A Conversation with Clay Blair

Clay Blair is a recording engineer and producer, and student of all things audio, technological and historical. Originally from North Carolina, he started as a kid playing in the World's Youngest Beatles Tribute Band (they even did a gig at the Cavern Club in Liverpool). He ran Altamont recording in Asheville, then moved out to LA.

He bought the studio that became Boulevard Recording through a Craigslist ad. The space he bought was formerly Producers Workshop, a studio with an incredible history—Steely Dan, Pink Floyd, Fleetwood Mac, Carly Simon, etc. It was at Boulevard that Clay made the record that got him a Grammy Award for Best Rock Album in 2017.

A studio fire in 2021 destroyed his vintage API console and shut Boulevard down, but Clay is nothing if not smart, resourceful and resilient. He repaired the damage and replaced the API with a Sound Techniques ZR.

Dan and I met Clay through the Sound Techniques connection, and he was tremendously helpful to us as we worked out the Alpha Range Channel and the 'to be released eventually' Sunset Sound Chamber One Reverb. We've spent a bit of time with Clay at Boulevard. It is a relaxed space with a classic 70s studio look and vibe. There's vintage gear all over, including things melted, but not destroyed, by the fire. And there's the Sound Techniques ZR36 console, one of a few, and easily the best sounding desk I've heard. Clay is warm, generous, and incredibly knowledgeable. And he's easy to talk to.

Luke D: So, how did you wind up with a Sound Techniques console?

Clay B: My API 3232 from 1975 was damaged in a fire. I loved that console. It was my dream console. I had a modest Trident 80c when I opened. To me, vintage APIs were what my ears sonically wanted to hear. It’s where I felt comfortable.

So after the fire everything was up in the air. Didn’t even know if I could reopen the studio. But my insurance kicked in and I knew finding a console would probably take the longest, so I got to it.

I looked at another vintage API on the east coast, but I also was looking for something I didn’t have to maintain. There was nobody making consoles new that I really was impressed with at the time. I was talking to my friend Jason Kingsland in Georgia. An engineer I trust and respect. We’d both worked in some of the same studios in that part of the country. So we both had mileage on quite a few different consoles. He couldn’t stop talking about the Sound Techniques in Athens. I said wtf is that? I vaguely remembered seeing the Ken Scott videos from NAMM about a decade before, about mixing Bowie songs, so I went down a wormhole.

Some of my favorite records of all time were done on Sound Techniques. In fact, other than the records made at Abbey Road in the 60s, it probably ticked most of the albums I loved.

So I found Danny White (the owner of Sound Techniques) and we started talking. Pretty soon, I had the 8 channel sidecar that was floating around LA and installed it at my mix room and was floored. It didn’t sound like anything I’d ever heard. The EQ also blew me away. So much so, I went to another studio to work on an album, which also had a vintage API like the one I had, and I took the sidecar and used it almost exclusively.

LD: What do you like so much about the Sound Techniques?

CB: It has the low end of a Neve but it’s not slow like a Neve—it’s fast and in your face and punchy kind of like an API, but an API has a mid range thing. The Sound Techniques is very broadband and immediate. It’s unique. I’ve never heard anything like it.

The EQ is on another level entirely compared to other console EQ’s.

Something that stuck with me about the Sound Techniques, that another Engineer said, was that it was the closest thing to a tube desk he had ever heard in a transistor form and I think that pretty much sums it up.

LD: You said the EQ on the Sound Techniques is on another level, and I agree. Can you elaborate on that?

CB: Ok. Let me think here. API EQ’s, being probably my favorite, have a sound and are deliberate—2dB steps and proportional Q. They don’t have a lot of features but have a sound. But they can get harsh—sweet is not a word I’d use.

LD: They sound clinical to me. I like Neve’s a bit better.

CB: Neve EQ has more options but it can get harsh, too. I’ve never heard the ZR get harsh. Even boosting 3k with a narrow bandwidth at plus 14. That should hurt. It doesn’t. It sounds musical, it sounds natural. When you have it on a piano and use the narrow bandwidth you can boost sharp like that and switch between the high frequencies from 2-8k and it sounds like a different piano at every frequency. Never heard an EQ do that except maybe a Lang or a Pultec. It reminds me of a solid state program EQ, like those EQ’s. Those don’t exist in consoles. The low end is very plush as well and the midrange is more tool like, which is what it should be.

