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Post by schmalzy on Jul 1, 2020 8:02:50 GMT -6
Just a quick update on this thread.
Just used Electra on a piano. It took it from "back" to "front" in a really nice way. The top and bottom shelves sound different than the other EQs I tried. It could just be a shelf Q thing but I don't care. It sounded great as soon as I twisted and matched level. That's the thing I want. I also used a small cut around 900hz to take that nasal thing back a little, too. It sounded really graceful.
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Post by schmalzy on Jun 24, 2020 8:05:11 GMT -6
That upper mids shelf down is a cool idea. I'll have to try that!
I've been doing one of a few things on my overheads depending on the mix:
Saturation that has a low-pass built into it. Kush's Omega N gets gently dark above 10 kHz and has been good for this. Low-pass deep but add some high shelf back into it. Softube's EQF-100 or the Kush Hammer EQ has worked great. It kind of sounds like a bell down with a shelf back up but better. ...and (idealogically the complete opposite) which is limiting the shells, hpf to 500-ish (I like the snare bark in that area), shelf up a bit around 8k, and compress fast/med slow with the detector high-pass set to 3k-ish. An important part in this is a heavy reliance on rooms and close mics for the overall drum sound.
All of those include a few narrow EQ rips. My room has a 2.3k thing but there's typically something around 6k and 9k, too.
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Post by schmalzy on Jun 10, 2020 8:56:45 GMT -6
Site's fine. Some of the PEOPLE on the other hand... jk
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Post by schmalzy on Jun 6, 2020 13:45:19 GMT -6
Ok. Who loves ortf or xy, rather than spaced pair. Or other. I’ve always just done spaced pair, but haven’t really spent much time trying other stuff. In mostly bad rooms with low ceilings. Cheers, Geoff Horses for courses, my man! I've never liked what ORTF has given me in my room. I end up just wanting XY. ORTF seems to prefer a better/livelier sounding room than I have. XY is narrower-sounding to me than ORTF. ORTF is narrower than spaced pair. Spaced pair gives me a more in-your-face cymbal sound and a de-accentuated center while XY gives me a much more balanced kit sound. What does the song's arrangement look like? Do I think there's going to be a lot of stuff crowding the center of the mix? Do I think there's going to be a lot of stuff out wide? Do I need to de-accentuate the natural drum and go for big impact or am I trying to really go for natural? Do I think I'm going to be trying to lean on room mics for a lot of the drum sound?
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Post by schmalzy on Jun 4, 2020 9:07:14 GMT -6
You haters are strange. It's a time tested tool that doesn't just "work" but sounds great doing it. Vocal, guitar cabs, bass cabs, drums... It's one of the mics I bring with me to 100% of the sessions I do, even if the studio already has one (because having 2 means I get to use 2). I think you might like yours a little more than I like mine but I definitely have to agree on most of your sentiment. Mics are tools. I'm nowhere near hipster. I love tools that work. I don't own skinny jeans. My beard is a genetically-caused hassle and I'd elect to have it removed if I could. I don't own flannel. I make my own espresso. I drive a 2007 Dodge Caliber. I refuse to "other" people who are generally benign. I also don't have a crazy budget for mics. Most expensive mic I have is a Vanguard V13. I have a pair because a pair of good-sounding mics is 3x more useful than a single mic. I've used some other stuff but wasn't in love with all of 'em. I used a 414 once. Once is enough. SM7b? Not expensive but gives me a sound I like and is predictable. That's awesome! I'm looking to make as many cool songs with my clients as I can so having reliable tools that don't damage the sound is huge. I talked about my buddy's Perlman TM-1 in another thread. Do I like it more for certain applications? Yeah? Did it always work well? Less that 75% of the time. That's a maintenance issue on my friend's part...but I don't have to do any maintenance on this SM7b. In fact, it came from a pawn shop from a sub-9,000 population town in 2015 (or before, I don't remember) and it STILL sounds awesome and has needed no extra attention from me other than re-situating the washers on the yoke. Kicks, close room, far room, snare, bass amp, guitar amp, the right vocal, the right horn, overly bright aux percussion...and probably other stuff! I don't use the same thing in the same spot on every record that comes through. Having a mic that gives me something I like predictably that is useful in a number of different spots is way more valuable than one great mic I only like sometimes on certain sources.
