Chris Yetter: 0:00

So, aside from the sound, you're going to get the final product, the experience you get using hardware. You start to understand the device more than just turning something on a screen. It's a whole different experience. It really is.

Benedikt Hain: 0:16

This is the Self Recording Band Podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records on your own wherever you are DIY style, let's go. Hello and welcome to the Self Recording Band Podcast. I am your host, benedikt Hein. If you are new to the show, welcome. If you are already a listener, welcome back. Appreciate you. If you are not aware, this is on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and all your common podcast platforms, but also on YouTube. So wherever you're discovering this, make sure to pick your medium of choice, and in this case, youtube might be the one. The way to go, because this is an interview we've done at Studio Scena event last week in Hamburg, and so at the time of recording this little intro here, it was last week. So we went to this trade show, audio industry event and we recorded live podcasts there on a studio sofa and, yeah, these have been recorded by the team doing the whole studio scene and we are sharing these conversations now on the podcast. So I think it's better to watch, a better experience to watch this on YouTube. So just go to the Self Recording Band and check it out there. So little heads up, save the date. Studio Scena is happening again next year. We're going to be a part of that, for sure. Again, they already invited us because it just went very, very well and it's going to be October 22nd to October 24th, three days in Hamburg. And so, yeah, save the date, get your tickets early. It's going to be bigger next year. It's already been amazing this year and yeah, can't wait to be there again. All right, as always, I'm here joined by my friend and co-host, malcolm Owen Flutt. How are you, malcolm?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 1:58

Hey, Benny, I'm great man. Life is good back in Canada, yeah.

Benedikt Hain: 2:02

You said you're not as jet-licked as you were going to Europe so far.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 2:06

Yeah, I don't know why that is, but we both came to the same conclusion because Benny came over to Canada for my wedding just earlier in the summer and, for whatever reason, going to Europe is way harder than coming for it. I was wrecked when I got to Europe, but I feel totally fine now. I think I mean we'll let the audience decide how intelligent I sound on this podcast, but I think I sound awake, I feel awake. It's good.

Benedikt Hain: 2:33

Awesome. Yeah, you look good. You're sounding and looking great. So, absolutely, absolutely good, yeah. Also, I want to give a big shout out to our whole little team that we have here now. So, wayne, thomas, malcolm, you like all of you, this has been like thank you for this week and this has been such an incredible experience there. So thank you for all your hard work. I want people to know that everyone really worked hard and you know it was just incredible. We filmed hours and hours and hours of content. We hung out at this cool houseboat with a built-in studio and created some things there, and you're going to see you're going to eventually see all of this. So we're working our way through all this material and then release it for you guys. But, yeah, thank you so much.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 3:18

I really appreciate you all and it's been fantastic, yeah yeah, if you're active in, like the Facebook group or, even better, in Benny's coaching community, you've probably interacted with Wayne or Thomas, the other half of this team. This was actually our first time the four of us were all in the same place ever, which it doesn't. It never felt like that once.

Benedikt Hain: 3:39

No.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 3:40

It was weird. I'd never met Wayne in person and I met up with him before you guys picked us up at the Hamburg airport and we were just hanging like we're chums for you know, our whole life. It was awesome so yeah, totally so cool.

Benedikt Hain: 3:52

And also, if you are not already part of our community on Facebook or on our email list or in the coaching community, wherever, now is a good time to get in, because there's going to be collaborations happening from that studio scene event. We're going to do a few exciting things. Can't tell you anything specific about it yet, but it's a good time to get in now because things are growing, moving in the right direction. We're going to add a lot of new things, more value to our programs and to our community, and if you want to benefit from that and not miss it, then you want to be on our email list and you want to be in the Facebook group and the Facebook community. So please do that. There's multiple ways to do that, if you just check the show notes or the description below this video. And, yeah, please become a part of our community here Amazing. So this episode that we're sharing today is with Chris Yedda. This was still day one, I think, of the studio scene event.

Chris Yetter: 4:45

This was the second interview we did.

Benedikt Hain: 4:46

So Warren Hewitt was first, then Chris Yedda was the second one. Chris is the founder of, and had basically of, Audioscape. Audioscape make analog gear based on classic designs and it seems to be. I've tried a lot of a few of their things in Malcolm Udett as well. I didn't try everything, but everything I've tried seemed to be really like no compromise high-end gear but they make that accessible for people on a budget. It's obviously still not cheap because it's great gear, but compared to some of the originals it's more affordable, Much more. Yeah, and his whole approach and that company's whole approach is really fascinating. It's built in the US. They have a team of, I think, 35 people, he was telling us.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 5:28

I think it was 34. It was 34. Yeah 34 people in Florida making this gear by hand which is crazy, that they can still make gear affordable with that setup. I think both Benny and I are, just told, business addicts as well, so I think we could have a whole nother podcast just talking about how he runs his team, because that's so cool, but we didn't. This podcast is going to be much more interesting than that for everyone else. We talked about the creation of their gear, the mindset behind their gear, where analog fits in a modern world when there's digital versions of everything. Now why does analog still have its place? And Chris is a great mind. He's a very inspiring person. I've used audio escape stuff for years at a studio down the road, silverside Sound. It comes up on the Sparkcast all the time. I feel like but yeah, they got an LA2A and a 1176 blue stripe of audio escapes there and they're killer. They're great. 1176 was active every session I was there.

Benedikt Hain: 6:31

Yeah, yeah, totally. I've had experience with their bus compressor and then at Studio Xenia we got to try a new piece. I think it's not out yet, but I think they already shared some pictures of it.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 6:42

I think it was announced there. Yeah, yeah, it's coming.

Benedikt Hain: 6:46

Yeah, so you'll see that. And if you go just to audio escape, follow them on Instagram because, honestly, if you're looking into buying the gear, you've got to be quick, you've got to catch their posts and then immediately order, basically because they always run out quickly when they announce available pieces. So I got to play around with, or we both got to play around with, a new compressor that they have, and it even in a setting like that trade show, where noise in the background oh, sorry, noise in the background unfamiliar headphones and all of that we could still both tell that it sounded pretty damn amazing the way it distorted. Malcolm and I love making things dirty and fucking things up, basically with gear, and that thing really did it in a very cool way. And so, yeah, my experience was entirely positive with all things audio escape. And then also, although Chris obviously believes in analog gear, he's again not this elitist person telling people like digital scrap or whatever, not at all. He's very open. He totally understands why people are using plugins. They even created plugins with I think they're partnered with Kai right, and they have plugins now as well. So he totally understands both sides of it. But he thinks that analog has its place in the music production process and, yeah, we got to talk to him about this. We also talked about what to actually listen for when you compare analog to digital. What he thinks are the benefits If someone's on the fence of getting into analog or wanting to try analog pieces like how do I even compare? What do I listen for, where in the process to apply these things, how to still make it easy for you to recall your sessions All these questions that people usually have in terms when it comes to audio gear, to analog gear. All of that and it's been a very, very good conversation. I really enjoyed it.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 8:35

Yeah, yeah, I think you're gonna love it. If you're ever at a studio recording conference and they're there, go stop by the booth. They're the nicest team of people. Yeah, you're gonna love them. So, yes, dude, you're gonna enjoy this chat. It's again somebody that makes analog hardware. Talking to Benny, who used some analog hardware he's got a hybrid mixer and then myself, he uses none, so it's. It's an interesting kind of triangle of different workflows and, yeah, I really enjoyed it. Thank you, chris, for coming on and, yeah, enjoy that episode.

Benedikt Hain: 9:10

Hello and welcome to the self recording band podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records from your home studio or jam space. I'm your host, benedictine. I'm here with my co-host, malcolm Owen flood, from Canada, and we're live again from the studio scenes to studio scene is what you actually call it in Hamburg, germany, and we're on the Studio sofa that the guys from sound and recording let us use all week, which is really really great. Thank you for that. So we're streaming, yeah, we're streaming live. It's very exciting. So if you're watching live, hello, thank you for joining us. And our guest now, which is very, very exciting, is Chris yetta from Audi escape. They make great, great analog gear for recording studios and we just had the chance to check some of that out and it sounded incredible and we have tons of questions. So thank you, chris, for taking the time To do this with us and, yeah, welcome.

Chris Yetter: 10:02

Oh, thank you so much for having me now looking forward to it, and thank you for all this space.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 10:07

Yeah, you get the, the couch of honor, sir. Yeah, exactly.

Benedikt Hain: 10:11

So yeah, malcolm, do you want to? You want to start today?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 10:13

Yeah, Well, I think right off the bat Benny said that you make you make analog hardware for studios, but but as we were pre-ambley and you actually make hardware for artists and for musicians, and I think that's a really, really cool thing to talk about the role of hardware and why it still exists and people still love it, even though there's unlimited plugins and software available now. And I would love to hear your thoughts on the place of analog hardware in the modern world. I love this question.

