McDSP

Based in LA, producer, mixer and engineer John Paterno has made his passion for music and gear into a career.  As many producers and artists have turned to digital plug-ins to achieve great sounding records, Paterno too has joined the bandwagon using McDSP as his plug-in haven.  Some of Paterno’s clients include Robbie Williams, Badly Drawn Boy,  Bonnie Raitt, Joan Osborne,  Los Lobos and Soraya.

With an interest in music and gear, Paterno found his way to the University of Miami as part of their recording program.  After college, dorm roommate Joe Barresi led Paterno to Sunset Sound/Sound Factory. As a staff assistant Paterno began working with Tchad Blake and Mitchell Froom.  Heeding way through the art of mixing and producing, Paterno says “at some point I decided I needed to stop assisting, and found my way into engineering gigs.” Recently Paterno has mixed a Roger Manning  dance record, mixed the second Jack Shit record, mixed the Robbie Williams ‘Best of Live’ DVD, and mixed four tracks for Italian star Eros Ramazzotti’s forthcoming record. He has also been busy mixing a new Roger Manning record, as well as producing projects by Lustra, Fascinoma, and The Big Provider.

FilterBank and Analog Channel are two of Paterno’s McDSP favorites.  “I tried a FilterBank demo ages ago and it was the first plug-in I ever bought.  It’s basically on everything I work on.”  Paterno believes “the FilterBank EQ is the most responsive…of all the EQ’s I’ve ever tried.  It’s got the right blend of personality and accuracy, without sounding clinical.  It allows me to get what I hear in my head faster than anything else.”  Within FilterBank there are 10 plugs that allow for various emulations of vintage equalizers and filters. For Paterno, he relies on E6 and F2 plug-ins for his EQ needs.  “The E6 EQ is all I need for most of my EQ/filtering needs.  I go to the F2 when I need more radical filters. I recently mixed a live Robbie Williams TV special called ‘Live in Berlin’, and FilterBank was the only software EQ I used on it.  From filtering out rumble and hiss, to detailing the instruments and vocals, it was all I needed.”

One tip Paterno recommends is using Analog Channel as a custom tape machine.  In working on mastering a new Roger Manning dance record, Paterno chose the 7.5 IPS, the Vintage, the IEC 1, and the USA A tape machine selections to get it started. “As needed for each track, I varied the input gain for overdrive/compression, varied the Roll Off and Bump to contour the low end, and varied the bias and the release to vary the top end and distortion characteristics.  I’ve got to say, it’s great that there are so many variables, especially the bias – that react like a tape machine actually reacts.  I’m not sure how I would have gotten the results I was after without it.  It’s almost as if I created my own tape machine for it.”

Paterno is set up with an HD3 ProTools system and is beginning to integrate a Command 8 into his setup.  He works with quite a bit of outboard gear usually used in conjunction with Pro Tools and McDSP plug-ins.  “I don’t want to work without them. They make it so I can just react to the music, and not get bogged down.” Paterno says McDSP is “a great company to work with.”