Urei-ka!

The other afternoon I made my way to the local music/DJ store to replace my old, worn down, needles. While I was there, a friend of mine that works in that department couldn't help but show me a mixer that he thought I should take a look at.

I give you, the Urei 1601E (click for larger picture). And I have to say, I haven't been this surprised by a mixer in a long time. If you're not interested in knowing about this mixer, or any other mixer, I suggest skipping the rest of this. ;)

Urei (by Soundcraft) was the series that pioneered the rotary style of mixer (before Rane, and before Allen & Heath) in the 70's/80's. If there was a hot club in the 70's/80's, you'd find a Urei mixer in the booth. I was never a big fan of rotary style mixers personally, which was why I was so interested in this particular mixer I was being shown; no rotarys, all faders. At a glance, a rugged (it's big) 2-channel, battle style mixer. After a short amount of time, I was convinced there was a lot more to it.

At first, I was attracted to it's subtle nuances; a blue-backlit headphone jack on the front (for those moments when it's too dark, or you're just too drunk), the XLR outputs on the back (in addition to the standard phono RCA jacks), and the "grippy" feel of all the dials. The more I looked, the more I found little "extras" that I've often wished other mixers would have.

The mixer has a very clean layout, and is not cluttered anywhere. The faders are light, and very responsive, not to mention fully adjustable (even the upfaders have adjustable curve, and can be reversed... making them... downfaders?). As an example, the upfaders were all the way at the top, and I lifted the mixer upright, to look at the top, and the faders slid down to the bottom. I like them to be quick like that, and this is especially cool because the curve can be adjusted for the them (for quick cuts, or gradual fades).

This all sounds great, and I haven't even touched on the granddaddy of all that is awesome on this mixer. The effects. The built in effects bank on this thing is nothing short of outstanding. 5 of the cleanest sounding effects: Cutter, pan, filter, flanger, and delay. Combined with X/Y dials for everything between a wet and dry sound. PLUS 25 preset combinations of the effects, which are all automatically matched to the BPM of the source (and for those tricky tracks or accapella, you can tap in the BPM), for awesome sounding effects. These are activated by a fader, rather than a button, which allows for quicker transitions. Not to mention you can isolate the highs, mids, and lows for each effect, making for many many fun DJ toys.

With all that is good with the mixer, there are some glaringly obvious shortcomings. It's a 2 channel mixer (6 inputs, including the mic), so if you're all about mixing more than 2 things at once, you might want to move onto something with more channels. For traditionalists like myself, this is no problem. Plenty o' room for a couple turntables, or a couple CDJs, or even both. I've had a 3 channel mixer for years, and honestly, the 3rd channel doesn't get much love from me.

The only other minor gripe I have about this mixer (and I'm totally nitpicking here) is that the crossfader is a little tiny bit too short. Yes, that's all I could come up with. A tiny $5 piece that can be replaced by yanking the old one off, and putting on a new one.

I've had the opportunity to play on a lot of different mixers. Pioneer's DJM500 through 800 and Allen and Heath's Xone line (rotary or otherwise). My beginnings with old Numark 2000x series, and 3000x series, a brief stint with some Vestax action, through to Mr Hyde's swanky new Denon X1500 (which has some amazing features also, that I won't get into now).. these have been eclipsed by 30 minutes with the Urei.

I'll be in the market for a new mixer within the next month or two (after the Christmas fallout), and this, without a doubt, is at the front of the pack. Once I get it home, and have a chance to abuse it for a while, we'll see if my thoughts on this have changed.

Take it easy folks!

---Jekyll