First recording: K&K + Black Angel, Felix. Advice?

[rschultz]

Hi,

I finally bought an audio interface (Presonus USB 96) so I could record, it comes with Studio One Artist v3. The only effects used was the Boss CP-1X through the FX loop. EQ was applied by the Grace Felix, see picture. I made 1 simple recording and then spit out 3 files:

K&K Only
Black Angel Only
K&K + Black Angel mix

Fingerpicking at first, then strumming around 0:47. I'd be interested in any advice on my sound, EQ, levels, etc.

Thanks!

[Sage97]

Very good playing. From my speakers and headphones, they all sound lacking the bottom and middle spectrums. Maybe others will hear differently but it is almost like it was EQ'd to eliminate the bottom and middle.

[StevenL]

BA only: Ice pick to the ear. Upper mids prevalent. Probably would be the easiest to mix with for a recording with several tracks... IF you just had to use a pickup for the recording.

K&K: Sounds like a K&K. Typical Whump on the attack. You'd have to eq that out in a mix. I'm no good for K&K comments since I just can't stand that Whump and it makes them unlistenable To Me.

Both: The Whump is reduced and sounds ok, but there's not enough benefit there to make the combination worthwhile. May be ok/good in a live setting, but impossible to know from this. For recording ... Have to go with mic'd every time.

If those recordings are indicative of the live sound ( I know they're not), I couldn't listen long to a solo performer, even if they were very good. Very very 'clean' though. The BA may sound better with some lower freqs added back in.

Just my head-top thoughts. Listened on HP laptop through Senn HD280's.

[rschultz]

Great feedback. I agree, they both recorded more thin than they sounded using my acoustic amp as a monitor. It's almost like the software needs to add a speaker EQ curve or something.

For live sound in a small band, that setup has enough cut to work. But for solo or recorded, yes it needed more low mids. And a touch or Reverb would help too.

Should I use the headphone out to EQ it instead of the amp monitor? I think I'm reasonably proficient with EQing live sound, but a complete newbie at recording.

Feel free to comment on how to get a better recording... both direct and/or with a mic.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[alohachris]

Aloha rschultz,

Howzit?

Thanks for the clips. Nice playing.

I'm not a fan here of using pickup systems of any kind for recording an acoustic guitar. You give up too much in terms of options later in the mixing process & it never sounds natural - unless that's what you're after a la Michael Hedges, etc.

For me, stereo miking with a matched pair of great SDC mic's through a great preamp, in an adequately treated space, gives me the most natural recordings & the most control for consistency. No balance or levels issues as with a mic & pickup combo. Sometimes, I also add ribbon mic to fill in the center with different levels & FX. Pick ups limit those options.

That said, in terms of improving the recordings you've shared here, a question: how are you EQ'ing the two sources? Are you simply maximizing each source for it's best sound & combining? Or are you EQ'ing the two sources separately for frequency emphasis & summing them later?

I suggest you use the latter method for recording a mic & pickup together (just as many of us do live). EQ the mic for the natural crisp trebles & upper mid's (& roll off all the bass & lower mid's). Then EQ the pickup for the round bass, presence & lower mid's (& roll off the trebles & harsh, thin sounding upper mid's). Then sum the two sources together.

I've had better results EQ'ing separately that way then just going for the best sound on each source. More separation of frequencies & clarity. More bottom & presence, more natural, fuller sounding trebles (strings). Keep the pickup slightly father back in the mix in terms of levels.

Or, as I said, record using two great mic's in stereo for greater consistency, control & sound.

Just a suggestion.

Record to monitors first, headphones second. I use both to ensure the right balance & location RE: mic placement.

All the best, rschultz

alohachris

PS: This may give you a detailed example of how to create an acoustic guitar recording (similar to how I do it) as well as Doug & his superior ear & signal chain. Listen to the final step-by-step evolution in a 16/44.1 Wav file in HD:

http://www.dougyoungguitar.com/WSSDemo.php

[rschultz]

Originally Posted by alohachris

PS: This may give you a detailed example of how to create an acoustic guitar recording (similar to how I do it) as well as Doug & his superior ear & signal chain. Listen to the final step-by-step evolution in a 16/44.1 Wav file in HD:

http://www.dougyoungguitar.com/WSSDemo.php

Wooooooowwwww. That video from Doug was both cool and overwhelming. It's taken me 10 years to get my live sound how I like, feels like starting over with recording. Not to mention a big investment in mic's.

