51m0n

100% pure awesome Gong lady the juggly woman is my favourite....

[quote name='Chrismanbass' timestamp='1362079470' post='1995536'] cheers mate the reason the snare sounds snappy is cos its a sample snare i've hardly got any compression on the snare at all but besides that thanks for the advice simon where are you thinking theres slapback on the vocal? i've run the effects track through a phaser might be what your hearing? [/quote] Aha then it wasnt always getting triggered off the snare in the track - have another listen, there are a few 'missed' snares that are there in the OH but arent coming through with the sample...

Right here are my thoughts as I listened through the mixes. Its not very well written, and its pretty abrupt, but first impressions are everything in this game I think, listen too much and any amount of awful can start to sound good. No offence intended to anyone, I really think the level has gone up a whole big step this time around from everyone involved! [b]SKOL[/b] Muffled kick and bass Bright and rather 'small' snare Lead vocals need a bit more presence Guitars nicely present and wide but extra parts dont 'jump out' as much as I'd like Bvs nicely placed [b]OLDG[/b] Slightly over compressed snare, kick is good and punchy, not big enough? Certainly pokes through, and competes with the bass though. Bit more EQ and that would be bang on! Nice bass sound there, gets a little lost against the guitars unfortunately Harsh funk guitar Trashy hats, they sound a bit 'pumpy', is there a compressor threshold/release or gate threshold/release thats opening and closing around them on something like the OH a bit? Some phase oddness perhaps... Very present guitars, nice, but maybe just bordering on the fizz I dont dig so much. I think you get away with it in the main. Slightly middy vocal? Dry - where is the sense of a space? [b]CHRISMANBASS[/b] Slapback on vocals? Bit odd Over compressed snare - gate threshold not right, its dropping some of the lighter snare hits (which is an unforgivable crime!) Thwacky nasty kick too middly - EQ far harder!! Guitars present - very dry not too bright though - nice! [b]LURKSALOT[/b] Kick needs a lot of work, eq pull out the mids a lot more to get some thump and slap (boost around 4KHz) Big reverb, early reflections too loud adding a slapback delay on lead vocal (which has a little too much low mid) Guitars could be even wider, maybe the verb pulling them central Bass sound is nice especially in mellow middle section! Better and better though Lurks, definitely moving in the right direction on this one.. [b]MOONBASS[/b] Guitars could be wider at the begining but it works ok as a feature part I think. Kick drum rather muffled, needs more click to back up the bass, I want to hear and feel every single kick, a lot of the lighter kicks are lost completely in the murk I think. Bass a bit wooly for me in the loud parts, there is such a good sound in there, then in the mellow bit you can really hear that groink. Super work on the guitars in the mellow bit, nice modulation! Love the fade in on the bass part(?) at the end of the middle 8 Lead vocs are good and forward, a little too bright maybe (tad harsh in the loudest parts is all) Clap could sound a bit more cracky, and some (more) ambience on it woudl give it a tail that would emphasise the entire snare, tricky to do that right though. Good mix overall though, some very good ideas, just all a bit congested in the low mids in the rhythm section I think. [b]BUTLERK02[/b] BIIIIG KIICK! Bit too much adds some mud with the bass Very dry, hats swishy swassshhhy, need to control that better I think (hint high shelf eq on the top snare mic set to -12dB and roll the frequency down from 20KHz until you get the perfect blend between the snare and hats) Good snare though, woody Lead vocal a little low mid heavy? Guitars are spread really well and very crisp, gives masses of room for the vocals, nice work! The lead parts are bordering on fizzy for me though, which I absolutely hate. Need to hear that lovely bass growl a little more in the main verse chorus sections I think, sounds so good in the mellow part after all! Great bvs! [b]VASDIM[/b] Snare is a bit muddy, full though, its overpowering the kick drum rather plus the toms are in another world from the rest of the kit! Guitars are nice, good control of the extreme top end, no fizzzzz Funk guitar is a bit loud and full for my liking Lead vocal is a bit heavy in the low mid too, wonder whether your monitors are light in that area and you are mixing to compensate? Like the guitar treatment in the middle 8. Very very dry, there is no ambience or sense of space to speak of, which is preventing cohesion, there are a selection of instruments playing at the same time, but not necessarily in the same space I think? [b]VIRTUALLY EVERYONE [/b](not trying to teach anyone to suck eggs, this is just what I felt from listening to all these mixes) ...had the snare roll too loud out of the middle 8 for my liking, really felt that absolutely had to fade in, listen to my mix where its all reverb and room at the beginning of the snare roll and the actual snare drum fades in as the roll goes on, its like the drummer walks right up to the vocalist from about 50 yards back during that roll, made it far more musical for me. Also I cant stress how much I felt this song needed to sound huuuge in a massive place, arena sized and then some, and every mix here (other than mine) sounds like its either very dry or has a reverb with a ton of early reflections on it making it sound like its in a very small space, in some cases we are nearing John Lennon levels of slapback delay, and that very rarely sounds good (it didnt for him either IMO ). I think that is what sets my mix apart from the rest, the band are in a huge space for a huge pop rock song. Its not a very popular thing to do these days I think (use that much reverb), although apparently reverb is coming back in these days, but it still sounds totally epic compared to the ultra tight bright mixes that I think are generally easier to produce (reverb can really overpower you need to absolutely pick the perfect one and tweak it and filter it to get this sound right) and end up sounding far less dramatic. One trick is to use a plate reverb on the vocal (but its got to be the right plate) since they tend to allow the vocal to sit forward even though there is a ton of reverb on them. The snare in my mix is backed up by a very very wide plate reverb that fills in the back beat, its a neat trick for getting a weedy snare to sound bigger without resorting to 80's gated reverbs (which I hate). IIRC there was a third reverb, and a stereo panned delay on the mix too, all helping to make a big airy sound that joins everything else up. Tricky though, I still cant decide if the guitars arent a tad too far back as a result, but the song does sound big, thats for sure. Of course mine isnt the song writer's favourite mix so what the hell do I know , very well done Moonbass for realisisng the mix the closest to how the songwriter imagined it should be. No small accomplishment that! Dont be afraid to use massively enormous eq cuts on the drums, these were immensely uninspiring sounds as tracked, and the kick in particular needed gobs and gobs of eq cut in the mids to get it to sound remotely like it needs to to stand its ground against the bass and snare. When a sound is gash do whatever it takes to get rid of the awful, and what is left will be at the very least usable IME. Having said all this and sounded maybe a bit negative I do think that the quality of the mixes has gone up a notch all round this month (possible exception being Skol, but he did his in about 5 minutes so thats only to be expected really!). Really really well done to everyone. I havent voted, I would have voted for mine, really because I think its one of the best mixes I've ever done for capturing a song in a space, and by gum thats a great bass sound (I also think I dealt with the 'damaged' drum tracks really well too), I am totally chuffed with it. But in my excitement to realise the mix in that big space I missed what the songwriter wanted completely it seems. Never mind! It has been an absolute pleasure mixing this track, its a great song, and I urge you all to buy the album too, this is not a great song standing alone by any means!

