Stefan Sobolak is very much enjoying his new ASP8024 Heritage Edition, which now sits at the centre of his Viennese studio, Eastendrecords and also happens to be the first Audient Heritage console to be installed in Austria. For him the console plays a very important role in the studio.
“For me the Audient ASP8024-HE is a step up”
“I used to work with a big analogue console and a whole host of outboard gear in a large suburban room in Vienna back in the noughties, but that place was razed to the ground. At the time I capitalised on the situation, changing my approach of producing to working in the box – and freelance. It was no substitute though, and I always wanted to go back to working with a desk.”
Enter the large format, ASP8024 Heritage Edition analogue desk from British manufacturer, Audient. A reimagining of the flagship ASP8024 designed by David Dearden, the Heritage has an array of added enhancements ‘under the hood’, maintaining its status as a modern classic. “For me the Audient ASP8024-HE is a step up, as well as a step back in time to the way consoles used to be: offering great audio with enough routing to be the centre of the studio. I like the desk VERY much,” he says.
“The most powerful feature is the quality of the signal chains”
“The most powerful feature is the quality of the signal chains, which are incredibly clean and give me a platform to build something great,” he continues, adding, “It’s still SO much easier mixing on a solid, large format desk when trying to deal with dynamics.” He’s not the only one that feels that way. A friend of his who works regularly on classic broadcasts at the national radio station ORF Ö1 was “just as amazed as I was by the quality of the sound”, and a producer colleague has already expressed an interest in mixing his latest release at Eastendrecords early next year, due to the neutrality of the room and the audio quality of the desk.
Happy at having finally found a ‘musical home’ for all his writing and production work after years of outsourcing, improvising and being flexible, he told us: “It was a great learning curve, but I wanted a stable working environment which would give me top signal chain and an easy, reliable workflow, with a perfect listening environment in a chilled place. The Audient ASP8024-HE certainly plays a very big factor in that, giving me the reliable sound and flexibility of a large format desk at a reasonable price.”
“It’s still SO much easier mixing on a solid, large format desk when trying to deal with dynamics.”
Eager to get on “writing and producing great music”, including some songs which are to be pitched in LA this year and a German pop production for release on his own label, Audient looks forward to hearing the results!
