The thing is, that's like saying the best girl is beautiful, nice, and rich. A very rare, thing, that anything is the complete package. These types of discussions happens, because very rarely are people recording great musicians in awesome rooms w killer gear, and a very high skill set. So I think if you have to pick one "most important" thing in music, it has to be the music itself, the song/performance. The rest of the stuff complements and supports the music, not the the other way around IMHO.

i would rather listen to a great performance badly recorded than a bad performance well recorded.

Gear matters. It matters a lot. I'll take a real limiter over a Waves L1 plug any day of the week - and twice on Sundays.

But if we don't have a good song and good performance to track to begin with...

Otherwise, using all that great gear is no different than polishing a turd.

You can paint it with 24 Karat Gold, spray it with expensive $1000 an oz French perfume, tie a silk ribbon around it - which is made from the labors of the endangered Hogastavian Silk Worm - of which there are only 100 left alive in the entire world....

But underneath all that priceless silk, 24k gold and expensive perfume .... it's still just a turd. ;)

IMHO of course.

d/

,

Sometimes part of the needed skill set is the ability to coach a good performance out of a marginal performer. This could be something as simple as doubling the speed of the click track, or providing a vocalist with a single-cup headphone so she/he can properly hear themselves. Sometimes it requires more complex suggestions requiring time and practice on the part of the performer. The key is to let them know that you are on their side and want to help them produce a result that they can be proud of.
~Jeff

Let's break this down a little more as this is too generalized. Let's be clear about some things. There's two different kinds of recording equipment. That which professionals use. And the other stuff that everyone else uses. Which basically breaks down to the haves and the haves not.

Now let's assume everyone is a millionaire. So the equipment you might purchase you wouldn't necessarily get from Wal-Mart. Which is likely a given?

But if your 19-year-old Billy Bob and you want to make a recordin' ? And your budget is $300 for equipment? You're going to buy the Beringer and the Chinese condenser microphone and you'll be flying. You won't be part of a large purchase of high-end pro gear. Does this mean you're not going to make a good recording? Not for me. I make good recordings on the worst and cheapest pieces of crap. Does this sound like my Neve and API stuff with the Neumann microphones and 1176's? Well no and yes.

What determines good sound? What determines a good recording? The sound of the equipment is not about what the specifications says it can do. It's actually about what the equipment can't do. But specifications are not printed that way.

Knowing what it can do doesn't make for a good recording. But knowing what it can't do, does make for a good recording. At all a juggling act. And if you can't keep your balance? Those spinning dishes all go crashing to the floor into little bits and pieces otherwise known as PCM and LOL. Because you didn't screw around with them enough to keep them airborne.

To me professional equipment means you have headroom. A larger operational, area. Consumer/prosumer equipment, Is kind of like the difference between a Chevy van and the Smart car. They both have four tires but the similarity pretty much ends there except for also having seats and a windshield. Otherwise it's not exactly like apples and oranges as much of that is like apples and watermelons.

So to make everybody out that your consumer/prosumer equipment sounds a little more professional... you cheat your gain staging. You opt for more noise to gain more head room. The noise can be more easily dealt with than flat topped squished audio blah blah. Giving the false impression that your cheap ass equipment sounds better than it should.

The opposite holds true, conversely, for great equipment in the hands of a know nothing moron. Who might think that because they're sitting behind a Neve, they've heard, it'll sound much better, if you push those preamps. Well it won't... if it's... say... the Neve, over at Ocean Way, Nashville. Why? Because that Neve is not a discrete transistor Neve. That Neve uses the same cheap 5534 IC chips, found in the cheapest PA mixers that poop out easily. And how is the average recording student schmuck, supposed to know that? They won't. They just know it looks like a Ferrari so you should be able to drive it like a Ferrari and not a VW. But you'd be wrong. It's a VW in Wolff's clothing. Or Rupert's clothing since Wolff doesn't own that company. Actually I think his LUX, ran out? Because I didn't hear the Tone. Nevertheless... what separates that Ocean Way Neve from that of a Mackie? The name and the Transformers. That's about it. That comes down to how you use it. And you can't use that Neve the same way you can use mine. I could've had a larger Neve with better EQ (33114) if I had opted for the 5534 NBC Neve. And no one could understand why I wanted the smaller older more busted, more intermittent, more crapped out Neve? Not even the top maintenance guys or engineering managers. What's that tell ya?

