Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[CCC]

thermionic wrote on Wed, 22 June 2005 11:24

JJ, I thought the trick was to use one mic, and connect one of the monitors out of phase - idea being that the performer stands equidistant between both monitors, therefore the sounds picked up by the mic are equal in SPL from either channel thus cancelling. Justin

This does work, although the crazy outside-the-speaker imaging of monitors in inverse polarity is disturbing to listen to.

Regarding the coincident 57s in opposite polarity; it would probably cancel the control room leakage. It would also cancel the lead vocal. In the case of a U2 record I guess we'd call this a win win situation.

[JGreenslade]

John Sorensen wrote on Wed, 22 June 2005 11:43

Regarding the coincident 57s in opposite polarity; it would probably cancel the control room leakage. It would also cancel the lead vocal. In the case of a U2 record I guess we'd call this a win win situation.

ROFLMAO!  

JJ had the right idea after all!

Justin

[J.J. Blair]

Regarding Bono, I believe the idea is to position the mics so that your only singing into one.  Perhaps they are staggered by an inch or two.  BTW, in the 1970s, there were live mic rigs that had a similar principal, so that the PA could be behind the band w/o the mic feeding back.  The Dead's "Wall of Sound" employed this, for example.

William, two questions:

What's the phase cancellation like, if any, when you mono sum the piano with that technique?

And those wall hangings: Is that a real poncho or a Sears poncho?  Hmmmm.  No foolin'?

[jimmyjazz]

I don't know why they're tracking Bono with two mics & one flipped.  Just track the vocal once, and track everything BUT the vocal again with the phase flipped.  Make him stand there if you want to be anal.  Mix the two, and voila!  no leakage.

It works awfully well, although I usually get just a smidge of super high frequency leftovers.  They are completely buried in the mix, though.  

"In the old days", this would have been awkward because of track count limitations.  Nowadays, that's not such an issue.

[G. Hoffman]

John Sorensen wrote on Wed, 22 June 2005 05:43

Regarding the coincident 57s in opposite polarity; it would probably cancel the control room leakage. It would also cancel the lead vocal. In the case of a U2 record I guess we'd call this a win win situation.

This is an old live technique.  Look at pictures of the Grateful Dead back in the "Wall of Sound" days, and they all had two mics.  You invert the polarity on one, and you sing with your lips touching one of the mics.  The other mic doesn't pickup enough of your voice to cancel out completely.  It also means you can isolate out the really loud drummer right behind the singer.


Gabriel

[J.J. Blair]

Hey, is there an echo in here?  I just freaking said that!  LOL.

BTW, the reason you can't just record the track without him singing is because he is holding the thing and moving around.  BTW, I'm just telling you what the U2 engineer told me they did.  I'm not saying this is how I do it or whatever.

[jimmyjazz]

J.J. Blair wrote on Wed, 22 June 2005 12:34

BTW, the reason you can't just record the track without him singing is because he is holding the thing and moving around.

OK, record him once and then record him again without singing but DOING THE EXACT SAME DANCE.

[G. Hoffman]

J.J. Blair wrote on Wed, 22 June 2005 11:34

Hey, is there an echo in here?  I just freaking said that!  LOL. BTW, the reason you can't just record the track without him singing is because he is holding the thing and moving around.  BTW, I'm just telling you what the U2 engineer told me they did.  I'm not saying this is how I do it or whatever.

DOH!


That picture of Walt's was too big for my screen, and I didn't see your whole post.


Gabriel

[wwittman]

The piano actually adds to mono really well, despite appearances to the contrary.

I bear no responsibility for that studio's decorations... really nice, live, sounding room though.

[ted nightshade]

FWIW part of the Wall of Sound technique was that the players stepped away from the mic when not singing, a habit some of them have to this day. That cancels the distant PA and drums and stuff through two equally available mics per singer, one out of phase (the bottom one). Then the singer steps up to the mic to sing and their chest blocks the out of phase mic.

Personally I find little bits of phase-cancelled bleed to be quite unpleasant, but judging from the tapes that Wall of Sound worked as well as anything ever did.

[J.J. Blair]

William, it was a Zappa reference joke, re: the poncho.

I'll post my weird piano technique later.

[wwittman]

Ah well, Zappa is admittedly only peripherally on my radar.
The closer anything gets to jazz the more it gives me hives.

[J.J. Blair]

"Camarillo Brillo" is defintely not jazz.  I would have figured an erudite, witty music lover such as yourself would have been a fan of '70s Zappa.

[Bash]

J.J. Blair wrote on Mon, 13 June 2005 16:49

William, you want a comment on the guitar set up?  Well, I don't know about the mic, but is that a Floyd Rose or some such nonsense on that strat like thingy?  OK, I can handle active EQ in the bass, but a Floyd Rose?  :shudder:

Oh, that's definitely Woody, the well-worn Schecter strat. In the hands of its owner, that Floyd Rose does some amazing things.

[J.J. Blair]

As promised, my weird piano technique.  M/S with the R84 as side, with the backside facing the high strings, and a M55 omni capsule on a Neumann CMV563 as the mid.