Trident A-Range: Tracking the recording history and movement of all 13 consoles

[Catface]

Hi all. I've been working on tracking the history and movement of all 13 Trident A-Range consoles, their twinned history with Sound Techniques, and the albums recorded on the Trident A-Range consoles.

I previously wrote a gear guide on Elliott Smith, his sound on From a Basement on the Hill kickstarted my fascination with the Trident A-Range.

So far this has existed as a .txt doc on my PC for the better part of a year, but I wanted to put it out there for other ppl to go thru, and hopefully correct any mistakes. It's a living document.

The formatting gets worse the further you get, and I still need to look into

• the 'A-Range-type' consoles made by Cherokee Studios.
• Fill out the histories of the studios while the Trident A-Range was at them, and the albums recorded there on their Trident A-Range
• Cite more sources for quotes
• And format it properly

Any thoughts or suggestions? It would be fantastic to hear from people who actually recorded at these studios and can name albums they worked on there.

 

[ruffrecords]

Definitely a worthy task. I was at Neve at the time and the possibility of yet another large UK console manufacturer was of interest to Neve. I happened to run a small location recording service called Ape Recordings at the time so I used that to obtain entry to the official launch. I spent most of the time chatting to one of the designers about the virtues of the Vox AC30.

By the way, there is only one 's' in bus.

Cheers

Ian

 

[Catface]

Noted and corrected, thank you!

Is it true that Neve caught wind of Trident and bought up a large order of input transformers so Trident couldn't use them?
I've read that story twice now
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/pro...x-a77-and-trident-a-ra-t19412018.html#p314739https://gearspace.com/board/showpost.php?p=5907066&postcount=478

 

[pucho812]

I never heard the Zutt story but I can say with certainty that most decisions by trident were purely based on cost. For example Malcom told me the Aberdeen color on the a-range was because they found a place closing and was able to buy for Pennies on the dollar.

 

[ruffrecords]

Noted and corrected, thank you!

Is it true that Neve caught wind of Trident and bought up a large order of input transformers so Trident couldn't use them?
I've read that story twice now
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/pro...x-a77-and-trident-a-ra-t19412018.html#p314739https://gearspace.com/board/showpost.php?p=5907066&postcount=478

To the best of my knowledge this is not true. Neve were very busy at that time which is why they second sourced the 10468 from St Ives windings as well as Marinair. AFAIK the 10468 was a Neve design and I am am not sure Marinair woud have been free to sell it to anyone else.

Cheers

Ian

 

[pucho812]

Ok as for Cherokee
At one point they owned 4 desks that were a ranges. They also took it upon themselves to make channels and sell them. Which is equal to me owning a neve desk and making my own 1081’s to sell. Cherokee also redid faceplates to a gray color and when they couldn’t get Zutt transformers they went with Reichenbach as a sub. Cherokee will tell you that sowter transformers suggested the Reichenbach’s to them but I don’t know if that is what happened or if that’s how they remembered it as what happened. If sowter did suggest it to them I would imagine it was based on location as Reichenbach would have been in l.a.
Cherokee did take an a-range and expand it to 48 inputs with a remote(on a cart best describes it) monitor section. The extra channels were made identical to the a-range modules, wiring looms and all with the reichanbach’s. Their a-range was also given a new frame that was less vertical and is basically a flat surface with inset metering. It did change things acoustically for the better. That was the work of their tech Toby foster. You can see a popular mechanics article about it in the November of 1987 magazine. You can find an online version.

 

[kpearsall]

Don't forget the cutting room console. An A-Range in WHITE. There exists only two pictures. a black and white in an old studio sound magazine, and one in the book "life on two legs" which is color but so small it only verified the color.

 

[pvision]

I worked on the A-Range at the Bennett House in Franklin, TN in the mid-80s. I was recording tracks for Tom Kimmel with Paul Leim on drums. Great-sounding console, probably the most open-sounding I've ever heard for drums

Channel strips were a very dark purple, almost black. Overall the desk was a little tired, with noisy pots, but the sound more than made up for any drawbacks

The Bennett House might have been owned by Norbert Putnam at the time - not sure. It was then bought by Keith Thomas

 

[pucho812]

I have heard Norbert’s name mentioned before. Apparently he modded an a-range that he had. Not sure what the mods were but I was told they were not so good. thinks people tell you, who knows what is the real truth

 

[Spiritworks]

The story of the "legal" Trident name, going back and forth between Malcolm and others over the years, is rather intriguing. Isn't Malcolm involved once again with a desk with the Trident name? Also, what about Goeff Daking? His desks are absolutely stunning, and based on the A range, IIRC.

 

[Tubetec]

I got a Trident fleximix frame with master section and a few channel modules around 30 years back ,
The thing was full up of red blob tants waiting to go dead short across the rails , I got rid of it in the end .

I did save the Zutt transformers though ,
1200ohm :50k ,
They work great as mic to grid step up but also can step up mic to line input , useful on louder sources with dynamics or quieter stuff with condenser mics .

 

[pucho812]

The story of the "legal" Trident name, going back and forth between Malcolm and others over the years, is rather intriguing. Isn't Malcolm involved once again with a desk with the Trident name? Also, what about Goeff Daking? His desks are absolutely stunning, and based on the A range, IIRC.

This is loose but here is a summery.
When trident went under due to the Diane, the trademark was purchased.
The company which got it did nothing with it.
In walks oram and he starts to put out desks with trident on them. From what I was told he just started doing it and no one stopped him. At the same time Malcom started doing MTA desks.
Eventually PMI audio purchased the trademark for trident and started the long road to building back the brand. They teamed up with Malcom to do Toft audio with the ATB while at the same time do the Trident 82. If you never seen one it’s because they only built the prototype and toured it. It never went into production. Malcom eventually parted ways with PMI. I don’t know that part of the story other then Malcom
And PMI are divorced. Pmi went onto making the trident 88, 78, and 68 desks.
They are currently available.
Malcom went onto other things.

 

[Brian Roth]

It took me awhile to "get" the play on words of the ATB model name.....

Bri