Posts Tagged ‘microphone’

Thoughts on Live Multitrack Recording at Clubs: Recording Palo Verde

Posted: August 14, 2023 in Gear, Philosophy, Recent Projects, Tricks of the Trade
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Many bands that play mostly in small to medium sized clubs will have YouTube or blog posts of their music. Often the videos are fine but the audio will be poor. Most computer video programs (think QuickTime, IMovie, etc.) will allow you to strip audio and insert a good recording of your music to sync with your video. Although a good two-track stereo recording can be an improvement, a multi-track recording gives you many more options which, if mixed correctly, can provide a first-rate, natural (not over hyped) listening experience to go with the video.

There are a few things that have helped me get a better-quality multi-track recording over the years. I’ll share some of these below. Then, I’ll give an example of the kind of recording I’m talking about by providing an example of a recording of Louisville band, Palo Verde.

  1. Use the right microphones. Some singers want to use their own microphones. It is important to check ahead of time to see what these microphones are. While some will work well, others will produce significant mixing issues. The same is true for drum mics, etc. Be sure to double check! Super or hyper cardioid mics are best because they work to eliminate noise from other instruments and especially floor monitors (see #2 and #3 below). Remember that when you’re trying to get a natural live sound you don’t need to put a microphone on every drum unless the band normally does so for the house mix. A single overhead (Omni?) microphone, kick, and snare mic will be plenty for many bands and less intrusive.
  2. Tweak monitor placement. While in-ear monitors permit the best recordings, most bands still use floor monitors. These should be placed well behind the microphone’s sound field. This is usually not difficult with singers. It is most difficult when a drummer uses a floor monitor, and it faces upward toward the overhead microphones. This means that the monitor mix will intrude on the drum’s overhead mix and render the overheads virtually useless. I usually bring along a spot monitor that I can place near the drummer, facing away from the overhead microphones.
  3. Control monitor mixes if possible. If the band is in a space with walls on either side and a wall in back, it will help if the front of house mixing engineer can run individual monitor mixes to each musician on stage, providing only the minimum of what they need. Full house monitor mixes at high volume can bleed into all of the stage microphones and wind up competing with your overall mix in a lot of ways (especially by creating out-of- phase issues) so keeping them as modest and targeted as possible will help later down the line. If band members are used to in-ear monitors this is best, of course!
  4. See if you can position musicians with the vocal stereo field in mind. If a band has three-part harmonies and those singers all stand at the front of the stage, it can help if these singers are not bunched up on one side. You will likely want to mix them to left and right, so have them stand on stage left/right if possible. This is helpful also because of the drum-bleed that comes through on the vocal mics. When mixing, the stereo field for the drums can be disoriented or out of phase if you are mixing a singer to the opposite side of the mix from where they stood on stage. Most musicians will honor this request, knowing its only for one night, if it is a huge change.
  5. Don’t fret the room microphone. If you use a room microphone for small to medium size club gigs, you’ll only use it for applause and room noise before and after songs. Otherwise, you’ll hear table conversations, etc. in the mix.
  6. Assess (and use) direct inputs for acoustic instruments. Most artists use direct inputs from pickups for guitars, mandolins, harmonicas, etc. these days. Some are excellent. Others are not so good. Use them no matter what the quality. Why? Because they are what the band “sounds like” and your job is to get that sound. That said, in some cases, you might want to stick a directional mic in front of an instrument, just to provide the option later of improving the sound. And remember, a good sounding direct input eliminates microphone bleed!
  7. The more you can control the better. In order to have maximum control over the quality of recording I prefer getting a direct feed into my own preamps and converters. Although many affordable mixers will now do multitrack recordings (Midas Mr18, Mackie Onyx, etc.) I prefer to use better quality preamps and digital to analog converters. For that I use a passive stage box that is a splitter, with one cable running to the bands mixer and the other running directly into my preamps and converters. This allows the band’s engineer to do his/her thing unimpeded while I do mine. When using a passive splitter, it is a good idea to carry along a few inline phantom power supplies and several good DI boxes to help with any ground lift issues. If you have the money and want to be sure you have the tools to get a good isolated sound and avoid compatibility issues with the house mixer you can avoid a passive splitter and get a few transformer isolated splitters such as the ART S8 and the cables to get from the front of house to the splitters and to your recording rig. I like my passive splitter because it has the cables built in and is easier to set up and haul. My basic converters and preamps are the Focusrite Clarett + series. I love the clarity and detail of the converters and the preamps sound great for just about everything. If I need other preamps I can bring them along.
  8. Mix to reproduce the live sound! The number one rule for mixing comes down to avoiding PD (plugin disease). When you have good tracks, it is tempting to add lots of effects (reverbs, delays, compression, etc.) that were NOT in use live. I see my job as reproducing a true to life recording that mirrors what the audience was actually hearing. When someone who attended the gig hears the recording as the audio for a YouTube they can say, “Wow, that’s just how the band actually sounded!”  

