Drewcifer’s Top Ten Toys from AES 2011: 

* Click the top pic to scroll full-size slides.

Number 1 - Look in to my eye! It’s the coolest monitor-controller ever devised! The Shadow  Industries Oculus with wireless “pendant” remote, selects multiple sources, multiple monitor outs, and multiple modes. Oculus is an ebony jewel; perfect for the modern studio … or … the Bat Cave. Alfred, get Shadow Hills on the bat-phone! 

Number 2 - Five years in the making, API’s fancy moving fader system for the popular 1608 console is finally a reality. The hardest part was fabricating those retro round button faders. This is Big City Gear!

Number 3 - The AMS-Neve 2264A-LM means that you can now squash like Jagger (or Bowie or Zepplin or any other classic Brit rocker who at one time or another has compressed with Neve). The 2264/33609 circuit has been ingeniously (and vigorously) stuffed in to the API 500 form factor. Supa-Smoove, baby!

Numero Quatro - From Down Under comes the new console beast with an iron heart. The Custom 75, “powered by Neve” combines modern soft-switching and advanced routing with an audio-path that is pure vintage. The guts are crammed with Carnhills, and the genuine 1081 channel amplifier has been upgraded from Class A/B to Class-A. It’s “retro-modern”. Bonzer! 

Number 5 - Pandora would be proud of this elegant-yet gnarly mic-preamp by Black Box analog Design. Despite the name, it’s all about color, giving the user drive controls over both the triode and pentode sections of the tube, enabling more tone variation than any EQ. Gain it up hot, hotter, or arc-weld. Blacken your tone!

Number 6 - The Lisson Grove R-124 unearths and resurrects one of the buried treasures of Abbey Road. When Sir George was bouncing Beatle tracks from three down to one, this mono mu-limiter (based on an Altec military/broadcast unit) was hard-wired across the chain. Alisson, as I call her, has a sexy, sophisticated character, like Mrs. Emma Peel.  

Number 7 - The Airfield Liminator2 stereo/dual-mono opti-comp is one of those rare devices that makes everything that goes through it come out sounding better. It’s dynamically transparent - with nice smooth compression - but the trick is in the trannies. You can switch the output between a cleaner Jensen and harmonic-laden Sowter. Cleared for take-off!

8, 9, 10) A Wunder of a U67, the TSL 4 by Vac-Rac, and Any Munro’s egg-speakers by SE round out the top 10. Get ‘em all at VKA. Viva AES!  

MORE TO COME…

  1. coleenskywalker reblogged this from astrovox
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  4. iateyourmic reblogged this from palerider66 and added:
    Interesting year...sure. So much gear porn.
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