Definition Branding & Marketing

Legendary producer/engineer Eddie Kramer has participated in some of rock music’s most important recordings, including the soundtrack to the original 1969 Woodstock festival and albums by Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Traffic, Santana, Kiss, The Rolling Stones, Carly Simon and many more. Most recently, Kramer remastered the recordings for the new CD and DVD Hendrix box set, West Coast Seattle Boy – The Jimi Hendrix Anthology. The set spans Hendrix’s recording career from his first sides as a sideman for The Isley Brothers, King Curtis, Little Richard and others to more than forty never before released tracks and alternate versions of classic Hendrix songs.

Kramer used JBL LSR6300 Series studio monitors for the remastering of the box set, which took more than a year and a half to produce. “Hendrix was a workaholic who lived in the studio when he wasn’t touring, and in the four years I worked with him we recorded an enormous amount of material, some of which is being heard for the first time on West Coast Seattle Boy,” Kramer noted. “The four CDs on the anthology trace Jimi’s career from the very beginning to the very end. It’s just amazing hearing the progression of Jimi trying to burst through the early tracks, all the way to later recordings where Jimi’s absolute mastery of tone and technique enabled him to create sounds that were just nonexistent in anyone else’s mind.”

Kramer emphasized, “I was determined to present these recordings with the best possible sound quality.”

Kramer produced the recordings using a JBL LSR6328P Series studio monitor system. “With this project, the quality of the original recordings varied from hotel room demos that Jimi did using just his own personal tape recorder and microphone, to full-blown multitrack masters recorded at Electric Lady Studios. In order to get the most from a wide variety of source material, I needed equipment that let me hear every last detail that was on these recordings, and enable me to make accurate judgments about EQ, compression and dynamic range to bring out the most in the source material,” Kramer said.

“The JBL LSR6300 monitors reveal tremendous detail. I am very happy with these speakers, because they give me the resolution I need, particularly in the high end. I love the LSR6300 monitors because they’re so smooth, and the top end doesn’t take my head off! They’re not fatiguing to the ears, which was crucial for the extended listening sessions that were often involved in this project.”

“One particularly important aspect is that I can easily tell where certain instruments are in the stereo image,” continued Kramer. “That to me is critical because I do a lot of very careful placement and a lot of panning.” The LSR6300 monitors also gave Kramer the ability to accurately monitor at low as well as high volumes. “I do a lot of my mixing at low volume. Anybody can turn a speaker up. But when the volume comes down and the relative quality and definition doesn’t change, that is a key element in what I’m doing. I want to hear all the detail that’s on the recording, and I can hear tremendous detail in these monitors. JBL is really doing it right these days.”

JBL LSR (Linear Spatial Reference) LSR6300 studio monitors combine advanced driver technologies with a design that ensures exceptional accuracy at the mix position in a broad range of rooms. Starting with patented JBL transducers in a bi-amplified system, JBL applies LSR design criteria for 72 off-axis measurements to provide a flatter off-axis response. This ensures that the reflected sound, as well as the direct sound, heard at the mix position is smooth and accurate.

The LSR6328P and LSR6312SP subwoofer are also equipped with JBL’s RMC™ Room Mode Correction feature system that compensates for low frequency inaccuracies typical in untreated rooms. A built-in 1/10th-octave parametric equalizer addresses frequency response irregularities below 100Hz. The supplied RMC calibration kit allows the user to identify problematic room modes and determine the degree of correction needed.

HARMAN (www.harman.com) designs, manufactures and markets a wide range of audio and infotainment solutions for the automotive, consumer and professional markets – supported by 15 leading brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon® and Mark Levinson®. The Company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 20 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of about 11,000 people across the Americas, Europe and Asia, and reported sales of $3.2 billion for the last twelve months ended March 31, 2010. The Company’s shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol NYSE:HAR.

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For additional information, contact:

Travis McGee
Definition Branding and Marketing
(212) 660-2555 x24
Travis.mcgee@definitionbam.com