Professional Quality EMX recording help.

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Fri May 29, 2009 6:58 pm

Hi All,

I've had an EMX-1 since about last august.
Recently, I've written/composed a few tracks that I am very proud of ... but sound like trash when i record them.

Is there a way to use midi in/audio out to record (synchronized) individual song parts as individual tracks (that I can then properly master / level / EQ in software rather than doing it live) ???

The thing is the best way to use the EMX is to layer parts. Once you get past 3 or 4 parts the sound quality goes to crap.

I want to record every part individually... then remix them in software ?

What do you guys recommend ?

Here's some older music (less composed than the new stuff that I want to record so a bit repetitive, and you can tell the Sound Quality is crap)...

http://www.tcsp105.com/music/Adandos_Fl ... _doves.mp3
http://www.tcsp105.com/music/Adandos_waves.mp3
http://www.tcsp105.com/music/Awesome.mp3

This is so frustrating. I just want people to hear it the way I hear it.

cyberheater · Post by **cyberheater** » Sat May 30, 2009 5:25 am

What hardware/software are you using to record your 'tribe.

And your right. The audio quality isn't great. They sound distorted to me. If you have a decent audio in card and set the levels right in your software then the recording should sound perfect.

blitzdj86 · Post by **blitzdj86** » Sat May 30, 2009 5:35 am

you dont need midi sync just record the parts one by one and dont change the tempo on the emx.

then open up a multitrack audio editor/daw with multiple audio tracks, drop each part on an audio track and line them up.

shabudua · Post by **shabudua** » Sat May 30, 2009 7:21 pm

If you just want to record it the way you hear it, there should be no need to record individual parts. I routinely record my EMX straight into my laptop, and it sounds fine. Your recordings sound like something is set wrong somewhere. Like Cyberheater said, check your input gain and other levels.

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Mon Jun 01, 2009 9:47 pm

I turned down the tube gain and recorded it ...

here it is ...

www.terrafirms.com/music/Adandos-Dreams ... ure-eq.mp3

Still , when you get more than a few song parts going together things get muddier... is this tubes ? or is this an internal limitation of bits per second for the electribe sound card ?

cyberheater · Post by **cyberheater** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:30 am

I've just listened to it. Apart from the distorted lead sound at the beginning which I guess is intentional, the rest sounds fine to me.

I loaded the mp3 into audacity and it shows that it was well recorded with no clipping.

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:28 am

Yes because i turned down the tube gain alot to record it
And to me, it sounds very thin at certain points in time doesn't it ?

I have a 'wow' SRS button on my laptop that when i listen to the MP3 with the SRS on it sounds right, more present, more gain, more powerful... with it recorded the way it is it sounds 'flat' i don't know how to describe it but it sounds like the gain is down and it's not so powerful...

If i turn the tube gain up, it brings it up more but things get muddy when recorded and even worse when compressed to MP3.

So i tried avoiding that now and that gives me a cleanly recorded track but it has no punch to it... you can even notice the when i run 6+ parts together my Bass drops out completely.

What i usually do is before i encode to MP3 i usually put in a 3-4db bass boost ... but i didn't do it here and you can tell in the middle of the song there's almost no punch ...

do you recommend new tubes + turn the gain up ?
or do you recommend some kind of software compressor ?

Here are my SRS settings on the laptop:

SRS Center: 0.38
SPS Space: 0.50
TruBass Level: 0.44
Trubass speaker size: 300Hz
Focus Level: 0.18
SRS Definition: 2.84
SRS Limiter Level: 0.34

What this does to the sound is give sharper mids, crisper highs, and boosted bass... it sounds more 3 dimensional

You think I can do this with an EQ boost for the mids ? a bass boost for the lows ? and a Compressor ? in software ...

Or would it be a better idea to use different tubes with more gain and record it normally ?

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:49 pm

I went in and did some audacity playing around ...

I split it to two seperate tracks
Delayed 1 track by 1ms (anything more and it was too far off).
Gave it only 1 cycle of ringing on the delay.
Played with the delay and decay.

So now i had a bit better stereo imaging ... but one track felt both earlier and louder.

