Me in my studio: Dennis Cruz

Cruzin' at the top

Spanish artist and Beatport number one Dennis Cruz has just put out his 100th milestone release via his own Lemon-Aid imprint on August 8th.

He has been sitting pretty at number one in the Tech House Beatport Chart for over two months with his last release 'New Life' and currently has 10 tracks in the Top 100

Currently a resident DJ in Ibiza with Solid Grooves at Vista Club Privilege, Dennis will be hitting the road for a South American Tour at the end of the year.

The busy sound engineer/DJ/producer toook time out of his busy schedule to let us snoop around his Madrid studio and check out his favourite gear.

Pendulum OCL-2

“A very clean analog compressor. I use it on the mix, I send the master channel to it to compress around 1-2 dBs with medium attack and a fast release just to get more power and a warmer sound.”

SPL Vitalizer MK2-T

“The signal from the pendulum goes to the vitalizer with this one I spread the stereo image of the track and also add more harmonics on the high frequency and get more power on the bass frequency of the track and then the signal goes back to the DAW, ready for mastering.”

Native Instruments Maschine Studio

“I absolutely love this! I use it to make my rhythms. It's so easy and fast to use with a great variety of drum sounds and FX you can add to each sound. It also has high resolution screens, so you can make a lot of things without looking to the computer as much.”

Native Instruments Komplete 10 and Komplete Kontrol Keyboard

“Komplete 10 gives you amazing synths and samples and then total control with the keyboard.

“The best thing about this is it’s so fast to automate all the synths parameters, use the arpeggiator and scale modes. I use it in all of my tracks!”

Roland TR-8

“This is a great recreation of the classic analogue Roland drum machines. It really works well for studio and live sets. I always have lot of fun when I use it.

“Classic fat Roland sound with an analogue-sounding reverb and delay. Try it and you'll love it.”

For more information check out the Dennis Cruz official website, listen to his music on Soundcloud and follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

I take care of the reviews on MusicRadar and Future Music magazine, though can sometimes be spotted in front of a camera talking little sense in the presence of real musicians. For the past 30 years, I have been unable to decide on which instrument to master, so haven't bothered. Currently, a lover of all things high-gain in the guitar stakes and never one to resist churning out sub-standard funky breaks, the likes of which you'll never hear.