Julian Rodgers  Welcome to the Sound on Sound recording and mixing podcast channel. My name's Julian Rodgers. In this episode, we'll be discussing approaches to creating a hybrid studio, by which we mean studios which try to combine the best of software based in-the-box approaches with external hardware. Joining us today, we have Gareth Young and Chevy One. Chevy is an award-winning producer and composer. He's built a two decade career across records, global brands and music technology. Operating a modern hybrid studio, he balances analogue commitment with digital flexibility. Recent work includes Ikea's, latest National Swedish campaign and product leadership at All Our Minds. Gareth Young is the owner of Cube Recording Studios, a residential studio in Cornwall where he's worked with clients such as The xx, Tom Misch and Sam Ryder. Gareth has recently co-written and produced Tom Meighan’s Top 20 debut solo album, The Reckoning and as a writer / producer, he’s co-written and produced hits for the Sugarbabes, Appleton, Dannii Minogue, Ronan Keating and All Saints to name a few. Welcome both. Gareth Young Good afternoon, sir. Chevy One Good afternoon. 01:07 - Julian Rodgers Excellent. So, jumping straight in on the hybrid thing, Chevy, do you wanna open this up? What does that mean to you? Chevy One Well for me, if I need to describe it in one phrase, it will be hybrid is about choosing where to place friction and I know this might sounds very, I don't know… Julian Rodgers Philosophical? Chevy One Philosophical is the way, but to me that is sort of like a staple of how a build, what I call a hybrid setup to me it's more of a better definition because hybrid studio could be many things, but hybrid setup and you know, when you can sort of like blend the analogue for commitment and decisions and you know, digital is great for, you know, scale and precision and you know, be able to recall large sessions. That's, you know, that to me in a nutshell is what, you know, is what hybrid really means now, you know, mixing on the box, printing through analogue, all that kind of stuff. Julian Rodgers Excellent. So I mean, correct me if I've got this wrong, but what I'm hearing is that for you it's a workflow approach and not making things too easy all of the time, would that be fair? Chevy One Not making, well here's the thing, I do a lot of R&D with my equipment. Like every single place needs to own the place in the studio. So I will, you know, if I have a piece that I haven't used it for time and it doesn't, you know, sort of like go with the workflow that you know, of what my clients want or when I need to do a project, then that normally tends to go. Julian Rodgers Gareth, I mean, kind of same question. The difference I draw here is that I don’t know Chevy’s studio, I know yours. You've got lots and lots of very nice outboard but why is it there? Gareth Young I think it's because I'm old, let's start with that. Julian Rodgers That was a good answer. Gareth Young Yeah. I mean, I am very much from the, you know, the days of tape machines going into early computers and having a desk was always a thing. It was never not anywhere, so I've sort of continued that across the studios, I mean we have consoles in all the studios. Some are more hybrid than the others, but for me it's just capturing the best quality on the way in and making decisions on the way in, is still something that I do rather than, you know, just leave it until later or try and do it in the box afterwards. So for me, it's mainly a tracking situation, is when I still use the analogue equipment on the way in. Julian Rodgers Hold that thought because we'll definitely return there. Returning to something that you just said about consoles, you have three rooms at Cube? Gareth Young Yeah. Julian Rodgers And you have a console in, do you still have a console in all of them? Gareth Young Actually no, the third room we don't have a console currently, we’ve got an Apollo set up. Julian Rodgers Yeah, you did have what, it was an AWS wasn't it? Gareth Young Yeah. Julian Rodgers And while we're here, what in each room, because I'm sure people… Gareth Young OK, so the main room has a SSL Origin 32-channel which is great, absolutely fabulous and then the room I'm in now, which is our studio B, has an Eve 8424, which is the one that doesn't have the mic inputs, or has a couple and then mostly line, and then the third room is an Apollo-based system now, so there's no desk in there as such, it’s just a monitor controller. Julian Rodgers Excellent, OK. Chevy, do you have a console? Chevy One Well funny enough I've just put it up for sale, my actual console, I mean, I've always have one of the Audient 32-channel summing console, a bit of a, again, hybrid system where I had eight microphone inputs, you know, 16 summing inputs but it has been very hard for me to let go of a console because I like the tactile control and it also works digitally. You know, you can use a protocol that it can work with Logic, which is my main DAW and then, you know, everything is very seamless. Great control room, talk back, all the good things that I actually like from my console. But time has changed and now I'm seeing myself working into a different workflow and I had to let it go. I actually took it away two weeks ago and it's been very hard, I must say. It's actually been very hard, but I'm kind of like adapting quickly because times are evolving, I don't want to tap into that conversation, but everyone knows what I'm talking about so, but yeah, I do agree with what Gary said to me as well, it's all about printing, catching the moment and you know, a method, what is like, if it sounds good