Nik Kozub is a bass player, songwriter, engineer and producer, who plays with Shout Out Out Out, a dance punk group whose lineup of two drummers and four bassists is unusual, to say the least. "We play primarily electronic music, with a strong focus on analog synthesizers. While I do generally mix in the box, I like to run a lot of analog effects in my mix for character and a bit of murkiness."

Despite his love for lo-fi, getting a clean signal for the wide variety of sources he has in the studio is of the utmost importance, and Nik chose an ISA428 for main tracking purposes, "It frankly just sounds great. The pres are clean, but not sterile by any stretch, and you can really change their tonal color a lot with the switchable impedance. I am also a huge fan of the sweepable high pass filter. It is really, really smooth and musical, and allows me to filter while I track very intuitively using my ears, saving me time in the mixing process. I track a lot of analog synths and drum machines through the ISA pres, and they absolutely excel in this role, my synths sound meaty and full, and I find it very easy to get my synths to sit well in the mix."

Nik uses his ISA428 to its maximum potential, with numerous outboard process patched into the insert points of the ISA428. "One thing that I really like is that with the insert point disengaged from the front panel of the ISA, the pre will still feed the input of whatever you have inserted. This is awesome, because it essentially allows me to multi my signal, and track with parallel processing if I want. This is even easier if you have the optional digital card, because you can run the output of your compressors (or whatever else you have inserted) to inputs 5-8 on the card, and with the one unit you are able to simultaneously track four unprocessed signals in parallel with four processed signals!"

Summing up, Nik simply states "The Focusrite ISA428 has become a crucial part of my tracking setup, and I now bring them to every session I work on. These pres sound great, and their unparalleled flexibility has definitely improved my workflow. I want more!"