Created in collaboration with multi-Platinum mixer Tony Maserati. Based on Maserati’s go-to signature mixing chains. User-Generated Content. 4.9 star rating 90 Reviews.

Many mix engineers, and musicians, have decided that the best response to the crisis in the music industry is to downsize and work in-the-box from an office space or garden shed or barn. Tony Maserati, however, has gone the other way. Two and a half years ago, and half a year after his move from a barn in upstate New York to Los Angeles, he partnered up with songwriter Stefan Skarbek, and the two founded Mirrorball Entertainment. London-born Skarbek is well-known for his work with Amy Winehouse, and has also worked with the Spice Girls, Lily Allen, Seal, Pixie Lott and Basement Jaxx.Mirrorball pools the studio and writing experience of Maserati and Skarbek, and the company bills itself as a 'music publisher, production team and recording company” that is 'committed to building the stars of tomorrow”.

Mirrorball employs half a dozen staff, has signed a dozen artists and works with a handful of writers, and operates from a building in North Hollywood with several writing, production and mixing rooms, one of them being Maserati's mix room. So does Maserati think he has a feasible business model on his hands, or was he, perhaps, just feeling lonely working all by himself?'

Well yes,” he laughed, 'I do get to talk to people much more now! But the entire building gives us a really great, cohesive, symbiotic environment where people can be creative at the highest level. Stefan has a writing room downstairs, and he can use my interns and engineers to get his business done. At least three of our engineers are also producers, so they can help some of the songwriters who are also artists to record their stuff.

All of the engineers see and hear what I am doing, so they know what the top level should sound like. Also, sometimes I get so much work in that it's not possible to do it all by myself. One of the first projects we started on was mixing six Lady Gaga songs in five days. So I slept every day at the studio, as did four of the other guys, and I had their fresh perspectives, which was very helpful.' As for the business model, I'm very aware that my success will have cycles, like every business has. I am very lucky with the success I have and with the successful projects that I worked on, in the past and currently, and hopefully in the future. But my feeling has always been that music is a collaborative effort, and with a solid team around me I can be more creative, have more fun, and all the work does not sit just on my shoulders.

When an artist asks me to mix an entire album, I can suggest that I mix the songs that they think are the biggest singles, and my team will mix the other songs, and I will supervise those mixes. That way my client gets a full album mixed for the budget that they have, and my guys get paid and get mixing credits and also get to establish contacts with major labels, artists and managers. It's a win-win-win situation.”. As if top-level mix projects and his company Mirrorball Entertainment don't keep Maserati busy enough, he's also expanding in another direction, with a unique, mobile studio design, created in collaboration with Toronto acoustic designer Martin Pilchner of the company Pilchner-Schoustal. Maserati: 'Martin and I call it Acoustic Workshop, and we think it will revolutionise the approach to building a studio, because it removes the tie between acoustic space and real estate. We'll soon be moving to a new space in Los Angeles, and I am not interested in building a traditional studio in it. If you rent a space and then spent $250,000 to build a studio in it, you can't take it with you when you leave again.

So we've developed a modular studio design, with units that go down to a very small size. The units are quite thick, self-supporting, acoustically designed and have AC connections in them.There are a variety of aesthetic coverings and they are completely self-standing, so the only connection with the building will be the floor.'

The main control room that we built is 22 x 19 feet, so it's quite large, and the ceiling height can be varied, because the blocks come in 2.5-feet units. Our concept is that one can use the same units for recording, mixing, mastering and post-production. The other thing is that you can completely define and then recreate the acoustics of your studio, wherever you want. If you want to move to another space you simply pack up and take the studio, and your sound, with you.

It will completely change the way we look at the real estate involved with studios. We're still in development, and looking for additional partners, but we are fabricating the first workshop at the moment at Martin's workshop in Toronto. My aim is for our entire crew to have Acoustic Workshops modules in our new building in downtown Los Angeles, so people will be able to see them in action. From there I'm sure the idea will catch on, because it makes sense from both studio-acoustic and real-estate perspectives.”.