LD: And it has the Pultec trick on the top.

CB: Yes. And it has attenuate on the high frequencies as well as the boost. You can do your own de-ess with a vocal with that overlapping attenuation like a Pultec, but even better than a Pultec because you have multiple frequencies to choose not just 3. You guys modeled that really well on the plugin. Y'all modeled the whole thing really well.

LD: Lately you’ve been recording to tape—8-track actually. What’s that about?

CB: When I had a 24-track Studer, it was glorious but everyone wanted to use it like a DAW because of the track count. Dump it into Pro Tools! Edit the crap out of it!

I like forcing people to make decisions. In a DAW you really don’t ever have to make decisions on the spot. You hold off 'til the end, or dump it on the mixer. One thing that’s lost on music production these days is decision making. If you think about it, decision making is just as artistic of a move as making an arrangement. The sound of things is part of the arrangement.

LD: Yeah, the wishy-washiness drives me crazy. It’s not so much perfectionism as fear of doing the wrong thing. So nobody just DECIDES.

CB: Nobody does it because they don’t have to.

When you’ve got 8 tracks and you’re used to sky's the limit, it makes you get creative in a way that works a muscle in your brain that you don’t often use in these situations. I think it’s therapeutic more than anything to say, “No, we can’t retrieve that drum separation, it’s gone. We had to bounce it down to make room for the vocals.” You have to live with that and learn how to adapt and focus on the song instead of the technical stuff.

LD: Truly. All the records that influenced the world and the industry, were put together by people figuring out ways to get over a technical limitation. Now there’s almost no limitations, and the music seems… strangely limited. Although there is some great stuff out there these days. Got a favorite old record?

CB: Revolver.

LD: And a favorite new record?

CB: Newish. Mike Viola—Godmuffin.

LD: You’re working on a band, and you get one mic to do everything. What’s the mic? You get a bunch of them. Desert island mic. Mics.

CB: Desert island mic… Neumann U67. I’ll take one for everything. It’ll work out great too. Although I prefer the M269C I have a pair, but they’re lesser known. Same mic, different tube. Sweeter top, smoother high mids.

LD: Can you give away a trick you do that you think no one else does? Can be for mixing or tracking.

CB: A trick. Coles overheads. They were meant to be EQ’d. They aren’t meant to be left dark. I love that sound too. But taking a Pultec, or the Sound Techniques ZR, or the Alpha Range plugin and going broad, 10k at 10-12dB, and your Coles will sound like a drum kit again. I made a preset for the Alpha Range, actually. It’s an inductor EQ similar to the Pultec. At the BBC that was the protocol. They didn’t leave them dark. You would’ve never been able to make out what was going on listening to AM radio with a Coles not touched with EQ.

LD: How do you use reference tracks?

CB: I don’t use them too often unless it’s an effect or something someone really wants and then I’ll investigate. Sometimes I’ll think of a reference and want to get my low end closer to it, so I will pull it up and just listen to the low end and compare it to my mix. My pal Shawn Everett came up with this approach for entire mixes for every frequency range. It’s a fun experiment. But usually for me it’s focusing just on the low end and maybe the vocal. I’ll spend 5 mins with it comparing and move on.

LD: When you’re mixing, are you thinking loudness, or is that something for mastering? What do you deliver your mixes at?

CB: My mixes are loud but I mix into a chain I’ve been using and changing for years, so I know the result. It’s loud but plenty left for mastering to deal with

LD: Best piece of advice you ever got in the studio?

CB: Best advice. Never shoot down an idea. And if you do, make sure you can back it up and it is not ego related. Everyone’s different.

With people you know how to work with well, shooting ideas down might be part of your process. But I always keep that in my mind front and center. Never shoot down an idea.

LD: I agree. Bad ideas usually go away on their own, and good ideas are worth the bad ideas. Usually. The one thing you tell all your assistants and interns. Or the one thing they should know walking in the door but they don’t?

CB: Be a fly on the wall, but also be the coolest fly on the wall, so that at the end of a session the artist says, “You know, I don’t really usually care for flies on the wall, but I’d prefer it if that fly was on the wall for all of my sessions.”

LD: Perfect! It’s been a pleasure. I will see you at NAMM!

CB: I better see you before NAMM!

LD: We're trying to get out to LA in November so maybe!