KC: Your mixing desk is
a Mackie 24 8. How good is that make?
RS: "They are by no means the
top end desk but they're not bad. They are like a
semi-professional set up. There are other desks available
such as Nieve Desks which cost absolutely thousands and
thousands of pounds, but we found for what we want in our
studio this is fine. We get really good results out of it
and the way things are going at the moment, everything is
becoming software based. With many artists now their music
doesn't leave the computer, it's all done in software. You
can record onto computer, you can add on all the instruments
internally on a computer. Where as we have always like the
idea of getting it back out onto an analogue desk and mixing
it the old traditional way to give it some warmth and depth
That's how we do it."
KC: You mention the
computer and in front of you is your computer. What role
does it play in recording your music?
RS: "You could say it's the
engine of the whole studio. It does the sequencing which is
obviously recording all the notes that you put in from the
keyboard and you can do all the editing on it. There are
editing sections and you build the song up with different
programmes. There are loads of different ones available on
the market but there is one programme called Q-Base so you
build the song up and that and then once you've got that you
can build up and record as a separate track. So you can
build on the vocals or whatever or any analogue instruments
or guitars or drums etc into the computer. And this is just
how we do it, we build the song up bit by bit and like I
said we just reach things back out of the computer onto the
desk for it's final recording or mixing."
KC: If you swing round
to your right you have a keyboard in front of you. It's a
Korg.
RS: "Indeed it is. This is a
master keyboard we use, obviously playing everything in.
It's also like a work station stroke sampler but it's just a
very very good quality Korg keyboard. It's got very real
sounds in it like string sections and a lot of other real
sounding instruments and that's already plugged into the
computer desk."
KC: And right behind you
is this, well I can't describe it. It's full of buttons and
switches.
RS: "I'll tell you roughly what
it is. We have a thing at the top which we call a midi
merger. All the keyboards use them like a control wire that
goes between each keyboard which is called midi so all the
keyboards we have are connected up there. It means I can
play every keyboard in this studio from this one keyboard
here in front of me. Then we have the next thing down that
is like a valve processor which we use for vocals. It is
just a like a compressor that squashes and controls the
vocals so that you can shout or sing quietly and it
maintains it's level and controls everything. And then we
have limiters and gates. These cut out noise or again would
limit a sound so it wouldn't go too loud or too quiet. We
also have a graphic equalizer which doesn't really get used
that much obviously because we have a desk that does a
better job. Then these are basically rack versions of all
the keyboards. You can either have a keyboard with a
keyboard on it or can have the whole kind of engine or the
main part of a keyboard without the
keyboard so I can play these racked instruments from one
keyboard. So that's that. We have several of those and then
we get to a large section of compressors, again you know
this is for controlling, literally controlling the volume of
things."
KC: So if we swing
round further to our right we have seven keyboards. How on
earth can you play them all in one go?
RS: "Well you use the aid of the
computer that plays the sections for you. But keyboards for
me, well it's like any guitarist. To the outsider we are
asked 'well why do you so many' and the reason why we have
so many is because they have different characteristics, they
all produce sounds in different ways. We have a Roland SH101
which is a very old analogue keyboard and it gets you that
kind of really squelchy early electronic kind of noises and
is very kind of manipulative. You can make some really cool
noises with that."
KC: What about the Nord
lead 2?
RS: "Well that is a newish
keyboard and what it does is emulate what these keyboards
used to do years ago. It's a digital version of an analogue
keyboard but it also has a kind of strange realistic
character of its own really. It's just quite a punchy sound
and it's also got very cutting filters on it. It can really
stand out in a track. When I hear one I can tell it's a Nord
Lead."
KC: And then you've also
got the E-Max 2.
RS: "Now this is a very early
80's sampler. And basically everyone knows what a sampler is
these days. It can record real instruments or any real noise
straight into it. You can play it across the length of the
keyboard for controlling pitch so you can take a human voice
and go up the keyboard with it and down the keyboard. You
can also manipulate it, change sounds and we use it a lot
for things like drums and guitars, just to mess them up
really. To take the nice clean sound and just completely
make them sound ...umm I don't know ..... make them sound
really dirty and scratchy because it's just old technology,
but it's something we use a lot. I like the kind of
characteristic it gives."
