Aug 1, 1998 2:44 PM, By Bob Clearmountain

With more than 1,500 Solid State Logic consoles in use worldwide, a lot of engineers have developed tricks for using the boards’ built-in automation, dynamics and EQ in creative ways. Here are a few of my favorites.

AUTOMATED DE-ESSER
Mult the vocal track into a channel adjacent to the current lead vocal channel. Be sure the channel you choose isn’t numbered the same as any group send (multitrack bus) you’re using for effects or whatever, because you’ll be using the channel’s direct output. Put the equalizer into the channel (the CH button). Boost 15 dB at 6 kHz (shelf), cut 15 dB at 1 kHz (green knobs) and cut 15 dB at 300 Hz (blue knobs)—both set to full wide Q—cut 15 dB at Hz (shelf) and filter all the remaining low end out at 350 Hz.

Put the dynamics section into the monitor (the MON button). On the compressor, pull up the release knob for fast attack, leaving it set to .1 (full left) release time. Set the ratio to infinity and the threshold to about -5. Leave the green expander controls fully counter-clockwise.

Press the Float, Direct and Ready Group buttons, and if it’s a G or J Series, pull up the Group knob to solo-isolate the channel. On the main vocal channel, put the dynamics section in the channel but leave all the knobs turned fully counter-clockwise (no effect).

Link the dynamics sections of the two channels: press the link button for whichever of the two channels is to the left of the other one—it doesn’t matter which one is on the left.

Play the vocal and push up the fader on your de-esser channel. You’ll notice that the fader now acts as a threshold control for a very efficient de-esser. Set it so the yellow compressor LEDs only come on for sibilance. You can now automate the threshold and hit the quiet esses harder and the loud ones softer.

MUTING THE COUNT-OFF (G SERIES ONLY)
Enter the command “Cue Z Here-.10” but don’t press Execute. You don’t have to use “Z”—you can call it anything you want, but I’ll call it Z for this example. Play the tape (or whatever) from before the music starts and press Execute when you first hear music.

Pull the master fader down, turn on the computer and “Goto Title”, which should be about eight seconds before music starts. Press Execute, and after you get past cue Z, push the master fader up.

Rewind to before Z, enter the command “At Cue Join Execute” and play the tape past Z. The master fader should come up just before the music starts. If it’s off a bit, nudge the cue by entering “Cue -.1” or “Cue +.1” and re-do this last step until it sounds right. If it was too early, you’ll have to rewrite the master fader with it down, past Z before re-doing the “At Cue Join” pass.

DRUM SAMPLE DYNAMICS
This neat trick lets your sample follow the original performance dynamics. It works best on short samples with no printed ambience or reverb. For this example we’re replacing a bass drum.

Create an advanced bass drum trigger track. You can do this by copying the bass drum to any timecode-slaveable recording medium, like a timecode DAT, a digital workstation, or an analog or digital multitrack with a synchronizer, then bounce it back to an open track on your master, offset ahead by ten or 15 milliseconds (half a frame). Note: If you’re using an analog multitrack and you have no open tracks, come off the sync head and delay it by about 15 ms less than the sync/playback head gap of your machine.

Patch your new advance track into the tape monitor input of the channel your bass drum sample is routed to. (Incidentally, you can use this same advance track in conjunction with a short digital delay to trigger the sample itself, so you can get it exactly in time with the original drum.)

On the dynamics section of the channel, press both the CH and the MON buttons. This makes the monitor input the “side chain” for the dynamics that is affecting the sample. On the expander, pull the release knob up for Fast Attack and set it to 3 (about 4 o’clock) and set the Range to 40.

Set the threshold so the sample dynamics match that of the original kick. You can do this by soloing both the original kick and the sample, panning them left and right and watching the stereo bus meter and listening. If you get it up to 40 and the expander is still opening all the way, even on lightly hit beats, you may have to reduce the level of the trigger into the tape monitor input by using a piece of outboard gear with a level control, like a limiter (without limiting!) or something.

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Producer Bob Clearmountain started his musical carrer as a bassist in Connecticut in the late '60s. He now makes his home in Los Angeles, where he has his mix room he calls “Mix This!"