Culver City Dub Collective
Occupation:
band
Official Website:
http://www.culvercitydubcollective.com
Background:
Culver City Dub Collective is the result of a two-year collaboration between drummer/percussionist Adam Topol and guitarist/producer/engineer Franchot Tone. What began as a five song instrumental CD honoring the late “Sir Coxsone” Dodd became a full-length soundscape exploring Reggae, Dub, Bossa Nova, Tumbao, Jazz, and electronic music. This album celebrates the revolution of the home studio, as this album began on a laptop in Franchot’s guest room in Culver City, California. More importantly, the full-length album will reflect the creativity and generosity of the musical community starting in Los Angeles and moving as far as Canada and France. Just a few of the album’s collaborators include Winston Jarrett, Rico Rodriguez, Ben Harper, Merlo Podlewski, David Ralicke, Koool G Murder, Chris Joyner, Don Cavalli, and Yeska.
Culver City Dub Collective is a follow up to Ritmo Y Canto, which was also produced by Adam Topol. Released on Everloving Records, Ritmo Y Canto (Spanish for “Rhythm and Song”) is a full-length album with traditional Afro-Cuban folkloric songs and rhythms. While respectfully
honoring the traditions of the Afro Cuban musical and cultural traditions, Ritmo Y Canto features sound design from Robert Carranza (Los Lobos) and musical contributions by members of Ozomatli as well as Cuban dance and drum masters from Matanzas and La Habana.
Look for Culver City Dub Collective’s opening track on Brushfire’s surf film “Brokedown Melody” and their full length release due in April.
Culver City Dub Collective
CCDC on M-Audio Hardware: “For our record we used the M-Audio Radium 49 on almost every single track. We used it to trigger all sorts of cool keyboard, string and sample sounds. Onstage we have integrated the M-Audio Trigger Finger as well as the Radium 49. We have a nine piece live band and for touring we are trying to scale back to a four piece with Ableton Live filling in the gaps.
“On our last tour we used the M-Audio FireWire 1814 to record all of our shows live. Every show we took a stereo feed from the soundboard and ran it into Pro Tools M-Powered.”
CCDC on M-Audio Software: “We love the sounds of the GForce reproductions of the vintage keyboards, and used the Minimonsta, M-Tron, Oddity, and ImpOSCar on our album. A lot of our record was accomplished through collaboration and Pro Tools M-Powered made it easy. We would save the session, send it to whoever was working on the remixes and they would work on it and send it back to us. It really streamlined the collaboration process.”
Why M-Audio? “M-Audio has made it easier to use MIDI, which is a technology we were not really familiar with. It has allowed us to use and play instruments and sounds which we might otherwise not be able to play. MIDI has allowed us to build songs and create soundscapes that we couldn’t create with actual instruments.
“The technical support at M-Audio has been incredible. They are a tremendous resource for us because we are not the most tech-savvy when it comes to MIDI. When we were at the M-Audio offices we were joking that M-Audio is poised to ‘take over the world’ as far as audio is concerned. They offer outstanding products for almost every single element of music production. We really like the products and were using them well before we were affiliated with the company in any way.”
What they are proud of: “We are most proud of our latest Culver City Dub Collective record to be released by Everloving records in the summer of 2007. Creating an album on which all of our very talented friends played on was an honor. We love how it sounds and we love the vibe.”
