2012 Award Nominated Projects from Top Engineers & Producers using Dangerous Music equipment
As the 56th Grammy(r) Awards show approaches, multi-award-winning hardware manufacturer Dangerous Music is offering congratulations to several of their users who have Grammy nominated projects for 2012. This year, nominated projects recorded, mixed or mastered utilizing Dangerous gear include artists such as Tom Waits recorded and mixed by Karl Derfler, Marilyn Manson co-produced by Chris Vrenna, The Roots, Lupe Fiasco, Elle Varner and John Legend with Ludacris mastered by Dave Kutch, Little Big Town, TobyMac, Matthew West, Kari Jobe, and Brit Nicole mixed by F. Reid Shippen, Kenny Garrett mixed by Todd Whitelock, and 2 Chainz mastered by Glenn Schick. The Grammy Awards are to be televised live February 10, 2013 on CBS.
Dangerous Music is a leading manufacturer of a wide range of pro audio hardware for recording, mastering, mixing and post-production facilities. Its products have won numerous awards including Technical Excellence & Creativity, Editor’s Choice, and AES Best of Show, among many others. The Company designs and builds products that are indispensable to any DAW-based recording environment, bridging the gap between the analog and digital worlds of music production. Over a decade ago, Dangerous Music introduced the Dangerous 2-Bus analog summing mixer, an innovation that went on to define the product category of ‘analog summing devices’ and ushered in the concept of “out-of-the-box” hybrid mixing.
Dave Kutch, Grammy-winning mastering engineer based in New York, states, “Dangerous Music gear acts as the transparent heart of my current mastering room, and as The Mastering Palace expands in 2013 it will again handle the signal routing and monitoring in ALL of my new mastering studios.” This year four of the many projects Kutch worked on are nominated for a Grammy: Elle Varner’s composition “Refill” for Best R&B Song, John Legend featuring Ludacris for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration on “Tonight (Best You Ever Had),” The Roots album ‘Undun’ for Best Rap Album, and Lupe Fiasco for Best Rap Album, ‘Food & Liquor II: The Great American Rap Album, Pt. 1.’ Kutch utilizes the Dangerous Music Master, Monitor and BAX EQ.
Producer and engineer Karl Derfler, who owns the Dangerous Monitor ST controller, engineered Tom Waits’ latest release ‘Bad as Me’ which is nominated for Best Alternative Music Album. “The Dangerous Monitor ST is the essential piece of gear in my arsenal. I couldn’t work without it. I know that I’m hearing an accurate representation of the system output, and the headphone output is the best I’ve ever heard,” says Derfler, an 8-time Grammy nominee.
Chris Vrenna, who’s own Tweaker record was recently released ‘Call The Time Eternity’ (Metropolis), was the co-producer on Marilyn Manson’s latest album ‘Born Villain,’ the track “No Reflection” is nominated for Best Hard Rock Performance. Vrenna used his Dangerous gear during the production process on the Manson project. In his Treehouse of Terror studio setup, Vrenna explains, “The Dangerous D-Box is the heart of my studio, it’s made all the difference having good monitoring control. I use the summing in the D-Box too, along with a Dangerous 2-Bus LT for a total of 24-channels of analog summing. The Dangerous summing makes a huge difference in the sound.”
Engineer Glenn Schick mastered the album from 2 Chainz, ‘Based on a T.R.U. Story,’ and is up for a Best Rap Album Grammy nomination. “I used the Bax EQs all over the 2 Chainz album. It really does great stuff on a mix. And getting signal through my Dangerous Master and Monitor sure make it easier to make those judgment calls. I depend on it,” says Schick. The 2 Chainz album is certified Gold, and hit #1 on the Billboard top 200.
Engineer F. Reid Shippen mixed a lot of artists that are up for a Grammy including Little Big Town for Best Country Duo/Group Performance, and, in the same category of Best Contemporary Christian Music Album, he has mixed four different artists: TobyMac, Matthew West, Kari Jobe, and Brit Nicole. Shippen talks about his Dangerous setup, “All of my monitoring goes through the Dangerous Monitor ST and DAC ST, and in my opinion every studio should have one of these. I always want to listen to a good clean monitor section like the ST.” Shippen also uses the Dangerous 2-Bus for certain aspects of his summing, “I tried every single summing box, and chose the Dangerous 2-Bus. It’s made by [Dangerous Music electronics designer] Chris Muth, I really respect his work. I know that I can walk into Greg Calbi’s mastering room at Sterling Sound and there would be Dangerous gear in the rack – that gives me a lot of confidence. If it’s good enough for Ted Jensen and Greg Calbi, it’s good enough for anybody.”
Grammy Award-winning engineer Todd Whitelock mixed legendary saxophonist Kenny Garrett’s current release and Grammy Nominated album ‘Seeds From The Underground’ (Mack Avenue Records) at Valvetone Recording/ Flux Studios, NYC using a host of Dangerous Music equipment. Valvetone Recording’s owner Damon Whittemore, in partnership with Flux Studios owner Fabrice Dupont, have installed the entire line of Dangerous Music gear which Whitelock regularly employs in all of his mixing there. For Seeds he utilized the Dangerous Music Mixer, 2-Bus, Master, DAC-ST and Monitor ST to achieve the high definition sound. “I’ve come to rely on the transparency and fidelity of the Dangerous Music equipment,” says Whitelock, “especially the combo of DAC-ST and the Monitor ST for monitor control, speaker switching and the headphone amp. I used to be a large format console mixer for years, both analog and digital, but now I’m loving all the headroom, spaciousness, and particularly the bottom end I’m getting out of these Dangerous devices. I’m a huge fan.” In addition to Seeds From The Underground being nominated for Best Instrumental Jazz Album, Kenny Garrett’s solo on the album’s track “J. Mac” is nominated for Best Improvised Jazz Solo.
The Dangerous Monitor ST controller is a key piece of gear in two of New York’s Stadiumred studios. In Studio A, production work was done on Drake’s album ‘Take Care’ and is nominated for Best Rap Album, while Elle Varner’s song “Refill” which is nominated for Best R&B song was worked on in Studio C4. Stadiumred also utilizes the Dangerous D-Box and Dangerous BAX EQ within their studio complex.
Visit the Grammy Awards website to see all the nominees: http://www.grammy.com/nominees
For more information on some of the engineers, producers and studios who have worked on these Grammy nominated projects, visit: The Mastering Palace: http://themasteringpalace.com – F. Reid Shippen: http://www.robotlemon.com – Chris Vrenna: http://tweaker.net – Glenn Schick Mastering: http://www.gsmastering.com – Stadium Red: http://www.stadiumredny.com
Dangerous Music Products
Key products from Dangerous Music, Inc., include the Dangerous 2-Bus and 2-Bus LT, Dangerous Monitor ST-SR and its Additional Switching System expansion units including the DAC ST, Dangerous D-Box, Dangerous Master, Dangerous Liaison, Dangerous Monitor and Dangerous Bax EQ. For more information on Dangerous Music visit http://www.dangerousmusic.com phone 607-965-8011 or email: info@dangerousmusic.com
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