What would be the best mic for this situation

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Jyntzer

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Hey guys

This is my first post here but ive had a look around and this seemed like a good place to make my first post a pretty newbie question. So heres the situation, I looking at investing into some audio equipment for my studio, mainly for recording acoustic guitar and vocals. Im not doing anything tremendously fancy and would like to find something that wont really break the bank to awfully much. But heres the thing, I find that my vocals are much more in-tune with the guitar parts if I sing while im playing. As soon as i attempt to split the two, and sing the vocals overtop the guitar track separately i get really pitchy and it just basically sounds like crap.:D So the question is, what would be a good mic to use that i could sing and play at the same time into, but would pic up more vocals then guitar. I was thinking I could maybe multitrack, and using maybe an sm57 down by the guitar, and some sort of a condenser mic for the vocals, i could just multitrack the entire take at once. but that would involve some sort of a direct box that could handle two mic inputs. so, as you can tell, im kinda lost at the moment. any suggestions?

Thanks!
 
Try 2 57's. One for guitar, one for voals. Just get an interface with 2 mic inputs and Bob's your uncle!
 
After rereading, I thought you might be confused about the interface. A lot have 2 mic inputs and you can get them with 10 or even 26 mic inputs so you can record all mics at the same time onto different tracks in your DAW. Look at a USB interface or firewire if you have that. You can get a simple 2 channel/mic interface for under $100 and up. Here's one example but there are a ton to choose from
http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--MDOMOBILEPRE
 
i wouldn't suggest using a 57 on an acoustic. I don't think it would sound very good. A condensor on the guitar would be better and the 57 on vocals. There are some very affordable condensors on the market that will fit the bill.

However, with just a little practice, you'll be able to sing in tune with the guitar whether it's in your hands or listening to a playback.
 
An SM57 is a fine mic to have...but it wont bring out the best in your guitar...not many vocal mics to choose from for arround 50-100 bucks better than an SM58...maybe a used AT3035 for that guitar can be had cheap and its a really good mic.
A Line6 UX2 seems to be a bang for your buck champ at $200...and you will need an interface anyway.
 
Chili said:
i wouldn't suggest using a 57 on an acoustic. I don't think it would sound very good. A condensor on the guitar would be better and the 57 on vocals. There are some very affordable condensors on the market that will fit the bill.
Click to expand...

I agree - an SM57 has about a 10db increase in frequency response centered at 5kHz. That would take a good deal of warmth from the tone of your acoustic guitar.

I've gotten good results with AKG Perception mics. They're not near top of the line condenser mics but by using various micing techniques you'll get a good tone out of your axe. In a similar situation (tracking a cover of "Rocky Racoon") I used two Perception 170's in an X/Y config pointing at the general area of the 14th fret and a spaced pair of Perception 220's, one down by the body and the other by the neck. For the vocals I used a Rode NTK tube condenser. Now you can mix to get the colors you want from the guitar mics without worrying so much about vocal bleed.

In this sort of circumstance, remember you're capturing a performance. I've seen engineers use 10 mics in various positions around the room just to capture all the tones and build a palette to get just the right mix.
 
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I think that you will do yourself many future favours by working on being able to just sing to what you have already played. Practice can eliminate pitchiness. Believe me !!
This may seem really silly, but when I sing live, because it's virtually always been with a guitar, I've come to realize that I feel odd without it, certainly exposed. I would force myself sometimes to stop playing, letting everyone else carry on and I'd just sing. And think,' blimey, this is what everyone else is hearing !' But I worked on it. You can work on it....
Even if you still sometimes record vocal and guitar simultaneously, having the scope to go either way will do you no harm. While it can be true that many options = more headaches, the vice is also versa. Think of the harmonies you could try, the backing vocals, the leads etc.
The skies the limit ? Shoot beyond them, pal !
 
I'd think if you wanted to sing and play at the same time and also record that with a single mic, you'd want a decent large diaphram condensor mic. You don't need anything fancy and a pretty solid 100$ mic would be something like a Samson CS01. It can record a guitar and vocals and do a relatively good job on both for the price. If you were going with two mics for cheap I would look at getting that cheapo MXL package which I think comes with a 990 and a 991 for like 150$. You could easily record your guitar witht he pen mic and your vocals with the large diaphram condensor and get a decent reocrding. These are not good mics, but they have a decent performance/price value and if you're just looking to get the tracks down in a nice clean manner this would be an easy way to get started.
 
A 57 is a perfect mic for a general recording use of a band like in your example. It can handle high spl ans so it works well for recording anything loud like drums, bass, electric guitars. That said, it is capable of recording acoustic guitars and vocals, but it is in no way an optimal choice for recording just an acoustic guitar and singing. Large diaphram condensorm mics are going to pick up a lot more detail and have higher clarity. The 57 sounds great when it's used in band applications because you don't want every instrument in a full band recording to sound perfectly clear and up front. So, a 57 has a good way of capturing the idea without sounding perfectly clear.