now, don't think it like oh no no, I'm gonna turn off that compressor or no, I don't want to have that boost on the top end, it sounds beautiful because I might do it later on the computer and I'm like, that's just the wrong approach. Something sounds nice, just leave it, live with it because it's music and I think, you know, and this could be again, open more doors, but I think we live in an era where it's like endless tweakability and a lot of wrong information going around that it's just, people often forget that it's still music and music has never changed from like a hundred, a hundred in years, but every time that I go on the internet, I see someone that actually think he has rediscovered something by tweaking the compressor like this, or by doing this or by new method that's gonna change and I always keep thinking, if your music on itself ain't good, it doesn't matter what you do and I always make emphasis from that, but that sounds a bit like, I don't know, it sounds like you will be of an old man by saying these things, but I'm like, well, but that's the reality, you know? I mean, you can't change that, you can't change, you know, music is a language, it's a form of art and if we divert into many different things, then we sort of like moving away from the main point, which is like, does it sound good in the first place? Julian Rodgers Oh, a point that has to be made at some time because yes, I think everyone's going to agree that if you've got a killer recording with fantastic takes, then why would you do anything to it later? Yes, absolutely. That's interesting. Chevy, is your studio public facing in terms of kind of, do you receive clients there or is it just in your workspace? You do? Chevy One Oh yeah. 07:31 - Julian Rodgers OK, we should return to this. Gareth, I've spoken to you about this before and you think that a proper recording studio experience for a client kind of ought to involve having a big console in the room, is that paraphrasing you too much. Gareth Young Well, remember I've been here for 20 odd years and you know, that was definitely a thing. I think, you know, as we move forward, the idea of a big room is less and less on TikTok or on Instagram anymore and it's more computer based, you know and so I don't know if it is as important as it used to be for getting clients through the door, but I do think that for my client base, we need to offer what they can't get at home and that's always been the thing. So yeah, I think for us, you know, the SSL badge and the Neve badge is still a door-opener and gets people to look at our studio. Julian Rodgers There is a benefit beyond purely having the console available to you for the workflow, yes. Gareth Young Yeah, there's a commercial element in terms of, you know, as I say, offering people what they haven't got at home and what they can't do on, you know, an Apollo or whatever. 08:43 - Julian Rodgers Which is a lot, it has to be said, but yeah, absolutely. Which brings us to the subjects of control surfaces. Do you both own and use control surfaces, if so what and how? I think I know some of the answers to this, but please, Gareth. Gareth Young So the Neve 8424 that I have does have the automation on it. I did pay extra for that to get it and I absolutely love it, to be fair. Do I use it enough, probably not but when I do use it, I always enjoy using it. I've also got SSL UF8 somewhere here, but I don't know where that is. That one seems to have just been put in a box somewhere but I do have one somewhere, not for any other reason apart from the fact that Ross, my main engineer who is in the SSL room most of the time doesn’t, he just does it all on a mouse because that's, you know, that's his thing, so it just wasn't getting used, so we moved it out and put a couple of compressors in here instead so, but yeah, the 8424 is, I like it because it feels really solid in terms of the fader movements, it doesn't feel flimsy, it doesn't feel, you know, so it does actually feel like more of a big console automation feeling, you know. So yes, I do use it. Again, probably not enough, but I do use it because you know, the mouse is still probably the quickest way to get to what you need to do. Julian Rodgers Oh OK, because this is kind of breaking with the answer that I hear more often than not, which is about the benefits of at least having physical faders available to you during a mix. Well I mean, Chevy, where do you stand on the faders versus mouse relative merits debate? Chevy One OK, so I've took the subject to very, very, very far because I've been looking for a very stable solution for many years because I agree with Gareth you know, the mouse on the keyboard is just so fast. It's so fast, I can actually solve any problems that you want. Now I call this issue for example, let's say I love to have a console, but my projects can be 180 to 200 tracks. I don't think that is physically possible with a console. It's just simply, it's not - sound design, music production, modern production composition. It's just the amount of channels and different nuances that need to be with different sounds and then duplicating a track and then having different plug-ins, so you want have that effect and you want to reverse it that sort of like, it start to create channels and as I say, a normal production after recording all vocals and backings and all the, you know, bells and whistles can, as I say, up to 200 tracks. If I need to manage that, even if it's on groups on an analogue console, for me it's just not possible after, I mean don't get me wrong, I've tried. So besides the mouse on the keyboard, I found one solution that it sort of like gives me, again, the