Musician Gear & Tech Discussion

I have found the adapters that I needed to record off my PA system through the mains using the STEREO OUT jacks into my Zoom H4.

Now I need some headphones with excellent ambient noise reduction.
Everything I have seen locally is designed to be "light weight" and are not going to muffle enough of the sound from the monitors / amps to make accurate gain adjustments feasable.

What I am attempting to do:
Band reherses through the monitors with a heavy vox mix for the singers.
When I record this it really sucks as far as overall sound.
So we rehearse with mains unlugged. I leave the monitor settings alone to make the singers happy. (I can even pull my guitar and the bass out of the monitor mix compeletly) Then using the headphones through the Zoom's monitor feature another person can adjust the individual outputs to the mains at the PA so that a more balanced recording can be had for practice sessions at home etc.

Two questions

1 Punch holes in my theory: ( I have tested this with my guitar and it seems to work, though I discovered I dont like the tone I get from my amps "cab voiced" output, therefore I now mic my amp into the PA)

2 In your various experinces whom makes the best headphones for this.
(assuming that the reduction of ambient sound being the major qualifier)

George, I don't know how many tracks your zoom has but I am assuming it is one of those live 2 track right and left recorders. Whomever is making the adjustments needs to be in an isolation room with the mixer because no headphones that I know of will isolate the persons ears from the live mix especially at the lower frequencies there will be some bleed thru that will effect the mix.
Back in the 90's that band I played in Rare Seed was on television alot and we hired a highly respected Engineer to come and mix us. We were at the Channel 13 studio ABC to do a live taping that is where they tell you to play about three condensed songs and you can't stop if you make a mistake, oh well its the same as playing live. That studio at that time was huge and of coarse we used no mains at all only monitors. We had this engineer at the other end of the studio (same room) with headphones and apparently there was some bleed and he cut back on the bass. Another time they cut back on my guitar. We were still in the mix just way back. My point is if you are doing a live mix it is usually better to run pre fader if you have mutiple tracks that way you can mix it later. But if you are mixing down on the spot you want the person that is mixing to be completely isolated from the live mix if at all possible. This will ensure that the engineers ears are not prejudiced by the live sound I.E. loud vocals in monitors could cause the engineer to turn them down to low in the mix. Try one song at a time untill you get a nice balance. I hope this helps.

Don't laugh, but we used to use three 20" headphone extension cords "from Radioshack" and a pair of cheep two way radios. Had one of the bandmates girlfriends stand at the board and twist knobs that I told her to turn. It got me outside the room. The only problem with that was, one day it was late in practice and we where all.... ah humm...... she turned the worng knob and blew up a pair of JBL's.

BOOM!! AH YEA THAT SUCKED!

Yes thats the basic Idea.
My H4 will do multiple tracks, but just one at a time. Too much time n hassel for just a practice mix. So yes it would be just left and right.

Thanks for the input. I had kinda figure to have some low frequency bleed. My intent was to compensate by doing a cut, then playback through the PA for all to critique, tweek and play the cut again. We had used this process before with mixed results partially due to the fact we were recording the monitor mix not the main output.
As we are working on just 3 of the 12 originals we have picked for our CD.
This should not be "too" time consuming.
I will give it some more thought.

George, if your board has main left and right VU meters, you can use them to get a visual pre-mix. Start with the kick and get it set where it lights up one of the yellow leds then back it off to just the green. Then do each channel after that, snare, toms, overhead (actually a kick mic and overhead mic will get great drum recordings), until you get all the drums mixed. Do this with all channels panned center. Then do the bass, rhythm guitar, lead guitar, and keys (if any). Then record a little bit and listen back and make channel changes accordingly. When all instruments are mixed right and sounding good, bring the vocals up in the monitors just enough to hear them over the instruments. Then, without the instruments playing and just the monitors on (to account for the amount of vocals that will bleed through the instrument mics), bring the vocal channel up on the board just like you did the instruments, just below the yellow leds. Then try part of the song again, recording it and listening back with all instruments and vocals. It's kinda hit and miss, but it's pretty quick compared to trying to do it all by listening to everything at once. You can really get a good recording without using headphones at all. And it gets easier every time you do it.

