Well Made Music LLC

Today we want to highlight one of our latest pressing partners, in Pittsburgh, PA! A short drive from Well Made’s old stomping grounds (Cleveland, OH), Hellbender has enlisted Well Made to cut lacquers for their projects starting in late 2022. The crew at Hellbender promises “Vinyl Alchemy”, and who are we to disagree?

- Always fun to work on local/regional projects. This is Mike Cooper and he was able to attend the cutting session for his project called The Modern Horror. He had never seen a master being cut before and we had great time showing him the gear and how the process works.

People often ask “Why do I need to mono my bass frequencies for vinyl?” Well, here is an excellent case study as to what can happen if you throw caution to the wind in the sub frequencies.

What we have here is a “lift out”. Literally, the cutting stylus attempted to move in too many directions simultaneously, and as a result the stylus actually lifted off of the surface of the lacquer. Not only does the groove get thinner, it also gets shallower, causing some form of an upward launch ramp for the stylus on playback.

Traditionally, this is caused by a phase discrepancy between left and right channels. More often than not, it is caused by out-of-phase info below 300Hz or so. Likely culprits can be synthesizers, tom drums, drum overheads, etc.

All this to say, mono your bass frequencies if you know your project is headed to vinyl!

The first cut of the New Year is here and it’s at a 192kHz sampling rate! Why 192k? Here at Well Made we believe in sourcing only from the highest quality masters available for any given project. In this case, the project was sourced from 1/4” analog tapes captured at 192k and then remastered and restored here in-house all at 192k. Other cutting studios have been known to top out their cutting at 96k, or worse yet, CD-quality (44.1k).

Some folks think cutting lacquers from a digital file is blasphemous in principle, but we think the best cut is only as good as your weakest link in the chain. This is why we trust and their excellent HAPI unit to make cutting from hi-resolution (including DSD audio) a breeze!

Here is a throwback from 1977 in Cleveland, Ohio: Grammy-Award winning engineer Michael Bishop is seen here working on the direct-to-disc recording sessions for Telarc’s famed “Direct From Cleveland”release. We here at Well Made have verified that the Neumann AM32b lathe pictured here is the same exact lathe we are currently restoring. The current plan is to have the machine running better than ever by the end of 2024!

- Packing in those grooves. A well calibrated pitch and depth system will maximize time and volume to disc by using as little land as possible between the grooves.

MERRY CHRISTMAS! What an amazing year! We can’t wait to see what 2024 brings. Thanks to everyone for their support this past year and beyond. We appreciate you all! 🎄 -The Well Made Music Crew: Clint Holley, Dave Polster, Michael Fanos, and Harrison Hunt.

Link in comments section! Need a little special something to spice up your holidays? Luckily for you, the crew at Well Made have compiled several playlists (for Spotify, Apple Music, and TIDAL) for your listening pleasure. All of the tracks on these playlists have been mastered to vinyl at WMM! Give it a spin, you might find a new favorite!

Bristol locals: Tonight, the legendary Grammy Award Winning bluesman Bobby Rush ( ) will be performing as part of Farm and Fun Time at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum ( )! Bobby Rush is still performing at 90 years old, and his 2016 album Porcupine Meat was a Grammy Winning album cut here at Well Made Music. You won’t want to miss out on seeing a living legend. Head over the the Birthplace of Country Music Museum’s website for tickets!

Here is one of the more unique groove patterns we have come across here lately. This record had a decent amount of “out of phase” mid-range content but still played as it should. Still, a visually dazzling pattern!

This is an official Recording Academy / GRAMMYs certificate recognizing Clint Holley’s work as lacquer-cutting engineer on Porcupine Meat by Bobby Rush.

We are excited to catch Bobby Rush live in concert here in Bristol, VA, for Farm and Fun Time on December 14th at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum.

This album won the award for Best Traditional Blues Album in 2017! Well Made Music is proud to work with so many of the world’s greatest and most iconic artists, and we’re looking forward to continuing to celebrate their achievements!

Here is a behind-the-scenes shot of discarded stampers, likely on their way to being recycled. These nickel-plated stampers are what are affixed to the record press at the manufacturing plant.

The stampers, which hold an inverse copy of your project with ridges as opposed to grooves, are necessary to press your records, and therefore turn it back into a playable, positive image.

If any damages occur to stampers during the pressing process, these flaws will be present on the pressed copies as well. With that in mind, it is fairly standard to dispose of stampers and order a new set if damage occurs. Even without damage, stampers have a finite amount of “press cycles” they can withstand before needing to be replaced.

If the mothers (in 2 or 3 step plating) have been used frequently to pull more stampers from, sometimes a new lacquer needs to be cut to press new copies.

- A great follow up to our cutterhead video. grabbed this photo while dialing in “chip” pickup.

Chip or “swarf” is the waste material generated by the cutting process. It is removed by a vacuum system which we will profile in an upcoming post!

We want to say CONGRATS to several WMM clients who have been nominated for a GRAMMY Award this year! Well Made Music was proud to cut master lacquers for the following releases:

Best New Artist:
-Ice Spice
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-The War & Treaty
[dP]

Best Contemporary Instrumental Album:
-Béla Fleck, Zakir Hussain, Edgar Meyer, ft. Rakesh Chaurasia: As We Speak


[dP]

Best Bluegrass Album:
-Billy Strings: Me/And/Dad


[dP]

-Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway: City of Gold


[dP]
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Congrats from everyone at Well Made Music!
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As We Speak pressed at

Ice Spice pressed at

Billy Strings and Molly Tuttle both pressed at

- Way to go Ohio! Well Made Music was founded in Cleveland, Ohio and owner Clint Holley has not been afraid to voice an opinion or two!

Today we want to shine a spotlight on our good friends over at ! Armadillo Tail Recording Company specializes in mono direct-to-lacquer recordings from celebrated artists such as , , , Charles Hill Jr., and more. The singles were recorded at Well Made’s sister business, , and quickly became collectors items. Check out Armadillo Tail’s Bandcamp page for a rich musical experience!