Let's get this show on the road

[Jeff]

Here’s a question for anyone who has ideas, but mostly Justin and Ryan, I figure:

The girls and I are seriously considering gigging in some very small venues here in the valley. We’d perform a combination of cover songs and a selection of some of my better originals. There are several places here in the valley that would allow kids in the place, and Maddie would be a featured vocalist. She sings the best of all of us. My question is about sound reinforcement. I haven’t done any live stuff since I was in high school, and then I just hooked in to whatever PA system happened to be in the place. I worked without stage monitors—I never felt a need for them.

I want to have most of the music sequenced on my laptop in Acid or something. But I also want a few live instruments, keys and GTRs. And, of course, I want all the mics to be live. So, the mixer would need to have at least 6-12 channels, plus a line input for my laptop’s audio outs.

What kind of sound reinforcement have you guys used? What kind would you recommend for us? What about the monitor question—our venues will be very small: bookstores, coffeehouses, restaurants and the like. Do we really need them?

Any input would be most welcome!

Jeff

PS www.zzounds.com/item--ZZOPA1 Would something like this be overkill or just about right? (I wonder if I could even get these speakers in my car!)

PPS Maddie and I are going to drop by Guitar Center today and have a look around.

[Betterout]

Well, let me first say that I don't know anything at all about this. My experience is as flawed as it is limited. With that out of the way, "the Reez" (uh... that's what I'm just gonna call my recent bar band for short) always had way more power than we ever needed. We used Big Dave's 750W Mackie powered board with an additional Behringer 1500W power amp into a Behringer crossover (splits up the signal based on frequency range). We had two sets of Bose monitors, two Nady mains and Nady subwoofers (forget Nady stuff--it's cheap but it's just junk). In addition, we also had two ancient cabs that everyone called "frogs" (was that a brand name at one time?) that we used for bass and drum monitors. This was way more power and equipment than we needed, and on several occasions, including our first show, we overloaded the outlets.

Recently Big Dave and I did sound for a piano/violin combo and just used one of the little Fender Passports. It worked very well for what it is: A small, portable PA for a one-room venue. Not a lot of inputs, I don't think. Four, maybe? It wasn't ours; we were just running the sound for the folks who were putting on the show.

My main concerns on sound reinforcement spring from my having played in a VERY LOUD 4-piece rock band.

· Bassist and drummer need to hear everything clearly, and the other instrumentalists really just need to hear bass and drums clearly. It's too easy for the bass in a mix to get lost amid the thumps, especially if playing right in the drummer's pocket. Even moreso if the mix is muddy. Same can be said of drums with respect to drums. But if those two are well balanced in the mix, the other folks can generally make the magic happen without a lot of monitor. Unfortunately, in our loudness, I could be standing next to 1050W of two 18" subs cranking out just my own sound and still not hear a single note I was playing. Drummer agreeed. None of this applies to you.

· Use heavy guage monitor cables to connect loudspeakers to the board. Guitar cables don't have the frequency response you need.

· Microphones are crucial, and use dictates type. Shure is the standard. Use 58s on vocals and 57s on instruments, particularly snare. Bass and bass drum really need special low frequency mics, like my Beta52. Mic drums at least four ways: bass, snare/hat, and two overheads (condensers work well for getting cymbals and toms to come in crisp and clean, but only if you can get them right in the mix without feeding back). Bass cabs don't need mics per se, but I think they give the instrument a brassy, ballsy, killer tone, particularly if the cab is on the verge of overdrive. Folks need their own vocal mics; sharing is just for Aerosmith to do harmony parts on videos. Amps really do perform better in the mix when they can be turned up or down or eq'ed from a central location, so mic them if you can.

· Vocalists need monitors. Unless of course you are going for tuneless cacaphony, in which case they can do without.

· Work out your all your tone problems at home before you ever go on stage. You'll have to tweak your settings (or abandon them incrementally) when you're on stage to get it right for the venue. But live-in-concert is not the right time to experiment with maxing the mid range on your dirty channel to get that sound you've always wanted but never tried to dial in. Those sorts of foibles can destroy an audience's hearing and willingness to stick around.

· It really does help to have someone in the audience area (oh, and don't be ashamed or afraid of sometimes having ABSOLUTELY NO ONE AT ALL in the audience once you get started--this is so common with all the band guys I know that it should really be expected every now and again) either adjusting the mix as you play or suggesting the adjustments via hand signals. Sound check one whole song, but not much more than that.

