Singer songwriter mixing

If you're handy with tools, you can make the traps easily enough. I'm fortunate in that I have some carpentry skills, and so made over a dozen traps of various dimensions, portable, on wheels, affixed to walls, etc. Room treatment is the most important thing for you to do. This can't be over-emphasized. That C-1 is pretty hyped on the high end, but it's serviceable for sure. I used it as a middle mic over a drumkit and got very good results with it.
 
I always say you are better off with a medeocre recording of a spectacular performance than a spectacular recording of a mediocre performance.

As my user name might suggest, I spent a lot of years working the guy/gal with guitar scene. Both playing and recording are learned crafts that take time and practice. I place the order of importance as, performance, instrument, electronics. Let's break that down.

As to your comment about how you sound live. A lot of performers have issues in a dry studio. Often that is the tension playing live with an audience that is not there in the studio.

I listened to the video you are trying to copy. The vocal is intimate. For this I've coached singers to imagine singing gently into a lovers ear. Up tight and close with a lot of control. With a lot of environment noise, the condenser might not be the right choice. A good dynamic mic with tight pattern, up close might get you closer to what you want with less background noise. Try it with the condenser first and see what it yields.

The touring artists I've worked with over the years had good guitars with electronics that yielded some pretty spectacular live recordings. You mentioned plug in and go. Piezo pickup no matter the pre isn't going to get you there. Fishman Blender with a Countryman mic along with the piezo gets closer. For live I always added a condenser like an AKG 451 or Crown CM700, giving me 3 guitar tracks to work with. Try skipping on the vocal and work on getting the mic technique sorted out for your guitar and begin to explore how it really sounds with mic placement. It's often a challenge to perform and listen at the same time. Maybe get someone else to play your guitar while you focus on listening while you work on mic placement.
 
Foam is close to useless. It cuts out higher frequency "flutter echo" that you can really, audibly notice, but it is not effective for lower mids typical of male voices and guitars. Boatloads of it are sold, and it no doubt improves the sound for gamers and some podcasters, but for music recording and mixing, you'd be better of buying heavy moving pads and tacking those on the wall, IMO.
 
Foam is close to useless. It cuts out higher frequency "flutter echo" that you can really, audibly notice, but it is not effective for lower mids typical of male voices and guitars. Boatloads of it are sold, and it no doubt improves the sound for gamers and some podcasters, but for music recording and mixing, you'd be better of buying heavy moving pads and tacking those on the wall, IMO.

"close to useless" is rather misleading.

Here are the specifications comparing 2 inch foam and rigid fiberglass. Is the absorption at lower frequencies better with fiberglass? Yes. For vocals? Lets look at some NRC ratings and compare.

Rigid fiberglass
1.6 PCF (26 kg/m3) Plain 2" (51 mm)
125 Hz: .31
250 Hz: .57
500 Hz: .96
1000 Hz: 1.04
2000 Hz: 1.03
4000 Hz: 1.03
NRC: .90

vs.

2" Auralex Studiofoam Wedges
125 Hz: .11
250 Hz: .30
500 Hz: .91
1000 Hz: 1.05
2000 Hz: ,99
4000 Hz: 1.00
NRC: .80

At the 500hz range, not a lot of difference. Kind of a wash until you need bass management. It's why I hate basement studios. Built mine on the 3rd floor where the really low end escapes out the roof. Don't think acoustic treatment is the direction the OP needs to start at. Plenty of good bedroom recordings have bee produced by focusing on good technique.
 
"close to useless" is rather misleading.

Here are the specifications comparing 2 inch foam and rigid fiberglass. Is the absorption at lower frequencies better with fiberglass? Yes. For vocals? Lets look at some NRC ratings and compare.

Rigid fiberglass
1.6 PCF (26 kg/m3) Plain 2" (51 mm)
125 Hz: .31
250 Hz: .57
500 Hz: .96
1000 Hz: 1.04
2000 Hz: 1.03
4000 Hz: 1.03
NRC: .90

vs.

2" Auralex Studiofoam Wedges
125 Hz: .11
250 Hz: .30
500 Hz: .91
1000 Hz: 1.05
2000 Hz: ,99
4000 Hz: 1.00
NRC: .80

At the 500hz range, not a lot of difference. Kind of a wash until you need bass management. It's why I hate basement studios. Built mine on the 3rd floor where the really low end escapes out the roof. Don't think acoustic treatment is the direction the OP needs to start at. Plenty of good bedroom recordings have bee produced by focusing on good technique.
Ok, I may have verged on hyperbole with "useless" but I would say it should be a last resort, with the understanding it should be replaced with something effective at the earliest opportunity.

