In-Ear Monitoring

[Johnny Wishbone]

Just recently I've started to have trouble hearing myself onstage at gigs, thanks largely to the oppressive stage volume levels enforced by sound engineers (seems to be a recent thing - I've not experienced this problem in the past, and I used to play much louder). I've tried raising my amp to ear level but whilst it's an improvement it's not an ideal solution, so I'm starting to think seriously about in-ear monitoring.

Obviously there are quite a few systems out there, so I'd appreciate the benefit of the forum's collective experience. Weight isn't an issue really, but bass reproduction (obviously) and cost definitely are. Am I able to get something half-decent without getting my ar$e handed to me over the price? Or am I realistically looking at a substantial financial outlay whatever I choose?

To give you an idea of budget I'd consider spending up to, say, £300 at a push.

Over to you.....

[synaesthesia]

If you are not expected to dance or slide across the stage, and can use a wired IEM system, buy a small mixer, take a line feed of your rig or bass, mix it in with a stage feed from your band's mix desk or FOH and you're done. I normally play in a trio where all of us are seated - pianist , drummer and me. We all use wired IEM. The performances are tighter. We use a 4 channel headphone amp (about £90), and I have a stage matrix submixer (I have several of these, so no cost to me but you could buy one for about £100 - 150) where everyone can have their own EQ'ed mix. It is the system I have in my recording studio for tracking band tracks. The outlay for the band is less than the cost of ONE decent wireless IEM, say a Sennheiser 172 or equivalent.

At the moment, I cannot justify paying 400quid per muso for a rudimentary wireless IEM which in truth is often , (i) mono only, (ii) limited in mix & EQ capabilities, when the wire to me or anyone else on stage, is not a bother. If we work with a singer she has wireless IEM because the punters want to watch her wiggle her hips.

I've also subbed regularly with a disco band & tribute band where from previous experience the stage monitoring was so poor that I could never hear the vocals, - I take a small behringer desktop 4 channel mixer, request a FOH vocal rich mix, and mix my own bass to it. It even feeds the ear pods. total cost, mixer approx £40, 5m IEM extension £5, ear pods - your choice, I use a Shure Ewhatever, can't remember now.

The only issue with all of this is that you don't really hear your bass cab as a monitor anymore, and if you rely on proper PA support, it raises the question whether you need to have a box behind you at all. What makes this worse is if you have spent loads of time and money in your on stage cab set up. If you need a 'speaker' tone you can use a Palmer rack unit or a Sansamp rack unit which will give that, and recently I came across a circuit using a lightbulb to simulate voice coil heating effects. I can see myself easily gigging without a bass cab.

Edited July 8, 2008 by synaesthesia

[Happy Jack]

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[Johnny Wishbone]

Sorry - I should elaborate further. I have tried wired IEM's before (our singer has an old set lying around from before he went wireless) but I found the wire pretty restrictive as I throw myself around a lot on stage.

The earphones kept flying out of my ears too. I do have trouble with earphones in general though as I have very small ears, so maybe it's a just a case of getting some well-fitting earphones like Shure E2s and persevering with a wired set-up? The cost of wireless IEM's does look fairly prohibitive, and I can't really afford £150-ish for moulded earpieces on top of that.

I don't have any trouble hearing drums, guitar or vocals on stage, so perhaps I should look at running the IEMs direct from the headphone socket of my amp (assuming it doesn't cut output to the speakers when in use)?

[ped]

The E2cs come with lots of different 'sleeves' - three sizes of foam, black rubber and transparent plastic, so one is bound to fit. I use the foam ones and they are very solid for stage use in a wired setup. I am not sure how familiar you are with the E2cs but they hook over the top of your ear so tugging the cable does not yank 'em out.

Cheers
ped

[synaesthesia]

[quote name='Johnny Wishbone' post='235161' date='Jul 8 2008, 06:18 PM']I don't have any trouble hearing drums, guitar or vocals on stage, so perhaps I should look at running the IEMs direct from the headphone socket of my amp (assuming it doesn't cut output to the speakers when in use)?[/quote]

In all seriousness, if you can hear everything else:

Step 1: Review your bass rig if that's the case, it may be your speakers, your strings, your EQ/tone settings, your pickups, pickup selection/blend settings, etc if you can't hear your amplified bass it may be because you have a freq. dip in the rig, not enough mid range, poor dispersion in your cab, etc

Step 2: turn down the rest of the band.

Step 3: feed some bass to the wedge monitors

Step 4: learn to hear yourself on stage, or dial a tone that allows you to hear yourself. Cut the low end and cut out the muddy boom. Your stage amp is more often than not a stage bass monitor, assuming you have proper PA support. You can dial whatever tone that allows you to hear yourself readily and feed a pre EQ tone to FOH, assuming your gear allows you to do this. Your situation may be different if you use efx on your bass or need a grungy tone.

