Ableton Forum

For those pros out there... How would you setup Live to record the crowd/room ambience without the audio from the music playing? In other words, if I set up a microphone with the intention of recording only the people in the room, can I somehow cancel out the audio from the music also playing in the room using the external effects/instruments and/or the utility plug-in???

I would guess that I need to setup the audio in on the mixer section as the microphone source. And then use another external in and utility set to difference?? or would I have the microphone source go to another track which has the master as an input and then use utility on that track set to difference?

Anyone have any experience with this sort of thing? From all that I've read, I don't quite understand how utility works.

If i understand you correctly you basically can't do that, at least not a 100%
the way we usually do it is to set up one simple (or two if you want stereo and don't use a stereo mic)
channels of audio, and record via a mic into them, basically it is all about the mic placement and type to have as little music or any other noise then the crowd on the recording, the highest level of 'isolation' you achieve with a shotgun mic recording the crowd from the stage side towards the back, basically with the PA direction, but you always will have the music as well recorded, it's a mic and it will always pick up the audio happening in the room, a disatvantage of a shotgun is, if you take a to direkt one you will not get a crowd noise, but rather a small group noise...

the utility plugin is just for gain and mono / stereo / phase swapp use...

remember any recording will alwys capture a part of everything happening.
one trick though is, typically in TV / Movie to reduce the opposite, the background noise...
make the crowd recording via a normal mic, not a shotgun (unless you want to pinpoint) record the music also separate (the whole sum that is heard in the room) and the line the music excactly with the music heard in the crowd recording, play a bit with the levels and swapp the phase. That way the music will cancel each other out, record the lot again (render) the amount of reduction will depend on the precision of your editing to aline the music precisely and your leveling, but it can get you close to zero.

Good Luck.

so say i'm playing a set in Live and it's recording in the background, I would set up two extra tracks. both armed but not recording and muted at the same time. one receives audio from the master track and the other from the mic with the utility plug in set to invert. then send both of those to a bus where the signal is then being recorded and should theoretically be only the crowd noise?? Would i have to delay the input of the first track receiving audio from the master channel so that it would align properly with the mic'd audio?

TBH.. i figured you would've been the last person to reply to me. Thanks!!!

SubFunk is a good guy.


this all reminds me of the Grateful Dead's PA system and how they did their monitoring. I always wondered why they had two microphones when they sang,


then I read up in their wall of sound.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_of_So ... eful_Dead) <-- that link probably won't paste correctly, you can find it.
"Moreover, the Dead's Wall of Sound acted as its own monitor system, and it was therefore assembled behind the band so the members could hear exactly what their audience was hearing. Because of this, Stanley and Alembic designed a special microphone system to prevent feedback. This placed matched pairs of condenser microphones spaced 60 mm apart and run out-of-phase. The vocalist sang into the top microphone, and the lower microphone picked up whatever other sound was present in the stage environment. The signals were added together, the sound that was common to both microphones (the sound from the Wall) was cancelled, and only the vocals were amplified."

it's kind of what you're asking about. I'd have to try it to give a better answer, you already understand the concepts and geekshit.

(and no, I'm not a Dead Head, just a casual fan.)

i want to do this because i'm taking a trip with some of my oldest friends next weekend up to a friend's cabin and i just want to record the happenings for the fuck of it. so it really doesn't have to be perfect while recording i guess. i can always edit it afterwards. i do realize that this could be asking for trouble later on, but fuck it, they have video from trips we've taken in the past...

you wouldn't want to be handling recording equipment while you're all lubed up with KY anyway. just enjoy the time with your friends.

Dude you have to keep in mind the room you're in. Theoretically If you were outdoors on a flat field on a clear cold day (or perhaps in an anechoic chamber) you might get close to achieving your goal. In a closed environment you have all sorts of reflections to contend with and issues of phase distortion.

so throwing effects on the signal and making them think the devil is in their head just isn't achievable?

Well, i don't know what excactly you want to achieve, but i would record them separately and edit them together later, depending on the use, etc you can additionally use EQs or stuff like melodyne to reduce the music further from the crowd recording...

it all depends a bit on your specific situation.

for a phase flip the aligning has to be as accurate and tight as possible.
and the levels equal.

To do it all 'live' i would do a test, and see how it goes, what you need to adjust, etc.

McQ714 wrote:How would you setup Live to record the crowd/room ambience without the audio from the music playing?

Hit the stop button

^ there's always gotta be at least one, right?!?!

check that...

there can be only one!!!