All contents copyright © SOS Publications Group and/or its licensors, 1985-2020. All rights reserved.The contents of this article are subject to worldwide copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part, whether mechanical or electronic, is expressly forbidden without the prior written consent of the Publishers. Great care has been taken to ensure accuracy in the preparation of this article but neither Sound On Sound Limited nor the publishers can be held responsible for its contents.

The views expressed are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the publishers.Web site designed & maintained by PB Associates & SOS.

Plug-in Bundle Mac/PC.By Paul WhiteMost of us can't afford to have Tony Maserati mix our tracks — but thanks to Waves, we can now use his personal effects and processing chains in our own mixes.I have, on occasion, suggested that music technology software might be made easier to use if it was approached from the musician's point of view rather than the engineer's. Waves have clearly taken steps in that direction with the Maserati suite of plug‑ins, developed in conjunction with award‑winning mixer Tony Maserati. Maserati has worked with artists as diverse as Black Eyed Peas, Beyonce, Alicia Keys, Macy Gray, Sting and David Bowie, and in March 2007's Inside Track feature , he talked to SOS about his work on John Legend's 'Save Room'.Tony Maserati has his own favourite signal‑processing chains for specific applications, and what Waves have done is recreate those chains in software, bringing out only those controls that Tony would normally adjust during a session and leaving the rest hidden. The result is that with just a handful of knobs and buttons, you can arrive at a highly produced guitar, bass, voice or drum sound very quickly. There's no clue as to what original hardware components are emulated in any of the plug‑ins or processing modes, but then that doesn't really matter: this suite of plug‑ins should be judged on its results. While stripping the controls down to a bare minimum may rob the more advanced user of some flexibility, the idea is that the sense of instant gratification you get as soon as you switch them into the signal path should more than make up for this.Running in native mode on both Macs and PCs, the Maserati Collection supports the native VST, AU, RTAS and Audio Suite plug‑in formats — there are no TDM versions.

Protection is via iLok. The load and save format is the same as with other Waves plug‑ins, as is the ability to create and compare A and B versions, but there are no factory presets as such. Mono‑in, stereo‑out and stereo‑in, stereo‑out versions of each plug‑in are available.First up is the GTi Guitar Toner, which is a dedicated tool for polishing electric guitar sounds. The source guitar sounds can range from clean to overdriven, and the plug‑in can also be used to add colour and movement to electric pianos. The main thing to understand about this plug‑in is that it doesn't do guitar amp modelling or overdrive — it's there to allow you to polish the sound once you've recorded it, and this it does very well.GTi offers five modes, named Clean, Clean Chorus, Heavy, Thick Rhythm and Soft Flange. As with the other plug‑ins in the collection, some of the controls change as you switch modes, but the Sensitivity control is ever‑present. This is accompanied by a three‑colour signal light to help you optimise the input level (necessary for any dynamic effects to work correctly), a round retro meter that can monitor either the input or output level, and an output level control.

If you can get the lamp showing amber but not red during louder sections you're pretty much set to go, though you can occasionally get desirable effects by running the plug‑in slightly hot or slightly cold.All modes have Presence controls and all except Thick Rhythm have compression adjustment in the form of the Tame knob. In Thick Rhythm mode this is greyed out, while the FX section grows a second Presence control. The same control paradigm extends right through this range of plug‑ins; some controls are greyed out when not used in a particular mode, while some of the others change function.The individual effects within GTi are controlled via the smaller knobs at the bottom of the screen, which adapt to the types of effect being added. For example, in Thick Rhythm mode you get to control the delay time, stereo width, vibrato and chorus on or off.

