Upgrading the studio he set up in Turkey nine years ago, Arıkan Sirakaya admits that he had his eye on Audient for a while before installing a new ASP4816 console. ‘I am so blown away by this desk,’ he reports…

‘Aside from all the great routing features, preamps, EQs and build quality, it’s the sound and the headroom that I love about this desk,’ he explains. ‘No matter how hard you push, it’s still musical and it bends in such a nice way that I keep wanting more of that. I am also blown away by the glue and cohesion that the desk produces. I used to record my drums with different preamps, such as 1073 on kick, SSL on snare, Focusrite Red on toms and it never sounded like this. Now I hear my drums as a whole kit – much bigger, much more focussed and in-your-face.’

Sirakaya’s background is in drumming, having worked his way up the ranks to tour Europe and the world tours with Turkish pop star Mustafa Sandal, taught percussion at hip-hop drumming school and more recently recorded drums for top acts in Turkey. ‘I do lots of drum sessions for top producers,’ he admits. ‘They don’t even show up here, we do it all online…

‘I have the computer screen set to the left of the desk and, for the first time in my life, I am mixing just listening to the song without staring at the display. It is such a blessing: the mixing process got much quicker and I can get a song working and sounding much better than I did working in the box.

Supplied by Akalin Muzik, the Audient also plays to Sirakaya’s penchant for analogue audio.

‘I’m really into analogue gear,’ he says. ‘I don’t think plug-ins and mixing in the box has that “sonic magic” that the analogue sound has. It had so many more features than the other desks I was looking at. More groups, huge routing options, more preamps, more auxes, more everything – and with a much more reasonable price tag. So I went that way.’

Called Ari Studio, the facility’s name means ‘pure’ in Turkish, as well as ‘bee’, which is reflected in its logo, as well as Sirakaya’s own work ethic. Having founded his own record label, he also works with young bands, and is currently recording, mixing and mastering several projects. Sirakaya hopes in particular that Feridun Duzagac’s latest album will do as well as the last one he worked on. ‘I produced his 2015 album which was chosen as the best rock album of the year by iTunes Turkey.’