[bomp] Mixing Metal Machines Nightly

[Andy Peters <andy@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Jul 1, 2004, at 8:52 AM, Sknoof@aol.com wrote:

> << Typical answers include the hoary _The Nightfly_ by Donald Fagen. >>
>
> That's an awful answer in SEVERAL ways, actually...
>
> Skipping the obvious value judgement, of course,  ;)  that kind of 
> music
> isn't going to help you tune the room for a rock and roll show, or 
> pretty-much any
> other kind of show either.  The instrumentation, the way it's mic'ed, 
> the way
> it's played...all of it is completely foreign to what will actually go 
> on in
> the room later.  The only thing you can accomplish by using "The 
> Nightfly" in
> every room you visit is to find out where the peaks and dips in 
> resonance are
> REFERENCED TO THE NIGHTFLY.
>
> (Pardon me, Andy, I know you know this stuff, I'm talking to everybody 
> else.)

Well, truth is really that you cannot "tune a room."  If there's a 
resonance or a bass trap or some harsh reflection, you can't fix it 
electronically.  Call in the Sawzall.

Also, my preference is to use a computer measurement system (like 
Smaart Live) that tells me exactly what's going on in both the time and 
frequency domains; the goal is to get the system response to be 
reasonably flat.  Then, if you play ANY CD, it'll sound right.  I don't 
adjust my home stereo depending on what music I'm playing, nor should I 
expect to adjust the PA system.

See, the idea is that with a flat system, you can put any band up on 
stage and you don't have to adjust the crossover and the main graphic 
-- you should be able to do everything through mic selection and 
placement (very important!) and using the console channel-strip EQ 
(which are better called "tone controls," anyway).  Kick drum needs 
more bottom? Turn up the LF control on the kick channel -- don't push 
up the 80 Hz on the main graphic (which will just muddy up the bottom 
end for everything else).  Guitars need more presence?  Push up a bit 
of the, oh, 500 Hz on the channel, not on the house graphic (which will 
make the vocals bark).  Feedback from one vocal? Notch a bit of 2.5k on 
that channel strip, not the house graphic (which will make everything 
else seem dull).  And so forth.

Of course, you do need to consider the music style.  If you're doing 
reggae, you need to bring in more subs than you'd think necessary, and 
use a technique called "aux-fed subs" to drive them.  Basically, you 
use a spare aux send from the console and you drive the subs with only 
the channels you want, like kick drum, toms and bass.  Conversely, the 
guy who was mixing BR5-49 asked us to turn off the subs.

Back to _MMM_: remember that it was originally released on vinyl, so it 
didn't have any excessive bass weirdness that would make the needle 
jump outta the groove or a subwoofer voice coil jump outta the gap.  It 
might be a reasonable reference for transfer-function measurements 
because it does have a lot of "frequency content;" certainly _MMM_ at 
100 dB is no more or less annoying than pink noise at the same level.

> The other reason it's an awful choice:  even big fans of that album 
> have to
> admit, and have always complained, that it's one of the worst-mastered 
> CDs of
> all time, second only to the original issue of "Aqualung."  Sounds 
> like it's
> underwater.

True -- wasn't it one of the very first CDs issued?  I guess some 
people are in love with Fagen's anal-retentive production process.

Here's a good story: the fucking asshole^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hsoundguy 
for Jellyfish used _Pet Sounds_ as his reference disc.  You should've 
seen him pushing the graphic EQ sliders up and down as he tried to make 
Maxwell's conform to what a partially deaf/partially insane Brian 
Wilson wanted.  I love the record but it's not an audio reference by 
any measure.

-a
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Peters                                           andy@latke.net
ASP Digital                                       cell: 520-907-2262
Live Sound Engineering                            home: 520-791-2716
Digital Circuit Design          5511 E Rosewood St, Tucson, AZ 85711
                                                (note new address!!!)

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