Voting ends tomorrow evening, would appreciate some more input chaps...

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361970151' post='1993760'] Well my current interface was only £45, and you'd be hard pushed to find something cheaper than that. If i was to get a Behringer Xenyx with 4 faders (which would be 8 channels, wouldn't it?) that would be the best part of £100. I'm going to start investing in stuff. Might start off with the DI and mics. Then get the interface and everything else i need after. [/quote] 4 faders = 4 channels For the money the mic pres will be dog poo, the drivers will be no better, it will be utter utter rubbish. It will not help you reach your goal, it will hinder you. You really get what you pay for with this kit. All the prosumer stuff will do an okay job, none of it, regardless of it being called a goldendoohickey[b][i]PRO[/i][/b] is in any way a professionals tool. A serious interface will cost way North of £500. For 8 channels. The best 2 channel interfaces on the market are the Apogee Duet (Mac only) and the RME Babyface. Best you sit down before you take a look at the prices I'm afraid.... I've spent years battling cheaper interfaces at home (rather than decent kit when working in studios), and can honestly say I shouldnt have ever bothered. Time to get the paper round money together, if you are looking to be able to easily produce a good quality product you need a decent interface with low (or no) latency. It must have great drivers, it must have great mic pres (or at least very very good and very clean), it must have great AD and DA conversion. If you have pants driveers you will spend more time foghting the interface than recording, if you have pants mic pres it wont matter what mic you record with, or how you place it, it will never sound great, ok yes, not great, if your ADA is to cock you wont translate what you record to the harddrive properly, and you wont hear what you put down before properly -either of which will ruin your work. On top of this you will need some reasonable monitors, good tracking headphones, and the afore mentioned mics, well set up and maintained instruments with new strings, a [i]huge[/i] amount of time, andthe burning desire to get this done, because it will take you at least ten times longer to do a great job than you currently think. On a positive note, when you do get that result you will be so chuffed that you will listen to it for a month non-stop, and play it to everyone, and they will actually want to hear it....

