Topic: (LMA)-Chris Hennessee 2010-01-15: First Show Ever Taped, looking for comments

[kdunne916]

Just got our first show on archives (awesome show, mark metejka of lynyrd skynyrd playing lead guitar).  Looking for suggestions, ran my behringer c-2s on our stand at about 7' (low 8' ceilings, everyone was seated though so we were still 3 or 4 feet over the crowd), dead center about 40' from stage.  Didnt mess around with the sound at all, no eq or anything.  Very small venue with a corrugated steel ceiling, Behringers came with this stereo mount bar thats probably only about 5" from clip to clip, so ive been running something like ORTF, at about 110 degrees with the mics as far apart as they can go on the bar.  Looking for any comments about what you think of this configuration.  Ran straight into an alesis protrack, had problems with clipping in the first track but mostly sorted out.  If anyone has experience with the protrack i'd love to hear if youve had problems with the ipod coming somewhat loose during the show and adding static, i think i need to get better foam to snug up the fit.  I will review the protrack at some point, it has been a great tool IMO, although i have nothing to compare to i think it will serve my purposes well once i sort out the kinks, its so easy to just plug in the ipod and have the files offload automatically, just split them up in wavepad and convert with flacer and its ready for the archives.  if anyone cares to listen and give me some tips on the mic config or what eq/effects to add it would be greatly appreciated, taping gov't mule on thursday and hoping to get a good pull.

[Jhurlbs81]

might get more feedback if you posted a link

[Scooter123]

My typical post is

Compression and lots of it

Highpass above 60htz

Sometimes, a tiny amount of high eq boost

Sometimes, a tiny amount of delay between channels

Thats about it.  So much depends on the room and the mikes. 

[bgreen]

http://www.archive.org/details/hennessee2010-01-15

You have lots of noise there. Gotta get the noise out of the chain before you can go further IMO. Trial and error my friend

Band sounds good from what I can hear though. Very laid back. Love to hear more.

[kdunne916]

Sorry about the missing link, thanks for posting it.  I agree the recording is noisy, i will accept that much of this is due to the combination of a poor A/D converter in the protrack, as well as a lack of preamp and probably noisy phantom in the protrack as well.  I'm very limited with my budget being 20 years old, could barely afford the rig i have now ($300) splitting it with someone else.  Believe me, I've got my eyes on so many different things here when the money allows it for now, but for now I'm really stuck with what ive got.  I've heard pretty good recordings with the c-2's on bt (granted with a pre and better recorder, also i think they mixed down from 24 bit) but i hope that with some eq or possibly tips on mic placement i can do better next show.  So any tips still appreciated.  Also, anyone in the nashville area, picked up my ticket to gov't mule at the ryman on thursday, almost all of them are left and pretty cheap at $29 total.  Will be bringing my stand (disclaimer: only 10'), and would love to have anyone clamp on if theyre interested, looking to meet some people with experience and see some real rigs in person.  PM if you're interested, hope to see some tapers out

[acidjack]

You probably want to invest $300 or so (if you're buying new) in some kind of improved preamp and recorder.  The iPod isn't really designed for recording.  I don't know much about the protrack at all. 

The easiest way to power the mics is probably something like the Denecke PS-2, which is just a basic power supply.  New one here: http://www.soundprofessionals.com/cgi-bin/gold/item/DEN-PS2-MINI
These can be found used pretty often on ts.com.  However, in that same price range, and far superior, is the Naiant "littlebox" which is a true preamp.  TS.com members have compared it to units costing thousands of dollars.  It's around $200 also, from www.naiant.com. 

The cheapest "real" recorder you can buy new that I think is of good quality is a Tascam DR-07, which is just over a hundred bucks. Or, find something used like an iRiver HP-120, which people sell on here from time to time. 

I think if you are serious about having good recordings of your band on the LMA (no doubt, partly to encourage folks to attend your shows and get into your music), you'd find that $300 to be a pretty good investment, IMHO.