Ali Stone (Katy Perry, Alok, Sofía Reyes, Kesha)
Colombian multi-Platinum producer and singer-songwriter, Ali Stone, was named by Billboard as one of the Latin Hitmakers of 2021. She has worked on Grammy-nominated albums, remixed top artists such as Katy Perry, and produced for the likes of RBD, Alok, and Mary J. Blige. Stone performed on Justin Bieber’s Purpose World Tour. Her self-produced, mixed, and mastered debut album, Sexto Sentido, hit number one on the Electronic Charts.
Tell us about your current studio setup.
I work primarily with Ableton and Pro Tools, doing all the instrumental production and mixing in Ableton, and all vocal recording, production, and mixing in Pro Tools.
I have three sets of monitors: a pair of Avantone Abbeys, a pair of KRK V6, and Kali Audio LP-6. The microphone I use the most is the VMS-1, and I have it paired with a Focusrite Liquid Channel (preamp).
As for audio interfaces, I have the Universal Audio Apollo X4 and the Audient ID44.
My main midi controller is the S61 from Native Instruments.
In synths, I have the Jupiter XM, JD-XI, SE-02, and AX-Edge from Roland, and the Prophet 08. My go-to guitars are the Gibson Hummingbird, the HP 416 W, the Les Paul & SG, and for bass stuff, I use the Kala Journeyman U·BASS.
My go-to plugins right now are the Neve 1073 Legacy and Tube-Tech compressor from UAD, C6, NS1, and CLA Unplugged from Waves, Soothe2, Native Instruments Kontakt libraries, Roland Cloud synths, Sylenth1, Massive X, Spire, and Omnisphere.
Having produced and mixed so many songs over the past few years, how do you stay fresh and excited about making music these days?
I feel that what has kept me excited to make music and stay fresh has been to work on verrry different genres and styles, going from a movie score to a bolero, from electronic music to rock. Being able to put on different hats every time I go in the studio is what makes it so fun to me.
How do you typically approach a mix: what's your process for setting it up? How often are you making big editing decisions in your mixing?
Usually, when I listen to a song, I can picture in my head how I imagine the production to sound like. I always communicate with the artist to make sure my vision and the vision of his or her is aligned, and I work on the production to make something authentic and true to the artist.
I usually make big production decisions at work; I like to propose sounds and ideas that are solid so that things always sound ‘finished’, even if it's a demo.