Although he is still best known for his work on over 120 films such as National Treasure, Remember The Titans, Austin Powers in Goldmember, Armageddon, Twister, Bourne Supremacy, and Training Day, veteran recording and mix engineer Steve Kempster has, as of late, turned his prodigious talents to the burgeoning world of high-end audio for gaming. Indeed, this year composer Austin Wintory won the ASCAP Composers Choice Award for Assassin’s Creed Syndicate and composer Gareth Coker won the Game Audio Network Guild Awards for Ori and the Blind Forest in the categories of Audio of the Year, Best Mix, Best Instrumental Track, and Rookie of the Year. Kempster mixed both scores at his private mix room, relying on his ATC SCM100ASL LCR midfield monitors and his ATC SCM25A LCR near-field monitors to ensure that the full emotional impact and intention of the composers’ works translate to gamers around the world, regardless of the sound systems they listen on.
“I’ve done most of Austin’s games and movies in the last few years,” Kempster said. “I helped him record the original ideas for Assassin’s Creed here in LA, and we were able to get very specific about the feeling and timbre we were after. He wanted a real tactile feeling so that the gamer would feel like the music was right there, not far off in the distance. Our early conversations and work held the project together, and so my mix was a natural extension of that.” Wintory introduced Kempster to Gareth Coker, which led to his work on Ori and the Blind Forest. Kempster is also working on new games with award-winning composer, Mikolai Stroinski.
Back in the late 1970s, Kempster got into the music business as a singer-songwriter. “I learned engineering so that I could get the right sound for the stories I wanted to tell,” he said. “I was inspired to do that because I found that if the engineer understood what I was up to, the song’s intention came through. But if he didn’t, it fell flat. It was an important place to get it right, so I trained myself on how to record and mix and worked with musicians on my own material. They said I had a better sound coming out of my garage than they were getting at the nice studios, so they started asking me to come work with them there. I think it’s helpful to keep the songwriter’s perspective as an engineer. I look at my job from a storytelling point of view first and foremost.”
Kempster explains that the biggest difference between mixing for records or movies and mixing for games is the inherent non-linearity of games. “Depending on the design of the game, the player will hear different things depending on their play,” he said. “If a player engages in a battle and loses, the game may reset to an earlier point. There can be a million different paths and outcomes, as compared to a record or movie with just a single linear arc. The music has to be composed so that it walks hand-in-hand with the action without becoming repetitious. It’s an amazing art that Wintory and Coker are adept at navigating. They build in different levels of the same cue. Those levels seamlessly transmute, and I have to be very careful that my mix works across all of those levels. That’s no easy trick.”
Kempster has two ATC setups: he has his LCR system of ATC SCM25As permanently installed in his home mix room and a large, but mobile LCR system of ATC SCM100ASLs paired with an ATC SCM0.1/15ASL subwoofer for use at different facilities around town. “My ATCs are the most important thing I own, and I own a lot of gear,” Kempster laughed. “With the 100s, I’m kind of like a mobile MASH unit. I’m pretty good at arranging them and working with the subwoofer’s cutoff and volume to get a nice even response. I have a few pieces of music that I listen to that help me calibrate things. Once they sound right, I know whatever I record or mix will translate.”
“All mixing is like sculpting,” he continued.” I chip away and remove the things I don’t want until I hear what I want to hear. With all the levels of a game’s mix, the details can add up in unexpected ways, and I rely on my ATC’s incredible clarity to alert me to any potential issues. When I have the mix right, the imaging on the ATCs is breathtaking and the mix sounds correct across all the volume levels. By relying on ATCs, my mixes translate to postproduction and consumer systems. If I couldn’t get that right, someone later in the production chain would have to do it for me. It’s great that there are talented people who can do that, but I certainly don’t want to be the engineer whose mix needs saving! Career longevity doesn’t come out of that equation!” (Spoken by an engineer who has been delivering spot on mixes for nearly forty years…).
Photo © 2016 Larry Mah
Transaudio Group (ATC U.S. Professional Product Distribution)
After working on audio monitors of a well known brand for over 12 years, Ulmt of Helios suggested to have a listen at ATC. After short deliberation the SCM45A Pro looked like the best option, so he brought a pair over to my studio. After all, it is best to check a monitor system in your own, familiar environment.
We played several CD tracks as well as some of my own recordings from a Pro Tools HD system. I “clicked” with the loudspeakers immediately, though I didn’t dare to say it out loud just yet! Ulmt suggested to keep the monitors in my studio for a while. “I’ll call you up in about a week to hear what you think of them”, he said. Two days later I made the call and told him I couldn’t do without them anymore.
