Welcome to the Phædrus Audio listening room where you can audition our products via lossless FLAC files or high-quality 192kbps, constant-bitrate mp3's.
The following files come from rock/pop and classical-music recordings from Perfect Pitch Music; many of them recorded with the original London Console, the inspiration behind the Phædrus Audio modular London Series.
The following tracks were all recorded with a tube microphone (Rode NTK) and the original, hand-built London Console which was designed to re-create the famous Abbey Road, REDD mixers of the 1960's. No compression was employed (beyond carefully "riding the faders"). It was the success of the London Console in producing a unique and "different" sound that Phædrus Audio was formed to make the various parts of the console: mic amps; EQ; vari-mu compressor; and stereo Shuffler available as modules as part of the London Series. For more information have a look at our video.
The following tracks were all recorded with the original Perfect Pitch Music London Console and were deliberately recorded with - and in - a 1960's style. All instrument amp's were largely miked and DI was avoided as much as possible, except for the bass which was either captured as DI (via the PHI) or miked up.
To give a bit of background, the original, hand-built London Console was designed to re-create (on a small scale) the famous Abbey Road, REDD mixers of the 1960's with which so much great music was recorded. It was the success of the London Console in producing a unique and "different" sound that Phædrus Audio was formed to make the various parts of the console: mic amps; EQ; vari-mu compressor; and stereo Shuffler available as modules as part of the London Series. For more information have a look at our video.
Everyone sniggers, but we wanted to have a try at getting some classic "Easy Listening" sounds with the London Console. It also gave us an excuse to come up with an easy-listening album cover too! Here are some of the results from the sessions. The synths were all recorded via PHAME preamps.
The shuffling technique selected when the SHUpHLER is set here is an entirely new technique and is intended to compensate for various shortcomings in crossed-cardioid recordings which are usually accused of lacking "spaciousness". We call it "Phædrus Crossed Fours" or "Rectified Cosine microphone technique" and you can read more here. Musical examples as a FLAC file are here. The first part of each musical extract (taken from rehersal tapes) is the signal direct from the microphones and the reprise is treated with the "crossed four" process. Beware.. this is a 42MByte file; FLAC is great but the file sizes are appreciable! An alternative 192kbps mp3 file is here.
Here is another demo of the "Phædrus Crossed Fours" or "Rectified Cosine microphone technique"; this time in a very reverberant acoustic. FLAC file is here. MP3 version is here.
Blumlein δ The greater part of Alan Blumlein's (1933) patent is concerned with a binaural stereophonic microphone arrangement in which two omnidirectional microphones are spaced about 8 inches apart (like the ears). Signals from microphones so arranged tend to produce excellent stereo on headphones, but disappointing results on loudspeakers. Blumlein contrived a theoretically sound and practical system for treating these signals for loudspeaker replay. The Phædrus Audio SHUpHLER has a modern implementation of Blumlein's original "shuffler" when the switch is set in the Blumlein δ position.
An example of the process is given here as a FLAC file. Once again, The first part of the musical extract is the signal direct from near-spaced omni microphones and the reprise is treated with the Blumlein δ process. Beware.. FLAC is great but the file sizes are appreciable! An alternative 192kbps mp3 file is here.
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| Stereo - what can the matter be? |
An example of the EMI Stereosonic Shuffler process is given here as a FLAC file. Once again, The first part of the musical extract is the signal direct from crossed-cardioid microphones and the reprise is treated with the Stereosonic Shuffler process. Beware.. FLAC is great but the file sizes are appreciable! An alternative 192kbps mp3 file is here.
BoF - The EMI Shuffler actually over-compensates for the theoretical correction required for pure, "pan-poted" stereo, multi-track recordings. This is possibly because the EMI filter was intended only for stereo recordings made with stereo microphone arrays. This is the motivation for another, completely new, Shuffling process called Bride of FRANCINSTIEN (or BoF). All the theory behind this is given here.
An example of the BoF Shuffler process is given here as a FLAC file. Once again, The first part of the musical extract is the signal direct from the mixer and the reprise is treated with the Bride of FRANCINSTIEN Shuffler process. Beware.. FLAC is great but the file sizes are appreciable! An alternative 192kbps mp3 file is here.
The HYDRA is Phædrus Audio's multi-headed, transistorised microphone preamp'. A unique concept, the HYDRA contains four classic circuits: the SW1, the SW13, NW8 and W1; each a recreation of the solid-state microphone preamplifiers found in these locations in London in the nineteen-sixties. Below are two examples recorded using the new HYDRA. In the first, one verse of the vocal track is sung and recorded using each setting of the HYDRA: the SW1; the SW13; NW8 and the W1. The second example is similar but the track is a recorded speaking voice.
Phædrus Audio PHAUN is a fully-balanced, class-A, super low-noise microphone head-amplifier to be used between the ribbon, or the moving-coil microphone and any high quality microphone preamplifier. A discrete, class-A amplifer design constructed with special, selected low-noise transisitors, the PHAUN takes its power from the preamp's phantom-power so it does not require its own power-supply. Microphone loading options run from 50Ω to >10kΩ ensuring the maximum tonal options from a single microphone type.
The PHAUN vocal demo was sung using the MXL R144 ribbon microphone from Marshall Electronics. This excellent value microphone needs no phantom power (in fact phantom-power is best kept away from most ribbon microphones) but it is relatively insensitive - about 24dB less sensitive compared with a modern condenser type. The PHAUN boosts this tiny microphone signal to the level of a capacitor type.
All tracks on this website © Perfect Pitch Music 2012. All rights reserved
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