when you do a live show, do you find yourself putting a bric

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 4:32 am

Cheers Chris!

I feel your pain. I've had to put up with the consequences in sound engineers who've had their spirits broken by the 10 preceeding idiot DJ's/live acts who sit on 11 all night.

You've just gotta care man. As a live act, why on earth wouldn't I want the best possible sound? Makes my job heaps easier!

When you're making music to play at loud volume I figure you're in the sound-pressure delivery business... SPL Deliveries... that's us..

The Holy Grail for me is to combine the spontaneity of a live band with the production-values that technology allows.

roach808 · Post by **roach808** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 4:55 am

Pitch Black wrote:Cheers Chris!

I feel your pain. I've had to put up with the consequences in sound engineers who've had their spirits broken by the 10 preceeding idiot DJ's/live acts who sit on 11 all night.

You've just gotta care man. As a live act, why on earth wouldn't I want the best possible sound? Makes my job heaps easier!

When you're making music to play at loud volume I figure you're in the sound-pressure delivery business... SPL Deliveries... that's us..

The Holy Grail for me is to combine the spontaneity of a live band with the production-values that technology allows.

Okies for starters I've mixed a fair amount of DJ and live acts, seriously tho they really fucked me off cause they insisted on cracking up their mixes to eleventeen and then some. I mean for fuck's sake I'm a competent person when it comes to mixing, trust me I know when to kick the level up when its needed. As a sound guy I just find it insulting that a live act wouldn't think I would have the brain to know when to crank it up. Oi, its like fighting with a guitar player to turn his amp down. The more you turn you amp down, the louder I can crank it up thru the house PA system....ect, ect ect......

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:22 am

Fundamental Truth: Sound behaves differently when it's loud. That's why the db scale is logarithmic, a sliding scale, an exponential curve. things get woo-woo up there in the high volume levels

It's such a shame that things are this way. Too many idiots at one end piss off too many engineers at the other. chaos ensues. a vicious circle. worse than the CD volume wars, because at this volume you are dealing with big stuff. real physics. loud noise and energy. you could literally blow someone's eardrums out, let alone what loud sound does to someone's emotional state - whether they are sober or not.

too many people have had their night completely fucked by bad sound: musicians, dj's, engineers, punters... and now the battlefield is so intense: if i was to turn up to you and say, "hi mr engineer! i'm a live act that doesn't sit on clipping 3 reds all night - so it's ok to turn us up much louder than you usually have it in here... (god forbid louder than you've ever had it in here)" you'd be: 1, somewhat surprised. 2, hopeful i wasn't bullshitting. and 3, delighted when it turns out i wasn't.

it's a shame that the battlefield is so intense with PA owners protecting their equipment/investment, and know-nothings pushing volume at the wrong point in the chain that have led to such evil levels of system-compression, that unless I'm very close to delivering you a square wave, chances are I just won't be as loud as everybody else in the FOH unless you turn me up.

One occasional, practical solution, give the offending DJ/live act blisteringly loud on-stge monitors. He just want's to "feel it" and know it's "going over big time" and he might not feel the need to push his levels so stupidly loud. Works about 50 percent of the time, I'd say.

but yet, hope remains

roach808 · Post by **roach808** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:33 am

Pitch Black wrote:Fundamental Truth: Sound behaves differently when it's loud. That's why the db scale is logarithmic, a sliding scale, an exponential curve. things get woo-woo up there in the high volume levels

It's such a shame that things are this way. Too many idiots at one end piss off too many engineers at the other. chaos ensues. worse than the CD volume wars, because at this volume you are dealing with big stuff. real physics. loud noise and energy. you could literally blow someone's eardrums out, let alone what loud sound does to someone's emotional state - whether they are sober or not.

too many people have had their night completely fucked by bad sound: musicians, dj's, engineers, punters... and now the battlefield is so intense: if i was to turn up to you and say, "hi mr engineer! i'm a live act that doesn't sit on clipping 3 reds all night - so it's ok to turn us up much louder than you usually have it in here... (god forbid louder than you've ever had it in here)" you'd be: 1, somewhat surprised. 2, hopeful i wasn't bullshitting. and 3, delighted when it turns out i wasn't.

it's a shame that the battlefield is so intense with PA owners protecting their equipment/investment, and know-nothings pushing volume at the wrong point in the chain that have led to such evil levels of system-compression that unless I'm very close to delivering you a square wave, chances are I just won't be as loud as everybody else in the FOH unless you turn me up.

One occasional, practical solution, give the offending DJ/live act blisteringly loud on-stge monitors. He just want's to "feel it" and know it's "going over big time" and he might not feel the need to push his levels so stupidly loud. Works about 50 percent of the time, I'd say.

but yet, hope remains

Umm, so yeah next time if your in the states and u need a FOH mixer give me a shout...your my fucking hero good sir.

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:37 am

You're the first person i'll call... when/if we get to the W Coast, been too long......

roach808 · Post by **roach808** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:51 am

Pitch Black wrote:You're the first person i'll call... when/if we get to the W Coast, been too long......

