Some interesting details and facts of the recording session for the Ultra Violence album by rich

My name's Rich and I'm the lucky chap whose been recording the MadDog album. I'm writing this quickly in a break from mixing the album!

The whole thing was recorded at my studio, the old blacksmiths in portsmouth, uk (Old Blacksmiths) except for a few samples MadDog brought in and some special backing vocals all the way from the US of A.

Right, a few details for the engineer nerds:

Everything was tracked to Nuendo 3.2 through the new SSL Alphalink converters. We tracked up most of the songs with bass and drums laid down together. Lee and Choppy were in separate rooms for this.

Equipment used on the drums:

Kick drum: Shure Beta 57 -> Gyraf Valve Mic Pre -> Buzz Audio ARC Compressor

Snare drum: AKG 414BULS -> Gyraf Valve Mic Pre -> UA1176 -> Buzz Audio ARC EQ

Rack Toms: Shure SM57 -> Audient ASP008 Mic Pres

Floor: TomAudio Technica AT25 -> Audient ASP008 Mic Pres

Overheads: Oktava MK-012 (Matched pair) -> Sytek Mic Pres (Burr Brown Version)

Bass: For Choppy's bass we used an Ampeg SVT-4 PRO head and 8x10 cabinet mic-ed with a Shure SM7 into the Buzz Audio ARC Mic Pre. I took a clean DI feed from the head and another DI feed from Choppy's 'tick box' (he has a special pickup fitted to his recording bass just to capture that percussive slap) Having recorded Choppy in the past I knew he rarely stands still whilst laying a take so I didn't worry about mic-ing the bass acoustically. The combined sounds of the amp, di and tick sounded great on their own.

Guitars: Jim's guitars (either a Gretsch or a Guild De Armond) were played through his Peavey Classic amp which was mic-ed with a good ole SM57 through the Audient ASP008 mic pre.

Vocals: MadDog's vocals were recorded with an SE 2200A. Not my first choice of mic but you've got to appreciate when something works, use it! We used the Buzz Audio ARC for the mic pre, a little bit of compression and the limiter on just to catch those loud 'pop' vocals MadDog is known for.

I'm mixing down in Nuendo using a hybrid system of outboard equipment on delay compensated inserts. Currently i have a GSSL4000 strapped across the stereo buss, I'm using a Pultec EQ clone on MadDog's vocals and the 1176 is doing a fine job on the Bass group. I have a Powercore card and UAD card which looks after the processing 'in the box'.

If you have any specific questions don't hesitate to ask!
Gotta get back to it!
rich