The Drawmer Story

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I first met the guys from Drawmer back in 1982 I think it was, when I was working as a rep out of Chicago for Electro-Voice. I remember being quite impressed with the people at Drawmer at the time. They seemed really sincere and nice, not trying to exaggerate or talk about how Drawmer stuff "blew everything away". That kind of talk kind of turns me off, and is a sure sign of someone who is trying to make something seem better than it is! But the Drawmer folks were kind of, well, letting the product speak for itself. "Just listen to it" was their comment. Well I did, and I was really impressed. The Drawmer gear seemed to sound a lot clearer than the other stuff that was out at the time, not so "colored". I kept in touch with Ken Giles (one of the partners of Drawmer) and we would always seem to get together and chat at trade shows.

I eventually went to work at Aphex as Director of Sales and Marketing, and so I got a lot more familiar with Drawmer (since it was my competitor). I found that Drawmer had a loyal following, that once someone owned a Drawmer, that was it-they were hooked. Ken and I stayed friendly and we would run into each other in Singapore at the audio show or Paris-all these exotic places, but always both of us there for an audio show. After a few years I left Aphex and started my own Consulting company, and Ken asked me if I would help him find a way to improve his US sales. Eventually, he asked me if I would be interested in taking over as his US Importer and handle all US sales. I said yes! Not long after that Ken was in town to visit some local Drawmer dealers, and told me the whole story of Drawmer...

It turn out that Ken had in his early twenties started hustling gear from the south of England to the north. He'd drive a truck down to London, pick up a bunch of gear and take it back up north to sell it to friends. He also had recording studio, called KGM Studios, and was working with some rather well known (although not at that time) British artists as an engineer and sometimes, producer. He met this guy named Ivor Drawmer, who had developed this kind of cool little box called a "Frequency Conscious Gate" (circa 1980), that was unlike anything else on the market. Ivor was just building them for himself and a few friends. Turns out Ivor was a bit of a hobbyist, and had built a lot of his own gear, even an organ using all tubes!

So Ken started selling a few of these weird little boxes, and soon he was selling all Ivor could build. Not long after that, Ivor and Ken formed a partnership called "Drawmer", and began producing other kinds of little boxes (like compressors) that studios were just snapping up as fast as they could. This was about the time that dbx really got going over here in the states, so the companies sort of followed a parallel path. Ivor decided to try and build a really good compressor, I mean an expensive one. He choose to do something that used tubes and solid state electronics for the lowest noise and highest reliability (all that old tube gear wasn't too dependable). He wanted something completely different than anything else, so he knew he wanted to build mic preamps into the compressor (unheard of at this time). He also wanted to include an instrument preamp on the front panel. Viola, the 1960 was born (circa 1983), and was snapped up by the likes of Eric Clapton, Paul McCartney, and on and on. Drawmer was on its way as a world class company building completely new kinds of products.

Ken told me the whole story of Drawmer;

It all began in 1981, when Ivor Drawmer was playing keyboards in a band near Yorkshire England, and experimenting with designing some music electronics on the side. Well he wasn't getting too far as a musician, or any younger, so some friends encouraged him to build up some needed delay lines. He called it the Multitracker, and Drawmer Electronics was born.

In 1982, Ivor was working with a producer named Phil Chapman, who needed some noise gates. He built up a couple of basic units, then realized how long it took to set them up properly. Clearly a better design was needed, so Ivor added some filters, creating the first "Frequency Conscious Gate", a product that revolutionized the gate business in only a few short years. Today's version, the DS201 is the undisputed world leader in gating technology.

In 1984, Ivor had an idea for a self contained "front end" for recording that combined two tube compressors, two killer mic preamps, a tube instrument preamp with familiar "guitar amp" controls. He was a fan of the earlier Fairchild compressors and wanted something that was more versatile yet sounded really good. The 1960 was born, and it too has revolutionized the recording and live sound business, and is still the favored front end of people like Cheryl Crowe, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, Dolly Parton and on and on. Thousands of these units are out there in daily use in recording and sound reinforcement worldwide.

As the 80's came to a close, Ivor had cooked up the incredible DL241 "gate/compressor/limiter" that became another standard of the all-in-one processor boxes, and dominates Europe as the "must have" piece of processing. Since then, the DL441 Quad Compressor, the DS404 Quad Gate, the DL251 Spectral compressor have made their own unique contributions to pro audio and are dominant in their categories.

Drawmer has emerged as the leading Professional processing manufacturer around the world. Their product is now specified by an unbelievably high percentage of the top touring music acts, studios, recording artists and musicians. It is safe to say to say that if you listen to popular music, you've definitely heard Drawmer in use. Ivor Drawmer is still at the helm of this healthy and growing UK based company, and their latest products are redefining the barriers of "what's possible" in audio. Drawmer is a real success story of a user-become-designer-become-builder, and how if you have a good idea, and you really care, you can make a real difference in audio.

Brad Lunde

President

Transamerica Audio Group