Recording - May 2020 - 32

What do you mic the violin with in the studio?

Incidents in The Sound Lab

Recording and Mixing

The String Cheese Incident
You bring up something interesting that I don't
think a lot of people think about when you have a
band of six people who are multi-instrumentalists
and you have 70 inputs-what do they use for
monitoring in the studio?

Usually some sort of small diagram condenser. I have some
old Neumann KM84 mics that I use quite often. Then I like to
use a ribbon mic under the violin to get some warmth out of it.
It can be a little challenging for placement. We've used an RCA
44, or I like the sE Electronic VR-1 Voodoo mic.

I have a pair of those. I like that they're small and
effortless to place.
Absolutely. I also use them in front of a guitar cabinet. And I
also have a stereo active Royer SF-24 that I like for drum room
mics, guitar room mics, and over the violin. If we're overdubbing a guitar solo or something like that, I'll place the SF-24 in
the room to make things seem a little broader. I love that mic.

We're using Behringer PowerPlay P16-M personal mixers
hooked up to a little Midas M32 console that lives downstairs in
the tracking room. It's fed from and mirrors Pro Tools upstairs in
the control room. I stem everything out to 16 channels on their P16
units. More so than any other band I've worked with, it needs to
sound right in their heads for them to really get into it, so we spend
a lot of time making sure that they're happy in their cans.

And how about the acoustic guitar?

Let's talk bass. Do you mic the cabinet, or is it all direct?

Yes, that and an older Neumann U 87, depending on the
performer. A Shure SM7B if we're doing really close and intimate, or more of a yelly thing and we want less room and
a more isolated kind of sound. I almost always drive them
through a Tube-Tech MEC-1A recording channel.

I mainly use just the direct signal. I rarely use a mic on the bass
amp because of bleed in the room. Usually I default to a Neve Active
DI Box into the Shelford Channel. That chain is just ridiculous to me.

How about electric guitar?

Usually we place the acoustic in an isolation booth that we
have on the second floor overlooking the main room. I'll use either a pair of KM84 mics, or I have a couple of Schoeps m221b
mics that are some of my favorites if we're all tracking together-
it depends on which ones are being used on drum overheads.

For vocals, Kyle mentioned you use a Mojave MA200?

I'll use a Shure SM57, or I'm a big advocate of the old Sennheiser gold face 409. I use those quite often on both guitar
amps and Leslie highs. I like a Shure SM7B close-miked on a
guitar cabinet, and I have some old dynamic Grundig microphones that I use. Kang uses an effected stereo amp set up with
a clean center cabinet. And then he has two outside cabinets
for his stereo effects. I'll use the late 60s Grundig mics on those.
They have a very similar capsule to the Sennheiser 409.

I covered keys with Kyle, so last up, how do you mic
up all the fun percussion stuff that Jason Hann uses?

I was going to ask about his setup because he does
so much effected spacey stuff, I was wondering if
that was direct.

I'm mainly in the box in Pro Tools. We have a big Digi Console,
but it's really just a big mouse-I use it more for tracking than mixing. For conversion, we use 64 channels of Apogee Symphony
I/O. I monitor through a Grace Design M-905 Monitor Controller.

His setup is always three mics on his cabinets, and then live
when he switches to acoustic mandolin, I also have a direct
input of that which I can balance in the mix. Live, his violin
is also a combination of direct in and miked cabinets. In the
studio, we mic the violin.

32 RECORDING May 2020

Photo by: Dylan Langille

His setup is insane-live it has probably 24 to 30 inputs. In
the studio, I use Sennheiser 604 clip-on mics, and then I use
three KM 84 mics for regional overheads, like toys one, toys
two, and toys three. I also use DPA 2011 mics a lot in the studio
for area miking, which sound just awesome-I love them.

Let's move to mixing, what's in the control room?

What are your monitor speakers?

I use a pair of Blue Sky Monitors that Jerry Harrison turned
me on to. I have an older pair of Yamaha HS8 monitors, and

Recording - May 2020

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