51m0n

24bit audio has more 'wiggle room' than any analogue circuit short of a straight fat short piece of wire. There is [b][i]no[/i][/b] excuse for clipping in digital with 24 bit recording at all. I can record drums with more than 12dB of headroom at 24 bit, garanteeing no overs, no intersampling clipping, absolutel nothing However the sound of analogue is definite and real if we are talking about tape, then there is a definite and real sound to pushing tape a bit, the saturation and gentle compression that results is definitely really nice, especially on drums. Actully go over the top with it though, and it rapidly starts to sound no better than digital clipping.

[quote name='billyapple' timestamp='1339351150' post='1687288'] +1 X Loads.. A super ace gig, completely hat-stand... Mine's a treble Mr Venom!... I think the pony-tailed rear-head is 51m0n... [/quote] Yup thats me. No not the loon on the bar in stockings (Monsieur Venom at your service), I am the far more pedestrian and hirsute chap on the left with pony tail. Proper proper mental gig, the last time I shook my tail feather was at a New Model Army gig, this was of similar awesomeness in order to make me get in the wee little wobbling wreck(ette) that developed at the end. Of course NMA didnt have a theremin (gotta love a theremin) or a stocking clad lunatic of a frontman, and their guitarist is no where near as easy on the eye! Brilliant brilliant fun, thanks for coming all the way down to Brighton to entertain us so much! Next time I can see I'll need to get the hair sorted into a proper psychobilly quiff, there's enough of it!

Quick work on the new drummer situation old bean, well done!

Excellent listen that, cheers!

Amazing, amazing team behind MJ on OTW and Thriller (and Bad). QJ is a ridiculously amazing arranger, well known stories of him writing out arrangements the night before on a plane to a TV studio without any way of hearing them, and they were perfect etc. Dont forget Bruce Swedien either though, he had a massive massive input into the sounds of those albums, google for "The Acusonic Recording Process", a method invented by BS to allow him virtually unlimited tracks on a couple of analogue tape machines whilst playing the original master tape thefewest possible times before mixdown. Or his selection of ribbon mics for the metallic percission on Billie Jean or Beat It (cant remember which off the top of my head right now, could have been a completely differetn track) as ribbons dont reproduce transients as accurately (the ribbon itself has too much mass to respond quickly to that fast a transient) effectively becoming a physical limiter,. smoothing out the sound and allowing for them to be louder in the mix without dominating when it came to mix time. Another cracking story is that they went through something like 90 mixes of Billie Jean before going back to mix 2 and going with that one! Outside the world of mix engineers and sad pale be-ponytailed sound engineer geeks he doesnt get nearly enough recognition IMO....

Single ply batter heads, no resonant heads on the toms (even the floor tom) or kick. Use some tape and cotton pads to control tom ring (esp floor tom). Tape up the lugs where the bottom head screwed in to stop rattles. Take a tea towel (or two if hes a nutter) and put them [i]inside[/i] the snare (literally take off the snares & resonant head, tape a tea towel in there so an inch is pressed into the batter head, and a couple of inches are going to rest against the resonant head when it is replaced), really you can get a super tidy snare sound, but you have to be very careful with placement of the towel, its time consuming, sticking it in place will kill a lot of volume etc. If this goes wrong halfway through the gig the drummer will impale you on a stick as the entire towel falls onto the resonant head and his £500 snare goes from a nice but quieter [i][b]whack![/b][/i] to a pathetic whup... Use a towel with about 2" to 4" of overhang onto the kick batter head, then mic up the kick (it will be so much quietr that you will be able to do this. Tune the kit to its absolute lowest resonant frequency, it will sound bigger,m but project far less when attempting to get as low as possible for each drum, Bob Gatzenburg does a good series on this on youtube. Do it right and the kit will sound fine, but you get to watch your drummer having a hernia trying to achieve the usual face melting volume from the kit. He will hate it, until you mic it up to get it loud enough. On its own he will struggle to make a dent in a loud conversation at a bar...

Up until the word cheap I was in a general agreement with you. A well set up good quality rack compressor in the fx loop of your preamp should be able to be set to just limit the transients that are causing you grief, and also allow a bit of general compression to get you level general more even without you feeling the effect on your playing style, in other words if you can feel it or hear it then its too much! You need to address the gain issues all the way down the signal chain though, there is no point compressing something after its caused an issue. If you provide a decent signal to the soundguy, compressed or not, he should then be able to take appropriate action to make it work in the mix (assuming he has enough time in the soundcheck).

