Live Recording Techniques.....Help?

[Seafroggys]

So for my band's next gig, I thought it would be a cool idea if I brought my recording rig in and recorded ourselves. Its a pretty small venue, we've played there a week ago and all we do is mic the vocals and snare drum and bass drum through the PA and let everything else just breathe.

I'm not sure what the outs are on the PA mixer, I'd have to take a look. I have a Firestudio, so my options are fairly open. These are what I have in mind:

1: My first thought was to place two LDCs (my Rode NT2-As) in front of the band, and use those to capture the main sound. Run a stereo out from the PA into the firestudio, and add that as needed to add some cleanliness to the vocals and snare/bass. I'd probably run the Rode mics as cardoid instead of omni to prevent the sound from being too muddy.

2: Same setup as above, but run the mics through the Firestudio first and then out into the PA. Again, it depends on the mixer, and if the computer fails for some reason, the PA fails as well, which is what we don't want. This allows for further seperation.

3: Add a bit more. The bass amp has a lineout. I can put that into the Firestudio as well, I can run a pretty high high-pass filter on the DI, so that the clarity and tightness comes through without making the fundamentals and boominess overbearing.

4: Throw up a mic on the guitar amp and only run it into the Firestudio, in addition to the line-out from the bass. This will make the guitar and bass more defined and provides more seperation, but also makes the whole ordeal more complicated. At this point I would run my LDCs as omnis to get the whole room sound, since I can rely on the close-ups for the definition. In this case, the drums lose focus, since only the snare and bass drum are micced. I don't have any extra condensors to mic the drums, so I'd have to through one of my RODEs on the drums and leave one for a room mic.

For a first time live recording, considering its just a bar, I'm not going to go #4, but 1-3 are definite possibilities. What do you guys think?

 

[gecko zzed]

So for my band's next gig, I thought it would be a cool idea if I brought my recording rig in and recorded ourselves. Its a pretty small venue, we've played there a week ago and all we do is mic the vocals and snare drum and bass drum through the PA and let everything else just breathe.

I'm not sure what the outs are on the PA mixer, I'd have to take a look. I have a Firestudio, so my options are fairly open. These are what I have in mind:

1: My first thought was to place two LDCs (my Rode NT2-As) in front of the band, and use those to capture the main sound. Run a stereo out from the PA into the firestudio, and add that as needed to add some cleanliness to the vocals and snare/bass. I'd probably run the Rode mics as cardoid instead of omni to prevent the sound from being too muddy.

2: Same setup as above, but run the mics through the Firestudio first and then out into the PA. Again, it depends on the mixer, and if the computer fails for some reason, the PA fails as well, which is what we don't want. This allows for further seperation.

3: Add a bit more. The bass amp has a lineout. I can put that into the Firestudio as well, I can run a pretty high high-pass filter on the DI, so that the clarity and tightness comes through without making the fundamentals and boominess overbearing.

4: Throw up a mic on the guitar amp and only run it into the Firestudio, in addition to the line-out from the bass. This will make the guitar and bass more defined and provides more seperation, but also makes the whole ordeal more complicated. At this point I would run my LDCs as omnis to get the whole room sound, since I can rely on the close-ups for the definition. In this case, the drums lose focus, since only the snare and bass drum are micced. I don't have any extra condensors to mic the drums, so I'd have to through one of my RODEs on the drums and leave one for a room mic.

For a first time live recording, considering its just a bar, I'm not going to go #4, but 1-3 are definite possibilities. What do you guys think?

The key phrase is "for a first time recording".

Make your life as easy as possible, then work up to the complexities.

My suggestion:

1 Use the Rodes in an x-y configuration to catch FOH sound. I'm not sure how much freedom you have to position these, but I'd try for somewhere near a spot that forms an equilateral triangle formed by the speaker stacks and the mikes. I would also use an omni pattern.

2 Take a stereo feed from the desk. The desk feed may be deficient where on stage sound is of a loudness that not much is needed in the desk mix.

Depending on how far from the stage the mikes are, you may encounter synchronising problems (i.e sound reaches the FOH mikes later than it coes via the desk mix. So when you mix together, you may need to advance the FOH sound (or retard the desk mix) to get them in-synch.

As you noted, desk mix will provide clarity, FOH will deliver atmosphere; balance the two for taste.

 

[starbuck26]

I would do it in a completely different way.

I'd take the two Omni mics and do a 'loose' binaural recording. Place them 7" apart where someone would stand in the crowd, put them through a decent preamp, and then pan them hard left hard right in the mixdown. This is how i record my band practices... it's admittedly not the greatest, but does give you a pretty good recording.

Of course... you could make it MUCH more interesting if you duct tape the omnis to the skull of the hottest chick you know and record it like that.

I don't know how close you are with the venue... but if I went up and started asking the dudes I know at some of these boston clubs if I could snag a stereo out off the desk and then mic up the entire stage before a 45 minute act they would probably wind up shrugging their shoulders, huffing and puffing under their breath, secretly plan my murder, and then not book us any more.

So quick and easy is the method I would use.