Hey gang,
Ok, this one's been coming for a while: I finally got out of the studio and into the field with my SAC rig... and for a first outing, it went exceptionally well.
Just what the fuck is SAC? I'm sure there are a few of you asking precisely that. SAC is short for "Software Audio Console" it's the companion program to SAW "Software Audio Workshop" both are written by Bob Lentini from RML labs. Yep, you read that right, they're written by ONE guy.
So what's the big fucking deal? SAC/SAW are unique in that they're the only modern audio production programs written in hand-coded assembly language. In layman's terms, that means for pure speed/power, they blow the fucking doors off of everything else out there. (I'm sure I'll catch grief for that statement, but after working with SAW for the last six years, I'll stand by it.) Go download the demo if you don't believe me. The only caveat: It ain't cheap.
So, with that out of the way, here's the deal with SAC. It's the live version of SAW. Here's what you get:
72 input mixer
Gate/Compressor/EQ on every input channel.
6 aux sends
24 outputs.
Not bad, but this is where it gets interesting:
You also get
24 SUBmixers for monitor sends & whatever else you can think of. Each has:
72 input mixer
Gate/Compressor/EQ on every input channel.
6 aux sends
24 outputs.
Oh yeah, you can also run your VSTs live as well, and SAW can run alongside SAC to record everything.
So here's the story: I ran SAC live for the first time on May the 21st, working with four bands at "The Coach and Horses" in Windsor Ontario.
I think a more apt name for the bar could have been "The Dank Pit" but you get the idea. The place was dark & dingy, packed to the gills and hotter than hell.
Technical:
RIG: I'm running an Athlon dual-core PC on XP, 2 gigs of ram, RMEHDSP 9652, and a Geforce 9600GTX for those parts when it gets boring. All tucked into a "Lan PC" body. Very light & portable, but really brings the muscle.
Here's a pic of one very similar to mine:
Converters: Presonus Digimax 96 and Berhinger ADA8000
Anyway, I stopped by the local rental shop that morning and picked up a snake, drum mic set, and extra cables.
Load-in was supposed to be at 8:30, but of course the bar staff didin't show up till 9:15, and we were due to for showtime at 10:00. (I'm guessing that's typical.)
We got in, disconnected the house board, and set up. The house had decent Yorkville PA & power amp, which I hooked into.
Now, the venue in question has a reputation for having horrible sound. I mean, just absolutely fn' terrible.
I ran 2 guitar mics, bass mic & direct box, 2 vocals, 2 drum overheads, 3 toms, 1 snare, & a kick trigger.
I had direct boxes for the guitars, but there was just not enough time to set everything up. The original plan was to reamp the guitars in the studio. But, when you've got a club full of people & groups chomping at the bit to get going, sometimes you have to make sacrifices.
I set Sac to 32 samples latency, 1 buffer. (I think that translates to 0.7 ms latency) It ran like a champ. (that's NOT a misprint. 32 samples, LIVE) It didn't even hiccup once.
Being a small club, I certainly didn't need to crank up the overheads, or even the guitar mics, for that matter, but I did have all the tracks recording into SAW. (more on that later)
Effects wise, I kept things pretty basic. Only some eq's on vocals & guitar, just to clear up some mud & fizz. Drumagog on the kick, with a vst post-eq. Gates were on pretty much everything, which was real nice at controlling feedback.
First set, they asked me to turn up the vocals. It was fun to watch the eyes light up at the vocals got louder & louder to the point where they cut like a knife, even at the back of the bar. Actually, as things got settled, I was able to walk though the club and marvel at just how good things sounded. The 'house sound guy' tried to look unimpressed, but it was gratifying to have people constantly come up to me & comment on how 'amazing' things sounded. That was the adjective that was constantly being used. "amazing."
Another interesting comment: I had one band member come up & comment that it was "The first gig he ever played where he didn't have to ask someone to turn up the monitors."
Now if I could only get metal singers to stop 'cupping' the sm58, I'd be real happy. The dumbasses don't realize it makes the mic feed back.
Some other notes: I had to swap out mics for FOUR drum sets! Jeez! Like the job isn't hard enough. Thankfully, the rental drum mics were Beyerdynamic Opus 87s. Nice and easy to swap due to the ingenious clip system. Just remember they're condensors, so when you fire them up & you're not hearing anything, turn on the phantom power! (ok, that's advice to myself!)
Overheads were a pain. I ran some StudioProjects C4 in ORTF, but getting the stand in the proper place, and then having the mics jostled & bumped constantly by the constant equipment changes made getting a proper stereo image nearly impossible. That & I realized after the gig that one mic had the 20db pad engaged! FUCK THIS SHIT, I'm buying an NT4!
The only real problem I had was with recording to SAW: Again it was a first test run. Saw would drop the recording every now and then. After asking Bob about it, it turned out I forgot to check off one thing in the setup menu for "realtime priority" , not to mention I was recording to the OS drive ( I thought that might give me some grief). Next time, I'm dropping in an extra hard drive.
Mind you, SAC didn't stop once during all four bands, and the show kept right on rolling.
Here's a sampler clip of the group "Hunter City Madness" from Ottawa.
Please bear in mind, this is my first live recording EVER!
Hunter City Madness - LIVE
Once I get the system completely tweaked, I plan to offer my mix/recording service to groups in Canada/Europe. If you want a live recording, I'll come to you.
I hope to get some pics/video up in a few days, I'm still waiting for the bands to send me some stuff.