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361969083' post='1993733'] Ok, what do you recommend? My teacher uses an EBS DI/preamp. It's rockin'! [/quote] [b] [size=3]BSS Ar133 Di Box[/size][/b] [url="http://www.studiospares.com/di-boxes/bss-ar133-di-box/invt/431310/?VBMST=DI%20box"]http://www.studiospa...?VBMST=DI%20box[/url] His EBS DI/preamp is a preamp first and a DI second, hence the DI isnt as good (clean, uncoloured) by its very nature.

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361964491' post='1993625'] Em, i had kind of already thrown out the room mic and second head ideas. My cab is posted at the back though, so to get any ported sound at all, would i not need to either have a mic at the back, or very far in front? [/quote] Okay - but for close micing a cone an LDC is not required, or often desirable (it can be used - but a really good LDC is mnassively out of your budget) So SDC or Dynamic? Dynamic is the norm, an SDC will do it though. Again not all SDCs are equal, a good one (the CM3 for instance is the cheapest really really good cardioid SDC available that I know of) is going to set you back over £100 A good enough dynamic will be less. Forget the port, it is flawed as hell compared to the DI low end, the interesting colour is almost always in the midrange anyway - right where the cone is putting out frquencies and your dynamic cardioid mic is good at capturing them - so dont bother trying to mic a port, DI instead for that bottom end. A good DI is over £100 too. Yes there are cheaper ones, but you already said you dont want this to sound cheap. Get a good workhorse DI, not some crappy Behringer rubbish that does all sorts of unnecessary stuff (ooh look its got eq and drive - crap unneccessary waste of money - ignore it at the price range you can entertain, yes I include all the bass preamp floor boxes with a DI thrown in to this comment, they are gash for what you are doing, do not let the bells and whistles seduce you). [quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361964491' post='1993625'] I was thinking of more going down the route of micing the cone and also taking a DI from the head (saves me needing to get a DI box) and then blending them in the mix. I need to learn how to match the phasing though. I know that's important, but i don't know how to. I'll read up on that. [/quote] Good, mic the cab. Bad dont DI from the head, it is not adding anything useful where you need that DI signal to be helping your bass sound that you cant do far better at mix down with decent VSTs - you do have a computer capable of running some decent softweare and reasonable VSTs at this point dont you? [quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361964491' post='1993625'] Another thing i need to record is my acoustic guitar. I would need a condenser mic for that, won't i? (as well as a decent room to record it in). [/quote] OK, CM3 is king for that at the price, a Little Blondie is more natural close miced (no proximity effect being omni) but your room wil put the kybosh on the recording of an acoustic guitar with an omni (why? source is low level, omni picks up the room as much as the source, by definition, crap room = crap result). CM3 is about £140 on its own, so maybe the t.bone stereo set will help at a much lower budget. Condensors do acoustic guitars far better than dynamics as a rule. Although a dymanic on the body and a condensor further up toward the neck can sound ace on acoustic guitar. Position is ultra critical for acoustic guitar, be ready to spend an afternoon just getting the mics in the right place. Seriously...

Also your first recordings will be almost certainly be pants, dont think for a minute you are going to light the world up on your first attempt to capture bass really well, its not that easy Work at it and you will get better at it, it isnt going to happen over night, there are so many variables here, for one thing you seem determined to add more than you need. This will only make it sound worse....

