 This is my new studio. Hi folks, I'm Mike and I hope you're well and welcome to the new Creative Source Studio. You know about six weeks ago our landlords informed us that they no longer wanted to renew the lease and we had four weeks to find a new place and move out, including moving my studio. Now a lot of you said to me at the time, Mike, this may be a blessing in disguise and you know what? I think you were right. I can't wait to show you around. But first of all, let's thank the sponsor of this video, DistroKid. If you follow the VIP link in the description down below, you'll get 7% off an already incredible price to distribute your music around the world. Now let's start off by taking a look at the beating heart of this studio, the computer. So this gives you an opportunity to talk about one of my favourite features about this new studio. And that's the access I have behind the desk. It's really comfortable, gives me quick access to all of those cables I seem to have to unplug and plug in on a daily basis. A huge workflow advantage there. And it's also where my PC is back in this corner. And I do use PC rather than Mac. That's primarily because some of the software I use is only available on PC. If it wasn't for that, I'd seriously be considering one of the new Macs because their performance for audio production is just incredible. But the performance for this is also very, very good. It's an Intel 11th generation i9 processor and I've got 64 gigabytes of RAM in there. And also really importantly for me because I use a lot of disk space, I have 12 terabytes of SSDs in there. That means they're also very quiet. We'll talk about how loud this computer is in a moment. But all of that data is automatically backed up to a server which I have in another part of the house. And that in turn is automatically backed up to the cloud which really sort of gives me a little bit of peace of mind in terms of losing really important data. So back to how loud this is because a lot of people look at this computer and they think it must be really noisy with this open case design and they see these three big fans spinning away. Now this computer is actually water cooled and those three fans are to cool the radiator but they're not ordinary fans. They're what they call magnetic levitation fans and rather than have bearings and things like that in there, they're actually floating on magnets which makes them super, super quiet. That's one of the things I love about this PC. So that's kind of the heart and soul of my production but there's another really important part of my daily existence in the studio and that's my desk. Regulars to the channel will know that I actually designed and built this desk myself and I did that so that I could have it exactly as I want it. It's not necessarily the cheaper option though if that's what you're thinking. Now I've got a couple of spaces at the back for some rack gear which I want easy access to and also importantly I've got space on the desktop in terms of depth for my surface controller and my computer keyboard as well. A lot of the desk that I looked at didn't have enough depth for that. Most importantly for me though, I do have a roll out tray which can accommodate an 88 key keyboard. That's a big workflow advantage for me there to have that at my fingertips. Over the course of the last three years or so it has got worn out and damaged here and there so I used the opportunity while we were moving to actually strip it down and re-varnish it so it's nice and fresh and ready for all of this gear. Talking about all of this gear. Now at the back left hand side we have the ART voice channel as its name suggests this is primarily designed for vocals but you could use it for anything really. It's a tube preamp with a compressor with an equalizer with a DS. It's just loaded up with features. I just don't think it's talked about enough to be honest with you. I must make a video about it. At the front of my desk I've got a couple of things which are not really necessarily audio related. I've got my speed editor here which is a device which connects up to my video editing software DaVinci Resolve. Make things a bit easier there and then I have my loop deck. This is a little bit like a stream deck. I think they're called. Basically you can use it with multiple programs on your computer. You can customise it. You can get quick access to functions and things. It's also got MIDI features and capabilities on the loop deck here which is just super useful of course if you're a music producer. Then towards the front you can see my computer keyboard and mouse of course here. I prefer to use gaming keyboards and mice, I'm never quite sure what that is because I like the colour lights on them. You can see them in the dark. That's my excuse anyway. I just think they look cool. Towards the back of the desk here and right in the middle, kind of in the centre is my Icon Qcon Pro G2 surface controller. For those of you who don't know, this doesn't actually process audio. It's kind of like a remote control for your