From the Studio to the Stage- ZOOM R24!!!

synthjoe · Post by **synthjoe** » Fri May 11, 2012 10:28 am

I'd vouch for the hardware DAWs I have mentioned, rather than the Zoom (of course the Zoom is great value for the money, so you'll have to look at second hands for the others to end up in the same price range). Having only two outputs (L/R) is VERY limiting in a live situation. Not being able to send bass separately, no group control on pads, etc. This way all the tasks of mixing will remain with you, which might be a lot to deal with while playing on stage. The FOH mixer guy will not be able to do much for you - which might be good or bad, depending on the individual...

Indeed, things sound quite different on stage than what you have perceived in the studio or over headphones. So someone experienced balancing things from the public's perspective is a clear advantage over sitting on stage and twiddling knobs while playing, trying to figure what sounds good out there without actually having any real life sensation. For the FOH sound guy to be of any use, you'd need to have at least 6 or so separate feeds for the act you've outlined: drums (percussions separately, perhaps), bass, pads, your solo keys, vocals, horns.

Solo keys, vocals and horns will be live, so you can leave that to the sound guy. However, him not having any control over the balance of bass, drums and pads will make you responsible for a great deal of your sound to the public, without actually hearing it, as already said.

Therefore I'd much rather recommend any of the three HW DAWs in my earlier post than the Zoom, as all of them have several outputs that can be used for separate feeds to the FOH mixer. Some of the AW family have motorised faders and can act as remote to your SW DAW, just like (or even better than) the Zoom. Audio interface is missing, but you can use your computer's sound card, maybe.

Level settings are usually part of the session setup, as xmlguy wrote (even if faders are not motorised). Having the faders at your fingertip makes it relatively easy to adjust levels on the fly, if need be - but I'd prefer to leave that to someone else, myself...

Edit: finishing touches and grammar - but posts moved on in the meanwhile

virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 10:54 am

Looks like I'm sold on the R24!!!

I'd love to pick up one second hand but there appears to be none out there.

Will keep looking and bite the bullet in a week if nothing appears.

THANKS!!!!!!!!!

synthjoe · Post by **synthjoe** » Fri May 11, 2012 10:59 am

virtuocity wrote:Looks like I'm sold on the R24!!!

I'd love to pick up one second hand but there appears to be none out there.

Will keep looking and bite the bullet in a week if nothing appears.

THANKS!!!!!!!!!

R24 is almost too new to have second hand - but you might be lucky if you keep on looking.

virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 12:17 pm

Ah cool. I didn't know it was a new product.

Look like £400.

***debit card in pocket whispers buuuuy it, buuuuy it***

xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Fri May 11, 2012 12:17 pm

As with any new gear that you're not sure will work for you or not, it's worth paying a bit more to get a return policy that gives you enough time to check it out for sure. I think it's foolish to save a few bucks to give up a return policy. It may be that you need all the features of a DAW, but in the right circumstances, these digital recorders are amazing. It used to take a room full of gear and at least a hundred grand to get 8 track recording and 24 channels of playback, and that was all analog with no automation.

You could also buy an 8 input splitter box, which would let you use the R24 for recording the performance and sending the backing tracks to the PA, with the PA still responsible for house mix.

billbaker · Post by **billbaker** » Fri May 11, 2012 1:00 pm

Regarding Question 1: "how will this look...". So far folks have responded about tech issues. For me at least this Q would appear to be a musical one. I think that any time you play with backing tracks you run the risk of looking "loungey" , that appearance is strengthened if the tracks you use are mediocre replacements for what people could be doing. That is doubly problematic if the genre you are doing is one that requires a freer format, such as jazz.

The flip side of that coin is that some genres actually benefit from this more rigid structure - doing anything with a more hip-hop flavor for instance is a circumstance where obviously sampled material like loops played over a basic beat get you halfway to the produced sound that's on the record. So to that extent a program like Ableton that integrates midi and sampled material might be ideal for reducing the dreaded 'lounge-factor'

I think doing as little as possible - only what is impossible to do because you run out of hands - is the secret... And when you do use that technology, try inviting the audience into the process. If you can find a copy, check out Thomas Dolby's video of the Sole Inhabitant tour; this one man show put all the technology right up front and some of the tracks were "built" live by playing into a looping recorder (NI MAschine?). This definitely didn't have a "push play" feel.

