i ask your advice on an album i will be recording

jesterroot4

jesterroot4

Member
Jul 5, 2007
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Croydon (south london) UK
long story short, i have recently got a new job at a studio and my boss wants me to record his next album as a live one with his band, to be released on their record label.
so i replied ''hell yah, would be a wicked opportunity, what instrumentation is there? and what genre etc?''

it turns out his band is a folk/acoustic experimental band which i thought would be interesting, however there are many instruments i have never mic'd up before and kinda worried about making the record sound shite.

instrumentation:
vox/guitar/banjo
cello
violin
flute
saxophone
clarinet
trumpet
Percussion - Jembes shaker/wind chimes/cowbell/didgerydoo and a frog

now he wants this album to be live and recorded in the same room, meaning i'm gonna have a hard time with the separation of each instrument/player, but we have a few acoustic boards which i can stick up so that part should be fine.

i'm just concerned about how to go about mic'ing everything up: including what mics/ mic positions/ best way to spread them all out across the room etc...

he's said if i need any more mics that we don't already have, he'll be able to get them for me and what not.

could any of you guys steer me in the right direction?
their myspace is http://www.myspace.com/mendicantmusic

any advice would be greatly appreciated!!! recording starts September 14th

cheers

Jim
 
What mics are available just now?

I'll send a few emails out to a mate of mine who specialises in similar types of music - so he might be able to help :)
 
What mics are available just now?

I'll send a few emails out to a mate of mine who specialises in similar types of music - so he might be able to help
Click to expand...

ahh that wud be awsome if you could man :)

umm.. well in the studio we have a bunch of 57's and 58's, pair of Rode NT5s, Rode NT1, GT GT50, Sure drum mic set, and some other randoms,
but we do have a shop and a studio designing/building company upstairs that i've not yet checked out that were welcome to borrow stuff from.

cheers
 
difficult to say...especially for the cello and violins etc it really depends on what sounds you're going for, how the musicians play, how the room is etc...

that's the perfect case of "go into the room and improvise using your eperience"... I know, stupid answer, but that's what I'd do.

of course you should be aware of the different micing/recording-techniques and know their advantages and weaknesses so you can pick the right one for the given situation.

and I guess you're boss wouldn't hesitate to help you a bit as well ;)
 
difficult to say...especially for the cello and violins etc it really depends on what sounds you're going for, how the musicians play, how the room is etc...

that's the perfect case of "go into the room and improvise using your eperience"... I know, stupid answer, but that's what I'd do.

of course you should be aware of the different micing/recording-techniques and know their advantages and weaknesses so you can pick the right one for the given situation.

and I guess you're boss wouldn't hesitate to help you a bit as well
Click to expand...

yah, thats my idea really, but i'm really just looking for tips and pointers, ideas i can think about before entering the room so i dont seem as confused on the day lol.

as for my boss, he doesnt really know much about recording as he has alot more work at the studios to get on with and other parts to the company to run. so i'm kinda on my own :| lol
 
jesterroot4 said:
yah, thats my idea really, but i'm really just looking for tips and pointers, ideas i can think about before entering the room so i dont seem as confused on the day lol.

as for my boss, he doesnt really know much about recording as he has alot more work at the studios to get on with and other parts to the company to run. so i'm kinda on my own :| lol
Click to expand...

How much have you time for got for the recording before you have to start mixing?

Time permitting, I'd say it'd be a good idea to just take an assload of mics down, and then just go crazy, try loads of shit out
Like that other guy, just use your experience and improvise.
Apply guitar cab micing experience, put some headphones, get down n dirty with the mic stand and move it around while the musician plays their instrument until you find where it sounds best.
Then listen to the band play + your mic position and then adjust to where it sounds good in conjunction with everything else.

Ask the band about their priorities instrument wise. Like what instruments are more important on a song by song basis. Stuff like that.

You'll be just fine.
 
How much have you time for got for the recording before you have to start mixing?

Time permitting, I'd say it'd be a good idea to just take an assload of mics down, and then just go crazy, try loads of shit out
Like that other guy, just use your experience and improvise.
Apply guitar cab micing experience, put some headphones, get down n dirty with the mic stand and move it around while the musician plays their instrument until you find where it sounds best.
Then listen to the band play + your mic position and then adjust to where it sounds good in conjunction with everything else.

Ask the band about their priorities instrument wise. Like what instruments are more important on a song by song basis. Stuff like that.

You'll be just fine.
Click to expand...

:) its gonna be tough but they reckon they could easily nail out at least 12 songs over a weekend.
 
if theres a rule of thumb when it comes to recording it's this:
"where does the sound come out of the instrument? Point a mic there."

And since there's multiple instruments and multiple microphones the 3:1 principle is in effect.
 
you could set the wind instruments up near one another and use a stereo pair and then set up spot mics as well and blnd them in to taste. You might have to add some delay to the spot mics though the get them to match up with the stereo pair if you go that route.
 
I'd wan't more condenser and multi-pattern mics for stuff like that. Not that I'm any good at folk music haha

If it's a nice room, I would start with the room mics, In whichever config you like (otfr, m+s or whatever), and listen to them do a song in the control room. Get the basic balance right and then implement with individual mics for each instrument.

If it's a horrible sounding room, close mic everything using your ears to find the sweet spot, and then use artificial reverb.

You probably know all this, but it could be worth something haha

Joe
 
yeah I'd start with room mics and work from there adding close mics as you feel they're needed. If I were you I'd spend ALOT of time on the micing- If they're tracking live they'll be able to belt through the songs quick enough- getting more time surely won't be a problem too with the owner of the place being in the band and all!

Might be wise to pick up "Professional Microphone Techniques" by some guy- Huber I think is his name.Its a good book with diagrams for micing tons of instruments including alot of the ones you mentioned. It's a bit of a simple book but its good for starting points and it'd help you alot I reckon
 
WOO so i finished mixing and mastering the album.

now i have one problem... when you place a CD in your computer, the internet normally finds all the track info for you.

how do i do this?

also...

i used wavelab at work to master it and all the files have been put onto disk as 'CD audio files', and all the tracks seem to be 44 bytes. why is this?

this is not making sence to me. is this going to make any difference when the band want to duplicate the disc?

the albums to be released on their record label and i've got to hand in the final product tomoz at 7pm.

could anyone explain what format and shite the whole thing should be in?


cheers in advance!
 
Google 'uploading to CDDB' for the first question (I don't know what software you use so I can't tell you specifically, but basically you give everything the proper tabs and upload it to the databases), and for the second one as long as the CD plays in an ordinary player don't worry about how big the computer says the tracks are.

Jeff
 
http://www.cddb.com/

And you've probably made a mistake with the CD if it's not coming up with weird audio files.
All the disks I've ever burned with Waveburner have had the audio in red book format - ready to go.

As for CD audio files,.. I'm not 100% what that is. Do you mean a .cda file?
If so, they need to be converted into an mp3 or wave before CD players will play them (AFAIK) since they'll only work in CD-Rom drives.

Any luck?
 
please don't burn mp3s to disk

its wav or aiff 16 bit, 44.1kHz files on the disk, with .cda files to point to the location on the disk.

burning an audio cd is not difficult to do.
Try Nero or Ashampoo for burning disks if you can't figure out Wavelab (or read the manual).
 
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