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Post by schmalzy on May 30, 2020 10:24:29 GMT -6
Cool looks like a fairly modern "NYC big muff." Those are great pedals! You've built a bunch of these sorts of things, huh? Any mods I should know about. I've built a couple pedals, a DI box, and a reamp box (plus a pile of cables) so I'm adept enough with the solder gun that I could probably do something you'd recommend. I'm always going for unique sounds whenever possible!
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Post by schmalzy on May 30, 2020 3:32:04 GMT -6
I'm pretty much always compressing a bit on the way in. Even if just in parallel to feed a singer that wants to monitor a compressed sound (I record both compressed and uncompressed into the DAW). Often the vocal comp that goes to my mix session is a blend of the compressed and uncompressed vocal. I'm using an ART ProVLA II because it always sounds pretty decent. It gets a little hairy but I don't mind because I'm splitting off my patch bay after my preamp it's in phase and gets blended for my end comp it turns out pretty decent. I'm looking to upgrade the compressor but I'm not sure what I'm going to use most. I'm probably going to go the 1176 route but I also think an LA2A might be good to take the place of the ProVLA.
In the mix I'm using my Softube Console 1 strip on everything including lead vocal. Often an aggressive vocal sees the "American Class A" (API, basically) compressor that I think is a model of the 525. If I need a little less aggressive I'll use the Summit TLA-100 compressor (in Console 1). Sometimes if I need more attitude or control I'll use the Boz Digital Labs +10db compressor (it's a model of the Compex Vocal Stressor). I'll use it set fast/fast 2:1 to do an 1176-like thing if I need that or I'll go slow/med-fast 3:1 if I need to push some clarity/spit/consonants forward.
Oftentimes I'm going for little bits of compression all over the place. The initial tracking might get 6-10db of compression but it's blended 50/50 with uncompressed. Aggressive or pop stuff might get a SlyFi Deflector in parallel during the mix just to provide extra grit and push the low stuff forward.
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Post by schmalzy on May 30, 2020 2:28:57 GMT -6
My new gear days aren't nearly as cool as yours! I just picked up a Big Muff Pi. I'm excited to use it on non-guitar sounds and make weird shit to hide in non-weird-shit songs! Which specific big muff did you get? I am something of a muff enthusiast, and have built up most of them by now in my own collection. I'm not a pedal guy so I have no idea. It's this one: (on my studio instagram) http://instagr.am/p/B_verMcgzhA
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Post by schmalzy on May 30, 2020 2:25:33 GMT -6
Does a high efficiency water heater count? Picked up an Ampeg SVT15e cab for the V4-B Oh, man! That's an awesome amp. I have an anniversary V4-B and matching 6x10 cab from 2005-ish. It's bonkers good!
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Post by schmalzy on May 28, 2020 9:48:40 GMT -6
My new gear days aren't nearly as cool as yours!
I just picked up a Big Muff Pi. I'm excited to use it on non-guitar sounds and make weird shit to hide in non-weird-shit songs!
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Post by schmalzy on May 27, 2020 15:33:24 GMT -6
Do you need nasally vaguely feminine? If so I have great news!
Otherwise I'm also out.
I've produced a ton of radio and TV work, though. I'll look to see if there's anyone in my circles who would want to voice it.
Do you have a timeline you need to hit?
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Post by schmalzy on May 23, 2020 4:34:22 GMT -6
I'm also editing acoustics by hand. Like others mentioned, I can't hang with the artifacts of retiming stuff. I'm sure there are methods and tools to do a less terrible job with stretching but I haven't heard 'em in the tools I've used. It's always a little better-sounding at higher sample rates (I've not worked at 192kHz so I assume it would be a further improvement) but I don't end up liking if I'm going for natural-sounding.
Reaper has slip editing. Like someone else said, it's just a different way of working with the audio. It's not magic or anything like that; just a super useful method. I worked professionally in film/video for 12 years and slip editing is a major part of the workflow there. I can't believe there are still DAWs that don't offer that sort of editing functionality.