door but you can sort of feel a little bit like you're using a console or a mixing desk. Great if you like that tactile feel. Got transport controls on their motorised faders a lot. Now at the back towards the right hand side, we have my main audio interface which I use all the time. That's the Antelope Audio Discrete 8 Pro Synergy Core, quite a mouthful. Apart from all the amazing features it has on it, I've come to love its routing capabilities. They're really, really in depth. You can really send anything to anywhere which I find very, very handy at times. Loving that. Then below that we have one of my favourite things in my studio which is my Audient ASP800. This is a kind of, I'm going to call it Legendary. This is a Legendary mic pre-app. It's got those pre-apps that we've come to know and love from Audient. Very, very clean but also there's a couple of coloured channels on there as well I've made a video about that. Then next to that or just in front of that we have a desktop audio interface. That's the Universal Audio Apollo X4. This is an incredible audio interface. Now, I have it set here mainly so I can access their plugins in real time and not have them running on my PC because I really love some of their plugins. But I do use it as an audio interface when I'm using my laptop for recording which I may be doing in another part of the house or I may be taking it out actually mobile. That's just an incredible piece of gear to have at your disposal for that. I've got to tell you. Now, in terms of my... Oh, one more thing before we talk about studio monitors because we're going to talk about monitoring is on the far right hand side I have my main headphones which I use on a daily basis. These are the Audis MM500s. Simply the best headphones I've ever used in terms of detail. Okay, that's what I'm going to say. But they are pretty pricey. You don't need these but if you can get them, get them. Now, my monitors, my studio monitors. I'm using the Adam Audio A7Vs. Okay, these are the sort of newer versions of their legendary kind of A7Xs I think they were called. Mine's got a little bit blank there but yeah, these are the newer versions. And I'll tell you what they're really good for. They are really good by the way but they sort of came into their own recently again because after I moved studio, of course, I ran Sonarworks sound ID to correct my monitoring for my room. Okay, now normally for those of you who have done that, you then have to run a plug-in in your door so that your mix is corrected in your room and you have to sort of switch that off when you actually mix down. Now, what they've done here is they've collaborated with Adam Audio and you can actually upload those profiles that you create into the monitors themselves. Okay, there's a LAN connection on the back to do that. What that means is those profiles are permanently on your monitors. You don't have to use the plug-in anymore even if you were not running a door or you had your computer switched off, your monitors are still being corrected. So that's absolutely awesome. Now, sort of down below on the pull-out keyboard tray is one of my favorite purchases ever. This is the Arturia KeyLab 88 Mark II. An incredible keyboard, just high-quality keyboard itself. I think they call it a key bed if I'd know that if I was a keyboard player. And a whole bunch of in-depth controls, door controls, you've got sort of CC controls and things. You've got drum pads on there as well at your fingertips, just everything you could really want from a MIDI keyboard controller. Okay, so I almost got down below there, didn't I, with that, but not quite. There's a few things down by my feet which I'm gonna walk through right now. So at my feet on the left-hand side, I've got an Adam Audio T10S subwoofer and a foot switch so I can switch it on and off. And talking about foot switches, I've also got this Roland sort of pedal controller here. This means that as well as having a sustain pedal when I'm playing piano, I can also have like a damp pedal and things like that as well. So really cool, I'm liking that. And then on the right-hand side, I've got a small rack here at the top of that rack. I've got a PreSonus Studio 192 audio interface. This is no longer in production, but I still love it. And I have a lot of other things routed into it. And then when I make tutorials for you guys, I generally use that as my audio interface with other things routed into it. Below that, I have a firm and power conditioner. I wouldn't be without that, because if I was without that, there'd be a lot of noise in my signals and I don't like that at all. And then I have a selection of audio interfaces. I've got a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 there. I have that because so many people have it, it's nice to be able to sort of compare it to other things or compare other things to it, including things like the new, or not the new, but new for me, Universal Audio Vault 276, I think they call this one. I haven't actually tried this yet, but I've got hold of it so that I can