Topic: Blues Traveler 07/23 & 08/29 W/CA-14's>bb>R-09 Read for more details....

[Johnny Thunder]

I probably should talk to some of the crew that have recently taped BT and see what the situation is. I THINK that Gina has the tapers IN FRONT of the blockaids right on the stage lip. Perhaps someone can confirm or deny that. (greenone?) If that's the case, I'm afraid the vocals may be a bit lacking as I'll probably be getting good (IE loud enough), vocal sound from the wedges only. Obviously, given the wedges kinda point the wrong direction for our purposes, this may well be all reflected sound. Any suggestions there would be appriciated.

I have a, "bar," for lack of better terms, a-la Gutbucket style, bent up from 4 pieces of mild steel welding rod tacked together that should allow me to choose between ORTF Din, Din-a or XY conincedent. I'm thinking with the cards, either ORTF or XY is going to sound best. Any thoughts there? Sure wish I had another set or 4 of mics. I'd personaly like to be able to roll XY & ORTF on the bar, plus spaced omnis, all at the stage lip, and some bastard version of ORTF/DIN FOB AUD under my hat. Then, in a perfect world I'd like to be able to run binaurals or omnis using my head as a baffle too. I could learn alot about what I do and don't like in just one show, but alas.....

Additionaly I'm hoping for a SBD patch. What the hell, I have the decks and (cheap) cables & adapters to do it, Just not alot of mics.

Anyhow, for those following along in theirs programs... The real questions here that deals with reality is mic placement for one set if I do in fact find myself at the stage lip with a recorder. There are a few considerations in my mind's eye. One is that I can just run an R-09 with it's internal omnis at the stage lip on a stand kept short enough to be pretty un-obtrusive, and use the CA-14's FOB in the sweet spot clipped to the brim of my hat or on my, "bar," hand-held at a low enough level to be fairly un-obtrusive. The hat brim is perfect for any near-coincident technique that does not exceed 28cm spacing. Further apart than that and the top of the hat starts to interfear with the sound getting to the far side mic for proper time delay registration. The bar offers me some lattitude in getting the mics up a little higher though... perhaps 12". That couyd make a marked differance in the recording though.

I really would like to capture a good stereophinic sound stage if at all possible though, and I don't think I'm going to get that reguardless of technique on the floor FOB. Not the kind I'm really after anyway, as the FOH program will most likely be mono. So the question this begs is, does anyone think I can get a good stereophinic recording with the cards at the stage lip, that won't be lacking good vocals, and if so which technique should I try? I'm absolutely going to have to set my levels during soundcheck, and set 'em a bit conservativly as I definately plan to taping AUD too, and will NOT be able to keep tabs on the stage lip rig. (Unless there's another taper at the stage lip that wouldn't mind keeping tabs on that rig.. which may be very likely. I know Adam's planning on being there.) I'm not really worried so much about that as I've overdone conservative settings in the past leaving the resultant master at about -30dB average program levels, and had little trouble in processing the master dynamicly in post with little ill effect resulting from raising the noise floor quite a bit along with everything else. This was using the R-09's internal omnis with the levels set at 4 and 6 on the deck. Live and learn. Rusted root I had the level set at 12 on the deck and never clipped or brick-walled. Very useful info if I tape from the floor again using the internals. Oh brother, once again I digress....

Sorry to be so long-winded, but I know damn well it's awful hard to help someone who provides way too little information.

-JT

[vanark]

Why do you expect to be stage lip?  I wouldn't think that is where you would be taping from.

[travelinbeat]

JT when I saw Blues Traveler last month-ish at a private show in DC I ran two rigs-- one was a 7' omni-split, taped to John Popper's monitors (as you could probably image, these where very vocal heavy), the other rig was a pretty straight forward DIN configuration on cards, set-up FOB at a nice, 9' height or so.  Gina (BT's tour manager) is very cool, but she has a job to do and that job doesn't entail catering to the every wish of tapers.  She was happy to allow the stage omni's (perhaps in part since they were TEENY TINY church CA-1's), and she was glad to allow me to fly-high (so to speak), but SBD patches were an absolute no-go (don't bother asking).  She walked me in to the venue with fellow area taper, Nate, and introduced us to head of security and said, "these guys are with me, they're the official archivists, they can do whatever they want."  After that kind of introduction, I had no problems with anything. 

I wouldn't go into this (or any) gig with the mentality that you "absolutely must set levels at soundcheck," as often enough this is the only practice time that a touring band will get.  Furthermore, soundchecks generally take place during such a hysterical time in the production of the event that any pushiness or requests from a taper to be inside for it may very well be met with a rather cold response which interprets your wanting to set levels as indignant ungratefulness.  Set levels during an opener if possible, and failing that set them at the same levels they were at for your last show, just turned town a bit.

I am generally happy with the results I pulled from my recording... though the room is complete trash, I can hear that the "formula" for the mix was spot on.  If you have omni's, I'd say tape them to John Popper's monitors and get a long extension from RatShack to get the cable off to the corner on the far side of the stage (WAY the hell out of the way).  Tape the hell out of it along the way, so as to avoid people tripping on it, and then plug your extension into your deck.  Set levels as best you can before the show begins, and set them LOW.  Keep your second deck under the tree in the back, running a nice nos / din / whateveryoulike.  During the show, just bounce back and forth periodically.  Keep things cool and you'll be fine.

