Monitoring equipment: some unconventional wisdom

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jeffree

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To anyone currently outfitting a low-cost home studio with monitoring equipment, you might want to consider my rather unconventional approach that works very well for me...

BACKGROUND
I've been a semi-pro studio musician (my part-time gig) for 20 years, and I recently set up my home studio with a Yamaha aw16g as the centerpiece. I read 100s of posts, especially at this site, and spoke with local engineers regarding monitoring equipment. In the end, after buying and trying quite a few products, I decided to do what many reading this might criticize:

***I set up my entire monitoring chain to sound the same as my quality home stereo. I decided to forget the "flat response at all costs" comments that swirl around these sites, and I tried something that just a few daring souls have mentioned: to emulate the sound of my pro home stereo system as closely as possible. And it works for me.***

MY RATIONALE
Yep, here come the arrows as I quietly proclaim that I started producing better (more transferable) mixes when I EQ'd my monitors and phones, as closely as possible, to my home stereo.
Using this set-up, it was a funny thing for me when--suddenly, overnight--my mixes sounded good on every system I own, including the car stereo and Walkman. When I knew what balance to target, I found that I could do so rather easily.

There is a catch, though, which nearly everyone agrees is key:
I spent hours listening to various types of well-recorded pro music on my home stereo and new monitoring system--to be sure of what everything *should* sound like on my systems. Then, I just made sure that these pro CDs sounded *the same* on my home stereo and my home monitoring systems, and the rest has been easy.

Needless to say, I've had to choose monitoring equipment that allows me to EQ the sound to meet my target sound: such items as M-Audio monitors (with their EQ fine tuning) and a headphone amp with EQ controls are keys in this process.

The cream on the cake here is that I can fully enjoy the sound as I record it and shape it to sound the way it will on most other systems. If it sounds good on my monitoring system, then it also will on my home stereo system... and, because I know these systems well, the sound will transfer will to other systems, too.

Well, I'm glad I got that off my chest. Now, I'll sleep better even
as others might launch the first arrows at my naiive (but successful for me) approach. Just remember, though, if you're considering my crucification, that I'm talking about a *low-cost home studio* in which I want quick, yet relatively accurate, results. When I want more, I pay the bucks and head over to
a full studio for their wizardry--they have the time and money
to take my work to another level. At home, unfortunately, I don't have this luxury.

Best wishes to you in setting up your own musical haven, regardless of which approach you decide to follow...

J.
 
Well... while I'm glad it works for you, I certainly wouldn't choose EQ phase artifacts, skewed freq. response, and added noise/distortion from additional gear in the signal chain over simply learning how to translate the unEQ'd monitors in the first place!

If you do a search - this topic has been covered to death already.... bottom-line is that it really isn't a good idea -- it generally does much more harm than good....

YMMV......
 
Have to agree with Blue Bear.

Proper positioning, and acoustic treatment will serve you better than EQing. Even with "cheapie" speakers.

I certainly would never apply EQ to my cans.
 
I know you guys are right, overall, but I hope any future readers keep in mind that I'm talking about a special case here: a busy recording musician who wants minimal fuss and maximum enjoyment while at home, and yet who wants a good decent mix at the end. I know my approach is unusual, but think of it this way... when I play, for example, Steely Dan's latest through my Yamaha aw16g , and either speakers or phones, I have the sound set up to be exactly what I prefer in my home listening--just the tonal balance to lay back and smile (not at the "flatness," but at the balance I usually prefer my favorite music to have). Then, when I record and mix one of my own pieces of music, I adjust everything to approximate the Steely Dan CD (or any of my many other pro reference CDs). In a way, for my needs, and on a budget, the whole process couldn't be any easier. And that's why I decided to throw the uncoventional process out here--others might be like me. They might want to experiement to see if such a simple approach (with its own internal logic) works for them, too. I suspect it will in some cases.