KC: Below all that you
have a mini disc player and other items.
RS: "Again, more analogue stuff
and a very very good keyboard version called a Roland JV 10
80. Again it gives some very warm string sounds, very real
sounding instruments such as a saxophone sound or a trumpet
sound. You would go to some instrument like this and get
that type of sound whereas the analogue stuff, the older
stuff, it's just unique sounds, you know keyboard type
sounds rather than real instruments. And then we have
another sampler and some more analogue gear really. So it's
different type's of keyboard really that we have in this
area"
KC. What I have spotted
is a guitar in the corner, looking very lonely on it's own.
RS: "Yes. I have several guitars
and that one's strat copy. But we do use guitars quite a lot
really. Again we just record them into a computer and cut
them up and mess the sound about a bit. I am not a big fan
of normal guitar chords or using a guitar in a traditional
way. I think coming from an electronic background, I like
to mix sounds up. You'd most probably not recognise it as a
guitar when you hear the finished result, but it's a good
instrument for adding the realism and grittiness to tracks."
KC: And then we have the
recording booth.
RS: "Yes we have!. It's a small
room I should say with a microphone in it and its
acoustically sound. Keeps the noise down. We've got the
usual acoustic foam in there to create a dead space and
that's where all our vocals are done."
KC: And then back we are
back to the beginning. What do we have under the mixing
desk?
RS: "That's all the effects I
was saying about earlier. That would be all the delays, your
reverbs and things like that. There is also a Dat machine
that we still use, which again is quiet old technology now,
but that's what we use to master all our finished
productions onto. And then we also have another kind of
compressor, limiter that controls the whole thing and goes
over the whole desk"
KC: Rich, you are the
Chief Engineer (he starts laughing) yes the Chief Engineer,
the Chief Studio artist aren't you?
RS: "Ummmm .............. yes.
Kind of. I guess. I do a lot of the production work on
Mesh's albums. I am not saying I do all of it. Mark
also does some in the studio too but I think I do the
majority of it now a days."
KC: How easy or
difficult is it to use this studio?
RS: "I would imagine for an
outsider it would be really difficult because I've built it
up from scratch, I've added to it and added to it and it's
almost like it's my baby. I know how everything works, how
everything is routed and where every cable goes, so you know
I find it was almost purpose built for us, the band as a
kind of standard studio. For a normal band to come in, it is
not exactly ideal but it more than suits our purpose."
KC: Did you learn about
all of this from scratch yourself or did you go to college?
RS: "No college. I learnt it all
from scratch. I bought a Sequential Pro 1 keyboard when I
first left school. It's a very old analogue keyboard.
Something 'Yazoo' did all their albums on, and I learnt from
there. I just sat there fiddling around with it. You learn
what each button does, each knob does and you just add to it
and add to it and add to it and here we are now."
KC: What advice would
you give to somebody who is just starting out and hoping to
set up their own little studio themselves?
RS: "I think the first thing
is don't be taken in by the whole money side of things. You
can buy some really good stuff now a days with a computer
and some computer programmes. There is a programme called
'Reason' that we use a lot in the studio and it's just
fantastic. It's so flexible and what you can do with it is
just amazing really. So like I said get something like that
and fiddle around with it and see if you have some kind of
aptitude for doing this before you start spending money on
the real thing. And don't spend too much money on it really,
like I did!" (And Rich starts laughing)
KC: You also do remixes
for other bands so are available for hire?
RS: "Yes. For remix work or
session work or production stuff. I don't think we are in a
position where I think that we can record full bands in the
studio and to be honest I don't think I would want to at the
moment. But for remixes and dance mixes yes, we'll do that,
it's not a problem."
To contact Rich Silverthorne and
Mark Hockings about production, remixes and dance mixes it
is best to e-mail
them or contact through their web site:
www.mesh.co.uk
