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Post by drbill on Jan 22, 2016 10:57:47 GMT -6
The whole concept of "envisioning, choosing and committing" on the front end, before the song is cut relies on experience and vision of the engineer and producer. Two elements that seem to be lacking more and more as modern productions can't seem to capture the creative muse of older more visionary productions that we all cling to as the holy grail. These types of plugins and concepts exacerbate the problem. Of course, tools are the responsibility of the wielder of the tool, but we all know where this will lead.... More decisions being "put off" until the mixer gets it...... More "options" down the line. What happened to the "all faders up - sounds close to a mix" concept? Gone. Antiquated I guess....
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Post by Quint on Jan 22, 2016 11:34:32 GMT -6
The whole concept of "envisioning, choosing and committing" on the front end, before the song is cut relies on experience and vision of the engineer and producer. Two elements that seem to be lacking more and more as modern productions can't seem to capture the creative muse of older more visionary productions that we all cling to as the holy grail. These types of plugins and concepts exacerbate the problem. Of course, tools are the responsibility of the wielder of the tool, but we all know where this will lead.... More decisions being "put off" until the mixer gets it...... More "options" down the line. What happened to the "all faders up - sounds close to a mix" concept? Gone. Antiquated I guess.... Agreed 100%. I absolutely believe that the quality (or lack thereof) of much of the music produced these days directly correlates with this "leave it until the mix"/"fix it in the mix" attitude. Not that it's the ONLY reason but I do think it plays a role.
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Post by RicFoxx on Jan 22, 2016 11:42:43 GMT -6
The whole concept of "envisioning, choosing and committing" on the front end, before the song is cut relies on experience and vision of the engineer and producer. Two elements that seem to be lacking more and more as modern productions can't seem to capture the creative muse of older more visionary productions that we all cling to as the holy grail. These types of plugins and concepts exacerbate the problem. Of course, tools are the responsibility of the wielder of the tool, but we all know where this will lead.... More decisions being "put off" until the mixer gets it...... More "options" down the line. What happened to the "all faders up - sounds close to a mix" concept? Gone. Antiquated I guess.... Yep, my problems as a singer songwriter are...I want everything to sound huge and punchy, its hard for me to worry about engineering decisions when Im thinking about phrasing and voicings, patching in the moment kills my momentum and God forbid my DAW crashing. I lose vision as a artist, lack vision as a engineer and it causes me to get nothing done because I have maybe 30 minutes to an hour/day to do this right now.
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Post by Quint on Jan 22, 2016 12:16:56 GMT -6
Yep, my problems as a singer songwriter are...I want everything to sound huge and punchy, its hard for me to worry about engineering decisions when Im thinking about phrasing and voicings, patching in the moment kills my momentum and God forbid my DAW crashing. I lose vision as a artist, lack vision as a engineer and it causes me to get nothing done because I have maybe 30 minutes to an hour/day to do this right now. That's exactly why I'm in the process of going towards an ALL VP-28 (well nearly all) setup. The VP-28 pretty much works on just about everything. Turn it up till it sounds good and go. Apply a little hardware compression going in on vocals and bass, smash the room mics and add a little hardware eq on kick and snare. Done. Hit record. No more option paralysis and losing track of artistic vision because of endless knob turning. Once I buy UAD Oxide, I'm even planning on printing every track through it while recording, just as if the Apollo were a 16 track tape machine.
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ericn
Temp
Balance Engineer
Posts: 14,953
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Post by ericn on Jan 22, 2016 13:04:28 GMT -6
A quick comment we have been here before, Anybody remember the Liquid stuff from Focusrite, the sky didn't fall then it probably won't this time!
