Tucked into the hills of Old Hickory, Tennessee, there is an analog-heavy recording studio favored by devotees of the Old School sound everywhere. Fry Pharmacy is owned and operated by Scott McEwen of the Ramblers and Phil Hummer of the Tecumseh Two. In part two of this Gearwire interview, McEwen talked about how he works in this unique environment.

McEwen is a devoted Ampeg fan. "First and foremost I'm a bass player (and I know this sounds like obsessive theme in my life), but when you plug an old Fender P-Bass or an old Kay upright into any tube Ampeg and set it flat, it sounds great, period. There are certain sounds our ears have grown up with, and that is why I like recording on analog tape. Drums, cymbals, bass guitar and electric guitar sound 'right' going to tape. It is the sound of rock, soul or R&B. You can get good sounds to digital, but you have to work harder at it. With tape it's just right."

Regarding new gear, McEwen says, "I think the Royer ribbons are great. I wish I knew more to tell you, but mostly I buy old, used stuff. I'd love to find a affordable plate reverb, and of course I'd love to try out the new API 1604 reissue mixing console." And sometimes the best gear solution doesn't even involve gear. "On the new Tarbox Ramblers record (out this summer) I used a realistic PZM mounted to a huge piece of glass (15 feet wide by five feet tall) as the primary vocal and acoustic guitar mic."

Fry Pharmacy does have a Pro Tools rig, which they use in conjunction with all their analog goodies. "The ease of editability of the digital domain can't be beat by tape. So it we have a really great track but a bad ending, I might put the better ending together in Pro Tools. Or if we have a song that has just too many things to do during mix, like multiple fader moves and mutes etc, we'll give it a couple of passes with everyone (band and me) grabbing a fader in analog; but if we keep messing up, I might put it in Pro Tools and do the mutes and volume rides in the computer. When I am in the computer, I at least like to group it out to the board for the analog summing."

An independent studio specializing in vintage gear creates both challenges and unique opportunities. "I am getting really good at fixing Ampex machines! I think recently I discovered that we have a market for people that want to add some classic recording studio sound to their recording they take home to work on in their home studio. For example, we have a pretty huge live [drum] room -- 45 feet by 25 feet. That, mixed with recording to a vintage high quality tape machine, is something you just can't do at home. But you can track it here, and then transfer it to .wavs and do your vocals and keyboard parts in your apartment."