Recording - March 2016 - 37
sound amazing, televisions are compact
thin designs vs. the big console style cabinets of the 1970s and 1980s, and most
people have home entertainment systems
with sound bars and surround sound
setups. Casual listening has evolved from
portable radios and boom boxes to
smartphones, laptops, and small computer speakers. Taking all that into account,
it may seem that the 5C is simply not
very "real world" any more.
However, after hearing and using the
new Auratone Cubes, I find them to still
be an essential mix tool. If you can get
your mix to sound real, balanced, and
believable on the 5C, that probably
means that you have an absolutely killer
mix. The difference is that it is still a
pleasant working experience rather than
a battle. Testing a mix on cheap computer speakers still has validity, but mixing
while fighting a speaker's resonances,
anomalies, and shortcomings is fatiguing
and self-defeating.
This brings me to my conclusion and
realization: I would use cheap computer
speakers, and even much of the 5C's
competition, to check my mixes... but
just as Quincy Jones and Bruce Swedien
did with Thriller, the Auratone 5C is a
speaker you can actually mix on. I
would not recommend it as your one
and only speaker, of course, but whether
in mono or stereo, no serious studio
should be without them.
Price: $174.50 each ($349/pair)
More from: Auratone, www.auratone
soundcubes.com. Dist. in USA by
TransAudio Group, www.transaudio
group.com.
The Auratone legacy: a chat with Alex Jacobson
Alex, give me a bit of history on Auratone. It was your
grandfather that started the company?
Alex Jacobsen: That's correct, yes. Jack Wilson founded the
company in 1958.
Did the company keep going all that time, or did it close up
shop at some point?
When he passed away in 2005, it took some time for my
family to decide what to do, and to get things organized with
the intention that we were eventually going to revive Auratone.
We never shut the company down for good; my aunt continued to sell inventory and make replacement parts available in
the interim. We fully revived Auratone and came out with the
new 5C a couple of years ago.
How true are these to the originals?
In terms of size and dimensions they are basically the same.
The new 5C doesn't use the original parts, but we had all the
original plans and old designs so it wasn't a hard thing to
reproduce. If you took one of the old '80s drivers, took it out of
the box, and put it up against one of our new drivers, they're
basically the same style. The 2 oz. magnet, the 4.5" paper
cone... and everything is still made here in the United States.
I always assumed a 5C was a 5C, but looking at your website there appear to be different models over the years...
An evolution?
Yeah, there were seven different variations of the 5C. Back
then it was different from today; my grandfather was buying
some off-the-shelf parts and speakers, and he would have to
change those over time. People ask me questions about the
originals, and I have to say, "Which original are you talking
about?" The ones from the '70s will sound brighter, for
instance, than the ones from the '80s, and those in turn will
have more bass than the ones from the '90s. They are all similar in terms of frequency response, but they're all going to
sound slightly different.
Visually the new ones look like the '90s model, which one
did you base the new one on?
We call it the mid-'80s model. We took a couple years of
R&D and went through all the documents; we listened through
all the variations, and that is the one we liked best. We knew
it had to be at least as good, or better, than that particular version, because we didn't want people to say, "Oh, it's good,
but it's not like the original."
Even though the 5C's biggest use is as a real-world check
speaker, I am guessing it was not originally designed for
that?
It was designed to be a good, compact home auxiliary
speaker.... and it really just kind of fell into the studio.
Was Jack Wilson ever offended that engineers started
calling them "Horrortones"?
Absolutely he did not like that. [laughs] People think "it's
supposed to sound bad." Well, that's not entirely true... it's a
misconception. But that's OK, the term is used in good faith
and most studios use them for positive reasons.
Any idea how many were sold over the years?
You know, I don't have [documentation for] the full run, but I
have quite a bit from the '80s. For instance, in 1986 there
were about 20,000 single 5C units sold, and it was the same
for 3 or 4 years in a row.
Wow!
I know! And people are still using them, even the old '70s
models!
Now Auratone made more than the 5C, correct?
My grandfather started with the home speakers back in the
day. When the 5C took off, he morphed into the studio market
and made some other studio monitors. There was the Auratone
T61, which was kind of a competitor to the NS-10, I like it better.
Then there was the QC66 [a 3-way studio nearfield monitor-
Ed.]. He made some 5Cs with a port, they call them the
Ultracube. Actually, we've had people who have many of those
and ask, "When are you guys gonna bring those back as well?"
I guess a great way to wrap up is to ask about your future
plans...?
We have some ideas. Maybe in the future we'll come out
with a little mini amp that goes with the 5C, or maybe a powered model... but this has been a pretty good hit so far!
RECORDING March 2016
37
http://www.auratonesoundcubes.com
http://www.auratonesoundcubes.com
http://www.transaudiogroup.com
http://www.transaudiogroup.com
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - March 2016
Contents
Recording - March 2016 - Cover1
Recording - March 2016 - Cover2
Recording - March 2016 - 1
Recording - March 2016 - 2
Recording - March 2016 - 3
Recording - March 2016 - 4
Recording - March 2016 - 5
Recording - March 2016 - Contents
Recording - March 2016 - 7
Recording - March 2016 - 8
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Recording - March 2016 - Cover3
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