An observation I made about my own editing tendencies: when I'm using slip editing I'm much more likely to use the existing parts and when I'm not using slip editing I'm much more likely to copy/paste stuff. I'm almost always trying to stay away from anything copy/paste sounding so I'll use slip editing most of the time. Some hip hop and certain implementations of pop stuff gain a little something by having recurring pieces so I'll PT-style edit behind (or whatever that's called) and do more copy/paste stuff.
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Post by schmalzy on May 17, 2020 5:16:28 GMT -6
You've got it sorted out so I'm not going to go into too much detail. Glad it's workin' for ya'!
I work in Reaper this "free tempo" way a lot. I work with a lot of hardcore/heavy bands that have intentionally wild fluctuations and dramatic moments needing a longer beat or two or eight or here and there.
The best way it's worked for me is just by doing it all manually. I've tried automatic stuff and never liked the result. Often enough the transient is intentionally off the beat so it's manual all the way for me.
...but you've got it figured out for an automatic sort of way. Awesome!
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Post by schmalzy on May 17, 2020 5:07:09 GMT -6
When I'm looking for something like this I've done fader rides on a vocal into a super fast attack medium release compressor. An 1176-style compressor at 2:1 is great.
Another thing I always do is split my vocal recordings. I compress one fairly hard (6-10-ish db of reduction at the big moments - a lot of the singers I work with like to be able to sing hard without blowing themselves out of their cue mix) and leave the other untouched. When I'm consolidating tracks to mix later I'll listen to see if the compression was too much or if it was appropriate. If I need that "uncompressed" sound then I'll blend the compressed and uncompressed to give me the consistency of the compression while leaving as much of the uncompressed sound in tact.
I think if you combine those two techniques - riding a fader into a compressor and blending a compressed and uncompressed signal - you'll have as controlled a vocal level as possible while not sounding "squashed.
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Post by schmalzy on May 8, 2020 2:35:28 GMT -6
Quick question for you: Do you know anything about the design/construction of these Chameleon Labs Preamps? I have a pair of the 7602 MkII XMods. One of them is acting up with some odd noise that comes and goes after I turn it on ... about an hour after I turn it on it stabilizes and stops doing that noisy thing (most of the time). I'd LOVE to get it worked on and Chameleon Labs told me they didn't want to work on them. Perhaps someone like you could get your hands on the unit, diagnose the problem (or just know right off hand what the problem is), and also learn some lessons you could apply elsewhere! Appreciate you thinking of us for this but to answer your question with the utmost honesty (as always) because we get asked about "repairs" quite a bit - we simply don't have the time or the manpower to take on repairs - it's also not really an area where we have much interest at the moment but that could change as it seems there is a lack of good techs out there! ;-) No worries! You had just mentioned that you liked the EQ. I figured that I'd be willing to send it to ya' so you could experiment with the EQ and really see how it works from the inside out if you would be willing to repair what I'm sure is something super simple. It seems like CL is able to do repairs on this stuff again so I'm going to get ahold of 'em and make it happen that way. The AS stuff sounds awesome from everything I've heard. I look forward to when I'll be able to add a few of your pieces to my setup!
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Post by schmalzy on May 8, 2020 2:32:28 GMT -6
Chameleon Labs worked on my 7602s about 9 months ago. Sad to hear in this thread they aren't servicing them anymore, their customer service was great!! Taya over there had remarked to me that "they love their long time loyal customers". If they worked on yours 9 months ago that is more recent than the last time I talked to 'em. My problems were in 2015 so your experience is MUCH more recent than mine. I'll have to get ahold of them again. Thanks for the info!
