Swiss electronic duo Yello (Boris Blank and Dieter Meier) has embraced immersive audio for their latest album, “Point,” by releasing a Dolby Atmos version that was mixed in Munich by media production company msm Studio Group utilizing PMC loudspeakers.
Opened in 1991, msm’s facility has two PMC-equipped mastering rooms (one in stereo and one in 5.1), a smaller editing and QC room and a home cinema style studio that is specifically designed for Dolby Atmos music mixing. This room houses PMC IB2S three-way loudspeakers for the left, center and right channels along with DB1S loudspeakers for the surround and height channels.
msm founder and Managing Director Stefan Bock has worked with Zurich-based Yello (a on previous projects and was approached by group’s record label, Universal Music Group, and asked to mix the new album in Dolby Atmos.
“I heard a demo of the album and spoke at length to Boris Blank so that I could identify their artistic intent,” Bock says. “In keeping with their precise Swiss nature, Yello sent us perfectly prepared session notes and files and I undertook the Atmos mix in Munich with my colleague David Merkl. David and I like to work in collaboration on this type of project because two set of ears and two different approaches to the soundscape often result in a better outcome. We push each other to try new things and it becomes a very creative process.”
Blank had planned to visit msm in Munich to approve the final mix but due to health issues he couldn’t travel, so Bock and Merkl went to Zurich where they arranged for him to hear the mix at Zurich’s University of the Arts, which has a Dolby Atmos studio.
Blank says: “It was a fantastic experience for me to hear our new album Point in full 3D sound for the first time in a Dolby Atmos-certified cinema at the Zurich University of the Arts. The amazement at the new room sound was comparable to how I heard the Beatles in stereo for the first time as a little Boris. Back then, those were worlds between mono and stereo. In my opinion, Stefan Bock and David Merkl have conjured up the Yello sound with great care in a new sound dimension.”
“Point” was released on December 11 2020 and is available on Pure Audio Blu-ray (www.pureaudio-bluray.com), a format developed by msm Studio Group. It ‘s also available on Dolby Atmos streaming services such as Tidal and Amazon.
“We have been dealing with immersive audio formats for some time, especially in the context of Pure Audio Blu-ray,” Bock concludes. “Our PMC equipped Dolby Atmos Mixing suite sounds amazing and we love working in there.”
