Mercury Recording Equipment Company

Rocco Deluca

A majority of Rocco Deluca's self titled album 'Rocco Deluca' was recorded at Effie House in Los Angeles by Producer / Engineer Chris Karn. The Mercury M72s, Mercury 66, and especially the Mercury GPQ15s were heavily used throughout the recordings. On the track "Thief and the Moon", all mic amplifiers used were either M72s and / or GrandPreQ15s from Mercury Recording Equipment. The album was produced and mixed by Daniel Lanois.

Producer/Engineer Chris Karn talks about recording ‘Rocco Deluca’

"I had been close friends with David at Mercury... When we started the record, just Rocco and I, there was no recording budget, so we were just cobbling our recording gear together for the pre production. On the first "Tracking Day" David was so nice that he shipped down a pile of his mic pres, a pair of his M72s (tube), and 4 of his (Solid State Discrete) Grand Pre Channel Strips (GPQ15s), as well as a M66 (Limiting Amplifier).

After shooting out all of the pres we had on hand, his Grand Pre Channel Strips (GPQ15s) and the new 57 was the coolest tone, and we stuck with it... loved it so much I bought the very channel strip to hold on to for the next record.

Harmonium sound: it was Rocco's personal Harmoniam that he played, we also recorded a 70's solid state hammond that had the coolest tones... It's all over the record... and that doubled some lines... both the harmonium and the organ were recorded with a Royer 121 into a Mercury M72s (one that I've owned for years). A big part of the tone on the record was from the beautiful old wood floors in the house....it has a tone.

Oh, and this is starting to sound like a Mercury commercial (haha), but honestly we had neve 1073, ua la 610, api512, and the Mercury Grand Pre Channel (GPQ15s) and M72s to choose from... at the end of the day the best mic and pre amp match won and we never moved away from those combos... it gave the record a sound that could be recreated over the 2 year process... yes, 2 years... that's another story.

Vocal = SM7 > Mercury M72s > (line in) UA LA610 opto compressor.

Bass Guitar (electric) = Mercury Grand Pre Channel Strips (GPQ15s) > UA LA 610 (line in) for opto compressor.

Some of the Back Ground Vocals (gang vocals) claps and percussion would also get the Same treatment but with a Royer 121 the M72s and same opto compressor.....but not often. This record was a team/family effort making us all better."

— Chris Karn - Producer, Engineer, Musician
(Source: Gearslutz)