Mercury Recording Equipment Company: News: AES 117

117th AES Convention
November 8, 2004

MERCURY RECORDING EQUIPMENT had a great turn out Oct 29th and 30th at HYDE STREET STUDIOS in San Francisco, CA. Hosted by Mercury's DAVID MARQUETTE and MIKE WELLS of Mike Wells Mastering.

Friday was EQ night and we had a "shoot out" between Pultec PLUG INs, 2x original PULTEC EQP1A's (provided by Mike and Andrew @ VINTAGE KING) and 2x MERCURY EQ-H and MERCURY EQ-P Program Equalizers. Feedback: The Plug Ins were not even close to the outboard EQs and the MERCURY was favored over the original PULTECS by the majority of people and ALL who took time to comment back to us. Stating that the MERCURY EQs were more open on the top and bottom, yet still had the original musicality and warmth of the original... unlike any other new Pultec type EQ.

Saturday we had 2x Mercury 66 limiting amplifiers vs. a FAIRCHILD 670, as well as FAIRCHILD Plugins. Again, the Plugins fell by the wayside rather quickly and most people didnt want to hear them because it was obvious the quality was not even close to the original or MERCURY 66's sonic quality. This was a tough battle and close match but at the end the MERCURY 66 was voted BETTER than the original FAIRCHILD 670! Most thought the MERCURY was a little more open in the high and low range as well as the low end was slightly more focused. But over all they were close and the MERCURY 66 was said again to be the ONLY product on the market to challenge the king of compression, the Fairchild 670. Our favorite comment was: "The price of Fairchilds just dropped $30,000 tonight!"

Mercury would like to thank all those who went to the event, as well as thank HYDE STREET STUDIOS, Micheal Ward, Jeff Cleland and Staff, Stephen Jarvis, Stephen Suda, Drew and Micha from Studio D @ Hyde Street, John Hinson, David Bock of Soundelux, Brad, Richard and Todd @ TransAudio and a special Thank you to MIKE WELLS for all the help at the MERCURY event.

While MERCURY RECORDING EQUIPMENT was hosting its "Plug Into Reality Party" in Studio D at Hyde Street the Mercury products were also used and put through the paces during the Mic Placement seminars in studio A!

THURSDAY, OCT. 28th was "How to Place a Guitar Microphone" by William Whitman with Paul Robinson playing acoustic and electric guitars.

William did a great job and was VERY informitive.

FRIDAY, OCT. 29th was "How to Place a Vocal Microphone" by Al Schmitt with Chris Von Sneidern providing vocals. Al Schmitt is a great storyteller and has been in the business a long time to aquire alot of great stories. The turnout was big as expected and the seminar went well but we all wished AL could have stayed and talked for several more hours!

SATURDAY, OCT. 30th - 7pm to 9pm: "How to Place a Drum Microphones" by Barry Rudolph with Michael Israel on drums.

After Barry set up a Soundelux 251 about 6 feet from the kit (at ear level) and ran it (the 251) through the Neve console into the MERCURY 66 Micheal played started drums... he quickly stopped to say: "That is the best fucking thing I have EVER heard..." which got a good laugh with the crowd.

Hyde Street staff engineer, Gabriel Shepard, engineered each night of the seminars. David Bock from Soundelux Microphones and Dirk Brauner from Brauner Microphones will be on hand with their microphones for all to hear during and after the seminar.