ENGINEERING & COMPOSITION
Studio evolution
Justin Scott Dixon / Voyager
The studio changed, the music changed, the mission was unfolding, a sequencer, a mixing desk, sound modules, affordable monitoring, all played the part, each made the other work harder.
- Period
- Early foundations → studio practice
- Contribution
- Producer · Composer · Recording Engineer
HISTORY & CONTEXT
Before Cosmic: listening, performance and editing
Early experiences I describe in the Super Progressive interview.
Learning to listen
Stereo was the sound stage, carefully extracted, as the fascination of how sound systems work together thru the transfer of devotion to be in control of something incredible hard to comprehend. efforts before Cosmic, became the guide book, only i knew existed.
Programming a night
Music made for night clubs, educated the continuity with the pace of music, and how its showcased. Radio broadcast audio engineering was how marketing agents competed for more listeners , how to make music sound like it did on the radio had me hooked.
From systems to songs
Turntables became instruments, speakers provided the bass, lighting completed the loop of futurism, manifested in the studio, destiny founded connections, partnerships of authenticity, preceded the un-needed.
HISTORY & CONTEXT
Hardware and musical space
Merritt Island
the oasis, intelligent samplers, refined synthesizers, DOS sequencers, compact consoles, cleanest signal path Cosmic Studios became legendary, Dj's Friction and Spice, no longer secondary.
Effects as arrangement
Delay the echo, echo the reverb, compress the ratio, attack the release. carefully Reverberation became the space, dynamic range placed it. the arrangement was the sound, as everyone gathered around.
Larger consoles
Cosmic 009 was the last record on the Mackie 1604. Retiring it was harder than expected, so much learning had happened across that little desk. The 24-8 brought more room, faders, routing, a meter bridge, the composition becoming something I could see across the console. The computer stayed, sixteen MIDI channels became sixty-four, the sound modules had more room to participate. Working on Aria with Rich Rosario in another studio brought ideas back to Cosmic. Ah Yeah grew through that exchange, the arrangement finding space as I learned to see its parts together.
HISTORY & CONTEXT
Digital instruments and recall
Time Travel
Automation and recall drew me toward the Yamaha 03D, understanding digital audio became the longer journey. Time Travel was my first release sequenced entirely in Logic, still playing the external sound modules, familiar instruments entering unfamiliar territory. Sounds were shaped at the source, but levels inside the desk needed another kind of attention. Digital overload made itself known. The Finalizer brought loudness and CD playback into the learning, clocking and synchronization took years to fully understand. I was making the equipment work before I could explain everything it was doing. The title belonged to that period, music moving alongside the technology I was trying to understand.
Aria — One
Cass Cutbush believed in the Voyager sound. Through Fire, the opportunity came to put the original One alongside a new remix, bringing what I was learning back to a piece already familiar. Rhythm became more dependable, drums could gather in layers, longer film samples brought a cinematic space into the arrangement. Pumping effects could be shaped inside Logic, without building the process around external equipment. The studio was still part hardware, part computer, but more of the idea could develop within the session. One became a meeting point, an earlier composition heard through an expanding set of possibilities.
Software instruments
EXS24, Absynth, ES2, EVOC. More cinematic possibilities, easier session recall.
HISTORY & CONTEXT
AK1200: capture the moments, capture candidly, the mix
Inside the album sessions.
The phone would ring
Usually a day or two before deadline, the phone would ring. AK1200 needed to record a set for his latest release. A vinyl acetate showcase, captured quickly in Pro Tools, working forward along the timeline.
Keep moving
If the mix fell off, we did it again. Stitch just before the bad mix into the newly recorded attempt. Keep moving.
Listen to the end result
Direct speaker monitoring via the TC Electronic Finalizer Plus, allowing us to simulate downstream limiting and EQ. That processing was for monitoring; not delivery...
HISTORY & CONTEXT
AK1200: editing around the performance
Be his wingman
Be Dave’s wingman, without him having to explain what was needed. That was the relationship we developed over the years. He performed; I handled the recording and edit.
It happens in the moment
Dave needed to just do what he does. It happens in the moment—that’s his brand. Once it feels contrived, he disowns it and never looks back.
That was the world of DnB
For me, DnB is the most cut-the-BS genre of electronic music. Always will be. Unforgiving of posers.
HISTORY & CONTEXT
AK1200: preparing the handoff
Mastering? Almost taboo
Mastering? Almost taboo. Dave played acetates. As I understood it, mastering was already done at the lathe. DnB artists were fanatical about preserving it.
The edited set, without another layer
Long-form stereo left-and-right master bounce, straight from the edit session. Bit for bit on a data disc, burned using Toast. No mastering plug-ins. No EQ. No limiters.
From us to the label
CD mastering in-house at the label. Indexing at the duplication plant, using the text file we sent.
HISTORY & CONTEXT
Composition with greater control
Almost Flew
Almost Flew changed how I used scales. Where the vocal sat, and how new melodies could work around it.
Pulse
A cinematic opening, then a heavier dance-floor section. Pulse let me express the compositional control I had been working toward.
Preservation
Returning to archived hardware patches was rewarding. It also reminded me why recall mattered. Getting back into the work, practically.
PUBLIC REFERENCES