I'll try and sign back on later and make more specific recommendations for your particular situation. But in the meantime, just know that this idea of y'all's is freakin' awesome. More power to you! Good luck!

[jtmx1]

Hey Justin what is generally accepted as a set and how many sets in a show? I think that I asked you this once. Was it like 10 songs in a set and 3 sets in a show? So, we'd need about 30 songs all together?

BTW: We are still in the trial balloon stage in all this, so I don't plan to sink any money into it just yet. But if we can work up a set by next spring, then we might perform in the battle of the bands at STC.

[chris]

We just saw a show here locally that was made up of three different bands. They each played about eight songs each. I think you could get a way with two sets/show for a band of the kind you're thinking.

I think you guys could make a really kick-ass show -- I hope you guys get something going!

[Guest Justin]

Sorry that I didn't get back with you about this, Jeff. I don't think there's really a standard set, but we always thought of one as some blurry time frame between 45 and 75 minutes. For my band, we usually shot for about ten to twelve songs per set, and we always banked on at least two sets, possibly three. Planning a setlist helps you get an idea not only of what actually constitutes your repertoire, but also helps you organize it by mood, and all the specific technical needs (like, put all three of the songs on which you'll be playing bass and Maddie will be spinning the turntables back to back, so that you won't have to waste the audience's time switching back and forth). Oh, and by the way, sometimes our setlists would be sprinkled with items like "5 minute blues in A" or "Jazzy jam in C#m," which we'd of course never attempted until we walked on stage. In a substantially pre-programmed situation like you'll be facing you guys won't be able to pad the set like this. You may need a few knock-knock jokes instead... Not a lot of help, I guess, but that's what the Reez did.

[ryan]

Jeff,

Getting a live project started, and putting together a "decent" PA system can be tricky. Justin had tons of great advice in his reply, and I agree with everything he said, but can offer a few addendums:

First off, regarding mics: This is a no-brainer, but it bears mentioning: Don't use condenser mics for live applications except (maybe) as overheads on a drum-kit. Big bands with sound-engineers can get away with it. Small bands, in my experience, shouldn't waste their time. Condensers are great for in-studio use, but if you run them through a live PA, you're just asking for feedback city. Dynamic mics generally can't capture the nuances that condensers can, but their small pickup patterns are perfect for controlling feedback in live-PA situations. And truthfully, most live situations aren't ideal for sound-reproduction anyway. Most bands run small or underpowered PA's, don't know how to really use 'em, and most venues have horrible acoustics. Taking all those factors into consideration, it's best to stick with dynamic mics for their feedback-controlling properties.

Personally, I've used the SM-57 as a live vocal mic for years. It took me years to figure out how to get a good sound out of it. Basically, the secret is to apply whatever bass-cut your soundboard has (mine has an 18db cut at 75hz), then take the bass knob of your paramentric EQ and turn it all the way down, as far as it'll go. Just dial all the bass out of the vocal-track entirely. My LOW EQ knob is fixed at 80hz. So, I apply a -18db cut at 75hz, and another -15db cut at 80hz. Just kill all that crap in the low-end. The human voice has no musical qualities in this frequency-range, so you're basically just killing the noise. Killing the low-end will help the vocals cut through the mix better, in part because it keeps your PA speakers from wasting energy trying to reproduce the (non-musical) low-frequency content of your vocal tracks. Once you've killed the low-end, run the vocals as hot as you can get 'em without causing feedback. I don't even worry about overdriving the board, unless it just sounds bad, or unless I start hearing feedback. In many cases, overdriven vocals can sound really cool. The Strokes and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs dig it.

But the Sure SM-57 isn't perfect, and there are certainly better vocal mic's out there if you're willing to spend more money. Sennheiser makes a killer stage-vocal dynamic mic; Paul Karleskint used one for a short while in 351 Windsor. It really helped the vocals to cut-through the mix. Unfortunately, I can't remember its model-number.

Justin mentioned the SM-58. I've got one, and I think it's crap. I never use it. It has a dull, muffled sound. It's supposed to be for vocals, but the one thing you don't want on vocals is a "dull, muffled" quality. I hate my SM-58, and have never found a use for it. On the other hand, Sure makes a "Beta 58" that's actually pretty darn good. I'm almost positive I used Matt Mayo's Beta 58 to record the vocals for Poseidon's Daughter. Keep in mind, Sure's "Beta" series is actually supposed to be better than their "SM" series, although the word "Beta" might suggest otherwise.

