Swedien Works with Jennifer Lopez
New York City, March 2003
Independent producer/ engineer Bruce Swedien has again worked his "sound magic," this time around with recording artist and actress, Jennifer Lopez, on her latest Epic album, This Is Me...Then.
Grammy-Award winning Swedien, who has spanned decades with his engineering prowess for innumerable popular music artists, is famously known for his work with Michael Jackson.
Swedien commented, "What attracted me to Jennifer's album project is, first of all, I love the sound of her voice, but equally important is that I heard that she is not afraid to work hard on a project. I love to work hard on all my projects and with that kind of commitment from an artist, I felt that I could help take Jennifer to a new level of musical and sonic excellence."
Lopez's CD also features collaboration with rap super-guru, LL Cool J. The single, "All I Have," has quickly risen to the #1 position on Billboard's Hot 100 music chart since its release this January. Swedien recorded Ms Lopez's vocals on her album at the Hit Factory in New York and at Philadelphia's The Studio. He arranged to have his personal set of StudioTraps, which make up the (comprised of the sound-shaping, acoustic Studio Traps) shipped from The Hit Factory Studio in Manhattan to the Philly studio in order to get the artist's critical new CD project completed.
"When we did some earlier work at New York's Hit Factory, Jennifer fell in love with the vocal sound space inside the Quick Sound Field. She insisted that I use them again. In fact, we stopped recording for a day until we could get them shipped down to the studio in Philadelphia."
Swedien continued, "I had all 14 of my ASC StudioTraps shipped; they are my 'traveling set.' I use them exclusively for critical vocal work, regardless of where I work. I have to accommodate an artist's hectic and irregular work schedule, so I find myself working in numerous professional as well as home/project studios. For consistency, I always depend on my ASC Traps to create the exact acoustic space I want, in whatever studio I'm working in.
In addition to all the vocals on this project being recorded with my Quick Sound FieldStudioTraps, they also helped considerably by creating a wonderful-sounding ambiance for the album's numerous string section overdubs."
Originally patented in the early '80s, and ubiquitously also known to engineers, producers and artists as simply,"TubeTraps" (owing to their tall and slender cylindrical shape), many recording engineers as well as numerous custom-designed commercial studios use them to achieve better recording (and mixing) results.
Summarizing his affection for ASC's Products, Swedien wrapped up a recent interview by once again offering his personal endorsement of the Eugene, OR firm's products, "ASC's StudioTraps have been one of my 'secret weapons' all these years. They are an incredible product—durable, portable, extremely flexible and most important, they give me the ability to achieve precise, repeatable sound results with whatever microphones I choose, wherever I work. I haven't done a project without them."