But if someone has more time and money to spend on the whole process, then yeah, by all means, do things more professionally, more technically correct, to achieve even better results. No argument there. OK, I'll shut up about it; I've made my point, but I would be happy to hear if anyone else has unconventional approaches to particular parts of the home recording process.

Best,

J.
 
jeffree,

I have a good idea why your method works well for you. You know (quite well) the sound of your home stereo and the sound of other CDs played in your stereo. You are simply transfering that to your studio monitor setup(which you have eqed to sound just like you stereo). You basically tuned your ears to hear what you like hearing in your home stereo to what your hearing in your studio monitors, and your mixes are transfering well...

However, as Blue Bear pointed out, you are adding phasing artifacts to your mix that you can bet your bottom dollar were NOT added to ANY Steely Dan release (or any of your other reference CD's you use)

A better approach is to get used to listening to your favorite CD's(the reference ones) flat in your monitors... Get used to how they sound flat, then try to emulate that! I think you will find that not only will your mixes translate well they will be tighter, more well defined, and better than ever...

give it a try

Shred
 
I really don't understand the point you're trying to make here -- or maybe it's just that simple.

It sounds like you're saying that you really don't care that much what it sounds like anyway. . . so any old method of monitoring should do, because if it sounds like ass, then so what (?). But to your delight, it doesn't sound as bad as you expect it to, so you're happy.

I don't see anything wrong at all with your method, provided playback quality and translation to other systems and environments isn't of prime imortance.
 
glad you unleashed this flood of wisdom

for us Daniel Son but if you look up a guy by the name of BORAY you will see that hes been preaching the home stereo for monitors jabber for quite some time now.
 
Maybe i'm missing something here, but wouldn't it be easier to just monitor through your home stereo, rather than buying monitors and EQing them to sound like your home stereo?

travis
 
Guys, I promise that this post will be my last on the subject since I just wanted to throw the possibility out there for others, especially newbies, who are deciding how to start. I suppose my
drive to mention this option comes from my notice of how many threads proclaim the party line, which is good advice but not necessarily the best for all. My approach is admittedly a poor-man's approach, a musician with even less time than money. Those of you with more time, more money, not to mention established studios, obviously wouldn't consider my option. But I have a sneaky suspicion that if you did, you'd be happier with the results than you now imagine.

But before I shut down here, I do need to respond to a couple of points raised:

* Do my mixes sound like shit now? Absolutely not. That's my biggest point. I'm having a much easier time mixing a song (in a short time, hours not days) with this approach than with my old
non-EQ'd system (including active Alesis Ones, MK II). Of course, like with all monitoring, there's no shortcut for taking the initial time to listen to pro reference CDs very carefully to understand my targets. Now, my mixes are quite good (I'm not trying to argue "brilliant" here), consistent, and transferable--not bad for a relatively cheap and quick approach. And as a 40+ year-old musician who has made good money as a session guy through the years, I'm not stating these points lightly. I've learned at least something about studio recording during these years.

* Could I just use my home stereo? Good question that made me pause until I remembered what happened when I tried this: my
Yamaha aw16g cd-drive did not have the same tonal balance as my home CD player. Thus, I'd still need to set up separate EQ settings for my Yamaha to get the sound to match my preferred
home stereo sound.

If anyone's still considering my advice, now or in the future, let
me close with the simplest justification of why I believe I'm having luck with this unconventional set-up. In my professional work, I'm a linguist at U of California, and we often use imitation to
teach folks to learn foreign languages. I'm finding the same type of imitation to be helpful in my home studio: I try to make my own mixes sound as similar as possible to those pros I admire...
from Pat Metheney to Steely Dan to Special EFX to Chick Corea to Bill Bruford, and on and on, depending on the music I'm recording.
And the set-up I'm using now allows me rather easily to switch between CDs--mine and theirs that I know so well--and notice
the similarities and differences while making the necessary adjustments on the fly. And all of this very quickly to produce a relatively solid mix that flows sonically well from these pros' CDs even when played back-top-back with mine on my CD players.

