Posted on

Behind the Board – In Front of The Screen

Last night we worked with NEXT Music at PCTV in Pleasantville, NY. This time it was an interesting twist. The band performed inside the TV studio as the audience watched outside on a big screen. Robbers On High Street have a great sound so it was fun to mix this show. The twist for us was we were mixing for three different elements, studio with monitors, TV, and outside. If you weren’t lucky enough to score tickets at this show, the whole thing was streamed online at allthingsnext.com.This was made a little tougher by a special event happening at the theater next door and the battle of not interfering with their presentation. But overall this experiment was a lot of fun. A party on a beautiful night with live music.

Now the outside really was an alley way between PCTV and a theater. The theater was showing a movie from music legend Neil Young. What was most interesting is here is an up and coming band working on their craft and a bunch of people watching and it was more of a nuisance to him! When Neil exited the theater he didn’t even acknowledge the people with a polite wave. Not even a glance. A decent crowd in an alley just mere feet from the door he exited from and it was as if the people who were politely saying hello were non existent.

But, it had nothing to do with the party itself so it had no effect on the good times in a little town in New York. Pictures and audio will be posted soon.

 

Posted on

Sound Advice

As a sound tech, the one thing I see the most that I find strange is vocalists who do not carry their own microphones.  Guitarists, Bassists, and Drummers all spend countless moments getting familiar with their equipment to develop their sound yet many vocalists  in club gigging bands will just rely on some cheap old mic that’s been sitting behind the bar and used 2 or more times a week by other singers. It’s been dropped and spit on, who knows what else. But what’s worse is the vocalist didn’t spend the countless moments that other musicians spend picking the right microphone to present their instrument out to the world.

Lets think about this here. A vocalist’s voice is their instrument. Everyone sounds different and some are more distinguishable from others. There are tones, and over tones. Nuances that make you sound like you.  Last thing a vocalist should be is content with just “whatever you got”.  

Now this isn’t just a quality of equipment situation. Or a health one (We’ve seen the nasty things that happen to house mics!). Just like other instruments there are different factors that effect tone and character with microphones. Better quality mics are more consistent sure, but they all pick things out of the air differently. Certain tones will be stronger on some than on others. Some are edgy with more bite, while others are stronger in the low end and may be boomier.

A vocalist needs to visit a bunch of music stores and ask to try some microphones out. Have them set you up with a professional PA amp and speakers. if any eq, it should be set flat. Stand in front of the speakers with a low volume and sing through a bunch of mics while listening to yourself. (Stand indirectly away to avoid feedback.) Which one do you like your sound on? That’s the one you want! Look for stores that carry Shure, AKG, Audix, and Sennheiser. These are the more common quality brands. Once you’ve picked your mic, look on Ebay or some other online stores for cleaning/sterilizing kits to help you maintain your mic and you’re all set. Now when you show up for a gig hand the sound guy your mic. An experienced sound tech has worked with most mics and is familiar with their characteristics. He’ll then eq your mics balance into his system. Take good care of your mic and it will last a long time.

Posted on

Behind The Board – Tales From The Other Side of The Board

So, (some of you may be familiar with this from my live tweeting) as I was attending a marketing seminar last month, I had the chance to prove our point about “Be Effective – Be Heard”. The house provided a little self powered, 2 speaker sound system for the speaker to use. He also used a screen and projector to show videos from his laptop computer. Said laptop was also connected to the little sound system. Add in a wireless lavalier microphone of questionable quality and no experience with the equipment and you have a recipe for disaster. (Side note, this was a seminar about using today’s technology to market your company.) So the seminar starts with a video. The video showed up on the screen but all you heard was crackling noise  as the wire he was given to connect his laptop to the sound system was a bad one. When he got it to work, there was so much bass you couldn’t understand. I actually looked outside for a thunderstorm first (legitimate thought as it was storming that day). Then he began to speak. This guy was a large man with an average male low voice. Here, he sounded like an AM radio (for the kids, that was what they listened to before streaming internet and podcasts). Static, no depth, hissing, all the things we pick on the fast food drive through for. Once in a while the mic would cut out. As a sound tech, I was out of my mind. But, let me be objective and look at what others reaction might be. Looking around the hall, I could see only about 40% of the attendees actually looking ahead. Afterwards, I asked a couple people the straight question “what did you think?” The first three told me they couldn’t hear it. Moral of this story. How can you get your point across, if you’re not getting your point out to their ears? People are pre-programmed to block out bad sounds. Extraneous noises get ignored by most people. Sound Techs on the other hand get annoyed by it. HAHA. If you sound badly, people will begin to tune you out.45 mins of listening to hiss is not most people’s idea of effective. Let alone the embarrassment of all your equipment failures. You’re supposed to be a professional?

A proper sound technician would have checked all the equipment prior to embarrassment. They would set up better equipment under a proper budget. They would have tested your sound prior to show and set the tone reaction between you and the microphone properly to give you clarity with the right amount of strength. 

If you’re doing a speaking engagement anytime soon and you’re in our area, give us a call. It’s a lot more expensive to fail to reach people than it is to hire us to set you up right. Or in any other area, look up “sound technician” or “sound engineer” in Google for that area. It’s really not that expensive in the long run, and you look more professional than this guy who was less effective than the girl at the Wendy’s drive thru I went to earlier for lunch!