Homemade Tricks

  • Thread starter Thread starter Trace
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Nr 1: If you want your inexpensive (tried it on Audia Technicas)condenser mic to sound like a "personal sounding and expensive mic from the golden age". Put a knitted sock over it in two layers, could even be more.

Nr 2: Put a mic in a bass case (or any case or box), close it and play the "bassdrum" with your hands on it. Play around with the eq's to get your favorite sound. Use some 1/4 filled macaroni box for that raw sampled high-hat and snare sound (with the mic mentioned in Nr 1)...Groovus Maximus.

:) Hans
www.hagen.nu
 
I have stairs leading down into my studio that curve down a hall with doors closed it is a cool echo chamber.I can put a v67 at the bottom and an amp upstairs to run guitar or vocals through.I then mix the sound with the dry tracks and it sounds good.
 
I remember reading somewhere that a guitar part on one of the Zeppelin albums was recoded in a fire place. They put the amp outside on top of the chimney, facing down, and mic'd it from the fireplace. Nah - no drugs in THAT house.
 
That sounds killer Vurt. I'm puttin the ladder on the side of the house as we speak!
 
BigKahuna said:
I once tapped the woofer of my stereo speaker with a pencil and close-miked it to simulate a kick sound.
Click to expand...

No mic needed. You can actually just use the speaker inputs as an output directly to your board or soundcard. Tapping the cone with your finger makes a very nice "analog synth" thud - a little side action for the snare. Try the mids and tweeters too (be gentle). Swiping them with a paint brush or other such utensil makes a cool soft sound.

barefoot
 
vulcanofga said:
Try sampling or recording the sound that a crystal wine glass makes when it is rubbed around the mouth.Also add some of your favorite beverage in different amounts in several glasses for different notes.
Click to expand...

I have a song called The Infidel Acoustic with that wine glass effect in the chorus. :D

Another one my roomate stole from Robert Pollard is to have someone pound on your back rythmically while recording vox. It gives sort of a natural vibrato sound. Pretty Cool. :p
 
Close-mic whatever it is you're recording in or near the kitchen with mic #1.

Place mic #2 (preferably a small-conser/omni directional) in the sink.

Mix tracks to taste.
 
when you're done with that cardboard bong, tape the ends up with some seeds inside.....makes a great shaker that doesn't have the high end to rattle your signal off the charts.
 
Get several of the largest coffee cans you can get.

-Cut both ends off all cans.

-Tape the cans together in different lengths, 1, 2, 3 & 4, making tubes of different lengths.

-Put lids on one end of each can/tube.

-Tape all different lengths of coffee-can tubes together, with capped end of all cans flush with each other.

-This cluster of cans can be mounted to a simple music stand, or support.

-This is a coffee-can style drumset, and each different length of coffee-can/tube will have different timbre, up in the range of bongos or congas.

-You can use different radius cans for different sounds, too, large and small.

-All it takes is cans and tape, lots of tape.

-You'll want to save all the plastic coffee can lids, 'cause when using them as drum skins, they'll need to be replaced often.

-Believe me, I've done this, and it's acceptable as a drumlike percussive device, you can play with drum sticks.

-Hey, it's low budget, but I've been there, done that.
 
I posted this somewere else but you asked for tips.

Get some clear plastic sheets and place them on your screen over your spectrum anyliser and trace (with a texta color) the top shape of the curve and the outline of the anyliser pluggin and do it for each track. Then overlap them using the pluggin outline as a line up guide. Now you can SEE mud. And now you can much easily wipe the mud of your windshield, I mean earshield.

Us new pc screen button winders find many new ways to mix.

Wouldn't it be good if you had a spectrum anylizer that had 4 or 5 inputs that made 4 or 5 different color lines move. that would be so fuckn usefull. Wonder if there's already something like this. If not I just invented it.
 
My favorite studio effect

Hey all,

This was the "effect" I used more than any other in my studio:

- I had a cheesy little 10-watt guitar combo (50 bucks) which I put in a closet and permanently dedicated a SM-57 mike in there, miking the amp as normal. In my case it was a Fender Sidekick combo but it doesn't really matter what kind, although great if it has master volume, and the "tinnier" and "boxier" it sounds the better - don't use a really good amp.

