Building upon my earlier posts of a night out with Crash Landing, I continue with the first part of the second set.
In future posts I will detail mixing/recording process and Live Sound Reinforcement techniques. For now, enjoy a few songs from my old cover band.
Here is the 2nd installment of my live recording of Crash Landing back in 2002. I played with them for a number of years. First as a sound guy. I knew the singer Gary Jefferson and he pulled me into the group. Gary and I go back a few years. He knows everyone and has played all over town. I have helped him with outside projects and you can hear his vocals on a lot of my original songs. Great people are hard to come by, but they will be there for you when you need.
I wish I had more video to share. I have a call out to other band members and friends to send me copies of anything they have. I have created videos for years but never really did much during this time. Again, I wish I had. Here is the next section of an evening with Crash Landing. This is still the first set and we are getting warmed up. Settling into the sound. That is the toughest thing about one-night-gigs; everything sounds so strange for the first 3 or four songs at the minimum. Depending on the sound guy/gal, this could take up to an entire first set to get comfortable.
I don’t have records of who was running sound this night. With this band I USED to run sound from the audience, then became a band member and ran sound and played/sang from out in the crowd using our own equipment! In many ways that was very cool. After a while we hired sound companies and I just don’t know who was at the board.
I hope you enjoy a night out – to hear a live band – without leaving your home. It’s like you are at the show, but you can still have one more drink and not have to drive home!
Here is the you-tube link for part two: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vHdxs6z-Qg
Recently I went to see some of my old band-mates playing out. I have always been the ‘senior’ member of the bands I have been fortunate to be associated with. NOT that I was with the band from the beginning but that I am usually the oldest member of the bands. Usually by ten years or so. As a result a few of my friends from old bands are still playing out in the city. It is always a pleasure to see what they are up to and catch up on life.
My drummer in Crash Landing was playing with one of his current bands and we got a chance to talk. His son is also taking up the drums and thought it would be cool if he could share some of the old recordings with him. He asked me if I could get him copies of what I have.
For you new to this blog I record a lot. Practice sessions, private parties, small gigs, writing songs in the late evening. I started with reel-to-reel tape machines since the 1970’s or so. The recordings sound and look as old as I feel, but they preserve the events and people involved.
I am a Singer Song-Writer. I write my lyrics and melody, decide the chord arrangement and structure of the song. That is what got me started singing. Then percussion. Then guitar and recording and working at music stores and learning sound reinforcement and recording techniques and….. In some ways playing with a cover band was torture. The bands members were really talented and experienced. I kept thinking they could do great things with my originals or create new amazing songs.
The thing about cover bands is that the good ones can do anything. Think about it. They can sound like so many other bands from one song to the next. They make the instruments and effects sound like the original. The solos are dead on and more often than not; improved. No over dubs: no guest artists. All this while they cannot hear themselves, people are yelling and drinking right in front of them and the sound guy is either drunk or deaf in both ears.
The audio recording was from a live performance. According to the DAT case it was 11-16-2002. This was a small club and I decided to record on my Panasonic two-track digital DAT machine. I was not mixing at this time so the recording success was limited. I grabbed a stereo feed from two subs and hoped for the best. I have a number of examples of live recording techniques in my LSR Series linked at the top if you have an interest.
I will get into more details on this particular recording and show other examples of recording results in later posts. For now, let me just say that the recordings are from one night. This is what we sounded like if you were in the audience. There are no cuts and if you put this series back to back when all are posted it will be the entire evening minus a few technical disasters. Here is the YOUTUBE link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3NTGTnemF8
The band members did not know I was recording. I just set it up in ten minutes and left it alone. Unfortunately, I did not shoot videos of Crash Landing. I wish I had for kicks and giggles.
Our banner designed by Marty Gillaspy
“Chase The Dream”
When one of the bands I worked with collapsed under the pressures of day to day life, it was quickly resurrected in a new form. Most of Euphoria members did not want to stop playing so we regrouped with a new guitar player to replace one of the founding members and became The Chase. We played out with about ten different names for a few months – Scenic Route was another favorite of mine – until we settled on The Chase. These guys were great. We had a solid rhythm section, a great lead singer and back up vocals that were tight and an amazing lead guitar player that could feel everything he played. We could play cover songs no other bands would play live. We also threw in originals from time to time. The banner was hung one each side of the stage vertically as seen in one of the photos below, and horizontally behind the drum set. It was pretty eye-catching and a lot of people complimented it.
