Jun 1, 2001 12:00 PM, BY GARY ESKOW

Bunny Brunel's reputation as a virtuoso fusion bassist was cemented with the lightning solos and solid timekeeping he laid down for band leaders Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock nearly two decades ago. A native of Nice, France, Brunel has fleshed out his career with session work and teaching, which he conducts in his L.A. studio and through his Cyber Bass lessons program, available online at bunnybrunel.com.

In February, Shrapnel/Tone Center Records released CAB 2, a follow-up to the successful initial CD that Brunel wrote and produced with fellow band-members Tony MacAlpine (guitars/keys), Brian Auger (B3) and drummer Dennis Chambers. With the exception of the rhythm tracks, which were recorded at Warp Studios, the entire album was tracked, mixed and mastered at Brunel's project studio.

No stranger to project studio recordings, Brunel recorded Momentum in 1986 using a Yamaha QX1 sequencer and an Akai 1212 analog 12-track. “The quality of that recording still holds up,” says Brunel. Today, Brunel's studio centers around two MOTU 2408 interfaces, running on a Mac G4, and his Mackie D8B console. “I started out with Performer, and after having tried all of the other sequencers, I have stayed with it. Digital Performer has great timing and excellent wave-form editing tools, and it interfaces best with the 2408s.

“I've recorded with Pro Tools quite a bit — the basics on CAB 2 were recorded to Pro Tools and then brought into my computer as SD2 files. If you have 30 grand to spend, you'll get a good, stable system. My experience with more pared-down Pro Tools systems has been less successful. I find the Digital Performer/2408 combination to be extremely powerful and very stable.”

Still, running native requires a console, according to Brunel. “You need to have a board, otherwise you'll encounter latency problems when you start getting deep into the track count. The DP/2408/D8B combination is perfect.”

CAB 2 was mixed entirely within Brunel's digital system with excellent results. Low-end material, especially Chambers' kick and thundering tom rolls and Brunel's lines, is well rounded. The stereo image is wide, and guitar overtones are nicely captured. When we spoke, Brunel had just installed Mackie's new 3.0 Console software update and several UFX cards, which adds third-party plug-in support. “Version 3.0 is the best,” chimes Brunel. “To me, the D8B sounds very much like a Neve console — very warm. Other comparable digital boards tend to have a smaller sound. The first thing I noticed about 3.0 is that Mackie's corrected the problems they had with the gates and compressor. Also, the Drawmer compressor is fantastic, and the Massenburg EQ is outrageous.”

Bernie Torelli mixed CAB 2, relying heavily on the Waves Renaissance compressor, particularly on the bass and guitar tracks. Another Waves plug-in, Maxxbass, was applied to both the kick drum and bass parts.

Most of the cuts on CAB 2 required 24 to 32 tracks, which go from his DP, through the 2408s and into the 24 Lightpipe inputs on the board. Torelli and Brunel decide which tracks can most effectively be processed within DP and group these as stereo pairs to the board. The 8-channel Alt I/O card was used as returns for the DP echo returns. If more returns were required, then Torelli used the analog outs on the 2408 to bus into analog inputs on the D8B. “This combined approach, using plug-ins both in Performer and on the board, works very well.”

Completed mixes, living on both the Mac and D8B, are then bused as a stereo mix to two additional DP tracks. Stereo mixes are saved as SD2 files and mastered in Pro Tools. “Bernie likes the compressors in his Pro Tools systems. We pay a lot of attention to getting all of the dBs we can out of tracks before we master. That makes the process easier.”

After 30 years in the business, Bunny Brunel is still an eager student of technology. “I'm amazed at some of the gear that's out there today. The Line 6 Prod Bass pod, for example, has the most amazing preamp I've ever tried. You can put all the cheese you want on your bass — distortion, flanger — and the sound stays perfectly clean! We've also recently upgraded our Tannoy monitoring system to the System 800A-powered Dual Concentrics, with a PS350B subwoofer. The fundamentals sound so good! The quality of product you can turn out in project studios just keeps getting better and better.”

Gary Eskow is a contributing editor to Mix.

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