Tune it or DIE!!!!! recording rant

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pipelineaudio

pipelineaudio

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This is another something I put on a local BBS but I think might be helpful here. You can show it to bands coming to you, so I can look like a dick, but still you get to tell themwhat they need to do without looking like a dickphor

Funny thing. Many times when a band is looking to book my studio, the first thing they ask is " whats the price ? " The fact that that should be near the LAST question they ask is for another discussion

My point is: IF you are worried about cost, then why the !@#$ mutha!@#$# goddamn ^%&* hell, would you blow most of your time on stuff that could have been totally avoided, saving you half the cost of making your record????

It makes me feel bad...VERY bad

Dont get me wrong, I dont mind taking your money, but I would rather be putting it into your album than intonating your guitars on the studio clock

OK, so even tho I will be loosing money from this, Im gonna put up some URL's that I hope will save you SERIOUS time in the studio, save you some money, get a better sounding product, AND hopefully youll learn that you can do most of this yourself( not to put any techs out of business,but...)

OK first of all intonation of guitars and basses. For those who have dealt with me before, I always warn about this ahead of time right? Well, many times Ill get in guitars and basses that are so far off any tracks they make will be unuseable, until they are repaired

http://www.virtualguitarmagazine.co.../Intonation.htm

thats a pretty good link. The gist of it is,
play your 12th fret harmonic,
tune it right to pitch,
now HOLD down the string on the 12th fret
check the tuning

if the fretted note is sharper than the harmonic, make the string longer, by moving the string's saddle AWAY from the neck

if the fretted note is lower than the harmonic move the saddle towards the neck

this can get tricky on floyd roses, but its something you ought to learn to do.

Repeat until the string is perfectly correct then repeat for the other strings.

ANYTIME you change string sizes, adjust the action ( string height), adjust the bow of the neck ( truss rod), and FOR SURE before you go into a studio, check the intonation. Weather can also play havok with this. You will be amazed just what your guitar can sound like properly set up

OK now, DRUMMERS!!!!

anyone who has worked with me knows what a drum nut I am ( tho Im actually a guitarist )

Drums will usually be the most expensive part of your recording session. For the most part the drummer MUST play the whole song right all the way thru, tho we know there are exceptions. Drums take the longest to mic and get tones for. If your drums arent up to snuff, or your drumming skills arent up to snuff, right then and there at the very beginning of a session, your album is already compromised. There is precious little to do to possibly make up for bad sounding drums or poorly played drums

ok first of all AVOID like the plague, drums that have matching dimensions. That means, if the kick drum is 22" diameter AND 22" deep, there are going to be problems. Not going to get into the accoustic theory, but matching dimensions are usually VERY bad news! VERY VERY bad news. The waveforms generated by such a drum tend to cancel each other out and have no " throw ". Even at the tuning point of maximum resonance these drums dont have much to say. A very popular manufacturer ( DW ) who used to, and many times still does, make excellent drums, is guilty of this time and time again lately. I dont know whats going on over there, but just because it says " DW " on it is no guarantee of anything!

Next, THROW AWAY the factory heads. I dont care if theyre on the bottom where they dont get hit, doesnt matter. These glorified pieces of Saran Wrap need to GO!

Unless you REALLY got confidence in the distant mic sound of your kick drum, make DAMN SURE theres a mic hole in it, and make sure it isnt too low to get a mic in...your live sound guys will also thank you for this

Take a VERY careful look around the drum for cracked screws, hardware, missing lugs, and loose anything...I kid you not, on more than one occaision drums have come in missing lugs, with the drummer unaware....I am NOT joking

http://www.drumweb.com/profsound.shtml

that link is great. You may agree or disagree with many of his findings and techniques, but they DO work, so its a good start...PLEASE if you are a drummer read that link

OK so we got the technical side out of the way, just as importantly ( perhaps more), is the performance side of this, but I'll leave that for next time

Aaron Carey
StudioZ/Pipelineaudio
www.studiozpro.com
pipelineaudio@angelfire.com
(602)954-6185
 
Can I make some suggestions too?

