General
NorthStar Music
Music publishing and production company.
NorthStar Music provide high quality music for the world’s leading film, TV and radio stations, and record commissioned music for clients around the world.
Sound On Sound
The World's Best Music Recording Magazine.
10 Great Tips to Help You Fail as an Independent Artist!
www.independentrockstar.com/11…
With so much advice being given to artists about what to do to succeed it's really refreshing to read this post by Scott James, from Independent Rock Star, giving his suggestions of what not to do!
Mixing & Mastering
DYNAMIC RANGE - Pleasurize Music!
The Pleasurize Music Foundation aims to standardise a reference for music production, much like the film industry, with a simple label system stating the dynamic range of a recording/album.
They have created an easy to use plugin that calculates the D.R. (Dynamic Range) value.
Preparing for Mastering
Sound On Sound's article on Preparing Music For Mastering.
QUIZTONES
A fantastic tool at QuizTones, the frequency identification trainer, to help sharpen your frequency recognition skills.
Making Music Radio Ready
www.orban.com/support/orban/techtopics/… [PDF]
Here's the proof - CDs don't sound better on the radio if they are louder!! Have a quick read of this before squashing your music to death.
Turn Me Up!
Turn Me Up!™ is a non-profit music industry organization campaigning to give artists back the choice to release more dynamic records.
Mixing Crash Course
Paul White delivers a crash course in instant mixing.
The Loudness War
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ
A great little example on YouTube to demonstrate what is done to music when it is hypercompressed.
Digital Domain • Bob Katz
Website of Bob Katz, Grammy Award-winning engineer, author, and audio guru. This site includes articles that are well worth a read.
Mastering WebBoard
Founded by mastering engineer Glenn Meadows.
Plugins
SoundToys
SoundToys' tag line is “Plug-Ins With Attitude” and they do certainly come with attitude. Since I started using them I have used at least one SoundToys plugin in every track I've produced. Ones I can't live without are Decapitator, Echoboy, Devil-Loc Deluxe, and PanMan.
Waves
Waves plugins - people either love them or hate them. Have the Mercury bundle and I love them!
PSP
Vintage Warmer is probably what PSP is most known for but they have some lovely plugins, especially for mastering.
Flux
Very cool plugins and their Bitter Sweet II freeware plugin is a great little tool for transient processing.
Artists
Arabella
A great bunch of guys, based in Coventry, is the band Arabella.
The four members of the band are James Sear (lead vocals, guitar), Matt Morton (guitar, backing vocals), Adam Nicholas (bass, backing vocals), and Thomas Jewett (drums, backing vocals).
They have a fantastic sound and song style and are currently busy writing new tracks.
REMMA
Remma are a four piece band formed in Cork, Ireland in 2003.
The band consists of brothers Shane O' Herlihy and Colm O' Herlihy with Darren O' Driscoll and Daniel Amedee.
Remma's EP, Continue The Search, released on 9th July 2010, features five songs; Sincerity, Forcibly Impressed, Categories And Strategies, You Should Know Yourself By Now, and Hurried Myself Along.
The bands debut album is scheduled for release in early 2011.
The Housewives
Laurie, Nick, Chris, John, and Lizzy are The Housewives.
They love keeping their house clean but, more importantly, they produce some great music.
Pop over to their MySpace page and discover what these guys are all about.
Lyla D'Souza
This Australian in London rock/soul singer/songwriter has a cracking voice, from sultry jazz style to full on rock.
As well as her solo career Lyla is always in demand as a session singer and lead vocalist for a number of top UK corporate and original bands.
Clive John
Clive has been performing since the age of 16 with his self-penned, heart-felt, songs.
His rich voice and guitar playing continues to draw crowds wherever he plays.
Primarily a folk/country artist, he also has a band called The Johnny Cash Roadshow, a tribute to Johnny Cash, featuring Clive John as the Man In Black.
Sam Hyman
Sam has such a versatile and soulful voice, a unique guitar style, and is a superb writing talent.
A seasoned singer/songwriter based in Erie (PA), he evokes powerful emotion through his music.
Sam also performs with his band, The Sam Hyman Trio. Sample some performances on their MySpace page.
Bellissima
Bellissima are Richard & Belle Erskine, a husband and wife duo from London. A superb combination of Richard’s innovative guitar style and Belle’s exceptional vocals.
Outside of Bellissima Belle is a much in demand session vocalist and songwriter and Richard is a professional composer, producer and sound engineer.
D-n-K
D-n-K are Dan Insley and Keith Waterfield; a singer/songwriter partnership from Rochester in Kent.
Their debut album, “No XCUSES”, was realeased in early 2009 and session players include Jef Van Veen (Drums), Julian Bury (Double Bass), Alicia Banton (Vocals - Summertime & Moviestar), Geoff Whitehorn (Lead Guitar - Voice in a Crowd), and Phil Beer (Fiddle - Between the Ties).
The CD, and digital downloads, are available from www.d-n-k.co.uk and Amazon.
Acoustics
China Cones
These aren't a cheap option but when I stuck them to the base of my monitors there was a definite improvement in the stereo image.
Real Traps
I have a couple of these traps, along with my custom build treatment, and they help keep the studio sounding good!
SOS Studio Design Forum
www.soundonsound.com/forum/postlist.php?Cat=…
There's a wealth of information on the Sound On Sound Studio Design forum to help you improve your studio environment.
YouTube
Video of a Rubens Tube
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpovwbPGEoo
The classic physics experiment involving sound, a tube of propane and fire.
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