Solid State Logic SL4048E

The Solid State Logic SL4048E is a 48-channel mixing console, also referred to as the SSL 4000E.

Peter Gabriel has owned this model of SSL during the 1980s and 90s as his first. He bought and installed the console in early 1985 at his Ashcombe House home studio, using money made from his fourth album and tour to fund the upgrade. The SSL was central to the recording and mixing of So. The bass part on "Sledgehammer" in particular was enhanced via one of the SSL's in-built bus compressors.

Once Real World Studios opened, the SSL 4048E was moved to the Work Room (Peter's private recording space located in the loft). Around 80% of the Us album was recorded there using this desk between 1989 and 1992. However, it was replaced with the Sony Oxford OXF-R3 digital console in 1997, which Kevin Killen did the surround sound mixes of So on.

There's some conflicting information regarding the number of channels: Kevin Killen recalls the console to have been a 56-input. But contemporary reports from the So era reveal that it's a 48-input desk instead (with number of inputs counted). The latter seems more likely, as Kevin Killen has clearly worked with several SSL desks during his career that he could simply be misremembering that small detail about Peter's SSL desk.

Specifics
According to an article on Real World Studios published in the January 1990 issue of Studio Sound magazine, the SSL 4048E had Total Recall automation, and was also fitted with G-series EQ & computer, integral synchroniser and the Real World Studios' Automated Send Matrix. Some of the modifications are similar to ones done to the SSL 4080G in Control Room one.