All the more reason to get it right. If you mic the cabinet within a few inches of the cone then the room wont make much difference. It will still make some difference though. However we were talking about an LDC a few feet back off the cab. At that point you are introducing a huge amount of room into the sound that that mic picks up. There is such a thing as critical distance in recording. This is the distance from the source in a room that a mic on that source picks up the reverberation from the walls of the room as loudly as the original signal, any further away from the source and the mic is picking up more room than source. It sounds like crap on almost everything to do this unless you want to do it as an effect. On a bass it woudl be an absolute disaster. So, you want to mic closer than the critical distance, with an omni mic or fig 8 mic you need to be a maximum of half the distance from the critical distance to the source. With a cardioid mic you can get away with 2/3rds of the critical distance. However in a little untreated room with parallel walls (hmmmk abedroom perhaps) you will find the workable distance is as little as 2 or 3 feet, quite often far less. You find the critical distance by setting up your source to be playing sound and moving the mic away from it whilst watching the meters. When the meters stop getting lower as you move away (and even get higher) you have hit the critical distance. If you close mic a cab you will not get the sound of the cab you will get the sound of the cone, or port, or tweeter, whatever you are closest too (volume follows the inverse square law remember, for every 2 timesfurther away from a source you get the volume drops to a quarter of what it was). You can even get phase issues between the different components of the cab since you are so close to them, they dont necessarily behave the same at 1 inch as they do at two feet. So you close mic a cone, which means you aren't getting the bottom octave of your cab, since that comes from the port. So you need to fill that in. A second mic is one way, a DI is a better way (it isnt suffering from the inherent issues of port tuning favouring certain frequencies for a start). A blend of mic'ed cone and DI is without doubt one of the most often used, tried and tested ways of capturing the grind and colour of an amp with tight full bass. Hundreds of engineers have come to this conclusion over years nad years of educated trial and error. You still have to get the phase bang on between the DI and the mic, but that isnt too hard to do. Now introduce your LDC room mic in anything but a stella room and it will not add good things to the sound. It will add complication to the setup, it will add nothing but bad. For a start to get away from phase issues it needs to be at the very least 3 times further away than the close mic, which to get in phase with the DI could easily be as far as 6 inches off the cone, so now you are backing up the 'room' mic to around 18 inches to 2 feet, or perilously close to your maximum range before critical distance comes into play, and you will be getting a very roomy sound from that mic. Roomy sounds utterly arse on bass. Trust me. I've done a tonne of this stuff for years and years (Jeez nearly a quarter of a century now), I've had great results because I've been shown how to do this by excellent mentors with the engineering (sound, acoustic and electrical) know how to absolutely back up their reasoning, and I've can generally capture a bassists tone with one cardiod dynamic mic and a good DI. You want to do it properly? One amp, one cab, one mic (dynamic cardioid - a 57 or 58 or Senn e835 will be fine), one DI (a decent cheap DI box for a recording would be a BSS Ar133, at about £110), in phase (so important!). That is as properly as you can do it with your current setup.

Fat fingers and a phone that thinks it's cleverer than it actually is - sorry!

Large diaphragm condenser mics are by their nature coloured. Cheap ones in a less good way. Small diaphragm condensers are less coloured. Stick to a cheap SDC for most sources. Use the LDC for the couple of headline instruments , ie lead vocal and one other - the final result will benefit from this approach. If you colour everything the same you may as well be in monochrome....

If you want to sound good keep it simple. You don't have the room treqtment for clever mixing nor tje monitoring solution nor the seperation. I've tracked hundreds of songs. If you wqmt a gteat sounding guerrilla recording then you have to keep the tracking very sttaight forward.

[quote name='Zenitram' timestamp='1361897874' post='1992702'] God I'm so full of stupid sometimes. I proof read for a living as well, you know. [/quote] Bwahahahahahahhhaaaaa!! Sorry

[quote name='Zenitram' timestamp='1361895889' post='1992641'] I just emailed the Karma people, as the mics on their own have $26.95 shipping, which is fair enough. If you then add two mic holders designed to go with the bullets (at $2 each), the shipping price jumps to $69.95! Which is mental and presumably a glitch. [/quote] The two mic set includes the clips as well:- [i]Includes 2 Mics, 2 Mic Clips Extra Mic Clips Can Be Purchased As Well[/i] From:- [url="http://www.karmamics.com/shop/K-Micro-Matched-Pair.html"]http://www.karmamics...tched-Pair.html[/url]

[quote name='Zenitram' timestamp='1361895889' post='1992641'] I just emailed the Karma people, as the mics on their own have $26.95 shipping, which is fair enough. If you then add two mic holders designed to go with the bullets (at $2 each), the shipping price jumps to $69.95! Which is mental and presumably a glitch. [/quote] Weird, that'd be that Amerrrkin Math I think...

Milty you are overcomplicating this I think. You dont need a room mic, its going to add a world of hurt for you regarding phase issues. If you dont already know about how to go abou tsolving this sort of thing, or even know how to recognise it, then you need not to be worrying about a third source. You need a decent two channel USB audio interface. Get a decent DI, ignore the amp, DI the bass. I've recorded albums without a mic on the bass cab, its not a necessity unless you are using an overdriven sound (nothing deliberately overdriven in the samples you have put up), and at your stage I would recommend simple first and foremost. Mic the cab with one mic, get it in phase with the DI. If you are going for some amp derived growl though mic the 115, a 57 would be fine, use the DI for everything below about 200Hz, and the mic above that. Sort that out at mixdown though, not when tracking, you havent got the set up to allow you to make that kind of critical decision during tracking. However if you arent using an overdriven bass sound then dont even bother with the mic.

Well they will do it for you, not as well as more expensive solutions, but I wouldnt expect them to.

If you want to learn to mic things up get some mics and play (you will get further quicker if you know someone who can show you where to start and what to listen for), if you want to record your bass you can DI, mic a cab or use some form of emulation, all can sound fine and neednt scare the neighbours.