Itonation on guitars are never perfect, the notes can be farther out depending on what fret your at. Try having a guitar thats used for rhythm tracks to be intonated for that, and another guitar intonated so soloing around the 12th fret to the 21st or 24th fret sounds right. Learn how to do bends on a guitar that has a floyd, I hate bends that go flat because your bending by feel! And I recently mixed some songs I was the drum tech on 13 years ago, if the kick and snare aren't right..nothing is right. Im ashamed of the kick and snare sound of this band...the toms are great, the overheads..great, the snare...dull..dead, the kick...dead, lifeless...sounds like a dead body hitting a sand trap at a golf course! Never let a bad engineer ruin your demo. Its good thing I don't work there anymore:p

Tune it on your own time...Rehearse on your own time, write the songs on your own time. Show up...play your part and get the heck out of my time! ;)

SoMm
 
Good info. Thanks for taking the time. My elec. Guit. needs a new neck. Its intonation is horrible and they have already tightened the truss rod as much as they can. It’s freaking maddening & unusable for recording :(

(It’s an old Peavy Horizon II so I don’t know if I want to have a new neck put on it or just get a new guitar) :(
 
pipeline, repeat after me:

ooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
ooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
ooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
ooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....
ooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....:o
 
You are of course right that this stuff is extremely important to do before you go into a studio. However, I HIGHLY recommended that you go to a professional to have your guitar work done. We own tools you do not, and more importantly, we have experience you do not. If you are using a digital tuner, you will never get your intonation right. It is not possible. Digital tuners are accurate to within 1 cent. Strobe tuners are accurate to within .01 cents. The difference should be obvious. Unfortunately, strobes are quite expensive, and are only really needed for intonation work, so there is no real need for normal musicians to own one. There is a very real need for repair shops to own one. We also own tools for making Floyd Rose tremolos much easier to adjust, though they still cost more than other bridges.

Most important, though, is that we know what to look for. There are a number of quite serious problems which are not very noticeable to the untrained eye. There are also thing you can cause serious damage to by doing your own work. Truss rods are not that hard to break, if you try to adjust them your self. Many people erroneously think that you adjust the action of a guitar by adjusting the truss rod, this is NOT true. The truss rod adjusts the relief in the neck. The bridge and the nut adjust action. We have the right tools for adjusting the nut, and I would bet money that you do not.

Always remember this. It will cost you twice as much to have us fix your mistakes as it would to have us do the work in the first place.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi
 
Light said:
Long, but good post...
Click to expand...

Hey Light,

Just out of curiosity, since you sound like a guitar tech type person, do you have any idea what it should cost to put a new neck on an old (mid-80’s) Peavey Horizon II? I’m wondering if it’s worth the cost or should I just start saving my pennies for a new guitar (which will be a long while). I just got POD (for better or worse) and wanted to start recording some elec. gtr. parts, but mine just isn’t useable in this condition. Don’ mean to cause you a bunch of work, just curious if you would have a ballpark idea just to help me along in my decision making process. Thanks in advance either way. :)
 
I am not familiar with that spicific guitar. I mostly build, and the others in the shop do the repair work. (There are benifits to being the owners son). I am assuming it is a bolt-on neck. It would be the cost of the new neck plus the labor. Labor would include finishing, fiting, and seting up the new neck. I would expect the labor to be at least $300, and another $150-300 for the neck. This is a very rough estimate.

It may not be necessary to replace the neck though. Bring it to a good repair shop, and they will be able to help you.

For me, that was not a particularly long post, I am just a wordy bastard. It's a genetic thing.

Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi
 
Thanks man… I appreciate it. If it ends up being that kind of money I may just get a new one. Wanted to save for an American Strat someday, but may have to settle for one of the cheaper ones to get it done quicker, or check out other options, pawn shops, etc….:D
 
i beg to differ about the matching dimensions thing. there are a lot of drummers who record with matching dimensions on kicks an toms. i think they sound great!
 
I have to agree about the intonation of guitars, I've learned the hard way. If guitars arent set up correctly they sound like crap. Especially if you are trying to get any sort of harmonic effects or double leads. I often try for this type of sound with another guitarist and if one of our guitars is off even a little it comes out sounding like a couple of cats fighting instead of like music.
A point I have discovered about drums is that sometimes the ones that sound great at a live gig may not sound the same in the closed in environment of a studio, I can't explain why, it's just something I've noticed, of course it could just be the drummers that I've been working with. Maybe someone else can elaborate on that.
 
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