best of both worlds and I'm not trying to be any sort of like, oh, he says this brand or the other brand, but I'm a huge fan of Console 1. I’ve got one and I use it every single day because I wanted something that it could be a one single software, one single plug-in where I can just control it without even looking at it. So it's a basic channel, you know, SSL channel strip and then you have your EQ, your compressor and he also controls Logic volume and pan and faders and it's always in front of me and that for me has been the best solution. So I don't have to have faders, but if I wanna control something, either volume, distortion, it’s right in front of me and it's always, you know, one button does one thing and that has for me really changed my perspective. So after I end up getting rid of my desk. Julian Rodgers Yes Console 1, great product and really well spoken of. The thing that I certainly have heard people enjoy most about it is its dedicated nature of doing one thing really, really well, rather than trying to do everything possibly less well. Would you agree with that, Chevy? Chevy One Oh, no, totally. I mean, think about something, have you not ever, I don't know, maybe years ago when we used to move from analogue to digital, I've heard a lot of people be like oh, I would love to have one channel strip that can control everything on my DAW. So I can just select Channel 25 and then I can have my cue. My sense that if I had one pound every single time I talk to a producer that told me that, this is about, you know, 15 or more years ago, maybe 20 years ago, I was like yeah and now someone finally goes and does it pretty well and not only that, you're not limited. And again, I'm not, you know, I mean probably I'm big enough soft to you but you know, the fact that you can actually swap the plug-ins, like you simply go like oh no, but you know, the SSL is not my kind of plug-in, no problem, Fabfilter, no problem. Plugin Alliance is an open platform. Julian Rodgers Well I mean, and it's true. It has expanded out but to begin with, it was like very, very focused and it was, I think it was only SSL in the first iteration but yes, doing one thing very well. And there are other examples I could talk about, but yeah, there's a lot to be said for that. However, what I want to do is, I mean, we're talking about having equipment that does one thing very well and this kind of could link quite neatly to outboard just because I mean, over and over again we're talking about, you know, specific pieces of outboard that do one thing extremely well, very often on very similar material. It's like I have this compressor because I really like it on bass, I have this compressor because I really like it on, you know, insert name of source here, you know. Gareth, you've got a lot of outboard. Gareth Young Too much. 14:53 - Julian Rodgers Perusing your racks when I've been at your studio, but does that sound familiar to you, of just kind of like OK, I have this particular kind of instrument, here's what I would try first if I want to give it some particular… Gareth Young Yeah I mean, I think we've all got our go-to channels and compressors for certain things. I mean I have a lot of the, should we say standard stuff, you know, the LA2A and the 1176’s but then also I've got some BAE stuff and I've got a Fairchild finally, which is lovely, or POMchild I should say, not Fairchild, to clarify. Julian Rodgers We circle back to that, yeah, so keep going. Gareth Young So yeah, I mean I have a lot of different mic pre’s, a lot of different variants on that. I mean,I think that is something that I got a bit carried away with when I was you know, just too many late nights looking at eBay and just you know, buying stuff and seeing what it was like but you know, there's been a couple of where… Julian Rodgers Any particular finds that, because I mean you know, we can go to kind of like yes, you know 1073’s are great on, I mean, we kind of, we know a lot of the usual candidates but anything that perhaps people haven’t heard of? Gareth Young There's a company called Peach Audio, I don’t know if you've come across them and they do a stereo… Julian Rodgers I think I was around when you bought that, but tell… Gareth Young Yeah, that thing, I mean that was a, to be honest with you, SX Pro just sent it to me randomly when they, you know, and it just arrived and they were very clever because they knew what was gonna happen and so I just used it for a couple of days and I just thought this is great. Julian Rodgers Describe what it is because not everyone… Gareth Young I mean it's a two channel mic pre but it's just super-vibey in its sound and it's just got a lot of extra controls on it where you can saturate things a little bit and you can… Julian Rodgers And it's a tube thing with VU’s and that's right, isn't it? Gareth Young Yeah, yeah. Julian Rodgers Kind of mauve-y colour, I seem to remember. Gareth Young That's it, yeah. But I think they're Australian. Julian Rodgers What have you found that that's particularly… Gareth Young It's really good on drums, overheads and also I use it a lot on acoustic guitars and I mean it’s a general, it's a good workhorse generally but it just has, it's very fast you know, it sort of brings things to the foreground quite a lot. Julian Rodgers Oh okay, that's not a word you usually associate with the valve gear. Gareth Young No, exactly, which is why I think it's stayed in the rack and it’s been there ever since, you know. Julian Rodgers Interesting. And you've also got some Undertone Audio pre’s, which I've always thought were rather good. Gareth Young Yep, amazing. Julian Rodgers Anything specific to say