Universal Mastering East and West
recently upgraded their facilities with
the latest technology from Antelope
Audio, Weiss, and Lavry Engineering.
Universal chose Sonic Circus Inc as
their technology partner. The facilities
serve as in house production hubs for
the worlds largest collective record
company, (A&M, Decca, Motown,
Island Def Jam, Interscope, Mercury,
Verve and others).
Universal was quick
to embrace the latest advancements
in digital audio. Because of this,
Workflow is now greatly improved and
sonic fidelity has reached an all-time
high. Recent projects run the gamut
from chart topping new artists in
every genre, such as Lil Wayne, Asher
Roth and Leona Lewis to deep archival
work involving digital transfers of
timeless classics by Stevie Wonder,
James Brown the Allman Brothers and
thousands of other titles.
Antelope
Audio’s Atomic Clocks are now
integrated throughout Universal’s
East and West complexes, making
them the first mastering facilities that
are fully networked with Antelope.
They have also just taken delivery of
Sonic Solutions Soundblade systems,
Weiss DS-1 and Lavry Gold converters
- reinforcing their standard as a
mastering and production powerhouse.
Senior Mastering engineer Vlado Meller
spearheaded the transition. After
critical listening demonstrations of the
Trinity and the Atomic Clock 10M there
was really no choice but to make the
transition for Vlado Meller in New York
as well as Erick Labson in Universal’s
new Santa Monica mastering facility.
Sonic Circus delivered and assisted in
networking the entire New York facility with
Eliot Kissileff (former Electric Lady
and Sony alumni). “Once the units
arrived and we started hooking them
up to our A-to-D converters, Pro Tools
systems and digital EQ’s it became
immediately obvious that there is a
new level of clarity and quality to our
already excellent-sounding equipment.
It’s almost as if it’s still in the analog
realm after the conversion. You feel
like you’re still listening to the master
right off the tape machine even though
it’s a wav file.”
Recent Universal highlights:
Engineer Kevin Reeves has recently
completed two massive re-issue
projects, the first being the 10-CD
Motown #1’s package, covering the
iconic record company’s entire 50-year
history at the top of the charts. The
second is a 15-CD Box of jazz master
John Coltrane’s Impulse albums.
Kevin also did his part for our current
president, turning around a stunning
re-mix of Stevie Wonder’s “Signed,
Sealed, Delivered” for Stevie to play
and sing along with at the Democratic
National convention back in October.
Ellen Fitton has been keeping busy
mastering the next volume in
Motown’s long-running “The Complete
Motown Singles” series with volume
11. She has also been working with
new packages for the Marvelettes and
the Miracles, as well as sixties legends
the Velvet Underground. Seth Foster
has been busy working on the latest
James Brown Complete Singles series,
covering some of his classic material
from 1970 like “Superbad” and “Sex
Machine”,
Universal Mastering’s East and West
Coast facilities are full-service
mastering, mixing and production
houses offering the best in both analog
and digital equipment. One of
the studios’ main functions are dealing
with the constant flow of analog and
digital tape of all vintages, from the
classic mono recordings of the fifties
through every digital format known
to man and beyond. One of the main
jobs of engineers at Universal is to
work towards preserving the legacy
of one of the greatest libraries of
recorded music ever assembled. As
the production hubs for the largest
record company in the world, they
handle the final phases of production
prior to manufacturing- encoding
metadata, quality control, as well as
watermarking and duplication.
Another growing area of work on
both coasts is mixing for the various
music-oriented video games, “Guitar
Hero” and “Rock Band”, along with a
growing host of smaller song-driven
games. These games challenge
engineers with the object of creating a
new mix of both classic songs as well
as newer hits that must exactly match
the originals so that the tracks can be
encoded for game play.