Brad Boatright
Bio
As an active recording and touring musician for over thirty years, Brad cut his teeth as the guitarist and vocalist in From Ashes Rise, making music in a scene fraught with challenges to sound quality. He was raised in the North Mississippi Hill Country, surrounded by a rich and historic music scene, and, after studying Recording Industry Technology at Middle Tennessee State University in the late 1990s, Brad armed himself with a healthy obsession with records, sound and music. He's always aimed to overcome challenges independent artists face while helping them realize their vision of sonic perfection. Since founding Audiosiege in 2010, Brad, a self-described "musician's engineer", has mastered hundreds of albums in his studio in Portland, Oregon. Notable among these are Michael Stein and Kyle Dixon's opening sequence and official soundtrack for Netflix's "Stranger Things" series, the reissue of Sleep's monumental "Dopesmoker" LP, as well as records from Corrosion of Conformity, Nails, Beastmilk, Obituary, Yob, and more.
And his collaboration list is really impressive.
Quotes
Front DAW
Sincerely, this is the first plug-in I’ve used that made me consider selling a certain piece of gear that I have. There’s something really good happening when you hear it working, like driving a discrete opamp or transformer to its sweet spot. I’ve found that just putting it before or after a surgical or transparent plugin can give you the best of both worlds. It’s like giving your software an analog retrofit!
UniChannel
Wow… This one really blew me away. Sitting at a desk full of analog gear is fun. It also gets hot. And it’s not something you want to take on the road. But I’m picky, so I still use it. Sometimes what we hear in analog is either the interaction between pieces of gear, or the cumulative effect of multiple analog stages, and UniChannel really manages to do something similar, beyond the normal deployment of saturation, EQ, and dynamics. I’ve tried a lot of plugins that aim to do what analog does, but UniChannel, quite honestly, is one of the few that truly succeeds, gives me that sound, and leaves me thinking about the sound after I’m done with it. For analog workflow and sonics in the box, it’s quickly become a staple.
FireEQ
I’ve already added this one to my default “ITB” mastering chain, and it’s staying there.
FirePresser
Firepresser has a unique versatility, and I love the interface. There’s something about the saturation and turbo controls that just brings things together nicely, and the Vari Mu mode has become my first choice when I need optical style compression without sacrificing punch. Even the modules that normally wouldn’t get used in mastering can be blended in for pleasantly surprising results.
MasterMind
As a limiter alone, MasterMind is a very capable tool, and I've used it at the end of several mastering chains with excellent results. But what I really enjoy about it is the EQ and saturation stages, both of which sound awesome and give it the flexibility to be a major part of any mastering setup
Plamen
The possibilities for tone-shaping are vast, and it also works well as an unconventional tool to equalize with distortion. It can be a subtle flame or a raging inferno, but with a grasp of the sounds of each mode, dialling it in is fast and efficient.