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Post by schmalzy on May 7, 2020 13:55:04 GMT -6
Quick question for you: Do you know anything about the design/construction of these Chameleon Labs Preamps? I have a pair of the 7602 MkII XMods. One of them is acting up with some odd noise that comes and goes after I turn it on ... about an hour after I turn it on it stabilizes and stops doing that noisy thing (most of the time). I'd LOVE to get it worked on and Chameleon Labs told me they didn't want to work on them. Perhaps someone like you could get your hands on the unit, diagnose the problem (or just know right off hand what the problem is), and also learn some lessons you could apply elsewhere! I had a similar problem with my xmod mkii 7602. One I'd the bands in the mid range EQ would cause a strange ocsillating distortion sound. Chameleon labs was great about it though. I called them up, had a great talk with the owner (didn't know he was the owner at the time) and sent it in to be fixed. They didn't even charge me for it even though it had been long out of warranty, just paid shipping. It was just a leaky cap or something small, I forget. Anyway, I hope you have better luck with them. IME their customer service was great. This was several years ago, sorry to hear of things have changed. Full Disclosure: They've been amazing overall in my interactions. Both the previous owner and the current owner. Both owners answered my emails and took my phone calls themselves. My problems with the units started a few years back...maybe as far as 2015? It's hard to remember this stuff! I had a pair of 7602 MkIIs. They both developed problems - one's problem was intermittent and the other was completely unusable. They had some difficulty getting them repaired because their repair guy was in China overseeing new the 7603 development. He was scheduled to be there for 3 weeks after I sent my stuff in for repair. 9 weeks later he still hadn't come back. So they sent me two brand new preamps they had in the shop. Consecutive serial numbers. They show up and the boxes say 7602 Mk II. I open 'em and they're 7602 MkII XMods. Sooooo...big upgrade. I called to tell them they sent me the wrong thing and they told me to keep 'em because they didn't have two of the non-XMods in the shop. They also mentioned that they're not going to be able to work on the old models anymore. That might have changed. Maybe I misunderstood and they only meant the wouldn't be able to work on the old models for a period of time. But I wasn't going to bother them again after they've been generous and dealt with me calling and emailing regularly while they were trying to sort out my units and their new production line. Plus, if Audioscape wants to take a peek at it and develop a killer product then I'd be more than happy to help that happen while it gets repaired.
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Post by schmalzy on May 7, 2020 10:29:16 GMT -6
Just used it on an acoustic guitar bus today on a semi-modern country song. Took a pair acoustic guitar tracks (two different guitar sounds playing a similar part) to a nice cohesive place that served the song a little better.
I do a lot of my EQing in layers. It feels a bit like whittling where I'm shaping then reshaping then reshaping as more and more of the song is found or defined. The individual channels got EQ to get the rough mix in the ballpark. Little saturation and a little compression, EQ some notch-y stuff if necessary (one side of the acoustic guitars had a resonance around 1.2kHz and the other had something around 3.5kHz - two different guitars with the same mic setup). Ran it into a bus but felt like the levels were still never right - jumping out or underserving their role - no matter how much automation went into the levels. So I used Electra to fit the acoustics into the track that little bit more. It really cleanly fit the two different acoustic guitar sounds right where they needed to be and gave the two different sounds a little extra unification they didn't have before.
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Post by schmalzy on May 6, 2020 21:15:13 GMT -6
I had a pair, I sold them. I'm probably in the small minority of people who don't love them. Its a well done EQ but not to my personal liking. It was very clean but had no vibe imho. My favorite hardware EQ's (that I've owned) was the EQ in my chameleon labs 7602. You could turn any dial, at any frequency and you just couldn't make the source sound bad. It was euphoric. The Electras on the other hand, made everything sound "different" but not euphoric...if that makes sense. Ymmv With you on this 100% - Had a pair and whilst I LOVE Kush's gear, ideals and over methods - the Electra's were not for me. I got them before the plugin came out. Did some testing of the plugin vs. the HW Electra's and TBH - the plugin sounded and behaved basically identically. So close that I couldn't justify keeping them. I know, heresy but just my honest opinion. ITB EQ is REALLY good these days - (unless a bunch of tube and transformer non-linearities are part of the HW EQ's "sound") and attempting to be emulated; then I can hear the difference . Compression on the other hand is still not there yet (unless you're going for a really fast, mangly-thing), but again, this is all just IMO... ....but DUDE!!! I am SO WITH YOU on the OG 7602 (the first version they released which is basically a clone of a TG2/1073). THAT thing's EQ is BONKERS. And again, that's saying a LOT coming from us, hahaha. The mic pre isn't anything to particularly write home about but mannnnn that EQ!! SO GOOD. Quick question for you: Do you know anything about the design/construction of these Chameleon Labs Preamps? I have a pair of the 7602 MkII XMods. One of them is acting up with some odd noise that comes and goes after I turn it on ... about an hour after I turn it on it stabilizes and stops doing that noisy thing (most of the time). I'd LOVE to get it worked on and Chameleon Labs told me they didn't want to work on them. Perhaps someone like you could get your hands on the unit, diagnose the problem (or just know right off hand what the problem is), and also learn some lessons you could apply elsewhere!