Now... how important is this recording you need to make? And what genre of music is being recorded? And please... someone tell me why I need a microphone preamp that only has .00005% harmonic distortion, over something else that has .005%? When the drums are bashing, the guitars are screaming and the vocalist sounds like he's gargling with Drano? Somebody please explain that to me because I don't get it? Actually... I don't want to get it. I'm still going to get to work as fast in my Chevy as you will in your Maserati. Because we're driving down the same road. You'll just look cooler and make everybody go ah. Which is really baffling them with bull shit. And that works.

And I have as yet to find a condenser microphone that can deliver better results, costing up to three or more times that of those cheap ass 57 & 58's. So what the hell are you talking about? Good bad, pro, consumer.

Now if you're talking about serious budgets, the kind that used to exist? There's no reason to use cheap stuff. But when you're the average Joe... you folks have a lot of nerve to tell someone they can't make a good recording with less than stellar equipment. That simply is just not accurate. The simple fact remains all that the equipment actually needs to deliver is 50-15,000 Hz, ± 2 db with no more than 1% THD. To obtain a listenable, with more than adequate quality, operatic recording. Throw some distorted guitars and loud drums into the fray and you're still good to go. Provided you have observed proper gain staging. Which is of the utmost importance and has more to do with the distortion equipment is going to deliver than anything else. I just cannot stress how important gain staging is... so I won't. But it's important. Really really important.

I think most of the problems occur in the " a little knowledge is dangerous " sector? People start to presume things from their own logic. Which to them makes sense. But to the equipment, it doesn't. Because the equipment does not understand their logic. Only they do and it doesn't necessarily transfer over to the equipment. Which is where the problems are.

So do I get the same kind of quality recording with a Mackie as I do with the API or the Neve? Hell no... but really... I'm the only one who does know. The average listeners don't. And they're the ones buying the product. While they're in the drive-through at McDonald's. So in the end... nothing really matters other than your engineering capabilities. Its theory versus practice. Not all of which are in sync with each other.

I cannot judge recordings strictly based on technical crap. It's like judging the value of different religions. That's an exercise in pure futility as there isn't one. So what we really need to be talking about on these forums is not so much the equipment that were using the hockey is the equipment that ya have to its fullest. And when done well, still always yields a professional recording. Regardless of the equipment specifications. It's how the sound of that recording moves you. They don't listen to a recording by first finding out what equipment was used. You listen to a recording because ya like that artist, have heard of the producer, recognized the engineer. And when it sounds good? Then ya might look at what studio and equipment it was done with? And you'll find all sorts of stuff that runs the gamut.

I came from really, no kidding, world-class musician/singer, parents. And ya learn something from that alone. Because there is no equipment involved. You are listening strictly to technique and the talent within. Nothing more. Nothing less. You do the math and you'll discover the same thing crosses over to what we do. You get world-class results from world-class technique with or without the world-class equipment. This has been proven more than once over a period of more than 70 years of continuing technology. You can all argue this with me but you'll be wrong. I'm not saying anybody is a dummy. You learn things through your own, experiences. You've developed your own technique. It works for you. Because you guys are professionals. So ya don't deliver crap to people. We just get all to the same place in different ways.

I'd love for everybody to be able to have great equipment. For nearly half of my professional career, I couldn't afford what I have today. I had less than stellar equipment. No, it wasn't what I wanted. It was what I had. And I should allow that to stop me? Of course not. But you sure as hell can't deliver something that sounds totally screwed up. So if you cross your eyes and DOT, your T.'s, you should be able to take the turn and not kill yourself, in the process. That's all I'm saying. It's understanding what the equipment can't deliver that's more important than what it can deliver. Because if it says "professional" on it? You are expected to deliver a professional product. If it doesn't say professional on its box? Then you're going to have to work harder to get something that encroaches on a professional product. And that's understanding what it can't deliver. What don't people understand about that concept?

