One Year of Gold Clip
From launch to legend, GOLD CLIP has come a long way in one year.
Several months before the release, I started an Instagram to talk my way through the making of Gold Clip. I made endless memes, bleached my hair gold, and sh*t posted my ride through the long and difficult development process. I made the project an open diary and chaotically posted "coming soon" everyday. A lot of you made suggestions along the way and even got involved in Gold Clip’s early development. Many of those comments and DMs were instrumental in what it is today. It was a wild ride and I never expected how long it would take to get over the finish line. And once I crossed that line, I didn’t expect it to end up in the hands of so many legendary creators around the world.
At the time of the release, I was an Associate Teaching Professor of Recording Arts and Music Production at Drexel University's music industry program and a full-time mixing and mastering engineer. Originally, I built Gold Clip for my own work as an engineer. It was a passion project that took over my life for nearly three years. Every dollar I made in music I dumped back in to Gold Clip. My music friends grew tired of hearing me ramble on and on about compression without attack and release. It was a long ride, but I had some trusty co-pilots and I just kept it moving. I told myself that if I didn't use Gold Clip in my own work, then I wouldn't release it. And that has been the ethos for all of my plugins since.
Schwabe Digital is here to stay. I can't tell you too much about my future plans right now, but I am making some new and innovative tools. First, we will release our debut FREE plugin - something simple and cool for the culture. Then, I cannot wait to share with you the next device, a FREE add on plugin for all Gold Clip owners. Gold Clip will become Gold Clip Pack. We are grateful for all of your support and want to give back to what you all started. After all that, we will release a new groundbreaking plugin that I have been using on all of my masters since the first alpha version. More on all of that later.
As I think back over the past year, I wanted to share some projects that my favorite engineers (and I) have mixed with the a little help from Gold Clip.
Stuart White: Beyonce - Cowboy Carter
“I used Gold Clip on a few tracks from Cowboy Carter. I had it inserted on my aux groups clipping some peaks off.”
Teezio: Chris Brown - 11:11 (Deluxe)
“The whole album has Gold Clip on it”
Bainz: Young Thug - Oh U Went (ft. Drake)
“Gold Clip was the last plugin on the mix with a little bit of gold for Young Thug’s Oh U Went”
Jon Low: Maya Hawke - Missing Out
“I have an instance of Gold Clip on the drum bus that's integral to the drum sound. It's acting slightly like a limiter through the clipping section in Classic mode. Classic Gold processing is at over 4db, really filling in some of the low level detail. On an acoustic drum kit, it adds excitement and punch in a totally different way than compressing. Gold Clip is also on the mix bus just doing a little work. The clipping is no more than 1-2db since the drum transients are already controlled early on.”
Tony Maserati: Jesse Reyes - SHUT UP (ft. Big Sean)
“Used Gold Clip on this mix and so many more”
Benjamin Thomas: Lil Uzi Vert - Endless Fashion (ft. Nicki Minaj)
I used Gold Clip on the drum bus and the mix bus and every mix I have done since it came out.
Chris Tabron: Jensen McRae - Massachusetts
In the year since I've been using Gold Clip, I've gone from putting it on at the end of a mix for just a dash of magic, to getting it in the chain fairly quickly after my balances and making lots of decisions through it. Just a bit of Gold Processing, and a touch of Alchemy gives me something inspiring to push into, without sacrificing any fidelity. You can hear this most recently on Jensen McRae's latest single Massachusetts.
Ryan Schwabe: BAYNK - Blood
“This song is intentionally crunchy sounding. I used Gold Clip on the mix bus with 4dB of Classic Gold to make it sound like the record is bleeding a bit.”
Be well,
Ryan Schwabe
Grammy-nominated and multi-platinum mixing & mastering engineer
Founder of Schwabe Digital
