What do commercial artists use?

T

ThaArtist

New member
Ok my question is: What do you think commercial artists use for recording? But let me explain further what I mean. Lets say like Mase (his last album sounds sooo amazing in my monitors), 50 cent, kanye, fat joe, and all the other top selling commercial hip-hop artists. I hear a lot of artists that use a lot of diff equiptment but none that have the same sound as the top selling commercial artists. The sound commercial artists have is far superior. I know them studios can cost thousands and probably even a million or so dollars but I'm curious as to what mics, sound interfaces, etc. I can never find this out.

I wish Bad Boy Records had pictures or their setup, and or listed equiptment.

I also know that the sound acheived is also the skill of the engineer but for sake of huge responses. Im just curious about the very best equiptment used. The closest sound I heard in comparisons with that "commercial" sound is from a dude I know that recorded his tracks at a studio that used Pro Tools racks for the preamps or sound interface (dont know exactly what the pro tools rack does since i havent really looked into it.)

I know everyone chooses different equiptment and there are virtually endless arrangements of setups and configuring things but I'm just curious to hear some of the mics, preamps, and gear these artists might use. I know I seen some pro tools racks in 50 cents studio when it was on MTV... So are we all just "screwing around" by not using pro tools? I want the best possible sound for the cheapest possible money of course (for me not being rich)... and i think the pro tools rack is like $1,500 or $2,000 ir somthin like that.

Any one got any comments on this subject? Im just curious.
 
Its not because of Pro Tools.
IMO, the best piece of equipment you can spend your money on is your rooms... tracking and monitoring.
 
Amen. Without a solid monitoring chain (including the room, of course), everything else is pretty much moot.

But if you're keeping score on gear, here's one of Dre's studios.
 
ThaArtist said:
I know them studios can cost thousands and probably even a million or so dollars but I'm curious as to what mics, sound interfaces, etc. I can never find this out.
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Go to Fletcher's place (Mercenary Audio) - those are all the big-boy toys! :cool:
 
Pro tools has very little to do with it. It doesn't sound any different than cuabse or nuendo or samplitude. It is all the outboard stuff that really does it.
 
yeah dude biggest difference by far is the tracking room. I guess most of the "million dollar" studios cost a million dollars because that's what it costs to construct a decent room in manhattan.
 
Blurry but clear enough. Wow, that's some nice iron in those racks.

I'm thinking that's an SSL console but I can't tell which model, in the blurry images it almost looks like a NEVE. Anybody know?

Is there a compressor or preamp made that is not represented here? GML, Neve, DBX, LA2A, 1176s, Joe Meek, Avalon, Distressor. This looks like the stock room at Mercenary Audio.
 
In my opinion the biggest advantages they have over average joes are (in order of importance):

1.) the *TIME* to get it right (when was the last time you spent 100 hours recording a single song?)

2.) the *TALENT* in the first place (let's face it, not everyone has it)

3.) *QUALITY* gear, and lots of it--more choices means you can match equipment to what you are trying to achieve (important, but not near as important as 1 and 2)

4.) the ability to have a proper workspace; i.e. no interruption closed sessions (you don't think you're actually gonna get the best quality work in that dank, smelly basement do you?)

5.) the ability to hire top producers, song writers, musicians and so forth (it's always a plus to have guys like Banner writing your beats, while being produced by Rick Rubin, and engineered by Nile Rogers)
 
That's precisely why I get so bent out of shape with the "I've been recording for a year and I can't get a "pro" mix with my $200 mixer and $50 microphone" posts.

Making a "pro" sounding record is about everything as a whole - Everything adds up - OR SUBTRACTS from the whole.

Great gear + crap core sounds = crap.

Great gear + crap engineer = crap.

Crap gear + an experienced engineer with a good ear = good.

Great gear + an experienced engineer with a good ear = great.

The novice engineer is limited by his experience.

The experienced engineer is limited by his gear.

All engineers are limited by their monitoring chain. (HINT!!!)
 
Massive Master said:
Amen. Without a solid monitoring chain (including the room, of course), everything else is pretty much moot.

But if you're keeping score on gear, here's one of Dre's studios.
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hey where is the berry stuff? they are suppose to be pro gear and used by the pro's.
 
Massive Master said:
All engineers are limited by their monitoring chain. (HINT!!!)
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I've been wondering about this for a while. At what point does upgrading your monitoring chain take priority over upgrading preamps, mics, converters, or sources.

It seems like if you're using a behringer mixer and a sound blaster the better monitoring is really only going to replicate the crap better.

Like if you have a soundcraft M8, delta1010, and some MXLs would you look for a $2000 monitoring environment before a $2000 preamp or mic at that point?
 
Kryptik said:
I've been wondering about this for a while. At what point does upgrading your monitoring chain take priority over upgrading preamps, mics, converters, or sources.
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You pretty much answered your own question, sorta. One's gotta ratchet up like they were raising a building. If you consider, say, tracking chain, mixing environment, monitoring chain, and room acoustics as the four corners of a house, you don't want to raise one corner faster than the rest. You jack up one corner and then try to make sure the rest is up to level.

