Me in my studio: Planas
Intro
"I'm Toby Davies; a producer, DJ and instrumentalist working out of a studio near Camden and at a houseboat studio in Canary Wharf.
"I go under the aliases Planas, Landlord and Seemore Productions. I also play bass, write and produce for Gentleman's Dub Club."
Tannoy Gold monitors
"I first heard these at Prince Fatty's studio in Brighton when we were recording some Gentleman's Dub Club tracks. Harry "Evergreen", our sound engineer, immediately went and bought a pair.
"I absolutely love them - even though the high mids are pretty militant there's a nifty frequency rolloff option next to the cones which you screw and unscrew by hand. They are passive rather than active which makes a really nice change from most modern monitors, if only because you can't hear the 'beep bidip bidip bidip' of smartphone interference through them!
"I have to shout out my Mourdant-Short MS902 shelf speakers: I use them at home which is where I get a lot of my initial ideas. I've had them for just over 10 years now and they're still going strong - I don't think my neighbours like them too much though!"
Neumann U87
"Very clear, sensitive mic capable of getting some great takes. Sometimes I find it a little too sensitive, and for things like sax and trumpet I'll use something like a Shure SM-57 to stop the valve sounds and breath noises coming through as much.
"A pair of these make excellent drum overheads, if you can afford two!"
Focusrite Saffire 6
"A great little interface for the money with good preamps and solid build."
Bach Stradivarius Trumpet
"I play a Bach Stradivarius, it's got a great tone and really slick valves.Instrument-wise I also use a Fender Telecaster and a Spectre Performer bass guitar."
Roland Juno G
"Such a versatile synth, I got it dirt cheap, second hand and it's become a really important part of my studio. I've fit it with an extra memory card so I can use it as a sampler and use the Roland effects and sequencer on any of my samples.
"In my Planas live band I only need the Juno and a laptop as it can be split between a synth, sampler, and midi keyboard all at the same time. I use the Juno in Gentleman's Dub Club as well.I also have a Roland FP-2 keyboard which is great for writing and getting that live sound as it has weighted keys and some really realistic keyboard emulations."
Blue Microphones Robbie pre
"Beautiful tube mic and instrument preamp with +36db of headroom. Designed to be used with the Kiwi Bluebottle which is a fantastic vocal mic, but is currently in Submotion Orchestra's studio as they're recording their second album at the moment."
Houseboat
"Harry runs a studio out of his houseboat in Canary Wharf: it's one my favourite places to work, especially when it's sunny as you can take your breaks up on deck!
"He's got loads of amazing gear there including Adam S2.5a monitors, two SSL channel strips which he put together from parts, a Vermona spring reverb and a Distressor compression/distortion unit."
The new single, Breathtaking by Planasfeaturing Ed Thomas is out now