shepardtone is an audio post-production partnership
Zlaya Loud
Working as a producer, mixing, mastering and recording engineer for over 30 years, Zlaya has collaborated with musicians and film makers from all corners of the globe and has over 500 albums to his name to date. Known for his unorthodox approach, Zlaya’s signature sound is a considered conflict of craft, precision and minimalism.
Working between London and Amsterdam, Zlaya began a 360-degree collaboration with prominent independent label Konkurrent which led to the critically acclaimed series of albums In The Fishtank. After a short period he established a state of the art mastering and mixing facility, aptly named ‘LOUD!’, which he ran from Studio 150.
Recent years have seen him working in NYC and LA on film postproduction and delivering spatial audio productions for VR. This led to an in-depth investigation into spatial recording and mixing techniques and the development of the Mach 1 codec.
Connecting sound to emotion is at the centre of Zlaya’s productions. His insight into the entire process, from initial conception to final master, enables him to enhance fidelity without making it sound overworked.
Owen Pratt
Owen has spent the last 15 years working as a musician, recordist and mix engineer. He honed his craft setting up Flesh and Bone Studios in Hackney which he ran for over 10 years. More recently he’s been mixing sound for film and picture and co-runs the Flesh and Bone sessions for NTS.
In addition to the technical dark arts, he produces music for film, dance and installation whilst maintaining a practice of live performance. His collaborative works have been exhibited at galleries and museums, including the ICA, Hayward Gallery, Centre Pompidou, Serpentine and Tate Modern.
He specialises in experimental synthesis and is intrigued by unusual approaches to noise and sound creation.
Music
Christian Fennesz ∙ Sonic Youth ∙ Ryuichi Sakamoto & David Toop ∙ Colin Stetson ∙ Jeff Mills ∙ Jim O'Rourke ∙ Sparklehorse ∙ Wolfgang Tillmans ∙ Kamaal Williams ∙ Dirty Three ∙ Low ∙ Nadine Shah ∙ Motor Psycho ∙ Lucinda Chua ∙ Viagra Boys ∙ Jagga Jazzist ∙ Ron Geesin ∙ Mansur Brown ∙ Post Malone ∙ Blake Shelton ∙ Collocuter ∙ O Yuki Conjugate ∙ Bo Ningen
Film
Alien Covenant, In Utero (D.Karlak) ∙ Together (Terrence Malick) ∙ Fela Kuti, One Day Go Be One Day (Akinola Davies Jr) ∙ The Amber Light (Adam Park) ∙ American Jesus (A.Garriga) ∙ The Last Goodbye (G. Arora and A. Palitz) ∙ The Business of Grime (Ewen Spencer)
Equipment
Over the years we've built up an esoteric collection of some of the finest analogue and digital processors available becuase we believe a digital/analogue hybrid is the best (and most enjoyable) route to creating rich, complex sonic textures while retaining the workflow and recallability of a modern digital system. It's ever evolving but some of the key pieces are listed below.
ATC
ADT
Bricasti
Chiswick Reach
Crane Song
Decca
Eckmiller
Empirical Labs
EMT
EAB Gaeling
Focusrite ISA
Neumann
Manley
Metric Halo
PEV
Vacuvox
Vertigo
TAB Telefunken
Teldec
Siemens
Studer
Weiss