-ryan
 
I agree with what someone said earlier- learning to sing after wards would by far be the best. It sounds like the problem you are having when singing after wards could be that you aren't hearing the guitar well. I've seen many "can't seem to stay on pitch" problems fixed by simple things like turning up the headphone volume, or panning guitar to one side and vocals to the other as you record. practice practice practice :)
 
So, when you get yourself a decent mic that can record both acoustic guitar and vocals with reasonable clarity (I won't go into this too much but I'm thinking a LDC rather than SDC) you record JUST the guitar on a first track - keep your trap shut and don't sing.....

Then, whilst listening to a smidge of just the guitar in your headphones, you set the mic up to sing (standing up preferably) and sing into the mic whilst playing the guitar a second time...

You need to get as much vocal in the mic as possible and as little guitar, but that will depend upon what you're playing, how loudly you play, what you're singing and how loudly you're singing...

So, you'll have one track with just guitar, and a second track with mainly vocals with some bleed from the second take on the guitar, which, if you're careful with phase, can be mixed together to get a decent outcome which may actually give you a better guitar sound because of the two takes than any single take will, given the level of your equipment.

You can thank me later... :eek:
 
I agree with those who say that a 57 is bad for acoustics and vox. But assessing the situation he doesn't want something fancy so why invest in cheapo condensers that will really suck and break faster just settle with two 57s or 58s and a interface you can't go wrong.
 
57's are great mics. however, if you are just going to be playing acoustic guitar and vocals, you might want to get the large diaphragm condenser.

explanation: more sound goes in. haha :)
 
Washburn100 said:
Try 2 57's. One for guitar, one for voals. Just get an interface with 2 mic inputs and Bob's your uncle!
Click to expand...

I agree. Sometimes a 57 can sound just fine on acoustic guitar. And if your room isn't good sounding, condensers pick up a lot of undesireable room reflections.

As for the "direct box" that can handle two channels-- research this link for the type of gear you'll need to do this:

http://www.tweakheadz.com/audio_interfaces_1.htm
 
in my opinion its always better to record guitar and vocals simultaniously, providing your not going to try and add much extra to it afterwrds. not for the sake of pitch but for the sake of fluidity. every perfformance of a song is slightly different and you want the vocals and guitar to flow with and be responsive to each other. as far as i'm aware i've never heard a truely great purely guitar and vocal recording/performance where the two have been recorded seperately.
 
i would use a samson c03 for vocals (great starter mic, and its really inexpensive) and a pair of samson c02's for the guitar (for stereo miking,do a search on here for that) or if you only have 2 inputs just use one c02 mic.

if you havent got an interface yet i would suggest the presonus firebox if you have firewire on you pc/mac or a similar usb interface. try m-audio, phonic, alesis..

also if you havent got a DAW try out Reaper as its very cheap (used to be free i think)


hope this helps
 
First, I pretty much agree with the Grim Traveller. Saying "I can't play and sing separately. It doesn't sound right.", is really a copout. What it says is, "I'd rather not do the hard work to become a real recording artist." Just do it. Did you play guitar well the first time you tried it? It's a separate skill, and it's one of the many things that makes being a recording artist different from being a stage performer.

Secondly, all this stuff about SM57 is so much hooey. There is *nothing special* about an SM57. It is a very ordinary cheap dynamic mic. It isn't any better than a Sennheiser e835, or an AKG D770, or for that matter, a Behringer XM8500. It does what a cheap dynamic mic does. Can you record vocals with it? Hell yes. Can you record acoustic guitar with it? Yes. Is it ideal for either one? No. It's good enough to be a standard on snare drum and electric guitar cabs, but any other decent dynamic can do that too. It does take EQ rather well. All I'm saying is that an SM57 is not an $89 magic wand.

That said, for fairly cheap, to do what you asked for, I'd try a CAD M179 on vocals, turned sideways, so that the guitar is right in the null field of the mic in figure 8. I have done this on a B.L.U.E. Kiwi and AKG C414 with success. For the guitar, I usually use a weird microphone that almost no one has, Shure SM82. In your case, I would spook around for a used or marked down AKG D3800 tripower, a hypercardioid dynamic that's real broad spectrum. It was intended as a high end vocal mic, but is too damned unforgiving for most folks to sing into. It rocks on acoustic guitar. The higher priced spread is Sennheiser MD421, which will get the job done, but isn't cheap. The all purpose badasses are Electrovoice RE20, and Sennheiser MD441 but they are even more expensive. For cheap on acoustic, the tripower will do much the same as a 421, which is very good. The MD421 is what the legendary SM57 wishes it was. That's the problem with legends. Like King Arthur, nobody's really sure if they are real.-Richie
 
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