Sounds like a lot of wiring! You running in any ethernet in there?

Yup I concur, excellent gig, thoroughly entertaining band, brilliant atmosphere and great choons (theremin for the win!)

Super duper! Should be along around ten....

[quote name='lettsguitars' timestamp='1339167497' post='1684782'] What? naked nurses? I'm there! [/quote] Ding dong......

Damn, she makes that look disturbingly easy doesnt she!

Okeedokee!

Sure its not the natural ringing decay of the drum? Bonham's kit wasnt exactly dampened for a start! In fact you'll probably find all the toms ringing sympathetically to the kick drum....

That'd be down the road from me that would. See if I can make it too....

Jeez, thats just not on, and yeah their studio was totalled not long ago at all....

Budget would be a good guide here! But if it were me I would look for an [url="http://www.rme-audio.de/en_products_babyface.php"]RME BabyFace[/url] just simply because their drivers are without doubt the best for PC, their preamps are very clean, and their sofware very polished. Not cheap, but not mega expensive as these things go.

Yeah, everyone will be stopping for some reason. Really coming on though, starting to get a bit of a feel for the space, that window wis going to give you a huge view, brilliant!

[quote name='Chris2112' timestamp='1338411276' post='1674309'] Just remember, Anthony Jackson got turned down for a gig once because he uses a seat whilst he plays. If Anthony Jackson can be snubbed for a gig it figures that we will all be mugged off by an idiot band leader at some point. [/quote] He did it [i]all [/i]the pies first though..... I still haven't forgiven him, greedy beggar!

Point to note, a 6 string bass with 24 frets has a wider range than a 6 string guitar with 24 frets..... Guitars have frets and so cant produce a true gliss either.... Harmonics on electric bass sound far better than harmoincs on a guitar.... ELectric basses (sorry ERB) tend to be active and so tend to be able to produce a more even signal for effects... The list goes on and on!

Timing and consistency. Two things that seperate really fantastic studio/live pro players (ie players who get paid to play for people rather than players in bands) are they absolute own the groove, spend a lot (I mean a lot!) of time with drum breaks/metronomes whatever really slow tempos etc etc, Wooten goes into a lot of ways to do this, playing with the metronome coming in on usual points in the bar (ie beat two 4th semiquaver at 80bpm) so that you make the groove and it just reinforces it. Playing the same groove for 5, 10, 15 minutes. Yup relentlessly holding down a groove, I mean relentlessly. No mistakes allowed, no deviations, no fills, nothing. The groove equivalent of just a minute. Will hold you in very very very good stead in the studio. Improvisation with others, the opposite of the above, which leads on to the other hands down massive diff between great pro players and 'the rest', your ears. Work on interval and chord recognition, singing what you want to play, then playing it, etc etc etc. If you cant listen to a bassline first time out, and play it back on the instrument pretty much straight away there is room for improvement - I wouldnt have believed this myself until I saw JakesBass do this a couple of years ago at a Bass Bash, and he does sessions in Abbey Road (I wonder why they book him, and not me?). Working as a small cog in a big wheel. Get used to it, you are a sideman, that is your role, work on your people skills, this is what gets you a gig over and above the obvious can you play. Improve your listening to people, and 'getting' what they are saying. Just thinking about it is a start but tomes have been written on how to be a team player, and not in a pure music sense. That leads on to networking skills, if people dont know you exist, you wont get hired, get out and get playing in bands, get your name in peoples heads. Play live - a lot, more than once a week for a year if possibly can - any gig in any genre, you need to have a hadle on anything from skiffle to death metal, who knows who mmay be looking for a bassist? Stu Hamm used to have a different warddrobe depending opn the genre of gig he was auditioning for - its good advice! Live gigs are especially good if its in front of musos, they can be very very harsh critics - once you realise they dont hear the mistakes in your playing you do the fear will melt away, and the confidence will shine through you. Its a self perpetuating state once you are there. Work on your knowledge of the business, how tax works for the self employed, what and how you can claim against it etc etc. Just a few ideas....

[quote name='ironside1966' timestamp='1338390602' post='1673799'] I must confess .... ....take rejection of their Ideas and visions for the music [/quote] This is exactly what I mean. Well said.

You guys never rocked out to the point where you banged your bass on something, had a singer/rhythm guitarist/audience member land on you and knock your vass out of tune then? Wow....

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1338379526' post='1673513'] Bang on, well said. [/quote] +1