Nah I hear you, they are just cool doodads to ahve around. Note they are omnis, so they work like a very sensitive barometer, they 'hear' evenly in all directions, so you cant get awway with pointing them away from a source of noise, they will find you out if you fart in the studio On the plus side that means they dont suffer from proximity effect (getting bassier the closer you get to something) and can handle meaty SPLs apparently. Great for acoustic guitar, spaced stereo pairs (no good at all as a coincident pair, since they are omnis, or ORTF or any stereo produced using cardiod characteristics of the mics used) Obviously for that money they are not the be all and end all in mics, but for interesting tiny little mics they are excellent fun and not crap apparently.

Yep, they are good, as are audiospares.co.uk for cabling and looms and the like (phone them up if you are doing a lot of stuff, good deals can be had)

Oh and the cheapest way to record something, just about anything, just capture it, is probably these:- http://www.karmamics.com/shop/K-Micro-Matched-Pair.html

[quote name='Zenitram' timestamp='1361881737' post='1992302'] That Red5 kick mic looks great 51m0n, but the website says it's only available as part of a larger kit. Do you have one? How did you get it? I've also been thinking about getting one of these: [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/the_tbone_sc300.htm"]http://www.thomann.d...tbone_sc300.htm[/url] next time I order something from Thomann. I've read some decent reviews of the thing -- for 24 quid. [/quote] When I got mine they were available on there own, in fact mine was on a special offer too. The kits are excellent though, highly recommended, but possibly more than you need. I wouldnt go near that T.bone mic personally (£24 for an LDC, really!), although this stereo set is considered a reasonably good design (similar physically to the design of a Neumann KM84, which is to be considered a very good thing, the electronics arent in the same league naturally):- http://www.thomann.de/gb/the_tbone_sc_140_stereoset_bundle.htm The CM3 blows these away though, or Little Blondies, although they are omni pattern and so not really suitable for your intended usage. Nothing wrong with a condensor on a cabinet, Flea used one live for years, I've seen toms mic'ed with Neumann U87s, kick drums with U47s, you name it. Ribbon mics on the other hand tend to be far more delicate! Sennheise 421 is a great mic (brilliant on toms) but very very dear by todays standards (ie with all the decent CHinese stuff now available), and I would personally not buy a second hand mic, especially if its usual role in a studio was as a tom mic, the abuse they can get is scary! Likewise the AKG D112 and beta52 are fine mics (pretty heavily eq'ed IMO) but you get pretty much the same thing for a fraction of the cost from the Red5 kit or failing that the Studiospares line of cheap mics is totally brilliant (for the money). Any of these will do as a starter for bass:- http://www.studiospares.com/mics-instrument/studiospares-s930-instrument-mic/invt/448620/ http://www.studiospares.com/mics-instrument/studiospares-sd102-bass-drum-mic/invt/449050/ http://www.studiospares.com/mics-instrument/studiospares-sd101-drumpercussion-mic/invt/448660/ The s930 is a mic I'm very interested in for horns and snare, but it will do for bass as well no problem - and guitar cabs - versatile little thing. Its what I'd get if I were you. A pair would do as overheads (neodymium magnets and a nice presence peak), but these would be even better:- http://www.studiospares.com/mics-instrument/studiospares-s980-overhead-percussion-condenser/invt/449040/ Then get this for vocals:- http://www.studiospares.com/mics-condenser/studiospares-s1000-studio-condenser-mic-pack/invt/448500/ Still under budget and your recordings will be far better for getting mics more targetted to different roles.

SM57 has some rolloff too high up for really capturing low end. You will do well to get a better low end mic than the Red5 Audio kick mic:- http://www.red5audio.com/acatalog/Dynamic_Microphones.html At about £35 + VAT its a no brainer, works great for me! Hopwever if you want to spend your £150 you might find a superb SDC (small diaphragm condensor) is the best all round option, like a Line Audio CM3. Incredible mic for the money, but they are made by a Swedish chap as and when he can (think Barefaced Bass when Alex just started, but for mics and mic pres) so the demand completely outweighs the supply unfortunately...

True there is definitely a place for it, I dotn think I manage to remain anywhere near as light fingered as he does, doesnt always work with the funk thing I tend to do. However I've been playing with 3 fingers rh technique soince before I'd heard of GW, as it just sort of made sense to me to be able to sue that third digit to get across strings more fluidly. Again I'm no slave to his concept, I certainly dont think my technique is remotely as well defined for a staret, and like you Bilbo I've borrowed idea from all over the place to get to wherever it is I am now exactly