Analog Obsession: The Dynamic DUO
by Tim Prince

SOLO/610 & SOLO/110, Tim Prince's Dynamic DUO

Last month I said I was gonna wear my 4110 shirt. I lied. I'm gonna put on the SOLO/110. The marketing guys made me do it. Well, that's okay; it's virtually the same preamp, except for some small omissions and some very big pluses. The greatest thing is you don't have to cough up for eight or four of these pre's in order to have this exciting and versatile tool in your shop. Details on that in a moment. First I'd like to say a little more about tubes vs. solid state.

I mentioned the simple concept of variety last month. That's a valid enough reason to use both technologies, and there are some general guidelines that most people follow when choosing one over the other. But I'm still intrigued by our perceptions and by certain phenomena of psychoacoustics. Music is all about sensation. I really like the food analogy better than the clothes/fashion one I made last month. Has this ever happened to you? A new restaurant opens in town, and it seems so great at first. For me it was this slick Texas-style barbecue joint. I ate there and thought, wow, this is great! Mmm, spicy, zesty...I ate there again a little while later. Yeah, I like this place. Pretty good food--cheap too. I ate there a third time. Ehh, it's okay. I never ate there again. Whether we're talking about our ears or our tongues, humans like change. And when the new sensation becomes the same old thing, it falls a notch on the Excite Me meter.

“The new SOLO/610 and SOLO/110 products are exciting because they bring their respected pedigrees to products that can be acquired at a very accessible price.”

My first experiences with tube gear--both mics and outboard gear--were very positive. Everything just sounded great. As my skills developed and my ears became sensitive to subtleties, I began to imagine that things could sound even better. I tried many things: different mics, mic placement...Still, I wasn't able to get the elusive improvement I wanted. I had grown accustomed to the sound of the tube gear. The novelty was gone. I didn't really need an improvement; I simply wanted one because humans enjoy variety.

One day, I took a Universal Audio 2192 home. I put it up next to my Finalizer 96k. I didn't get it right away. I A/B'd the two converters in an analog-to-digital test. I was mixing a multitrack recording of a bluegrass band. At one point, I had the fiddle soloed while I monitored through the Finalizer. I could hear the other instruments in the background, bleeding into the fiddler's mic. When I switched to the 2192, I could still hear instruments bleeding into the fiddle mic, but I could hear what they where! Those low-level signals were now clear and defined. I went back to the Finalizer and listened to one passage where I could hear some "chink chink" sounds in the background. I played the same passage through the 2192 and the chink chink magically became beautiful little mandolin notes. I was blown away. From that moment on, everything sounded way better through the 2192. Like I said, I didn't get it at first, but once the veil was lifted, I began to grok the finer essence of the 2192. It's capable of delivering sonics with the greatest clarity and definition, which translates to hair-tingling realism. The 8110, 4110 and Universal Audio's new SOLO/110 are all based on an ultra-hi-fi, discrete-component, solid-state amplifier module that comes from the award-winning 2192 converter.

So this is where I make my call on tube vs. solid-state. Of course it takes an exceptionally good solid-state unit to deliver this kind of accuracy, but they are out there. They can cost as much as (or more than) a high-end tube pre, but I find that having both has finally made me comfortable and confident that I can produce recordings that do justice to the music. The new SOLO/610 and SOLO/110 products are exciting because they bring their respected pedigrees to products that can be acquired at a very accessible price. Anyway, tonight I have a special date and we are not going to the Texas-style barbecue. We're going out for some SOLO/110 with a nice bottle of Merlot.

The date is with a great local band here in Santa Cruz, The Woodsmen. (Google it, all their music is free on the Internet.) They're young and innovative, with a sensibility that favors minimalist production and short songs. The core of their sound is built around grand piano, bass and drums. I recorded some stuff for them that was pretty raw--one or two takes, no overdubs, no fixes and lots of bleed. For our next project I want to get a different bass sound. Here's the plan. Use the SOLO/610 as a DI box. It has a switch on the back that converts the output to "mic level." The instrument input jack on the front is connected to a quarter-inch jack that allows you to patch your instrument over to a guitar or bass amp. In typical DI style, you can have one clean signal going "straight to tape" while a parallel path records a miked amp.

What I have been playing with, and will use with the Woodsmen, is recording the bass through an old Fender Vibroverb guitar amp miked with a Rode NTK tube mic. I use an external speaker and put it in a closet. I mic the cabinet about three inches from the speaker and keep the amp volume fairly low. Imagine someone playing bass at a volume just a bit too loud to accompany an unamplified acoustic guitar. I play with the bass guitar tone controls and the amp controls until we have a really nice clean sound that is full-range but not real bassy. I plug the mic into a SOLO/110 preamp. This gets recorded along with the DI direct out from the SOLO /610 on a different track.

I have chosen the SOLO/110 to capture the miked cabinet because I have gone to great lengths to create a sound that is perfect the way it is. It's got all this tube character that's unique due to the interaction of the bass guitar's pickups with the input stage of my old Fender amp. It's full of midrange and harmonic content. I want to capture all its subtle character and complex tone. During mixdown I bring the miked amp track up first and then slowly bring up the DI track (SOLO/610), which adds low-end meat. You could use any DI in this scenario, and any mic or preamp. It's great fun, and often I don't use any EQ--just play with the relative volumes of the two bass tracks.

If you're thinking of buying a mic pre, take a look at the SOLO/110 and the SOLO/610. Check out the pictures on our Analog Products page. I would recommend them for the sound alone, but these portable packages offer some nice features and double as DI boxes. The SOLO/610 actually brings more features and some improvements over the M610 and is available at a lower price. The lower price is mainly due to the high cost of the heavy metal used for the M610 and the rotary gain switch that is replaced with a pot on the SOLO/610, along with other manufacturing improvements. The continuous control gain pot on the SOLO/610 offers finer control and implements a pad function when turned full CCW. The SOLO/610 also has a signal-level indicator, which the M610 lacks.

There is tremendous competition for getting a product idea to the product-approval stage at Universal Audio. There are so many requests for re-issues (like the LA-3A) as well as for innovative and classic hybrids. I'm very happy to see these two new SOLO products make the grade. They bring the experience of using this gear to a greater number of engineers. Many of us at Universal Audio have the pleasure of producing music for friends, clients and ourselves. We are fortunate to have access to these tools and know first-hand how good it feels. Hope you have the pleasure also.