in mid town can now jump the 7 train and get back to their hotels for a nice foot soak before heading out on the town.



7 Train Station, 34th & the Yards, Chelsea
I suspect it won't take long before that part of Chelsea gets a series of facelifts, including shops, more places to stay and more restaurants. How much you'll pay for that convenience remains to be seen, but a two nights stay in the lowly, grimy Pennsylvania Hotel (booked in advance) was over $800. REALLY! Oh, yeah, that's right we're in NYC.


Mark Fouxman - Samar Audio Design - VL37A

What's Old Is New
My first stop was Mark Fouxman at the Samar Audio Design booth. Mark began his work by modifying microphones. His modification of the AKG C1000S is pretty stellar and economical. It makes the C1000S very useful in the studio. Check the link for audio samples.

Microphone modification soon led to inspiration and he began making his own microphones. I have been talking to Mark about his VL37 classic, bi-directional, passive ribbon mic which now at my studio for review. He's done some very inventive things to squeeze as much signal and as many high frequencies as possible while lowering the noise by fine tuning an old design.

He brought the next phase of the VL37 to this AES show; the VL37A, an active version. About 10dB more sensitive and quieter than you would expect, the active version also has that uniquely extended high frequency response. By adding the active stage, Fouxman provides a more consistent termination for the ribbon. This means that a variety of preamps will not vary the sound of the mic as much because the loading of the ribbon is achieved by the active circuitry.



Rupert Never Designs for 500 Racks
Rupert Neve
AES isn't much without checking in with Rupert, who is now 89. The first thing to catch my eye was the Dante sign. Dante, patented by Audinate, stands for Digital Audio Network Through Ethernet. This is no time to stick your head in the sand. Dante is here and shows no signs of going away. Here's a list of recent Dante enabled products. Careful, it's a rabbit hole!


Rupert Neve Design 5060 Centerpiece
Not far away was a Rupert Neve Design 5060 Centerpiece Desktop Mixer. No, it's not new, but it sure looks nice. It's an up to 24-input line mixer with the mix buss from the 5088 console, including a multimode insertable “Silk” circuit. The center section has three monitor outputs, mono and dim, three external inputs, and talkback to two separate outputs including a headphone amp.

The mixer section has four 100mm mono/stereo faders, each fader having insert and mute, for inputs 1-8. At the top left of the panel are 8 stereo rotary faders for stereo inputs 9-16. On the right is a Master fader. A pair of large VU meters with peak flashers indicate output level There's a USB / MIDI transport controller with a Shuttle/Jog wheel. Yum!


AnaMod ATS-1 Analog Tape Simulator
ANA MOD
If your world is too digital, perhaps you need to return to your analog roots. AnaMod's ATS-1 analog tape simulator is a two channel box. You can see it here in the top slot of the rack with the light faceplate and dual analog meters. You can choose 7.5, 15 and 30 i.p.s.. The modes have the corresponding head bumps built in. There are four types of tape machine and four different tape formulations. You can add hiss in stereo. (how quaint.) There is also bias control and hi and low EQ. There is nothing digital in this unit.

The ATS-1 models up to four types of tape machine and up to four types of analog recording tape. Machine and tape formula changes are done by SIMM cards. The unit ships with Quantegy GP9 and Ampex 456.

Applications include tracking in front of A/D converters and mastering to achieve a more analog sound.




Pendulum Audio
Not far away was Greg Gualtieri's Pendulum Audio with racks of analog and tube-based gear. Shown here from top to bottom are:

The Class A OCL-2, Electro-Optical, Vacuum Tube Compressor Limiter.

The Class A ES-8 Remote Cutoff Tube Limiter.

The Class A 6386 Remote Cutoff Tube Limiter.

The PL-2 JFET/MOSFET Two-Channel Brickwall Peak limiter.


DS-500
Several other Pendulum pieces caught my eye. Gualtieri has broken out the De-esser from his Quartet Tube Recording Channel and made it available in the API 500 format as the DS-500.

Pendulum SPS-1
There are many ways to record acoustic instruments with pickups. The Pendulum SPS-1 is a two-channel rack unit that offers an impressive array of controls.

I've been very happy with the K&K Pure Western Mini in my D-28S Martin and my Martin Grand J-28LSE baritone with D-TAR Wavelength pickup and mic, using vintage Groove Tube Brick and Ditto, tube direct boxes, or the instrument input of my Millennia Media STT-1, but this gear does spark my interest. That's all for now, but there's a lot more to come. Please stay tuned and subscribe to this blog.