Well, let's look at some more frequencies:
Baritone vocal: 100 – 400 Hz
Acoustic guitar (fundamentals): 82 - 660Hz

Of course it does something, so can be argued that it is better than nothing (but there are a *lot* of options in that set). But Auralex spec (which I don't even know if it is comparable to the pack OP linked to) is still only a bit more than half as effective through the fundamental range of my vocals and a lot of the "meat" of the acoustic guitar.

This topic comes up all the time. Sure, people do it, some even find a way to make decent recordings, and if you have real talent, many folks will be happy. Still, I have yet to hear anyone say after they got "real" acoustic treatment that they should have stuck with the foam, and mostly I hear "Why did I wait so long to do this?" I'll leave it at that.
 
Hey Keith, so maybe not completely useless? I suppose it would depend on the kind of wall it covers and the setup of the room. I couldn't find any of the Owens or Roxul online,will have to do some more research
 
In the video you see a small clamp connected to the sound hole with a mic that is capturing the sound up close. The better the sound of what you capture, the less you have to process it.
View attachment 107795View attachment 107796

Yeah I noticed, was hoping that sound/tone could be recreated using a behringer C1. Though how come they don't get a lot of boominess with the mic aiming inside the sound hole? Or does the clamp mic work differently?
 
Yeah I noticed, was hoping that sound/tone could be recreated using a behringer C1. Though how come they don't get a lot of boominess with the mic aiming inside the sound hole? Or does the clamp mic work differently?

It's a classical guitar. A rather delicate piece of music. He's not exactly wailing on that guitar.

How do you know that sound can't be recreated using the C1? You should be try getting in close and experiment with placement. As I said in a previous post, focus on getting the sound you are after, one instrument at a time. It is how you train your ears and learn what works.
 
Something else to remember when you are trying set up your mics... what you as a guitar PLAYER hears from your guitar is NOT what the mic or audience hears. If you have a friend who plays, have him play while you move the mic around and listen. Next best would be for you to play and have someone move the mic around while you listen for a sound you like (have some good headphones).
 
I also record guitar and vocal. I’ve just been at it a short time. In the beginning, I had that muddled muddy sound also for weeks. I discovered a few things that worked for me.
1/ Use EQ to drag the bass down, raise the midrange of your vocal
2/ Apply reverb.
3/ mic the guitar at the neck, no so much at the sound hole.

P.S. as for DAW, I swore I didn’t want one. But, I went from Audacity, to Reaper, to Logic Pro in a few weeks time, and so far, all of my best efforts came with the simple Audacity! E.g. Compression, EQ, reverb.
 
Your vocal is pretty much the perfect tonal balance imo. I'm listening on harsher laptop speakers and it sounds full/not harsh. All of your other instruments need a lot of work, you can go much further with a good mix, but I think your intro guitar may need re-tracking so you do not get that harsh piercing note. mute your verb/effects if you have any extras does that help? EQ it out. try a De-esser on 4k and above (high shelf ducking) or multiband, duck 12db if you need to, disguise the harsh notes with warmth EQ, or re-track, I think perhaps now you have a pretty good vocal sound (tonal balance) you may want to work on slotting the bass into your mix, I couldn't hear it at all by the way on my laptop. probably means it's lacking a ton of 300hz or thereabouts. overdrive on the high piercing percussion (good for harsh cymbals etc) and turn it down like 5db, scoop those ugly mids on keyboard 800-1k very wide band, will make it sound much smoother + better at louder volume, clear room for other instruments and enhance warmth+airiness. your instruments are not gelling quite right, work on eq only and balancing and get the mix sounding great using just that, then concentrate on the effects after.

watch produce like a pro (mixing bass) and employ that technique, just use the di. this should give your mix (vocal/guitar/bass) the foundation + appropiate brightness, get the bass right and even that piercing note may not be half as bad!, or at the very least, the nice warm full low end will give you something to balance the highs to. blend the keyboard in last. don't balance anything to that high percussion, it's way too bright/harsh, use a spectrum analyzer on your master, SPAN is free, keep relatively flat, easy to spot buildups by eye and to get your bass in the ballpark.

