Los Angeles, CA (February 24, 2016)—Veteran mastering engineer Pete Lyman of Infrasonic Mastering, who worked on the 2016 Grammy-winning albums by Jason Isbell and Chris Stapleton, reports he has been using his Manley Stereo Variable Mu Limiter Compressor on most of his recent projects.
“I was looking for a compressor that gave me that little extra bit of ‘glue’ I needed on some mixes,” says Lyman, who has mastered projects for Rival Sons, Fall Out Boy, Weezer, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Panic! At the Disco, Sebadoh and countless others. “I had a compressor that I swore by, and it gave me a gluey, analog squeeze, but it was never quite ‘there’ in my mind. I realized something was missing. I had heard about the Variable Mu, but I hadn’t worked with one, and I had a misconception of what it sounded like. I was a solid-state-path guy; I didn’t want tubes in the path because I didn’t think the sound would be transparent enough for mastering.”
A friend and fellow motorcycle buff prevailed on Lyman to give the Manley Variable Mu a try; that friend was Manley Labs president EveAnna Manley. “From the minute I used the Variable Mu, I realized that this was the compressor I’ve been missing. The Variable Mu does exactly what I want it to do. It sounds fantastic, and it’s hard to beat the build quality. I love it; I’m a huge fan.”
Lyman’s work spans a variety of musical genres, and he uses the Variable Mu for all of them. “My discography is diverse, and I like it that way,” says Lyman, who grew up in Colorado listening to country music while playing bass in punk bands and loving metal. “The Manley Variable Mu has made it onto pretty much every record I’ve mastered since I got it. It sounds as good on punk, metal and rock as it does on Americana and country.”
Manley Laboratories
www.manley.com