Chris Yetter: 10:45

So a good way to look at it is because we get this question all the time and, like we're, you know, we just we're talking about announcing a plugin and it's one of those things where you could see a picture of a beautiful place, but it's another thing to go there and and see it with your own eyes, right, and that's kind of like the same. That's kind of the analogy I would use with hardware and you know, and a plugin is great and it's modeling that one unit, but there are some variances that should be celebrated, in my opinion, when it comes to hardware. And when you have those variances, you have your own individual unit. It's part of your sound and that's something that you know. Yes, you can model that, turn that into a plug-in if you want, but there's something to be said for having that unique Individual art piece, you know absolutely is you know kind of what we look at each unit that comes out and we judge it that way accordingly. So you know we always talk about building in small batches and that's what we do we sit and listen. Is this representative, you know, representation of what we want to go out in the wild and have people you know use on their records.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 11:53

So you know, very Conscious of all of that you know, absolutely, and, and I like the variances is a cool thing because, no matter how hard you were to try, every unit that leaves Audio scapes factory and, and, and I understand, they're all like hand-built by you and your team in Florida, which is, yep, really, really cool. They're the. You know, matter how hard you try, they're gonna be a little bit different every single time, right.

Chris Yetter: 12:20

Certainly, you know every unit is built end-to-end on site, daytona Beach, florida. There's about 35 of us now building all this gear. And yeah, you're using, if you're using, the old components, like carbon composition resistors. You know even some of the, you know, standard Potentiometers have a 20% tolerance 20%, yeah, and carbon-comp resistors. I know you guys are into do it yourself, you like, I'm sure you guys have used some carbon-comp resistors and you know, as you heat them up they drift. You know they drift with heat, they drift with time. That's just part of what you accept, you know. But they to me there's nothing that sounds like that in a tube circuit, like you can chuck metal film in there and be as clear, you know, clinical and sterile as you want. But that's not what we're about, you know we're, you know we accept those variances. We accept that and that's part of the charm and part of the sound, you know that makes it unique.

Benedikt Hain: 13:12

Yeah, that's always funny when people. It's one of those things when people compare plugins to hardware, for example, and and they always say, like, yeah, it doesn't sound exactly like the hardware. I was like if you took two of the hardware pieces and compared them, they wouldn't sound the same, and sometimes drastically different actually. So what do you compare it to? Like it's it's just that one model, that they modeled it off, you know?

Chris Yetter: 13:31

and so, yeah, and it's part of what makes it exciting and interesting, right, this is the whole yeah, and, and you know, conversely, yeah or not conversely, but you take two vintage Units or you know five, and they're all gonna sound different.

Benedikt Hain: 13:44

Yeah, that's they're gonna have yeah, or five new ones, even to a certain degree, it's you know yeah what do you think, like I know that a big part of our audience Doesn't, like has never used analog gear, with the exception of maybe their interface preamps and, like you know the stuff, it has to be analog. But if someone's on the fence and thinking about whether or not they should try and buy like an analog compressor, for example, and get into that and Maybe use it instead of a plug-in or on the way in the tracking chain, what do you say? What would you say to someone who's like I'm not sure if it's worth it? Like how do I even hear the difference? Because they're probably gonna buy it. It will sound great. They compare it to a plug-in. They're not sure if it's really better, because the differences can be subtle. Like what would you tell a person like what do you listen for? Where's the actual benefit and how do I know if it's, like you know, worth trying or like all those things? Because I know that a couple people like think about this and I'm not sure if they should get into it.

Chris Yetter: 14:40

Yeah, I mean first off, I just say yes.

Benedikt Hain: 14:43

Yeah, of course, definitely do this.

Chris Yetter: 14:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah but yeah, and the reason being is you know, aside from the sound, you're gonna get the final product, the experience you get using hardware, and actually you start to understand the device more than just turning something on a screen. It's. It's a whole different experience. It really is. And Something interesting you brought up there, is using it while tracking Mm-hmm, and I know they're trying to approximate that. But there's something different that happens when you track with the compressor or you know Signal chains changing, you know EQ after compression before you know if you're doing that all live, while you're going in and you're just committing, you know what your sound is and you commit a lot, of, a lot of people that buy audio escape gear. That's what they do, they track with this stuff. So it's there's really you know. Then they ask us which one to use, and that's the hardest question.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 15:40

Right, yeah. Well, I think that that's a great point, because so many people nowadays say like so-and-so mixes in the box. Now Jason Joshua, who we just were listening to a chat, apparently mixes all in the box now. But those songs weren't recorded all in the box. There was hardware committed in those decisions in the tracking that led to what they're now working with, like, yeah, you can. You can, of course, get great results In the box, but out of the box as well is stole still hugely in the equation.

Chris Yetter: 16:09

Yeah, you know, and at a certain point you know it is about the people, whether it's about the people who are building the gear, whether it's about the people who are mixing and their skill set and they know they've had enough hands-on experience with analog gear. They know how they can get that sound in the box. It's all part of the experience. There's no, I don't think there's ever any right or wrong way to do anything. It's just a matter of, you know, preference for each individual person and I don't feel like analogs ever gonna really go away.

Benedikt Hain: 16:38

No, just like visiting beautiful places is never gonna go away you know, yeah, and what would you specifically like listen for if someone's like, yeah, I don't know, like what will the benefit be because my plugin already sounds so amazing? And like, how would you? What would you think is the biggest benefit when it comes to, like, say, an analog compressor versus a plugin version and I don't want to get into all of this, actually that not comparing to plugins, but in general, like what do I listen for? That like, and maybe if I don't have the trained ears or the experience already?

Chris Yetter: 17:07

so there is a lot of nuance, definitely involved in what we do and even with what we listen for for final QC. That's good point actually. Yeah, the it's. There is a. You know I don't want to get into the comparing plugins and generalizations because that can get really tricky, yeah, but you know I do notice differences and just saturation notice differences and I mean, if we want to get really into it, stereo field if you got a stereo device, stereo compressor, stereo yeah reverb even you know, Stereo. I mean I've had you know. Some people send me clips and I hear the difference in the stereo field on an iPhone speaker.

Benedikt Hain: 17:49

That's crazy.

Chris Yetter: 17:49

Yeah, they're like, that's Okay, you know, like I you know, but there is a place for you know, I guess there's I. Some people describe it as three-dimensional, yeah like things sound more three-dimensional and real because they are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel like.

Benedikt Hain: 18:10

My experiences and I. You have a bunch of like really nice analog stuff as well in my studio, although I mixed in the box. But I sometimes run stuff out through the analog ear printed back in so I don't have to deal with the recall but I still have the sound. You know, something similar to reamping. That's what I do when I make stuff and and what I feel like. The more with some of those things, the more you push them, the bet, the more I like the analog version of it. So you can get away with like subtle settings a lot of the time. But if I like really push some compressors hard and like just get distortion out of them, that's where some and I don't want to like talk trash about, like talk shit about any plug-in. But that's where some of the plug-ins crap out and the the analog part, yeah analogs things.

Chris Yetter: 18:49

Still does it, and in a very cool way. That's actually what we listen for with our compressors, like you know, with when, how we select the 6aq, 5 and our, in our opto, our 2a style compressor, like does it fall apart or does it do that rubber band effect that you're looking for and just grabs it and holds it. You know, yeah. So, yeah, yeah, you can hear that sometimes once you start pushing things, once you start boosting highs.

Benedikt Hain: 19:14

Yeah, yeah, cool, yeah, awesome now um.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 19:19

Real quick. Yeah, if there's one like benefit that I don't think it's talked out enough with hardware, it's that you can use your the two hands at once. You can change two knobs at the same time, and it's so amazing being able to like adjust the attack and the release or the input and the output, not having to like turn up the compressor input like on a 1176, for example, and then it's getting louder and you don't know if you actually made it better or not. And is being able to real-time adjust with two hands on a piece of hardware is life in like it's? I mean, yeah, you can definitely reach a desirable result a lot quicker.

Chris Yetter: 19:52

Yeah, once you get everything set up. It is like you guys are talking about with the state, with the, you know, with the boat studio getting it all set up yeah but once you get it all set up, you're good to go. You know, yeah, you know, one thing I do want to talk about is you know you were talking about sending it out and then back in. Yeah, and I do a lot, something very similar and I use I don't want to, you know, plug a friend's company or whatever, but the flock audio patch. I use that With our whole demo room set up and it's so easy and convenient because you have that modern convenience of a plug-in routing menu.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 20:24

Yeah, with all the gear.

Benedikt Hain: 20:25

Yeah quickly.

Chris Yetter: 20:26

So you have all that convenience, but you're still using the hardware and it's. It sounds great. I don't hear like any. You know it's all Digital with the switching but it's all analog with the right. Are they here with their product?

Benedikt Hain: 20:39

I don't think so. We actually have them in our racks in the states.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 20:41

Yeah, okay, yeah, I'll check them out.

