Stereo or Mono?

[Weird Musician]

About preferences in Stereo and Mono

When I watch TV, I'll I really ever had was a crappy Tv with mono sound out of a left speaker on the tv set, a while back I tried to hook up my computer speakers to my VCR to see what the sound would be like coming out of them, and it sounded all weird beinging in stereo, I guess for TV I was use to that Mono sound, but when I listen to anything else I perfer Stereo.

 

[esactun]

...bands that play in stereo are wasting their time. All that happens is the people on the right just don't hear whatever's panned to the left. Stereo only works if you're sitting in the sweet spot.

I don't think is is quite true. For perfect stereo and all those wacky effects (even John Denver did it on the intro to "Country Road"!), the sweet spot is necessary.
For "stereo" in a more general sense of the term, as in soundstaging, etc, "sweet spots" are not as well defined (or at least far larger--does this make any sense?). Some arrangements need to be a panned at least a bit so everything isn't stepping on everything else. Sound fidelity issues aside, compare some old big band recordings in mono to something like "Afro-Cuban Jazz Moods" by Dizzy Gillespie and the Machito Orchestra. The Diz record would suffer in mono, IMHO-- there's too much rich-sounding stuff going on for one channel, drums over here, percussion here and there, horn sections on either side, Diz dead center--it's a super record. I love the old big band stuff too, and I do marvel at how they could record such large bands and have everyone in them be heard.

And for modern heavy-guitar bands, stereo is necessary (at least for those with two guitarists). A one-axe lead-in to the next riff after a rest would sound so crappy in mono--like the volume got cut or the master suffered a drop-out. Having that one axe off to the side (not 100%, mind you!), leaving acres of sonic spaciosness to be filled by the other axe, the bass, and the drums when they kick in at the end of the measure, is just so incredibly powerful. And it gives the producer a chance to have something resembling dynamics.

With the jazz and the heavy stuff, I find that you get a at least a sense of soundstaging as long as you're in the room with the receiver, sweet spot or not. Sort of like watching a band from off to the side instead of dead center front row.

All that being said, crappy four-track recordings sometimes get new life in mono, somehow. (Phase issues killing all the crappy excess frequencies? )

Just a rambling 2 cents from a clue-impaired newbie.

 

[Lt. Bob]

Esactun, I agree that recordings sound better ( to me at least) in stereo. I was actually talking about bands who play "live" in stereo. I don't think in a club atmosphere that it's possible to achieve any sort of soundstaging as those sorts of things are rather delicate in nature although I do agree with all your comments as to the benifits of stereo, just not in "live" gigs. Once you get a bar full of drunks, the subtleties of panning and stereo 'verb tend to get lost.

 

[slkeen]

Anybody remember the quaraphonic scare of the mid 70s when all the stereo manufacturers were pushing quad sound? I never bought one of those systems, but it was an cool effect to listen to. The problem is you have to sit exactly in the center or it sounds all off balance. Stereo is the same way. My favorite chair is exactly center on the stereo. And now we have dolby surround and the 5.1 thing. I'm happy with stereo.

 

[Lt. Bob]

Yeah, slkeen, stereo is plenty. However I did have a friend with one of those Quadraphonic systems,....a good one. he had 4 Electro-voice Patricians and two red S.A.E.'s driving them. It was actually pretty neat. He had this one Hugo Montenegro record that did some awesome quad versions of Beatle songs. really fine but way too much trouble. I'd like a pair of Martin- Logans with Acoustic Research pre and power amps and a Simon Yorke turntable with a Graham arm. Ooooooo gives me shivers just thinking about it. Maybe we should start a poll asking what everybody's dream (cost no object) stereo system would be.


OOooooooo.....Simon Yorke...ooooo......

 

[strum4u]

Best Way to Enhance Mono Minidisk Recording?

This is an interesting post (Stereo or Mono?) While on that subject, could anyone eloborate on the best way to enhance a Mono recording in order to emulate some of the properties of Stereo?

I have some live material recorded onto minidisc in mono, and it's
lacking in dimension. The tools I have are a Roland VS-880EX, Cakewalk Pro Audio 9, ART Tubepac, RNC compressor, and the Wave/MP3 editing program, Clean 2.0, which has some type of surround sound enhancer, though I've yet to try it.

Can a mono recording turned into stereo using any of these pieces of gear?

How about recording the mono mix onto three different tracks in the VS-880 or Cakewalk, panning two of them hard left and right (with reverb), and putting the third track panned center, without effects?

Thanks for your help!!

--Glen--

 

[esactun]

strum4u:

I think (I don't have them myself) that the Waves native bundle has some sort of "stereoizer" plugin... ask around.
I know some editors like Sound Forge will have a "pseudo-stereo" effect, but I think (someone correct me if I'm wrong) it's done with phasing, which may not be the best thing to use.
Your panning idea is similar to something I tried once, and it just might work. I only used stereo reverb on the whole mono mix, and it works OK (esp. for that "fake live" sound; I wanted the whole track to be sham )

Maybe have the hard-panned tracks put into Cakewalk in two-channel mono mixed with a stereo reverb? Might be neat to have the left-pan track's reverb move to the right, and vice versa. If that turns out muddy, try the reverbs going out. I'd love to hear the results, however you try it.

Once you get a bar full of drunks, the subtleties of panning and stereo 'verb tend to get lost.

Absolutely! And chances are they only hear it through one ear since they're turned towards the girls they're trying to pick up. Or they're standing next to your buddy's cabinet and can't even hear the drums. And there's nothing like playing your ass off to only see everyone playing pool.

 

[Abbott]

can anybody tell me the names of the best outboard gear that does this stereo enhancement stuff your talking about preferably under 200...i have a four track, so no audio plugins and stuff like that

 

[spiral]

can anybody tell me the names of the best outboard gear that does this stereo enhancement stuff your talking about preferably under 200...i have a four track, so no audio plugins and stuff like that

As people mentioned before, it is cheap and easy to get a stereo reverb that has a mono in to stereo out. You don't need much to make it give it some space. If your machine has effects sends/returns then it will make your job even easier. I used to use the boss RV-3 stereo reverb/delay for that very purpose. Older stereo reverbs are cheaper by the day, stuff like the smaller lexicon rack units, alesis etc. Most rack multi-effects have stereo reverb. Does that make sense?