Russian Recording

04/20/2026

This is Dan. Dan is the man. He’s been the studio manager and in-house engineer for over two years, and he’s an absolutely wonderful guy all around, with top marks in every category: from shredding to producing, from affability to reliability, from craftsmanship to friendship. This is a bittersweet farewell to an excellent dude as he’ll be moving to Chicago in less than three weeks. He’s pretty much single-handedly kept this ship afloat, and I’ll be forever grateful for that.

If you haven’t yet had the chance to record with Dan, you’re in luck, because we’re offering a Farewell Dan Special to anyone interested in booking time with him on the last available days before he leaves B-ton. He has eight days open between now and May 8. For only $250 a day, you can book him and the studio to make your music-making dreams come true. He’s one of the most talented and hardworking dudes I know, and you’d be a dummy to pass up this last-minute opportunity.

Available days:
APRIL 21, 22, AND 30
MAY 3 AND 6-8

If interested, HMU via DM, TYVM
TTYL!

04/03/2026

Recording Damion LP III this week to 2" 16-track tape. This mix is the live take straight off the Sphere Type III. Not a keeper take, but still poppin’.

When you’ve got great mics, great rooms, great instruments, and great players, things come together effortlessly.

Thanks to for spinning around endlessly in the middle of the live room on an office chair 📷

04/02/2026

Used our Neumann M49b on Damion’s vocals for a piano jam, and it truly floored everyone in the control room. We’ve used hundreds of rare, sought-after, and legendary microphones over the years, and while many live up to their reputation, very few still impress us every single time. The Neumann M49b is one of those mics.

We may be known for our collection of esoteric Soviet and Japanese tube mics, but this M49b remains one of the standout favorites in our locker.

You might notice that Damion is singing into the back of the mic. We had it set to figure-8, and that orientation gave us the best result when blended with the piano mics.

03/17/2026

Our friends ar posted a second follow up feature interviewing Mike at our studio, discussing the history of vintage Japanese and Soviet microphones. Here are some select quotes and flattering screengrabs from the interview. You can watch the whole thing at the link in our bio.

We’ve got cool mics and gear for sale, please reach out if you’re interested.

03/09/2026

Spent two weeks working on a new record in my dream studio with Satomi, Ed, John, and Greg of Deerhoof. This was our second time working together, and the first time here at Russian Recording. I was first introduced to their ingenuity through 2005’s Runners Four, and if you had told 25-year-old me that I’d be helping them make records 20+ years later, I would have found that to be quite an entertaining tall tale.

The session was a huge success. We tracked nine songs, then spent the last two days pre-mixing them so they could take the analog mix stems and finalize the mixes at their own studios.

It’s a truly collaborative effort, and I am honored to have earned their trust in helping them craft this brilliant concept album. I cannot wait for fans of adventurous music to hear it.

I’ve been editing a cool video detailing last week’s drum recording setup, and I hope to post it here in the coming days.

03/05/2026

03/04/2026

Deerhoof has been at the studio since last Friday, working on a new record. After a great week of full-band tracking, I set them up with a beautiful vocal setup in the live room and they spent last weekend recording vocals themselves. Here is a detailed breakdown of the vocal setup.

Satomi > LOMO 19a13 > DBX 786 Mic Preamp > Purple Audio MC77 FET Limiting Amplifier > Manley ELOP Compressor > Highland Dynamics BG1 Tube Compressor > Orban 536 De-esser

Vocal Room Mic > Schoeps CMC6 w/MK2S > DAV Broadhurst Gardens No. 2 Preamp > Pultec EQM-1S3 EQ > Buzz Audio SOC-M Optical Compressor

For the close mic, a slight high-frequency lift was applied on the DBX 786 preamp, a highly underrated mic preamp that really glows. The signal was carefully compressed with the M77 for fast peaks followed by the ELOP to tame big dynamic swings, followed by the BG1 for gentle dynamic smoothing and some color, then capped off by the Orban De-esser to tame sibilance.

The room mic was placed on the floor about 10 ft behind Satomi below a hanging absorber to eliminate flutter echo. The BG No. 2 preamp was used for clean gain, followed by the Pultec for a musical low-frequency and high-frequency roll-off to eliminate rumble and unwanted sibilance in the room mic, followed by the SOC-M optical compressor to smooth out erratic vocal spikes while preserving natural dynamics.

Swipe to see the equipment used and the applied settings.

03/03/2026

Day 10 of Deerhoof at the studio - we've been so engrossed in the process that we didn't realize how much time had passed without updates. Looking forward to sharing some of the mechanics of this sonic adventure we’ve recklessly embarked upon. For example, the accidentally behemoth bass tone achieved with no less than an unintentional eight tracks of one bass.

02/22/2026

Today the sessiin starts with a floor tom as a kick drum while .saucier sets up a double kick tom pedal.

Hope to share more nerd content in the coming days

01/19/2026

Really enjoying time with my old friend Brett Eugene Ralph, mastering the Kentucky Chrome R***e record which we tracked and mixed here over many countless days back in 2010. Pretty cool hearing these recordings agaij 15 years later, and very glad they are finally going to be out in the world.

12/17/2025

Here is a cool preview of the homepage of our new badass website - www.russianrecording.com. If you haven't checked it out yet, it's worth a look. There's a lot of cool music, tons of cool pictures, and even a 3D tour you can take where you can check out all of our cool stuff and probably spot a few cats.