Sounds like a plan, If I get work down in your area of the world your the first person I'm calling to have a pint at the pub with, heh.

Johnisfaster · Post by **Johnisfaster** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:56 am

sometimes when I'm making a really loud sounding song in the studio I slap a limiter on the master. this is totally ill-advised for anyone who follows the rules.

not me though

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:00 am

Johnisfaster wrote:loud sounding song in the studio

(emphasis added)

that, there, is the crux of the problem

Johnisfaster · Post by **Johnisfaster** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:05 am

Pitch Black wrote:
Johnisfaster wrote:loud sounding song in the studio
(emphasis added)

that, there, is the crux of the problem

I know, I was working on a track a little bit ago where everything in it had this harsh quality to it, I worked a bit with eq and seperating things slightly right and slightly left but everything was still peaking out so I just limited it so I could continue working on the song itself. it was either that or lower the volume of everything the exact same amount and then turn up my mixer. too much hassle

nbinder · Post by **nbinder** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:20 am

@Pitch Black:
Thanks for the info, i know your excellent session with Tom...

When it comes to the "live set" I think my approach differs from yours. What you are doing is more like dub mixing whereas I myself am trying to do "realtime rearrange". I focus more on the sound modulation and creation on the synthesis side (at least I think so, haven't yet seen a full length live gig of yours).

What I do is launching clips (midi clips mainly), playing with different synth parameters and fx and some tiny bit of "dubbing". As I said: It's different from your approach, hotever not completely.

These days I thought a lot about buying a better/other camera than my MBP builtin videochat cam, if I do so I think I'll also upload it to get some feedback and maybe share some ideas.

Have to keep it really short this time... 7 in the morning here and I gotta go - Berlin is calling today

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:26 am

Briefly, "realtime rearrange" is achieved by using Scenes and Session View. Instead of "dubbing" as we do it, call it "modulating" as you put it/do it, and the "realtime rearranging" is done by launching Scenes and Clips. We are doing the same thing, perhaps? I'm sure you could work out ways to be as constantly occupied and spontaneous as a realtime dub-mixer

something to leave in your brain, perhaps... now off to work!

nbinder · Post by **nbinder** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:54 am

I didn't mean that launching the clips is the difference... but takes one of my hands from time to time

The difference as far as I can see from your videos is that you are playing a lot with the FX, the EQ and all that (or did I get that wrong?) while I focus more on filters, envelopes, carriers, grain sizes. Have to visit your next gig in my area definitly...

No work today, it's one of the rare free weekends

Berlin's calling me to party

Oh and yes... there is a huge common basis in what we do, sure.

Pitch Black · Post by **Pitch Black** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 7:15 am

Have a look (again?) at the first 2 minutes of this video, before the sounds get sent to Mike. No dubbing from me there, that's filtering/triggering/modulating.
Not a "dub" genre song either.

Yay for partying in Berlin!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1siG6_Pd-Mg

Jekblad · Post by **Jekblad** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:17 pm

Pitch Black wrote:Have a look (again?) at the first 2 minutes of this video, before the sounds get sent to Mike. No dubbing from me there, that's filtering/triggering/modulating.
Not a "dub" genre song either.

Yay for partying in Berlin!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1siG6_Pd-Mg

now your just pimping yourself

i put ableton's new limiter on my master for the acoustic show.

i have plenty of dynamics. There is hardly (if any)gain reduction, and i can't hear a difference flipping it on and off. So it's acting more like a peak limiter? It's just so i don't distort with digital. I suppose i could take it off if it's not "doing" anything though. I used to turn ableton's master down to -12 and adjust the hardware for the proper volume as to not touch the red zone at all, maybe i go back to that?

SubFunk · Post by **SubFunk** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:54 pm

Pitch Black wrote:No Limiter on my master out.

I like dynamics.

Dynamics sound AWESOME, live.

Just think about it, if you're limiting hard, you have no-where to go.

i.e. if you're going no-where, you're actually static, not moving. this is a Bad Thing.

being able to have that extra bash when you want to, just to make a point, is worth the price of admission for not putting any limiting your master output.

if it's just a case of "but I'm not loud enough compared to the CDJ's etc" you should know where the gain stages are in the system, and be able to turn up somewhere else to compensate. Boy will you sound big now, because you've got somewhere to go.

Sadly, if the PA system is so heavily system-compressed because the 10 idiot DJs/live acts on before you all ran everything-into-the-red-all-the-time, and the venue got sick of replacing their trashed equipment, and thus put an evil system-limiter on the PA you are going to strike trouble.

If you can't speak politely to someone about turning the system up for an actual dynamic "live" act, you have to question if you're playing in the right place to start with.

Strike a blow for less limiting in live performance today!

/rant

oh, yeah baby!!! plus a million!

i am already annoyed by studio productions without dynamics... but live it's a MUST, it has to go from whisper to blowing your head off and make your ears bleed and back... F-all those limited / compressed shite, dynamics are one of the most expressive tools in music ever... and this fu-ng dancemusic attitude is killing it.

damn.

end of rant.

when you do a live show, do you find yourself putting a bric

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