NAMM Preview: Audient comes to NAMM with TEC-Award nomination ASP88 Mic P

Press Release:

Seventeen years since its inception, British audio equipment manufacturer Audient brings exciting new products, a fresh, dynamic team, a progressive new owner and a new distribution partner to the United States. No stranger to NAMM, Audient comes to this year's show having picked up its third TEC-Award nomination, this time for the eight-channel mic pre, ASP880. Another recipient of much acclaim is the feature-packed USB AD/DA interface and monitoring system, iD22 which visitors to the show should be able to get a look at. It all started with the large format ASP8024 analogue console designed by David Dearden, who himself lays claim to a sound electronics design experience second to none. He's spent over 40 years working with consoles, headed up DDA, co-founded Audient, and also had the incredible experience of helping build the custom console used for John Lennon's 'Imagine' album. "Every Audient product with a mic pre - including the latest releases, ASP880 and iD22 - incorporates the original Dearden-designed console preamps," explains Chief Technical Officer, Tom Waterman taking pride in driving Audient's engineering in new directions, whilst staying true to the company's heritage. "Indeed Audient is the only company whose renowned mic pre design features throughout the whole range. It is testament to the design of the flagship analogue console, ASP8024 that it is still manufactured today and that there are more than 1,000 in daily use worldwide." ASP8024 is a top choice for schools as well as studios across the United States. Renowned creative institute Full Sail University packs a staggering 12 desks into a single teaching space; NYU Steinhardt and University of Central Oklahoma both possess one and Women's Audio Mission has just taken delivery of its first 48 channel Audient. Industry heavyweight Simon Blackwood is at now at Audient's helm and has a proven track record for pro audio business development - past successes including Focusrite, Novation and founding Spirit. A year after taking the reins he is very pleased with the brand's progress, stating: "There was significant growth in our business in 2014 and our focus for 2015 is the US market". Most recently he has utilised his close connections with industry manufacturing to help source new technology and better component pricing, which has led to the significant reduction in the price of iD22. Together with Tom's vision for exciting new products, Simon promises to propel Audient forward into the new year. "We have plenty of scope for further development over the next 12 months, and great energy from our team based in southern England. Setting up new distribution agreements in the States and across the globe is just the start of it." To bring this new direction to the USA, Audient has signed on a new distribution partner in Momentum Audio Sales. Founded by audio industry veteran John Devins on his experience in leading sales efforts for Steinberg, Cerwin-Vega, Focusrite/Novation, AKG, and JBL, Momentum Audio Sales is the perfect fit for Audient to expand their offerings in the US market. Devins will tap established dealer and sales rep networks in the US and is looking forward to a year of growth in 2015.

5 Tips for eating healthy on the road… A different perspective

Want to eat healthier on the road? Try getting more sleep. One of the most difficult things to do when working either as a crewmember or artist is to keep a healthy lifestyle on the road. The constant push to keep moving and arrive at the next destination on time or better yet early makes the traveling portion a major grind. Long hours on the road or airport while eating on the way at fast-food joints or even worse, gas stations.

Here is what I have learned over my years of doing road gigs: I get hungry when I am tired. Yes, I tend to go for the sugar and carbs when I am absolutely exhausted. It’s like my body’s saying, “Hey, you are tired but need to keep going? Have some sugar and fast food (which is really bread [sugar carbs] and sweeteners) so we can keep this pace up”. Although for you road warriors and other crew types, you know that sleep is pretty much a premium. During one of my first tours as a green A2, I was shocked to see crewmembers getting a 2-hour break and then spending it curled up under a staircase or on a set of road boxes. This would often be the sleep they would get before another 8-hour shift.

So as I grow a little bit older, I noticed that when I was well rested, I tended to eat much healthier. Mostly vegetables and protein; no fast food. When I get tired at night, I sleep a minimum of 7 hours. This leaves me well rested and actually ready for the day. I tend of have more cognitive engagement as the day progresses as well. I translated this new behavioral process to my road warrior lifestyle and so far, so good.

Here are my 5 tips for eating healthier on the road:

1. Get sleep in a minimum of 3.5 hour blocks.
2. Eat mostly plants and protein (meat or vegetarian options)
3. Try to have 2 hours of downtime for yourself somewhere in the day. Play video games or do something mindless you enjoy.
4. Naps are great, take a 10-30 minute nap if possible
5. Work out! Yes, work out. 30-60 minutes of increased cardio helps curb appetites and makes us crave better food and sleep!

Press Release - Antelope Audio Zen Studio Wins Mix/PAR 2014 Innovative Product Award

Press Release : Leading professional audio gear manufacturer Antelope Audio announced that its Zen Studio won an 'Innovative Product Award' in the first Mix/PAR reader's choice awards. The Zen Studio audio interface was nominated in the Interface category alongside equipment from several other leading audio manufacturers. Each of the winning products were selected by readers of Pro Audio Review and Mix Magazine.

"We are pleased that Zen Studio has been recognized with an Innovative Product Award by readers of Pro Audio Review and Mix Magazine," commented Marcel James, Director of US Sales and Marketing, Antelope Audio. "We believe the many innovations in Zen Studio and our other products like Pure2, MP32, Orion32, Satori and others are raising the bar and shaping the expectations of pro audio consumers, who are demanding greater flexibility and uncompromising audio quality in the products they choose."

In recognition of outstanding technical achievement, Zen Studio recently received a nomination for the 30th Annual TEC Awards. Zen Studio is a professional portable audio interface, clock, preamp, and monitor controller. It is built with the purpose to be a powerful professional mobile recording studio, but its features such as 20 analog inputs, 12 world-class mic preamps, Antelope's acclaimed conversion and clocking, onboard DSP effects, multiple monitor mixers, custom high-bandwidth low-latency USB, and Mac/PC control software make it a perfect recording solution not only for location but studio recording as well. Since its launch in May, Zen Studio, has received multiple recognitions from the media, users and Grammy Award winning engineers across the Globe.

Zen Studio was designed and manufactured based on proven conversion, clocking and USB technologies used in Orion32, the company's best selling product. Orion32 is part of the critical audio signal path in a number of large live shows and prominent studios. For its diminutive size, Zen Studio delivers a breakthrough number of mic pres and DI instrument inputs in a mobile interface, along with exceptional monitoring and tracking DSP capabilities more commonly found in high end, commercial studios.  

Twitter Problems

So recently I was trying to update TheAudioPod.com's twitter account @TheAudioPod and found some pretty interesting limitations.

1) Twitter will only let you follow 1,000 people a day. Not a great thing when you want to keep up to date with all the artists out there.

The work around: Put them into lists. *WARNING: Twitter has a limitation on lists also. See below

2) Twitter will only let you do about 150 list changes per hour. YES! per hour! That means you can only add or remove 150 people at a time. Not a great system. I imagine the reason is so that it limits the amount of BOTS on their systems at one time. I could see a bot removing or adding people on lists jumping into a FOR loop and crashing twitter.

However, the issue is that for small blogs like this or ordinary people it is a major hassle to manage your news feeds. Feel free to leave some ideas on how to manage this better. Yes I also use Hootsuite.