The latest happenings at ULS
It’s late March here in the DC area, and the weather is already getting warmer. Things always calm down a little bit after Pinewood Derby and high school hockey seasons are over, and it’s nice to have the opportunity to relax a bit. This week, I’m happy to be working and hanging out (well, mostly hanging out) with my good, longtime friend, Paul Sirvatka.
The mixing and editing work on the debut album from D.C.-based Norteño band Los Ilegales de Lempira is winding down, and the band has asked me to put together the graphic design for the album as well. Here’s a look into that process as our recording studio was converted into a very different kind of studio for the weekend!
As a kid growing up in Chicago in the 70s and 80s, I was a huge fan of that “local Chicago band that made it big,” Styx. We’ve just picked up some new wall art from the band’s only number 1 album, 1981’s Paradise Theatre.
Designed to sound like Solid State Logic’s famous stereo bus compressor, WesAudio’s Dione compressor combines classic sound with some really cool features for a modern DAW-based studio like ours.
This week I’m building the last two of our four-unit set of Lola mic preamps from Hairball Audio. I suppose I should be feeling a little nostalgic to finally be finishing these units. I built my first two Lola units about 2 years ago, and they were the first 500 series modules I built. Our rack has come a long way since then! I’ve built 14 modules since then, and our rack is filling out very nicely.
Back to building preamps! Joining the ranks in the rack this week are a pair of MP573s from French audio designers SoundSkulptor.
After laying down the basic tracks last weekend for their new album, Tequila y Bucana, the guys from Los Ilegales de Lempira are back recording overdubs.
In studio this past weekend were the gentlemen from Los Ilegales de Lempira, a Norteño band from here in D.C. A busy, working band that plays frequently throughout Northern Virginia and D.C., they are here at ULS working on tracks for their first album, Tequila y Bucana.
The rack in our control room features a pair of Avalon 737SP channel strips. We have two units purchased 8 years apart, but one of them was already used and is likely more than 10+ years old. As a result, the two units have vacuum tubes of wildly different vintages in them. Time for some deferred maintenance.
In our never-ending quest for different and varied flavors of compression, we take the plunge on a very reasonably priced all-analog, 500-series recreation of one of the most expensive compressors on the vintage market.