compare it to other audio interfaces and give you guys a verdict. Talking about newish audio interfaces, I've also got the Audient ID24 here. I recently reviewed this and it's now sitting here because I aim to sort of work it into my workflow. I'll talk about that in another video, but I really like this audio interface. And kind of last but not least here, I have this Cranbourne Audio EC1. I've just recently got this. Now this is a Mic Preamp, which has a lot of really high and clean gain as well as a great headphone amplifier on it as well. But I got it for the mic amp primarily and I'm using that for my Shure SM7B. Now this is the microphone you often see me using. It's on the arm on my desktop. Now the SMB may be legendary, but it also is a little bit problematic in terms of gain. It requires a lot of gain and it needs clean gain. Now a lot of people don't have that on their audio interface, so they use something called a cloud lifter a lot of the time to sort of boost the signal before they go into their audio interface. I've got a cloud lifter, but I have to say I haven't been very impressed with it at all, which is why I got hold of this Cranbourne Audio EC1 and I'm gonna tell you right away before I make the video, it has improved that significantly. Now all of the rack gear that you see on my desktop and just below my desktop is actually all hooked up with ADAP, okay? And also I'm using Word Clock to keep it all in sync with each other. So that's why these particular pieces of rack gear are all together on the desktop, but I do have some other rack gear which doesn't have ADAP and we're gonna talk about that now. So at the top of my rack here, I have a WA2A from Warm Audio. This is an LA2A style compressor. I absolutely love this on vocals, acoustic guitar and bass guitar as well for particular songs. Below that I have a Warm Audio WA76 which is an 1176 style compressor which is really quite different. I haven't used this in any productions yet, but I will be and you'll be hearing about it or seeing about it in a video quite soon. Below that I have a headphone amp. This is from ART, it's a Head Amp 6 Pro. If you've got to buy a headphone amp also with multiple outputs, I highly recommend this one. Super clean output, lots and lots of gain and it's got some cool sort of features on there so that you can create some individual mixes on the fly with this, I won't go into that now but it's really quite clever. Then below that I have my patch bay. Now there's lots of patch bays on the market and a lot of them fall short for me to be honest with you. It seems like such a simple thing but a lot of them with the different routing types which for a patch bay in case you don't know there's normal, half normal and through we'll have the switch for that on the back. I don't understand that but anyway this has got the switches on the front which is why I got this particular one. Then I have a Furman power conditioner again same as the other one and then I have a Behringer headphone amp which isn't even plugged in or switch on a ball because it's not very good to be honest with you. It's just so noisy which is why I bought the ART one. Now at the bottom, below all of those things in the bottom of this rack I have a box which has got my patch cables and things and then you'll see three wooden boxes there as well. Those are all microphones, the kind of more special microphones I guess. That includes an SE Electronic VR2 which is an active ribbon mic. I feature that in one of my videos really love that on acoustic guitar combined with another microphone. Also have a pair of Neumann KM184. This is probably my favorite type small diaphragm condenser for acoustic guitar it's not good for all acoustic guitars for all songs but overall I think they're very, very good. And then finally I have a Neumann U87 legendary vocal mic there. I won't be making a video about that but I'm aiming to include in some videos soon in some creative ways with some cheaper microphones. Look out for that, should be fun. Now just over to the side here you can see the corner of some stands that I had to build for this studio. Let's talk about that. So one of the challenges I had putting together this studio was the fact that we are in a rental so we're not allowed to drill any holes in the wall. Can't directly attach anything to the wall. And of course I wanted to put some things up on the wall including my sound absorption panels. You can see one of the smaller ones here and what I thought is I'll make some stands but when I began to cost that out it got pretty expensive pretty quickly. So in the end I bought some TV stands off of Amazon got those pretty cheap and just adapted them for this purpose. Add a little bit of wood on the front there to sort of match the rest of my studio and give me a place to hang some cables and things like that. Just at the bottom there by the way it's just out of shot a little bit probably but there's a thing there called the little bro. This is a stage box okay. So it's just got a snake attached to it with a bunch of