about those? Gareth Young They're always on drums, always on drums. Yeah, always. Yeah, there's those. I'm just trying to think what's in my rack now because I forget some of the times. Julian Rodgers That's okay. I mean we could, while you're thinking about that, we could go to Chevy. I mean similarly do you, you know, concur with any of what Gareth was saying, any thoughts on where to use your available analogue gear and how? Chevy One Well I mean, it's great that you asked me because I had a sort of like a reconnection with a person that sadly died in 2025, which is Ted Fletcher and I've been digging into it and I've rediscovered one of his latest creations, which is the Tfpro Studio Channel P1, which is very, very hard to find. I need to say this man was a legend, Ted Fletcher was the actual guy who built all the analogue consoles for the BBC and obviously you know, he knew a thing or two about analogue signal and especially about optical compressors. So if you ever come across one of the Ted Fletcher products, especially one of the latest ones, which he kind of like separated from the old Joe Meek and then he sort of like made a bit of a mastering sort of like line. Then you can find that he's got an optical compressor with five different types of variable knee. I don't have to say more, but that's kind of like having five different types of Opto compressors, of how to react to material. So you end up testing stuff and then you'll be like, I think this is incredible for you know, for vocals and some acoustic guitars and then you try all the different things. I mean I do have as well, not as much as Gareth because you know, we've all been at Gareth’s and then Gareth is like you know, impressive. But as I say, every single piece in my studio, which if anyone wants to know I can go through, but maybe this is for another time. I do like the analogue and I especially like to find the tools that work with the, you know, with certain material. I mean, we all know that 1176 could be used on so many different things, you know. We also know the, you know, different compressors might benefit different type of sources. But again I tend to test those myself and make my own decisions. I mean I like what the overall public might sense about oh, you should always use this, but then it's still always classic what I call my R&D sessions where I test things on things people might not think of and then you get some eureka moments. Julian Rodgers This is something that I certainly think is a potential pitfall for, because of the wealth of information we have available online, to assimilate other people's opinions without ever trying them and that's what you're saying, isn't it, of like yes, it's not exactly news that 1176 is great on drums, for example, but if you really experiment, they're pretty good on most things. Chevy One Yeah, they're pretty good on most of, but I keep saying this, I always try to catch people with things, especially when people sort of like talk the usual you know, what I call the overall knowledge that you can find on the internet. You know, I mean the purpose why the 1176 units were made were to prevent the signal to clip into tape machines. Now, nowadays, I don't see people sort of like recreate, only a few producers I've seen recreate down this software world. So it's kind of like, okay, if we really want to know what is the actual purpose, what was the purpose of a legendary hardware made for, well the best thing is just go back research and then be like well, this hardware machine was built for purpose and this is one of the things doesn't happen on software because software is like The Matrix, anything could be turned into whatever you want, a river can turn into a chorus or it can turn into this. Okay I understand, you know, software sometimes trying to solve problems but back in the day you know, hardware was built to actually solve an actual problem. They weren't thinking about all the things this happened with the Pultec, this happened with the, you know, with 1176. I mean, it happened with many different machines that we had and I don't even want to go into limit mode from the LA2A because people are looking at me like, are you crazy, you know what I mean. But all these sorts of thing for me is very important that people really, truly educate themselves, do a bit of reading, understand why the tools that we have around ourselves exist in a studio and like, you know, like someone like Gareth, you know, it's the perfect example. You ask him, I need to recall this, and you go, bla, you need to use this. Why, because he’s… Gareth Young Don't include me. Chevy One Yeah, well I mean you being on that area where it's like, you know, when you have a studio then it was certain pieces for whatever reason, for economical, you know, or simply because certain things weren't invented. And I do believe that the good things that the hardware does is like, it limits yourself and when you limit yourself, creativity expands, which it doesn't happen with the digital one anyway. Gareth Young Yeah that's true. Julian Rodgers Yeah, well said indeed. Something that's, I mean, taking what you said possibly a little further is that some hardware is an investment in a way that software isn't and because of that, you're very motivated to try to get as much out of it as you can. I know that I have been and for example, I haven't got a great deal of, you know, really good hardware, but one thing I have got is a BAE 1073, like a dual channel one and I've used that getting everything I can out of it because the thing was expensive, I want to use it. Good examples are, I mean obviously you can attenuate it and drive