Look at how we used to tweak analog recorders. Your tape might be rated at +3, over 250 nano wafers per meter. (Some with cream filling) but you might have tweaked your regime for +6? Is that wrong? No it's not. Or maybe you tweak your machine for +0? That's also not wrong. It all comes down to what you make it. And if you don't believe that? You're likely in the wrong field? Because if your world revolves around the obsessive-compulsive disorder of minutia? You're not going to live through this very long. Ask Paul Reed Smith's, older brother, another remote truck owner and NPR radio network engineer who just figured this out, recently, in his mid-60s, finally. And he's enjoying his work and resting easier because of it. In time... I think most of you will figure that out too? It comes as a natural course of events. It doesn't come just because you wanted to come. It doesn't work like that.

I have been involved in making parallel recordings with others of fine arts, classical performances. Where performance of equipment really does have some bearing. But what's totally bonkers is to see two entirely different setups, different microphones, different preamps, different converters and yet...both recordings turn out nearly identical. How do you justify that? You can't. It's bonkers. So you might not believe that? Until it happens to you. And then ya will rest easier and deliver a fine professional product... even on a Mackie and using only 57 & 58's.

Now I don't think my recording sound as good when they were tracked on a Mackie even when I mixed it on the Neve. But the fact remains... it's perfectly adequate. And only I know the difference. Which actually makes the entire question, moot. He used the ultra-clean, transformer less preamps and microphones. I use the old 1970s stuff with lots of transformers and color. And yet there was virtually no difference. It was startling to say the very least. And few people have the opportunity to ever experience that. Equipment does not hear like our ears do. It's an electronic folly. And all this nonsense about neutrality just doesn't fly in the face of good sound. But in the end it seems that it doesn't really matter.

I always get the feeling so many engineers of audio, think they are on the planet, to invent a new wheel? That's not what you're here to do. That's not your job. You might do it for a hobby? You might design equipment professionally? And you might be in competition with the likes of Neumann? So then, you know you have to design something little bit better than something you might purchase from China? But if you're trying to build something better than the Chow Shin microphone company of China? Then just about any piece of crap you come up with will likely be as good? And which you are only in it for the money and not for the prestige.

So everybody seems to keep forgetting all this stuff and I don't know why? I consider everyone here to actually be all quite competent. Both pros and beginners. Although sometimes we do hear those whose novice product differently wreaks from truly bad, lack of recording technique and improper use of equipment. And that doesn't happen in the hands of a professional from any of y'all. Because you wouldn't deliver something like that because you are all professionals in my eyes. Each with their own particular style and skill levels. I don't like to judge Art. I won't judge people's lifestyles. I won't judge what instrument you play. I won't judge what you believe in or who you go to bed with. Like I could give a damn. But give me a crappy sounding recording that just sounds bad? I won't give that the time of day regardless of what equipment was used to record it. Which again makes the entire conversation moot. And you can't tell me that bad sound, trashy sound, crappy sound is a style. Not a style. It's simply crap. With no endearing features or listenability. And no one can gain enjoyment from stepping in dog shit. Though some might? It takes all kinds. That's why God created computer-generated music thingies. For those that have no talent but want to think they do. And they're all happy as a pig in shit. Oink! Snort.

And I'm Jewish?
Mx. Remy Ann David

Kurt Foster, post: 415545, member: 7836 wrote: i would rather listen to a great performance badly recorded than a bad performance well recorded.

You're right Kurt, there's nothing more unpleasant than a bad performance.
But when you open your studio to customers, that's one thing you can't control. So I get the best gear I can for my budget and hope a great band will come. (like in the movie : Build it and they will come) :)

thatjeffguy, post: 415563, member: 38103 wrote: Sometimes part of the needed skill set is the ability to coach a good performance out of a marginal performer. This could be something as simple as doubling the speed of the click track, or providing a vocalist with a single-cup headphone so she/he can properly hear themselves. Sometimes it requires more complex suggestions requiring time and practice on the part of the performer. The key is to let them know that you are on their side and want to help them produce a result that they can be proud of.
~Jeff

Very good point! Most customers never been in a studio before. A little coaching can do wanders !