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Post by Johnkenn on Jan 22, 2016 13:14:24 GMT -6
The whole concept of "envisioning, choosing and committing" on the front end, before the song is cut relies on experience and vision of the engineer and producer. Two elements that seem to be lacking more and more as modern productions can't seem to capture the creative muse of older more visionary productions that we all cling to as the holy grail. These types of plugins and concepts exacerbate the problem. Of course, tools are the responsibility of the wielder of the tool, but we all know where this will lead.... More decisions being "put off" until the mixer gets it...... More "options" down the line. What happened to the "all faders up - sounds close to a mix" concept? Gone. Antiquated I guess.... I believe many of the productions we consider great is because the SONG is great. Although, I guess a lot of pop production has saved insipid lyrics...I tend to save things for the mix because I know what I want - and I'm going to be mixing it or adding effects (delay, compression, EQ, etc.) before sending it to someone. As far as tracking, I most often track with compression at modest settings. I would say I track guitars with effects 95% of the time. Bass pretty fully effected. Anyway, I guess maybe people are getting tracks with nothing done to them and then ask the mixer to produce it...Is that what the complaint is? It just seems to me there's this thing now stressing that you're only cool if you commit to a sound on the way in...and that's just silly.
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Post by Johnkenn on Jan 22, 2016 13:18:25 GMT -6
The whole concept of "envisioning, choosing and committing" on the front end, before the song is cut relies on experience and vision of the engineer and producer. Two elements that seem to be lacking more and more as modern productions can't seem to capture the creative muse of older more visionary productions that we all cling to as the holy grail. These types of plugins and concepts exacerbate the problem. Of course, tools are the responsibility of the wielder of the tool, but we all know where this will lead.... More decisions being "put off" until the mixer gets it...... More "options" down the line. What happened to the "all faders up - sounds close to a mix" concept? Gone. Antiquated I guess.... Yep, my problems as a singer songwriter are...I want everything to sound huge and punchy, its hard for me to worry about engineering decisions when Im thinking about phrasing and voicings, patching in the moment kills my momentum and God forbid my DAW crashing. I lose vision as a artist, lack vision as a engineer and it causes me to get nothing done because I have maybe 30 minutes to an hour/day to do this right now. What used to really slow me down is that as I was laying down tracks, it never sounded like a finished product and it made me sit and futz with just (for example) drums and acoustic until I got frustrated and stopped. That's a danger of laying down all the tracks yourself. Not sure if that's what you're describing to an extent...but I just had to learn to get bones down, power through and then go in and improve when the entire skeleton was down...
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ericn
Temp
Balance Engineer
Posts: 14,953
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Post by ericn on Jan 22, 2016 14:01:09 GMT -6
More and more the line between "pro" and "home" studio equipment is getting blurred. There was a time when you could tell, but the scarier part is the fact the line between "pro" and "home" studios is being erased. I feel sorry for manufacturers are they making expensive toys or tools? Also we see the 2 best and very different marketers in audio software bring very similar pieces to market, one the hip Kush he makes you think your just hanging when your getting a slick sell, Slate who's so slick at the hard sell any time he's hanging.
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Post by drbill on Jan 22, 2016 14:07:54 GMT -6
Anyway, I guess maybe people are getting tracks with nothing done to them and then ask the mixer to produce it...Is that what the complaint is? It just seems to me there's this thing now stressing that you're only cool if you commit to a sound on the way in...and that's just silly. It's just my perspective. Not gospel. If it doesn't work for you or the next guy, that's fine by me. That's kinda it, but not quite it. Look at it this way. If I want to track electric guitar and I ask the player to choose a generic guitar so that I can go towards Les Paul or Strat sound after the fact, if I ask him not to track with compression or delays or ?? so that I can do that after the fact, if I want him to put no grind on the amp so I can choose later, if I track him dry with no verb.....how will he play? The same as if he was going thru his fav amp, fave FX and fave Gtr? I don't think so. Getting the sound "up front" - IF you know what you want - is the best way to get not only the sound, but the performance you're after. If you don't know what you want, try to figure it out. If you can't well....then you can't. That's all I'm saying'. And yeah, in regards to mixers having to do all the work.....believe it or not, I just got 3 tracks to mix with over 500 tracks apiece on each one to sort thru. Yup, that's not an extra zero...you read it right.