Benedikt Hain: 20:44

Yeah, yeah that sounds, yeah, I love those solutions actually, like, like you said, like the, the analog sound or like a certain thing we love. But then the convenience we expect these days when we work like things have to be done fast and they have to be, you know, you recall, and, yeah, best of both.

Chris Yetter: 20:58

There's some exciting things going on in the analog world, and that's one of them. Yeah, like that's that it's worth mentioning that if you're used to that convenience of those plug-in menus, you can still get that with your analog setup. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

Benedikt Hain: 21:12

So when you, when you create a new design for, for a, for a compressor, and that's based off of like a vintage piece, basically, or inspired, by. I mean, just be a bit of piece. Do you work of like just the schematics and then, or do you have an actual unit that you try to get as Close as possible to, or like what do you do there?

Chris Yetter: 21:30

That's a great question. When I started I Did not have a pot to piss in, so I would Scrounge together money to buy, like with with the opto I would buy like the original UTC iron built a point-to-point like the original, just you know. And then that was the God model. And then it like okay, let's make a, let's make a build. Every single build that we make sound as good as this right and that's what. That's what I did back Then when I didn't have the money for original. Now we're a little bit, you know, luckier in the sense that we have people that support us. They'll send us stuff. They're like do this you know, so like, for instance, manny, who's with produce like a pro as well, manny Neato, he, he sent us his 1178. Wow, and we use that as a model for our AS78. So, like all like his same components because they all vary. So, like you know, the same silver mica caps that are around the dual fat, we, you know, yeah, all the same, you know half watt carbon film resistors, and then did you ever get one that was broken or like we're like.

Benedikt Hain: 22:30

Oh, I don't think we can't muddle that the way it is.

Chris Yetter: 22:34

Yeah, sometimes you break stuff Sometimes wires are real fragile and then we got to go fix it, but yeah so. And then there's like a lot of people that kind of beta test or they give us ideas like so, during that dev process for the, for the AS78, we had Ryan Hewitt reaching out. He was mixing like unlimited love back then for the Peppers first album in a while, mm-hmm, and he wanted like a 78 though, but he wanted like the blend control, he wanted some more sidechain high-pass options. So that's something that we took into account, we added right as well. So we do collaborate with artists and people, you know who. Just their passion, just as passionate as us, basically, yeah.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 23:15

Yeah, I guess they they know what they're looking for and that's got to be helpful, of course. Yeah, now is there a Limit to, like you know, because you could just add features, add features, add features. But I would assume there's a cost to doing that.

Chris Yetter: 23:27

So, yeah, one thing you'll notice about audio escape products is that we don't add too many features because you know there is. The more you add you take away, right. So you have to be tasteful and what you're doing. So that's where you know plugins can win. They can just go unlimited crazy with options and I think that's cool and that should be celebrated. But yeah, with hardware, I think you know sometimes it's there's a cost-benefit analysis going on at all times during the dev process. Is this? You know you have to go back to like rev one or rev zero after you've done a bunch of stuff and compare.

Benedikt Hain: 23:59

You know yeah that's a great point. Going back to like being passionate about it, like you said before, and you can tell like you're really passionate about what you do. Is there a certain piece of gear you're working on now, or you have been working on, that you're particularly excited about at the moment?

Chris Yetter: 24:13

Yeah, there's. We usually have 10 to 12 active products in development and then whatever one sort of Kind of comes together in a cohesive manner with all our available options and things that are going on. That's usually what I start focusing in and honing in our time on. There's probably like three or four that are really getting close right now. Obviously, I don't want to let the cat out of the bag, of course, on it. But there's a lot of exciting stuff going on and there'll be more announcements. You know we have Nam coming up in January. There'll be a big announcement there of another new product.

Benedikt Hain: 24:45

So what's been the latest announcement that you can talk about already?

Chris Yetter: 24:49

Well, we did announce just today the MK 609. We've been in development on that since about 2020. Got an original friend of a supporter of ours, earl Edgar, from New Zealand you know sent us his original metal knob 609 and. We just went to town. It's actually pretty complex circuit, you know more than you would think, and it took a while, took a couple years to really and there's not really. If you look online or anything, there's. You know, schematics of, you know 609, but there's not really a metal knob one. So we really had to just reverse engineer the you know the build itself in that manner and then also Went to the trouble of molding the knobs. Original metal knobs, as you know, they're really hard to find, you know. So the originals, I know there's not that many out there, they're like getting pretty rare. So and it's a circuit that I feel like should be out there for people.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 25:47

I hadn't even considered that you have to also figure out how to reproduce the look to some extent. Oh, another challenge, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 25:55

Yeah, and luckily, you know, we have a Ryan, ryan Schmead, who's over there. He does all our mechanical designs. He's our head mechanical engineer. So when I first started it was just like Basic front panel. You know all that and I was, you know. Now he's got 3d models and everything. You can see it from every single angle and very cool. Yeah, and Long way speaking of Ryan, he did the mechanical design for our ASA 6a, which we're releasing soon as well. That is like a mechanical feat if you look at that.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 26:25

Yeah it's.

Chris Yetter: 26:26

It's not like a traditional rack case.

Benedikt Hain: 26:29

So if you you know, it's a beautiful unit. We just got to look at it and also try it and listen to it and it's like I'm yeah, yeah, I was gonna say are we allowed to say that we saw it?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 26:38

Yeah? Oh, yeah, yeah and it sounds amazing, it sounds very also feels great and looks great.

Benedikt Hain: 26:43

So back to the topic you were just talking about. Like the way it looks and feels the material it's built.

Chris Yetter: 26:48

And yeah, it's built just like. Just like the original back in 1951 with the umber gray I. You know power coat finish. It's got the hinge front panel. It's five U in height. It's got all the original tube layout, new old stock tubes, all the original transformer layout. It's really it's got like on the inside you could pull it out. It's like a two-part case, you know. It's got like that old amplifier kind of chassis that you see in the tray.

Benedikt Hain: 27:14

Yeah, it's so funny because our audience is probably confused by now, because on most of like, we were almost 200 episodes into the podcast and on most of the episodes we always tell people, like, use whatever you have, you know, as things are so available these days, and like, don't let the gear limit you and all of that. And we encourage people, of course, because we love that everyone can make their own records and everything. But now we're like talking about the analog gear and I'm not gonna lie, I love gear and I still have analog gear and I'm getting excited about it and now I want one of those you know that I just listened to. So it's like, yeah, that's the truth, it's still exciting. I don't think everyone has to have all those things, especially when you're starting out, but at some point you should at least try it and then make a decision for yourself, you know Like. But I'm not gonna pretend it's not exciting because it is. It's very exciting and I really think it's cool.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 27:57

I mean you both touched on how hardware seems to take being pushed really hard way better than plugins. And that new ASA model is like we both. Just the first thing we did is distorted vocals.

Chris Yetter: 28:11

Yeah, it's like instantly don't let everyone push it.

Benedikt Hain: 28:14

Oh yeah, Immediately cracked the input and like oh yes, so good.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 28:17

And what's cool about that that I think is relevant to our audience, is that what people are sometimes worried about, like being too too quantized or things being too perfect and not standing out, not having any way of being unique and I think that is a really cool thing about analog gear is that they're all different from each other in you know some variances at least, and how you use them is also gonna give a very different result, and it's like a cool way of kind of setting yourself apart. Like I don't have anything that could sound like that new compressor of yours on a vocal. I cannot make that sound. If I could, I'd kind of have a different vocal sound going on than anybody else in my area.

Chris Yetter: 28:55

That's a pretty cool thing it's true.

Benedikt Hain: 28:57

And also a good point. There is like how you use it that's. I don't know exactly why that is, but I've always noticed that when I use analog gear, even if it would sound exactly the same as the plugin like, I use it differently For whatever reason. If I turn the knob on the screen, whereas it's like grabbing the knob and maybe not even looking at it, I do different things with the hardware, I use it differently. So that is, that is also something that I think that's fascinating, has to be talked about in a way, and I, yeah so, totally agreed. It helps you be unique, stand out to your thing and maybe react more to the music.

Chris Yetter: 29:28

And you guys mentioned. Now, I'm passionate about this. I really am Like. We're like kids in a candy store.

Benedikt Hain: 29:33

Yeah, every day Like. Is that your experience as well? That you like whatever it is that you use it differently, maybe Like oh, certainly. Yeah.

Chris Yetter: 29:42

Like, and sometimes I will compare something to a plugin. You're just to be like okay, there's maybe some weird quirk, and I don't have an original handy at the moment or something like that and I'll be like did they model this quirk? Am I, you know? Am I crazy? Is this what's going on? And yeah, it's handy. But yeah, as far as your question, yeah, definitely 100%. It's always different and there's still some nuance, even if it sounds close. You know, we add sometimes some options, like you know, like on the 6A, you can actually just have the grit with no compression, right?

