recording live band_would love some help

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

Hi fellow slutz. i turn for your advice once more.

Im a studio eng. and Ive been asked to track and mix a considerable big band. They want to record an album. Its a new approach on 70´s popular dancing music. very livish and humurous...

When I realized the size and the number of instruments to be recorded live I soon got to the conclusion that it wouldnt be praticle to track them in my studio. Not enough space. So they invite me to check out their space. I did. Its awsome. really great. Big warehouse in the middle of nowhere, except for a nearby train rail....but that sounds pretty good and that looks even better. i will try to post a picture.
So the place is so nice that I agreed to track them there. i have a couple of questions about how to do it best...

First the band:

From left to right in the stage-

A set of farfisa organs. 3 organs into a small mixer out to a 70´s Fender Twin and a Vintage Marshall

A Hammond A100- with leslie and another combo vintage guitar amp. Another Marshall i think

A Percursion set: small set of conga, tamborine and light perc.

Drums. Very big bassdrum, 2 small toms, snare and cymbs.

Bass to Bass Amp- A beautiful rare vintage amp. i really have to take some pics. Played Really dry and "FADO" like. Up and down all the time.

upright Piano. restored old upright piano. open front. You can see all the mechanism. usually doing melo rythmic patterns

guitar to guitar amp-JazzMaster to fenderTwin. rythmic clean guitar

3 lead vocals! one guy 2 babes! really fun and good looking band, really good players and singers. All. Long time experienced guys.

Heres a rough draft of it:

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

My ideia is balancing them on stage and try to capture everything with a big main stereo array. From there fill in with some spot mics. This might be a bit too ambicious...The stage is very big. Something like 20 meters wide and 8 meters deep. About another 6 to 8 meters high, or more.

So my first question is: If trying to take the best of the space with a distant stereo array, what should be a nice one to start from? I never did a decca3..
I was thinking omni in the center and 2 flancs...omni or cardiode. I think I can not cover the whole stage with just 2. Xy would be miles away from the guitar amp and organs. A wide stereo A B will probably leave a big hole in the middle...
I have 3 days to do everything so I cant test that much. I will test though...But it would be nice to take some ideas in the pocket!

I will be recording it to pthd2 through auroralynks. Preamps are api/baes73s/flamingo/oram/rme octa.

Here are the mics:

2 schoeps cmc6 mk4s
2 OktavasMk12
u87
cmv563 M7 m8 m55
414 b uls
AT 4047
Peluso2247LE
2 x 421 (white ones)
m88
d112
sm57s
m201
revox3500
r84
tbone rib

Any suggestions?

[bishopthomas]

Spot mic everything, put up a couple of room mics, and you'll have lots of options in the mix.

[Daniel Stark]

The first question that needs to be answered is, do you want this record to sound very different than the band does in the room? If the answer is "No" then go ahead and set up that array as the main pickup source.

But this scenario sounds like some creative technique might be appropriate.

One thing you might try, is setting the drums and vocals up on one side of the stage. Mic them with a single 2247le, or an m/s pair. Then put the rest of the band around the Schoeps pair. There you get the drums and vocals in the middle but with more flexibility at mix time and a bigger sound out of the kit than you would get with just the pair. Plus you can get the Schoeps up closer to the amps without having the drums overpower everything, and you can mix the vocals up and down as long as you get the right balance of drums with placement.

I do think it's possible with just an array but the drums will sound small....They will take up in the mix, the place that they take up on stage.

Make sure at the VERY least that the drummer and vocalists have monitors though.

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

Thanks for the input so far.

A couple of thoughts:

Im not trying to capture everything with a main stereo pair. Im just trying to get the most out of what can later be used as room or main stereo image. And, because the stage is pretty wide, my first concern was that a pair wouldnt be sufficient to cover it all.
So my main question here is what kind of array would you go for. 3, 4 mics?

If a 3 mic array, how far should they be placed and what polar patterns would be a nice starting point. Or is there a maximum distance between mics that you would advise me to not go beyond? What do you guys usually go for? I can later use this as room mics or I can rely a bit more on them for the majority of the sound, depending on how nice it will sound.