BTW: http://www.archive.org/details/bt2010-05-19


**EDIT: woo-hoo, that's my 1,500th post!!!

[setboy]

I think travelinbeat has given you some very good info.

I am very confused why you would think you would be put on the stage lip though........that doesn't make any sense to me at all.

Oh yeah, forget setting levels at soundcheck and getting a SBD patch.......the chances of them happening are not high. (though depending on what's going and where they are playing you might be able to pull off the sound check)

[Johnny Thunder]

I thought that's where Gina's was having the tapers record from.

Yep, that would probably be inside the FOH barrier once BT's crew takes over.

From http://taperssection.com/index.php?topic=135977.15 Post #18

Apparently this was at just one particular venue? Ok, no sweat. Additionaly, I wasn't sure if BT was hauling their own rig to all shows. If their not, they will probably be doing a quick and dirty sound check right after the set change before BT takes the stage. Most likely there's not going to be the exact same desk there if it's not their own rig. If so, Adam's not just going to be able to load his program and roll... Hence the quick and dirty sound check. Since it's typicly drums that give me the hottest levels, I should be able to get pretty close if they give a few shots of low toms and kick through the house PA. (Which they typicly do even if using their own rig as acoustics very widely from venue to venue and toms can ring enough to cause feedback troubles.)

Absolutely there's been some excelent advice given here. Most of you probably don't know this, but I used to hire and run crews on the top grossing national stadium tours here in the US. This might only serve to handycap me as I pretty much had access to everything. Pretty different situation here though. Unfortunately, while I have a fair bit of audio experiance, I basicly have NO knowlege of taping (in this manor) or taping etiquette. Perhaps I've made that abundantly clear already, eh? I've learned alot from the fine folks here at TS, and I've got a long way to go I'm sure. Really guys, I'm very appriciative of all the help. It can be alot of work to haul one's head out of one's own ass when it's in real deep.

Perhaps if Gina let travlinbeat tape omnis to JP's wedges, I might ba able to put a very unobtrusive (IE 1/4" wide mild steel welding rod painted black with ORTF or XY Church CA-14's about 2.5-3 ft high), "stand" (for lack of better terms), on the stage lip, given my intention is to, "set it and forget it." If there's a wedge near DSC, which there's sure to be. I can easily bend this tiny little stand so that it's height just peaks an inch or three over that wedge, but is just far enough downstage so it's not overwhelmed by that wedge. Perhaps it might slightly obstrct the view of one of JP's ankles. Conservative levels are no problem. As I stated in my first post, I've had recording levels set WAY too conservatively as I wasn't able to check them after I started rolling, and after processing the dynamics in post, it sounded fine. I really didn't have any problem with the noise floor at all.

SBD patch is out? Well, shit. That's life.

Unfortunately, I don't have omnis yet. If I did, I'd definately try a set spaced like travelinbeat suggested. But I would really like to try the cards as I've described if allowed to do so. If the reflected vocals (and anything else that might be run DI), aren't too weak, I imagine it may well be a really nice sounding recording with a very nice stereo image.

Actualy, there is a possability that I may have CA-11's and omni caps by then too. We'll see.

Thanks for all the great suggestions, and please do keep them coming! (Even though my wife's just about had enough of me sitting at this computer reading and playing around with recordings in post all day every day. )

-JT

[setboy]

Yep, that would probably be inside the FOH barrier once BT's crew takes over.

I believe he was talking about setting up inside the  soundboard booth area.......

[Johnny Thunder]

Yep, that would probably be inside the FOH barrier once BT's crew takes over.

I believe he was talking about setting up inside the  soundboard booth area.......

Thanks setboy. That's quite different. I'd have stated that as FOB barrier vs FOH, hence my confusion.

-JT

[setboy]

Yep, that would probably be inside the FOH barrier once BT's crew takes over.

I believe he was talking about setting up inside the  soundboard booth area.......

Thanks setboy. That's quite different. I'd have stated that as FOB barrier vs FOH, hence my confusion.

-JT

Why would it be FOB?

[greenone]

FOH = Front of House = sound engineer's booth. For the two shows you're going to, it'll be a general admission outdoor gig with no seats, so you can set up wherever you see fit. They don't care about running FOB but I'm not sure I'd do that in those crowds.

For the 7/16 festival that I was referring to in my reply to setboy, the venue is supposedly anti-taping so the only way he'll be allowed to set up a stand is if he's brought in through the crew entrance and allowed to set up inside whatever barriers they have around the sound desk. If you ask Adam (BT's sound engineer) I'm sure he'll let you set up inside the barrier if you want.

[Johnny Thunder]

FOH = Front of House = sound engineer's booth. For the two shows you're going to, it'll be a general admission outdoor gig with no seats, so you can set up wherever you see fit. They don't care about running FOB but I'm not sure I'd do that in those crowds.

For the 7/16 festival that I was referring to in my reply to setboy, the venue is supposedly anti-taping so the only way he'll be allowed to set up a stand is if he's brought in through the crew entrance and allowed to set up inside whatever barriers they have around the sound desk. If you ask Adam (BT's sound engineer) I'm sure he'll let you set up inside the barrier if you want.

{nod} Thank you for the clarification. I'm thrilled to have this wonderful opportunity to tape one of my favorate bands.

-JT