Doesn't appear to be too much for one post. Also, you site formatting totally blows on my Android phone. 1 letter per line. Totally unreadable. Thanks Johnkenn for putting a properly formatted post (of basically magazine content).

Hey man, most people have the courtesy to not show up on a site and not just post a link to their own site, but rather start a conversation on the site they're at.

I looked beyond that and clicked the link to your site. This is what I see...

imgur.com/951ilaT

Thankfully, John posted the full text so we could read it. Beyond that, I just read some specs and about page info. Nothing hard hitting or insightful, just some basic magazine speak (which I assume might be helpful in getting some sponsors/demo/endorsement gear for your personal blog).

Give us some personal experience. How did the Samar ribbon sound? Was the active version better than the one you currently have to demo? Anything lost with the active electronics? How about the centerpiece from RND? We can all read the specs on their site. How about some objective opinion on the sound?

Don't give me some back handed remark about my AES info when you provided no substance and spammed this site with a link to yours. I could provide some specs and basic info too, without even attending.

Yeah, so you got nothing.

I was welcomed when I began posting some months ago. I been doing this a while; 25 years or so. You won't be the first rude hot head I've run into, just the first one on this site. We can leave it that way or move on, I don't really care.

I have the VL37 here and I heard both of them on the floor. I guess you've never been to an AES show. If you had, you'd know there's no way to get any good impressions on a floor full of noise. I would have thought they taught you that at Berklee. Would you do try it at Chan's during a show? Well maybe you would.

When you find out who peed in your Wheaties, be sure to let us all know.

Apparently I'm not alone in disliking the spammy attempt to get traffic to your site.

If I tried a piece of gear at Chan's and though it was worthy of a post, I would tell you my impressions based on the context of the scenario.

I'm the resident "Dick" here  , I welcomed you, and you've stopped in here 2wice in 6 months to do nothing more than link your site, and it's super lame! Jess is a top notch dude, and real member here, you should probably take that condescending attitude and hike.

Happy holidays 8)

Look man...I don't mind people coming and pimping every once in a while...hey - I'd like to get more hits too...but you haven't really contributed much and then come in and link your blog to take people off this site? Just kind of uncool.

But maybe I'm over-reacting. I saw it and kind've rolled my eyes...but then I got two PM's saying it was pretty lame. And honestly, I kind of agree.

Because we thought you bring something to the party, instead you come to our party just to get people to your party, if we have google for that!

OK

I'm just posting to ask what a banana nose is..

I think it's cool you write this stuff but posting the content or even the first paragraph along with the link would have been the fair thing to do. Most people don't pimp themselves hard here even after substantial contribution and we've got people doing tracking and mixing services, selling gear, selling plugins, selling music etc. etc.

And, checking my archives, I found that M71 review!

Perestroika Mics Deliver Neumann Sound

Ty Ford, Baltimore, MD

When it was announced earlier this year that Sennheiser had acquired
Neumann, many questions were raised about the future of the
distinguished Neumann line of microphones. One of the most important
questions for Gotham Audio (now Gotham Technology Group) in New York
was, "What Next"? After all, Gotham had been the long-time distributor
for Neumann.

Microtech Gefell
I got my answer from Gotham's Jerry Graham at the most recent AES
convention in New York. Gotham has made arrangements with Microtech
Gefell of East Germany, to distribute three microphones that were
originally designed by Georg Neumann, but that have been "lost" behind the
German Wall. The UM 70S ($1150), UM 70 ($995) and M71 ($795) are all
priced under the $2200-$2400 to which Neumann mics have been raised
within the last year or so.

Positioned as the "Perestroika Microphones", the mics are built with
Neumann's M7 large diameter dual membrane capsule. In case you're
thinking that this is just another noisey "old technology mic" trying to
hang on in a digital world, you're wrong. The mic's internal amplifier
system has an FET input stage coupled to a hybrid amplifier specially built
for the M7 capsule and requires phantom power. Both mics I tested were
plenty quiet.

THE NEUMANN SOUNDPRINT
While the price, heritage and technical evolution of these mics are
important, the big question is, "What do they sound like?" Having heard my
own voice on many different high quality mics over the years, I knew I
was speaking into a Neumann the instant I heard myself in the headphones.
If you know the sound, you know what I'm talking about.