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Post by drbill on Jan 22, 2016 14:16:01 GMT -6
Yep, my problems as a singer songwriter are...I want everything to sound huge and punchy, its hard for me to worry about engineering decisions when Im thinking about phrasing and voicings, patching in the moment kills my momentum and God forbid my DAW crashing. I lose vision as a artist, lack vision as a engineer and it causes me to get nothing done because I have maybe 30 minutes to an hour/day to do this right now. What used to really slow me down is that as I was laying down tracks, it never sounded like a finished product and it made me sit and futz with just (for example) drums and acoustic until I got frustrated and stopped. That's a danger of laying down all the tracks yourself. Not sure if that's what you're describing to an extent...but I just had to learn to get bones down, power through and then go in and improve when the entire skeleton was down... I get it. That's the result of a decimated music industry to a great degree. Once upon a time, you'd probably have an engineer drop by your place when you were ready to start laying down tracks. Sometimes that's a GREAT thing. Other times, not so much, but yeah, we live in the era we live in..... It's hard to try to be engineer and performer at the same time. Still, having your studio set up and ready with things easily accessible goes a long way towards not getting bogged down in the engineering aspect. Nothing worse than crawling behind racks while trying to remember that perfect part in your head.
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Post by category5 on Jan 23, 2016 12:58:56 GMT -6
I'm not understanding. Can you not still commit to your sound while using these tools? Just don't screw with it and you've committed. What I'm hearing here is that options are bad because people don't have the discipline to not overuse them. Is that the point you're making? That may be true, but I certainly wouldn't blame the tools for that.
My dad recently got a new Ford pickup truck. It has voice control, GPS, bluetooth phone integration, and can even become a router for your phone's wireless signal, so devices like laptops and ipads can connect. It's pretty full featured. Dad doesn't care though. He listens to FM radio, and drives it like every Ford pickup he's had since the early 80s. He does think it's nifty that the doors unlock automatically when he grabs the handle though.
The latest and greatest certainly won't be for everybody, but I don't think it will get in the way of working the way you always have. Hell, I think these preamp emulations can slot right in to your "set and forget" workflow. Make it sound great, then don't touch it anymore. You've committed to your sound.
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Post by mrholmes on Jan 23, 2016 13:28:41 GMT -6
RicFoxx Avatar Jan 22, 2016 18:42:43 GMT 1 RicFoxx said: drbill Avatar Jan 22, 2016 17:57:47 GMT 1 drbill said: Yep, my problems as a singer songwriter are...I want everything to sound huge and punchy, its hard for me to worry about engineering decisions when Im thinking about phrasing and voicings, patching in the moment kills my momentum and God forbid my DAW crashing. I lose vision as a artist, lack vision as a engineer and it causes me to get nothing done because I have maybe 30 minutes to an hour/day to do this right now. It is a matter of workflow if you track yourself. Since the last year I arrangend amps and guitars and everything else, rack console etc. in that way that the only thing I have to leave the chair for is singing, and acoustic guitar palying. In this case I use a DAW controler on the I PAD to not walk around all the time. I use a fixed template in logic with the most often used virtual sounds. One template for working ITB another for working hybrid etc. Ready to go audio tracks, fixed inputs …. etc. If you want to compose arrange with the DAW and you do not want to retrack everything - it comes down to workflow. Inspiration is long gone if you have to search for something. Hans Zimmer is a master of Workflow too. Its a never ending story, every here and there I have a new idea to optimize the workflow. All guitars and bases are to my right, I do not have to change the jacks I have a switch A B C D made by my tech. Amps have one or two fixed mix positions…. Vocal mic is always there in the both…. It needs to go fast otherwise inspiration is gone. If I have captured some of the feel I had in my mind in this moment I do notes in Logic and I can come back the next day, needs a little meditation to get the feel back…. but its not totaly gone. In my beginning days every thing was meesed up becasue I had no idea about waht workflow is when you compose/arrange with a DAW. Ahhhh yes uhhh dont use amp sims…. they never sound right, except the Kemper Baby…