I am an archivist. I record everything. Audio recordings of practice sessions and live performances. Video of many performances and photos of major events. Before YouTube I posted a number of them on our cable TV Local Access channels using their video editing suite. I had my fingers in everything. Some of the projects got finished, but a lot of the raw tapes have only been viewed by me and a select group of people.
I just put together a new video that uses a lot of this vintage raw video and some of the photographs from the time period. The medium is so old that the quality suffers, but it does a good job of representing the events of the time. We played in many clubs and outdoor events and I will create future videos to highlight more venues. For this video I used an original instrumental song that Nick Robinson was working on and our new band, The Chase, made it our own. There is no video of the song as we only played it out a few times. Nicky has since re-joined Euphoria when it regrouped a few years ago and is still playing out with some amazing players.
Please check out my latest YouTube post (and other videos while you are there) of his original tune: “Chasing The Dream”. Enjoy!
In most situations when you want to record a performance, you might not have a lot of time to set up. The environment might not be perfect, and there are other needs than getting a great recording. I have tried and been quite successful with a number of techniques. I will offer a few here for your consideration.
Getting a good mix from the sound board Mono Out or Main Left and Right Outs in a small or medium size venue is very easy to set up, but most likely to be disappointing. The needs of the audience in a live situation can be the exact opposite from the recording engineer’s. As mentioned in the beginning of this series, LSR is reinforcement. The sound person will amplify the weaker signals in the House or Mains; vocals – along with a LOT of effects, acoustic guitars, flutes, and even the drums. They might not need to reinforce the lead or bass guitar as much. So the board mix is heavier on vocals, effects, and keyboard in some cases. Not a great listen for most people. You can set up a sub-mix if the sound guru gives you access. If they run Left (Mono) like most venues, you can create your own mix using the Right Mono out. Using the pan for each channel, keep full signal going to the Left out, and pan toward Center position to send desired amount of signal to the Right out. You might want to isolate the guitar or bass, add a little toms if they are mike’d, but not heavy in the mix. You can mix the two outs if you record in stereo and get a great live sound. This will not give you a perfect stereo field, but most audiences do not remember concerts in stereo. The sound seems to come from the stage, not left and right cabinets in front of the stage.
I have also had luck with those portable stereo digital recorders available now for what I think is really cheap for what they do. You need to set them up correctly and take care of them but they are so easy to set up and you get great sound in various environments. If you have a SAFE place where you will hear more of the band than the audience (sounds easier than it really is) this is worth a try.
There have been many memorable events in my life to date and many more to come. It might not be apparent at the time the impact any one of them would have at the time. I have never been diagnosed or treated professionally but I find myself dealing with depression from time to time. It is impossible to know what triggers those feelings and more difficult to see your way out. On one of those times I could not break the cycle. I had no motivation or inspiration. In fact, I did not care at all. About anything. I had been through similar situations before so for weeks I kept telling myself it would pass in its own time. I would get through this one as well. But that was the only positive thought I had. Life not worth living. Nothing made me happy or sad. I forced myself through motions and obligations by shear routine. I seemed like this would go on forever. It felt unbearable even though most of my friends had no idea what I was dealing with.
I had tickets to see an amazing show under any circumstances, so I went to see Cirque du Soleil. It is funny how this affected me. I watched human beings do what seemed impossible even if you could think of the skills in the first place. Art and amazing physical prowess seamlessly blended together to tell a story with few words. Strength and perfection only achieved with years and years of unrelenting practice and sacrifice. It again showed me the potential of mankind. Dedication, creativity, trust, respect were all required to make this amazing performance happen. I realized watching each scene that we are incredible beings when we try. That night I started trying again. I saw the end of the funk that was created by myself – for myself. I could see again the beauty of life and the result of hard work when things seem impossible.
