In The Control Room With Mark And Chuck

Here's a great movie with my friend engineer Chuck Ainlay and former Dire Strait's frontman and guitarist Mark Knopfler in the control room of Mark's fabulous personal studio. The cool thing about this studio is the vintage gear, and Mark has not one but two of the old EMI consoles; a REDD (originally used at Abbey Road) and a TG-1.

If you can gear lust, best not to look at his movie. But if you love old gear and love the the fact that it's actually being put to good use in Mark's studio, you'll love it.

By the way, Chuck was one of the featured engineer's in the second edition of The Recording Engineer's Handbook.  I'll post an excerpt from his interview soon.

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8 Things To Check Before You Press Record

Here's an excerpt from my book The Recording Engineer's Handbook. It's a checklist of questions to ask yourself before you ever hit the Record button.

1. Does the instrument sound great acoustically? Make sure that you start with a great acoustic sound with the instrument well tuned and minimum of sympathetic vibrations and extraneous noises.

2. Are the mics acoustically in phase? Observe the 3:1 rule and make sure that any underneath mics are at a 90° angle to the top mics.

3. Are the mics electronically in phase? Make sure that all the mic cables are wired the same by doing a phase check.

4. Are the mics the correct distance from the instrument? If they’re too far away they’ll pick up too much of the room or other instruments. If they’re too close the sound will be unbalanced with either too much attack or ring, and not enough of the body of the instrument. Walk around the player, put your finger in your ear, and find the spot that sounds the best. Remember, most instruments need some space for the sound to develop. The ambience from the surrounding area is a big part of the sound for most instruments.

5. Does it sound the same in the control room as when you’re standing in front of the instrument? This is your reference point and what you should be trying to match. You can embellish the sound after you’ve got the sound as close to the way it was when you were standing next to the player.

6. Is there another problem besides the mic placement? A great sound is dependent upon the instrument, the player, the amp (if there is on) and the room. The player has to be able to achieve the tone you're trying to record with his hands or mouth or voice first and foremost. The mic itself usually has less to do with the ultimate sound than the placement, room and the player and ultimately, the project itself.

You should always trust your ears and begin by listening to the musician in your studio, find a sweet spot and then begin your microphone placement there. If you don’t like the resultant sound, then move the mic or swap it with another. EQ is the last thing you should touch.

7. Is the problem in your signal chain? Don’t neglect your microphone preamp. The better your preamp, the less trouble you’ll have capturing the sound, but sometimes a certain mic/preamp combination will give you the sound you need. Don't be afraid to experiment.

8. Is the problem in the players signal chain? A guitarist’s signal chain, for example, can be a huge help or a big hindrance. You’ll get a warmer yet aggressive guitar sound by decreasing the amount of distortion from pedals, but turning up the amp’s volume instead to obtain the sustain/distortion from the amp and speaker. Also, smaller amps and speakers tend to sound bigger than large amps/speakers when recording.

REMEMBER: Mics cannot effectively be placed by sight, which is a mistake that is all too easy to make. The best mic position cannot be predicted, it must be found.

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Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Don't forget to check out my Music 3.0 blog for tips and tricks on navigating social media and the new music business.

The Best Microphone Information Sites

There are a couple of websites that I really like for information on microphones. One is the Microphone Database at recordinghacks.com from drummer and mic collector Matt McGlynn, and the other is at coutant.com, which is a site by Professor S.O. Coutant of Pasadena City College.

The Microphone Database has 860 microphone profiles and focuses more on newer mics. Each mic has a brief description, the features, as well as the specs, frequency chart, polar plots and review. It's a great place to compare the virtues between several mics before you choose to buy.

Professor Coutant's site looks more at older mics, which makes it a great resource for any microphone history, and specializes in mics used for broadcast. There are some great detailed photos, as well as some seldom seen celebrity user pictures (like the one of a very young Willie Nelson from 1966 on the left).

When I was teaching recording in the early 1990's, one of the biggest problems for my students was one of microphone identification, especially of vintage mics. It was all well and good to discuss using a U-67 or a C-12A, but most students didn't have a clue what they looked like. That's why I dedicated an entire chapter to the microphones that are considered "standards" in The Recording Engineer's Handbook. I tried to give a history of each mic, as well as it's uses. I'd like to think I did a really good job with providing facts that can't be found anywhere else in my book, but sites like Matt's Microphone Database and Professor Coutant's now make it easy for a student to easily identify a vintage microphone. Now if only they were more available to use.

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Follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Don't forget to check out my Music 3.0 blog for tips and tricks on navigating the music business.

The 8 Constants Of Vocal Recording

By my count, there are 8 “constants” that we find in vocal recording. These are items or situations that almost always prove to be true. Just keeping them in mind can save you a lot of trouble in the search for a sound that works for you and your vocalist.

Here are a few tips taken from The Recording Engineer’s Handbook and the upcoming Music Producer’s Handbook to help you get a great vocal sound quickly and easily without any of those nasty side effects.

1) Your mic selection, amount of EQ, and compression used is totally dependent on the voice you are recording. Setting up the same signal chain for everyone might work sometime, but best to keep an open mind (and ears) before you settle on a combination.

2) The best mic in the house doesn’t necessarily get the best vocal sounds. There is no one microphone that works well on everything, especially a instrument as quirky as the human voice.