Benedikt Hain: 30:14

So I mean, yeah, how would you sort of approach like implementing this into a modern like workflow? Would you run it as like in, like plug-in inserts, like you know, like in and out of the computer in real time while you're mixed? Would you do the re-amp thing where you print it? How would you go about like a recall? Because you know how it's like, like we sometimes work on like 10 Zogs at the same time and then they need a fast revision and then we need to recall all the things, and that's one of the reasons why people don't get analog gear even though they think it sounds great. So do you take pictures? Do you have like recall sheets, like all of that? How would you personally approach?

Chris Yetter: 30:49

Well, I know we do offer a patch rat subscription for free to our customers and you know that's kind of more you know digital way of digital recall but not you know. So it kind of like spec, you know recall sheets but just in your phone. Yeah, so we offer that as far as how you use it.

Benedikt Hain: 31:10

That goes, sorry, does that mean I don't know that thing? That doesn't mean I see the front plate, basically, or like I can turn knobs, or do I have to mark it, like on a recall sheet or like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like it's just like a GUI.

Chris Yetter: 31:20

Yeah, okay.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 31:21

Yeah, each front panel.

Chris Yetter: 31:23

And that's useful for. But to answer your question, that really depends on each individual user. I do. I will say there is really what I love about these devices is you can't mess them up Like you know. They just sound great any way you use them. So you just you know you're going to be better off plugging into any of these, you know, than not doing it.

Benedikt Hain: 31:42

So it's a great answer. Yeah, it's a great answer, yeah, Because it's this fine line, you know. It's like efficiency is important in today's music production role and being fast and intuitive. And like maybe maybe the time you lose setting things up, maybe you save that because you mix more intuitively and faster, you know whatever.

Chris Yetter: 31:58

Yeah, yeah, and today's day and age it is tough though I feel that, but you know, and sometimes people they want that convenience of digital recall on their device. I get that, but like on something like a 2A, like I'm sorry, Like that's, that's what, two knobs guys.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:14

Like I'm on, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

Chris Yetter: 32:16

Yeah, you're in the wrong business if you need digital recall with that device. I'm sorry.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:22

Very good point. Very good point. One other thing I want to bring up that you you told us when we chatted earlier is that you're I mean, I think people might assume okay, he likes analog hardware because he makes it, but you also have a plugin coming out. We do.

Chris Yetter: 32:37

We think it would be something that would be useful on the plug in marketplace. We're not just going to do something that's been done. A bunch from you know like, like. There's a bunch of 2A style compressor plug-ins out there, so our reverb is completely unique. So we're coming out with our XL305, our reverb plug-in and we partner with Kyve Audio doing this.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:58

Which make great plug-ins.

Chris Yetter: 32:59

They make great plug-ins. Eddie is. Eddie is a wizard at what he does. We sent him the original XL305. If you guys aren't familiar with these reverbs, they're a little bit more obscure. But I worked with Wayne Kirkwood who designed the original XL305 in the early 80s and he helped us redesign it for the modern you know for today and it's it is a completely different device from the original one as far as it's got the same concept, as far as the echo chamber and the way it's built and put together, but it's a completely like re-imagined device. So it's like a what I describe as like the best general purpose spring reverb you could use all over your mix Awesome.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 33:37

And I think spring reverb is one of the most absent plug-ins in my opinion, like I don't actually own one that I really like right now, so I'm excited to try it.

Chris Yetter: 33:46

Yeah, and it's cool Cause you can toggle between the original one and and the new one. Oh, cool, yeah, so you can get like you can hear, like how different they really are and they're cool. They're both useful in their own right, so I think it's really cool and we might do some different stuff with it as well in the future, so things that go beyond what the hardware can do, like we were talking about with plugins. So love it.

Benedikt Hain: 34:09

Totally. What would you say to someone who's trying to get like how did you get into this building things and how did it all start? And that's interesting as well, because you are probably now very. You said you're 35 people or something. You're now very far from where you were at the beginning, probably, and you've come a long way. So how do you get into doing this and how do you get to even understand all of this and be able to pull it off and create units that sound like that?

Chris Yetter: 34:37

Like we, audioscape started in 2016. Before that a lot of people don't know this there was a company I did from 2010 to 2015 called CVC Pedals and I built guitar pedals, all right, and I just built them in the garage and, like you know, on Vero board or whatever, and I used to etch my own circuit boards, drill the holes, do all that stuff. That was fun and we were semi-popular. You know. We did some cool stuff and it just got to a point where I was building the bus compressor for a producer friend of mine who was like, I'm all in the box but the only thing I'd use is a bus comp, you know. So I was like, all right, I'll build you one. And then I was like, hey, this is something I think people could use. So Audioscape was born out of that, that one product, and then it just took off from there. And then I'd start getting pedal orders and I'd throw them against the wall and be angry, you know, because it's too much for one person to do two different companies. So Audioscape sort of took over and then if you go on, like the CVC pedals, like YouTube, you'll see people are like I don't know what happened to this company. I think this guy's dead, or in jail or you know.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 35:43

Like, like, just moved on.

Benedikt Hain: 35:44

No, we just moved on. Yeah, yeah, totally. Oh, that's interesting, great way to get into it, though, with starting with pedals.

Chris Yetter: 35:50

Oh yeah, you can't hurt yourself that way. You know nine volt, you know You're not gonna really shock yourself to that.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 35:56

Very good point.

Benedikt Hain: 35:57

So, before we wrap it up here today, because we're coming close to the end of our slot here, we're like how does the order process work? And then, how do you get your hands on one of those products? Can I just go to the website at any point and just order it? Or how does it work?

Chris Yetter: 36:11

So for the 260VU and the Bus Comp you can go to the website and just order and there's a standard lead time two to three weeks on each of those. Those are, you know, we've sort of standardized our production with that to a point where we can do that. The other products, like the Opto, we drop on Wednesdays and Saturdays like the traditional model. We started with APM Eastern Standard Time and then for the EQP and the AS78, there's a reserve list. So and that's that we open up usually like every other Saturday so people can jump on for that. And we are looking at doing some EU distribution with our friends at Session Desk as well and having an EU website where there's some more agreeable times for our inventory updates. So people you know it could drop APM here, you know, instead of APM six hours, you know earlier.

Benedikt Hain: 37:02

And does that mean like you gotta be, you gotta be on it at that time, right it's, they don't last long.

Chris Yetter: 37:08

They don't. Sometimes it varies different times of the year, certain products, but yeah, some of them, like you know, like our optos, usually typically they're gone very quick, you know. And people they email I can't get it. You said it was gonna be in stock. I was like, you know, we just, yeah, get a run, you get a run on them. But you know it's not like we're trying to do that on purpose. You know we have a lot of people working and everybody's building that from Monday to Wednesday and this is how many optos we've built.

Benedikt Hain: 37:33

And it's hand-built in the US. I mean, this is like you know. Yeah, end to end, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 37:36

Yeah, we got. You know. We have a girl showing up with a baby on one arm and a box of boards on the other on Fridays, like that's this company, you know.

Benedikt Hain: 37:44

Yeah, yeah, so cool, I love it. So you guys have any questions here. I think anybody wants to ask Chris a question about any of the gear, or all good.

Chris Yetter: 37:59

Do you have a question?

Benedikt Hain: 37:59

Ryan. Yeah, ask Ryan, do you plan on bringing any pedals, back? Oh, that's a good one actually, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 38:09

That is a good question and we actually did bring one of the CBC pedals back. Oh yeah, about a week ago we did a drop on the Campanion Plus.

Benedikt Hain: 38:17

What is the Campanion Plus?

Chris Yetter: 38:19

It's based off the old Chennai Campanion. Plus which is an excellent, excellent fuzz pedal for guitar bass, anything. A lot comes with big fan of fuzz pedals I know that. Yeah. So it's basically yeah, it's got the old style circuit board Like, and it's got like we use the original transistors that were in our original pedal from way back when, so like we've sourced those. So it's just going to be like a limited run that we do on them. But yeah, it's fun. You can check it out if you go on the Audioscape website there's actually a CBC pedals tab.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 38:50

So yeah, it's kind of coming full circle with that. That's fantastic, fantastic.

Benedikt Hain: 38:54

Well, thank you, chris. This has been really fascinating, really interesting. Also, thank you for letting us use the gear and getting to hear. It was really amazing and yeah, so how, like? Where should we send people if they want to check it out? Is this the website? Is it audioscapecom? Is it your socials?

Chris Yetter: 39:10

Like, what's the Audioscapecom and also at Audioscape Audio on Instagram is usually the best place to find us.

Benedikt Hain: 39:17

Awesome, we're going to put that in the show notes as well, and then, yeah, we'll be back there, like tomorrow and on Thursday. I think I'll have to hear more of those, yeah you do Come on back. Yeah, we'll be. Thank you for taking the time, Chris. Oh, thank you, Thank you, guys for listening and then watching us live here and yeah, and thank you for being here and listening to this, all right, awesome. Thank you, guys A big round of applause for Chris, please.

Chris Yetter: 39:42

You guys are awesome, oh, ok.

