Basement with terrible sound proofing...what can I do?

Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 8:48 pm

I'm renting out a basement and living with 4 other people. The place is not very sound proof at all, and I get really frustrated because I can't sing or play guitar at a normal level without the people upstairs hearing.

The basement is pretty large (the ceilings are only 6'6" though). I'm looking into building an isolation booth mostly so I can sing and play without my roommates hearing, and also for recording if its feasible (with respect to cost and skill to build). It doesn't have to be perfect, I just need something functional.

I'm wondering:

- How to build the walls (I've read staggered studs and sheetrock work well?)
- How to have something sound proof but not airtight so I don't suffocate
- What kind of sound is a 5X6 box (or similar dimensions) going to give me
- If their is a better solution than building a little room inside my basement
- Can this problem be solved with less than $500

Sorry for the long post, thanks in advance for any advice.

Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:31 pm

A little box placed within a little box will give you the sound of a little box. Nothing anybody would actually want to hear or listen to. I mean after all, aren't all of your favorite Platinum selling hit songs tracked in phone booths? Right, they're not. Not even close.

My suggestion?

Quit your day job and get a night job. (50% of my 37+ year career was spent midnight to 8 a.m.)

When you come home from work you can play and sing all you want since your roommates are at work somewhere else. Voila! Instant private quiet studio. This way, they'll have to keep things a little quiet in the evening before you get up for work. I'll see you post Meridian!

Now go back to bed and let me get some sleep
Ms. Remy Ann David

Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:40 pm

Well, I don't know if this applies exactly...but singing in the shower and the car both sound good, and they're really small closed in spaces. Can't that be recreated? And aren't a lot of vocal tracks recorded in booths?

Night job idea is definitely interesting though.

Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 10:32 pm

Real vocal booths, in real recording studios are frequently as big as a bedroom. It's not a closet. Even for professional announcers, the studio is generally as big as a good-sized bedroom. This is the smallest size 1 can hope to glean proper wave propagation of vocal frequencies, without adding a most unflattering tonality.

Adding huge amounts of foam in a closet is simply a vertical coffin. And it will sound like one.

I'm not saying that people haven't stuck their guitar amplifiers other vocal microphones in the bathrooms of recording studios. They have. We all have. We don't do it as a standard modus operandi. We do it for an effect and not every time.

Now you could put some foam up in the corner of your room. Put your microphone up there, singing into the corner where the foam is. This will certainly help to absorb much of what you perform into the foam corner. This will keep intact the acoustics of the room and negate the sound of any vertical coffin.

Ouch! Who flushed the toilet upstairs!?!?
Ms. Remy Ann David

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 5:42 am

But as far as building a little soundproofed box for practicing, you might be able to get away with some broadband absorption traps, try looking around Mr. Winer's site. You might be able to get away with some panels or something you can stack together and then pull back down when you're done, so as not to be a fire hazard, you know, trapped in the little box when the door sticks and the house burns down kind of deal. Dunno, but try asking over in the Studio Construction Forum...

Nathan

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:08 am

Will do, thanks guys.

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:07 pm

How do you feel about installing 6" insulation overhead in the joist cavities?

Itchin' to get started?

I think you have enough scratch to get it done.

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:13 pm

ShaunR88 wrote:

singing in the shower and the car both sound good

Dude, you don't even know how good I am when singing in the shower or in my car.

I'm a rockstar.

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:10 pm

My first booth was appropriated from a construction site. It was fiberglass, had a door, and even a seat! I just had to close up some rectangular holes on the sides near the top. It didn't work that well, though...in fact, it was kinda "crappy". Mr. Green

Kapt.Krunch

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:15 pm

oh pleezzzease!!! Wink

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 6:17 pm

fourone3: "Dude, you don't even know how good I am when singing in the shower or in my car."

Short of someone joining you in the shower, you can never verify that complaint as the humidity in the bathroom and the water noise will ruin any recording you try to make.

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 1:29 pm

At least your mucous membranes in your sinus passages get amply humidified. Of course you would sound better there. But I don't want to take a shower with you. Especially since I'm a dirty girl!

Let's roll in the mud, just so long our mixes don't
Ms. Remy Ann David

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 5:19 pm

Wouldnt that be a wet recording....
I would rather record dry.....LOL

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 8:32 pm

Touche' !

This topic sponsored by: