I conceive two approaches to recording live sound: 1) "They Are Here"---mic-up the band for a studio-type recording separate from the house feed, adding mics to capture the room acoustics and audience... tricky but has been done very successfully e.g. Clapton Unplugged; 2) "You Are There"---binaural recording from a good seat in the audience, maybe at the FOH sound board. One of my very favorite live recordings and performances is Procol Harum Live, seemingly a kind of compromise between the former and latter approaches, somehow. My hat's permanently off for the many talented engineers that successfully pull off these tricks---especially the recording of symphony orchestras---that have provided me a lifetime of listening pleasure.
Kraftwerk's sole founding member, Ralf Hutter, once told an interviewer that their live shows were mixed to mono to ensure a democratic experience for all audience members, or words to that effect. I believe that they now use a very sophisticated state-of-the-art (naturally) FOH system with a large number of separate channels. -- 3D sound to go with the 3D visuals. (For those who wonder whether they're actually doing anything on stage: Hutter plays keys. Of the other three, the one next to Hutter plays keys sometimes and otherwise does some live remixing, the guy next to him mostly does live remixing, and the last guy mixes the video playback.)
Thank you for the video, which raises a very relevant topic. Let's stick with the rock concert, because I imagine that recording a classical orchestra has different aspects and could find different solutions. The simplest and perhaps shortest answer is that since, say, the 1960s, PA technology and recording technology have developed separately in parallel, and it has never been the same. The jazz trio is perhaps the easiest to record. A good recording of three musicians playing acoustically unamplified is perhaps the closest to a live performance... with all the drawbacks. Recording a rock band well in the studio has reached a higher standard over the decades and created higher expectations among consumers. It may sound good in a stadium or a large concert hall, but the demands of an audiophile in his armchair at home are different from what a PA has to fulfill at a live concert. In the 80s, I was a stagehand during my university years. In the four years I was there, we set up pretty much all the big names in all kinds of stadiums and concert halls in North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne, Dortmund, the Ruhr area, Düsseldorf, etc. BTW, is it not a nice memory when we played football in the concert hall after the soundcheck with the original Deep Purple line-up in the early 80s because they were bored until the evening? The Perfect Stranger tour. Back to the topic you can't compare it one-to-one. The sound of a great live concert is not audiophile in the sense of the qualities you expect at home, no "3D" listening, no "stage" as described by audiophiles at home. I have stood at the mixing desk at many live concerts. But there are other characteristics that cannot be realized at home. The incredible energy that emanates from a good PA system, the sound fidelity, the impulse of the drums, etc. All of this can be heard very physically. BTW at my time everything was still analog. The only digital thing on the set was the brand new Sony discman that the sound engineer plugged into the mixing console in the afternoon and we listened to Donald Fagen's IGY or The Wall. The sound was great, it was the time of analog Clair Brothers, Martin and Turbosound PA systems. By the way...these studio recordings by, for example, Donald Fagen did have a stereo or even hi-fi effect via the large PA system. But the live mix in the evening had other priorities. I also think that a lot of live recordings for records were taken directly from the mixing console and remixed later for home listening just adding some ambient sound of the venue. Today, I like to listen to BBC-style speakers. But to experience a sound that is reminiscent of a concert hall, I bought old Klipschorn speakers and restored them to their original condition. They're not audiophile speakers, but they conjure up a nice live atmosphere in the living room.
Hey, Collapsed Lung are playing the Adelphi in Hull on 9th November!! Should be an amazing night out. Fantastic band. Don't know much about Broken Ribs. Are they any good?
My favorite recording that I own is the 4 channel mix of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon". And the reason I love it so much is that it is positional, which is just very, very different from most other rock recordings. And because it's a 4 channel positional mix, you actually feel like the band is surrounding you, in the room with you playing their parts, with you in the middle. It is very different from the later 5.1 mixes that the band seem to prefer, which sound more like traditional live recordings with all the instruments up front and the rear speakers used only for ambience. Anyway, I realize you're talking about stereo but that is the only positional mix I think I own (or have maybe ever heard) from a rock band recording and it is unbelievable, but I'm not sure it'd work in stereo because you'd lose that feeling of the band being in the corners of the room. Actually, now that I think about it, the only other real positional rock mix I can think of is Rush's "Farewell to Kings", which is another surround mix (both of these are on Blu-Ray Audio). The imaging is not used throughout the entire recording but, for example, at the beginning you can hear the acoustic guitar moving around left to right and front to back, which gives the impression of Alex Lifeson actually walking around you as he plays. It is very effective and fun. Maybe a rock mix doesn't need to be entirely positional, but touches like that can really bring some life to the music.