cables inside and I've got that hooked up to one of my audio interfaces so I can easily just plug in a microphone from here without going round the back of my desk to do that. But I like this one in particular because it's also got a couple of TRS connections on there so I can just easily plug in some headphones as well which is what you want normally when you're back here recording vocals or something you'll want to plug the microphone in and the headphones as well. So worth mentioning there. Now the other type of stand that I needed or was something to get a couple of guitars up high which I would normally have up on the wall. So I created these stands which are basically amp stands okay with a little bit of storage underneath and then they have this kind of guitar stand coming up. That gets a couple of my guitars up and out of the way giving me a bit more floor space. Let's dive into some of these stands in a bit more detail. So on the first of these kind of amp stands I have this Fender Rumble 25 bass amp. This is a practice amp which I probably wouldn't use for recordings generally because I'll probably get a better result with an amp sim than I would with this but it's great to have it here just so I can quickly plug in a bass and practice something or work something out. Below that in the sort of storage part of this I have some more microphones. Those being a Nude C12. This is my only tube microphone and I really like that kind of sound that it has that sort of vintage sound. Then I have an AKG C414 which is a great microphone but not for everything, okay? So it's a bit hit and miss if I'm honest with you but it is nonetheless a fantastic quality microphone. Then I have a couple of Austrian Audio I think they're called CC8 if I've got that right. These are newish to me but they're great. The little small diaphragm condenser microphones. Got a bit of a darker sound than the Neumanns that I was talking about earlier. So it could be better for much brighter sounding guitars. Now just quickly over in the corner here with this other sound panel stand I've got some headphones hanging on there. Those being some close back ones. The Audizee LCD XC's is a close back versions of their other famous headphones. I've got some Austrian Audio I think they're high X60's these ones. I really do like the Austrian Audio headphones very, very much. Some Biodynamic DT700 Pro X's or are they D700 Pro X's? Getting my model names mixed up but also very, very good. Sort of newish you could say. And then the latest of the Olo headphones. I've been trying these out but I haven't made a video about them yet but Olo headphones really are very, very good and worth checking out. Now that's the sort of first of our stands. Let's go to the other side of the room and take a look at the other amp stand. For this stand I have a Vox AC10 a pretty nice little amp actually and don't be fooled by the 10. It's pretty loud as well but quite enough to be used in a studio. I like this a nice tube amp, straightforward. You can get a little bit of grunge out of it. Very nice indeed. Below that I have some guitar pedals. I'm not gonna go through those. If you're an electric guitarist you probably recognize most of them anyway. But what's that you say? Talk about the guitars? Sure. And what better place to start than with my Gretch 5 420TG? This is limited edition guitar in Cadillac green. I absolutely love the look of this but I also love playing it. I like the sound of it and I also like the way it feels, okay? If you've never played a Gretch before I urge you to try it. They're very different to the other types of common electric guitars out there. On the other side of the room I have my Taylor 814CE Deluxe. This is way more acoustic guitar than I deserve. It's an absolutely exquisitely crafted instrument. It's also just amazing in terms of playability and has a great sound for recording especially I feel. Moving on from there you probably notice I have a guitar rack with a few guitars in there. I'm afraid it's a bit of a Fender Taylor fest. Let's just quickly run through those. I've got my Strat which is just a player series Fender Strat which has been sort of souped up in all kinds of different ways. It's got a Goto floating tremolo on there. Recently I upgraded the pickups to some Seymour Duncan California 50s and that really was an upgrade. Goodness me, made a huge difference to the sound of this guitar. Love that. Next to that I have my Taylor 214CE N. Now the N stands for nylon. This is a nylon string guitar. I made a video about this actually. It's one of my favorite guitars. It's absolutely beautiful. And it doesn't, it's really a nylon string guitar rather than a classical guitar. And it's got some features that you normally find on so steel string guitars which makes the playability on this very, very good. The intonation is also incredible. Moving on from there, we have my Taylor 210CE. This is a Dreadnought guitar. Not as easy to record as my 814. Very throaty sounding. But if you want a particular sound, you want that Dreadnought