But hey, gotta start somewhere. Thanks for the tips, I'll have to mess around with recording with my SM58 and maybe another one and see how that goes.

I think my goal is not to record to anything near what Doug was, but more to record song ideas to pass on to others. So something that sounds decent is all I need to get the point across.

[alohachris]

Aloha rschultz,

I PM'ed ya today.

alohachris

[Doug Young]

Hey rschultz. I totally agree on using mics for recording, but if you're just trying to get ideas across to someone, what you have is fine. If you want to get a little better sound there are some things you can do both with the Felix and in mixing. What channel is which on your Felix? Based on the sound, I suspect the K&K is in channel 2? Bring that high pass filter up a bit, just enough to kill the thump. Meanwhile, why is the high pass filter so high on Channel 1? You're cutting everything below 125 Hz, which seems like too much.

If you make your files downloadable (it's under the permissions tab on your tracks), I can show you a few mixing tricks that can open up the sound a bit more - tho it's hard to totally avoid the pickup sound.

[rschultz]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

Hey rschultz. I totally agree on using mics for recording, but if you're just trying to get ideas across to someone, what you have is fine. If you want to get a little better sound there are some things you can do both with the Felix and in mixing. What channel is which on your Felix? Based on the sound, I suspect the K&K is in channel 2? Bring that high pass filter up a bit, just enough to kill the thump. Meanwhile, why is the high pass filter so high on Channel 1? You're cutting everything below 125 Hz, which seems like too much.

If you make your files downloadable (it's under the permissions tab on your tracks), I can show you a few mixing tricks that can open up the sound a bit more - tho it's hard to totally avoid the pickup sound.

Hey Doug, thanks for the reply. How ironic, I was just reading up your DADGAD book tonight... probably will get it.

The K&K is on the ring of my guitar's TRS jack, while the mag is on the tip. And I was plugging into channel 2 of Felix using a TRS cable. So that puts the K&K on channel 1 with the mag on channel 2 of Felix. As for the HPF on channel 1, it's set to a notch filter (not HPF) set to around an 125 Hz.

Permissions... is that in SoundCloud? Or on AGF? I looked around and couldn't figure out what you are referring to. Please clarify.

Those settings sound pretty good to me through my amp... but definitely a bit stale in the recording. I'll have to try a condenser mic and give it a go!

Thanks a lot!

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by rschultz

The K&K is on the ring of my guitar's TRS jack, while the mag is on the tip. And I was plugging into channel 2 of Felix using a TRS cable. So that puts the K&K on channel 1 with the mag on channel 2 of Felix. As for the HPF on channel 1, it's set to a notch filter (not HPF) set to around an 125 Hz.

Ah, OK, that makes sense. So you're getting all this low frequency thump that someone was complaining about. You might try setting it to the HPF setting, and dialing it up to around 60 or so, at least for recording.

Permissions... is that in SoundCloud? Or on AGF? I looked around and couldn't figure out what you are referring to. Please clarify.

Soundcloud. Go to your track, select More... and then edit. You'll see three tabs across the top: Basic info, Metadata and Permissions. Select Permissions, and you'll see an option "Enable Downloads". With that checked people can download your track, so they can do something like load it into a DAW.

[rschultz]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

Soundcloud. Go to your track, select More... and then edit. You'll see three tabs across the top: Basic info, Metadata and Permissions. Select Permissions, and you'll see an option "Enable Downloads". With that checked people can download your track, so they can do something like load it into a DAW.

Got it. They are now downloadable. I'll mess around with the HPF later this weekend.

Thanks!

[Doug Young]

OK, here's a few ideas, I'm sure there are many other approaches. I just took the 1st few seconds of the track and played around with some ways to open the sound up.

In the first pass, we hear the K&K with a high pass filter to get rid of the "thumps" that the K&K tends to pick up. This is just a mono recording of the K&K alone, and you should be able to get this sound with Felix.

Second pass is still just the K&K, but adds a stereo effect in Logic that is created by alternating EQ on each side. You could simulate this in any DAW by using a graphic EQ and alternate bands - cut a frequency on one side,and boost that same frequency on the other. I also added some reverb, and EQd the pickup a bit, cutting around 700 Hz where it tends to sound "pickupy".

Third pass brings in the Angel, just panning each pickup about 50% to each side, and adding a little EQ and reverb. You could pan taste and get a wider or narrower sound.

The final pass uses an MS decoder to place the Angel in the "middle", and the K&K on each side, to create a stereo effect. I EQd the Angel to reduce the metallic high end a bit, and let the K&K handle the highs. I used the free Voxengo decoder, and just put the Angel on the left, or "middle" input, and the K&K as the right to become the "sides" of a stereo image.