There's always an FX level control to adjust the signal sent to the effects section. In this mode, even with all the effects turned to minimum, there's a very subtle tremolo effect when the FX knob is turned clockwise, while the Vibrato knob, when turned up, gives a shimmering, almost rotary‑speaker‑style modulation.Clean mode adds no obvious effects but allows a useful degree of tonal change, as well as applying some dynamic processing, and, like all the mode settings, seems to include a low‑level expander or gate to keep pauses clean. All the other settings are quite obviously effected, but in a way that sounds good right out of the box. There's scope for adjustment, of course, but the overall effect is very slick‑sounding.

Thick Rhythm, for instance, includes a very plausible doubling effect when you crank up the delay time (which is limited to a short slap‑back). It may not suit all guitar sounds or all songs, but in most instances it will help you make a good guitar sound even better, and if you want to go all‑out on the chorus or vibrato effects, you can. With all of these plug‑ins, whenever you switch to a different mode you get the default factory setting, after which you can make your own adjustments.Everybody wants to create the perfect 'produced' vocal sound, but that involves having mastery over compression, EQ and reverb. The VX1 Vocal Enhancer makes all of this manageable using just a few intuitive controls, and with three 'contour' modes to suite different song styles. Contour 1 creates the impression of a small, intimate space, while Contour 2 conjures up a larger chamber that works well with slow ballads.

Contour 3 is designed for faster tempos where a ballad setting might be too messy, and combines a very small room with pre‑delay. Compression is built in and in modes 1 and 2, once the input level is optimised, there's nothing else to adjust other than the compression amount knob.The EQ section comprises simply Bass and Treble optimised for vocals, while FX controls the amount of signal sent to the effect section. DLY adjusts the delay time, DLY Mix sets how much delay is added and Decay sets the reverb length. The reverb tonality can be tweaked using the VRB knob. In Contour 3 mode you also get to adjust the amount of 'air' or high boost in the sound, usually in the 10 to 12 kHz region, at the expense of adjustable compression.

Again, this plug‑in saves a lot of work combining other plug‑ins, and makes vocals sound more even and more present in the mix. The delay is pretty conventional, while the reverb is quite rich in reflections, which really reinforce the vocal while not muddying the mix. The resulting sound is pretty contemporary, but there's enough scope to get a more obvious reverb if it suits the song.

I like the way this plug‑in brightens and focuses vocals without making them seem hard or edgy, and it really pushes them to the front of a mix. Definitely one of my favourites!Rather than offering a single treatment for a drum mix, the DRM Drum Slammer has seven switchable modes that optimise its operation for the kick drum, snare top, snare bottom, hi‑hats, toms, overhead and room mics. Part of its aim is to help percussive transients cut through mixes and it can be used with live drums or any sampled drum instrument that allows you to separate the individual kit pieces. The frequency bands have been designated Thump (Low), Snap (Mid) and Treble, and I suspect there's a lot more going on behind the scenes than simple EQ, including some carefully tailored dynamic processing.The same controls are available for each mode, but I suspect that the EQ filter shapes are fine‑tuned for each application, which makes adjustment pretty foolproof. There's no adjustment of compression, though some dynamic processing is clearly happening, as the ring of the decaying drum hits lasts noticeably longer than when the plug‑in is bypassed. All the EQ controls work well, though Snap is sometimes quite subtle, but in the main the plug‑in makes drum sounds brighter and more present. Indeed, you have to be careful not to overdo things on well‑sampled kits, or you can push the sound too far forward in the mix.

Obviously, you get the best results by processing separate drum tracks or instruments with multiple outputs; you can process a stereo kit mix using the Overhead or room setting, though the results are far less controllable.As with the other plug‑ins in this suite, the Tony Maserati HMX Harmonics Generator is far more than just a harmonic enhancer. In Modal mode it widens the apparent stereo image and adds a subtle chorus effect that works well on pianos or even vocals, not unlike a Roland Dimension D. Bounce mode adds a touch of reverb and delay, so this is a good general‑purpose plug‑in for making sources sound more lush and interesting. Size sets the perceived spaciousness, Amount controls the amount of added reverb, and Spread adjusts the stereo spreading effect.

