What is wrong with the sound on Conan's Tonight Show?

[Silver Sonya]

Someone needs to get fired and replaced.

When a band plays, you think "Oh no, someone muted a channel! The vocal mike is off! They'll fix it any second now."

But no. Nothing gets fixed and it will be the same for tomorrow night's performer.

Why is everything always so far away? Are they putting microphones in the hall to "capture the ambience of the hall?"

Ugh.

- c

[StillCrazy]

Unfortunately fixing the music cannot fix the show itself. A lot of my friends have quite watching.

[jdtrbn]

Distorted guitars sound like flies buzzing every time and vocals are too loud.

[sailor]

Yeah, really weird room-y sound on that show. Too bad, because the old NYC show sounded great....I always thought the MW7 was the best sounding house band on TV.

I'm hoping they're just still sussing out the sound of their new stage....but it's taking them a long time.

[RKrizman]

The content.

-R

[MrChang]

I agree. I always thoughts the MW7 was the tightest on-air band. The sound of the studio in New York was just that, tight sounding. The stage Conan is taped on now sounds like a high school cafeteria.

Not to mention the show has now

Dump Andy Richter (again) and bring back Joel Godard as the announcer. The whole creepy & awkward, not to mention hilarious, vibe they built between Conan, Max, and Joel for more than a decade is gone as it is; unwatchable for the moment for fans of the Late Night branded Conan.

[willerichey]

I really have to agree. The NY show sounded tighter. Is this because it was a smaller studio than the LA one? I recently read in the Mix Engineer's handbook about LA vs NY mixing styles. NY mixes are described less roomy and in your face while LA mixes have more room sound and are more about capturing that actual live performance. Some engineers have mixed both to come up with their own styles.

Is this an east coast/west coast thing or are they stillign working out the audio kinks of the new studio? COnan did say the power went out once.

I think he has caved into the constriants of the new time slot. The show has lost its edge and it is a shame becuase thats why it was so fresh and funny before.

[Stevil]

"Later... with Jools Holland" has had some disappointing sound problems as well. Typically volume drops like someone has a mix bus compressor set too aggressively.
Really distracts from some otherwise spectacular performances & recordings.

[doug hazelrigg]

I concur, the new Tonite Show sound is terrible; too much room ambience

Don't these guys watch the show when it plays back and cringe when they hear their sound?

[wesarvin]

Everybody's bashing the new show's sound, but didn't they ever realize how AWFUL Leno's show sounded? At least Conan's sounds a little better than the Leno show, but it is still very roomy and loose sounding. It's probably a combination of acoustics and mixing styles.

I won't gripe about the content however, it's just a culture shock that we'll all adjust to following the transition. People said the same stuff when Carson and Leno changed hands (and yes, even though I'm young, I still remember that time!).

[lovekrafty]

I built out all of the audio room's for the new Conan Show and built out the stage audio, ( Equipment and wiring )

I agree the sound is'nt the greatest

I think there are a few reasons
First off it's a big room, originally designed for film production
( it's actually the Jack Benny shows old stage ).

They did'nt do too much in the way of treating the room
including the rafters the stage is 40 ft high lot's of bouncing around going on ( infact they stripped alot of the original treatment off the walls, i.e. 50 year old fiberglass covered in burlap )

The floor is covered is black shiney acrylic tiling which certainly does'nt help.

On the production side, it's a whole new crew , with new equipment
and to be honest the production room design was'nt that good.
After all it's only broadcast right?

The whole build was behind schedule and as soon as we finished they immediately went into rehearsals, I'm pretty sure not much in the way of acoustical analysis was done , the company I work for certainly did'nt do any

I suspect it'll take them a while to iron out the bugs
It's a completely new production setup and they did'nt have enough time
to really test drive it.


If you look at my Avitar to the left , that is the Audio Production Console

Cheers
LK

[lovekrafty]

FYI, I've got lot's of pictures of the build out, including the audio production rooms if anyone is interested.

[Quint]

Originally Posted by Stevil

"Later... with Jools Holland" has had some disappointing sound problems as well. Typically volume drops like someone has a mix bus compressor set too aggressively.
Really distracts from some otherwise spectacular performances & recordings.

I've always thought that the Jools Holland show sounded like ass. It sounds like ass to the point of making me not want to watch it, even when it's a band I really like. That and I could do without the lame ass piano duet he does with everybody at the beginning of the show.

[sailor]

Originally Posted by lovekrafty

FYI, I've got lot's of pictures of the build out, including the audio production rooms if anyone is interested.

Sure....it's Gearslutz!

[lovekrafty]

What's the easiest way to post pics here?

[andersmv]

Originally Posted by lovekrafty

What's the easiest way to post pics here?

Post them on photobucket or facebook and link them to here.

[lovekrafty]

O.K. It'll take me a while but I'll post some pics, stay tuned !!

[gvonbaren]

Is the girl who mixed the show in ny still mixing. Best horn sound EVER in broadcasting and great sound overall.
Glenn

[lovekrafty]

Don't think so , other than the Exec Producer it's a whole new crew

That's Conan in the middle

[Topgear]

I've only watched the first few shows, but I noticed that Max's snare would just get completely lost in the mix. It wasn't a case of "lack of punch", it's as though the whole mix is massively overcompressed/limited, and the frequencies are fighting each other on top of that.

These guys used to sound like the best band on tv.

[bcgood]

Gr8 stuff lk thanx for posting. It's interesting to get some background info. I'm too busy right now to watch the show but I think Conan is a HUGE step up from Leno. So a lot of old people don't get it and are taking awhile to get used to Conan. Nothing new or surprising there.

As far as the sound goes the main thing that I noticed was that at least in the first couple of shows, (maybe they've fixed it now) Andy was mixed extremely low and you could hardly hear what he was announcing over the band music playing in the intro.

[lovekrafty]

Here are a few photos

[Stevil]

Originally Posted by Quint

I've always thought that the Jools Holland show sounded like ass. It sounds like ass to the point of making me not want to watch it, even when it's a band I really like.

i've got some bose speakers in the living room that are very forgiving to bad mixes. still very hit or miss on my end, unfortunately the misses tend to be on bands i wanna hear.
could it be the show giving the station a hot mix & the squashing happening on the broadcast side?

Originally Posted by Quint

That and I could do without the lame ass piano duet he does with everybody at the beginning of the show.

the 'everybody jam' bit always sounds like mud.
must be fun for the up & coming bands to be able to say they jammed with Paul McCartney or whomever.

[anemicrock]

Awesome. Looks so fun to work there.

[lovekrafty]

and a few more

[lovekrafty]

Originally Posted by anemicrock

Awesome. Looks so fun to work there.

Was fun , but a lot of hard work, it leaves you mentally and physically drained at the end of the day.

Hope you enjoy the pics
LK

[EqnoixStudios]

Why aren't the any talk show hosts table mic actually plugged in?

[anemicrock]

Was fun , but a lot of hard work, it leaves you mentally and physically drained at the end of the day

I bet.

[Sounds Great]

I haven't watched in a while, but when I did, it was MONO! I watched for a couple of great music acts and the sound was mono every time.

dfegad

[Sonic Lush]

Originally Posted by lovekrafty

and a few more

hey that's Lian Light in those two photos!

she does great work and is super nice.

cool! thanks for sharing these, lovekrafty