Panning for Live Backing Tracks?

[cfranchimusic]

Hi, I'll begin by saying I'm brand new here and I made an account just to ask this question, so forgive me if I've done anything wrong regarding this post or whatever.. Anyways.

My band has recently been trying to get into using a backing track for live shows, just for some synth backups and orchestral type instruments. We looked up how to do it, which eventually led me to buying a microamp with the stereo splitter cable, ect.

The problem I'm having is that no matter what sample/DAW I use to create my click track (which should be panned 100% to the left or right, with the actual backing track panned to the opposite channel), whenever I pan my click track 100% left, there's alway still a SMALL amount of the click track coming through on my right channel. This is bad because the click track now comes through the PA with the backing track.. And yes, I've tried switching channels, no luck. I can't find anything regarding this issue on the internet, but surely someone knows what to do here? I'm stuck. -_-

 

[BLUElightCory]

It's called crosstalk, and it's caused by something in your signal chain, probably the stereo splitter cable.

 

[DanLights]

I use a normal 1/8" jack to RCA (red and white) cable and never had any crosstalk problems, I used to have it when separating in a mixer though. What cable are you using for it? The backing track FAQ thread by Ahjteam might help if you have any doubts

 

[WindriderMetal]

It could also be caused by the file format you are using. If your backing track is an MP3 or other such lossy format, the compression involved in making the file smaller often impacts the stereo separation and can lead to a small amount of bleed from one channel to the other. Try using a WAV or AIFF, and if that doesn't help then you know it's part of your signal chain.

 

[raisedfist]

This shits weird. I was using a sony MP3 player into a mini-jack balanced jack cable into a mini mixer, left for click and right for track. Had crosstalk issues until I DI'ed the track channel before the mixer. I have no idea why but that sorted it.

The other weird thing that happened on a show at my work is that the CD for running the show was burnt in itunes and that joint stereo setting seems to print a bit on the left track on the right and vice versa and so I learnt that little gem infront of 500 people....fml

I'm running Laptop with reaper, with the extension pack thingie so I can put in auto pauses after each track into a crappy lexicon usb interface, then a balanced jack to xlr cable either into DI on stage with no problems. Solid as feck so far.

Check out the reaper SWS pack its crazy good. Got te drummer using his Alesis drum modules midi out triggering all the stuff off the laptop

 

[Shreedhan Vaidya]

It will either be because it's an unbalanced signal (fixed using a DI) or because your DAW doesn't truly hard pan (Garageband is notorious for this!)

To make sure your tracks are clean, best thing to load them into Audacity and hard pan them in there.

I wrote a guide on my setup if you're interested in checking out how I do it.