In an age of AI, automatic software, and wonderful digital plugins for analog emulation in music production, we choose and will always choose "imperfection" - the genuine analog technology and instrumentation that sparks that beautifully imperfect yet uniquely human creativity, which can never be replicated by so-called "artificial intelligence." We have simply chosen not to suppress humanity's natural ability to create and conceive music as "perfectly imperfect."

Birdbox Records reference master tapes were played back from a 1/2-inch Ampex ATR102 recorder, from a working copy tape, directly onto Studer A80 RC 1/4 without any intermediate processing stages. No modifications of any kind were made to the signal, such as noise reduction or equalisation, in order to preserve the original sound of our master tape work.

After mixing if the recording is completely analogue we carry out the mastering from Studer A80 2 inch 16 tracks or from Tascam ATR80 2 inch 24 tracks directly on Ampex ATR 1/2 inch for the archiving master tape and for the working copy master tape. So we basically make two direct master tapes!
If, on the other hand, we have decided to record in hybrid analogue-digital mode, we perform the mastering always in analogue directly on Ampex ATR102 1/2 inch for the archiving master tape and for the working copy master tape, passing through the Metric Halo ULN8 3D 192khz/32bit conversion units without loss of musical information.
We believe that this is the best way to have a direct copy from the second generation master tape without loss of dynamics and musical information, this is because the working copy tape is always a 1/2 inch with very high dynamic range.

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Our MASTER 1/2 inch super transparent recorder

The Ampex ATR-100 Series recorders are regarded as the finest reel to reel  audio mastering recorders even made, which is why we believe that our copy tapes are the best you could wish for from a recording. Ideally, a mixdown machine should be as trasparent as possible to avoid degradation of the recorded signal. Considering its outstanding performance capabilities, the Ampex ATR-100 is as close to the ideal all-around recorder as you could find for any application, recording, mixdown, post production or whatever.

Once you've seen an Ampex ATR-100 in action, you'll find all other recorders to be of inferior quality!

For our avant-garde sound enthusiasts, we exclusively use newly manufactured RecordingTheMasters SM900 and also RTM LPR90 tapes, which have the same chemical formulation as the original RTM SM900 master tape we use, but which allow for a longer life in terms of minutes. We take care to carefully avoid any alteration of the signal, such as disturbances on the power line and possible sound discolouration caused by cables and connectors, by using highly professional quality mains filters and stabilisers.