I recently had a chance to record Louisville’s Palo Verde at an outdoor venue called Bud’s Tavern. The recording was not made for video purposes, so live video is not available here. Here’s an audio track from that event, however, to provide a feel for the kind straight-forward enhanced “live sound” I’m talking about. You’ll want to listen on headphones or good speakers to appreciate the difference between this sound and a simple iPhone or two-track stereo recording.

Microphone Modifications!

Posted: June 14, 2019 in Gear, Recent Projects, Tricks of the Trade
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So, living in Nashville is pretty amazing if you have a studio. Great musicians are available all the time, you can rent gear from several outlets for reasonable prices, and the there are many world-class techs available to repair, renovate, or modify your gear when needed. On that last score, I have been self-modifying several of my microphones, soldering better capsules and capacitors into my Rode N2 and into a Studio Projects B3 large diaphragm microphone.

After using my Miktek CV4 for a couple of years, and basically loving it for most things, I found that I kept trying to equalize a little high end “zing” – evidently due to the way the capsule interacts with the tube electronics in the body of the mic. I read a Tape Op magazine article about a microphone tech in Nashville named Shannon Rhoades, a guy who used to actually work at MikTek, who could do a killer modification on the CV4. After listening to some digital files of the results he is able to achieve, I bit the bullet (literally – this was not cheap) and decided to go for it. I emailed him and then packed up my CV4 and drove it over to his house. When I walked in, I shuffled past a dog, and a guy coming out of the back workroom with a microphone modified for Martina McBride (I believe it was her, or maybe it was Shania Twain), and met Shannon in the workroom Here’s a little video from YouTube of an interview with Shannon in that room (scroll to about 5:45).

The room was full of microphones, all being modified and personalized for various country luminaries, and Shannon asked me a few questions about what I was looking for in the mic. He got the drift, I left, and he went to work. Two weeks later I returned, paid him through PayPal, picked up the microphone and put it into action recording the Flat River Band (a post to come about that later).

After nearly a year with the modified microphone, using it on vocals, acoustic guitar, acoustic bass, and as a room mic, I have to say that it was worth every penny. What was a really, really good $1600.00 tube condenser mic, was now close to a world-class microphone – the kind you’d pay 8 to 10 grand to use. It has that huge, larger than life, “suck you in sound”, with a silky high end, tight and controlled midrange, full and flowery low end that is really nice to have on most vocals and featured instruments. It reminds me a lot of a Telefunken C12, and for about 1/3 of the price. Check Shannon out at https://www.facebook.com/Micrehab/

Control Your Gear Lust!

Posted: July 15, 2012 in Gear, Philosophy
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Here’s my simple philosophy for keeping expenses down: CONTROL YOUR GEAR LUST!

The marketing gurus are after you! And they are always trying to sell you something you probably don’t need. To record with professional quality, however, you will need a few more items and a few better items than you need for just knocking around with a few garage quality demos. Here’s the recording/tracking chain:

1. Computer. You need a good computer. Two drives: one for your DAW software (Logic, Pro Tools, Cubase, etc.) and the other for your tracks. I’ll have more to say on this another time.

2. DA Converters. You need HIGH QUALITY analog to digital converters. This is one place not to scrimp! The biggest different in your sound happens here – with converters (and digital clock). I use the Apogee AD16x (I sometimes need 16 simultaneous tracks for live tracking) – now replaced by their Symphony system. In order to get the least possible latency, I use the Apogee Thunderbridge and X-symphony card in order to be able to use the thunderbolt in/out on my computer. Get something comparable (Lynx, or UA Apollo). You won’t regret it.

3. Preamps. Next in the food chain are your preamps. Here, the marketers go wild. Since preamps add color and texture to the sound on the way in, helping with the often brittle quality of digital recording, you’ll be tempted to get all kinds of preamps. What you NEED, however, is at least one really good clean or transparent preamp, and at least one more colored preamp (tube or heavy transformer based). You might also get two or three “channel strips”. A channel strip includes a good preamp, a good equalizer, and a good compressor/limiter. The ability to bypass the equalizer and/or compressor/limiter is an important feature. You won’t always want these in the chain.

For clean/transparent pre amplification, I like the True Precision preamps. I bought the True Precision 8, which includes 8 transformerless channels, since I sometimes record bands. It gives me 8 great channels for a drum kit, for instance, and at a good price point. Other great transparent preamps are Grace preamps, but they tend to be a little pricier per unit.

For a more colored transformer based sound I recommend a few channels of API channels or similar. I have the Warm Audio WA-412 which gives me four great channels at a price point well below API prices.

A very nice, inexpensive tube pair of tube preamps, if you can find them, are the Peavey VM-P-2s. The Warm Audio WA2-MPX is also a great choice.

