The production of Naxatras III, like any other, follows a series of stages. The first, of course, is choosing the recording venue, setting up the group, selecting and positioning the microphones, and make the actual recording. The second stage includes the process of the recording, the setting up of the cutting lathe, the making of test cuttings, and -ultimately- the cutting of the record. This is followed by the mailing of the master cut to the record production factory and the thorough evaluation of the test prints send back before the final "ok" is given for mass production of the record. Quality control of the finished product follows. In all of this, in the case of this production, another step is added. This is the creation of master duplicates, the second-generation tape copies that are also available to anyone who wants to buy one.

The recording of Naxatras III.

The band and their instruments were all set up in Magnetic Fidelity's main live recording room, a fairly reverberant space, ideally suited for recordings where the contribution of the room acoustics and natural reverberation are desirable.
A small selection of microphones was strategically placed around the room. the setup consisted of different models by AKG, Shure, Electro-Voice, Lem and some real oddball vintage types.

J. I. Agnew states: "I believe that there are tremendous differences between sound reinforcement at a concert venue and a studio recording. As such, I usually avoid close-miking and firmly believe that microphones shall never be placed inside a bass drum unless you would also place audience members at your concerts inside the bass drum...!"
Each microphone was wired up to a suitable microphone preamplifier and the outputs of these were hooked up to a Thermionic Culture Custom Green Fat Bustard built to Agnew's specifications. He used to have the black Fat Bustard II, which was great, but he wanted something a bit different. This is a vacuum tube summing mixer, essentially taking up to 14 sources (microphones or whatever else), summing them and delivering a stereophonic output.

Jesus: ”I discussed my ideas and requirements at great length with Vic Keary, and they put together this one-of-a-kind version of the Green Fat Bustard for me, with an external power supply unit, special capacitors fitted, special NOS tubes, and some other modifications.”
The output of the Fat Bustard went straight to a modified Telefunken M15A tape machine, fitted with custom butterfly heads, manufactured by Studer a while back, to audiophile specifications.

Jesus: "Sadly, this was a one-off batch of heads and Studer no longer manufactures heads. The batch sold out already long ago and I was lucky to be able to acquire a few sets for my the machines I own. When these sets wear-out, it will be the end of an era. Their sound is truly unique."
The tapes used for the recording sessions were the 1/4-inch Master Tape from ATR Magnetics. Jesus: "I love this tape, but to make the most of it, you need to properly calibrate your machine for it. Not just the electronics, but the transport as well! This tape has different thicknesses of base, magnetic coating and back coating compared to other tapes, which must be taken into account."

The recording parameters were set towards the limits of the medium, to take advantage of tape saturation for dynamic range control, instead of using additional dynamics processing tools such as compressors and limiters.
When the recording was completed, the master tapes were assembled for the final album by cutting up the tape portion for each song and piecing it together so the songs appear in the desired order, with the desired gap (or lack of) between them, along with some creative effects.

The Birth of the Naxatras III Vinyl Record

The records that would be available to the public need to be manufactured from the master tapes. Vinyl record manufacturing begins by cutting the master lacquer disks on a precision machine tool called a disk-cutting lathe.
The master tapes were reproduced on the same Telefunken M15A machine that they were recorded on and the signal was sent to a Manley Massive Passive Mastering vacuum tube equalizer, for some very minimal signal processing that was deemed necessary to allow the material to make the most out of the disk medium, given the particularities of information storage in grooves on a revolving disk. From there, it was sent straight to the cutting amplifier system which drives a stereophonic motional feedback cutterhead.
Some test cuts were taken while adjusting all the cutting parameters, such as depth of cut, the spacing between the grooves, cutting stylus temperature, and so on.
The test cuts were reproduced on MF's calibrated reference disk reproducing systems. These include a modified Thorens TD160 fitted with an SME 3009 Series II improved tonearm and a Van den Hul MC Two moving coil cartridge, a Thorens TD160 Mk II fitted with a Thorens TP16 Mk IV tonearm and a Stanton Reference Series 881S moving magnet cartridge and a custom turntable fitted an SME 3009/S2 improved tonearm (slightly different version of the other SME) and a Shure V15 III moving magnet cartridge. Magnetic Fidelity uses full range, temporally accurate monitors (Agnew Analog Reference Instruments Type 911), capable of reproducing very decent square waves in the room, as seen on an oscilloscope via a measurement microphone. These are driven by amplifiers originally designed as disk cutting amplifiers of extremely high performance, which have proven very accurate for driving loudspeakers as well. This is the Agnew Analog Reference Instruments Type 891, which Agnew developed and presented recently in a paper published in the November 2018 issue of the Journal of the Audio Engineering Society. The Type 891 was also used as the cutting amplifier for the master disks. It has a ruler-flat frequency and phase response from DC to over 100 kHz.
A short, but interesting video from the cutting process, can be viewed here.
The master lacquer discs were packaged in special wooden crates developed at Magnetic Fidelity, to protect the sensitive disks during transit to the pressing plant. The package was shipped with a special courier service which can get it to the electro-plating department at Pallas Group, in Germany, within a few hours.
Following the successful plating of the masters, the metallic stampers are taken to the pressing department where test pressings are made. These were sent back to Magnetic Fidelity for approval, along with a print proof of the artwork for the graphic designer to approve.