the transformers really hard and use it as a saturation box, which is, you know, doesn't take a lot of figuring out. Something else that I've used it for is because of the inductor high pass filters, which you can set differently on either channel, you can offset them out of the way down low where they're not really doing anything but you can get really interesting stereo spread things because of the different phase response on each channel for example. I could do that in software so easily, but it feels more valuable if you’re doing it in hardware, you know. 23:24 - Julian Rodgers Gareth, we should bring you in on this because somewhere where we see a lot of activity with outboard and hybrid approaches is either on the way nor the way out. So how and where do you use your hardware on play… Gareth Young In a mix situation? Julian Rodgers Yeah. Gareth Young I mean, this is one of those things where I'd love to use it a lot more than I do. I have currently got, as I said, this Fairchild that I've got, I’ve currently got that locked against as an insert on my master bus in this room, but everything else, it’s just the whole, you know, the recall and trying to work on 15 projects at once and coming back to, you know, I mean, I don't know how you find it Chevy, but I find one of the downsides of Logic is if you keep going back into the same mix page, things change. Whatever happens, it doesn't, for me, it's, I don't like that element of recall as a maximum you know, in terms of, so putting analogue in the way as well, it's just gonna make the job take longer. So most of the time I don't use much in the mix stage. When I do, I really enjoy it and you know it's the things that, I do use the summing on the Neve a lot because that is much easier to control and to recall, but in terms of actual strapping compressors across things, I might do it now and again but it's not something that I do with software unfortunately, or fortunately wins in that sense because like I saw, I've got loads of presets I've made up on my own channels and my own you know, things that I recall and then work from there generally. Julian Rodgers Okay. There's a word beginning with R that's looming around, which we should get to in a minute but before we do, Chevy, in terms of mix processing, group processing, anything on buses, is there much going on in the analogue domain for you? Chevy One Oh yeah. Everything in my line of work is on the master output, so as I say, I will track with hardware and capture what I want with the hardware in, that is for me is a must, I don't play that game anymore so you know, as Gary said, if it sounds good then you know, you record it with your EQ, compressions, all that stuff, fantastic, let's do that and, but then on the way out when I reach to a level of the project where everyone is happy with the compositions and I wanna take this to my sort of like fill, it could be a composition you know, the creative team goes like okay, this been approved and it's like okay, it's time now to give the high risk version, the version that everyone goes like, oh my God, what have you done with this? So that's the time I, in my master bus, I process through a, I don't know, can I get into details? Well, I'll do it easy. Julian Rodgers No, do. Think of the audience, I'm sure someone listening is gonna wanna know what you're using. Chevy One So my thing is always two types of EQ, two types of compressor and a summing and then a mastering limiter. So I have got a Elysia xfilter and I've got then an IGS Rubber Band, which is kind of like you know, passive EQ. So I will do the adjustments with the xfilter which is, then I would then colour the signal with the IGS and then you know, to give a different colour. So one is sort of like to control what's coming out of the master output, the other one is to colour the master output. Then I'll have a very clean compressor like the xpressor from Elysia as well and then is when it goes to either a classic SSL XLogic, SSL, the G Bus, the classic one, nothing new, transformer-less but it’s got sound and then it goes to a couple of transformers. I'm a big fan of Cranborne Audio, the Summing Mixer they’ve got on the added equipment is incredibly good, it’s incredibly modern compared to my Audient desk. The low end is very, you gotta be careful sometimes, like I've tried in acoustic material and then suddenly it's too, the mid range is too forward and people go like no, I don't like that, but for modern music it's incredibly well, like suddenly the kick drum, the bass is right on your face, very well controlled. And then I go through a Bettermaker Mastering Limiter. Julian Rodgers Oh right, okay. Is that things that you are bringing in and out, not necessarily using all of that? Chevy One No, no, no. They always all go in that sort of like chain. Julian Rodgers And I'm saying clean followed by colour, clean followed by colour kind of combination. Chevy One Yes, that seems to be, although I have seen some projects where I just press a bypass and it goes like oh, it sounds better without it. I'm like easy with that, but you know, I must say that since I got this unit, it's been a while, it's been a learning curve and it's been a learning curve because you know, an 1176 and an Opto compressor, recording stuff is very easy to tweak, it’s just, you just tweak and it's just only one, it's only one sound, it’s either bass, a guitar, a vocal, but when you have an entire mix going through then how you approach a compressor to an EQ, it's been a very, very enjoyable learning curve and so far when I deliver the mixes, people were like what have you done and I'm like well, this is what I want you