On the channel strip side, you might get a non-transformer strip, a good transformer-loaded strip, and a good tube strip. For a little tube flavor to warm things up, perhaps the best price for the money for a “money channel” is the Universal Audio LA 610 MKII. I use mine all the time, especially for vocals. Another good workhorse choice is the Avalon VT-737sp. For a good budget minded non-transformer channel strip, think about the Presonus Eureka. I use mine regularly. The preamp is fast and transparent, the compressor adequate for most projects, and the eq is very clean. For a transformer-based strip, you can’t do better than the Focusrite ISA 430 MKII. It takes a while to learn (due to its many, many options), but simply sounds fantastic on just about everything – especially bass! I use mine all the time.

4. Hardware compressor/limiters. If you are multi-tracking, you may never need these, but it is a good idea to have a couple on hand to tame transients on the way into the box. You could spend a bundle here, but I wouldn’t. I like the FMR audio RMC1773 “Really Nice” Compressor. Tremendous for the money, and I’ve never had a studio situation – drums, bass, BGVs, etc. where they didn’t do the trick if I needed them to tame a signal.

5. Microphones. Here again, the marketers will want to you spend, spend, spend. What you really need, however, are a few good mics in the following categories:

  • Large Diaphragm cardioid condenser. First, you need a good large diaphragm cardioid condenser microphone for capturing vocals, drum overhead, etc. How good? Well, despite what you might be led to believe, you can get good professional recordings with less than you think. I have come to love quality and versatility of the Neumann TLM 103. This is a very straight forward, quiet, clean microphone with tremendous handling of sound pressure levels (spls). There are lots of other great choices here that won’t break the bank. For vocals I love my Miktek CV4 tube mic. IT works well on most types of voices, male and female. The Mojave MA-200, MikTek C7, Shure KSM44A, or AKG C414XLS will all do the trick for a reasonable price.
  • Stereo Pair – Small Diaphragm Cardioid Condenser. Second, you need a good stereo pair of small diaphragm cardioid condenser microphones for capturing a range of acoustic instruments – mandolin, fiddle, banjo, acoustic guitar, choirs, ensembles, etc. These are also good for cymbals. Many studios make use of the Neumann KM 184 matched pair. I find these to have a tiny bit too much of a high end spike for my taste, which doesn’t make them versatile enough to handle some instruments – like the fiddle. I now use the MikTek C5MP and love them. The high end is not brittle, but smooth and easy to eq. I also like supporting the local economy. These great sounding microphones are made in Nashville.
  • Dynamic Microphones. Third, you need a few workhorse dynamic microphones. These are especially good for recording drums and guitar amps and cabs. I grew up on Shure Sm-57s for these tasks, and I’d strongly recommend looking into the Shure DMK57-52 drum microphone kit. You’ll get three SM57s, and a Beta 52 for kick, along with a nice case and drum mounts. The Beta 52 is a great kick mic, and can also double when you multitrack the bass amp with good results, and does surprisingly well also on double bass. For bass amp miking and for some vocal applications, it is also good to have an Electrovoice EVRE320 on hand. A great mic for the money and a real workhorse.
  • A Ribbon Microphone. Finally, it is a good idea to have one ribbon mic in the closet. Some instruments and vocals just have too much high end bite, and only a ribbon mic can get them under control. And from time to time you’ll want to reach for a mic that will provide that dark vintage vibe. Also, ribbon mics have a figure 8 pattern, which can be helpful in many applications, especially when you want to capture room ambience. Typically these are expensive microphones. Its hard to beat a Royer R-121 for versatility. The AEA R84 is great. If I need one of this quality, I usually head downtown and rent one for the day (about 60 bucks). In my closet, however, I have the very affordable Cascade Fathead II. For most applications, it is more than adequate – great for the squeaking violin or the room mic. And a good guitar amp mic as well. For as often as you’ll probably need a ribbon, this should be enough. I also get great use out of my very affordable Cascade X-15 stereo ribbon mic. I have a very active sounding drum room, and this is a great room mic for stereo miking drums in such a room. It is also lovely on guitar in some applications.

Ok. Granted there are lots of other choices and occasional needs – omnidirectional, tube condenser, etc. And you can keep adding on. The basics, however, are mostly cardioid mics – condenser and dynamic, and the occasional ribbon.

Home recordists usually have room issues. These are often over-stated by product marketers, however. In today’s world, you’ll be doing a lot of close miking, and the room will not present huge issues. Even drum miking can be fairly well controlled in rooms that are not perfect. On the room-prep end, I’d recommend that you grab a closet and turn it into a vocal booth if you can. This will be your main need in terms of room issues. Here’s mine.

Vocal Booth in the Closet

And purchase one of several great new products for controlling room reflections. I use the SE Reflexion Filter when recording lots of instruments, and for some vocal applications – a first rate product. The Auralex ProMAX is also great and very versatile. Two of these will be all you’ll need to control most room issues.

That’s it for gear in the recording/tracking chain. You don’t need more than this to get professional quality recording going at home.

I’ll blog another time about studio monitoring equipment and recording software and plugins to consider. Again, the philosophy is, and will be, the same – Control Your Gear Lust!