The long awaited iconic British magazine’s Sonic Farm Creamer Plus test has just been published in their May 2012 issue.
We are delighted with the results of the review, conducted by Hugh Robjohns, and are eager to see what the reactions of the pro audio community will be…

Please download the article PDF here or just click on the image above.
I couldn’t resist to quote a couple of Hugh’s impressions:

“…it is always wonderfully appealing and musical, adding a relaxed sense of life and character to every source. The more I used this preamp and compared it with my familiar references, the more I became aware that transients seemed to be enhanced in a subtle but interesting way, too — probably because of the minimal negative feedback.
Electric guitars and keyboards (miked or DI’d), percussion, drums, voices — everything took on a pleasing, larger-than-life character and became somehow more satisfying and organic.”

Right on, Hugh! But our users already know all that, right?

This year, Creamliner will be traveling all over North America on tour with Kenny Chesney! The schedule shows no less than 48 concert stops in the US and Canada, including some large Country festivals.

The Country megastar picked none other than our friend (and fervent supporter) Chris Rabold for the FOH mixer post. Chris was extremely happy with the Creamliner on the Lady Gaga tour, which prematurely ended due to some medical emergencies.
So now he is bringing it with him to the Kenny Chesney tour. There’s no secret why.
In Chris’s own words:
“I’ve used all of the “glue-it-together, thicken-it-up” stuff out there when mixing live. By the time most of those products do their thing you’re left with a mess in the low mids. The Creamliner does EXACTLY what you ask it do; impart life, lift and color. What it does not do is muck up the frequency spectrum in damaging way. When it comes to signal processing, the Creamliner is the single biggest difference maker I’ve used in a long time….maybe ever!”

Happy touring, Chris, thanks for your support, and we hope you get enough sleep on the tour!

Pictured above is the first snapshot of Chris’s rack with the Creamliner at the tour opening concert in Houston, Texas.
Below is an archive photo of Chris and Boris in Vancouver earlier this year after the Lady Gaga show.

It’s been a few months of hard work and excitement over the way things are taking shape.
We are adding our last touches to the new Silkworm solid state preamp (series 500 module).
Also, one of our Creamliner prototypes has been in Nashville undergoing a test by Russ Long, to be published in Pro Audio review in late spring.
Being impatient as we are, we gave him a call to check in and see where he’s at with the review.

Here’s what he told us:
“I love the Creamliner! It’s been working great on my stereo bus and I’ve been placing it as the last element in my signal path while recording and it’s working great for that as well. It is a superb line-level tone-shaping tool!”

I’m sure there will be many more details in the actual review, but for now, we couldn’t resist publishing this little sneak preview. It’s about a movie in which everybody wins: we as designers and builders, Russ and the PAR magazine, and, of course, our users!

Thank you Russ and all of you interested pro audio gearheads!

Pictured above is Russ Long during one of the sessions next to the sweating Creamliner.

The Nautical Miles are an adventurous four-piece alt-roots band from Vancouver. Whether collaborating with jazz artists for mash-up performances, with visual artists for a year-long song-blog, with bluegrass bands or brass quintets, The Nautical Miles continue to push the boundaries of contemporary Canadian folk music. With this band, you can never be certain what will come next, only that you don’t want to miss it.

For their new album project, they chose a small studio in Burnaby, The Hive, known for its out-of-the-box production and recording approaches.
The creative engineer/producer Jesse Gander wanted a clear and punchy but still warm sound on the drums and bass. His final choice fell on the Creamer Plus and a 2DI4 (actually on this occasion he used an older Je-DI version).
The session went as smooth as can be, and the resulting tracks were convincing, with weight, punch and detail.

In Jesse’s own words:

“I used the Creamer+ on drum overheads for the new Nautical Miles record and got some of the most detailed cymbal recording I’ve made. A pair of akg 451′s and a spot mic on the kick and snare was all that was needed. Great transient response combined and a solid low end made the drums sound controlled without sounding compressed.
“The Je-DI also delivered on the bass guitar. I’m not usually a Di man, as I often prefer the warmth of an amp, but with Je-DI the DI track sounded full and thick. Sat really well in the mix too.
Congrats on two great products!”

Thanks for trusting Sonic Farm, Jesse!
Pictured above is the Hive Creative Labs control room.  Below are the guys from Nautical Miles and Jesse with the Creamer and Je-DI.
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“Creamer, Creamer, on the wall, who’s the most talented of them all??” – this is how award winning engineer, producer, songwriter and guitarist Tony Rudner talks to his newly acquired studio weapon!

“But humor aside, I’ve been through the thick and thin of Music industry”, says Tony, “and after about 35 albums, 14 feature films, 8 TV series, innumerable commercials and countless recording sessions, my ears have become quite demanding. Subtle differences in quality have become very important as they add up to (or take away from) the credibility of recorded music.

“When I decided to launch the Harbourside Institute of Technology and Harbourside Studios in North Vancouver, Canada, I knew that I had to deliver to both my students and studio clients what they expected. To the students, the ability to discern between the good and the bad sound and the skill to steer it to where it needs to go. To my clients, the finished recordings that would hold their own next to any radio material.

