tips for tracking without headphones

[cordura21]

hi guys. I read in an interview is SOS on how Jamiroquai's singer likes to use monitor, not headphones, as loud as he can without getting into feedback. They also said that they used to put one of the speakers out of phase and things like that.
Can you give me some tips (mic placement, phases, etc...) to do it without mudding the track?
Cheers, Andrés

 

[TexRoadkill]

I wouldnt do that unless you have a whiny, high profile artist who insists on it.

But for general live monitoring you want to have the speakers as off axis to the mic as possible. I would only use one monitor speaker. Not sure about the phase problem.

 

[ap]

I apologize in advance if this is obnoxiously stating the obvious; but, it took me longer than it should have to figure it out, so I thought I'd go ahead and mention it.

I used to think it was impossible to go too loud or too much in the direction of the mic w/o feedback. Then I realized, duh, don't monitor the recorded track! Monitor the mix, but not the vocal part you're actually recording. Of course this means you can't hear your voice through the speakers, not to mention added effects, and you may get unwanted bleed from the mix on the take. It doesn't seems to matter with the stuff I do. Course, I'm not the most sophisticated guy in the world, so take this with a can a' salt until you try it.

I feel like I can get a much better feel for matching the vocal to the rest of the song. I like it much better than phones, or one-earphone-on/one off. Sting does it too, I think.

 

[Vurt]

ap, can you explain that again, this time in stupid man terms? I don't understand what you're talking about, but would like to. I think.

 

[axehead]

How strange - I was listening to Jamiroquai when reading this thread

This is what I think he's saying -

If you want to record your vocals, but you don't want to do it while using headphones to listen to the track you're recording too, you can instead listen to the mix through your monitors, but make sure to set up your system so that you are not monitoring your vocals - this is what would cause the feedback if you had the volume past a certain level. With that taken out of the equation, you can have your mix, minus the vocals, nice and loud on your monitors, and then sing into your mic.

I've tried this, and I must say I do prefer it to wearing headphones sometimes. The only thing is that fact that you get the bleed of the monitors.

 

[axehead]

This extract is taken from SOS:

Some singers just can't work with headphones, and in this case, the only alternative is to use loudspeakers for monitoring. This obviously raises the question of spill, but in situations where a modest degree of spill isn't a problem, you can get away with keeping the mic fairly close to the vocalist and setting up a speaker (or pair of speakers) behind the mic, in much the same way as you would live. You'll need to use either a cardioid or hypercardioid mic to make this work properly, and the monitor needs to be positioned in the 'dead' area of the mic, where it picks up little or no sound. It is also important to position an absorbent surface behind the singer, to minimise the amount of sound reflected back into the 'live' side of the mic. Even after you've taken these precautions, the monitoring level should still be kept as low as possible.

A more effective solution is to use the 'out-of-phase' monitoring trick, which involves sending an identical mono foldback mix to two speakers, one of which is wired out of phase with the other. If a microphone is placed anywhere on an imaginary line equidistant from the two speakers, the sound fields will largely cancel each other out, resulting in very little spill. The mic position is critical, and the best way to do the final adjustments is to listen to the mic channel using headphones while you play the backing track. As you move the mic, you'll hear the spill level change, and it doesn't take long to find the spot where there's minimum sound.

 

[Vurt]

Okay I get it, thanks axe. Although I don't like the whole idea, I might actually try it out with a guy who doesn't do well under headphones. Probably can't hurt too much on loud rock that sounds like shit to begin with.

 

[LLTA]

Thanks, Axehead

This works pretty well for me. I'm a bad singer, and hate recording with earphones. I don't have studio monitors, just a home stereo system. I switched the wires on one speaker and set the receiver on mono. Then I set up the mike away from them and centered. I still got a wee bit of the playback on the track, but nothing that would spoil the mix. The vocal was much better than what I was getting wearing cans, both the pitch and dynamics. Seemed a little more sensitive to the material, too. So, it works for me with my setup. BTW, with my low-end eqpt(TAXCAM Porta 02) there's no controlling the volume level of the track(s) being recorded through the phone output, so what you hear when you record is way unbalanced. And even with the ouputs turned all the way down, there's still some leakage into the phones(but not the line outputs).

 

[enemyofthesun]

This extract is taken from SOS:

you can get away with keeping the mic fairly close to the vocalist and setting up a speaker (or pair of speakers) behind the mic, in much the same way as you would live.

What does 'behind the mike' mean? Speakers towards the portion the singer sings into or from the other direction? I would think the latter..

 

[cordura21]

What does 'behind the mike' mean? Speakers towards the portion the singer sings into or from the other direction? I would think the latter..

I guess it's comparing it to stage monitors where it goes:

SINGER--MIC (pointing to the singer)--SPEAKER (POINTING TO BOTH)

That way you take advantage of the cardioid pattern of the mic (if it's a cardioid, that is, if omni then you'll have plenty of spill).

 

[TexRoadkill]

Ideally you would place the speaker on a stand so it is as directly behind the mic as possible and pointed in the same direction as the mic (at the singer).