Client Stories

For Tim and Preston Cochran, the owners of the brand new Trace Horse Studio in Nashville, Tennessee, music is something that has been passed down in their family from generation to generation. "My grandfather was a guitarist and a bluegrass promoter in rural Virginia. He also gave me a Harmony electric guitar for Christmas when I was 10 years old," says Tim Cochran. "As far as passing my passion for music onto Preston, it was never really a conscious thing, unless you count putting the White Album and God Save the Queen on continuous play while he was still in his crib." Spurred by Preston's interest in writing and recording as a teenager, Tim's love for gear was reawakened and the two began to assemble all the gear needed for a traditional studio space. With the opening of Trace Horse, Preston, who is recent Belmont graduate, has already been lining up clients to work on the studio's beautiful Neve 8014 and BCM10. We recently chatted with Tim about Trace Horse finding its place in the world of Nashville studios, creating an aesthetic and owning one of only five Class A Neve consoles in Music City. Continue reading →

John O'Mahony reminisces about his childhood as being an era where music was much more hands-on. "I would go to the only cool record store in town and stare for hours trying to decide which record to buy. It felt like a life or death investment decision every time," O'Mahony states. "My friends and I were all obsessed with music, I bought a guitar and distortion pedal at 14 and we all tried to play music together." Continue reading →

Now in his fifth year of teaching in the School of Media Arts & Studies at Ohio University, Lecturer and Outreach Coordinator Kyle P. Snyder has been hard at work with his colleagues Josh Antonuccio, Eddie Ashworth, and Jeff Redefer transforming the Music Production curriculum within Scripps College of Communication to prepare students for real world studio jobs. "What I find most rewarding about working with students in our field is seeing their evolution from day one through graduation," Snyder says. "It’s tremendously rewarding to see that evolution over our brief four years together, which really gives you a phenomenal glimpse into how big an impact we have upon their careers." Snyder's approach to the school's studio facilities is making the biggest impact on outbound students, as he opts for durable gear that allows as many hands on as possible at one time. With this in mind, the OU professor recently worked with Vintage King's Chris Bolitho and Greg Fraser to bring in a Yamaha Nuage workstation and Nuendo software for a state-of-the-art mixing room. We recently caught up with Kyle Snyder to talk about why he choose this particular desk, how he uses it in tandem with an analog console and what his students think about the work surface. Continue reading →

Fascinated from childhood by music and the technology of recording, Don Setaro got his start by creating his own recording studio in the mid 1970s. In the time since, the Northern California based producer and engineer has moved on to tracking at Prairie Sun Recording Studio, Fantasy Studios and 25th Street Recording, but continues to do his mixing work in his own studio. Despite the comforts of working in his own space, Don's studio wasn't tailor made for listening to mixes properly. To combat his issues, he reached out to Vintage King's Alex Oana, whose solution was to utilize Trinnov Audio's ST2 Pro Optimizer to create a better listening environment. We recently caught up with Don to talk about how the ST2 and Trinnov software have helped ease Don's mixing process and create better audio results. Continue reading →

Whether leading an orchestra, writing his own compositions or handling large-scale mixes for film, television and video games, Jeffery Alan Jones has relied on an incredible sense of organization to keep himself on top of his work. In order to further his ability to work on projects in an orderly manner, the Los Angeles-based creator recently teamed with Vintage King when looking for a new control surface and brought home an Avid S6. Continue reading →

After spending a decade as the driving force in the art-rock band Tirez Tirez, Mikel Rouse began to feel a disconnect between his form of composition and the modern world of pop music. "I was feeling [that] I wasn't merging my love for complexity with my love for pop music and the sound and production of pop music," Rouse says. Pushing forward with his own vision, the St. Louis, Missouri native launched a new era of crafting songs by more experimental means for operas, multi-media musical works and albums like Quorum. Rouse's latest work comes in the form of a project called Metronome, whose release, Take Down, has been garnering fantastic reviews from a wide range of media outlets. We sat down with the composer to talk about his incredible career, his early adoption of drum machines, his methods of picking out studio gear and what he used on the Take Down album. Continue reading →

After meeting at an impromptu jam session in 2010, Ken Cain and Brett Bach both realized that they had a new ally in the world of post-production. The duo, who says the only difference between them is that "Brett wears Vans and Ken wears Converse," began hiring each other for different freelance jobs until finally joining forces and founding Sound Brigade in 2013. Since going full-time with Sound Brigade, the duo has built an incredible track record for sound supervision, sound mixing, sound design, sound editorial and ADR/VO recording. In 2016, Bach and Cain teamed up with Vintage King's Alex Oana to upgrade their control surface and bring an Avid ICON into their studio space. We caught up with the duo and talked about the difference the ICON has made, how they pick gear for their studio and what they love about working in the world of post-production. Continue reading →

Located along the Colorado River, Lake Havasu High School in Arizona has built an incredible education platform on the idea of equipping students with the skills needed to utilize the world’s latest technology. To enrich the students’ knowledge of audio production, the school’s administration reached out to their own Director of the Community Performing Arts Center, Sam Brindis. Continue reading →

Since John and Martina McBride opened Blackbird Studio in 2002, the Nashville-based space has become world renowned for being the home of recording projects for Taylor Swift, Tim McGraw, Chris Stapleton, Jack White, Zac Brown Band and many more. Blackbird has been able to build such an elite client base because of their attention to detail, fervent love of incredible analog gear and the will to employ the latest technology to keep sessions moving in the right direction. Last year, studio client Niko Bolas (Neil Young / Johnny Cash) asked about the studio's transition to Avid Pro Tools | HDX, in hopes to achieve more headroom while working at Blackbird. Recognizing their client's needs, Blackbird saw a chance to improve their studio space and reached out to Vintage King's Chad Evans about the logistics of the situation and purchasing the gear. Continue reading →

A few weeks back, we talked with Billy Crockett, the owner of the beautiful Blue Rock Artist Ranch and Studio, about the creation of his facilities in Wimberley, Texas. While the initial build of the space featured a digital workstation, Crockett had always planned on making an analog console the permanent centerpiece of his destination studio. Continue reading →