History sometimes repeats itself. Funny to think of this after my recent event at a concert to see my musical mentor and hero – Peter Gabriel, performing on tour with Sting. It is so refreshing to know there are others in the world that struggle to be good. That work every day to promote peace love and all that corny stuff I could not live without. In their music and through their lives they can impact so many. I thought I would never be able to see Gabriel perform. I have come close, but things did not work out. They almost did not work out this time either. Of all the artists/people in the world, his music, words and projects affect me like no other person on this earth. I am who I am with his unknowing help and guidance. I struggle to be better knowing it is possible.
I grew up listening to Genesis and following his solo career. I am not obsessed and do not own everything he has. I do not know every detail of his personal life or career. But I do think I ‘know the man’. I understand him as a man and not an idol. We are growing old together.
Sting was also amazing and sang a number of Peter’s songs, and performing his own tunes and some from the days of The Police. For me, it was precious, unforgettable and one of the greatest musical experiences I have had.
While performing with my last cover band, Crash Landing, we played local clubs, festivals and private parties. In this picture of a live set up, you will see a fairly standard rock/blues/country/alternative/jazz band stage arrangement; drums center rear, Lead Vocalist center front. Keys (and/or rhythm guitar) on the left as you look at the stage and the lead guitar player on the right. In smaller clubs the keyboards get crunched back in the corner next to the drummer…… no sour grapes here! Bass player close to the drummer. (either side doesn’t really matter) In reality, most bands will not practice in this configuration, but this is the way most of us play out live and we are quite used to it. In our case, Crash Landing has a number of vocalists. All but the drummer sings in this band. The bass player takes front stage position and sings a number of lead vocals. So does the guitar player. You can see where the microphone stands are placed for the vocalists. Close up pictures later in this series will show other microphone positions for the instruments. These are good places to start. If you have limited time or setting up for a number of bands in an evening, you go with the standard format and shape the sound from the board as much as possible. Knowing or having experience doing the quick set-up successfully a few times you will see the standard configuration and mic placements work well for the vast majority of performances.
We can also see the positioning of the vocal stage monitors across the front of the stage. There are various thoughts on how to set these up but the differences can seem minor. For this many vocalists across the front, this spacing and direction worked fairly well. The drummer and/or other non-vocalists might also need monitors. (it would not be unusual for the keyboard player requiring a monitor to hear the keyboards and a vocal mix if they sing) This stage size gives players room to breath AND hear. When inside on a smaller stage, everything seems to collide and jumble. Outside you can hear yourself play much better (depending on the sound engineer, of course) and at times you might actually struggle just a little to hear the other players! Take two steps closer to them and they are plenty loud. This should be an easier situation for a sound engineer. If I had to do a first gig in my life as a practice run, I would want to do an outdoors gig.
If we start from the stage things actually be come easier. If the mixing or sound board is the hub of processing sounds, the stage is the hub for generating sounds! Most Live Sound Reinforcement events would benefit if the engineer spent more time here. It is not uncommon for the sound guy to spend fifteen minutes making sure the kick drum has every frequency needed pumped up loud enough to message your spine (and ear drums) but they take two minutes to set up the stage monitors. And most do that right after the band sets up - – – – – when there is no music playing!
So let’s take a minute and walk up on stage and see what it physically looks like. If you are familiar with the band you have a good idea of acceptable arrangements: Overall dimensions. Where are the riser(s). How tall are the ceilings. Where are the AC outlets. You may not be able to direct where the performers set up in a number of cases but you can influence some. Where should the drums/keyboards/horn section go. Where is a good central place for the snake (multi-connector cable connected to the mixing board). Where do the monitors go (unless using in-ear monitor systems). For me, this is also a good place to determine where the house speaker cabinets and amplifiers are placed. BTW, if you are not familiar with the band or act make it a practice to find out. Go to their website or media page. Get an idea of what they do live, if you can. Ten minutes on-line will save you a bunch of headaches if they turn out to have specific requests for their instruments or performers. I can also tell you from personal experience if you go up to Player C and say, “Hey, I got that adapter you need for your axe”, the player is going to notice the effort. They will relax and you can let them know they are in good hands. Getting the band’s cooperation is not necessary. It is not in the books. In some situations it might even be a waste of time. I will still try every time. Getting their cooperation…… sets up a great performance. Then I focus on stage sound….. and most band members will go out of their way to help during sound check and throughout the performance before 20 minutes of equalizing the kick drum.