know, this is what for me, what it works. But again I don’t, my line of work is different than Gareth. Gareth needs to recall full bands, I don't do full bands, but we can tap into the type of sort of like clients that we have but that's a different thing. So I understand where Gareth is coming from with his way of doing. I mean, we both know how busy his studio is. Imagine having to change. Julian Rodgers Yeah, of course, of course. So I mean this, we might as well go there just because I mean, I referred earlier to kind of like, you know, getting sounds right on the way in. Maybe getting them right on the way out again is achievable using a hybrid approach, but things get much more difficult. The downsides get multiplied, should we put it that way. Are either of you ever using your analogue gear as inserts on tracks in projects? Gareth Young On Pro Tools or Logic, is that what you mean? Julian Rodgers Yeah, yeah, yeah. Gareth Young Yeah, I mean I do that, I definitely do that. I don't do it as much as I should do it. Again, I think that in the future, I think that when it's just me sat in my new, you know, garden studio, I think I probably would have a much more set up where things were patched and much more accessible but again, because we are a commercial studio and we're having to use things, the patchbay has to be accessible and I can't have stuff hard wired into certain inserts on interfaces and things like that. I think for me that that's probably one of the reasons why I don't use it as much as I probably would do. Does that make sense? Julian Rodgers So this is a good point actually, we haven't discussed that. So your gear, is that all patched up to a patchbay? Gareth Young Everything in all the studios is just on a conventional patch bay, yeah so, which makes it, and the rooms are patched together as well, so you can record stuff. Julian Rodgers And given what the work you do, that does make sense. So in your studio Chevy, patchbay? Are you manual patching? Chevy One Yeah, yeah. I've got patchbays and well, I mean, the funny thing is like when I sort of like moved from London to, to Hertfordshire to build this new studio where I am, I had a different sort of like idea of what the clientele was gonna be and then over the two years I realised like okay, well you know I just, this is not what I thought it was gonna be and I've been adapting, but not in a bad way. So I've got pretty much everything that you need in here to sort of like you know, looms and I got patchbays and you know, everything is sort of like patchable because it's the right way. I mean again, I'm a bit old school into all this. If you have another equipment, the best way to patch it and mix it together is to have a patchbay. To me like not having a patchbay is like, I don't know. Julian Rodgers Although what I mean, I suppose the point I'm getting to is that yes, having a way of patching is important if you need flexibility, but you're not just limited to the choice of old school manual patch fields these days. For example, I know people who use Dante as as a huge digital patchbay, but there are a digital you know, software recallable patchbay solutions for people who want to go there as well, but neither of you seem to do that. Gareth Young And I'd like to go there to be fair, but I think I will end up there in the future. 31:46 - Julian Rodgers Right, okay. It might solve some of the issues which, right, we should bring things in. We've kept a hard division so far between there is software and there is hardware, but things get a little bit muddled in the middle. For example recallable hardware, examples I don’t know, like WesAudio, your Bettermaker, that kind of gear, isn't it. Chevy One Yeah, fully recordable. I mean it's still the version one, it's not the sort of like latest version two, but it's kind of like, it's fully recallable. You open the plug-in and it's just so, so easy to recall. I'm making presets and it's kind of like a beast. Like I didn't know, I never thought that a mastering limiter was going to be this good. Julian Rodgers Did you buy it for that feature? Chevy One Yes. It's kind of like the last thing on the whole chain for a reason because I'm not gonna lie you know, sometimes I need to finish a mix for a client and I'm, in my head I'm thinking, I need to tweak this, I need to tweak that, I need to tweak that. And I'm not gonna lie, put it through, add a bit of the, some of like the different type of distortions that it has and it sort of like, it makes everything, the transient response of the track, everything gets together and then I'm like okay, this is, it's just done quicker than I thought that was gonna be, so you investing money in something that is gonna get your, you know, your turnover faster, which is one of the things I forgot to sort of like mention earlier but something I said, Gareth, when he said about the, you know, he thinks about I'll be amazing, have my room and then, you know, tweak all these things and be able to insert the stuff but the reality is that we haven't talked here, is the client willing to pay for that extra time, because that is one of the things you know, I'm more than happy if someone comes to me and goes like hey Chevy for the drum bus I want you to dial in the Bettermaker, or for that thing can you bring the SSL. I'll happily do that, I’ll definitely happily do that. But you can’t do that when someone goes like, I need to get the two tracks done by tomorrow. Julian Rodgers Yeah, yeah. Agreed. Any recallable hardware at Cube Gareth? Gareth Young No not, no, unfortunately not. We're still old school. I mean apart from the desk obviously. Julian Rodgers There's the other