Q: What is your current home-recording setup?
Chris Greatti — Guitarist/Producer
Photo by Gianennio Salucci
A: I do all my sessions at my house in L.A., so it's fully set up to track any instrument quickly while still retaining a super casual vibe. I just got the Adam A77X monitors (which I'm loving). The vocal chain is a Peluso 22 251 mic into a Universal Audio LA-610 pre/comp into an Apollo x8p. As for guitars: 2020 Fender Ultra Jazzmaster (which I use on everything), Gibson '61 reissue SG, my custom Carbonetti Strat-style, Gibson Firebird and Hummingbird, some old Silvertone acoustics, etc. The amp situation du jour is a Kemper (for quickness) with a Dumble preset from Top Jimi. The pedalboard features some classics from MXR, EarthQuaker, and Strymon. I prefer my Fender P bass with flats. The synth setup just got upgraded, too: Moog Sub 37, Roland Juno-106, Mellotron M4000D, and some terrible toy Yamahas. Lastly, and arguably most importantly, I just bought seven sunset lamps and they're improving my life drastically.
Current Obsession:
Caroline Polachek, Lewis Taylor's Lost Album, Teenage Fanclub, Portishead's Dummy, Yves Tumor, perpetually a little Lady Gaga, and Van Halen. I've been getting back into the Strokes, too. Their guitar parts are always so creative and they're insanely tight and unique as a band. But to be honest, I've been crazy busy this year producing albums for Yungblud and Palaye Royale (not simultaneously, but in quick succession) and have mainly been in the headspace for those projects, deliberately trying not to take in too many outside influences.
Portishead - Wandering Star (Official Video)
Daniel LeSaux - Reader of the Month
Daniel LeSaux
A: My recording setup is small, but I was able to pack a lot into a tiny space. I built my own cabinets to maximize the use of the room. My pedalboard is at lap level to make tweaking easier. My studio is called "Moose Tracks," a nod to the state of New Hampshire, where I live. In my digital workstation I use a PreSonus Studio One with a PreSonus 1824c interface and a PreSonus FaderPort II. I have KRK Rokit 5 monitors, KRK KNS 8400 headphones, a Mackie Micro Series 1202-VLZ Mixer, and a Mackie Big Knob Passive Monitor Controller. My outboard effects include: Klark Teknik EQP-KT Passive Tube Equalizer, Klark Teknik 76-KT FET Peak Limiter, Klark Teknik KT-2A Opto Electrical Tube Leveling Amplifier, PreSonus Studio Channel strip, and a Samson S-Patch 48-Point Patchbay. I have way too many pedals to list!
Current Obsession:
I've been chasing the perfect on-the-verge-of-breakup clean tone, similar to the tone Larry Carlton has been using in his recent releases. That tone is so alive and expressive. It takes high gain and a gentle touch to achieve it. And as soon as you dig in a little bit, the notes explode! It allows so much tonal variation depending on the pick attack, the pick angle, and whether you use upstrokes or downstrokes. It also makes it easy to switch from rhythm to lead just by varying the pick attack. To get that tone, I'm playing a stock Epiphone Dot using a blend of both pickups into a Custom Tones Ethos Clean II running into a Two Notes C.A.B. M+ with a 1x12 Electro-Voice open back cabinet sim. I have an MXR Carbon Copy in the FX loop and an MXR M300 as a send on the Mackie board. I'm currently working on an album of original tunes using this setup.
Rig Rundown - Larry Carlton
John Bohlinger - Nashville Correspondent
John Bohlinger
A: I've laid down all my dough on recording rigs four times in my life. A few years back when the Mac tower that drove my Digi 002 died, I shifted from my Pro Tools rig to a streamlined Universal Audio Apollo Twin/Logic combo. Although the old system was primitive, I knew it well, could work fast, and get decent results. After this last change, I feel like I'm relearning the rig every time I turn it on.
Current Obsession
Letting go.
Shawn Hammond - Chief Content Officer
Shawn Hammond
A: To track myself (guitar, vocals, keys) and Connor, my drummer, live together, I use a 4-input Audient iD44 and a 2-input Apogee Duet feeding GarageBand. Guitars (and keys, which go through my guitar rig) are miked with a Royer R-121 (sometimes also with an SM57). A Shure KSM32 large-diaphragm condenser is the drum overhead, a Rode M2 dynamic is on snare, and an Audix D6 is on kick. For bass, I often go direct into a Warm Audio WA-2A tube compressor, in addition to miking the amp with the Audix. For vocals, I use a Shure SM7B. Monitors are a pair of KRK Rokit 7 G4s.