3) A singer who is experienced at recording knows which consonants are tough to record and knows how to balance the them against the vowels to get a good final result. A singer with this kind of experience will make you look like a genius.

4) With a good singer, many times you'll get “the sound" automatically just by putting him/her in front of the right microphone. On the other hand, with a bad singer (or even a good singer that just doesn't adjust well to the studio), no amount of high priced microphones or processing may be able to get you where you need to go.

5) In general, vocals sound better when recorded in a tighter space, but not too tight. Low ceiling rooms can also be a problem with loud singers as they tend to ring at certain lower mid range frequencies, which might be difficult to eliminate later.

6) Windscreens are actually of little use when recording a vocalist with bad technique. There are two different sorts of people in this category: the people who have never sung with sound reinforcement, and the people who have developed bad habits from using a mic on stage.

7) Decoupling the stand from the floor as well as the microphone from the stand will help eliminate unwanted rumbles. Often times a microphone isolation mount isn't enough. Place the stand on a couple of mouse pads or a rug for a cheap but efficient solution.

8) Just marking the floor with tape might get the vocalist to stand in the right position in front of the mic, but she can easily move her head out of position. An easy way to have a vocalist gauge the distance is by hand lengths. An open hand is approximately eight inches while a fist is about four inches. By saying, “Stay a hand away”, the vocalist can easily judge his distance and usually doesn’t forget (see the grapic on the side).

We'll discuss vocal recording in more depth in a future post.

Distorted Sound Checklist

It's not uncommon for someone in their home studio to come up against an age-old problem - trying to record something and getting a distorted sound instead of something nice and clean. This sometimes lead to user being baffled and uncertain what to do, but if you think it through you can find the problem in no time.

Here's a checklist to follow the next time this happens. Follow it in this order.

1. Is the cable working correctly? Try a different microphone cable.

2. Is the mic working correctly? Try a different mic as a comparison.

3. Is the mic being overloaded? Try a different mic to see if the signal level from the source is too loud, or move the mic back about 3 feet to see if the distortion goes away.

4. Is the microphone preamp working correctly? Try a different preamp or console channel.

5. Is the microphone preamp being overloaded? Check to see if any overload indicators are lit. Turn the input level of the preamp down or move the mic back 3 feet to see if the distortion goes away. Try a different preamp, console or interface channel to see if the problem is resolved.

6. Is the signal chain after the mic preamp being overloaded? Check to see if any overload indicators are lit on your interface and DAW. Decrease the output control of the preamp or bypass any compressors in the signal chain. Play back the signal from the DAW to make sure it’s clean.

7. Is the monitoring chain working correctly? Is the stereo or control room buss being overloaded? Try a different set of amplifiers and speakers.

These tips and more can be found in the Recording Engineer's Handbook.

A Recording Checklist

Here's an excerpt from my book The Recording Engineer's Handbook. It's a recording checklist that, if followed, will pretty much keep any engineer, or musician trying to record himself or his band, out of trouble.

1. Does the instrument sound great acoustically? Make sure that you start with a great acoustic sound with the instrument well tuned and minimum of sympathetic vibrations and extraneous noises.

2. Are the mics acoustically in phase? Observe the 3:1 rule and make sure that any underneath mics are at a 90° angle to the top mics.

3. Are the mics electronically in phase? Make sure that all the mic cables are wired the same by doing a phase check.

4. Are the mics at the correct distance from the instrument? If they’re too far away they’ll pick up too much of the room or other instruments. If they’re too close the sound will be unbalanced with either too much attack or ring, and not enough of the body of the instrument. Walk around the player, put your finger in your ear, and find the spot that sounds the best. Remember, most instruments need some space for the sound to develop. The ambience from the surrounding area is a big part of the sound for most instruments.

5. Does it sound the same in the control room as when you’re standing in front of the instrument? This is your reference point and what you should be trying to match. You can embellish the sound after you’ve achieved this.

6. Is there another problem besides the mic placement? A great sound is dependent upon the instrument, the player, the amp and the room. The player has to be able to achieve the tone you're trying to record with his hands first and foremost. The mic itself usually has less to do with the ultimate sound than the placement, room and the player and ultimately, the project itself.

You should always trust your ears and begin by listening to the musician in your studio, find a sweet spot and then begin your microphone placement there. If you don’t like the resultant sound, then move the mic or swap it with another. EQ is the last thing you should touch.

7. Is the problem in your signal chain? Don’t neglect your microphone preamp. The better your preamp, the less trouble you’ll have capturing the sound, but sometimes a certain mic/preamp combination will give you the sound you need. Experiment.

8. Is the problem the players signal chain? A guitarist’s signal chain can be a huge help or a big hindrance. You’ll get a warmer yet aggressive guitar sound by decreasing the amount of distortion from pedals, but turning up the amp’s volume instead to obtain the sustain/distortion from the amp and speaker. Also, smaller amps and speakers tend to sound bigger than large amps/speakers when recording.

REMEMBER: Mics cannot effectively be placed by sight, which is a mistake that is all too easy to make. The best mic position cannot be predicted, it must be found.

Send Me Your Comments

I'm looking for some quotations about my books for some upcoming marketing.

A lot of you have personally told me that the books have been a help in some aspect of your musical life, but I've never bothered to write your comments down (I will from now on).

That being said, if you've read any of my books, I'd love to hear what you have to say - good, bad or indifferent.

You can send them to me here. Thank you kindly!