What Im surely going to do is to close mic everything. But, because the band sounds really good in the room and they can balance them self really nice that way, it would probably be nice to take advantage from that also. Im thinking that it can be easier and quicker to follow the sound and image that I already have when Im in the room facing them, than to re construct an entire image from scratch, one that might have nothing to do with the real one... that could be more imaginative/creative and could perhaps lead to a more interesting results, but it would also take much longer and id be fighting with the room mics then. My idea is to take the real stage were the band is as my phantom final stage. Get them to change places if necessary ( not the hammond I guess!), placing the amps in the right place ( left/right and close/far relatively to were the main stereo mics are...), like I would do with a pan or fader when mixing...the use the spot mics to fill whats missing....is this to far fetched?

Thanks in advance

[nickynicknick]

I would mic everything individually it's not that many tracks 24 maybe including a stereo pair...also I would use some baffling around the drum kit and face the piano back towards the louder instruments...you may have to separate them a little more depending on how it comes back...

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

Originally Posted by nickynicknick

I would mic everything individually it's not that many tracks 24 maybe including a stereo pair...also I would use some baffling around the drum kit and face the piano back towards the louder instruments...you may have to separate them a little more depending on how it comes back...

thats what i have in mind. The good news is that the band plays unusually quiet, soft. Thats one of the reasons it sounds good. The only thing I dont like that much is the drum sound. Not because it sounds too loud or messy! As one would imagine, but the contrary...the room is pretty dead. Concrete floor with carpet, walls and ceiling is pretty far away from the instruments. Drums sound a bit dull, dead. I miss some crack/sparkle from it. I might let this job for the mixing stage or I could build something around it to improve the sound from the start...The warehouse doubles as the guys atelier...he is a plastic artist, he has a lot of materials laying around and he is very good at constructing things, matter of fact the whole place was done by himself, and it is gorgeous...

What could be done in that department? What kind of surface, material would benefit drums to have a bit more life? plywood? we do have the space, the materials and time to build if its worth...

[nickynicknick]

Originally Posted by Dog_Chao_Chao

thats what i have in mind. The good news is that the band plays unusually quiet, soft. Thats one of the reasons it sounds good. The only thing I dont like that much is the drum sound. Not because it sounds too loud or messy! As one would imagine, but the contrary...the room is pretty dead. Concrete floor with carpet, walls and ceiling is pretty far away from the instruments. Drums sound a bit dull, dead. I miss some crack/sparkle from it. I might let this job for the mixing stage or I could build something around it to improve the sound from the start...The warehouse doubles as the guys atelier...he is a plastic artist, he has a lot of materials laying around and he is very good at constructing things, matter of fact the whole place was done by himself, and it is gorgeous...

What could be done in that department? What kind of surface, material would benefit drums to have a bit more life? plywood? we do have the space, the materials and time to build if its worth...

A (half inch) plexiglas enclosure (on three sides with enough room to put mics) should do the trick they should be at least as high as the tom mics are gonna be...also try to isolate yourself as far away from the music as possible with some baffling...also spend as much time as you need getting things right...remember the band (if they are good) can play the songs at any time...they're hiring you to get good sounds...give yourself time to do that and although they may become a little impatient.... in the end if it sounds good they will completely forget about that part...but if it just sounds ok..that's no good to anybody

[Daniel Stark]

that sounds like fun (plexiglass thing) i have seen pictures of those but never built one. sounds like a good thing to post photos of if you have a good builder to make it!

the omni flanks are what picks up a wider source, typically placed 1/3 to 1/2 the distance between the center pair and the outer edge of the band. there are some good threads on this.

i am curious how you guys would plan to balance the spot mics with the main stereo array? would you use mostly the mains or are you just using those as room mics and using mostly spots in the mix?

to me it seems like there are two opposing approaches to this, a) spot everything and mix with room mics and b) place the mains and spot as needed, but c) spot everything and use a main pair, seems kind of like trying to have your cake, and eat it too (although to be fair I never understood that saying either....?) but i do know that it's not supposed to be a good thing

[nickynicknick]

Originally Posted by Daniel Stark

that sounds like fun (plexiglass thing) i have seen pictures of those but never built one. sounds like a good thing to post photos of if you have a good builder to make it!

the omni flanks are what picks up a wider source, typically placed 1/3 to 1/2 the distance between the center pair and the outer edge of the band. there are some good threads on this.

i am curious how you guys would plan to balance the spot mics with the main stereo array? would you use mostly the mains or are you just using those as room mics and using mostly spots in the mix?

to me it seems like there are two opposing approaches to this, a) spot everything and mix with room mics and b) place the mains and spot as needed, but c) spot everything and use a main pair, seems kind of like trying to have your cake, and eat it too (although to be fair I never understood that saying either....?) but i do know that it's not supposed to be a good thing

why bake a cake if you can't eat it?

