Topic: Levels / Decibels Question

[echo1434]

as a guitar player myself, i cant think of a player more inspiring to me than j. mascis....i almost fell asleep at the last clapton concert i attended..

[prof_peabody]

As a guitar player my self. I often laugh at these guys with 50 amps on stage... I mean give me a break you dont see Clapton with 50 amps he has a pair of matched amps, one is a backup, and a Lesley for a effect.. But the rest is fingers and talent..

Chris-

You must have seen Gordie (Grady) Johnson play at some point up there.  He puts up a serious stack and has a lot skill.  I've heard so many distorted recordings from the mega SPLs!  If I had my way...

[ellaguru]

saw big sugar many times as well.....unreal spl's with just a couple marshalls>p.a. stack....

[live2496]

From Wikipedia...
The Who's live performances were traditionally extremely loud. For most of the 1970s and 1980s they were listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the loudest Rock band in the world, measured at 130 decibels, though other bands, notably Deep Purple have since taken over that dubious honour. Daltrey has hearing problems as a result, and Townshend's later partial deafness and tinnitus is well known; popular legends hold that the members of the band suffered permanent hearing loss from their loud concerts, or that Townshend's right ear was damaged as a result of being too close to the drum kit when Moon detonated an oversized concussion bomb in it at the conclusion of a performance on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1967. Townshend, however, maintains that the true cause was listening to music at high volume through headphones in the recording studio.

[prof_peabody]

As a guitar player my self. I often laugh at these guys with 50 amps on stage... I mean give me a break you dont see Clapton with 50 amps he has a pair of matched amps, one is a backup, and a Lesley for a effect.. But the rest is fingers and talent..

Chris-

You must have seen Gordie (Grady) Johnson play at some point up there.  He puts up a serious stack and has a lot skill.  I've heard so many distorted recordings from the mega SPLs!  If I had my way...

I actually worked with Big Sugar. Yes I know Gordie quite well.. He actually used a Garnet preamp into a SVT bass head... For power.. In some cases he was louder then the PA... But it was a good loud.. In the early days it was just a fender super reverb amp..

Chris

Reminds me... I need to head up to Austin to catch Grady again...

[rokpunk]

my favorite new toy...
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?A=details&kw=PHPAA3&is=REG&Q=&O=productlist&sku=398993




i mostly mix monitors (all my engineers prefer to mix FOH...i prefer to do monitors so i can stay out of the crowd and have some space of my own), and usually for a rock band the SLP on stage is somewhere around 112db-115db. needless to say, once the monitor mix is up and the band is happy, in go my ear plugsl.

[Church-Audio]

As a guitar player my self. I often laugh at these guys with 50 amps on stage... I mean give me a break you dont see Clapton with 50 amps he has a pair of matched amps, one is a backup, and a Lesley for a effect.. But the rest is fingers and talent..

Chris-

You must have seen Gordie (Grady) Johnson play at some point up there.  He puts up a serious stack and has a lot skill.  I've heard so many distorted recordings from the mega SPLs!  If I had my way...

I actually worked with Big Sugar. Yes I know Gordie quite well.. He actually used a Garnet preamp into a SVT bass head... For power.. In some cases he was louder then the PA... But it was a good loud.. In the early days it was just a fender super reverb amp..

Chris

Reminds me... I need to head up to Austin to catch Grady again...

I just realized were not talking about the same person lol...

[prof_peabody]

As a guitar player my self. I often laugh at these guys with 50 amps on stage... I mean give me a break you dont see Clapton with 50 amps he has a pair of matched amps, one is a backup, and a Lesley for a effect.. But the rest is fingers and talent..

Chris-

You must have seen Gordie (Grady) Johnson play at some point up there.  He puts up a serious stack and has a lot skill.  I've heard so many distorted recordings from the mega SPLs!  If I had my way...

I actually worked with Big Sugar. Yes I know Gordie quite well.. He actually used a Garnet preamp into a SVT bass head... For power.. In some cases he was louder then the PA... But it was a good loud.. In the early days it was just a fender super reverb amp..

Chris

Reminds me... I need to head up to Austin to catch Grady again...

I just realized were not talking about the same person lol...

