"SSL AWS 900 Workstation Assists on Streisand Album"
Basic tracks for Guilty Pleasures
were recorded through the SSL 9000 J Series console
(www.dmnnewswire.com,
January 16, 2006)
Twenty-five years after her multiplatinum Guilty, Barbra Streisand’s Guilty Pleasures, which debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 album chart, is another artistic and commercial triumph for the legendary singer. The long-awaited Guilty Pleasures once again pairs Streisand with producer Barry Gibb.For engineer and producer John Merchant, the Solid State Logic AWS 900 Analogue Workstation System was indispensable in the creation of Guilty Pleasures at two critical stages of the process—Streisand’s vocal overdubs and mixing.
SSL’s most popular console ever, the AWS 900 is a proven hit-maker for the top engineers and producers who recognize the dual benefits of the console’s SuperAnalogue™ signal path coupled with a comprehensive DAW controller.
Basic tracks for Guilty Pleasures were recorded through the SSL 9000 J Series console in Studio A at the Hit Factory/Criteria in Miami, with overdubs recorded to Pro Tools at the Bee Gees’ Middle Ear Studios, where Merchant served as chief engineer for more than 10 years.
“Barbra really wanted to do her vocals at home,” said Merchant. “She gave us this beautiful cottage with sweeping views of the cliffs of Malibu, looking out at the mighty Pacific. But we needed to create a studio, so we rented an AWS 900 from Advanced Audio and Pro Tools rigs from Design FX .
“I’d had a demo on the AWS 900 at GC Pro and really liked it,” Merchant recalled. “It’s very intuitive. We sat down, pushed up the faders and everything sounded great, surprisingly great. Within an hour, after seven or eight takes, Barbra came out and said, ‘That sounds fantastic.’ She said that from the first day to the last.”
Back at Middle Ear, mixing on the studio’s console was proving a frustrating experience. “Usually, I’d spend a day on the mix and then Barry would come in,” Merchant explained. “But I kept telling him I wasn’t ready yet. After three days, he finally came in and listened, and I could tell he was holding something back. I finally said, ‘It’s just not the same, is it?’ and he said, ‘It really isn’t, it’s not what we got used to.’Merchant contacted Advanced Audio, and the same AWS 900 used for vocal overdubs was shipped to Miami. “Because of its size and portability,” said Merchant, “it went in a flight case and was here the next day. We set it up, and there was that great sound we had gotten used to for three weeks in California. So the album was mixed on the AWS 900, too.”
Solid State Logic is the world’s leading manufacturer of analogue and digital audio consoles for broadcast, post, music and film facilities, and provider of solutions for workstation users. SSL’s product range includes the C100 new-generation Digital Broadcast and C200 Digital Production Consoles, the new C300 Master Studio System, the XL 9000 K Series SuperAnalogue™ Console, AWS 900 Analogue Workstation System and the XLogic range of outboard processors.