[Remoteness]

Ah yes, the phrase “you can't have your cake and eat it too…”

It’s a figure of speech that is most often used in a negative context.
This phrase usually is used to express the impracticality of having something both ways, if those two ways conflict with each other.

Once you ate your cake, you don't have it any more.
It’s like working your arse off to pay for your new live recording rig, but you never have the time to use it.

Originally Posted by nickynicknick

why bake a cake if you can't eat it?

[nickynicknick]

Originally Posted by Remoteness

Ah yes, the phrase “you can't have your cake and eat it too…”

It’s a figure of speech that is most often used in a negative context.
This phrase usually is used to express the impracticality of having something both ways, if those two ways conflict with each other.

Once you ate your cake, you don't have it any more.
It’s like working your arse off to pay for your new live recording rig, but you never have the time to use it.

really? thanks for clearing that up.

[Daniel Stark]

Originally Posted by nickynicknick

really? thanks for clearing that up.

fine, if we're going to get all sarcastic up in this place just throw a mic on everything and call it a day sheesh.

[Remoteness]

Don't worry about it Daniel; some folks just cannot help themselves -- it's how they're wired inside.
Stay out of their fog of sarcasm and you'll be just fine.

Originally Posted by Daniel Stark

fine, if we're going to get all sarcastic up in this place just throw a mic on everything and call it a day sheesh.

[joelpatterson]

Step out into the bright sunshine of comedy!

[Fuzzy Logic]

Originally Posted by nickynicknick

really? thanks for clearing that up.

didnt oscar wilde declare that sarcasm is the lowest form of wit?
and he was one witty man.

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

so we got a lot of plexiglass! We are going to try to build a vocal booth and a drum booth. well not really a booth, more like 2 or 3 pieces around instruments. What should be best for drums? Covering the front, placing the plexi in front of the kick, or behind the drummer? Man this is going to be a wild job.

Heres the band REAL COMBO LISBONENSE on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Videos

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

man we had a great session yesterday. We built a vocal booth ( big enough for 3) and a drum thing...no not a booth. we put some plexi around, as you suggested, sounded great! Then we realized that the main pair was getting too much drums comparing to rest of the band, so we built a kind of an acoustic panel. It worked! In the end of the day, after a lot of building, testing and mic placement we finally recorded a whole song, to test, it sounded way better than I was expecting to get in a place like that. Great. Today: fine tuning everything and recording. I will ask the band to post some of the pics I took.

Thanks for your help on this

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

Ok. No more recording to do. time to show a bit. The plexiglass worked wonders. so did the booth. its sounding really nice.

Heres the inside of the "booth"

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

view from booth facing drums, and from drums facing booth.

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

ups, wrong photo, thats the bass amp on the right.

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

here it is

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

this is what we placed around drums. Plexi and an acoustic panel over because the main pair mics was showing too much drums compared to the other instruments. we walked around with the panel until we found a place where we could balance the drums. it worked!

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

this structure was at the far end of the warhouse. i thought it had an intersting reverb. So I placed a mic inside. I got the most wonderful and caractherful reverb i ever got from an acoustic space. I cant even hear the songs with that mic!

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

here our improvised control room! We got a really nice isolation from the band. Hot like hell though! 32ºc plus the gear...

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

i will ask if i can post a bit of the music. its sounding like a record already! No eq, no artificial reverb, no compression. not even mixing or autos. The space is all. i want a new room!!!!!

[Daniel Stark]

Thanks for keeping us updated!! Great to hear and see how things are working out.....

[nickynicknick]

Glad it worked out...looks like you really went for it. Awesome!

Nick

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

thanks. It was nice to have your suggestions in mind. Heres a couple more pics. I had a busy day, didnt ask the band to post something, yet.

Heres a better look on the structure for the booth and in the other you can see how we placed the main stereo pair, over the booth.

[Dog_Chao_Chao]

there was a lot of cool gear laying around the place, we tried some of it. Heres a couple of beauties...

we had to track a couple of extra acoustic guitars that we werent counting on so we used the small console. Great sound, I loved the limiter on it. Very very good. the reslos were nice also. Tried the ribbon on drums and guitar amp.