Chris Yetter: 0:00

So, aside from the sound, you're going to get the final product, the experience you get using hardware. You start to understand the device more than just turning something on a screen. It's a whole different experience. It really is.

Benedikt Hain: 0:16

This is the Self Recording Band Podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records on your own wherever you are DIY style, let's go. Hello and welcome to the Self Recording Band Podcast. I am your host, benedikt Hein. If you are new to the show, welcome. If you are already a listener, welcome back. Appreciate you. If you are not aware, this is on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and all your common podcast platforms, but also on YouTube. So wherever you're discovering this, make sure to pick your medium of choice, and in this case, youtube might be the one. The way to go, because this is an interview we've done at Studio Scena event last week in Hamburg, and so at the time of recording this little intro here, it was last week. So we went to this trade show, audio industry event and we recorded live podcasts there on a studio sofa and, yeah, these have been recorded by the team doing the whole studio scene and we are sharing these conversations now on the podcast. So I think it's better to watch, a better experience to watch this on YouTube. So just go to the Self Recording Band and check it out there. So little heads up, save the date. Studio Scena is happening again next year. We're going to be a part of that, for sure. Again, they already invited us because it just went very, very well and it's going to be October 22nd to October 24th, three days in Hamburg. And so, yeah, save the date, get your tickets early. It's going to be bigger next year. It's already been amazing this year and yeah, can't wait to be there again. All right, as always, I'm here joined by my friend and co-host, malcolm Owen Flutt. How are you, malcolm?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 1:58

Hey, Benny, I'm great man. Life is good back in Canada, yeah.

Benedikt Hain: 2:02

You said you're not as jet-licked as you were going to Europe so far.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 2:06

Yeah, I don't know why that is, but we both came to the same conclusion because Benny came over to Canada for my wedding just earlier in the summer and, for whatever reason, going to Europe is way harder than coming for it. I was wrecked when I got to Europe, but I feel totally fine now. I think I mean we'll let the audience decide how intelligent I sound on this podcast, but I think I sound awake, I feel awake. It's good.

Benedikt Hain: 2:33

Awesome. Yeah, you look good. You're sounding and looking great. So, absolutely, absolutely good, yeah. Also, I want to give a big shout out to our whole little team that we have here now. So, wayne, thomas, malcolm, you like all of you, this has been like thank you for this week and this has been such an incredible experience there. So thank you for all your hard work. I want people to know that everyone really worked hard and you know it was just incredible. We filmed hours and hours and hours of content. We hung out at this cool houseboat with a built-in studio and created some things there, and you're going to see you're going to eventually see all of this. So we're working our way through all this material and then release it for you guys. But, yeah, thank you so much.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 3:18

I really appreciate you all and it's been fantastic, yeah yeah, if you're active in, like the Facebook group or, even better, in Benny's coaching community, you've probably interacted with Wayne or Thomas, the other half of this team. This was actually our first time the four of us were all in the same place ever, which it doesn't. It never felt like that once.

Benedikt Hain: 3:39

No.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 3:40

It was weird. I'd never met Wayne in person and I met up with him before you guys picked us up at the Hamburg airport and we were just hanging like we're chums for you know, our whole life. It was awesome so yeah, totally so cool.

Benedikt Hain: 3:52

And also, if you are not already part of our community on Facebook or on our email list or in the coaching community, wherever, now is a good time to get in, because there's going to be collaborations happening from that studio scene event. We're going to do a few exciting things. Can't tell you anything specific about it yet, but it's a good time to get in now because things are growing, moving in the right direction. We're going to add a lot of new things, more value to our programs and to our community, and if you want to benefit from that and not miss it, then you want to be on our email list and you want to be in the Facebook group and the Facebook community. So please do that. There's multiple ways to do that, if you just check the show notes or the description below this video. And, yeah, please become a part of our community here Amazing. So this episode that we're sharing today is with Chris Yedda. This was still day one, I think, of the studio scene event.

Chris Yetter: 4:45

This was the second interview we did.

Benedikt Hain: 4:46

So Warren Hewitt was first, then Chris Yedda was the second one. Chris is the founder of, and had basically of, Audioscape. Audioscape make analog gear based on classic designs and it seems to be. I've tried a lot of a few of their things in Malcolm Udett as well. I didn't try everything, but everything I've tried seemed to be really like no compromise high-end gear but they make that accessible for people on a budget. It's obviously still not cheap because it's great gear, but compared to some of the originals it's more affordable, Much more. Yeah, and his whole approach and that company's whole approach is really fascinating. It's built in the US. They have a team of, I think, 35 people, he was telling us.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 5:28

I think it was 34. It was 34. Yeah 34 people in Florida making this gear by hand which is crazy, that they can still make gear affordable with that setup. I think both Benny and I are, just told, business addicts as well, so I think we could have a whole nother podcast just talking about how he runs his team, because that's so cool, but we didn't. This podcast is going to be much more interesting than that for everyone else. We talked about the creation of their gear, the mindset behind their gear, where analog fits in a modern world when there's digital versions of everything. Now why does analog still have its place? And Chris is a great mind. He's a very inspiring person. I've used audio escape stuff for years at a studio down the road, silverside Sound. It comes up on the Sparkcast all the time. I feel like but yeah, they got an LA2A and a 1176 blue stripe of audio escapes there and they're killer. They're great. 1176 was active every session I was there.

Benedikt Hain: 6:31

Yeah, yeah, totally. I've had experience with their bus compressor and then at Studio Xenia we got to try a new piece. I think it's not out yet, but I think they already shared some pictures of it.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 6:42

I think it was announced there. Yeah, yeah, it's coming.

Benedikt Hain: 6:46

Yeah, so you'll see that. And if you go just to audio escape, follow them on Instagram because, honestly, if you're looking into buying the gear, you've got to be quick, you've got to catch their posts and then immediately order, basically because they always run out quickly when they announce available pieces. So I got to play around with, or we both got to play around with, a new compressor that they have, and it even in a setting like that trade show, where noise in the background oh, sorry, noise in the background unfamiliar headphones and all of that we could still both tell that it sounded pretty damn amazing the way it distorted. Malcolm and I love making things dirty and fucking things up, basically with gear, and that thing really did it in a very cool way. And so, yeah, my experience was entirely positive with all things audio escape. And then also, although Chris obviously believes in analog gear, he's again not this elitist person telling people like digital scrap or whatever, not at all. He's very open. He totally understands why people are using plugins. They even created plugins with I think they're partnered with Kai right, and they have plugins now as well. So he totally understands both sides of it. But he thinks that analog has its place in the music production process and, yeah, we got to talk to him about this. We also talked about what to actually listen for when you compare analog to digital. What he thinks are the benefits If someone's on the fence of getting into analog or wanting to try analog pieces like how do I even compare? What do I listen for, where in the process to apply these things, how to still make it easy for you to recall your sessions All these questions that people usually have in terms when it comes to audio gear, to analog gear. All of that and it's been a very, very good conversation. I really enjoyed it.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 8:35

Yeah, yeah, I think you're gonna love it. If you're ever at a studio recording conference and they're there, go stop by the booth. They're the nicest team of people. Yeah, you're gonna love them. So, yes, dude, you're gonna enjoy this chat. It's again somebody that makes analog hardware. Talking to Benny, who used some analog hardware he's got a hybrid mixer and then myself, he uses none, so it's. It's an interesting kind of triangle of different workflows and, yeah, I really enjoyed it. Thank you, chris, for coming on and, yeah, enjoy that episode.

Benedikt Hain: 9:10

Hello and welcome to the self recording band podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records from your home studio or jam space. I'm your host, benedictine. I'm here with my co-host, malcolm Owen flood, from Canada, and we're live again from the studio scenes to studio scene is what you actually call it in Hamburg, germany, and we're on the Studio sofa that the guys from sound and recording let us use all week, which is really really great. Thank you for that. So we're streaming, yeah, we're streaming live. It's very exciting. So if you're watching live, hello, thank you for joining us. And our guest now, which is very, very exciting, is Chris yetta from Audi escape. They make great, great analog gear for recording studios and we just had the chance to check some of that out and it sounded incredible and we have tons of questions. So thank you, chris, for taking the time To do this with us and, yeah, welcome.

Chris Yetter: 10:02

Oh, thank you so much for having me now looking forward to it, and thank you for all this space.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 10:07

Yeah, you get the, the couch of honor, sir. Yeah, exactly.

Benedikt Hain: 10:11

So yeah, malcolm, do you want to? You want to start today?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 10:13

Yeah, Well, I think right off the bat Benny said that you make you make analog hardware for studios, but but as we were pre-ambley and you actually make hardware for artists and for musicians, and I think that's a really, really cool thing to talk about the role of hardware and why it still exists and people still love it, even though there's unlimited plugins and software available now. And I would love to hear your thoughts on the place of analog hardware in the modern world. I love this question.

