Quote:
Originally Posted by Dean Roddey  It would take an pretty crazy amount of effort to do that, compared to just getting good levels......
Not to mention that it requires knowing absolutely what the song is going to sound like before you start, and never changing your mind later, even if a better idea comes to you during the mix. Many people are creating the song as the go and could hardly be expected to have an absolute understanding of every aspect of every instrument before they track, such that they would never change their mind about desired levels. |
Its really not rocket science or hard to do..
but perhaps its more of a 'rock band' technique, because with a rock band it is REAL easy to do - you simply set your monitor faders in a row and record levels and sounds that play back as a pleasant / "vibey" rough mix
This means that typically things like hihats and overheads & ride cymbal tracks aren't peaking anywhere near zero - (a newbie might say "dude you bedder turn that up man, its waaay too low!"
- when in fact the gain staging is PERFECT for such transient signal..
) conga tracks wont look "look ballanced" on the VU meters
- but will SOUND balanced to the ear..
etc..etc..
I can see with loops, midi music, 808 sub kicks, and dance music it might be a little harder to operate the 'straight line' method (but I have done it without problems in that genre too..)
For a live drum 'band' style music it works brilliantly..
Another proviso..
As the ongoing 'mix' is being monitored in the control room - its easier to do if the performers are out in the live area using headphones (so you as the engineer can monitor your ongoing 'mix' - because if the performer is in the control room, they may nag you to be
louder than just 'nicely mixed in' while doing their overdub.. This is a a subtle point but I feel worth mentioning.. (You could always push the fader up for the overdub but find your optimum 'mixed in level on a run-through..)
IMHO its an
awesome discipline to get into for recording rock / live band music.
Give it a try, its real easy.. + fun / cool and the ability to get up rough mixes by just putting faders in a row is an obvious advantage (say you have tambourine / shaker / percussion overdubs to do towards the end of an album - its a TOTAL DRAG to have to spend 5 mins to 'get a balance' on each tune (because you will want a nice one to make percussion decisions) on each of 10+ tunes just to do the f^**^% shaker parts.
(its a buzz getting a great sounding vibe going in the studio, having another engineer drop in and watching their split second eyebrow raise as they look at the faders and realize that what you have going on is 'all faders in a row' - its kind of an "engineering machismo" thing to do