sound. It's a great guitar. I love playing that one too. And then finally I've got as much bass guitar as I deserve. Maybe more than I deserve in actual fact scenes. I'm not a bass guitarist. This is another player series, Fender Jazz Bass. I haven't done anything to this whatsoever. But I do enjoy the basic sound of it if you'll excuse the pun. Now I do regard myself as a guitarist. But for most of us, if you've got a home studio, you probably end up sort of forcing yourself to play keyboards as well. On the top here, I've got this Yamaha QS300 Synthesizer. Hardly a classic synth, I've got to say. But it's sort of useful to me in the sense that I picked up really, really cheap. And I like having something here, which I don't have to have a computer switched on to get some sound from it. Just the headphones there. So yeah, great for sketching out some ideas. No problem at all. Below that, I have a native Instruments S61 controller keyboard. An absolutely fantastic keyboard. Especially if you're in that kind of native Instruments ecosystem. If you're using it like complete, you can browse all the instruments. Now right at the bottom, that's not a keyboard, but it's MIDI related, I have this Behringer MIDI foot controller. This is an incredible piece of gear. And it does exactly what I wanted it to do. However, it's crazy complicated to figure out. The instruction manual is absolutely mental. Took me months to figure out how to do some basic things in it. I don't like it when things are too complicated like that. I'll tell you one thing that is not complicated though, that's using the sponsor of this video, DistroKid, to distribute your music. By using DistroKid, you get to release your music directly to some of the best platforms on the planet. We're talking Spotify, iTunes, TikTok, Amazon, you know, all of the household names. And you don't need to open any accounts there because DistroKid does all of that for you. Now, once you've created your master and your album artwork, it's as easy as filling in a friendly form, uploading them and DistroKid takes care of the rest. All for one flat annual fee and DistroKid takes none of your royalties. Sign up with my VIP link in the description and you'll get an extra 7% off. In the dark mysterious corner at the rear of my studio is a curtain and behind the mysterious curtain is the Wizard of Oz. No, not the Wizard of Oz. There is a kitchenette in here, except I'm not going to be using it as a kitchenette because I don't want a buzzy fridge in the background of my recordings. So I'm using it both as a storage area, but it's turned out to be a great sort of work area. It's got some benches in there if you like. And when I just want to take things apart or fix things or solder things, things like that, it's been very handy indeed. I've also got a charger station set up in there for all of my recharging of various different devices in there as well as some drawers with many more microphones in their various different sorts. Many people though have suggested that I should use it as a vocal booth. And I think I will eventually, but it's got to be treated for that. At the moment, there's lots of hard surfaces in there and it wouldn't be great for recording vocals at the moment. So I'm going to put together maybe some sort of portable gobos or sort of sound panels that I can put in there when I want to use it as a vocal booth. I'd love your ideas for this. Put them in the comments down below. If you've done that at all, let me know about the results that you've had. So a lot of this has still got to be done. There's a few other things I've still got to do in the studio as well. So I've got to say, I'm pretty pleased with this as a starting point for my new studio. And it's really thanks to people like you. And I do mean you. People who actually watch these videos, especially until the end, you make this possible for me. So I'm so thankful. Actually, let me know in the comments down below if you're one of the people that made it to the end. I'll be super impressed. Now, what else can I do to this studio? Well, nothing too urgent. I will make those upgrades to the kitchenette, probably turning it into some kind of a vocal booth. And also I've got to still do some things for the sound treatment. You can see there's a lot of panels around me and I've got some corner traps back there, but I do need some corner traps for the back of the studio. I've got to build those. But it feels a little bit like a kind of a solution looking for a problem because I've got to tell you, one of the biggest things that has improved with this studio is just the sound. That's something I couldn't actually show you in this video right away. There's a massive difference in terms of how controlled the sound is. So I'm super pleased about that. Now, of course, you don't actually need all of this gear at all. I don't want you to think that you need this to make music. You need a lot less than this to actually make some great music. If you want to find out what you do need, I suggest you watch this video right here.