Chris Yetter: 10:45

So a good way to look at it is because we get this question all the time and, like we're, you know, we just we're talking about announcing a plugin and it's one of those things where you could see a picture of a beautiful place, but it's another thing to go there and and see it with your own eyes, right, and that's kind of like the same. That's kind of the analogy I would use with hardware and you know, and a plugin is great and it's modeling that one unit, but there are some variances that should be celebrated, in my opinion, when it comes to hardware. And when you have those variances, you have your own individual unit. It's part of your sound and that's something that you know. Yes, you can model that, turn that into a plug-in if you want, but there's something to be said for having that unique Individual art piece, you know absolutely is you know kind of what we look at each unit that comes out and we judge it that way accordingly. So you know we always talk about building in small batches and that's what we do we sit and listen. Is this representative, you know, representation of what we want to go out in the wild and have people you know use on their records.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 11:53

So you know, very Conscious of all of that you know, absolutely, and, and I like the variances is a cool thing because, no matter how hard you were to try, every unit that leaves Audio scapes factory and, and, and I understand, they're all like hand-built by you and your team in Florida, which is, yep, really, really cool. They're the. You know, matter how hard you try, they're gonna be a little bit different every single time, right.

Chris Yetter: 12:20

Certainly, you know every unit is built end-to-end on site, daytona Beach, florida. There's about 35 of us now building all this gear. And yeah, you're using, if you're using, the old components, like carbon composition resistors. You know even some of the, you know, standard Potentiometers have a 20% tolerance 20%, yeah, and carbon-comp resistors. I know you guys are into do it yourself, you like, I'm sure you guys have used some carbon-comp resistors and you know, as you heat them up they drift. You know they drift with heat, they drift with time. That's just part of what you accept, you know. But they to me there's nothing that sounds like that in a tube circuit, like you can chuck metal film in there and be as clear, you know, clinical and sterile as you want. But that's not what we're about, you know we're, you know we accept those variances. We accept that and that's part of the charm and part of the sound, you know that makes it unique.

Benedikt Hain: 13:12

Yeah, that's always funny when people. It's one of those things when people compare plugins to hardware, for example, and and they always say, like, yeah, it doesn't sound exactly like the hardware. I was like if you took two of the hardware pieces and compared them, they wouldn't sound the same, and sometimes drastically different actually. So what do you compare it to? Like it's it's just that one model, that they modeled it off, you know?

Chris Yetter: 13:31

and so, yeah, and it's part of what makes it exciting and interesting, right, this is the whole yeah, and, and you know, conversely, yeah or not conversely, but you take two vintage Units or you know five, and they're all gonna sound different.

Benedikt Hain: 13:44

Yeah, that's they're gonna have yeah, or five new ones, even to a certain degree, it's you know yeah what do you think, like I know that a big part of our audience Doesn't, like has never used analog gear, with the exception of maybe their interface preamps and, like you know the stuff, it has to be analog. But if someone's on the fence and thinking about whether or not they should try and buy like an analog compressor, for example, and get into that and Maybe use it instead of a plug-in or on the way in the tracking chain, what do you say? What would you say to someone who's like I'm not sure if it's worth it? Like how do I even hear the difference? Because they're probably gonna buy it. It will sound great. They compare it to a plug-in. They're not sure if it's really better, because the differences can be subtle. Like what would you tell a person like what do you listen for? Where's the actual benefit and how do I know if it's, like you know, worth trying or like all those things? Because I know that a couple people like think about this and I'm not sure if they should get into it.

Chris Yetter: 14:40

Yeah, I mean first off, I just say yes.

Benedikt Hain: 14:43

Yeah, of course, definitely do this.

Chris Yetter: 14:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah but yeah, and the reason being is you know, aside from the sound, you're gonna get the final product, the experience you get using hardware, and actually you start to understand the device more than just turning something on a screen. It's. It's a whole different experience. It really is. And Something interesting you brought up there, is using it while tracking Mm-hmm, and I know they're trying to approximate that. But there's something different that happens when you track with the compressor or you know Signal chains changing, you know EQ after compression before you know if you're doing that all live, while you're going in and you're just committing, you know what your sound is and you commit a lot, of, a lot of people that buy audio escape gear. That's what they do, they track with this stuff. So it's there's really you know. Then they ask us which one to use, and that's the hardest question.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 15:40

Right, yeah. Well, I think that that's a great point, because so many people nowadays say like so-and-so mixes in the box. Now Jason Joshua, who we just were listening to a chat, apparently mixes all in the box now. But those songs weren't recorded all in the box. There was hardware committed in those decisions in the tracking that led to what they're now working with, like, yeah, you can. You can, of course, get great results In the box, but out of the box as well is stole still hugely in the equation.

Chris Yetter: 16:09

Yeah, you know, and at a certain point you know it is about the people, whether it's about the people who are building the gear, whether it's about the people who are mixing and their skill set and they know they've had enough hands-on experience with analog gear. They know how they can get that sound in the box. It's all part of the experience. There's no, I don't think there's ever any right or wrong way to do anything. It's just a matter of, you know, preference for each individual person and I don't feel like analogs ever gonna really go away.

Benedikt Hain: 16:38

No, just like visiting beautiful places is never gonna go away you know, yeah, and what would you specifically like listen for if someone's like, yeah, I don't know, like what will the benefit be because my plugin already sounds so amazing? And like, how would you? What would you think is the biggest benefit when it comes to, like, say, an analog compressor versus a plugin version and I don't want to get into all of this, actually that not comparing to plugins, but in general, like what do I listen for? That like, and maybe if I don't have the trained ears or the experience already?

Chris Yetter: 17:07

so there is a lot of nuance, definitely involved in what we do and even with what we listen for for final QC. That's good point actually. Yeah, the it's. There is a. You know I don't want to get into the comparing plugins and generalizations because that can get really tricky, yeah, but you know I do notice differences and just saturation notice differences and I mean, if we want to get really into it, stereo field if you got a stereo device, stereo compressor, stereo yeah reverb even you know, Stereo. I mean I've had you know. Some people send me clips and I hear the difference in the stereo field on an iPhone speaker.

Benedikt Hain: 17:49

That's crazy.

Chris Yetter: 17:49

Yeah, they're like, that's Okay, you know, like I you know, but there is a place for you know, I guess there's I. Some people describe it as three-dimensional, yeah like things sound more three-dimensional and real because they are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel like.

Benedikt Hain: 18:10

My experiences and I. You have a bunch of like really nice analog stuff as well in my studio, although I mixed in the box. But I sometimes run stuff out through the analog ear printed back in so I don't have to deal with the recall but I still have the sound. You know, something similar to reamping. That's what I do when I make stuff and and what I feel like. The more with some of those things, the more you push them, the bet, the more I like the analog version of it. So you can get away with like subtle settings a lot of the time. But if I like really push some compressors hard and like just get distortion out of them, that's where some and I don't want to like talk trash about, like talk shit about any plug-in. But that's where some of the plug-ins crap out and the the analog part, yeah analogs things.

Chris Yetter: 18:49

Still does it, and in a very cool way. That's actually what we listen for with our compressors, like you know, with when, how we select the 6aq, 5 and our, in our opto, our 2a style compressor, like does it fall apart or does it do that rubber band effect that you're looking for and just grabs it and holds it. You know, yeah. So, yeah, yeah, you can hear that sometimes once you start pushing things, once you start boosting highs.

Benedikt Hain: 19:14

Yeah, yeah, cool, yeah, awesome now um.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 19:19

Real quick. Yeah, if there's one like benefit that I don't think it's talked out enough with hardware, it's that you can use your the two hands at once. You can change two knobs at the same time, and it's so amazing being able to like adjust the attack and the release or the input and the output, not having to like turn up the compressor input like on a 1176, for example, and then it's getting louder and you don't know if you actually made it better or not. And is being able to real-time adjust with two hands on a piece of hardware is life in like it's? I mean, yeah, you can definitely reach a desirable result a lot quicker.

Chris Yetter: 19:52

Yeah, once you get everything set up. It is like you guys are talking about with the state, with the, you know, with the boat studio getting it all set up yeah but once you get it all set up, you're good to go. You know, yeah, you know, one thing I do want to talk about is you know you were talking about sending it out and then back in. Yeah, and I do a lot, something very similar and I use I don't want to, you know, plug a friend's company or whatever, but the flock audio patch. I use that With our whole demo room set up and it's so easy and convenient because you have that modern convenience of a plug-in routing menu.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 20:24

Yeah, with all the gear.

Benedikt Hain: 20:25

Yeah quickly.

Chris Yetter: 20:26

So you have all that convenience, but you're still using the hardware and it's. It sounds great. I don't hear like any. You know it's all Digital with the switching but it's all analog with the right. Are they here with their product?

Benedikt Hain: 20:39

I don't think so. We actually have them in our racks in the states.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 20:41

Yeah, okay, yeah, I'll check them out.

Benedikt Hain: 20:44

Yeah, yeah that sounds, yeah, I love those solutions actually, like, like you said, like the, the analog sound or like a certain thing we love. But then the convenience we expect these days when we work like things have to be done fast and they have to be, you know, you recall, and, yeah, best of both.