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Post by drbill on Jan 23, 2016 14:32:39 GMT -6
I'm not understanding. Can you not still commit to your sound while using these tools? Just don't screw with it and you've committed. What I'm hearing here is that options are bad because people don't have the discipline to not overuse them. Is that the point you're making? That may be true, but I certainly wouldn't blame the tools for that. My dad recently got a new Ford pickup truck. It has voice control, GPS, bluetooth phone integration, and can even become a router for your phone's wireless signal, so devices like laptops and ipads can connect. It's pretty full featured. Dad doesn't care though. He listens to FM radio, and drives it like every Ford pickup he's had since the early 80s. He does think it's nifty that the doors unlock automatically when he grabs the handle though. The latest and greatest certainly won't be for everybody, but I don't think it will get in the way of working the way you always have. Hell, I think these preamp emulations can slot right in to your "set and forget" workflow. Make it sound great, then don't touch it anymore. You've committed to your sound. I suppose that's fine if you believe "emulations" achieve the sound, dynamic, and sonics of the originals they copy. Is that your stance? If so, then go for it. As for me, I'll be using the originals in the foreseeable future. Maybe someday I'll be convinced, but not in 2016.
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Post by Johnkenn on Jan 23, 2016 15:52:11 GMT -6
Isn't the Silver Bullet an emulation?
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Post by drbill on Jan 23, 2016 16:06:33 GMT -6
Isn't the Silver Bullet an emulation? Nope. It's a piece of verifiable hardware. Not software emulation. Not to mention there is nothing else out there that does what it does. Are Jeff's CAPI pre's or BAE 1073's "emulations"? I'd say no.
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Post by category5 on Jan 23, 2016 16:41:37 GMT -6
I'm not understanding. Can you not still commit to your sound while using these tools? Just don't screw with it and you've committed. What I'm hearing here is that options are bad because people don't have the discipline to not overuse them. Is that the point you're making? That may be true, but I certainly wouldn't blame the tools for that. My dad recently got a new Ford pickup truck. It has voice control, GPS, bluetooth phone integration, and can even become a router for your phone's wireless signal, so devices like laptops and ipads can connect. It's pretty full featured. Dad doesn't care though. He listens to FM radio, and drives it like every Ford pickup he's had since the early 80s. He does think it's nifty that the doors unlock automatically when he grabs the handle though. The latest and greatest certainly won't be for everybody, but I don't think it will get in the way of working the way you always have. Hell, I think these preamp emulations can slot right in to your "set and forget" workflow. Make it sound great, then don't touch it anymore. You've committed to your sound. I suppose that's fine if you believe "emulations" achieve the sound, dynamic, and sonics of the originals they copy. Is that your stance? If so, then go for it. As for me, I'll be using the originals in the foreseeable future. Maybe someday I'll be convinced, but not in 2016. Not for $149 you wont. Look, I mostly agree with you. Real hardware still rules, but even guys with nice pres to choose from don't necessarily have enough to go around. Plus, there are plenty of guys with 8 channels of interface pres that make great stuff now, and this type of tool can up their game for very little scratch. Give them a listen. I don't expect you'll dump your hardware, but if you're honest with yourself you'll at least see the point. They sound pretty darn good.