Finally, at least once in your set, play without backing, or be willing to experiment with arranging a tune or two without it. You might want t o check out some of the "String Quartet Tribute to.... (artist)" albums at iTunes to see what I'm talking about; these are extreme examples but you will start to get a feel for how much it is possible to strip away from a song yet still retain it's musical core.

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virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 1:08 pm

xmlguy wrote: You could also buy an 8 input splitter box, which would let you use the R24 for recording the performance and sending the backing tracks to the PA, with the PA still responsible for house mix.

Can you explain this in 4 year old terms?

virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 1:13 pm

billbaker wrote:
Finally, at least once in your set, play without backing, or be willing to experiment with arranging a tune or two without it. You might want t o check out some of the "String Quartet Tribute to.... (artist)" albums at iTunes to see what I'm talking about; these are extreme examples but you will start to get a feel for how much it is possible to strip away from a song yet still retain it's musical core.

BB

Welcome to the discussion and thanks Bill.

Yes, I plan to write a few tracks which are a bit basic i.e. organ sound on SV-1 with the rest of the guys using various percussion noises and utilising their voices. Will be very cool.

These tracks should pad out the 'boring' push and play going on.

Which leads to a question that I'd ask everyone who has contributed to answer:

We often play small stages in crappy venues (who doesn't?!). The engineers will have a heart attack when they see us needing mic'd for:

1 x trumpet
1 x sax
3 x vocals
Set of congas
Set of chimes

Do you think it would be worth ME buying mics for the percussion and sending them into my own mixer for us to then send the mixer outputs to the engineer's mixer/PA? If so, gear recommendations for mixer and mics would be SOOPERB.

Thanks (yet, yet again).

billbaker · Post by **billbaker** » Fri May 11, 2012 1:41 pm

You don't show a location in signature so I can't really address your expectations, but 90% of the places I play in DC/MD/VA have NO P.A., and when they do have it, even then only spotty engineering. I'd worry less about how many mics and worry about consistency and stage discipline (noise) with the extra people on stage.

For consistency the issue is fairly easy to tackle; make a stage plot showing everything you need and where you need it. Show mics, back line feeds to FOH (direct boxes) and any special monitor requirements.

The next step up from the stage plot would be to provide yourself (as a band) everything up to the point where a cable would go to the snake... so, your mics, your stands, your DI's, your amps, ect., and their cables and FOH P.A. When we play we even bring our own in-ear monitors and extra xlrs because we know ours work.

When you mic a lot of things, particularly acoustic instruments, keeping on-stage volume to an absolute minimum becomes really important. You're lucky to a certain extent in that playing with recorded drums means that there is nothing extra you need to do to isolate the drum sounds from stage. But that dynamic means you will have to really trust your engineer/sound guy in order to get a properly balanced sound between you (on stage live) and your backing tracks. For that, side fill monitors - yours or theirs - playing the full FOH program may be the best way to intuitively keep the sound balanced.

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xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Fri May 11, 2012 1:48 pm

virtuocity wrote:
xmlguy wrote: You could also buy an 8 input splitter box, which would let you use the R24 for recording the performance and sending the backing tracks to the PA, with the PA still responsible for house mix.
Can you explain this in 4 year old terms?

Sure, it's really easy. A splitter takes one input and gives it two (or more) outputs, usually with an audio transformer or active electronics and sometimes there's a direct output that allows phantom power to still go from the PA to power any condenser mics. All the stage mics plug into the splitter, then one output goes to the PA snake and the other to the stage monitor mixer, or in your case, the multi-track recorder. The output of the multitrack then only sends the backing tracks to the PA, while you record the rest. This would only be needed if you want the main PA to control the house mix.