If you want to go wireless IEM, feed a mix of the stage and your bass, you're more likely to play in time better than if you augmented only your bass in your in ears, and listened to everything else at stage volume and dispersion. Using one ear bud only for bass and one open - I suspect you will have problems, and you'd more than likely boost the volume so that you can just about hear your bass notes. Also, bass reproduction in ear buds work properly if you have a good seal, unlike open or semi open Headphones, and the psychosomatic completion that you get with the bass 'in the middle of your head' is best achieved with 2 ear buds, at much lower SPLs than you would with one ear bud.

[Johnny Wishbone]

[quote name='synaesthesia' post='235317' date='Jul 8 2008, 10:11 PM']In all seriousness, if you can hear everything else:

Step 1: Review your bass rig if that's the case, it may be your speakers, your strings, your EQ/tone settings, your pickups, pickup selection/blend settings, etc if you can't hear your amplified bass it may be because you have a freq. dip in the rig, not enough mid range, poor dispersion in your cab, etc

Step 2: turn down the rest of the band.

Step 3: feed some bass to the wedge monitors

Step 4: learn to hear yourself on stage, or dial a tone that allows you to hear yourself. Cut the low end and cut out the muddy boom. Your stage amp is more often than not a stage bass monitor, assuming you have proper PA support. You can dial whatever tone that allows you to hear yourself readily and feed a pre EQ tone to FOH, assuming your gear allows you to do this. Your situation may be different if you use efx on your bass or need a grungy tone.[/quote]
I see what you're saying, but:

1) Used the same bass/rig for years, aside from my amp head which I've upgraded to a GK 700RB-II about 6 months ago. Following the upgrade to the GK I could definitely hear myself better (much cleaner/crisper sound) and my EQ is set flat, bar a low mid boost of about 10-15%. I used to use a really bass-heavy scooped EQ setting on my old amp, but following the consensus here on BC that it's all about the mids, have rectified this and definitely noticed a massive improvement in clarity and audible volume. I also began using earplugs about 8-10 months ago and found I was able to hear myself better as they cut out all the cymbals etc. I'm pretty sure it's not my tone itself that's the problem as up until a couple of months ago I could hear myself fine. Bigger venues aren't so much of a problem as the engineer is less worried about overspill/boominess from the backline and I can get away with a higher stage volume (plus I can usually get a tiny bit of bass through the wedges). I'm well aware about the consequences of playing with too high a stage volume in smaller venues so I've always kept the volume down, but it seems that recently I'm being asked to play at such low volumes that there's barely a peep coming out of my speakers, even when the rest of the band aren't playing.

2) Drummer is very loud (although not as loud as our previous drummer) so our overall stage volume needs to be quite high. It's certainly not unreasonably loud though. If anything, it's lower than it used to be. I think as you become more experienced you learn that the lower the stage volume the better it is for everyone, not just the sound engineer, so we try and keep it as low as we can, drummer excepted.

3) Very few venues around Yorkshire/Midlands (or indeed any I've played nationally) have half-decent monitors, and even fewer put anything other than vocals through them. In the few places I've had a wedge, it's definitely been an improvement (except the sound quality itself is pretty awful, but at least I can hear something!). I used to be able to manage quite well without monitors (at the very least I could feel the bass through the stage floor).

4) I do use a lot of effects (always have done) and always send a pre-EQ signal to the desk. I guess I could try boosting the mids further onstage to see if that helps. The general consensus amongst regular gig-goers round here is that my bass always sounds huge out front.

I've been gigging for 12-13 years (heavily for the last 3-4) so I've a fair amount of experience (although not compared to some on here, obviously) and I'm pretty sure the problem isn't with me or my rig. Our singer has also remarked recently that he can't hear me as well as he used to, which is something of a problem for him as he takes his cues from the bass (he reckons I'm a tighter player than either guitarist). As previously mentioned, he uses IEM's and has in the last few gigs resorted to having the bass fed into them, whereas he's never had to have anything other than vox in them previously.

Thanks for all your input guys. I really appreciate your advice. I'm starting to wonder if IEMs are the answer for me. What you say about having the rest of the band in them (rather than just bass) so I can play more accurately with them makes sense, but the quality/size of PA's/monitors commonly in use on the unsigned circuit, plus the lack of set-up time (caused by many places booking 4-5 bands a night) would render IEMs largely impractical I guess.

We do have some wedges lying around in the rehearsal room, so maybe I'd be better taking one of those to gigs and using it just for bass?

Edited July 9, 2008 by Johnny Wishbone

[guyl]

You'd get on great with my old man - he repeats himself 3 times over!

[synaesthesia]

Try IEM for a while to see if it works for you, but try the full IEM, with a mix of your stage partners, as opposed to one ear bass only IEM (which IMmostHO doesn't work well).

[Johnny Wishbone]

[quote name='synaesthesia' post='235870' date='Jul 9 2008, 04:45 PM']Try IEM for a while to see if it works for you, but try the full IEM, with a mix of your stage partners, as opposed to one ear bass only IEM (which IMmostHO doesn't work well).[/quote]
No worries - I won't be trying that. Think I tried a similar thing with earplugs once and ended up feeling quite disorientated (plus the ringing in just one ear afterwards, which is even more annoying than having it in both!) Thanks again for your advice.