Chris Yetter: 20:58

There's some exciting things going on in the analog world, and that's one of them. Yeah, like that's that it's worth mentioning that if you're used to that convenience of those plug-in menus, you can still get that with your analog setup. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

Benedikt Hain: 21:12

So when you, when you create a new design for, for a, for a compressor, and that's based off of like a vintage piece, basically, or inspired, by. I mean, just be a bit of piece. Do you work of like just the schematics and then, or do you have an actual unit that you try to get as Close as possible to, or like what do you do there?

Chris Yetter: 21:30

That's a great question. When I started I Did not have a pot to piss in, so I would Scrounge together money to buy, like with with the opto I would buy like the original UTC iron built a point-to-point like the original, just you know. And then that was the God model. And then it like okay, let's make a, let's make a build. Every single build that we make sound as good as this right and that's what. That's what I did back Then when I didn't have the money for original. Now we're a little bit, you know, luckier in the sense that we have people that support us. They'll send us stuff. They're like do this you know, so like, for instance, manny, who's with produce like a pro as well, manny Neato, he, he sent us his 1178. Wow, and we use that as a model for our AS78. So, like all like his same components because they all vary. So, like you know, the same silver mica caps that are around the dual fat, we, you know, yeah, all the same, you know half watt carbon film resistors, and then did you ever get one that was broken or like we're like.

Benedikt Hain: 22:30

Oh, I don't think we can't muddle that the way it is.

Chris Yetter: 22:34

Yeah, sometimes you break stuff Sometimes wires are real fragile and then we got to go fix it, but yeah so. And then there's like a lot of people that kind of beta test or they give us ideas like so, during that dev process for the, for the AS78, we had Ryan Hewitt reaching out. He was mixing like unlimited love back then for the Peppers first album in a while, mm-hmm, and he wanted like a 78 though, but he wanted like the blend control, he wanted some more sidechain high-pass options. So that's something that we took into account, we added right as well. So we do collaborate with artists and people, you know who. Just their passion, just as passionate as us, basically, yeah.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 23:15

Yeah, I guess they they know what they're looking for and that's got to be helpful, of course. Yeah, now is there a Limit to, like you know, because you could just add features, add features, add features. But I would assume there's a cost to doing that.

Chris Yetter: 23:27

So, yeah, one thing you'll notice about audio escape products is that we don't add too many features because you know there is. The more you add you take away, right. So you have to be tasteful and what you're doing. So that's where you know plugins can win. They can just go unlimited crazy with options and I think that's cool and that should be celebrated. But yeah, with hardware, I think you know sometimes it's there's a cost-benefit analysis going on at all times during the dev process. Is this? You know you have to go back to like rev one or rev zero after you've done a bunch of stuff and compare.

Benedikt Hain: 23:59

You know yeah that's a great point. Going back to like being passionate about it, like you said before, and you can tell like you're really passionate about what you do. Is there a certain piece of gear you're working on now, or you have been working on, that you're particularly excited about at the moment?

Chris Yetter: 24:13

Yeah, there's. We usually have 10 to 12 active products in development and then whatever one sort of Kind of comes together in a cohesive manner with all our available options and things that are going on. That's usually what I start focusing in and honing in our time on. There's probably like three or four that are really getting close right now. Obviously, I don't want to let the cat out of the bag, of course, on it. But there's a lot of exciting stuff going on and there'll be more announcements. You know we have Nam coming up in January. There'll be a big announcement there of another new product.

Benedikt Hain: 24:45

So what's been the latest announcement that you can talk about already?

Chris Yetter: 24:49

Well, we did announce just today the MK 609. We've been in development on that since about 2020. Got an original friend of a supporter of ours, earl Edgar, from New Zealand you know sent us his original metal knob 609 and. We just went to town. It's actually pretty complex circuit, you know more than you would think, and it took a while, took a couple years to really and there's not really. If you look online or anything, there's. You know, schematics of, you know 609, but there's not really a metal knob one. So we really had to just reverse engineer the you know the build itself in that manner and then also Went to the trouble of molding the knobs. Original metal knobs, as you know, they're really hard to find, you know. So the originals, I know there's not that many out there, they're like getting pretty rare. So and it's a circuit that I feel like should be out there for people.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 25:47

I hadn't even considered that you have to also figure out how to reproduce the look to some extent. Oh, another challenge, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 25:55

Yeah, and luckily, you know, we have a Ryan, ryan Schmead, who's over there. He does all our mechanical designs. He's our head mechanical engineer. So when I first started it was just like Basic front panel. You know all that and I was, you know. Now he's got 3d models and everything. You can see it from every single angle and very cool. Yeah, and Long way speaking of Ryan, he did the mechanical design for our ASA 6a, which we're releasing soon as well. That is like a mechanical feat if you look at that.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 26:25

Yeah it's.

Chris Yetter: 26:26

It's not like a traditional rack case.

Benedikt Hain: 26:29

So if you you know, it's a beautiful unit. We just got to look at it and also try it and listen to it and it's like I'm yeah, yeah, I was gonna say are we allowed to say that we saw it?

Malcom Owen-Flood: 26:38

Yeah? Oh, yeah, yeah and it sounds amazing, it sounds very also feels great and looks great.

Benedikt Hain: 26:43

So back to the topic you were just talking about. Like the way it looks and feels the material it's built.

Chris Yetter: 26:48

And yeah, it's built just like. Just like the original back in 1951 with the umber gray I. You know power coat finish. It's got the hinge front panel. It's five U in height. It's got all the original tube layout, new old stock tubes, all the original transformer layout. It's really it's got like on the inside you could pull it out. It's like a two-part case, you know. It's got like that old amplifier kind of chassis that you see in the tray.

Benedikt Hain: 27:14

Yeah, it's so funny because our audience is probably confused by now, because on most of like, we were almost 200 episodes into the podcast and on most of the episodes we always tell people, like, use whatever you have, you know, as things are so available these days, and like, don't let the gear limit you and all of that. And we encourage people, of course, because we love that everyone can make their own records and everything. But now we're like talking about the analog gear and I'm not gonna lie, I love gear and I still have analog gear and I'm getting excited about it and now I want one of those you know that I just listened to. So it's like, yeah, that's the truth, it's still exciting. I don't think everyone has to have all those things, especially when you're starting out, but at some point you should at least try it and then make a decision for yourself, you know Like. But I'm not gonna pretend it's not exciting because it is. It's very exciting and I really think it's cool.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 27:57

I mean you both touched on how hardware seems to take being pushed really hard way better than plugins. And that new ASA model is like we both. Just the first thing we did is distorted vocals.

Chris Yetter: 28:11

Yeah, it's like instantly don't let everyone push it.

Benedikt Hain: 28:14

Oh yeah, Immediately cracked the input and like oh yes, so good.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 28:17

And what's cool about that that I think is relevant to our audience, is that what people are sometimes worried about, like being too too quantized or things being too perfect and not standing out, not having any way of being unique and I think that is a really cool thing about analog gear is that they're all different from each other in you know some variances at least, and how you use them is also gonna give a very different result, and it's like a cool way of kind of setting yourself apart. Like I don't have anything that could sound like that new compressor of yours on a vocal. I cannot make that sound. If I could, I'd kind of have a different vocal sound going on than anybody else in my area.

Chris Yetter: 28:55

That's a pretty cool thing it's true.

Benedikt Hain: 28:57

And also a good point. There is like how you use it that's. I don't know exactly why that is, but I've always noticed that when I use analog gear, even if it would sound exactly the same as the plugin like, I use it differently For whatever reason. If I turn the knob on the screen, whereas it's like grabbing the knob and maybe not even looking at it, I do different things with the hardware, I use it differently. So that is, that is also something that I think that's fascinating, has to be talked about in a way, and I, yeah so, totally agreed. It helps you be unique, stand out to your thing and maybe react more to the music.

Chris Yetter: 29:28

And you guys mentioned. Now, I'm passionate about this. I really am Like. We're like kids in a candy store.

Benedikt Hain: 29:33

Yeah, every day Like. Is that your experience as well? That you like whatever it is that you use it differently, maybe Like oh, certainly. Yeah.

Chris Yetter: 29:42

Like, and sometimes I will compare something to a plugin. You're just to be like okay, there's maybe some weird quirk, and I don't have an original handy at the moment or something like that and I'll be like did they model this quirk? Am I, you know? Am I crazy? Is this what's going on? And yeah, it's handy. But yeah, as far as your question, yeah, definitely 100%. It's always different and there's still some nuance, even if it sounds close. You know, we add sometimes some options, like you know, like on the 6A, you can actually just have the grit with no compression, right?