In the end, as some of you here at this site have reminded me... if it works well for me, or for you, than that's the bottom line. I'm keeping this as my mantra while seeing what other "rules" I can break in my coming years of recording. It's kind of fun, and I hope you won't hold it against me if I share my enthusiasm sometimes, regardless of how odd it might seem... or might, in fact, be...

Peace,

J.
 
J., as chessrock said, "so you're happy". If this is truely the case, then you, my friend, have succeeded in your journey, and will more than likely be more satisfied with what you are doing than a lot of folks trying to do the same things, ie. play and record your own music at home.

When I finally came to the realization (quite a while ago) that all I would ever be is a half-assed musician, and then after spending a few thousand bucks, realized that I would only be a half-assed homerecorder, and figured out it was way more important to make my own music for the pure enjoyment of it, and to play music with my friends, I found out what makes me happy.

Dan
 
Beautifully expressed, Dan. I think we can extend your thought in some ways to life itself...

J.
 
I, for one, appreciate your thoughts. I think that there are alot of people reading this forum who are a one-person-show....meaning that there isn't anyone else around to run a board and pay attention to the sound going to tape. I have alot of trouble with thinking that tracks sound good as I record them, then hating them later when I'm putting them together.

I'm sure that I only have myself to blame for this. But I'm never going to have a control room with total isolation, flat monitors, and the flexibility to get *just* the right mic placement...I am forced to monitor with cans, and very close to the source. So I appreciate the spirit of your post, it's interesting to think about.
 
smtcharlie said:
I, for one, appreciate your thoughts. I think that there are alot of people reading this forum who are a one-person-show....meaning that there isn't anyone else around to run a board and pay attention to the sound going to tape. I have alot of trouble with thinking that tracks sound good as I record them, then hating them later when I'm putting them together.

I'm sure that I only have myself to blame for this. But I'm never going to have a control room with total isolation, flat monitors, and the flexibility to get *just* the right mic placement...I am forced to monitor with cans, and very close to the source. So I appreciate the spirit of your post, it's interesting to think about.
Click to expand...

I'm alot like that myself, although I did buy some monitors. I figure I'm too old to be a rock star. What with all these young whores out there now a days willing to beat there heads against the wall for a few scraps. For me it's just a hobby as I'm sure it is for lots of folks here. So I say mix any damn way you want. If it makes you happy and sounds good to you more power to ya.
 
I appreciate your comments Jeffree,

There seems to be a dividing line on alot of these issues from my reading.

Some of us (me included) have no expectations, illusions or aspirations of producing a truely professional ready for mastering and mass producing project.

I never want to do it for money or for a career and I can't justify spending multi $1,000 of dollars when I have no intention of recouping the cost financialy.

What I would be able to do is record some decent demo quality songs of my self and friends and maybe someday produce demo's for some local groups of my choosing.

Your ideas seem like they work for you at this level.

Then we have "Home Recorders" here who are doing this for a career and work very hard at their craft and have very different standards. I have learned a great deal from them and respect their opinions and specifically Blue Bear has been most gracious when I have asked Newbie questions as a newbie.

It does seem to me that their admirable dedication to the standards of their craft lets them see only one truely "professional" way to do things.

I am glad "Pro's" hang out here and have their standards and commitment to quality...those are the people I want to work with if I am trying to make a pro release and I want to learn from.

But as you said when you want a pro studio result you go to a pro studio.

When you want a quick home mix that consistantly transfers well to what you want it to sound like...you have found a less expensive method that works better for you.

I don't see that spending hours learning to adjust your ears to mix on ruler flat monitors is going to benefit Jeffree unless he wants to be a pro engineer and I did not get the impression that is where he wants to be.

I just think we as a community can better serve each other if we realize some of us have no intention or interest in going pro...but we wan't to get as close as we can get with what we cna afford to invest in this home recording hobby of ours.
 
The bottom line is........

What ever works for anyone at any given time!
 
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