defining the sonic characteristics I want

[Walter Tore]

Hi All: I make up my words and music as I go along and it is all recorded live. So, there is not any overdubbing. Also there is lots of bleeding because all the instruments and my voice are within a couple feet of each other. So, with all that said, some of you know that I have been feverishly teaching myself how to record my music for the past 4 years. I have been trying to pinpoint just what sound am I trying to capture. Not musically, but sonically. Well, I figured it out recently. The doors meets sinatra (reprise recordings) and the reverb chess stuff. I love the sonic quality of the doors recordings. They captured me as a young teen on my funky record player and still do on my nice sounding studio monitors, and all 3 artists used a lot of reverb on those recordings. My friend Mark Rubinstein, who is moving to Ohio next month to teach the recording/engineering program at Ohio State University, was at our house for diner last week and will be living a 1/2 hour from us. I showed him my set up. He asked how much eq I was using on my recordings. I told him quite a bit. He said with my mics and preamps, I should be getting truer sound and to play with the mic placements and selections on each of my 4 things - vocal/harp, guitar amp, snare drum, ride cymbal. I have been doing this nonstop since our conversation and now am down to almost no eq'ning on each mic. I am learning to turn things down sonically. Does this make sense? I am getting closer to the sound I hear in my head and what I am able to produce on the computer. This journey is sure a fun one! Walter

 

[Monkey Allen]

That's good news Walter...so you were using a fair bit of eq before hey? Now you are saying that you are more controlling the volumes in order to mix the 4 musical parts? You said now you are down to 'turning things down sonically'...what do you mean by that? I suppose if your friend is a bit of an expert at the engineering side of the business...that it goes to show a little bit of experience and knowledge goes a long way...especially when you can get that knowledgeable person right there in your recording space. I bet a lot of home recordists could benefit a lot just from having someone with experience and knowledge step into their recording space for a couple of hours and check out their gear and space and offer suggestions about how to best use it.

 

[Walter Tore]

That's good news Walter...so you were using a fair bit of eq before hey? Now you are saying that you are more controlling the volumes in order to mix the 4 musical parts? You said now you are down to 'turning things down sonically'...what do you mean by that? I suppose if your friend is a bit of an expert at the engineering side of the business...that it goes to show a little bit of experience and knowledge goes a long way...especially when you can get that knowledgeable person right there in your recording space. I bet a lot of home recordists could benefit a lot just from having someone with experience and knowledge step into their recording space for a couple of hours and check out their gear and space and offer suggestions about how to best use it.

Hi Monkey Allen: I paid money for the universal audio plugins, and figured to get my money's worth I needed to be turning dials. I am not turning down the volume. It is the same. I have rigged a small chop stick size stick to a drum beater to hit the cymbal. this keeps the volume way down. I rigged another beater with a drumstick on one side and a brush on the other for the snare, and the guitar amp uses a thd hotplate. My volume is no louder than a singing voice. By turning down, I meant to say that I am using less of the neve 1081 eq, almost no compression with the LA2A compressor, and spending more time on mic placement and mic selection. Mark's simple advice that the mics are working right when they capture the sound with minimum eq'ning really hit me. I have been pretty lazy on this end of recording. I love playing, and to mess with mic placements is not as exciting. What I am doing now is messing with the mic stuff and recording. If I like something I make a mental note the mic used and the general placement. You are right about having a person with knowledge come in your home studio. Having Mark close is going to be a great assest. Take care. Walter

 

[rayc]

I bought myself an old Altect Lansing Voicette EQ to try to train myself. It's subtractive only so I'm training myself, slowly & inconsistenly, to not add. It's a hard road to travel but it makes sense to me. There are some things I need to work on like capturing a little proggy definition in my bass guitar without doing it in the box.
Non destructive editing in the box is VERY seductive however.