I arranged for a evaluation session with Louis Mills at Flite Three in
Baltimore. Again the sound of these mics was immediately recognizable as
Neumann. Even with the typical EQ changes Mills applied to bring out the
voice a bit more, the Neumann soundprint was evident, which brings me to
an important point.

PROBLEMS
A few years back, before the economy began to wither, a lot of radio
stations replaced their dynamic mics with Neumann TLM 170, U87 or U89
mics. I've heard from a number of these people who were ultimately
disappointed with the performance of these mics. They complained that
these mics weren't bright enough, that they sounded bad when worked
"close", and that they picked up everything in the room, including aging
cart machine bearings and air conditioner noise.

SOLUTIONS
Part of the close-working problem was that the high output of these mics
was overdriving the mic preamp. Complaints about lack of brightness came
from situations where the mics were just plugged into the board without
any EQ. I think a lot of radio station people saw the aforementioned mics
being used to record voice at recording studios and assumed that all they
had to do was plug them in to the console. Bad assumption.

The rule for this kind of operation is very simple, any time you work a
close mic using a large diameter condenser mic with a cardioid pattern,
you're going to have to roll off the low frequencies that are picked up
when you're that close to the mic. Most engineers also peak the 3KHz to
6KHz a few dB, which allows the voice track to cut through better.

I'm not suggesting that you'll be happy just plugging the UM 70S in without
EQ, but I was happy with the sound without EQ on both my voice and
another voice. Both mics have a richness in the lower midrange (part of
the Neumann soundprint) that gave my voice a cross between power and
presence, without the "boominess" most mics create by having too much
bottom.

Incidentally, the next time you compare mics for voice-over work, try
each one over the same selection of music beds. Both Microtech Gefell
mics I worked with sounded, less "beefy" and not as bright as some typical
voice-over mics, but that extra energy in their lower midrange really does
put your voice "out front". In fact, working with these mics has changed
my entire approach to voice EQ. Like a lot of people, I typically mess with
the 100Hz-200Hz and 3KHz-5KHz ranges. These mics taught me that there
is a lot of power in the 800Hz-2KHz range that I had overlooked.

PATTERNS
The M 71 is a fixed pattern cardioid. The UM 70 and the UM 70S are three-
pattern switchable; omni, bi-directional and cardioid. The slightly more
expensive UM 70S is a bit quieter version of the UM 70. The omni pattern
has very good polar response, with the high frequencies dipping only
slightly at thirty to fifty degrees off-axis. The bi-directional pattern has
great nulls and very uniform frequency response from front to back. All
three mics have -10dB pad and bass roll-off switches. The MKV 8
swivel/stand adapter and the WS 86 acoustic foam wind and pop screen
come with each mic. All three mics are shipped in classy little foam lined
wooden boxes.

Gotham strongly suggests that you use their three-conductor, double
reusen layer shielded cable. Although I had no problems at my studio with
my own cables, using the house cables at another nearby studio turned the
mic and cable into a great R.F. noise antenna. Switching to Gotham's cables
eliminated the problem. Gotham makes these cables in black, red, yellow,
green, blue and gray. A ten foot cable with XLR connectors runs $25.00,
with twenty-five and fifty foot extensions at $35.00 and $45.00
respectively.

The EA25 elastic suspension ($125) is optional, $100 if you order it with
the mic. Reaching in through the cat's cradle of elastic bands to close the
clasp took a little getting used to. Orthodontists should have no trouble
with it.

The proof is in the product. I'm currently using these mics on my voice for
radio spots which run from Boston to Richmond, and on other voices in the
Baltimore/Washington area. I use more than the average amount of clean,
high-speed compression and limiting. The soundprint remains
recognizable. You owe it to yourself to hear these mics. For more
information contact GPrime at (212) 765-3410.

Ty Ford may be reached at www.tyford.com

If we were facebook friends, you'd already know that.

I think BOTH parties are entirely corrupted by big, dark, corporate money. I think the majority of house and senate members are so beholden to these corporations that got them elected by campaign contributions or other manipulations, that we, the people, don't have a fucking chance.

I think Citizens United is the devil incarnate and how the Supreme Court allowed their existence casts major shade on the members of that entire fucking bench.

I think that if you have any allegiance to either party that you have probably been drinking the Kool Aid too long.

I think the "Clown Car" republican party primary candidates are pathetic. What a hilariously dismal thing the Grand Old Party has become.

I think the only clear winner in the democratic race is Bernie Sanders. Can he get done what needs to be done? I don't know, but he's the only one not talking crazy.

Hillary? Please, God, no!

That's about it.