Finn Poole
Production portfiolio
Examples of work in studio engineering, mixing and mastering.
My Approach
Studio engineering is the work that I love. Recording studios are a magical environment to be in and should always be a place of enjoyment as well as work.
I believe in an artist-focussed approach to studio engineering. Recording and realising the creative vision of the artist is the main objective of a recording session and it’s the responsibility of the engineer to achieve this in an enjoyable, effective and memorable way.
Every session that I work on I make sure to be as organised, efficient and professional as possible so that nothing is left in place to slow down the creativity of the artists I’m working with.
Artist testimonials.
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Brian Henry
“Finn is a highly talented producer and mix engineer with whom I’ve had the pleasure of working on several projects in my role as musical director. His attention to detail is exceptional, and his passion for achieving the perfect mix and overall sound is truly commendable. Finn brings both technical skill and creative insight to every project, and I have no doubt he has a bright future ahead in the music industry. I’m excited to see where his talent takes him.”
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Kieran Francis Moyano
“Working with Finn is always easy and a great experience. With him behind the desk, I feel comfortable that if any problems arise he will be there to solve them. He always delivers in a timely manner and goes beyond what you would expect, keeping you up to date and informed with everything giving you upmost professionalism.”
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Karolina Chojnacka
“Finn has demonstrated outstanding technical proficiency in his role as recording sound engineer throughout the Tuning In project. His expertise spans all aspects of the recording process, from initial setup through to final mixing. Finn consistently displays attention to detail when setting up recording sessions, positioning microphones with precision, and configuring our SSL mixing desk to achieve optimal sound quality. His knowledge of recording software is exemplary, and he approaches each session with the technical understanding and creative insight that one would expect from a seasoned professional.”
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Sofie Amelie
“I’ve had such a good time working with Finn. He came to session punctually and prepared. He has extensive knowledge of engineering gear and live recording setups which was perfect for the project I was working on. He approaches any situation with professionalism which made it great to work with him.”
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Huw 'Jazz' Lloyd
“Over the past few years, I have had the pleasure of having Finn record, mix and master many of my sessions. With a deep understanding of production as a whole, Finn makes great use of any space he is put in, always choosing the best microphones and picking up the best sound for all acts ranging from acoustic soloists to heavy ensembles. Thank you for all of the projects we have recorded together so far and I look forwards to the next session.”
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Shea Stedford
“I’ve had the pleasure of tutoring and working alongside Finn for a few years now and can honestly say any artist is in safe hands with Finn. Always wanting to get the best results for a project utilising specialist and creative knowledge in engineering and studio production”
Brian Henry and Nadine Caesar
I was fortunate enough to engineer a session with the fantastic Brian Henry and Nadine Caesar for the ACM Inspire Sessions where they showcased three excellent covers.
The setup and operation of the session was a challenge but successful! As the live room was being used as a stage, I had to factor in significant bleed from the drums so used direct inputs as required and dynamic stage microphones for vocals and the talk box.
Despite this, we still ended up with an intolerable amount of drums in the main vocals which degraded both the vocal and the drum signal. To combat this I made use of audio repair tools and drum doubling to bring the punch back into the drum sound and lift the vocal back out.
The acoustic session for Close To You was a welcomed track to record at the end of a full day of difficult technical issues
This session really tested me from start to finish. The preparation for the session started weeks before preparing technical specifications, live room configuration, cameras, lighting, timings and the engineering plan.
The studio setup required very precise organisation and problem solving using 22 out of 24 channels on the desk and experiencing issues on multiple channels from various places. We had broken XLR cables, broken DI boxes, faulty outputs and a pesky broken patch lead that kept me entertained for the longest of all the issues that day.
Despite the issues, we we’re able to complete the session and record everything we set out to to the quality we needed all while staying calm, collected and professional.
Slowlight
George came to me looking to record an EP with a sound inspired by the likes of Stevie Ray Vaughn, Derek Trucks and Marcus King. What he wanted to take from these was the live feel of the tracks, and the raw, gritty tone to their recordings.
We recorded the core elements of guitar, bass and drums live and then completed the solos and vocals in a separate session. George wanted to have a few takes of vocals and solos so a separate session focussed on just these was the way to go.
Benchwarmer
Getting the opportunity to work with Benchwarmer was amazing and gave me the opportunity to work with a band with a massive sound. The blend of hard hitting drums, heavy bass, huge guitars and laid back vocals is an awesome combination and was a challenge to do justice to the sound in the room.
