NO GOING BACK - ROB CHIARELLI

Rob Chiarelli can’t imagine life without the Dangerous Music System Complete in his studio

By Brooke Bilyj

Rob Chiarelli doesn’t wonder where his career might be without Dangerous Music. The award-winning record producer and mix engineer has been widely recognized for his work with artists like P!nk, The Temptations, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, and Charlie Wilson since he started his production company, Final Mix Inc., in 1991. But ever since plugging in the Dangerous Music System Complete (DMSC) a few years ago, Chiarelli has been mixing one big hit after another, racking up several GRAMMYS® and other honors along the way.

“My Dangerous gear has made such a difference,” he says, “that I hate to think what I would do without it.”

Chiarelli can’t deny that his transition to Dangerous has helped him tap into a streak of success. He took a break from his busy schedule to tell us how his favorite Dangerous products have changed his life.

Building a foundation

At first, Chiarelli eased into Dangerous Music slowly. “I generally won’t add more than one piece of gear at a time to my system, because I like to learn each piece one at a time,” he says. “I like to take my time and learn every detail so I know exactly what it's doing.”

The first piece Chiarelli plugged into his system, sometime around 2014, was the Dangerous COMPRESSOR. The more he used it, the more he appreciated how the COMPRESSOR maintained the musicality of his mixes, without compressing the original sound.

“The Dangerous COMPRESSOR makes things sound more modern and it glues the mix together without sounding over-compressed,” he says. “It keeps the mix feeling and sounding open and musical, especially when I use a low ratio, like 1.4:1. There’s nothing else on the planet like it, and that’s really what I look for in audio gear – I look for things that are especially unique, musical, and reliable.”

After a couple months of getting to know the COMPRESSOR, Chiarelli added the Dangerous BAX-EQ to his mixing chain. “They work together, so if I’m using the Dangerous COMPRESSOR on the drum bus or mix bus, it’s got the BAX-EQ right after it,” he says. “The BAX-EQ makes even the biggest EQ changes sound musical and transparent, to provide a crystal-clear, perfect audio path.”

Next came the CONVERT-2 D/A and MONITOR-ST monitor controller, which dictate everything Chiarelli hears and therefore, every decision he makes. In his own words; “You can’t mix what you can’t hear”

“When you’re building a house, you need a good the foundation. I have CONVERT-8’s, CONVERT-2, the COMPRESSOR, the BAX-EQ, the 2-BUS+ and the MONITOR ST – that is my foundation,” he says. “They have been on every mix I’ve done since I got them. Once I heard the difference, I was hooked!  I just can’t get this sound anywhere else.”

Success with DMSC

The DMSC turned Chiarelli’s studio into a true hybrid mixing system, offering the elegant precision of digital editing combined with the inherent warmth of analog – bringing the best of both worlds to his fingertips.

“The Dangerous gear has almost replaced the large console for me. It brings together all the musical aspects I love about analog consoles, but within a few rack spaces instead of a whole room,” he says. “I still love using a big console, but not every client has the budget to go into an SSL room – and even when we do, I always bring my Dangerous gear; I have to because it’s such a large part of what I do now.”

By condensing the full power of an analog studio into the sleek setup of his DMSC, Chiarelli has been taking his mixes to the next level.

The first record Chiarelli mixed on Dangerous equipment was an album by gospel singer, Kirk Franklin, that ended up at #1 for 25 consecutive weeks. After that, Chiarelli mixed the first solo studio album for Erica Campbell – who performs with her sister as the gospel duo, Mary Mary. That album, “Help,” won a Grammy for Best Gospel Album.

From there, he mixed another album for Kirk Franklin called “Losing My Religion.” The first single from that record stayed at #1 for 45 consecutive weeks, and the project won another Grammy for Best Gospel Album in 2016.

Chiarelli’s third Grammy for Best Gospel Album came in 2018, for his work on Tori Kelly’s “Hiding Place.” In total, 16 of the projects Chiarelli has mixed have been nominated. Plus, in between the formal award nods, there has been a bounty of other hits and No. 1’s since Chiarelli turned to Dangerous.

“For whatever reason – be it luck, divine intervention, Dangerous gear, or a combination of those things – Dangerous has been a big part of all the hits,” Chiarelli says. “I won’t say it’s all because of Dangerous, but I’m definitely not going to unplug any of it. When I have success with something, I don’t want to change it.”

Chiarelli is careful to note that just plugging in Dangerous gear isn’t a magical silver bullet to the top of the charts. In this “game of inches” that is mixing, the DMSC provides nuanced controls to make the subtle improvements that collectively have a big impact on the final mix.

“We all want to get from one to 10, and getting to that point has been easier with Dangerous,” he says. “That’s why it’s important to have the right equipment because when you hear something in your head, you need great tools to help you get there.”

Back to the future

Even before Chiarelli plugged in his Dangerous gear, he racked up an impressive repertoire working with artists from Will Smith and Ray Charles to Janet Jackson.

To think how these monumental early projects may have gone if he had modern Dangerous gear in his studio back then, Chiarelli feels a bit like a mad scientist, mixing with tools from the future. Or perhaps like Marty McFly jamming out “Johnny B. Goode” long before the song’s time.

“If I had this stuff in 1989, I would have been the happiest mixer on the planet,” Chiarelli says with a laugh. “I would have been Dr. Emmett Brown from ‘Back to the Future,’ holding the cables and waiting for lightning to strike the clocktower.”

Likewise, wondering where he might be today without Dangerous, Chiarelli feels like Doc Brown might feel without his flux capacitator-fueled DeLorean. “I don’t want to think about what things would be like if I didn’t have the Dangerous System today,” he says, “because this stuff takes mixing to another level.”

The DMSC has become so engrained in Chiarelli’s mixing process that he simply can’t imagine life without it. If he could only choose a single piece of Dangerous equipment to keep, “you’d have to force me to choose at gunpoint,” he says. “But if my life depended on it, I’d probably have to keep the MONITOR ST, because it’s so critical to have a proper monitor controller and a clean audio path for monitoring.”

Even after making this difficult hypothetical choice, Chiarelli admits, “I would cry if I didn’t have my Dangerous COMPRESSOR, and I would cry if I didn’t have my CONVERT-2, and I would probably cry if I didn’t have my BAX-EQ or 2-BUS+,” he says, confirming that the whole system is staying in his studio for good. “The Dangerous gear is a game-changer. You’ll have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands.”