Yeah we are.  Gordie lives in Austin now and goes by the name Grady (also the name of his band down here).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grady_%28band%29

From the wikipedia Big Sugar article:

The band broke up in 2004, after, according to the band's website, Johnson became frustrated with Canadian radio programmers who claimed his single "All Hell for a Basement" was "too Canadian" (the song references the province of Alberta). Johnson, a staunch nationalist, was disgusted and angry and left Canada to pursue music in a more "open, welcoming" environment. The newly re-named "Grady" Johnson can now be found in the Austin, Texas-based band Grady.

[Church-Audio]

As a guitar player my self. I often laugh at these guys with 50 amps on stage... I mean give me a break you dont see Clapton with 50 amps he has a pair of matched amps, one is a backup, and a Lesley for a effect.. But the rest is fingers and talent..

Chris-

You must have seen Gordie (Grady) Johnson play at some point up there.  He puts up a serious stack and has a lot skill.  I've heard so many distorted recordings from the mega SPLs!  If I had my way...

I actually worked with Big Sugar. Yes I know Gordie quite well.. He actually used a Garnet preamp into a SVT bass head... For power.. In some cases he was louder then the PA... But it was a good loud.. In the early days it was just a fender super reverb amp..

Chris

Reminds me... I need to head up to Austin to catch Grady again...

I just realized were not talking about the same person lol...

Yeah we are.  Gordie lives in Austin now and goes by the name Grady (also the name of his band down here).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grady_%28band%29

From the wikipedia Big Sugar article:

The band broke up in 2004, after, according to the band's website, Johnson became frustrated with Canadian radio programmers who claimed his single "All Hell for a Basement" was "too Canadian" (the song references the province of Alberta). Johnson, a staunch nationalist, was disgusted and angry and left Canada to pursue music in a more "open, welcoming" environment. The newly re-named "Grady" Johnson can now be found in the Austin, Texas-based band Grady.

That's funny I first saw the picture I did not recognize him I know Ben too as it turns out.. He was the sound man for Colin James.. And many others. I heard he was a good bass player.. Now that I look at the picture I can see that its the same guy...

[anodyne33]

i mostly mix monitors (all my engineers prefer to mix FOH...i prefer to do monitors so i can stay out of the crowd and have some space of my own), and usually for a rock band the SLP on stage is somewhere around 112db-115db. needless to say, once the monitor mix is up and the band is happy, in go my ear plugsl.

When your doing monitors do you typically have a wedge at the console or do you use phones to solo individual mixes?

[Church-Audio]

i mostly mix monitors (all my engineers prefer to mix FOH...i prefer to do monitors so i can stay out of the crowd and have some space of my own), and usually for a rock band the SLP on stage is somewhere around 112db-115db. needless to say, once the monitor mix is up and the band is happy, in go my ear plugsl.

When your doing monitors do you typically have a wedge at the console or do you use phones to solo individual mixes?

When I am doing monitors I have to have a listen wedge and I make sure that all the monitor eq's are inserted in the aux groups. So when I PFL a group I can hear the eq.. I sometimes have a pair of listen wedges if the whole band is "doubled up" if I am doing a combination of inear/wedges, then I have both a listen wedge and a pair of inear's exactly like what the band is wearing.. I have my own e5's with molds. But if I am on tour with an artist that has something different I get the sound company to provide it. I then use the headphone outputs on the transmitters to listen to the mixes.

I think doing monitors with out a proper listen wedge is pretty much useless. Even with a listen wedge its not going to be quite the same as the on stage mix but it should be very close. I also get off my ass during sound check and walk around on stage and make sure the guys are happy.. I also make sure that things are in the wedges before the band even hits the stage.. That way they dont have freak out when they cant hear them selves during sound check. There is nothing worse then a band that is weirded out before the day even starts, they will ride your ass all night long.. If you hit the ground running and have all your vocals in the vocal wedges before the band starts doing anything they will feel more secure in knowing that you have your shit together. Monitors are 5% talent 95% physiological make the band feel comfortable you will have an easy night.. Make them feel like your a knob and they will make your life a living hell.. We have all been there..

Chris

[nic]

Apples and oranges.  The SPL is the limit that the mic can deal with, without distortion.  In the digital realm, you clip at 0 db.  If the concert was 140 db, you would have blood gushing out of your ears.

unfortunately, tell that to the rental soundman at the MMW/Project Logic show at JMU from about 4-5 years ago.
you know its bad when people are running up to FOH with their hands over the ears in pain and the decible meter at FOH registering 140+ and the soundman was f-ing clueless about it.