RemyRad : I must apologize, I didn't have the heart to read your entire post.
You really should write a book named 'Remy's thoughts about recording'

My original post was :

1. To voice my concern about posters who miss the point of a question and go a different route. (if someone asks for the best preamp for his needs, why oh why, one would answer : preamps don't mather)
2. To say : A great recording needs all parts of what recording is about : Room, instruments, performance of a good song, gear, recording skills and trained ears. Also to achive anything in life : time, energy and motivation !
   class="xf-ul">
   To put it in a simple way. I wish people give the answer the OP needs and not the answer they need themself.

   If someone is telling me the bass line of the song is wrong when I ask if the mixing sound ok. That person is not helping me. I may relay the message to the song composer. But, I'm trying to make the best mix I can. Not re-write the song !

   Anyway, a forum is a place for opinions. I guess there's no point to refrain people from voicing theirs ;)

"...If someone is telling me the bass line of the song is wrong when I ask if the mixing sound ok. That person is not helping me. I may relay the message to the song composer. But, I'm trying to make the best mix I can. Not re-write the song !..."

But... what if the bass line is effecting the mix? What if notes are played early, or late, or out of time with the kick, or vice versa, resulting in early or false triggering/attack/release of a compressor - say for example, in parallel mode? Or that it might be messing with an expander? Or, for that matter, even EQ... because what if the bass part is smearing the low end because it's simply just a clone of the guitar line - except an octave down - and because there's little separation in the parts relative to one another, it becomes hard to separate or define tonally in the mix?

I'm not in disagreement with you generally PC, I agree with much of what you say, for the most part I always do. Personally, I believe that without a good song and well performed tracks, no gear and no mix in the world will help, other than to perhaps make it a great sounding recording of crap. LOL

But I do take exception to your example - with total respect of course, because you and I see eye to eye on most everything else - because I think that performances do in fact effect a mix... more than most people think. ;)

IMHO of course.

d/

.

I get you Donny, I didn't think about an off timming bass or a mirror of the guit. But I'm sure, if you would bring that up like you just did it would give a lot more sense than 'I don't like the bass' (which was the kind of comment I was thinking in my exemple)

Nearly all senior members know how to give there opinions with good explanation that make sense.
But some poster will give you a cow when you ask for a horse and that's bugging me. Of course if I ask for a horse to get milk, please slap me in the face with my misconception of things !! (y)

You all know what I find difficult to read. It's the reason I don't go to GS. You ask for an opinion on A or B and in the first 5 answers somebody says it's crap and you need C. (often way out of the budget stated) Now If I ask for A or B or alternatives... That's another story ! :)

Ah ! I'll get over this in a couple of days.. The old shmuck in me will go back to sleep.. he he !!

Late to this party, been away for a week. :D

I'm with Kurt on this however, (during my performing days) I would not have been near successful had I not invested in the best gear I could buy.

I had a bet with a buddy years back. He was very much along the lines of Max and Kurt on this post. Its all about the performance.

Yes, that is the first part. But then, you need to sound awesome if you want to be on top and people to feel what you are "performing" !

So I say, really? I did tests in a few clubs. I actually asked the audience for one hour to be the judge of Stereo verses Mono. I also returned to clubs using a bigger system that was mixed better and had more power and gear. Oh ya, tighter bass = better tweeters, mids and bass bins. Big power, serious console with excellent pre's cross-overs and processing etc.
Every club I played in (oh yes... and the exact songs and playlist) ALL SAID we had improved. We knew we didn't improve our performance. We improved our sound.
Management and booking agents all said we sounded great and also thought we had improved.
I went from the B circuit to the AA circuit almost instantly. From making $280 very week to $6000 to $8000 a month just like that. You all might think not, I know different. Its all about the sound too. If you sound like shit, or wimpy, your performance might be good but nobody will listen or take you serious.