Of course, without the actual skills to use this stuff, the house is a condemmed property that's not worth jacking up and moving.

G.
 
I know it's not completely realistic, but *if you can* I always suggest getting the highest possible quality monitoring regardless of the rest of the gear.

Even if the monitors are "beyond" the rest of the gear, at least they're not the part that's limiting the engineer.

With good monitoring, you're more "in control" of ALL of your gear - cheap or not.

Going around SSG's analogy - If a recording rig were a buiding, the monitoring chain would undoubtedly be the foundation. The quality of that chain would decided if the foundation is built for a small home, or a skyscraper.
 
Middleman said:
Is there a compressor or preamp made that is not represented here? GML, Neve, DBX, LA2A, 1176s, Joe Meek, Avalon, Distressor. This looks like the stock room at Mercenary Audio.
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I thought I saw TWO Fairchilds :eek:
 
Yes, I believe those are the 660 mono boxes. It's been awhile since I did Fairchild research though.

I concur with John on monitors being the first step in creating an accurate mixing environment. Using the 4 corners of the house analogy I might make them DAC Convertors, monitors, room treament then gear. When the back end is solid it saves an immense amount of time which can be used to focus on the music or creative engineering. Speakers are just windows on the frequency spectrum, make sure yours can capture the whole range clearly.
 
I agree wholeheartedly with the concept that monitors are perhaps the most critical link in the signal chain; they are the items that are actually transducing all those abstract voltages into actual sound for your ears to hear. As such, no matter how good the rest of it, if your're pumping pristine inforamtion into a pair of crapola monitors, it's going to sound like crapola. Even more important, it's going to have a sound that makes it difficult, if not impossible to get a good mix.

Way Back When I sold consumer audio gear, we used to recommend in general that no matter how much or wht type of gear that the client was purchasing when they shopped for a system, that they plan to reserve at least 40% of their budget for the loudspeakers alone (this number varied, again it was just one of those general rule of thimb things.)

But the key words there were budget and percentage. If one is building a home studio and has a $2000 starting budget, a pair of Genlec 8040s isn't going to do the user any good if they have no money left for anything else. Their monitors won't sound very good playing a blank CD-R through them (unless they are golden-eared mimes :D)

There is also the law of diminsihing returns. If the user is recording through a pair of SM57s and an NT1 going through a Behringer mixer into their Soundblaster sound card, the $1000 more that one would be paying for a pair of, say, Adams over a pair of Mackies would probably have a greater impact on the quality of their mix if it were spent on some mic and/or preamp upgrades instead of on the admittedly better monitors.

It's for this reasoning that I recommended that one try and "match" the quality of monitor to the quality of the rest of the system, to get the most bang for the buck out of each part of the signal chain so that they can actually have a complete and servicable chain. Once that's in place, like cranking the jacks under the lowest level of the house, they can upgrade based upon what they believe to be the weakest parts of the chain. Before long, that weakest point will indeed be the monitors, for sure. But until then, the other parts of the chain have to be considered, IMHO.

G.
 
ok, ALL that sounds great, but....

i understand everything that's being told, but isn't one, if not THEE most important things to an overall GREAT sounding final mixdown, is a GREAT ear in the mixing process? Of course, you have to have a great pair of monitors to give you a great sound in the first place; but isn't there some sorta' "standard", or "rule of thumb" that engineers catering to hip-hop, use or keep in mind when adjusting their immediate settings for vocals? That "SOUND"; that's SOOOOO different than local artists?! I know SOMEONE knows what i'm talking about.

There's a distinct difference. A noticeable difference. And some of these so called locals HAVE the access to facilities with this "top-notch" gear. The BEST and most expensive pro-tools, the mixboards, the rooms, the mics, the money AND time, etc and so on. A very few even have a little talent enuff to "fake it 'til they make it".So; let's do some process of elimination: The gear is not the difference. Let's face it: you damn sure don't need the best talent, or the most expensive recording crew in order to SOUND good, or go platinum.(i.e.; see "laffy taffy"). OK, check off the artist(s). Leaves nothing left but the final step. The mixing process. Could this be(as I believe), the ENGINEER?

Good example: hypothetically, 2 different crews: from artist to engineer. But exact same gear and facility. 50 cent and G-unit is crew 1. They do their thing, and have that thickness, clarity, and width on their vocals. Now crew 2 are just some locals tryin to emulate what they just heard from crew 1. THAT engineer believes what he's hearing are 2 vocals, or one vocal DOUBLED, but still doesnt have that same "UMPH" and in your face, yet still in the music vocals. MAN, this has been so hard to try an explain, even to crew # 2, cause no matter what i'm saying, no one seems to actually "hear" what i'm tryng to explain. I'm sorry, i'm about to go cry again and go to sleep.
 
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