We-Verb Project: Rob Owen

We have currently been working with Rob Owen, a singer/songwriter from Santa Cruz. Insert shameless plug.... oh, about here: http://www.robowenmusic.com/

Thus far, we have tracked drums, acoustic guitars, a scratch vocal track, and hand percussion (!!!!!!).

Speaking of drums, want a killer kick sound? Try a MA-200 outside of the kick, and stick a D112 inside.... add a little D-Verb (simple, yet sexy) to be a showoff on your blog, and you have this:



And as if you needed visual confirmation:

Here are some other random pics from our aural escapades...

Our drum set up:

Will doing some editing for the bass player:




Blythe holding down the talkback mic so Rob can play in the control room as a reference for the bassist and drummer:


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More will be posted soon as this project progresses.... we are also venturing into open water with assembling a DIY audio project without the proverbial floaties of a printed PCB:

Yes, my friends, a bread boarded Tube Screamer is on the way.

We-Verb Challenge

Before we start getting back into serious posts about our happenings (recording, mixing, our new SCA preamp shootout, wrestling with a multi-mod guitar pedal), I would like to issue a challenge...

Give me one reason why these invalids deserve the acclaim they have been handed out of, what seems to me, sheer accident:

Vampire Weekend... populating the young adult section of a library near you.

SCA: N72

Why yes, we have purchased a Neve clone from SCA.

Be prepared.

The Long-Awaited Preamp Shootout!!

Yes, we have finally waded through the murky, and uncharted-since-university-3-years-ago waters of the first half of a real academic semester, and we are here to boast the results of a preamp shootout that took place over a month ago, that we just haven't had time to share.

[Yeah, I know, worst excuse ever. The actual scenario was that AR and I got abducted by the Digidesign gods.... and... and... yeah, no, I've got nothing.]
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The C84 was amazingly easy to construct. It took us about 4-5 hours total, and it worked on the first try.

Here is our PCB in the "final" stages:


Just as we had opened what we call our "Final Stage Beer"... we discovered that we had 17 more pages of wiring the damn thing to the power supply in the chassis. No pictures of that part... we were a little too annoyed to take pictures, so we probably supplemented that with another "First Stage of Final Stage Beer":


Andddd... we jump to the ultimate tier of construction: Completion with functionality! You can tell it works from the giant LED... you see it there? Yeah you do.



Here it is ladies and gentlemen, the shootout:

Mbox2 with Focusrite preamps:


Seventh Circle Audio C84:


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Coming soon to We-Verb (no, really):

- We will be doing a couple microphone mods... a minor one and a major! More details to follow.

Purple Haze

From the February issue of EQ:


Fig 3. The purple waveform is compressed, while the magenta waveform is the original signal. Note how the uncompressed waveform has much higher peaks.

And yes, that is the original border at the top of the page... nothing screams compression like lavender in contrast to plum.

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This week on We-Verb:

- We won't make you wait any longer: Our preamp is............ functional! (On the first try, might I add!) Scientific shootout between the SCA C84 and the...... Digi Mbox2. It will be nothing less than epic.

Happy New Year from We-Verb!

That's right! We celebrated New Years day the same way as the rest of you, with a glass of bubbly and a nice hot soldering iron to keep you warm. (Also, please ignore the monitors in the background, we are borrowing them to test them out... we will go into failure another time.)

We just wanted to give you a quick update, we have dove in to soldering components to the PCB on the C84 from Seventh Circle Audio.

First we had the painstaking task of sorting through the 150 or so electrical components and parts, matching them up to the Bill of Materials, just to make sure that everything was there. Clearly, the most fun was the tiny resistors, where their value is indicated from several colored bands that each stand for a number, and since the people who came up with this system were not art students, a lot of the colors look similar.

Luckily we have a digital multimeter, so we were able to verify the resistor values accurately. Also, for anyone else pursuing a project like this, once we found the value of the component, we put a piece of tape on it and wrote where it goes (e.g. R22, means resistor 22, which is silk-screened on the PCB):



We will post more as it happens! Since I'm sure you're dying to see it... yes, here is another gratuitous PCB shot:

Pitchfork's Top 50 formula... revealed!

