Audio Power Tools Evolves, Expands Brooklyn Retail Experience

In March, an intensive microphone comparison served notice that NYC-based Audio Power Tools was transitioning from a rep service into a retail operation. That metamorphosis is now complete, with the opening of Audio Power Tools’ new retail space in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

(l-r) Blue Wilding and Dan Physics have opened the Audio Power Tools demo room in Williamsburg.

Located in Williamsburg’s Roebling Tea Building on the corner of Metropolitan and Roebling, the Audio Power Tools demo room gives co-owners Blue Wilding and Dan Physics the opportunity to conduct high-end audio gear sales to their exact specifications. A quick heads-up is all that’s needed to visit this casual intimate listening environment with a studio atmosphere — designed specifically to facilitate fast, sonically dependable A/B listening.

Customers who make an appointment in advance will arrive to find any requested configuration of Audio Power Tools’ inventory set up and ready for critical comparison. The company’s product line includes select monitors, audio interfaces/converters, preamps, compressors, EQS, 500 series modules, microphones, 5.1 solutions, monitoring solutions, and acoustic treatments, from over 40 brands including A-Designs, Apogee, ATC, Bricasti, Burl, BAE, Bock, Cartec, Chandler, Cranesong, Daking, Dangerous, Elysia, Josephson, Kush, Manley, Miktek, Retro Instruments, Royer, Sonodyne, Telefunken, Tonelux, Unity Audio, Wunder and more.

“The focus here is on demo-based shopping,” says Wilding. “If you build a shop around that, then I think that changes the whole experience. From our years in sales, we’ve found that users really need to hear this gear before they invest in it. But for many of the products that we carry, that wasn’t an option before now.”

By establishing themselves in Williamsburg, Audio Power Tools aims to make life more convenient for the growing legions of Brooklyn-based engineers and studio owners. “We’ve seen some really cool things happening in the Williamsburg studio scene in the last couple of years,” Physics explains. “We wanted to make this option available to the local pacesetters – we’re a walk away from them, and also easily accessible to the Manhattanite who may be a little restive of going deep into Brooklyn. For us, this location is the obvious intersection of those worlds.”

A/B Efficiency

Wilding and Physics, who are both veterans of the NYC audio sales sector, designed the Audio Power Tools demo room to feel inviting, familiar, and – most importantly – accurate to their customers. Set up to mirror the experience of a mid-sized control room, a DAW-centric configuration at the head end is flanked by a custom producer’s rack on the right, which Audio Power Tools has pre-patched and at the ready for A/Bing on arrival.

Pull up to the APT sweet spot (click photo to enlarge).

“We found that 85-90% of our clients, if they didn’t already have their own studio, were building a streamlined and often console-free facility in a medium-sized room,” states Wilding. “They have their DAW/Pro Tools rig, and generally they have a rack or two of premium outboard gear and some carefully-chosen monitoring products. We believe most anyone would be comfortable in this environment, from a full-time audio professional to a project studio user to an engineer at a small post facility.”

“There’s an ergonomic flow here that’s specifically designed to A/B products,” Physics notes. “Generally, clients bring their own content to listen to – they can show up with their own drive, plug it in, and have a choice of interfaces and configurations to play it back through. This is primarily a line-level listening facility, however: If clients want to audition a microphone, we’ll demonstrate it onsite in their space, because we think it makes the most sense to judge a microphone in a familiar environment.”

Outboard Is In

While plugins are undeniably taking up more and more of the sonic universe, Audio Power Tools is confident that hardware will remain essential for the majority of professional setups, for years to come.

“I think there’s always going to be the demand for outboard,” Dan Physics says. “While the plugin market has successfully established itself, I often find people eventually migrating to some sort of hybrid environment. I certainly have done that myself in my home studio, and even my friends who are the most dedicated synth nerd laptop junkies are getting into outboard gear.”

“People realize that all of their software is only as good as the hardware on the other side of it, so that becomes a paramount decision,” Blue Wilding adds. “In turn, we don’t get behind brands simply because they’re high-end, boutique or expensive: We get into products that we feel represent trusty tools that will function extremely well. Audio equipment has to work in demanding conditions, indefinitely — we know first-hand what gear lasts, as opposed to being the flavor of the day.”

— David Weiss

Quick switching is enabled from the producer’s rack.

A closer look at the patch bay.

A multitude of 500-series modules are in-house.

Speakers are not just on display.

Mics: ready to go to their new home.

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