Current Obsession:
Using all the aforementioned stuff—and getting back to gigging!
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Silos features six presets, tap tempo, one full second of delay time, and three voices—two of which are styled after bucket-brigade and tape-delay sounds. In the $150 price category, it’s not unusual for a digital delay to leave some number of those functions out. And spending the same money on a true-analog alternative usually means warm, enveloping sounds but limited functionality and delay time. Silos, improbably perhaps, offers a very elegant solution to this can’t-have-it-all dilemma in a U.S.-made effect.
A More Complete Cobbling Together
Silos’ utility is bolstered by a very unintimidating control set, which is streamlined and approachable. Three of those controls are dedicated to the same mix, time, and repeats controls you see on any delay. But saving a preset to one of the six spots on the rotary preset dial is as easy as holding the green/red illuminated button just below the mix and preset knobs. And you certainly won’t get lost in the weeds if you move to the 3-position toggle, which switches between a clear “digital” voice, darker “analog” voice, and a “tape” voice which is darker still.
“The three voices offer discernibly different response to gain devices.”
One might suspect that a tone control for the repeats offers similar functionality as the voice toggle switch. But while it’s true that the most obvious audible differences between digital, BBD, and tape delays are apparent in the relative fidelity and darkness of their echoes, the Silos’ three voices behave differently in ways that are more complex than lighter or duskier tonality. For instance, the digital voice will never exhibit runaway oscillation, even at maximum mix and repeat settings. Instead, repeats fade out after about six seconds (at the fastest time settings) or create sleepy layers of slow-decaying repeats that enhance detail in complex, sprawling, loop-like melodic phrases. The analog voice and tape voice, on the other hand, will happily feed back to psychotic extremes. Both also offer satisfying sensitivity to real-time, on-the-fly adjustments. For example, I was tickled with how I could generate Apocalypse Now helicopter-chop effects and fade them in and out of prominence as if they were approaching or receding in proximity—an effect made easier still if you assign an expression pedal to the mix control. This kind of interactivity is what makes analog machines like the Echoplex, Space Echo, and Memory Man transcend mere delay status, and the sensitivity and just-right resistance make the process of manipulating repeats endlessly engaging.
Doesn't Flinch at Filth
EarthQuaker makes a point of highlighting the Silos’ affinity for dirty and distorted sounds. I did not notice that it behaved light-years better than other delays in this regard. But the three voices most definitely offer discernibly different responses to gain devices. The super-clear first repeat in the digital mode lends clarity and melodic focus, even to hectic, unpredictable, fractured fuzzes. The analog voice, which EQD says is inspired by the tone makeup of a 1980s-vintage, Japan-made KMD bucket brigade echo, handles fuzz forgivingly inasmuch as its repeats fade warmly and evenly, but the strong midrange also keeps many overtones present as the echoes fade. The tape voice, which uses aMaestro Echoplex as its sonic inspiration, is distinctly dirtier and creates more nebulous undercurrents in the repeats. If you want to retain clarity in more melodic settings, it will create a warm glow around repeats at conservative levels. Push it, and it will summon thick, sometimes droning haze that makes a great backdrop for slower, simpler, and hooky psychedelic riffs.
In clean applications, this decay and tone profile lend the tape setting a spooky, foggy aura that suggests the cold vastness of outer space. The analog voice often displays an authentic BBD clickiness in clean repeats that’s sweet for underscoring rhythmic patterns, while the digital voice’s pronounced regularity adds a clockwork quality that supports more up-tempo, driving, electronic rhythms.
The Verdict
Silos’ combination of features seems like a very obvious and appealing one. But bringing it all together at just less than 150 bucks represents a smart, adept threading of the cost/feature needle.
EarthQuaker Devices Silos Multi-generational Time Reflection Delay Pedal
In this episode, we’re celebrating the thrill of guitarmony, sick riffs, and driving 8th-note rhythms by talking about Judas Priest. Before getting ready for this episode, neither of your esteemed hosts had ever delved into the Priest discography beyond the rock-radio hits and Beavis and Butthead—though we’d both spent our time with Heavy Metal Parking Lot. Since so many of the GOATs hold the band in the highest of regard, we knew that K.K. Downing and Glenn Tipton belonged on this list, so we embarked on a journey to find out why.
After hours of listening and watching, we’re happy to report that we get it. From their debut, 1974’s Rocka Rolla, through 1980’s British Steel, deep into the ’80s-production era with 1986’s Turbo, and through the speed-metal bravado of 1990’s Painkiller, plus live videos and records—the super-loud US Festival performance and the crushing Unleashed in the East record—we found a lot that we love.