“Both categories come from a plethora of music cultures and interests. So when I was choosing the equipment for the studio (which is occupied by students during day hours), I knew I had to use my budget wisely and get quality gear that delivers the right sound for as many sound sources as possible. I couldn’t afford a preamp that was just good for a female rock mezzo-soprano vocal through an AKG C12, you know what I mean? I already had one quite specialized unit, the Manley Voxbox but needed a product that sounded great with as many mics and instruments possible. I had kept my trusted Trident Dream series 24 board, which is very useful when I need a lot of channels at once, like drums. It sounds great, but it kind of has its own musical imprint. Not very versatile.

“That’s when I , by coincidence, ran into Boris. When I told him what I wanted, it kind of felt like preaching to the choir. He brought over a test Creamer Plus the next day.

“After the first few minutes of auditioning with a couple of mics, I knew this was an excellent piece of gear. Another hour, and I was a believer. By the end of the day, I become an addict! This thing was not to leave my studio any more! A few months later, my enthusiasm has not waned: the C+ is my first choice for recording anything, vocals, acoustic and electric instruments, bass, percussion, etc. When I record drums, I use it for overheads; I find this to be the most critical for the drum sound. I wish I had 12 or so channels of this kind of quality.

“The Creamer is the most versatile preamp I have ever used. It can be tailored to shine in any application, with almost any microphone.  Surely, there are amazing units out there that are the best for a given application. But they are mostly one trick ponies. Creamer is not. You tweak a few knobs and voilà: huge, rich, detailed sound.

Thanks for being such a great supporter, Tony!

Below: Tony shows how fat and big Creamer sounds.

Pictured here is SOS’s chief editor Paul White shooting a video presentation about the Creamer Plus in front of Sonic Farm’s booth at the AES in San Francisco. The video will be posted on the web soon.
We’re looking forward to the review in SOS!

That’s why we were so honored when he chose a Creamer Plus as one of his important tools on a current album project for an Australian artist Bernard Fanning under the record label Dew Process/Universal.

“The C+ sounds pretty impressive! , says Joe, ”I loved it on guitars and keys and even percussion! It’s big sounding, clear and punchy. The tone options are a big plus and overall I’m really pleased with it! I’ve just started to discover uses for it and I’ll put it to work wherever I can on this project!”

We are very grateful to Joe for thinking outside the box and firing up a product he was totally unfamiliar with. What’s amazing is that every single engineer has a favorite use for the Creamer. Sometimes it’s the vocals, other times acoustic instruments, drums or electric guitars. It depends largely on the mike and other units used in the signal chain.

One of Joe’s go-to mic’s at the Sunset sound is a vintage Sony C37A. It is a very warm sounding tube mike, which is already very harmonic-rich. He also tends to use an old Pultec EQ and a Retro 176 limiter, both very lush sounding tube units. Even within such a massively colored signal chain, Creamer held its own and retained signal definition. (in this case, a mic like U87 or U47 would deliver much more presence than a C37A. Of course, it all depends what the sound source calls for.).

We caught up with Joe at the AES Show in San Francisco, and later visited him at a session at Sunset Sound in Hollywood. We’ll keep you posted of any interesting news on this front line.
Thanks Joe!

We have returned from our California trip with big smiles on our faces! A lot of people have seen our Creamer Plus pentode tube preamp, the 2di4 pentode direct box, the new Creamliner stereo line tube signal conditioner, and the super new, yet to be announced, Silkworm series 500 preamp module.

Tons of new contacts, lined up reviews in more major pro audio magazines, many interested audio professionals!
On the above picture, you can see us with Dave Thomas, owner of Advanced Audio Microphones, the smart and talented designer we shared the booth with. His microphones are a match made in heaven with our preamps.

The image below shows our booth after the show opened.  More news follow soon!

We have been working hard on the Creamliner for the past few months.

Basically, it is is a stereo line signal conditioner, aimed at improving the sound of digital PA boards by running it through a pentode.
2 tactile switches allow for line selection and true bypass, enabling it to connect two mixers, as often needed at live events.
Both channels are affected by the tube mode switch.
The pentode mode will have the same output level as the triode mode, facilitating auditioning between triode, pentode and bypass.
After first tests at live shows, we have changed the tube bias in pentode mode to have fewer harmonics than the Creamer. (Creamer will not have this change as people like how it sounds) The result is a warmer and somewhat “glued” stereo image, with a noticeable improvement on the smoothness of high end, something that is typically an issue with digital boards. We have already tested prototypes at live shows as well as with some professional mastering facilities, and the response has been more than encouraging.

We will have a pre-production unit at the AES show in San Francisco this fall.

Seasoned studio veteran Steve Drake is in the middle of an album project with singer and composer Che Dorval.  She also plays guitars on all songs.  The studio of choice is Stone Canyon Studios in Vancouver. Steve is arranging and engineering all songs, and in addition playing bass. Early next month they are expecting to join forces with none other but the famed 60′s Rolling Stones producer Andrew Loog Oldham. Naturally,  Steve wanted the best possible sound so he turned to Boris for help, and now two Creamers and a Je-DI are happily nested next to other outboard units.

Says Steve: “We are using Creamers on the most critical tracks. For the drum recording session, one Creamer was used on the Overheads, while the other was covering the main Snare and Kick microphones. Bass was recorded directly through Je-DI.  After that, we have been using the Creamers on pretty much everything needed: guitar, voices, etc. Everything recorded through them sounds rich, present and punchy. Great coloration and clarity at the same time! We will definitely run the mix through the Creamer to get that analog vibe!”

Great, we can’t wait to meet Mr. Oldham when he gets here!