Apollo producer Charlie Baldwin shows us round his studio.
My Studio – Kasket
This is my Berlin-based studio which I call “The Cave”. I have changed this room around a lot as I always move my studio around. I made my last two EPs in here – Where is Alice? and my forthcoming Synthesis, both for Apollo Records. I like to feel surrounded by gear when I make music – you just zone out into your own world.
Eurorack Modular
This is my modular synth so far. It sounds wicked and it’s always unpredictable! I used it a lot on my newest EP, Synthesis. I tend to use it mainly for drones and percussion. My favourite tools are the Make Noise Optomix and Echophon modules. Make Noise are a company I think are doing awesome things. On my track ‘Wave Multipler’ you can hear this system at the beginning, playing the little drone Sequence.
Korg MS-20 Mini
This is basically where most of my track leads and atmospherics are made. It’s such a versatile synth. The bass of it sounds great and you can really push it. I used it pretty much on every track on the new EP for drones and leads. I put it though an Electro-Harmonix Memory Man delay pedal – it’s a great pair!
Doepfer Dark Time
This is a pretty basic sequencer, but I use it all the time to clock my modular system to Ableton. I have always been a fan of Doepfer stuff – it’s great stuff for clumsy people like me. It takes abuse and always does what it says on the tin.
Access Virus B
I absolutely adore this piece of kit. Again, it’s pretty much in every track I’ve made. It was passed down to me and I use it regularly. It sounds massive and there’s no end to what you can do. The FM on it sounds great too – you can get some real screaming sounds from it!
Co-Producers
These guys keep watch on me while I work, making sure I’m meeting deadlines.
Kasket’s Synthesis EP is out now on Apollo. Find him on Facebook, Twitter and SoundCloud.
01.06 PM
This isn’t really on the same level as some of the other studios featured. Nice that he can do so much with so little, but not all that engaging to review…
08.15 PM
Slightly harsh, Jocko. I’ve never really thought that the point of these articles was to show off how much stuff you have. That’s fun too obviously but just because you’ve got loads of stuff doesn’t mean your music’s good. Plus there are loads of artists making amazing music with very little hardware these days. It’s a nice look at how different people work. I hadn’t heard of Kasket before but if he’s signing records to R&S he must be doing OK.
08.16 PM
Just to add, it would actually be kind of fun to see someone in here who doesn’t really use hardware. There must be a lot of producers who only use a laptop and monitors. Maybe show their favourite software?
09.40 AM
Palms Trax, for example, makes amazingly techno/house-ie kind of stuff that sounds like it *should* come out of a hardware synth & rackmount setup, but he produces all on a laptop. (IIRC)
09.22 PM
its nice to see how creative people can get with limited tools.
01.44 PM
Would you describe that setup as limited though Matt?! He’s got 4 synths and some modular stuff and god knows how many plugins.
I’d call an Akai 950 and an Atari ST with a turntable as a limited setup, but not this!