The main request from this band was all of the takes had to be done live. To get the best sound with this request we had the drums in isolation, bass through a DI and guitars through amps all in the live room. Vocals were also recorded in the live room and did have a lot of bleed from the guitar amps but luckily the sound of this added some distance in the hi-mids and top end of the guitar tone and luckily didn’t have too much of a degrading effect on either the guitar or vocals.
Kieran Francis
Working with Kieran on his project was a great test for me to see how well a recording can come out with no amplifiers being used or recorded at all.
The reference I was given for this session was a live session by Yussef Dayes. This comprises of a powerful and clean drum recording, heavy bass and suitably etherial spacious mix approach.
Having the same drum bleed as I did with Brian Henry and Nadine Caesar was not an option here hence the use of DI signals all round on every element apart from drums.
To record this session we used a Kemper modelling amplifier for the guitar sound. If I can’t use an amp, this is the next best thing to go for - sometimes better. It sounds great every time for every track.
Bass was recorded from the direct output on an Aguilar head and mixed to give it the added depth it lacks from recording alone. Keys was also a simple direct output.
Recording drums here followed the same core principles that I use for all of my drum recordings:
Well tuned, well kept drums. Good cooking starts with good ingredients.
Phase friendly microphone setups. Phase is not your friend here, good stereo positioning will create a much cleaner recording.
Variety of close mics to support overheads
Tom Atherton
I worked with Tom on one of the ACM inspire sessions where he was showcasing one of his live compositions, blending a combination of etherial synthesisers and powerful percussive sounds.
Huw ‘Jazz’ Lloyd
I’ve worked with Huw very consistently through university recording multiple EPs and singles along the way. Huw is singer songwriter who performs on keys and vocals and arranges with bandmates to put his songs onto a larger scale.
Huw’s incorporates Billy Joel style songwriting into much of his work and combines this with his strong vocals, intricate piano parts and the occasional guitar solo to top everything off.
Harrison Hall
Harrison and I spent two 10-12hr sessions recording Rain check with a vast majority of that time being focussed on vocals. The guitar was recorded in a single take, and took us about half an hour to get the one. The mic setup was two Sontronics Sigma ribbon mics in a Blumline configuration at the 12th fret blended with a Beyerdynamic m160 under his right hand. The guitar was a Taylor with very low gauge strings which had a big part to play in the depth of sound achieved here.
The vocals and backing vocals for this track was nearing 1000 takes and so is by far the highest amount of detail that I’ve gone to on the vocals for one track. Harrison wanted each layer, of each section to be done line by line and every word to be perfect.
Another track that I recorded for Harrison was his track Scars on Scars. For this, he wanted to have a deliberately lofi recording towards the start of the track and then blend in a higher quality recording to shine through towards the end.
For the lofi recording I put a volt condenser in a cardboard box with mic facing away from him and the box open towards him. The quality recording was our standard blumline of sigmas with an m160 with the addition of a 414 for his vocals.
The sound of the sirens was completely unintentional..
Sofie Amelie
Recording Sofie’s album was one of the biggest projects I’ve undertaken by far. Sofie came to me to produce her album because she needed someone who was willing to accommodate her incredible attention to detail and not call it a day until everything was perfect.
The main recording was completed over two consecutive days in the studio with vocals, sax and organ being recorded after. The editing and mixing was completed over the following months, and getting the opportunity to see how far Sofie’s attention to detail goes was amazing and something I’ve carried forwards with me in all of my later projects.
SPL/T
Torrin and Alfie of Spl/t are a prime example of just how powerful a two piece band can be. They combine excellent songwriting, hard hitting guitar, phenomenal vocals and Alfie’s highly technical drumming to create the unique sound that they have.
Torrin plays a baritone guitar tuned to a variety of non-standard tunings and plays through some extreme processing to fill the space in the absence of a bass player. One addition I brought to the recording process for Alex’s Song was a tube preamp with a parallel output allowing me to run the guitar signal into a guitar amp and a bass amp simultaneously. The blend of these added a lot of weight and depth to the sound and is a technique I’d love to explore more in the future
Stonny the Donny
Recording with Stonny the Donny was a live lounge style session with no reference. They asked me for a '“grungy” sound and that they didn’t want anything polished or perfect.
All tracks were recorded in one take each, one after the other with no cuts, edits or redos.
If you’ve come down this far, thank you for reading!
To summarise, I’m Finn. I’m a studio engineer, music producer, music lover in general and obsessed with music production in any way it comes - but mostly the studio.
I love making great music, working with amazing people and if I’m making music, I’m happy.