Jack Daley DSM's With API

New Jersey: Longtime Lenny Kravitz sideman and session bass player extraordinaire, Jack Daley, has outfitted his personal production studio with the first API Discrete Summing Mixer (DSM) in the country. The 19-inch rack system - essentially a mini API console - is configured with 72 input channels (48- and 24-channel versions are also available). Additionally the API DSM incorporates the company's famed API 2500 discrete two-channel stereo buss compressor.
The API DSM, designed to complement DAWs by providing analog summing, mixing, control room switching/monitoring, TT patchbay, and a complete set of I/O connections, is installed with Daley's Digidesign Pro Tools|HD3 rig at his studio. "It's like the master section and returns of a console," he explains. "You can mix out of Pro Tools with the analog sound of an API desk. It also has a buss compressor and a full patchbay, so you can incorporate a lot of other analog stuff."
Also incorporating an API meter bridge panel, an API 7800 discrete four-buss console master, and outfitted with nine API 8200 modules, each with eight inputs, level and pan controls, mute, AFL solo, two aux send level controls, plus an insert in/out button, the DSM's performance belies its compact size. "It's a small console that sounds like a huge API desk," comments Daley.
He reveals that he first came across the API DSM in a pro audio magazine while working in England. "I was over there doing a record for my friend, record producer, Mike Peden, and saw the blurb on the DSM and thought, this is exactly what I want."
The new API mixer provides the bass player with easy access to an impressive array of analog outboard gear. "I have this desk, plus a rack of API mic pres and EQs," he explains. "I have another rack of Neve 1081s. API and Neve are my two favorites. There's another rack with all Manley gear. And I mix to a Studer half-inch. It's a small room but it's pretty decked out. It's a good little studio. It's been my project for the last year and a half."
Unfortunately, he adds, he won't be able to enjoy the studio fully until later in the year. "The guys from Sonic Circus are going to come by and wire the last patchbay so I can access all my mic pres. Right around the time they finish I'm going to have to leave town. But I have to be thankful to have this amazing studio and a great gig with Lenny. I can't complain."
Daley, who has been the live bass player with Lenny Kravitz for 12 years, is about to begin rehearsals for the Celebrate! world tour in support of the artist's seventh album, "Baptism." The tour kicks off with a Latin American leg before continuing on to the United States, Europe and Russia.
But when Kravitz is off the road, Daley is generally in the studio. "I've done tons of other session work," he reports. "I played on both of Joss Stone's records ["Mind, Body & Soul," and "The Soul Sessions"], and I've played with Daryl Hall, Naughty by Nature, Alana Davis, Everlast and many others."
Working with U.K. producer Peden, Daley has also played on some of the biggest U.K. pop hits of recent years. "I played on the Will Young and Gareth Gates records." Young and Gates were winner and runner-up respectively of the first "Pop Idol" competition on U.K. television. "And a couple years ago I played on and was the musical director for the Lighthouse Family." The U.K. R&B/pop duo was hugely popular at the time, he says: "I couldn't believe how big they were."
Having his own facility will now allow him to pursue his goal of becoming more involved with record production, says Daley, who has already produced a couple of records for Jamie Benson, an English singer formerly in a band called Hepburn. "And I've just completed a record for this band Super 400. They are an amazing rock trio," he relates. "The guitar player/singer is ridiculously good and the drummer rocks. And the bass player may be the best female rock bass player in the world. I'm currently working on getting them signed."
As he points out, producing in your own studio gives you the tools and the freedom to craft the best possible record. "When you do an all-in budget record the label gives you the money, but at the end of the day you have to turn in something great. If you start it and want to change direction, where are you going to get the extra money? I thought, if I'm going to do this, I at least need a good enough facility to work on something until I'm happy with it, since I'm turning it in with my name on it."

API DSM Channel Systems

API's DSM 24, 48, and 72, a 24-channel, 48-channel, and 72-channel "Discrete Summing Mixer", with API 2500 stereo busEssentially a mini API console in a convenient, 19-inch studio rack with roll-around casters, the new DSM (that's Discrete Summing Mixer) workstation monitor rack is specifically designed to compliment any digital audio workstation by providing professional analog summing, mixing, control room switching/monitoring, patchbay facilities, and studio I/O connections. The DSM answers the requests of many DAW users who have always loved the sound of API consoles, but found it not always possible to mix their projects on large API boards.

API engineer, Jeff Bork, says: "The DSM is for someone who is looking to get rid of the computer processing load it takes to do digital summing and its negative effect on the operation of their DAW software, while getting the great sound of API summing amps at the same time." The DSM is loaded with all API equipment, with 2520 discrete op amp modules used throughout.

The genesis of the DSM line started two years ago with the introduction of the API 7600 discrete four-buss channel strip that combined an API 212L microphone pre-amp, 550A equalizer, and 225L compressor. The 7600 recording channel has four buss output paths, complete LED metering, four aux send outputs, solo, mute and polarity switches.

With the 7600, 'an API console strip' in a 1U rack space, the 7800 discrete four-buss console master was developed to enable linking any number of 7600s together for multi-track recording, control and routing. Bork comments: "The 7800 Master is very heavy with a lot of transformers and twelve 2520s to handle four sends, four busses, and stereo pre/post fader paths." The 7800 will control, sum and interface the 7600 or the new 8200 units in any combination or number.

All the pieces of the DSM fell together with the introduction of the single-rack space 8200/8200A discrete eight-channel summing mixer. The 8200 makes it possible to mix eight mono (or four stereo) stems from a DAW down to stereo. Like the single recording channel 7600, the 8200 also has level and pan controls, as well as both mute and solo buttons - a complete 8X2 line level mixer in 1U.

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