So I boosted the other channel by 0.4 db to make it make it sound equally present.

Then I joined them again to a single stereo track.

Then I bass boosted it by ~4db at 300hz

Then I gave the compressor 15 goes of trial and error till i found something that seemed to work...

I'm uploading it now and will post the final version when i'm done...

http://www.terrafirms.com/music/Adandos ... stered.mp3

plosive · Post by **plosive** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:18 pm

I never use articifical surround effects when listening to music, havent for years and thats one of the reasons. you should never (ever) use such things when producing either. what you've done by delaying one of the tracks is essentially you have done your own poorman's fake surround sound by creating a phase offset. if you want your tracks to sound wide and well produced you should take more attention to your panning and sound placement.

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:49 pm

I understand what you're saying plosive but i'm not taking about panning. I'm talking about the sound feeling dead when recorded and encoded. Not like it does when you hear it coming straight out of the box.

partly because i have to turn down my gain to get a clean recording... but i don't know why else.

What do you recommend ?

xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:20 am

You're using MP3 and you're wondering why it doesn't sound good?

Do all the mastering using raw, uncompressed formats. Then pick the final encoding very carefully, like AAC with a 320K bitrate, AC-3, or WMA highbit rate or lossless. Be sure to leave space for the bass by low cutting everything that's not bass.

cyberheater · Post by **cyberheater** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:06 am

Adandos.

I've taken your first file and added EQ, 4 way multiband compressor, stereo imager and audio maximizer.

I think it sounds more open and less muddy. Let me know what you think.

http://www.filedropper.com/masterexperiment

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:57 pm

What software are you using ?

Sounds much better .... and there's some detail in there that just popped out that you couldn't hear in the other 2 versions.

Did you add any artificial panning ? or is that just the stereo imaging bringing back the panning that was already in the track...

Some parts have completely changed for the better...

I totally need your help

I have at least 6 great tracks that I need to re-record and re-master.

I guess to sum this up, we all agree that the electribe, tubes, recording is fine, but alot of work needs to be done in the mastering ?

Or is there something I can do while recording not to have to do so much post processing ?

Thanks !

cyberheater · Post by **cyberheater** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 2:18 pm

Adandos wrote:What software are you using ?

I'm using Propellerheads Reason. I just converted the mp3 into a stereo wav and then imported it into a NN19 sampler.

Adandos wrote:Did you add any artificial panning ? or is that just the stereo imaging bringing back the panning that was already in the track...

Yep, just the stereo imaging used to widen it slightly. I also used the EQ to give it a bit of bass with a low shelf around 30hz, a bit of boost around 5khz to give it some definition and a slight lift around 10-15khz to give it some 'air.

Adandos wrote:Some parts have completely changed for the better...

Yes. I was a bit surprised too.

Adandos wrote:I totally need your help I have at least 6 great tracks that I need to re-record and re-master.

Well I've got no idea about mastering. I just try things until I think they sound right. I don't know if i'm doing the right thing at all.
And I did this on earphones which they reckon is a no no but I think it helps to work out bass levels etc..

You just need to get yourself some decent mastering software and some decent monitoring. Also, listen to others peoples stuff that sounds like yours. It might help.
One other thing. It definitely helps to work on other folks stuff. I found it easier to attempt to master your stuff then my own.

And I would be prepared to work on some (maybe all) of your other tracks but really, I feel like i'm just guessing with this stuff.

Adandos · Post by **Adandos** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 2:42 pm

I just had a Duh moment.

I have an old version of reason 5 but i don't like writing music on it. Much prefer the EMX for it's interface.... but i never thought about using its power for processing... Going to re-install it to give it another go around.

My 'monitor' system is a small 2.1 laptop type system but it is THX certified. so that I know it's got a good flat response curve. Only thing about my system is that it has soft dome tweeters for the highs. I used to use some very sharp resonance which sounded fine on my system but then you take it to a hard dome'd system and it comes out too much, so I've learned to back off the resonance alot when i go to record.

It makes sense that you resampled it. The original recording had some pops in it and i'm not sure where the source of the popping is, but by resampling the pops are gone ...

Thanks for the help Cyberheater... will report back later !