Despite the fact the mixes I made on my previous monitors still hold their ground, the ATC’s give me much more detailed and accurate information, especially when it concerns layers of instruments, placement and depth of field. After experiencing this, there simply was no way back. But the most important thing for me was that, while so much more information was presented to me, the overall sound appeared more relaxing to my ears. It caused, so to say, less confusion in my head. The positive result of this is that it leaves more room for creativity in my mind. Making mix decisions is now so much easier! Music is a story to be told and when mixing, all the track information needs to be brought into balance, giving each and everything the right dynamics. The SCM45A Pro’s are a great support accomplishing this.
Peter van Tilburg, Studiobizz, Oss
Like The Beatles, Madonna, and Nirvana, you’ve undoubtedly heard the music of Devin Powers, but you probably didn’t know it. Powers is arguably the world’s most prolific recording artist turned composer for modern television. He’s written, performed, and recorded literally tens-of-thousands of songs in every genre and style imaginable for all manner of TV shows. His clients include the pioneering reality show Blind Date, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, The Biggest Loser, The Amazing Race, and Naked & Afraid, the ground breaking #1 survival show for Discovery along with others for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, The History Channel, MTV, A&E, and more. In fact, Powers has had music in over four hundred TV shows over the last seventeen years. He’s earned numerous awards from ASCAP, including “Most Performed Television Underscore” in 2006. The three keys to his success are a limitless wellspring of musical inspiration, the capacity to perform every aspect of his compositions, and the professional tools to nail the sound of the target genre and deliver a perfect mix on deadline. For the last two years, Powers has relied on ATC SCM25A active near-field monitors to craft those perfect mixes in an enjoyable, non-fatiguing way, day-in and day-out.
Powers didn’t start out aiming to be top dog in the world of television underscores. Instead, he was a bona fide rocker; an ace on guitar and vocals, with plenty of chops to spare on everything else. He wrote for and led the Universal Records band The Vents in the 1990s. With top-10 radio hits saturating the airwaves, The Vents toured the USA, opening up for bands like Smashmouth, Matchbox 20, Radiohead, Foo Fighters, and Wilco. Clearly, Powers had arrived. But alas, the vicissitudes of corporate mergers and steely boardroom decisions saw The Vents dropped from the label despite radio hits and an undeniably ascending trajectory.
It was a blessing in disguise. “My goal had never been to be a rock star, per se,” Powers said. “I live and breathe music. It oozes out of my pores. My goal was always to make a living making music. I started producing for younger bands when I met up with an industry friend who was looking for an authentic rock guy to write songs for a ‘reality TV show.’ This was back in 1998, and no one knew what a ‘reality TV show’ was! He explained the concept, and I thought it sounded like a fun opportunity to sit in one place and write punk, funk, rock, R&B, metal, you name it. I signed on, and it was way more rewarding in many ways than working in the rock world with no touring! In Blind Date’s first season, Powers wrote and recorded over 1,500 tracks, and at the end of five seasons, he had 7,000 tracks.
Now eighteen years later, Powers has a group of writers working under him, but his main focus is still on writing, recording, and mixing music for his biggest clients. And he has amassed the resources to be a true master of tone. He has all the guitars, amps, drums, keyboards, microphones, vintage outboard gear, and all the deep know-how to pick and choose among that massive arsenal of tools to get just the right sound for a piece. And he does it at a breakneck pace, often starting with nothing in the morning and leaving eight hours later with several completed mixes of songs he wrote and recorded that day!
“Only the biggest primetime scripted shows master or sweeten the music tracks before they’re incorporated into the show. On unscripted shows it’s on the composer to make sure everything is absolutely perfect before it goes out the door,” Powers said. “I have found that my ATC 25s reveal everything that’s going on in my mix, and they do so at any volume. Their midrange is fantastic, and overall, they have the right combination of rock, detail, and punch. And I can listen to them all day and not leave feeling fatigued.”
Powers notes that there are a few differences between mixing for traditional music outlets and for television. First, there’s no unity volume in TV, so Powers typically mixes in the green, leaving more room for dynamics than you might guess. Second, the effects of low volume on sustained sounds (e.g. synth pads) versus transients (e.g. drums) can wreak havoc with a mix. Although he doesn’t want to give away too many secrets, Powers always checks his mixes at low volume on Auratone Sound Cubes. “I listen carefully to the transients,” he said. “My mixes have to work well and translate at all volumes.”