Sure also has a PG series. I think that stands for "Performance Gear." It's supposed to be their budget line of microphones. I've never heard one, but I'd avoid 'em. With microphones, you generally get what you pay for. Cheap dynamic microphones often have a very wide pickup pattern, and will cause feedback problems similar to what condensers will cause. On the other hand, cheap dynamic microphones often make decent room-mics for studio-scratchpad purposes, simply because they pick up everything, and they're not as expensive as a nice condenser.

Regarding the mixer: Mixers are getting cheaper and cheaper, and the quality of today's "affordable" mixers is frankly mind-blowing. I certainly wouldn't recommend getting the Behringer Buy-Of-The-Week if you were a pro looking to run sound for a reputable act -- but as a musician just looking to do a few gigs to get your feet wet, well, you really can't go wrong with any of Behringer's offerings. I can't recommend other bargain brands because I haven't tried 'em. I hear Alesis makes some fine mixers which even incorporate firewire support (which comes in handy if you want to record a show or rehearsal straight off the board). But my $125 Behringer Eurorack UB1204-Pro is a great little device. I've used it in almost every conceivable way you'd use a mixer. I run all my mics and instruments through it in my home-studio to help limit my dynamics and avoid digital clipping. I've used it for my main mixer during live shows. I've recorded band-rehearsals through it. I love the thing, and although I'm sure its preamps don't stand up to Mackie or Allen & Heath preamps, I have to concede that my studio conditions wouldn't allow me to get full mileage out of great preamps anyway. So, where the mixer's concerned: Figure out what you're gonna use it for, and how many inputs and outputs you'll need. Then shop around, and don't be afraid to buy cheap, because the cheap gear can be astoundingly good.

Regarding the power-amp, mains, and monitors: This is the heart of your sound-reproduction system. This is where you will spend the money. Amps aren't cheap, and good speakers will cost you an arm and a leg. My advice: Spend the money on the amp. Get something that provides way more power than you plan on using. I recommend Crown power-amps, because they have a great reputation, and I've used 'em time and time again with no problems.

Do you need monitors? Ideally, yes. As Justin pointed out, vocalists always perform better when they can hear themselves. The same goes for the rest of the band. But every Idiot Plot gig was performed without monitors, including our CD-Release. We got so used to it, actually hearing ourselves play probably would have thrown us off our game. So, yes, you can get along without monitors. In small venues, you will hear yourself well enough from the mains that you won't really need another speaker pointed back at you. But it always helps, and if you've got the money, spend it. You can always unload the equipment on Ebay later.

What about the mains? These are as important as your power-amp. The fact of the matter is, if you buy mains that are perfectly matched to your power amp, they'll last longer and sound better. This means that their power capacity should match your amp's power output, at the same level of Ohms. I forget how this works. When I put Idiot Plot's PA together, I spent a lot of time trying to match affordable components together to achieve the best possible sound at the lowest possible price. Our amp is matched to our speakers, so it supplies ample power, and yet cannot overdrive our speakers. It seems that the homework I did at the time has paid off, because we haven't blown a component yet. I remember back in the 351 Windsor days, when Paul would scrounge-up whatever amp/speakers/board combo he could find for our band rehearsals, and we'd blow the horns out of our speakers on a weekly basis. For a long time, I thought that was just the nature of PA speakers. It was only later I learned that this is the primary symptom of underpowering your speakers. Of course, it can also happen if you're overpowering your speakers to the point of distortion, or if you're having a lot of problems with feedback. Feedback, pops and excessive distortion can blow horns.

So, that's the gist of it: In an ideal world, you'd buy a super-powerful amp, and a combination of Mains and Monitors that can consume exactly the amount of power the amp can provide. If you match your speakers and your amp in this manner, you'll get the most out of your equipment.

But in the real world, most of us can't afford to buy a super-powerful amp and the great speakers to match. Most of us want to buy small, and upgrade later. Since it's always better to overpower your speakers than to underpower them, the wise move is to buy a killer amp, and so-so speakers. Don't worry if you're not consuming all the power your amp can provide; this isn't efficient, but it shouldn't damage your equipment like having an underpowered amp will. And when you start making some dough at your gigs, then you can buy the better speakers and have a great PA system.

That's all I have to say on the matter.

You may find a ton of help here:
studio-central.com/phpbb/index.php

-- Ryan

[Jeff]

Justin, Chris, and Ryan:

Thank you guys so much for your suggestions. We will keep them in mind as we work though all our decisions.

Jeff