These won't fool anyone into thinking its a mic, but see what you think - maybe good enough for what you're going for?



I made this downloadable, if you want to grab the track yourself.

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by rschultz

It's taken me 10 years to get my live sound how I like, feels like starting over with recording. Not to mention a big investment in mic's.

Others are already giving great advise so just some thoughts in general
In fact to some extent you are starting over or perhaps more accurately starting in the middle. Understanding live sound reenforcement gives one a good base from which to start (just winging a number here ) say 60% to 70% it is that last 20% to 30% of the learning curve in recording, that we all must go through and start to make the difference between just a recording and good recordings. It just takes some time.

Now of course the "goal" is always personal..... if the goal is simply archival then you are already there. If however you actually are interested in getting better sound ( arguably a life long pursuit ) then think of the investment in mic's and pre's etc. as similar to an investment in guitar/s , not something that is a "must do" , but may at some point be a "want to do"

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Now of course the "goal" is always personal..... if the goal is simply archival then you are already there. If however you actually are interested in getting better sound ( arguably a life long pursuit ) then think of the investment in mic's and pre's etc. as similar to an investment in guitar/s , not something that is a "must do" , but may at some point be a "want to do"

Just to 2nd Kev's comments, I focused in my response on what you are doing - recording with a pickup, and how you might improve that a bit. But, recording is really a different thing than live sound, and for the most part, your live gear is unrelated.

My advice to anyone who is just getting started, especially if you're doing solo stuff - not full band recording - is to get one of the portable recorders. If you pickup a Zoom H5 or H6, sit it a foot in front of you and hit record, you should have a sound that's 95% as good as anything you hear out there (At least after a bit of post-processing, adding reverb, etc). If you don't, it will be because of factors other than the gear - room acoustics, performance, guitar, etc, and you can focus on those. You can close that 95% gap to 99% by adding some decent mics to replace the internal ones. If you catch the recording bug and want to close that remaining 1% gap, that's where you spend the rest of your life chasing better mics, preamps, reverbs and effects, learning about mixing and EQing, etc, etc. A hobby in itself...

[rschultz]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

OK, here's a few ideas, I'm sure there are many other approaches. I just took the 1st few seconds of the track and played around with some ways to open the sound up.

In the first pass, we hear the K&K with a high pass filter to get rid of the "thumps" that the K&K tends to pick up. This is just a mono recording of the K&K alone, and you should be able to get this sound with Felix.

Second pass is still just the K&K, but adds a stereo effect in Logic that is created by alternating EQ on each side. You could simulate this in any DAW by using a graphic EQ and alternate bands - cut a frequency on one side,and boost that same frequency on the other. I also added some reverb, and EQd the pickup a bit, cutting around 700 Hz where it tends to sound "pickupy".

Third pass brings in the Angel, just panning each pickup about 50% to each side, and adding a little EQ and reverb. You could pan taste and get a wider or narrower sound.

The final pass uses an MS decoder to place the Angel in the "middle", and the K&K on each side, to create a stereo effect. I EQd the Angel to reduce the metallic high end a bit, and let the K&K handle the highs. I used the free Voxengo decoder, and just put the Angel on the left, or "middle" input, and the K&K as the right to become the "sides" of a stereo image.

These won't fool anyone into thinking its a mic, but see what you think - maybe good enough for what you're going for?

Veeeeery interesting. I never even noticed the "thumps" before, but now I do... should be easy to fix with Felix.

I actually like the 3rd pass the best. I see what you mean about the magnetic sound of the Angel, but I like that a bit. And a little verb goes a long way. Thanks for the tip about 700 Hz. I've always struggled to figure out where is the best place to cut the K&K is, I've done anywhere from 400-1k2. Any thoughts on Q?

It seems that software is a big deal... I used Presonus Studio One Artist that came with the interface, and also have Garage Band. Reverb has a deal now that I could get Reason Essentials 9.5 for an extra $10 if I purchase an AKG P170 mic. Any thoughts on those 3? I haven't spent a ton of time with Studio One, but it isn't terribly intuitive.

So it seems that with recording, you want to doing minimal processing during recording to give you maximum flexibility post-recording. Right? So add reverb in the software, not during recording. Do basic (minimal) EQ during recording and then more EQ post-recording. What about compression? I love my Boss CP-1X, it really does something special I think. But would compressing it work better post-recording or not?

Thanks!