Benedikt Hain: 30:14

So I mean, yeah, how would you sort of approach like implementing this into a modern like workflow? Would you run it as like in, like plug-in inserts, like you know, like in and out of the computer in real time while you're mixed? Would you do the re-amp thing where you print it? How would you go about like a recall? Because you know how it's like, like we sometimes work on like 10 Zogs at the same time and then they need a fast revision and then we need to recall all the things, and that's one of the reasons why people don't get analog gear even though they think it sounds great. So do you take pictures? Do you have like recall sheets, like all of that? How would you personally approach?

Chris Yetter: 30:49

Well, I know we do offer a patch rat subscription for free to our customers and you know that's kind of more you know digital way of digital recall but not you know. So it kind of like spec, you know recall sheets but just in your phone. Yeah, so we offer that as far as how you use it.

Benedikt Hain: 31:10

That goes, sorry, does that mean I don't know that thing? That doesn't mean I see the front plate, basically, or like I can turn knobs, or do I have to mark it, like on a recall sheet or like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like it's just like a GUI.

Chris Yetter: 31:20

Yeah, okay.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 31:21

Yeah, each front panel.

Chris Yetter: 31:23

And that's useful for. But to answer your question, that really depends on each individual user. I do. I will say there is really what I love about these devices is you can't mess them up Like you know. They just sound great any way you use them. So you just you know you're going to be better off plugging into any of these, you know, than not doing it.

Benedikt Hain: 31:42

So it's a great answer. Yeah, it's a great answer, yeah, Because it's this fine line, you know. It's like efficiency is important in today's music production role and being fast and intuitive. And like maybe maybe the time you lose setting things up, maybe you save that because you mix more intuitively and faster, you know whatever.

Chris Yetter: 31:58

Yeah, yeah, and today's day and age it is tough though I feel that, but you know, and sometimes people they want that convenience of digital recall on their device. I get that, but like on something like a 2A, like I'm sorry, Like that's, that's what, two knobs guys.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:14

Like I'm on, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.

Chris Yetter: 32:16

Yeah, you're in the wrong business if you need digital recall with that device. I'm sorry.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:22

Very good point. Very good point. One other thing I want to bring up that you you told us when we chatted earlier is that you're I mean, I think people might assume okay, he likes analog hardware because he makes it, but you also have a plugin coming out. We do.

Chris Yetter: 32:37

We think it would be something that would be useful on the plug in marketplace. We're not just going to do something that's been done. A bunch from you know like, like. There's a bunch of 2A style compressor plug-ins out there, so our reverb is completely unique. So we're coming out with our XL305, our reverb plug-in and we partner with Kyve Audio doing this.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 32:58

Which make great plug-ins.

Chris Yetter: 32:59

They make great plug-ins. Eddie is. Eddie is a wizard at what he does. We sent him the original XL305. If you guys aren't familiar with these reverbs, they're a little bit more obscure. But I worked with Wayne Kirkwood who designed the original XL305 in the early 80s and he helped us redesign it for the modern you know for today and it's it is a completely different device from the original one as far as it's got the same concept, as far as the echo chamber and the way it's built and put together, but it's a completely like re-imagined device. So it's like a what I describe as like the best general purpose spring reverb you could use all over your mix Awesome.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 33:37

And I think spring reverb is one of the most absent plug-ins in my opinion, like I don't actually own one that I really like right now, so I'm excited to try it.

Chris Yetter: 33:46

Yeah, and it's cool Cause you can toggle between the original one and and the new one. Oh, cool, yeah, so you can get like you can hear, like how different they really are and they're cool. They're both useful in their own right, so I think it's really cool and we might do some different stuff with it as well in the future, so things that go beyond what the hardware can do, like we were talking about with plugins. So love it.

Benedikt Hain: 34:09

Totally. What would you say to someone who's trying to get like how did you get into this building things and how did it all start? And that's interesting as well, because you are probably now very. You said you're 35 people or something. You're now very far from where you were at the beginning, probably, and you've come a long way. So how do you get into doing this and how do you get to even understand all of this and be able to pull it off and create units that sound like that?

Chris Yetter: 34:37

Like we, audioscape started in 2016. Before that a lot of people don't know this there was a company I did from 2010 to 2015 called CVC Pedals and I built guitar pedals, all right, and I just built them in the garage and, like you know, on Vero board or whatever, and I used to etch my own circuit boards, drill the holes, do all that stuff. That was fun and we were semi-popular. You know. We did some cool stuff and it just got to a point where I was building the bus compressor for a producer friend of mine who was like, I'm all in the box but the only thing I'd use is a bus comp, you know. So I was like, all right, I'll build you one. And then I was like, hey, this is something I think people could use. So Audioscape was born out of that, that one product, and then it just took off from there. And then I'd start getting pedal orders and I'd throw them against the wall and be angry, you know, because it's too much for one person to do two different companies. So Audioscape sort of took over and then if you go on, like the CVC pedals, like YouTube, you'll see people are like I don't know what happened to this company. I think this guy's dead, or in jail or you know.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 35:43

Like, like, just moved on.

Benedikt Hain: 35:44

No, we just moved on. Yeah, yeah, totally. Oh, that's interesting, great way to get into it, though, with starting with pedals.

Chris Yetter: 35:50

Oh yeah, you can't hurt yourself that way. You know nine volt, you know You're not gonna really shock yourself to that.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 35:56

Very good point.

Benedikt Hain: 35:57

So, before we wrap it up here today, because we're coming close to the end of our slot here, we're like how does the order process work? And then, how do you get your hands on one of those products? Can I just go to the website at any point and just order it? Or how does it work?

Chris Yetter: 36:11

So for the 260VU and the Bus Comp you can go to the website and just order and there's a standard lead time two to three weeks on each of those. Those are, you know, we've sort of standardized our production with that to a point where we can do that. The other products, like the Opto, we drop on Wednesdays and Saturdays like the traditional model. We started with APM Eastern Standard Time and then for the EQP and the AS78, there's a reserve list. So and that's that we open up usually like every other Saturday so people can jump on for that. And we are looking at doing some EU distribution with our friends at Session Desk as well and having an EU website where there's some more agreeable times for our inventory updates. So people you know it could drop APM here, you know, instead of APM six hours, you know earlier.

Benedikt Hain: 37:02

And does that mean like you gotta be, you gotta be on it at that time, right it's, they don't last long.

Chris Yetter: 37:08

They don't. Sometimes it varies different times of the year, certain products, but yeah, some of them, like you know, like our optos, usually typically they're gone very quick, you know. And people they email I can't get it. You said it was gonna be in stock. I was like, you know, we just, yeah, get a run, you get a run on them. But you know it's not like we're trying to do that on purpose. You know we have a lot of people working and everybody's building that from Monday to Wednesday and this is how many optos we've built.

Benedikt Hain: 37:33

And it's hand-built in the US. I mean, this is like you know. Yeah, end to end, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 37:36

Yeah, we got. You know. We have a girl showing up with a baby on one arm and a box of boards on the other on Fridays, like that's this company, you know.

Benedikt Hain: 37:44

Yeah, yeah, so cool, I love it. So you guys have any questions here. I think anybody wants to ask Chris a question about any of the gear, or all good.

Chris Yetter: 37:59

Do you have a question?

Benedikt Hain: 37:59

Ryan. Yeah, ask Ryan, do you plan on bringing any pedals, back? Oh, that's a good one actually, yeah.

Chris Yetter: 38:09

That is a good question and we actually did bring one of the CBC pedals back. Oh yeah, about a week ago we did a drop on the Campanion Plus.

Benedikt Hain: 38:17

What is the Campanion Plus?

Chris Yetter: 38:19

It's based off the old Chennai Campanion. Plus which is an excellent, excellent fuzz pedal for guitar bass, anything. A lot comes with big fan of fuzz pedals I know that. Yeah. So it's basically yeah, it's got the old style circuit board Like, and it's got like we use the original transistors that were in our original pedal from way back when, so like we've sourced those. So it's just going to be like a limited run that we do on them. But yeah, it's fun. You can check it out if you go on the Audioscape website there's actually a CBC pedals tab.

Malcom Owen-Flood: 38:50

So yeah, it's kind of coming full circle with that. That's fantastic, fantastic.

Benedikt Hain: 38:54

Well, thank you, chris. This has been really fascinating, really interesting. Also, thank you for letting us use the gear and getting to hear. It was really amazing and yeah, so how, like? Where should we send people if they want to check it out? Is this the website? Is it audioscapecom? Is it your socials?

Chris Yetter: 39:10

Like, what's the Audioscapecom and also at Audioscape Audio on Instagram is usually the best place to find us.

Benedikt Hain: 39:17

Awesome, we're going to put that in the show notes as well, and then, yeah, we'll be back there, like tomorrow and on Thursday. I think I'll have to hear more of those, yeah you do Come on back. Yeah, we'll be. Thank you for taking the time, Chris. Oh, thank you, Thank you, guys for listening and then watching us live here and yeah, and thank you for being here and listening to this, all right, awesome. Thank you, guys A big round of applause for Chris, please.

Chris Yetter: 39:42

You guys are awesome, oh, ok.