Eddie Kramer Master Tape Plug-In User Guide

Chapter 4 Appendix
KRAMER M ASTER TAPE WHITE PAPER
Written by John Haeny
Based on an original outline by
Mike Fradis, Waves Product Manger
Edited by Michael Costa
Bias Definition by Michael White
Introduction
When Waves started a h
ardware modeling project with Eddie Kramer, it was always
their intention to create a model of the original re
cording chain from Olympic Studios in
London that Eddie used on his great recordings of Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones and
Jimi Hendrix. The model of the Helios Console Channel was challenging, resulting in the
Waves Kramer HLS Channel. Next was the modeling of the famous PYE compressor
which was released as Waves Kramer PIE Compressor.
Missing from this ‘golden’ chain was the classic American tube analogue tape machine
used for these recordings. Waves acquired what they believed was the right machine
and set about modeling, knowing it would be difficult based on what was already on the
market. As it turned out, the task was much more daunting than anticipated and Waves’
first attempt, the initial Kramer Master Tape, was withdrawn shortly after being
introduced into testing. It turned out that this third piece of the Kramer Olympic chain
was going to be the hardest.
Waves discovered (along with the guidance of so
m
e of their Beta tea
m) that they were
missing a number of things, each one extremely complicated by itself, and in total
representing a huge challenge. Thanks to the guidance of Bob Olhsson and John
Haeny, Waves were ultimately directed to the correct transport and tube electronics.
With Bob’s help, one of these rare beasts was found in Florida owned by Eric Shilling.
Eric kindly agreed to let Waves do some preliminary testing to ensure that this machine
was producing the sound that both Bob and John had missed in Waves’ first effort.
To clarify what appears
to be a contradiction regarding the Olympic tape machine being
an American product in a British studio, it shou
ld be made clear that at the time Eddie
Kramer was working at Olympic Studios in London, it was these American tape
machines that Olympic and their clients were using as master recorders.
This world f
amous tube tape machine was the mainstay of the recording industry
(particularly in
Am
erica) and was used for literally thousands of hit albums and sing
les
over more than two decades of recording. For example in 1954, an early tube analogue
reel-to-reel tape machine recorded the historic first single of an unknown truck driver
named Elvis Presley, "That's All Right" at Sun Studios in Memphis. This same reel-to-
reel tape machine was also the backbone of the earliest days of multi-track recording.
The first of the 8-track versions of this recorder was custom built for and sold to Les Paul
Waves Kramer Master Tape
User Guide
14