As always, comments/questions are welcome
--Glenn
BTW, here's a link to the program:
http://www.softwareaudioconsole.com/
Ok, this one's been coming for a while: I finally got out of the studio and into the field with my SAC rig... and for a first outing, it went exceptionally well.
Just what the fuck is SAC? I'm sure there are a few of you asking precisely that. SAC is short for "Software Audio Console" it's the companion program to SAW "Software Audio Workshop" both are written by Bob Lentini from RML labs. Yep, you read that right, they're written by ONE guy.
So what's the big fucking deal? SAC/SAW are unique in that they're the only modern audio production programs written in hand-coded assembly language. In layman's terms, that means for pure speed/power, they blow the fucking doors off of everything else out there. (I'm sure I'll catch grief for that statement, but after working with SAW for the last six years, I'll stand by it.) Go download the demo if you don't believe me. The only caveat: It ain't cheap.
So, with that out of the way, here's the deal with SAC. It's the live version of SAW. Here's what you get:
72 input mixer
Gate/Compressor/EQ on every input channel.
6 aux sends
24 outputs.
Not bad, but this is where it gets interesting:
You also get
24 SUBmixers for monitor sends & whatever else you can think of. Each has:
72 input mixer
Gate/Compressor/EQ on every input channel.
6 aux sends
24 outputs.
Oh yeah, you can also run your VSTs live as well, and SAW can run alongside SAC to record everything.
So here's the story: I ran SAC live for the first time on May the 21st, working with four bands at "The Coach and Horses" in Windsor Ontario.
I think a more apt name for the bar could have been "The Dank Pit" but you get the idea. The place was dark & dingy, packed to the gills and hotter than hell.
Technical:
RIG: I'm running an Athlon dual-core PC on XP, 2 gigs of ram, RMEHDSP 9652, and a Geforce 9600GTX for those parts when it gets boring. All tucked into a "Lan PC" body. Very light & portable, but really brings the muscle.
Here's a pic of one very similar to mine:
Converters: Presonus Digimax 96 and Berhinger ADA8000
Anyway, I stopped by the local rental shop that morning and picked up a snake, drum mic set, and extra cables.
Load-in was supposed to be at 8:30, but of course the bar staff didin't show up till 9:15, and we were due to for showtime at 10:00. (I'm guessing that's typical.)
We got in, disconnected the house board, and set up. The house had decent Yorkville PA & power amp, which I hooked into.
Now, the venue in question has a reputation for having horrible sound. I mean, just absolutely fn' terrible.
I ran 2 guitar mics, bass mic & direct box, 2 vocals, 2 drum overheads, 3 toms, 1 snare, & a kick trigger.
I had direct boxes for the guitars, but there was just not enough time to set everything up. The original plan was to reamp the guitars in the studio. But, when you've got a club full of people & groups chomping at the bit to get going, sometimes you have to make sacrifices.
I set Sac to 32 samples latency, 1 buffer. (I think that translates to 0.7 ms latency) It ran like a champ. (that's NOT a misprint. 32 samples, LIVE) It didn't even hiccup once.
Being a small club, I certainly didn't need to crank up the overheads, or even the guitar mics, for that matter, but I did have all the tracks recording into SAW. (more on that later)
Effects wise, I kept things pretty basic. Only some eq's on vocals & guitar, just to clear up some mud & fizz. Drumagog on the kick, with a vst post-eq. Gates were on pretty much everything, which was real nice at controlling feedback.
First set, they asked me to turn up the vocals. It was fun to watch the eyes light up at the vocals got louder & louder to the point where they cut like a knife, even at the back of the bar. Actually, as things got settled, I was able to walk though the club and marvel at just how good things sounded. The 'house sound guy' tried to look unimpressed, but it was gratifying to have people constantly come up to me & comment on how 'amazing' things sounded. That was the adjective that was constantly being used. "amazing."
Another interesting comment: I had one band member come up & comment that it was "The first gig he ever played where he didn't have to ask someone to turn up the monitors."
Now if I could only get metal singers to stop 'cupping' the sm58, I'd be real happy. The dumbasses don't realize it makes the mic feed back.
Some other notes: I had to swap out mics for FOUR drum sets! Jeez! Like the job isn't hard enough. Thankfully, the rental drum mics were Beyerdynamic Opus 87s. Nice and easy to swap due to the ingenious clip system. Just remember they're condensors, so when you fire them up & you're not hearing anything, turn on the phantom power! (ok, that's advice to myself!)
Overheads were a pain. I ran some StudioProjects C4 in ORTF, but getting the stand in the proper place, and then having the mics jostled & bumped constantly by the constant equipment changes made getting a proper stereo image nearly impossible. That & I realized after the gig that one mic had the 20db pad engaged! FUCK THIS SHIT, I'm buying an NT4!
The only real problem I had was with recording to SAW: Again it was a first test run. Saw would drop the recording every now and then. After asking Bob about it, it turned out I forgot to check off one thing in the setup menu for "realtime priority" , not to mention I was recording to the OS drive ( I thought that might give me some grief). Next time, I'm dropping in an extra hard drive.
Mind you, SAC didn't stop once during all four bands, and the show kept right on rolling.
Here's a sampler clip of the group "Hunter City Madness" from Ottawa.
Please bear in mind, this is my first live recording EVER!
Hunter City Madness - LIVE
Once I get the system completely tweaked, I plan to offer my mix/recording service to groups in Canada/Europe. If you want a live recording, I'll come to you.
I hope to get some pics/video up in a few days, I'm still waiting for the bands to send me some stuff.
As always, comments/questions are welcome
--Glenn
BTW, here's a link to the program:
http://www.softwareaudioconsole.com/