Don't dwell on the mix for too long, work on something else at the same time if you can to keep perspective.

Good job.

(edit: get a great mix and it will sound balanced and pleasing to listen to on all speakers, it will translate. but don't expect it to sound like the reference (although you can get it to sound much closer), for that you will need to re-track with different methods/treated room)
 
There are a number of things going on here.
You have a number of problems. The room is all hard surfaces, which doesn't help but you are not really comparing like with like. We have, I suspect a recording in a nice room with a voice that has real warmth recorded, edited, treated and balanced really well merged with a video I suspect is intended to 'pretend' to be a real recording, when it's almost certainly a bunch of people miming to the nice track. Some of those focus throws I suspect disguise some of the slips in lip-sync. At the start of yours the piano is out of tune with the guitar - so I guess you recorded the guitar part with the guitar tuned nicely by ear then discovered it was out of tune with the piano. The piano sound is awful - sounds like you miked up the internal speakers, and the rather er, less than fluid playing coupled with the dismal quality of the piano make that pretty difficult - it's just not a sympathetic addition. The guita sounds nice a bright. The voice sounds exactly like a too distant mic position in a reverberant room. In the video you like, we're seeing a mic position that does not sound like a mic would sound placed there - not how he moves back from the mic and even turns his head away and the sound remains good? That doesn't work in real life.

So you are not comparing like with like - you have a pop shield. Why? I assume because you could hear pops. That video didn't have one because that mic wasn't live. You need to decide if you want a video to look good or be real. Frankly, with your voice, I think a close mic position would reduce room sound, warm it up and make it have more character. You really need to consider the stringy bit at the end. Komplete Audio 2 has far far better sounds than your piano and strings were giving.

As a bass player - you might also want to consider what you're playing. You have a strummy guitar - so there are 'holes' - so usually the bass would cover these. Your bass is also quite rhythmic but leaves the holes, because it seems to have little sustain - have you tried some quite sever dynamic compression to make it sustain more.

I think your problem is simply mic position and sounds. Guitar is eq-able and perhaps a little reverb would make it nicer - the bass is kind of bolted on, and the piano sucks - it sounds like the ones they have in schools, with a mic slapped on the tinny speaker. You are comparing this with a polished studio recording. The video makes you think it's recorded live. It isn't.
 
Hey DesertRatt that's interesting. BEEN using studio one and ableton for so long it's kinda hard to let go once you get used to it.

Just wondering what you guys think he did here. He's not singing so close to the mic, I was wondering how he managed to get his voice to be so clear. Or perhaps would it be due to the room being treated heavily? WE ALL DIE YOUNG (STEELHEART) Miljenko Live In his Studio 2020 - YouTube

Yes, the room has plenty of acoustic treatment - you can see the panels hanging on the wall behind him. There is a pop filter, not that it matters at the distance he is away from the mic. Looks to be a thin-body Ovation guitar, so not much acoustic 'sound' coming from it that the mic picks up at it's height. Then there is compression. level automation and EQ applied to the vocal.
 
Looks like I have a lot of things to work on then, and you guys have much better ears than me when it comes to picking out these faults. I really appreciate you guys taking the time to help, many thanks.
 
Just remember that videos are frequently a fiddle. Some people are really, really good at lip-sync. I've worked with a singer from a very well known UK pop band - she has a really good voice, but they never sing live. when she mimes, you can stand next to her and with a mic in her hand, or a headset on, you cannot tell it's coming off a track.
 
The new AC/DC video is extremely well done for syncing. You can even see Angus's string vibrato and it seems to match the song. That's a pro doing his job. I'm sure it wasn't a "one and done" shot, there are dozens of angles, include GoPro type shots when there is no GoPro in other shots.

Usually the audio is the giveaway. The live pandemic videos always sound hollow to me, unless they have a multimic setup with a good room. One of the best live ones I've seen was a John Legend interview. With a close up voice mic, a pair of mics over the grand piano, it sounded studio quality. There was no difference between the interview and the singing. Others generally sound like all the amateur videos on Youtube, which is surprising that some of these folks could easily afford to have a good setup.

I've heard some really DREADFUL musical guests on TV. You would think a musician would worry more about sound quality.
 
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