Glasgow’s finest show us round the studio where they made their new album.
Slam – My Studio
Not the biggest studio space we’ve inhabited – but it has a great sound and our ears are in tune with its acoustics.
Slam Modular
The Reverse Proceed modular setup. It’s growing every month and we won’t be happy until it has a whole wall of its own in our studio. It’s as easy to find a great sound as it is to lose it. The ultimate “toys for boyz” (or persons).
K&H O300
Our main studio monitors – a three-way system from Klein & Hummel, now a part of Neumann Group. Just the best speakers we’ve heard in our small studio space, regardless of what type of music you pump through them. You can have all the equipment in the world, but if you can’t hear your music accurately, well… “German engineering where your studio needs it most.”
Much like our hardware synth collection, monitors are always bought and rarely sold. The Yamaha NS10Ms were the first pair we owned. They used to be industry standard. It’s always wise to have the baby Genelecs to reference from time to time, to hear a more radio/TV/good car system image. We heard the KRK V4s when visiting a friend’s studio, loved their sound and got them second-hand a few years after their release. Super cheap. The Dynaudio BM5As were our main studio monitors along with some Tannoy Golds the size of two large fridges. The tiny Sony minijack speakers and mini amp were bought in Japan, following Thomas from Daft Punk’s theory: “If it sounds good on these, then it will sound good on anything.”
Sequentix Cirklon
After scouring the world for analogue equipment, we found the centrepiece for our new album right on our doorstep: Colin Fraser’s mighty brainchild, the magnificent sequence master, the Cirklon, produced only ten miles from us in Glasgow. A thoroughly modern take on the old style of sequencing MIDI. Thanks Colin for all the help.
Roland TR-909
The 909 has never left our setup. We now have two – one we got Jeff Mills to sign, as he always uses it when he performs for us. They’re both a bit crackly and loose, but it just is the bedrock sound of techno music. We’ve used the external trigger function on a lot of our tracks since the early 90s. The old master has pride of place.
Roland Jupiter-6
The oddball keyboard from this innovative Japanese company – it has a raw sound unlike any other keyboard we’ve heard.
It produced the main bassline for our ‘Positive Education’ single. The part was named the “Wula Wula” – I’m sure if you listen you’ll recognise it. We can’t turn it off during recording, once all the circuitry has warmed up – it will never sound the same if you turn it off and then back on. The gem of our extensive Roland collection.
Maneki-neko
A constant reminder of one of our favourite destinations – you see these cats everywhere in Japan.
Slam’s new album Reverse Proceed is out now on Soma. Buy it here. Slam play a live set at fabric on Saturday 29th November. More info here. Find them on Facebook, Twitter and SoundCloud.
06.51 PM
LEGENDS!
I’d like these articles to show more stuff, not just the main or most impressive pieces. Maybe their favourite effects…..
09.22 AM
I agree. Show more stuff including any super cheap stuff so we have ideas on what could be had at garage sale prices. If they have cheap gear ask them how they use it. Whats in that rack left off the monitors and why so many hard drives. The My Studio series is the best part of this website, since you guys have access to these artistic spaces.. show some pride in this section and take us for some in depth tours.
03.16 PM
+1
Maybe add an interview with topics like how they started. How their workflow is (especially when working in teams), their relationship with gear, their thoughts about the devlopments of it, maybe some footage about them working live in the studio. It’s a shame that when you enter the cave you don’t take the whole treasure. (Just made this one up myself).
Still enjoy your website and you guys are doing a great job!
05.02 PM
David,
Just some trainspotting:
In the rack on the left side of the first picture I can see a budget TC Electronics FX unit (maybe the D-Two delay or the M-One multi-effector), a Nord Lead, and an Ensoniq DP/4 multi-effector. There’s also a Korg MS-10/20 on the right-hand side.