How PURE MAGIC Was Recorded

For recording technoids and other interested parties, here is a rundown on how Pure Magic was recorded:

We used a pair of Neumann 170-R microphones set on a hypercardioid pickup pattern. The mics were directed toward the bridge of the guitar, 8 inches (!) away.

They went into a Presonus MP-20 mic preamp which went direct into an Aardvark Aark-24 AD/DA converter (soundcard). The Aark went into a PC custom built and optimized for music recording, but not really exotic or expensive. (We have since ugraded to an Avalon 2022 Preamp and an Apogee Rosetta 200 AD/DA converter.)

We recorded Pure Magic using Cakewalk’s Pro Audio 9 but have since upgraded to Sonar 6.

Monitoring was done on some old Kef speakers through a NAD 1020 Stereo Preamplifier and a Hafler Transnova P1500 amplifier, but we’ve since upgraded to JBL Professional LSR 6328 powered monitors.

The Neumann mics are very high end, but the rest of the setup is pretty unremarkable. With today’s technology, if you experiment a lot and put thought and care into what you do, you can produce remarkable results with unremarkable equipment. But you know, when you think about it, it has always been that way…