You can find splitters on Sweetwater, ZZounds or any music gear shop. They are usually special order items at brick and morter stores.

billbaker · Post by **billbaker** » Fri May 11, 2012 2:07 pm

General percussion/instrument mics - shure sm-57 - this is the straight flat-end mic that has bees around for 50 (!) years. If you buy used they should be around $50, but if you do buy used make sure you try 'em out first for level, no shorts or distortion, no handling noise, rattling or loose parts. Don't buy the switched model unless you need it.

Vocals - shure sm-58 - I personally like the Beta version, but they standard version works for most applications... again, 50 years of production so if you buy used (~$85) - same advice for trying out.

DI's: whirlwind director for keyboards; it's hard to mess up a direct box so anyone's will probably do the job; whirlwinds are road tough, simple and sound good.

My own preference here - don't use anything on stage that requires phantom power, such as condenser mics or active DI's. Phantom can interfere or even damage your keyboard if it comes when you don't need it. Some older or less expensive sound boards don't provide the option of channel assigned power; it's all on or nothing. I choose nothing.

You don't have to spend a lot of money to have a sub mixer. Although they have a bad rep among some users, I have a couple of pieces of behringer gear that have served me well and their small format mixers with 4 or 6 xlr inputs are very reasonable. Being able to reduce your input for a fairly complex system down to 1 or 2 sends is absolutely a good thing to do if you want to exercise more control of your sound from the stage

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virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 2:21 pm

For those who care, I'm in in the UK.

All venues tend to have a PA, Backline, loads of mics etc, but perhaps not enough mics to stretch to percussion etc.

Bill- interesting point re: phantom power mics. I was looking at the SE1a mics, but can pick up used SM57s much cheaper.

xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Fri May 11, 2012 2:31 pm

Hi bill, I agree with everything you've said, except for one caution about buying used Shure mics because there's a large number of counterfits out there that are virtually indistinguishable from the orginals, except for sound quality and the internals. Even authorized dealers are fooled by the knockoffs. The real Shures are great, which unfortunately, has made them a target for ripoffs, even with identical packaging. It is possible to identify the knockoffs with disassembly to examine the sound cartridge, but it does require some research to tell the fakes from the real thing. Just something to look out for.

virtuocity · Post by **virtuocity** » Fri May 11, 2012 2:41 pm

xmlguy wrote:Hi bill, I agree with everything you've said, except for one caution about buying used Shure mics because there's a large number of counterfits out there that are virtually indistinguishable from the orginals, except for sound quality and the internals. Even authorized dealers are fooled by the knockoffs. The real Shures are great, which unfortunately, has made them a target for ripoffs, even with identical packaging. It is possible to identify the knockoffs with disassembly to examine the sound cartridge, but it does require some research to tell the fakes from the real thing. Just something to look out for.

Proceed with caution, gotcha.

Hmmm, I'd struggle to tell a fake as i don't know what the legit ones sound like. Grr.

billbaker · Post by **billbaker** » Fri May 11, 2012 3:14 pm

...not enough mics, ...fake shures.

You aren't running drums, that alone is between 3 (sn, bd, hh) to 8 mics that are not being used, so ther should be enough mics and inputs for most venues - again, having a clear stage diagram that you can send ahead and have spare copies of for each venue will help things run more smoothly. If you are concerned about it enough to open you wallet, then budget ~$500 (€?) to buying a couple or 3 mics, cables, and a submixer that will take it all down to a single xlr out. Put similar instruments on the submixer, such as your horn players or your extra percussion, and you will get to the board with no more impact on the mix than a single mic would have.

I can't really speak to the fake shure mic issue, as I have been lucky enough to not run across it as a problem. As my high school science teacher Mr. Kilkusky would say, when in doubt of your results you need a control. What that means in this case is that you take a mic you like and you know works and do an a/b test using the same cable, pa, and signal (voice) and see what the mic you're thinking of buying sounds like. Is it duller? Softer? Hissy? Lack "balls"? I have a free real time analyzer app on my iPhone that will tell me if there's no bottom or a clipped high end.

Go into this or any other buying situation with your eyes open and brain engaged. Deals that seem too good to be true usually are. Caveat emptor

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