approach which is I mean for example, the McDSP APB, which has got, you know, very much a software forward but still analogue process. Chevy One Amazing stuff, that's amazing stuff. Julian Rodgers Okay, have you tried one Chevy? Chevy One No. I mean I've tried in NAMM and you know, different sort of like trade shows, but I haven't actually you know, sort of like had one of them myself. I was very excited when they actually released a, you know, proper brick wall limiter, which I was very willing to sort of like have a listen. Obviously the price tag is there but I think the public is not there yet. It's one of these amazing products where the plug-ins are incredible, they come up with a groundbreaking product and with this, probably a lot of people are gonna hate me, but we’re living in an era where the software is sort of like not moving forward as much and that's not a bad thing. All I'm saying is like, it keeps coming with the same thing over and over with extra features like oh, now it’s the SSL EQ but it's an intelligent EQ and I'm like whoa, but it's still an SSL EQ and all these kind of things where the guys have McDSP, they went really forward and I think it's about the public to actually catch up how the good product they have. I mean, is pretty amazing. Julian Rodgers Yeah, it is a great product. I haven't met anyone who's used one much who doesn't love it, so that probably says something. So yeah, we've kind of filled in the middle ground if you like, between strictly analogue and strictly software. Something I think, I mean Gareth, this is probably one for you because you said that, you know, you have all this hardware, but it's been kind of squeezed out by recall, which we still haven't confronted head on, although referred to it in passing a few times. Recall is the thing, would you agree, that's really pressured these analogue workflows out of studios and workflows? Gareth Young Yeah I mean you know, today, this morning, we've had three mix amend requests you know, for different projects come in on email already today and you know, for things that we've done a week ago, a month ago, six months ago, whatever, so to try and recall and do those without being able to do it in the box would be you know they just, again it comes back to what Chevy said, the clients just aren't gonna, if you just said yeah, that's great, it's gonna take six hours or you know, whatever it is, they're just gonna be no, so we have to… Julian Rodgers And leaving a piece of paper on top of the console saying mix in progress, do not touch isn't really viable for you these days. Gareth Young Yeah. And also trying to find a compressor setting from six months ago is just not gonna, it's just not a reality and you know, I think the recallable stuff is definitely the way forward for that you know and I've not had too much experience with it, but I can, you know, from what I've seen again at NAMM with you know, it's probably the way forward, but in terms of what we do here, the clients are booking in, you know, we get album projects, but we get a lot of day, two day, three day sort of sessions and you know, everyone wants to tweak a mix a week after they've had it, every single person. Nobody, you know, if you get it right on the first, then you know that's an exception rather than a rule. Julian Rodgers You must have an awful lot of emails that start, can you just. Gareth Young Yeah, can you just and can you not charge me for that, it’s like oh okay, yeah of course, yeah. So we have a very strict one amend policy and then after that they have to pay. Julian Rodgers Well that is a good thing. Gareth Young And you'd be surprised how many people would love that first amend and don't want anymore. Oh okay. 37:16 - Julian Rodgers Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I wanna bring it back to something that you said earlier Gareth, which is that you know, you've got all of this outboard but it's been squeezed out by just the reality of kind of you know, the work that you're doing. So have you got any examples of pieces of hardware that you have the hardware, but you are using a software version because of the convenience and workflow, like a one-to-one kind of thing. Do you have an SSL Bus Compressor, but you're using a software SSL Bus Compressor, that kind of thing? Gareth Young Yeah, exactly that. I mean again you know, we have a SSL Bus Compressor on the Origin that doesn't get used that much if I'm honest. Again, it gets used when we're tracking if you wanna just get a bit of you know, funk in the room and like make everyone feel a bit better and I've got some, you know I’ve got, I dunno, four 1176’s and a couple of LA2A’s, but I haven't got 10, which is what we end up using in a mix, you know? So for that reason they, you know, there is that and I do have bits of gear that you know, I often look at that I haven't switched on for two years but I'm like, I'm not getting rid of it because it's, you know, it's things that I do love and when I do switch it on again, I will love it, you know, so it's one of those, but… Julian Rodgers Is there a case, I mean, having stuff up to a certain point I mean it can get counterproductive but you know, if you've got room for it and it's not doing any harm being where it is, then you know, you might as well sit on it. We haven't really mentioned instruments and of course I mean particularly with virtual instruments, are you still using hardware instruments when viable software alternatives exist and have the advantages of recall and other things as well? Gareth Young In 2001, Jules, I had 18 synths and currently I have one Hammond. Oh no, I've got a Juno 106 aswell. So I mean, that