UREI 546

UREI 546 Dual Parametric Equalizer

Normally, when I’ve finished tracking a project in Logic Pro, I bounce the mix down to a hard drive and then import that mix into Waveburner for mastering.

Waveburner Screenshot

This has worked quite well for a long time and continues to work. It’s quick and easy and sounds quite good. I like the adaptive limiter, the metering, and the EQ is pretty useful. I tend not to do a lot of EQ in the mixing or mastering stages. One of the things my Dad drilled into me early on was the importance of getting the sound you want before you record, so it’s pretty rare that I have to do any “fixing” EQs. When I think back on weekend remotes that he dragged me to as a kid, there was never any EQ involved-just some Electro-Voice RE-15’s and an Ampex 3oo in a road case.

As for mastering, Dad had told me to find a spot in the 1.5 to 2Khz range by sweeping till it “popped”. “You’ll know it when you hear it.” he said. Once the spot was found, set it with the broadest Q possible and boost at 1.5 to 2db. “Any more than that and something’s wrong. I don’t know if you can do it with a computer- you need a nice EQ.” he was quick to add. I’ve always mastered with that approach in mind, even though I’ve been using software EQ’s. I’ve never had the opportunity to work with a “nice” EQ.

Today’s the day, though. One of the first pieces that I’ve brought into my studio is a UREI 546 Dual Parametric Equalizer. I was immediately attracted to it simply because it said UREI. Everybody’s played with a UREI 1176, software or hardware. This is a solid state EQ with four sweepable bands and an adjustable Q on all bands. It also has sweepable high and low cut filters on each channel. Best of all, the Q knobs are also push/pull pots that function as bypass switches for each band. It’s nice to be able to A/B the individual bands. On the back is a switch to that allows the unit to operate as a mono eight-band EQ, if you’re into that kind of thing.

The concentric knobs on the bottom control the frequency and gain, respectively. The knobs above are responsible for bandwidth and bypass. The top knobs manage the high and low cuts.

When I first got this home, it was dirty and moldy from having been stored poorly. I cleaned it up, plugged it in and nothing happened. Nothing. No lights. No nothing. Then I looked on the back panel and noticed that there was no fuse in the fuse bay. There was also no cover on the fuse bay. I scoured eBay and other sites, but couldn’t seem to find the right fuse cover. In desperation, I took it up to my friends at Ossinning Music. They don’t deal in this kind of gear, but they’re used to me and my crazy requests (“I need to figure out how to wear a bass drum on my back and make it playable..” “I need a banjo for a job tomorrow..” etc.) Two days later, they called me. “We’ve got a fuse and a cover. It powers up, but we’ve got no way to test it.” I didn’t care. I picked it up, brought it home and racked it. Now, I’ll find out if it works.

The fuse cover is the white square. Note the CBS Records inventory badge.

This unit is not generally considered to be a “mastering” EQ. I’m not remotely bothered by this, for a number of reasons. First, I’ve been mastering with software, for crying out loud. Second, Dad was a real believer in “it’s not the gear, it’s the guy”.  When Dad started out in recording, the engineers were building their own gear. It was a real “by hook or by crook” time-before manufacturers were meeting their needs. Engineering was a skill dependent job. If you were good, you could make anything work.

Dad, as you may have guessed, was really down on computers and how easy he thought they made things. But then something funny happened. After he retired, he moved down to North Carolina, where he got friendly with the music department at UNC Asheville. Wayne Kirby, the department chair, invited Dad to come down and speak to the students. “I don’t know what I’m gonna talk to them about.” He was actually worried that he’d have nothing to say after thirty five years in the business. When I asked him how it went he said, “I was gonna break it down by each decade I worked, but we only got through the first couple of years.” He was genuinely surprised by how many questions the students had and he seemed puzzled that he’d had something to offer them. “Well,” he said, “computers or no, you still gotta know where to put the mic.”

After that, he got himself an Mbox and a Dell PC and began to talk about transferring his reel to reels. When I started going through his stuff, the Mbox was still unopened and the PC, while not in the box, had never been set up.

Allright, enough talk. I’ve got an EQ to play with. I’ll let you know how it turns out.