Yves Jaget - Sound Engineer
President of l'Association des Studios Français, Owner of Yellow Sub
Credits
Alain Chamfort, Catherine Lara, Michel Jonasz, I Muvrini, Véronique Sanson, MC Solaar, Zazie, William Sheller, Eddie Louiss, Hubert- Félix Thiéfaine, Vincent Venet, Vanessa Paradis, Helene Segara. Michel Polnareff, Lara Fabian, Aldebert, Johny Hallyday, France Gall, Patrick Bruel, William Sheller, Sting, Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd, Placebo, Patti Smith, Trust, Montreux Jazz Festival, Victoire de la musique, Paleo festival de Nyon
You are grown up in a very technophil environment. At the age of 12 you built your first radio transmitter, one year later your first oscilloscope and so on. What fascinated you in such a way at technology?
My father was an electronic engineer and at an early age I was very fascinated by the power of electronics on sound. His company was based at home and so I got to meet lots of engineers who were somewhat surprised and amused by my interest in their work. At the age of seven, I got hold of a soldering iron and started to study the workings of lamps and transitors.
At 11, I built my first FM radio receiver without anyone’s help. And little later my first live console copied on a MALCOM HILL model, which I used on tour for 3 years.
You said, you decided very early to once have your own studio. What made you choose this way?
I worked in a lot of big studios, both French and English. The idea of creating my own studio came as a result. In fact, I never really found all I wanted in a one-and-same place! Besides, I had a double passion for live sound and studio sound. So, in order to do both, I founded a company specialized in Live recordings, named "Le Voyageur" in which I had for 13 years. Then 4 trucks later, I embarked on the project of a fixed studio. I contacted an excellent acousticen engineer, Christian Malcurt, who had already built some of the best control room in France, as well as 2 of my mobile studios. My own studio -"Yellow Sub"- is organised and arranged exactly as I like it.
Did you have any education or training in electronics or audio engineering?
My experience of electronics has helped me alot in my career as sound engineer. But for me, actually listening is key. I think that the profession of "Mixer/producer" is essentially based on knowledge and a taste for music, not forgetting a high technical level which is also indispensable.But there is clearly an artistic aspect which comes into play, because when you listen to different tracks in order to mix them, the greens or reds leds, the position of the vu meters, the level of the faders doesn’t means nothing , but ultimately it’s your own ears that prompt the decisions.
What has been your breakthrough in the business?
The first album I worked on, came about through an enormous lie. The artist Catherine Lara, with whom I was on tour, asked me if I had worked on any albums on my own, as a sound engineer. I told her I of course had. And there I was with Tony Levin, Andy Newmark, Manu Katche working in a studio and with having absolutely no idea on how I was going to deal with the recording of the album, as a sound engineer but also with the responsibility of co-producing it . After a few days, Catherine Lara told me : "you’re doing pretty well for a first album!"
I was rather ashamed but also knocked out by the trust she put in me that day. This album remains the one of Lara's greatest sales..
You worked with a lot of international and french artists. Is there any occurence, which you remember particularly gladly?
Some time ago I was responsible for the Live recording on a Pink Floyd Tour in Europe with “Le Voyageur 1”, I installed 2 couple Shoeps microphones -among the 30 audience microphones installed in the stadium of Munich- at the bottom of the sound tours. I noted the amusement of the permanent technicians of the tour, looking at me all the time. I was pretty irritated and had the feeling that they were making fun of us, “us the little frenchies on a big tour”! In fact, it was my first installation on this show. The pyrotechny was massive and I installed, not realizing what I was doing, the couple shoeps at the bottom of the sound tour just besides the 50 mortar fire which would never give a chance for my couple shoeps to survive! At the end of the show I heard a big deflagration completed with a “buzz” on 4 of my audience mics ...and I never found my microphones again!
With whom did you cooperate dearest? If one can say in such a way.
The greatest complicity I shared and still share is with Zazie. I have worked with this great artist for 14 years. We have evolved and progressed together. Rare are the relations in this business where you can pretend to share friendship. It’s the case with her and it enables us to work in a different way because we do not have ego problems. We mostly just tell each other what doesn’t fit instead of making false compliments...
What have you worked on recently?
I worked on the new album of Zazie "TOTEM" and I'm now on Tour with her for the next 5 months.
I recorded and mixed the new album of "ALDEBERT", a french band from Besançon.I just produced and mixed a DVD of a Live show at “The Olympia In Paris” in both stereo & 5+1, with Placebo, Patti Smith, Pony Hoax, The Virgins, Suicide, and many other bands.
Do you still make your owm music?
I sometimes compose songs. But I remain focused on my work which is production and mixing, or recording of albums.
You call yourself a power user of RND Plug-Ins. What are their specific advantages?
I downloaded the RND-plug-in demos in july 2006, while recording the album of Zazie "TOTEM" and I was immediately taken by their strong personality. I think there are 2 categories of plug-ins: the "amazing " plug-ins and the professional tools. The RND-plug-ins of course belong to the second category. They have several advantages: you can use them on all sorts of sources, thinking of the DYNAM-IZER in particular. The first time I used it, I inserted it in a group of drums. I was really seduced by its control of the peak. It is the first time I insert a plug-in in Protools with having the feeling to have put an analogue insert of high quality, like a compressor NEVE 33609 or an GML 8900. I know that these two references are very far away one from another but still, that is what the DYNAM-IZER does.
I often use the filter in order to avoid the treatment of the compressor on the low frequencies. I construct compressors with multiple cells and I know that behind the “small quantity” of adjustments accessible on this machine, hide multiple interactive adjustments non accessible. I finally used the DYNAM-IZER for all the drums on this album, but I also used it for the voice of Zazie, and I have never felt so good about the magic positioning that the voice took in the mix.
Since then, there is not one mix that has gone out of my studio without having passed in the DYNAM-IZER.
Which RND Plug-ins do you use most frequently? What are your favourite features?
I use the DYNAM-IZER very much because it has a particular way to handle the dynamic. The 4 compression cells enable a very precise and complex adjustment, keeping its use simple at the same time.
In that way, you obtain -on the bases of the preset proposed- an impressive result, and this very fast. But I also appreciate the UNIQUEL-IZER which enables different kinds of filters. Again, the sound makes you think you are using a real analogue equalizer. I had the opportunity to experience the UNIQUEL-IZER on difficult cases, on live albums, in harmonic retreats and it was very helpful. I would also like to mention the effectivity of the INSPECTOR XL. In analogy, you can pass some details, make a distortion on the input of a preamplifer, push a compressor in its limits, but you cannot do the same thing with digital and the calibration as well as the scale of levels are essential. INSPECTOR XL gives all the details about the indispensible measures, which you cannot find on a machines like Protools. Thank you for having full filled this lack. FINIS is the ideal tool for mastering. It uses a limitation algorythm that pushes the signal of maximas in it last limits, without audible distortion you can hear in other tools I won’t mention here...
Any special hints or techniques you want to share with the readers?
The plug-ins are to often associated with “toys”, because they are used for a “home studio” use. But I think that mentalities have changed a lot and opened the doors for real research laboratories, like RND, where the algorythms are of high quality, equivalent but different to their analogue homonyms. Using them correctly means you have to really sharpen your ears and read the information provided. For me, they belong to my daily work and I couldn’t work without them anymore so important is their influence and implication in musical production. They are definitively complementary and the best ally of the analogy.