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – DECEMBER 2015: John Rodd snuck out of the house. The year was 1977, long before he would become a prominent music recording, mixing and mastering engineer in the film, gaming, and music industries, with credits including Breaking Bad, Star Wars: The Old Republic, The Lincoln Lawyer, World of Warcraft, Elysium, Batman: Bad Blood, Call of Duty, Assassin’s Creed; and Eric Clapton among countless others.
He was eleven years old at the time, and the occasion was arguably worthy of so great an infraction: the original Star Wars film was playing in the theater and he wasn’t going to be the only kid in class to miss it! Now, decades later, Rodd is a part of the Star Wars universe by mixing and mastering Gordy Haab’s original score for EA Star Wars: Battlefront™. Like many of the scores he records, mixes and masters, Rodd relied on his ATC SCM150ASL Pro reference monitors to inform his decisions with transparency and truthfulness
Players of EA Star Wars: Battlefront™ hear Haab’s original score throughout most of the game, but the game also segues in and out of parts of John Williams’ legendary Star Wars film scores. Rodd had to make sure that Gordy’s original score would fit with the older film scores from both a technical standpoint and, more importantly, from an emotional standpoint. “To fit within the Star Wars universe, Gordy’s music had to sound lush and huge, exciting and dramatic,” Rodd said. “The recordings took place at Abbey Road’s largest studio, and part of my task was always striking the perfect balance between the room mics and the spot mics. If only the room mics were utilized then the music would sound too far away. The spot mics add presence and detail, but if they become too loud, the recording loses its grandeur and falls out of balance. It loses its depth.”
Rodd emphasized that his cinematic and gaming work takes a different mindset compared with that of a classical recording that is meant to stand on its own. It has to effectively coexist with dialog and sound effects, which require different considerations. “I had to think about the big picture for EA Star Wars: Battlefront™,” he said. “Clarity is paramount. A lot of my work involves tiny surgical adjustments to clear away frequencies that are masking or diminishing important elements. Getting the right balance of clarity and size is difficult, and it requires profoundly accurate monitoring.”
He continued, “I find that my ATC 150s are very revealing and honest. ATC is legendary for its midrange quality, and I rely on my ATC 150s to help make all the tiny sonic decisions that add up to a compelling mix. They’re brutally honest, which is a good thing! If something actually sounds glorious, then it will sound glorious on my 150s. If something is slightly amiss, it will sound wrong on my 150s. There’s no guessing; ATC gives me the whole picture. Moreover, that truthfulness guarantees that a great sound in my studio will translate well to any other system. As a result, I’m able to work with 100% confidence.”
ABOUT TRANSAUDIO GROUP
TransAudio Group, founded by industry veteran Brad Lunde, has quickly become the premier U.S. importer/distributor and/or U.S. sales and marketing representative for high-end audio. Success hinges on TransAudio providing dealers and end users with a higher standard of product expertise and support far beyond the norm.
“The ATC SCM 50’s and an ATC SCM 1-15 subwoofer have been my main monitoring for three years now. They’re the best I’ve had.” Tom Elmhirst, SonicScoop, December 2015.
Read the feature in full here at sonicscoop.
According to his official website, Omar Hakim is: “Widely acclaimed for his versatility, technical prowess, and groove [and] is one of the most successful session drummers of the past forty years.” Yet the acclaimed American jazz, jazz fusion, and pop music drummer, producer, arranger, and composer certainly needs not blow his own trumpet too loudly, so-to-speak, for his association with top-tier acts as varied as Miles Davis, Marcus Miller, Weather Report, Sting, Daft Punk, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Kate Bush, Dire Straits, and Journey surely speaks louder than words.
When ever-present US rock band Journey’s longtime drummer, Dean Castronovo, was arrested during their 2015 North American summer tour they turned to Omar Hakim to capably walk in his percussive shoes at arguably the shortest notice in high-flying touring history — less than 24 hours! However, when reclusive English singer-songwriter, musician, composer, dancer, and record producer Kate Bush ventured out on stage as a headliner late last year for the first time in 35 years for a sold-out string of no fewer than 22 ‘intimate’ theatrical shows at London’s Eventim Apollo theatre — the admired, albeit renamed venue where her only concert CD to date, Live At Hammersmith Odeon, was recorded way back in 1979, it was with Omar Hakim holding down the perfect beat throughout those career-spanning shows… shows that indirectly led the demonstrably in-demand drummer to ATC, as it happens.
