Please Rip This Apart!!!

  • Thread starter Thread starter dumass
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That is cool (the 57 close and 012 distant) Be careful of phasing issues between the two mikes, but it will give a nice sound that you can blend to create a nice tone.

I Use marshal MXL 2001 for OH's and know one is the wiser. 1" Condensors sound good on Overheads. They mellow them out.


I would do the Oktava 319 Mike instead though for OH's

Smaller diaphragms tend to make the OH's sound thin and shrill in the very upper hi-end sometimes. Except the Neuman KM-84/184 and the AKG 451/461's

Bryan Giles

BTW I was not accusing you of crying, I have just heard people whine about cheap mikes and then I use the same crap and get a good sound. Placement is the key!!!. Even if the kit is not the greatest, tune it and use good heads and get the best sound you can out of it then go forth

I have hear a cheap remo set kill a poorly maintained pearl maple or birch set. Even a cheesy Tama set can kill a 5K set if you get the sound you want. Remember it is all relative.
 
"but yeah, thanks for your comments...i appreciate your help..but what do you mean about think SPACE? i'm still new at this.."

I think he's referring to two things...

Firstly stereo 'panning' in the mix. This means you don't leave every instrument coming out of 'the centre' of the hifi speakers when you listen. Instead you 'pan' each instrument to the left or right channell to a greater or lesser degree. So if dead centre is say 12 o'clock you might put the lead vocal there, but the backing vocal might go at 11oclock, the keyboard might be at 1o'clock, the overhead drum mikes might be at 9oclock and 3 o'clock respectively, and so on. The trick is so when you listen on headphones for example you can hear each instrument/voice in its own place like when you hear it in the practice room you may have the guitarist with his amp on your left side and the other guitarist o your right, with the drummer in front of you and so on.

The other meaning of space is to give each instrument its own 'sonic' space by use of eq (basicaly adjusting the trebble, middle and bass tones) to make each instrument distinctive from the rest. So for example although the kick drum and bass guitar are both bass frequency instruments you can adjust the tone of each so that when it comes to the mix you can still hear each one and it doesn't get hidden by the other. For example by adding some trebble to the kick drum you might add the 'click' sound to it which makes it stand out from the bass guitar. To achieve this you need to listen repeatedly to the overall mix (not just the individuial instrument in isolation) and see which instruments you are having trouble picking out. Try to work out why it is you can't hear the bass guitar properly for example, is the heavy chords guitar masking it, you may need to remove some bass frequencies from that guitar. These are the types of 100 and 1 decisions you need to make repeatedly until you can say the mix is complete. if you do things right at the recording stage then you can cut down the munber of problems like this that occur, but that takes lots of expereince.

BTW engineers always seem to recomend remove rather than adding tone. For example if you want a more clicky kick drum sound you'd take away some middle tone from it rather than boosting the trebble which adds noise to your recording. If the guitar is too muddy take away bass and middle rather than boosting trebble, and so on.


The result of all this is to make each instrument heard with its own SPACE in the final mix. if you don't do it, you will start to ask yourself why the rhythm guitar has disappeared from the mix, or why you can't hear the kick drum etc. reaching for the slider and boosting the volume is NOT the answer. If you succeed you will end up with a mix where each instrument is present and audible.

BTW I am only a learner too, and have picked up this advice from reading groups like this over the past 6 months or so and have put it into action with improved results on my own stuff.
 
I agree with M'que.

A great tune done with minimal equipment.

I might suggest you pick up the latest version of this book.

It contains invaluable information for the home recordist.

"The Muscians Guide to Home Recording" by McLan and Wichman.

It will help you with most of the critiques done here and help you personally with you recording and mixing.

Good Luck.

David Artis
 
hey man, i'm gonna take your side on this one...this recording sounds better than the stuff i did for my first few recordings...and i had better stuff..no offense to yours of course. Anyone who wants to flame me for this can go right ahead..I think "dumass" is on the right track! Keep rockin man..just keep rockin!
 
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