sort of answers your question and I, but again I, you know, one of my regrets is getting rid of those keyboards just because I think that the real deal is definitely still the real deal. Julian Rodgers And there it is. A very wise friend of mine said to me, if you don't need stuff get rid of it, but keep instruments and I think there's something to be said for that. What about you Chevy? What about instruments? Chevy One Yeah, you know, I do have some regrets of things I've sold in the past and I actually, well I mean can I, I always like to bring another thing to the table but let's be honest, with some of the hardware, equipment, very specific pieces, they actually, this, if you think of money, they’re investment, like some pieces, like I want to keep the ones that will keep going higher in price over the years. I know it sound ridiculous but you know, there's not the same thing to be like oh, I'll buy something that costs £900 now and then it's gonna go down by 200 in you know, in a couple of years that oh look, I've got this amazing piece of this instrument you know, that I know over the period of time will go up in value or, that's one thing, right in terms of you know, money and all that. But the other one is, I had a lot of keyboards and I've sold a lot of keyboards and I still have some now, some of them that I will never, ever sell, like I'm a sampler guy so I still have an AKAI S1000, yeah. Fully love it and all retrofitted with all that kind of stuff. Julian Rodgers When did you last switch it on though? Chevy One Ooh, long time ago but you know what, when you come to the studio it looks great. Julian Rodgers Okay yeah, I can understand that. Chevy One Yeah and I still have the AKAI MPC 2000XL, which I still have here and that get quite used, especially when someone wants a bit of a nineties flavour and I'm a big fan of monophonic analogue synths as well, so I still have some pieces. But here's the thing, you know, I’m getting rid of the ones that are losing value and I'm going to invest in the ones that actually are good value. Julian Rodgers Okay. Chevy One Yeah, yeah. I would say that if you do have the money and you like instruments, definitely buy instruments because it holds value. Like, put it this way and I like economics a little bit, but if you're gonna have a thousand pounds in the bank and it's gonna devalue over the year of whatever, two years, rather buy a thousand pounds on an instrument that's gonna make you some percentage little down the way, so. Julian Rodgers You're talking to the guy who sold in Juno 106 for £250 in 2004, so you know. Chevy One It happens. It happens. Julian Rodgers Yeah, yeah, yeah, but I mean we've all had that. Well certainly I've had that painful experience of something that I bought new which then, you know, many years later, but it's happened to me relatively recently, gets released in plug-in form and I think, there's a lesson there. There's a lesson there. I haven't got that any more. Chevy One Yes it's not the same. Julian Rodgers Oh no, I just mean the fact that isn't there some kind of status that goes with this piece of hardware, there's a plug-in of it now which means that… Gareth Young Yeah, it means it's good or bad, or it doesn't mean it's good yeah. Julian Rodgers Well or notorious or something, but yeah. So I mean you went there with the economics thing, which was something I wanted to say. I mean, certainly the value proposition has to be referred to between, when we're talking two sides of hybrid workflow, software versus hardware, I mean who, Gareth, you got anything to add to what Chevy said? Gareth Young In terms of the economics? Julian Rodgers Yeah in terms of, I mean you're sitting on a lot of hardware. Chevy One And a lot of money. Julian Rodgers Yeah. Gareth Young Well no, I mean for me, I think I always have bought clever on the gear that I've got, I've always got a deal along the way and so my investment into gear with some exceptions, but most of the you know, the older sort of stuff I've got is, I didn't buy it new, I bought it secondhand and it's probably worth what I paid for it, if not more now. So I think that you can still do that with the hardware for sure. I mean Chevy's right. With certain instruments you know, you can lose your right foot or you can make a load of money if you want to do that but I don't think that anything in my situation apart from you know, the stuff you buy brand new, like anything you know, it devalues or it doesn't but… Julian Rodgers Yeah, if you bought a Synclavier new in… Gareth Young Yeah, it’s gonna be painful. But I mean, you know, the only thing I tend to buy new is consoles you know or speakers at the end. I'm just looking at looking around the room thinking what have I bought new and yeah, it's generally been speakers or consoles or interfaces, you know, because you need the latest. Julian Rodgers So things that either have to be current because of the technology demands. Gareth Young And Macs obviously. Julian Rodgers Or I mean, I’d argue the speakers have got better with time, whereas that isn't the case for in a lot of hardware, but… Gareth Young Yeah, yeah. Julian Rodgers Excellent, excellent. It feels like we're kind of coming to the end of the discussion. Thank-you so much for being on. Thank-you for listening and be sure to check out the show notes page for this episode where you'll find further information along with web links and details of all the other episodes. Oh, and just before you go, let me point you to the soundonsound.com/podcasts page where you can explore what's playing on our other channels. This has been a Julian Rodgers production for Sound On Sound Magazine.