- I then ran a cable from one of the console's effect sends to the guitar amp's input.

- The microphone cable was sent (through an available console channel) to the effects return.

I could now easily blend any track from tape, at any time, using the effect send, with the sound of the track running through the guitar amp.

Blending in a little bit "underneath" really fattens up the sound, giving it punch and earth - great for snare drums or whole drum kits, percussion, vocals, acoustic guitar, bass, keyboards, whatever. Sometimes I ran whole mixes through the thing, adding just a teeny bit of it underneath the "clean" mix.

If you wanna get extreme, mute the original signal and just use the one coming back from the amp. Or distort the amp. Experiment! To me the whole point was that by rigging this permanently, it was really easy to try out at any time, since there was no effort involved in rigging stuff up etc, just had to turn the channel's effect send knob, and there it was...

Sometimes it was really cool to run the whole drumkit through the amp - and in the beginning of the song, only use the return signal from the amp. Then gradually blend in more and more of the "real" drums, or just "turn them on" at the start of the first chorus or something. The layering effect can be really pleasing...

I originally just tried this technique as an experiment - but I never took the amp or the mike out of the closet again - used them all the time...

If I did this for several tracks in the same tune, I'd tape the effect return, which allowed me to fiddle with it further - eq, compression, effects, reverb, delay, whatever. Sometimes had to gate the channel to pull down some of the "sssshhh" from the amp.

Well worth the effort!

hope it's useful /Tommy
 
gnarled said:
Another one my roomate stole from Robert Pollard is to have someone pound on your back rythmically while recording vox. It gives sort of a natural vibrato sound. Pretty Cool. :p
Click to expand...

I'm not here to drink all your beer
in the fridge
in the room
in the house
in the place that we both so love

Good one.
 
Put an amp in a large cardboard box and tape it up.Close mic the outside of the box.Also you can cut a small hole in the box and mic the hole.Cover the small hole with wax paper or tin-foil and mic the results.
 
Vurt, That is the question that has been haunting mankind for years.
 
I have made some really unique sounding maracca shakers by using old empty
coffee cans and putting different stuff inside, like sand, small pebbles, acorns,
wood chips, etc. I have recorded some really neat sounds this way. Plus, all you
have to do to change the sound is take the plastic cover off the top and put new
stuff in.
Save those old coffee cans!!! I'm telling you, you will be able to make endless
"shaker" sounds!!!!

Keekwek
 
Put a few mobile phones up to your pickups for some serious radiation leakage. (if ringing or on line even better) then get the highest gain and treble settings as possible coming from a 32 x 12 cab. Crank up and melt your bassilar membrane. Yeah
 
years ago I started with a tascam 4 track casette recorder doing acoustic guitar and vocals.

For percussion I had a big metal coffee tin full of pennies, play on the top and the sides. Take pennies out or put more in for desired sound.

Another good one was a box of matches with the old sandpaper strip, not safety matches...and a plectrum. matches in one hand, plectrum in the other...shake, shake, SCRATCH, shak, shake, SCRATCH. sounds great with a bit of reverb

A vacum cleaner with a hose attatchment and the palm of your hand through a flanger with a long delay sounds good too.

spraying an aerosol can sounds awsome with a big hall verb, wear a dust mask if you're recording it in confined spaces. *NOTE* use an air freshner or deoderant, this WILL NOT WORK with cheese whizz!!
 
Always keep a water bottle handy

I was doing a radio commercial in which we needed to suggest the sound of high colonics (don't ask). Took a half-empty 1.5 liter water bottle tightly mic'd and sloshed it back and forth at the rate of someone walking slowly...most disgusting and convincing sound I've ever heard on the air.
 
Here's one

Get a regular old kid's latex balloon, a more or less round one that will be a foot or so in diameter when blown up. Put a couple of hex nuts in it, 1/4" or 3/16" will do. Blow it up and tie it off. Hold it by the tied end and swirl.

Try it, it's a very cool effect. I dunno what you'd use it for, though...
 
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