the asshole way:
the guys a fucking idiot, although he doesnt know it yet...
just let him do it his way. it could be a win/win situation here... he could:
1. provide a killer mix, making ur job easy(ier).
2. realise how crap it sounds his way when u show him.

or...

the sneaky way:
u could tell him u will hook up his schmakie and bearinga in the control room through an aux or something and control it from there. then when he goes out to record, you just skip that and record your way. he probably wont know the difference.

or...

the sensible way:
hook both ways up by running both systems and A/Bing them and decide. if time isnt a problem for u or him, u have nothing to lose.

good luck.

Is he your boss? Does he own the hall? Is there some reason you have to pay attention to him?

I don't think you should allow him to mix the vocals for you...

Perhaps you can sit down and talk about WHY he doesn't like your vocal mix...(harmonies are stacked wrong, or whatever)...may be an easy way to take care of things...

But you have better gear and you know your job better than he does...don't give him control just because he "talks a good game." Does he know what he's talking about?

At some point, you just have to do the best job you can...

best of luck,

On Track,
Ask yourself these questions.

1. What is his problem with your vox mix? Is there a way you can get it the way he wants it?

2. What is at stake here? If it sucks is it going to come back on you? Is there an opportunity to do it all over if it sucks or is going to be your ass?

If you have nothing to lose, then by all means let him do it and if it sucks let him take the fall. But if it's going to come back on you then don't let go of control. Good Luck Fats
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tannoy, Dynaudio, Blue Sky, JBL, Earthworks, Westlake, NS 10's :D , Genelec, Hafler, KRK, and PMC
Those are good. …………………….. Pick one.
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2. What is at stake here? If it sucks is it going to come back on you? Is there an opportunity to do it all over if it sucks or is going to be your ass?

If you have nothing to lose, then by all means let him do it and if it sucks let him take the fall. But if it's going to come back on you then don't let go of control.

No matter how you slice-and-dice it, this is all going to come back on you. Don't let him take control is my opinion, or do the A/B thing if you can and let him decide. Also the advice about finding out what he doesn't like is the best advice of all...but no matter what, you are going to be the "fall guy" if this comes out sounding bad. My advice is that if it is your responsibility, you better have control!

You are all right in the sense that I will be the one to take the blame since it is my sole responsibility to mix, record, edit and master the recording every week for airplay.

No, this guy is NOT my boss - or anyone else's in this gig for that matter.

I shudder at the thought of letting someone else whom I have absolutely no idea of their background / expertise in the field take total control over my vocal feeds for the recording - especially using non-pro studio gear on the front end. I wonder who he thinks will do the mixing while he is singing....?

I will be more than happy to turn the house/monitor split around & send it back down the snake for him to do whatever he wishes with, but I am not ready to give him control over my mix.

What I need to do is to sit down with the band LEADER and find out how my vocal work sits with him.

Thanks for the feedback.

Jeff,
Ya gotta work with the guy but in the situation your in you also need to tell him to go take a flying leap at a rolling donut. But try to be nice about it. The worst thing is to have pissed of talent on the stage. But really, from the statements he's made regarding Mackie (ugh!) and Behringer(double ugh!) you gotta know he's suffering from rectal cranial inversion. It's your ass on the line and you need to let him know that. No chance for re takes or do overs ... it's a risk you can't afford to take nor should you. He probably doesn't like the tone of his voice or it's not as loud or soft as he thinks it should be, or the mix balance of lead and back ups aren't what he thinks it should be. Bottom line, your the pro put in charge ... he's not. Tell him to lick you .... Fats
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tannoy, Dynaudio, Blue Sky, JBL, Earthworks, Westlake, NS 10's :D , Genelec, Hafler, KRK, and PMC
Those are good. …………………….. Pick one.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tell you what .. reverse the idea. You tell him to split off of wherever you can get direct feeds to him, and let him do his submix, etc, and record that .. should be a piece of cake since he came up with a similar idea for you ...
Then, you can compare later when you have both given it some time and your ears a break.
My gut feeling is:
1. He may get some good quality sound with the equipment, since this is what he is used to.
2. You're right, you win, hands down !

*****UPDATE*****

Late last week, I came up with a plan that I hoped would get this guy off my back:

Since we have 8 return lines on our snake and none of them are being used, I told him that I would un-plug all of the Solo mic lines of the snake that sends them from the splitters to the house/monitor board and plug the return lines into their place thus sending the Solo mic lines back down the snake to the stage. I told him he could pull these feeds from the 8 return lines on the snake, hook them up to his system and do whatever he wants with them. That would give him total control of these mics for both the house and monitors yet would leave them untouched for recording. Should make both of us happy ;)

While I was re-patching the splitters, I had our house sound engineer make this simple chart and give it to the guy:

1 - A
2 - B
3 - C
4 - D
5 - E
6 - F
7 - G

where the number indicates the Solo mic # and the letter represents where on the snake returns each would show up.

Well, long story short:
He came up to the recording room several minutes later sweating & frustrated and said that he couldn't get anything to work. We asked him what he did and, by his answers, discovered that he had taken the first 7 mic lines out of the snake & plugged them into his system. These first 7 mic lines were clearly labeled (thank God!): Kick, Snare, Hat, Tom1, Tom2, Bass and Gtr!! So I quickly went down and plugged them back into their proper spots.

Now realizing how he was supposed to do it, he continued patching into his system. Several minutes later, he came back up saying he still can't get it to work. I sent the house guy down to help and turned to a friend sitting in and said, "He probably forgot to turn on the phantom power." - sure enough!! After several more minutes, the house guy came up and said, "maybe we should just forget it and put everything back the way it was - we did.

After that, we patched his wedges into the monitor feed that was already in place and they used his monitors for the show. I was told they sounded really bad...

In a way, I was kind-of hoping this would work 'cause this church's sound system is all messed up - the house cabs are BEHIND just about every mic on stage! Can you say 'can I have some feedback, please!?!'? :cool:

To be continued.....(I bet...)........

Well how about that, eh?! .. so in goes to out, and out to in, or in to in and out to in??? My left or your left. Great work.. next week teach how to mult a signal .. if he says Malt, buy him one, but send him out for it!
Great work, and it should have been a learning lesson for him too .. very cool Jeff, my hat's off to your patience.

My theory is: This guy's perception of your mix was clouded by early reflections from his "glass belly button", which was obviously installed so he could see where he was going... :=) Steve