“I didn’t become aware of ATC until I began working with Kate Bush,” begins Omar Hakim himself, before adding: “Her engineer was the great producer/engineer Greg Walsh, who set up a control room space at the rehearsal location during pre-production for the London shows. That’s where I heard ATCs for the first time — SCM100ASL Pros, I believe. I was immediately blown away with
what I was hearing. That was the first time that I had ever heard a speaker reproduce audio like that! Then I had the pleasure of doing some show prep at Kate’s personal studio, where I think she had SCM150ASL Pros — fantastic!”
So when it came to upgrading the main monitoring at The OH-Zone, his own personal studio back home across the pond in New Jersey, it was an ATC done deal as far as Omar Hakim was concerned: “I was thinking of getting SCM25A Pros — until I heard the SCM50ASL Pros at the ATC factory, having had the pleasure of getting a factory tour and sitting with Managing Director Billy
Woodman to audition several ATC models. I decided to go with the SCM50ASL Pros because I could hear the difference in the low-end response. I also knew that for my purpose of tracking live drums and small rhythm sections they were the right choice for me! To finally be able to monitor music with this level of accuracy and detail is an incredible experience for me. The SCM50ASL
Pros are definitely taking my work to the next level.”
Not that Omar Hakim has ever been short of session work, mind — most recently recording drums for the Grammy® award-winning Random Access Memories album by breakthrough French electronic duo Daft Punk, as well as recording, mixing, and producing his third critically-acclaimed solo album, We Are One, at The OH-Zone. The Trio of OZ, the band he formed with wife Rachel Z in 2010, are currently working on their second album, all set for release on his OZmosis Media Group label in 2016: “I’ve recorded and mixed three albums there, and I also do lots of sessions for clients around the world that send me tracks to put drums on.”
Omar Hakim has plans to build a new home and studio, so his beloved SCM50ASL Pros will definitely be making the move, too: “I’ve always had a deep appreciation for technology and the thought, ingenuity, and commitment needed to bring it to the world. Billy Woodman and the crew at ATC are craftsman of the highest order. From the beautiful wood cabinetry to the speaker components and electronics, ATC speakers are simply amazing!”
The winners will be determined by online voting via Mix, Pro Sound News, Pro Audio Review, and Electronic Musician and via professional audio and sound production organizations. The winners will be announced at the 2016 Winter NAMM show, held from 21st – 24th January 2016 at the Anaheim Convention Centre, California.
For more information: TEC Awards NAMMSINGAPORE: Reflecting a growth in market share and demand for the brands it represents, ATC distributor CDA Pro-Audio has moved its Singapore-based showroom to a larger 140 sq-m facility based at Bendemeer Road, #01-01. The showroom has been designed to encourage both audio professionals and and Hi-Fi enthusiasts to relax and audition new products in a comfortable yet professional environment.
Representing brands including ATC, CEDAR, Prism Sound, Maselec, Trident, Tonelux, Penny & Giles, SADiE, and MicW amongst others, CDA-Pro Audio already has dedicated offices across Australia and Asia. The new Singapore facility, located in a central business district is only minutes’ walk from the Boon Keng MRT station. Having been purpose-designed, the showroom offers high floor-to-ceiling windows for an abundance of natural light plus a modular-style layout for maximum flexibility.
According to Joel Chia, CDA-Pro Audio Singapore general manager, the concept for the facility was to have the demo area, “feel like a living room or lounge where people can freely relax and not be intimidated by aggressive sales people. We try to relate to customers discover what solutions suit the customers’ needs, rather than simply push product”.
Full contact details for the new showroom are: Luzerne 70 Bendemeer Road, #01-01, Singapore, 339940. Tel: +65 6252 9983 Email: singapore@cda-proaudio.com Web: www.cda-proaudio.com
When Paul Power, owner of Power Sound Studio in Amsterdam , heard the new ATC SCM45A in Helios’ demo room in Haarlem, he knew there was no turning back. This audio monitor proved such a big step forward that Paul found the change to be simply unavoidable. A week later Paul placed the order and three weeks later received delivery and now the control room is equipped with a 5.1 monitor system where many only dream of.
Soon a personal response from Paul Power….
ATC Professional products are distributed in the Netherlands and Belgium by Helios Pro Audio Solutions
For more information on Paul Power’s Power Sound Studios please take a look at their website
Our CA2/P1 pre/power combination has been very favourably reviewed in this months Hi-Fi Choice magazine.
Reviewer, David Price concluded:
“An excellent performer, this is a true slice of affordable esoterica – you get a taste of what a really top-flight high-end pre-power amplifier will do, without having to remortgage your house in the process.”
The magazine is available now. Alternatively, you can click the photo or text below to access a PDF of the review.
ATC CA2 & P1 Review, Hi-Fi Choice, April 2015