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The effects can also be tempo‑sync'ed in Bounce mode.In fact, the harmonic enhancement effect seems quite subtle compared to the other treatments, adding a hint of air to the upper registers of most sounds. In combination with the effects, it can add interest and definition to pianos, synth pads and so on, and it also works with voice and guitar. A good plug‑in to try when you feel a sound is lacking something but you're not quite sure what!The B72 plug‑in has two modes of operation, one optimised for bass guitar and the other for synth bass, and it is worth trying both settings on any bass source, as you occasionally get very workable results by picking the 'wrong' mode. The Type switch toggles between the two bass types, and once the sensitivity is optimised, you get a very intuitive set of Bass and Treble tone controls that work in conjunction with a preset style of compression. Switching to Synth mode gives you the same controls plus FX input and output level controls, along with a dedicated tone control that works on the 'buzzy' part of the synth's spectrum.Using this plug‑in, it is easy to make a DI'd bass sit well in a mix. The sound becomes fuller and less gritty at the top end, while the behind‑the‑scenes compression evens up the sound and adds further weight to the notes. In Synth mode the FX tone control seems to work as some kind of sweep equaliser, but I could also detect a very subtle chorus or doubling effect that created the effect of gentle pulse‑width modulation.

Whatever is going on, it adds character to the upper harmonics of a synth bass sound, while the EQ and other 'invisible' processing makes the bass end seem even fatter: very straightforward and seriously effective.Acoustic guitars can be difficult to get sounding right in a mix, so the ACG Acoustic Guitar Designer provides a straightforward toolkit comprising tonal control, ambience effects and some under‑the‑hood compression. Once again, there are two settings: ACG 1 enables the user to maximise level and tweak the high and low tonal contours, while ACG 2 is similar but more compressed. The EQ section is split into Hi, Mid and Punch bands, with switched rather than continuously variable settings.

An Excite function appears to add high‑frequency harmonics to the effect chain, Pre‑delay does as expected, and there's also some kind of built‑in room ambience that sits the guitar nicely in a track without making it sound messy.ACG doesn't hide all of the piezo 'quack' from less‑than‑perfect under‑saddle pickups, but it does a pretty good job, while at the same time adding a lovely ambience and scope for basic tonal tweaking; the tone controls seem ideally placed to address the body tone and string zing of the instrument. Using the exciter can add brightness to an otherwise dullish instrument, and the compression seems to be set up just right for the acoustic guitar in the two modes.

The driest of acoustic guitar recordings comes to life with this plug‑in, and a few basic adjustments soon get it sitting correctly in the mix.I love the idea behind these plug‑ins, and because the user still has a great deal of adjustment available I don't really consider them to be dumbing down music production: rather, they're a means of giving you the taste of a professional producer's signature style. Each does a specific job, and extremely well. Vocal Processor is my favourite, as it makes achieving a really professional vocal sound relatively easy, and of course you can use other plug‑ins in combination with it if you need something more specialised.

Perhaps more tweaky users would have enjoyed an 'under the hood' mode with more controls that could be opened only when needed, but on balance I think the format that's been adopted will be welcomed by most recording musicians, and it's only a matter of time before competing plug‑in designers latch onto the idea. You do need a fairly brisk computer to use these plug‑ins, as each hides multiple processing blocks behind its simple exterior and each has its own demands on processing power, but then most modern DAWs have a freeze function to save on CPU power if you need it. The bottom line is that I really like the results from these Waves Maserati plug‑ins and I think they'll become firm favourites in my own studio. All contents copyright © SOS Publications Group and/or its licensors, 1985-2020. All rights reserved.The contents of this article are subject to worldwide copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part, whether mechanical or electronic, is expressly forbidden without the prior written consent of the Publishers.

Great care has been taken to ensure accuracy in the preparation of this article but neither Sound On Sound Limited nor the publishers can be held responsible for its contents. The views expressed are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the publishers.Web site designed & maintained by PB Associates & SOS.