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Post by drbill on Jan 23, 2016 16:44:39 GMT -6
I suppose that's fine if you believe "emulations" achieve the sound, dynamic, and sonics of the originals they copy. Is that your stance? If so, then go for it. As for me, I'll be using the originals in the foreseeable future. Maybe someday I'll be convinced, but not in 2016. Not for $149 you wont. Look, I mostly agree with you. Real hardware still rules, but even guys with nice pres to choose from don't necessarily have enough to go around. Plus, there are plenty of guys with 8 channels of interface pres that make great stuff now, and this type of tool can up their game for very little scratch. Give them a listen. I don't expect you'll dump your hardware, but if you're honest with yourself you'll at least see the point. They sound pretty darn good. For $149 - you're right - certainly not. But I don't judge "sound" on price. I know for many that's an issue, and I'm not infinitely wealthy, but chasing all the emulations gets pretty expensive in it's own right. At this point in time, hardware has never been better (arguably) and cheaper. It's a killer time to build a studio and get it equipped "right". The options are myriad. When I track something, I want it right. Mic, Pre, Interface..... After that, all bets are off and I use lots of emulation plugins that I'm "ok" with. But with space and money not being an issue, I'd still rather have the hardware.
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Post by Johnkenn on Jan 23, 2016 16:45:35 GMT -6
Maybe I'll record some stuff with and without and post. Through the Apollo pres.
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Post by rowmat on Jan 23, 2016 16:54:25 GMT -6
Just tracked a female vox through a Flea 47 into a Neve 3115 pre fitted with a Phoenix Audio Class A output stage mod.
The performance and sound was both immediate and tangible.
To sit at at f*cking computer screen post tracking and try and find a plugin to emulate that sound would be enough to make pack this whole recording business in and go fly a kite.
You can keep your mic and micpre simulation "butt plugins" and I'll keep my hardware - Good Night!!
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Post by Guitar on Jan 23, 2016 17:06:16 GMT -6
Cool thread. I guess the preamp emulation just becomes a saturation plugin of sorts. You could either "print" with UAD, or "bounce in place" with most modern DAWs to cement your sound if you're passing it down to mix, you can still make that decision permanent. Same with any plugin.
I think it's interesting that the gain element of plugins is really what's being modeled almost as much as the action or function of the physical gear. Most notably in the case of a mic preamp, which is simply a gain stage, an amplifier. It's already been thoroughly done with EQ, compression, tape, console emulation, etc. Preamps seem to be only a natural extension.
The Silver Bullet is a cool piece of gear to me too because it's just simply an analog gain stage (with basic EQ). It's primary function being "tone."
I guess if you had to answer it, this is primarily what's missing from digital so it's great for this road to get plowed further. I'm all for it.
Also I agree that it's really hard to track, and especially multitrack yourself. I really do wish I had help sometimes. Honestly the plugins make it happen for me. My rough mixing can happen very quickly, but still sound respectable, by inserting a few nice modern plugins, and not spending a full day on the mix. I am speaking of demo recording for myself, not mixing for release. Although for the tracking phase I rely almost 100% on hardware gear, which leaves me sitting in a pretty place come mix time, with those analog tones being predetermined and captured. Efficiency is definitely key in the one man scenario.
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Post by mrholmes on Jan 23, 2016 17:43:34 GMT -6
I suppose that's fine if you believe "emulations" achieve the sound, dynamic, and sonics of the originals they copy. Is that your stance? If so, then go for it. As for me, I'll be using the originals in the foreseeable future. Maybe someday I'll be convinced, but not in 2016. Not for $149 you wont. Look, I mostly agree with you. Real hardware still rules, but even guys with nice pres to choose from don't necessarily have enough to go around. Plus, there are plenty of guys with 8 channels of interface pres that make great stuff now, and this type of tool can up their game for very little scratch. Give them a listen. I don't expect you'll dump your hardware, but if you're honest with yourself you'll at least see the point. They sound pretty darn good. I did start with low end hardware such as ART Pro, Behringer, SSL G Clone, SPL..... even the Behringer stMDX 1000 is great on E Guitars.... no plug was even close.... Ok costs? Art Pro was 150 used, SSL G Clone was 300 used, behringer was 40 used SPL was 300 used. I did believe for a long time in the software can do it all story, and yet alone UAD got more tham 2.5 k from me. I go with dr.bill there are great plug ins today, but in the end if I go hybrid with the hardware I am more happy with the output.... I go that far that a well choosen rack of low end hardware is a money and time saver!
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