mic placement and production techniques - Photek and Cinematic Orchestra

[Kirk D]

Photek techniques probably belong more in the Electronic Production section of the forum:

Modus Operandi era would be manually cut up breaks using Emu E6400 (or E4 I don't remember exactly)

Mackie mixer (don't remember which model)

Behringer Composers and other budget processing

Cubase? I forget... I was a collaborator with him at this time so visited his bedroom studio several times... but it was around 12yrs ago so can't remember exact models, etc.

It was all about the meticulous drum programming and the choice of breaks (rather than just chopping up the ubiquitous amen break) - more than any great gear (as you can see from the gearlist above - it really wasn't much more than that).

Mackie analog mixers were very popular with drum n bass producers like Photek, Peshay, etc - in the mid-90's.

Hope that helps.

KD

[psycho_monkey]

Can't help with photek, but I've assisted on several Cinematic Orchestra sessions - mainly drum recording. The drums we did were done near the end of the track's production - the talented Luke Flowers on kit - tracked to PT through Neve VR (no fancy outboard plugins, the usual 87s/414s/421s etc as mics) in a nice wood room, and then mixed to stereo against the backing track.

One of the tracks was then mixed on the VR, the other Jason took away stereo drum parts to integrate into the track.

The other parts of the tracks...well I don't think there was much that was done unconventionally! I think it was all multi tracked though - not a lot of playing together in a room. Mainly down to great arrangements.

[Kirk D]

Mainly down to great arrangements.

[matucha]

Originally Posted by psycho_monkey

Can't help with photek, but I've assisted on several Cinematic Orchestra sessions - mainly drum recording. The drums we did were done near the end of the track's production - the talented Luke Flowers on kit - tracked to PT through Neve VR (no fancy outboard plugins, the usual 87s/414s/421s etc as mics) in a nice wood room, and then mixed to stereo against the backing track.

One of the tracks was then mixed on the VR, the other Jason took away stereo drum parts to integrate into the track.

The other parts of the tracks...well I don't think there was much that was done unconventionally! I think it was all multi tracked though - not a lot of playing together in a room. Mainly down to great arrangements.

For what album? It is my guess that the first album and the remixed stuff was done with samples only. The later sound more organic... so I guess that's where some tracking was done ;-).