UAD atr102 (Sounds like a record)- Well.. not until this gets invented

[Bookumdano2]

Model a vinyl cutter lathe. And I'm not even too sure it can be done.

 

For my interest.. not for that cliche vinyl sound that kids can not fully understand... but with real controls modeled so that I can .. cut hot 45s. In the virtual world.

 

It's so dang expensive to go over to Bernie Grundman, but there is such an art to standing there, experimenting with pushing the process just far enough go get that cool, over the top, magic of old 45s. Not the scractches (think we have enough plugins for that), but the vibe. Something even 33 1/3rds don't have when stacked up against 45 mastering.

 

So far in 2011, tape doesn't get you that last half mile, plug ins don't get you there. The only way you get there is if you stand there with the cutting engineer, and push the cutter until "I'm givin' it all she's got Captain". And then throw out the idea and start over for another couple of hours until you hit the magic zone.

 

The way it is now, you get a cut you like the sound of, make a lacquer, and you're already in the $ past the point of no return. You either play the lacquer to capture it back to digital archiving (ruining the lacquer), or high tail it over to a pressing plant to spend even more $ making 10,000 records. And that's for one song. Or two in the case of 45s.

 

And I don't even think most artists even spend time with the cutting engineer to participate in that vital part of the process. At least for those who still do vinyl.

 

The cool thing would be user-meltable, reuseable vinyl for those who may want to learn the craft to make one-offs with a lathe to then port immediately to digital. But that doesn't exist. The old "make your own vinyl records" machines were pretty horrible sounding and way expensive when they were around.

 

The vinyl making process now can range from pure art to fairly lame (lame being- send us your computer file and we'll cut it to a buncha vinyl records- arggh.. crucial step left out there)

 

Of course, this entire topic then brings the endless discussions about whether the process of vinyl cutting is worth the trouble, whether the art can be learned by the masses, whether joe blow can hear what happens to the cool cool sound of a vinyl 45 when compared with the master tape (magic in the hands of the right cutter engineer imo). And whether digital modeling can even tackle such a technology. And I'm only focusing on 45s. Not the "other" cutting arts and mindsets used for albums.

 

Maybe a software version of this will be something out of Celemony's mind at some point rather than a company like UAD. But this is something I would love to dive into. It's one of the few secret-guru areas remaining.