The Test Pressings.

Test pressings should be better approved by an experienced engineer with a deep understanding of the record manufacturing process. Special equipment is needed to properly inspect the pressings for a vast number of hidden defects. As a final step, the test pressings are going through a rigorous listening session, which is the first opportunity to listen to what has been achieved over the disk mastering stage, the electroplating stage, the stamper centering stage, and the pressing stage.

Jesus: “With the overwhelming number of things that could go wrong, it is always a huge relief to hear a test pressing free from defects. All six sides sounded great, so Pallas was given the go-ahead to proceed with the proper manufacturing run of several thousand records. When these were delivered, it was time for yet another challenge: Figuring out if the final product meets our standards of quality, from the first copy to the last. Obviously, it is impossible to check all the records one by one. Besides, they arrive sealed and the customer expects to receive them unopened and unused!
What we do is a statistical check of random samples from each box, which are opened, inspected and auditioned. These samples cannot be sold, so they are kept aside for those involved in the production of the album. If the product uniformity is good throughout, it is assumed that the statistical likelihood of a defect on an unopened record is extremely low, considering the nature of the manufacturing process.”
”Sadly, there are not many people left in this world, who have the know-how and experience to do quality control on this level, but it is essential for any serious, quality-oriented, record release. In every stage of their manufacturing, vinyl records still depend entirely on the human factor. It is a combination of science, art and traditional craftsmanship. Likewise with magnetic tape. Much like antique furniture, analog media go beyond utility: An antique wooden cupboard, handcrafted by a master carpenter, is much more than just a storage solution.”

Naxatras Reel-to-Reel Tape Release

The reel-to-reel version of the album is an entirely different story. There is no mass-manufacturing operation there. Each master tape is reproduced on the Telefunken M15A machine that recorded them and the outputs are connected to another, identical, Telefunken M15A machine, with the exact same modifications and fitted with the same custom butterfly heads. The second machine is recording 1:1, as the first machine is reproducing, in real-time, at 15 ips, with the same adjustments and level calibration, using the same ATR Magnetics tape stock. This means that only six copies of the album can be made in a single daily shift. As such, the resulting tape is a second-generation copy of the master tape and these copies are made in batches of six. The tape machines are fully calibrated before each batch begins and thoroughly cleaned each time tape reels are changed.

Jesus: "To maintain maximum fidelity, we make use of a phase compensation system, ensuring that the phase errors inherent in tape recording are eliminated. Anyone who has ever tried to record and reproduce a square wave on tape while observing the result on an oscilloscope has observed the deviation from the desired wave shape, as a result of phase errors. Our phase compensation system compensates for such errors, making it possible to record a square wave to tape, which can actually be reproduced as a square wave by the end-user, on their tape machine, with no need for additional equipment. This is possible because our phase compensation system works on the recording side, so it is compatible by default with all properly calibrated tape machines.
Our tapes are recorded at 15 ips, using IEC (CCIR) equalization, on 0.75mm track separation heads, at a nominal magnetic flux density of 355 nWb/m. They are packed in wooden boxes, handcrafted from beech wood. Each box is accompanied by artwork and a certificate verifying the product authenticity as direct real-time copies of the master tapes.”

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