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Post by schmalzy on May 4, 2020 14:18:25 GMT -6
I think a large part of my issue with the plugin is the concentric “knobs“. It’s hard to do those well in software, IMO. I would imagine the hardware could get a good sound happening with two hands really quickly. They updated the plugin to also have sliders next to the knobs so the controls aren't so hard to use. It's made it much quicker for my use, for sure!
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Post by schmalzy on May 2, 2020 22:22:32 GMT -6
I don't have the hardware but I have the plugin. It's supposed to be a clean eq so I don't expect the hardware vs software debate to really hold much water in this particular case. Kush does really cool stuff and when they want dirt, they get it. When they want clean - which is rare - they seem to do a pretty good job of getting that, too.
I dig the plugin. It's a good 2nd EQ. I don't think it's an only EQ. The low shelf is really nice to add weight. Pair that with the 12db/oct slightly resonant hpf and there's some shaping that can happen down there in a pretty nice way. The midrange bands go from gentle to notch-y. I think that's where they get the "Electrified transient" portion of the description. If you grab the right frequency and give the gain a twist you can really jump the transient forward away from the rest of the sound. The high shelf is nice in a gentle-yet-dangerous way. I've accidentally applied GOBS of it before it sounded like too much...and then it was REALLY too much. I like it.
I don't particularly use it a ton anymore. Between my stock DAW EQ for notching/picking up slack and the EQs in my Console 1 channel strips I get most of my EQ needs met. Every now and then I'll use something like the Boz Digital Labs +10db channel strip for some brightness on a source or a little more sculpting if additional compression is also required. My master bus will typically get either the Kush Hammer or the Kush Clariphonic. Now that I think about it, though, I'm going to use it on my next bass guitar, kick drum, and acoustic guitar.
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Post by schmalzy on May 1, 2020 8:46:30 GMT -6
Early on I had the privilege (curse?) of working with an over the top, brutal, perfectionistic, AAA+ level producer who was a great guy, and amazing musician / arranger. He destroyed musicians and vocalists until he got what he wanted. Which was his vision of perfection - plus maybe 10%. End product wise, it's amazing. Kind of flattened out, and 2 dimensional in a way, but nonetheless amazing. I got industry cred, engineering and studio accolades, and awards with said producer. But it left me cold. It always amazed me that he actually COULD pull more out of musicians, but he did. What sorts of things was he doing to pull more out of musicians? I find myself a lot of times with a musician who can't rise to the occasion. I'm thinking of a particular vocalist right this second but it's been every position in different groups at different times They can belt it on stage but just can't seem to find it in the studio. We've tried every version of monitoring (headphones, one ear off, no headphones with studio monitors blaring, extra people in the studio, no one else around, dark, bright, hot, cold, booze, [redacted other things], too much praise, withholding praise, talking about the song, imagining the scenario, watching scenes from films, and ANYTHING ELSE I COULD THINK OF but this person just can't bring it. What ways do you all coax more sauce and spice out of an artist?
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Post by schmalzy on Apr 26, 2020 10:48:35 GMT -6
Damn! Thought that sounded familiar actually. Funny enough I think I might own one too. I have the previous version of it and it sits next to me all the time in the studio. That's the only reason I knew of it!
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Post by schmalzy on Apr 25, 2020 15:55:05 GMT -6
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Post by schmalzy on Apr 17, 2020 9:31:35 GMT -6
Just FYI, the test with HCL has been ended, because most patients died... Do you have a link for that?
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