Now that you have a good idea of the dimensions and set up requirements, place each performer in the best location and set up their respective microphones and monitors as needed. Set up House gear and test. From the mixing board, use a ‘talk-back’ microphone sent to the stage monitors to test and communicate with the performers. Band members might feel like they are inside a cage at the zoo, looking out at the visitors! Sometimes all you can see are the stage lights in your eyes. The venue may be quite dark. So the more comfortable they feel; the more like rehearsal you make it feel, the better the blend among performers. The better the blend, the better the whole event will unfold.
Going forward I will go over a few details and outline this process to make it easier as well fun!
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Through the beginning to the end of the last chapter, we have concentrated on the hub or the central nervous system of a Live Sound Reinforcement assignment. I have been focusing a bit on live performance in a typical band or musical event. We now understand how most equipment for the House PA, the stage monitors, effects, and even lighting systems use the mixing board as the central hub. The mixing board’s usefulness does not end there! Once equipment is set up, connected, turned on and confirmed functional, most of the adjustments made for the rest of the evening will happen because of changes to the mixing board. It also becomes the Master Device, and all other connected devices are ultimately controlled by the mixer. The sound engineer is the ONLY person that should touch the mixing board.
The next logical step would be to describe the components of the House PA system and how much power (or how much money do I need to spend….). After all, this is what most people hear, right?
Obviously, I set up as a trap question. The answer seems obvious.
If I said, “I sound like a broken record”, most young readers will not know what that means! But I will repeat myself on certain themes and I feel one a’ comin’! The next important thing is not the House PA and the number of speakers and amplifiers you need. Most small venue mixing engineers go straight for the house and main systems, completely ignoring the most important ingredient guaranteeing a great performance. We will avoid that trap now and focus on the stage and more importantly – the musicians on the stage.
When bands practice, they ultimately find a good use of space and volume so each member can achieve the two primary goals;
1) Hear myself (usually louder than any one else. This is not ego and we will get into that later)
2) Hear the other performers (usually not as loud as the performer wants to hear him/her self!!)
Once they settle in and can accomplish the above – practice is comfortable and productive. Each member can hear themselves and can also hear enough of the other members to blend with them. If you saw a live symphony orchestra and all you could hear were the trombones, it would seem like an awful performance. If you were a musician in the orchestra and all you could hear were the trombones……………
Now we can go back to the band members standing on a stage or venue they have never seen or played in…… and now understand that this is a very real challenge, and the smaller the venue… the smaller the budget. Lack of Resources can be difficult challenge to overcome.
In larger venues it was quite normal to have a smaller mixing board off to the one side of the stage. All the instruments and monitors would connect to this mixer, and it would ‘split’ all channels and send them equally to the House mixing board out in the audience area. (it can also be used to send signals to a recording van parked outside). The sound engineer on stage makes the band members happy by concentrating on the performers but does not affect the signal going to the House board. That way the House Engineer has full control of the unaffected incoming channels from the stage board.
Good enough for now and in the next few sections I will focus on the stage sound and mix.
You may think this funny, but my first real concert was a Grateful Dead concert. I was seventeen or eighteen at the time. I had seen bands perform at parks or other small events, but this was my first concert. The thing I remember most to this day were the huge balloons that the audience and band members would smack back and forth the entire evening. I was not that familiar with their music but I had heard references (“It’s not for lack of bread, like the Grateful Dead; dying”, from the musical play Hair, which I also saw!) but had not really heard much of their music before.
The second thing that I noticed was how communal the audience was. It is unlike other concerts. Everyone was friendly and happy to be there. It was a different group of people. They enjoyed the music, enjoyed the event and everyone got along. I wish more of the concerts I have seen had audiences that resembled The Grateful Dead fans.
What was your first concert? What do you remember about it?
MidiMike 