I have refrained from ranting about Pitchfork Media (intentionally not using a hyperlink to their main site, for your own protection) here on We-Verb on several occasions, but since it's a holiday, we're all allowed a little headroom... analog style (meaning I'm probably going to clip a little on this one, but at least it will sound good).

Every year Pitchfork comes out with its' much anticipated Top 50 albums of the year list. Some years have been fantastic as far as content and correct ranking (2005, 2007 are the recent ones that comes to mind). Then some years, like this one, I feel like flying to Chicago, hunting them down (I'm pretty sure most of the writers look like this mongoloid, who probably want to make love to their hero ,who they look like, while listening to the most tragic hit single the music industry has ever had infiltrate its' sacred fortress of respected indie-crossovers) Um, wow, not sure where that came from... but, like I said! Flying to Chicago and hunting down the PF hipsters to slap them across their round woeful faces! That would be my reaction to the 2008 Top 50 PF Albums of the Year list!

Yes, this year they have stuck to their "Oh shit! We were barely paying attention this year!" formula. A formula only I may dissect, because I have read them for so long, and know their cunning and malevolent ways:

Top 50-41
This spot is saved for the giddy kid in all of them! This is for the cool art, the radical colors, the pretentious photographs, essentially the "Hey, I like the cover too much for the music to ruin this for me!"albums that they haven't really listened to, but figure they should give a shout-out for the visual stimulation that they have provided. Some years, an album the PF staff know that they should like (because it's actually musically solid) but really just don't, make this tier. This year it's David Byrne & Brian Eno 'Everything That Happens Will Happen Today'.

Top 40-31
This is usually the experimental junk. Albums they really want to like because they are so edgy and forward thinking, but just plain don't. This is usually peppered with noise-rock and electronica. When they have no real basis for any decision they are making, they will throw in legends who have released albums this year. Apparently 2008 was especially confusing and off-base, because they put two: Arthur Russell and Nick Cave.

Top 30-21
This the tier that we (the people who follow music) finally start recognizing artists. This is crunch time for the PF writers, this is where the obligatory names need to start showing up, they can't just make up pretentious bullshit now! This is where artists who have made stellar albums in past years, who then follow up with sub-par offerings this year, land... Hold Steady, I'm looking at you! This is also the resting place for albums that should be higher on the list, but aren't, because they released their album in the first 6 months of 2008, so therefore fall out of a fickle hipster's mind in December (Flying Lotus, Atlas Sound). Also, in their never-ending attempts to touch base with the hip-hop genre, they start throwing in picks to make them look like they pay attention to things other than indie (note: Kanye West).

Top 20-11
Again! Time is of the essence! This tier is usually the early-year darlings. The ones where you once saw daily news of their happenings and tours in the PF news feed any time before late spring. Though, since it's the end of the year, it discounts the quality of the music they've made... you know, just slightly, so they drop to here. In February, I knew what the Crystal Castles were eating for lunch, in December, they're #15... ouch. (Also, I should note that The Walkmen 'You & Me' is astounding, and deserves way higher than #19.) You will also note that more hip-hop titles abound here as well (You guessed it! They are trying really, really hard to fit in with other genres... well, one other genre).

Top 10-1
Crunch time kids! Usually, they get the top 10 albums in there, just not in the right order. Often times, they concede defeat to the revolting trend-band of the year (Vampire Weekend, oh how I loathe thee), and throw them in mid-pack. This year they have the good band that has released a stellar-album (Portishead) at #2, then they usually do the most popular album from their respective genres, as follows:

Collaboration: Hercules and Love Affair
Electronica/Post Rock: M83
Electronica/Dance: Cut Copy
Punk: No Age
Hipster Favorite (Even though this album isn't very good): TV On the Radio
Experimental/Punk: Deerhunter
Nod to Classic Rock: Fleet Foxes

Keep in mind that these are all interchangable! It's all about the nerd that has the best argument in the boardroom in regard to order, but you will always find this collection in the PF Top 10.

I also can't help but note that in order to get #1 with Pitchfork in the past two years, you need to have your album art resemble Hieronymus Bosch's work, but you know... hipper:

2007 PF #1: Panda Bear 'Person Pitch':


and

2008 Fleet Foxes 'Fleet Foxes'