That is an 18 year lesson I know is truth. I was booked 48 weeks a year. Gear matters. Sound matters. It all matters.

the only reason people say, "it's performance not tools" is because they don't have tools. if there wasn't so much cheap (rack crap) gear for sale then we wouldn't be having this discussion.

with web distribution and gear you can buy for less than a junkyard car costs, every idiot who thinks becoming a "recording studio owner" is a good way from having to get a day job is jumping in and forcing the world to listen to their productions. we have to weed through the swamp grass to find the good stuff.

when i and other vets here like Chris and Donny were growing up and deciding to go into music, a decent guitar cost in today’s dollars thousands. amps too .... if you had a PA you were very popular. forget about recording gear .... a 4 or 8 track Teac / Tascam home recording set up would cost $50,000 in today's dollars. the point is those who bought this stuff had saved up and worked their ass's off to get it. and the guys who managed to get recording gear usually ended up moving on to bigger and better, opening up commercial studios with "real" equipment. it wasn't for the light hearted. they were dedicated and for the most part proficient in the craft. you really had to have a passion for the biz to even gain an entry point. it was a "filter" and it worked pretty damn well. crap musicians usually just gave up and got real jobs. and the ones who were crappy didn't have any gear to play so who cared? they were relegated to sitting in the garage or bedroom banging away on their St. George guitars and Kent amps. no one wanted them in their bands.

now this could split off into several directions. quality of original material, quality of the recordings, lack of mentoring and filters to weed out the dweebs and gherms or the greed of the people who manufacture and sell "rack crap" but it all comes down to when it cost a lot to record or to buy recording gear and set up recording studios, when quality instruments were more expensive their was a natural selection process, a weeding out, filter systems in place that (for the most part) saved us all from this sh*t.

so can a proficient recordist produce good recordings with low end bottom feeder gear. sure, but why would they want to? any one with ears wants the good stuff. can you learn to drive in a GEO? you bet you can. but wouldn't you rather get in to a bad head on in a Mercedes?

so those of you who want to produce music with a tuna can, go ahead. i'm driving a tank.

well i had a 5k guitar rig , that i cut lawns and painted houses to buy, mommy and daddy, didnt openn their wallets, if i wanted it i earned it.

as far as filtering out, there still is quite a filter.

well Kyle, you really are an exception to the norm.

Well I just had a big rant almost done and my iPad ran out so, I lost it, but I'll try to condense it. I think we all buy the best stuff we can afford. And I think we can all agree that a good song recorded reasonably well can sell. Those sweet pieces of gear, can just help make them mmm mm sweeter!

I'm not afraid of the $20 an hour guys in their home/garage. It's good that they are there, cuz a lot of those people they are recording really can't afford to go to the studios I'm at. And evryone should at least be able to have the experience of turning an idea into a tangible product. I had a blast doing my high school bands demos at home studious to adat and a beastly 900mhz sony computer, remember cooll edit? That was a real studio to me. It would've been a waste of time for a bunch of bleached blond punks writing songs about chicks and getting wasted to go to a fully legit commercial studio. It would have made no diff in the whooping 200 copies we sold to our friends. Those guys can get all the cheap or expensive gear they want, but that still doesn't change the baby crying, or the "better half" from whining, or keep the neighbors happy. I've recorded demos for bands that have their own studios, and for some reason or another they weren't happy, so a day or to in my facility, was better for them, than the months they labored themselves.

And college kids? I ain't scerd of them either. This stuff takes a long long time (for me at least) to become even mildy decent at, some of these kats pick "sound engineer" as if it is a job, not a lifestyle, and a lot of them are starting from, this is a mic, this is an eq. And the talented ones, they are gonna succeed anyway, and places like full sail offere tremendous opportunities, to jump into the big time tours and stuff.

The filter is persistence, I've watched numerous interns, and paid employees leave there positins at the studio cuz their partener wanted them to "get a real job", or it took too long to get paid. I'm too damn stubborn. And I'm learning every time all the time. One day I'll hopefully be actually recording people as much as a think and talk about it. And when those days come, I'll be grateful, and well prepared.