Thanks Ratsass:

My PA does not have any type of metering other than the clip indicators on each channel.
My recorder when set properly does have a meter. It also has limiter and compressor functions.
When I was playing with my guitar and my drummers set (he left it here after or last practice) I used the meter to variying success.
Man that kick mic pegs the sh*t out of the meter. I currently have condensor mics right and left and the kick mic'ed.
I thought perhaps I should fully pan the left and right condensors but you say to stay center at first eh. Thats good info. My meters give a numeric readout on a sliding bar. Seems pretty accurate.
This may just work after all.

Now I have a confession to make. I have been playing with myself again.

I been out in the shop/barn/studio working on the balance process outlined by Ratsass. (kinda hard to do by myself)

I made some preleminary recordings of my tests so I could play them back through the headphones (Zoom) and the computer. It is much cleaner than anything I have posted thus far.

First off the sound I am now getting by having my guitar amp mic'ed vs using the "cab voiced out" jack is huge. No more CVO for this boy.
I guess using my amp as my monitor was hiding that fact from me all along.
I wonder if I am having the same problem by not mic'ing the bass cab?

I remember someone posted in a thread sometime ago about using two mics one on his guitar amp and the second on his extension cab. Then panning partially left / right to make the guitar sound thicker.
Do any of you guys remember that post?

I thought perhaps I should fully pan the left and right condensors but you say to stay center at first eh.

That was mainly to get an accurate level reading on the meters. For recording, the harder you pan them left and right, the wider the drumset will sound. Play with it a bit until you get them panned so that when you listen to the recording with headphones on, you can close your eyes and "see" the drumkit in your mind. When recording them, do some slow rolls from snare across the toms to the floor tom. This will show how wide the drums are panned. Then add just a touch of reverb to the channel that is picking up the snare the most.

Ratsass, That is what we do live and the drums sound huge. When the drummer does a roll the drums go from one side of the stage to the other. I don't have them panned to hard but it does make a difference.

Great input. Was kinda what I was planning to do. I just was not so sure how well it would work.
Ah yes another sound system experiment.

Yea I guess the reverb on the snare will give you that 80s drums sound. Good info here, once again.

We finally get to practice again tonight.
Going to work mostly on sound and recording setup as Ray is still not %100 from his MVC.
Be good to have the band together playing again. I was getting psychotic-er.

George, If you are able to use 2 mics and 2 channels for guitar, what I would suggest is send one signal to say the right side basically dry and then send the other signal to the left with a dose of reverb on it. That should thinken your guitar tone a little. If you have a digital delay, put about 10ms of delay on one side and that guitar will sound huge.

Ive never liked direct guitar from an amp. Most amps arent set up right and it gets a real tinty sound to me. I would lean toward an SM 57 shoved in the grill. I do that live and for recording, Why? Cause it works.

Good Luck and let us know how it goes.

Thanks John. I will keep that information in mind.
As soon as I am able I will put another cab in service off my amp so I can have my "monitor" on both sides of the drummer.
At that point I will have two mics on my guitar going into the PA, and I'll throw a little verb and delay on one channel as you suggest.

Yea I guess the reverb on the snare will give you that 80s drums sound. Good info here, once again.

Depends on which reverb and how much you put on it. I do that live to give the snare a little more depth, not a ton of it like 80's rock. I do it in the studio differently but for the same reason, depth. You can mix it just right so that you can sense that the snare is farther back from you than the cymbals even if their volumes are the same. By the way, I loved that snare sound in the 80's but it doesn't fit today's style as much. Nowadays I like that snap with a little over ring, so much cleaner in the mix.