The Bunker Studio

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The Ampex 300-series of tape machines ruled the 2- and 3-track era in the USThese fabulous sounding vacuum-tube machines...
09/13/2025

The Ampex 300-series of tape machines ruled the 2- and 3-track era in the US
These fabulous sounding vacuum-tube machines were part of so many iconic recordings at places like Columbia’s iconic 30th st. location here in NYC
The transports from these machines are a bit clunky by modern standards and complete machines are difficult to incorporate into modern workflows (it can be hard to calibrate more modern tape formulations), but the electronics sound so good that people started converting them to mic preamps a couple of decades ago
We have a few channels of these—they’re thick, lush and colorful (the “A” setting on decapitator seems to be modeled thereupon)

We’re so fortunate to have our favorite mastering engineer right inside the building—the great  works  in this lovely  r...
08/29/2025

We’re so fortunate to have our favorite mastering engineer right inside the building—the great works in this lovely room full-time!
The tight feedback loop between recording, mixing and mastering—while maintaining specialization in these roles—is reminiscent of the late 20th century era when budgets tended to be a bit larger
it’s nice to be able to make that no-compromises ethos just a bit more accessible!

This lovely pair of vintage 1176LN Rev. F lives in our mix roomThe 1176 had many revisions over the years—thirteen to be...
08/12/2025

This lovely pair of vintage 1176LN Rev. F lives in our mix room
The 1176 had many revisions over the years—thirteen to be exact
The first couple used FETs instead of bipolar transistors, and most use UTC input transformers
The classic 1176 we all know really matured with revisions C-E (all basically the same in the important ways)
Rev F (seen here) was a further refinement, changing the amp topology for a touch of extra headroom
Rev G ditched the input transformer in favor of an active balanced input stage

One of our owner-partners  is our resident modular synthesis expert, and some of his gear has started finding its way in...
08/05/2025

One of our owner-partners is our resident modular synthesis expert, and some of his gear has started finding its way into our mix room!
Use of modular synthesizers as mix processors is nothing new and we certainly didn’t invent it, but it’s full of possibility
Modular gear isn’t just for tone generation; there are some great filters, followers, and sequencers that can all come into play in a mixing workflow

most of our mixing occurs in our dedicated  , but our larger Neve is equipped with flying faders automationParticularly ...
07/27/2025

most of our mixing occurs in our dedicated , but our larger Neve is equipped with flying faders automation
Particularly for certain music, mixing on the Neve does something nice. It lends a certain density that’s not for everything, but can be great when it works
On numerous occasions, we’ve heard that outside mixers have a hard time beating the sound of the rough mixes printed straight from the output of this console during tracking

Our  collection keeps getting bigger!Not in the sense that we’re acquiring additional sets—rather we keep swapping small...
07/14/2025

Our collection keeps getting bigger!
Not in the sense that we’re acquiring additional sets—rather we keep swapping smaller speakers for larger ones
We’re now up to three sets of SCM110s, including this newest set in Studio A (which replaced a pair of SCM45s)
The 110s in our mix and mastering rooms are flush-mounted in the walls, designed-into the Northward Acoustics control rooms
Our third, smaller Northward-designed room has a pair of flush-mounted SCM45s, and our B room now has 45s as well (this set replaced a pair of 25s awhile back)
With ATCs, the larger you go the better they seem to get! We love the consistency of having similar speakers in all five of our control rooms

We love our    and  A vintage original would be more of a conversation-piece, but we really enjoy the fact that this one...
07/08/2025

We love our and
A vintage original would be more of a conversation-piece, but we really enjoy the fact that this one sounds *consistently* great, is much lower-maintenance and much more consistent!

A little tech day love for one of our vintage   consoles!These desks sound fantastic and were built well, but contain th...
06/24/2025

A little tech day love for one of our vintage consoles!
These desks sound fantastic and were built well, but contain thousands of components and are nearly half a century old
Inevitably, semiconductors fail, plastics deteriorate, capacitors age, and contacts corrode
No matter how much maintenance you do, you’re never “done!” But it’s worth it

a couple of near field monitors that have stood the test of time—approaching the half century mark of usability and rele...
06/06/2025

a couple of near field monitors that have stood the test of time—approaching the half century mark of usability and relevance!

The humble   74 Junior velocity ribbon microphoneThis was a budget ribbon mic from RCA’s mid-20th-century heyday—it was ...
05/23/2025

The humble 74 Junior velocity ribbon microphone
This was a budget ribbon mic from RCA’s mid-20th-century heyday—it was very popular among amateur radio operators and smaller AM stations as an announcement mic, and sold in large numbers
As a result, they’re not too hard to find today—not quite as valuable as the flagship 44BX or 77D/DX (and not quite as hi-fi, either), but a very handy workhorse
it’s a great candidate for putting in the general vicinity of a drum kit and compressing heavily

Did you ever notice that the   logo consists of three illustrations of a cardioid mic pattern, overlapping to form a tri...
05/18/2025

Did you ever notice that the logo consists of three illustrations of a cardioid mic pattern, overlapping to form a triquetra (“Celtic knot”) shape?
Similarly, Yamaha’s logo consists of three overlapping tuning forks (they even use this one on motorcycles!)

The   diode bridge compressor has a unique feature that only applies if you have two or more of them—you can link as man...
05/11/2025

The diode bridge compressor has a unique feature that only applies if you have two or more of them—you can link as many as you want for multichannel operation!
the small toggle switch in the lower right of the unit has three positions—“a”, “b”, or “ind”
this links the compressor to one of two buses, or sets it up to operate independently (unlinked)
we have four of these in each of our tracking rooms plus four more in our mix room, so we could theoretically link them quadraphonically (not that we’d ever need to!)
we’ve never tested the limits, but can’t see why it wouldn’t be possible to link all twelve (though the imagination strains for a use case… 7.1.4 bus compressor maybe?)

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Brooklyn, NY
11211

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