The thing w affordable technology, is that it is opening a new market as it is closing another. Everyone w a best buy card who knows two chords, now wants a home studio. Well, guess who they can call. I'm no acoustic genius, or master carpenter, but I am capable of the basics, and get a reasonable amount of calls helping people w there home studios. Wiring racks, setting people up, building rooms, computer problems, all this stuff is far more common than when home studious, were a serious endever, reserved for serious people who were probably as proficiency as any other professional. Internet mixing and collaboration, awsomeness!

This is a transitional state of an industry that frankly got way too greedy, and overblown. Come on, a year and a million to make a record? Engineers making hundreds of thousands? That could never last. How many great songs never got heard because someone couldn't record them like they can sing into their phones now? I can't beat it, so I join it, or I'll go work at a bank, and exercise that finance degree I dropped out on and never got.

I feel that to be successfully I not only have to be a better engineer w a better studio, that offers a better experience, than the competition, but more well rounded, and a smarter business person as well. I have to find the market and be creative w it, because, just cuz I built it, don't mean they know about it. So this is the filter, if everyone is familiar w PT and an 87 cuz they gotl certified at school, it doesn't mean they know what to do to get to use it. And if they are able to work at home and make enough money to make a living at it, who is anyone to criticize, cuz they re doing something right.

Nevermind the education opportunities , that are opening up. Teaching a couple nights a week for a steady check and doing gigs on top ain't a bad way to go, and something I'm strongly considering.

There's just as much talent out there as ever, I mean 7 year old playing eruption on the violin, omg, that Sullivan kid who's playing w bb king. The unfortunate part is "engineers" like me have to wear more hats, and my skill level will likely suffer compared to the older model, where it would be all day every. But that formula also burnt a lot of talented people out. I can't say that I've ever had a " real" job, and I intend to keep it that way or or fail trying, burger fiend ain't going anywhere anytime soon.

And to touch on gear, we all know the best is the best, but you pay significantly more for that last 10%. Ther really is no justification for chargin 4k for a box based on a circuit that's 50 years old. I can understand gear were a lot of RD went into it and it's new, but even then, very very overpriced. But if there wasn't that "thing" whatever that elusive magic thing is, that they do, nobody would buy them, and all records would be made on a laptop and a knock off mixer, w headphones.

Well, I'm gonna go to bed, luckily I've got enough gas to get to the studio later today, lunch will be a different story.

Well I just paid $7000 for two mono EQ's. Is it worth it? I want more. Can I afford it ? As always, I will find a way. Will I make my money back? Maybe. Am I worthy of this? I don't know but I will definitely be happier.
From my understanding, the less we support hardware, the more expensive it will get. Would you stay in business for only a few orders a week @ $10 an hour?
I wouldn't . Specialty services that are flawless come at a price. And as far as I'm concerned, I like things that cost money because those products usually filter out the swamp water.
If you want my sound, it ain't coming cheap. Non of us are in this business to be sold off as a deal. I practiced for 10 hours a day for 20 years. My kids are now the same. Do I want to record them in a box? No way.
Is this all just transportation, like saying you get there in a Kia or a BMW at the end of the day. I don't think so. I'm pretty certain my sound is better going through some expensive tools that are used correctly. Will everyone hear what I hear. NO
I'm not playing or mixing for the mass. I'm doing it because it sounds more accurate to what I am imagining. People that hear like me and expect better support this. People than don't hear as well and don't take it as serious, could care less. And then there are those who run everything down that they can't touch. Its like this in every business. Its human nature. We're all different.

We usually know the difference. Some of us admit it and others go out of our way to pull the level down so we don't feel so left out.

Its human nature.

Through all that noise, I do believe most people are sincere. Its not easy reading between the lines and figuring out whats right for you.

I bought an API 2500 thinking it was going to be everything it was hyped about. Its was the complete opposite. I can get what it does better ITB. Am I now taking the cheap seat or do I know something special on this one? Everything is subjective to other parts of the bigger picture.

Whats good for me might be a complete waste of time and money for you. Learn your craft and follow those who hear it like you.

"Whats good for me might be a complete waste of time and money for you. Learn your craft and follow those who hear it like you."

Yup. There it is. The quote of the week.

Abso-damned-lutely.