I have attended performances by many famous rock groups. I have walked out of some concerts when the sound was painfully awful and I would certainly not wish to have a recording that accurately reproduced this live experience. A recording should sound like the artist and be a pleasure to listen to.
The control over audience sound level provided by line array systems is incredible, I remember walking from the stage to the back of Glastonbury Pyramid stage one Sunday morning, the sound level remained constant all the way to the very back (it did get “harder” as the cabinet pointing at that area was a little louder than the one below it) then suddenly the sound almost disappeared as I stepped onto the road at the back, so much control that there were complaints from stall holders behind the arena that the buzz of being at a festival was destroyed, the following year it was set up so more sound spilled out of the arena. Sadly I have yet to hear a line array that sounds any good, the high & mid can sound ok (although often limited to death) but the sub-woofers overwhelm at a very narrow band of bass (last weekend I was at a folk festival, one player’s double base had an open string that was far louder than all the other strings and notes he played). Added to which live mixes seem always to be based around the drums, with the vocal almost always far to quiet, so one is aware someone is singing, but no idea what, unless you know the words. Sorry to hear about the accident, glad you are well on the mend.
I can't believe how good old jazz recordings sound- like old blue note recordings. I can hear a difference even in my car with a CD. I have a modest stereo older stereo but my speakers are moved way off the wall (in a completely non wife approved placement 🙂) It's like magic.. It doesn't matter what format.
The soundcheck process on those recordings amounted to the band being placed where needed with tape marks on the floor. Any instrument that had solos had a second mark closer to the mic. Artists fully expected this ‘experiment’ before every recording session. This is not a completely obsolete method either. Placing the sources makes much more sense than the brute force method of remixing.
Every time I hear discussion of sound stage, I imagine that a superb system would successfully capture and pinpoint in space the creaking of each floorboard of the stage beneath the performers.
I had such sensation with excellent mono reproduction of radio program. Speakers, cables were created by me and it was with excellent tube radio which was mono and due to that had no filtering for 19 kHz at all. (which was after detection later always in radios. With stereo programs I in my youth heard in room 19 kHz from speakers. ) The opera singers were walking on stage and I heard their steps on stage (in mono but sound was spacious enough to match imagination of at least 2 meter wide stage). With some floorboard cracks. It was in past when people used mechanical hand watches and always recognized radio speaker by sound of her hand watch. Perceiving it today in stereo is less spectacular because in stereo we receive "programmed " directions which are not always coherent with secondary sensations Also after all engineers to make it perfect cut all unwelcomed additional sounds. That is why I also like old recordings on vinyl - even sounding live sparkling tiny cracks like on surface of wall of sound (of courese not the loud ones) make feeling like actual creation of sound .
Center fills and subs go a long way to removing dead spots and creating a sound field that covers the listening area well. The older reliance on mains stacks is, i think, on the way out, at least for medium-sized venues. And IEMs are freeing up stage space that can now be used for fill speakers. No, the newer methods don't necessarily solve the stereo image problem, but i think in a live setting a coherent stereo image is not an actual expectation of the audience.
Had no idea about your bike accident. Glad you are doing better! A friend and I were cycling years back. He was barreling down a fairly steep grade. For whatever judgement wise he decided to take a left on a road that was impossible given the speed he was going. Majorly wrecked. Broke his hip bone. Got him in the car carefully and headed to the hospital. It was a nerve racking time for both of us.
Glad you’re back . I doubt there have been many audiophiles at rock band concerts over the years . The few I’ve been to were more about the experience and crowd participation than correct imaging . On a couple of them I’ve experienced hearing loss for several days afterwards . Regarding other forms of live music , I understand your point . Anyway hope you’re feeling better.
This really brings to point that this issue is an artistic decision that should be made by the artist and not left to chance or technicalities. Like it or not, the artist should be involved; do they want their recordings to be “photographs” of their live performance or do they treat them more like “paintings”.
Yet another tantelizing set of questions, great video ! 🙂 And I wish you a speedy recovery from your accident. I would guess that it's a set of creative decisions, in order to fabricate a certain sound & stereo image, perhaps mostly by taking direct feeds of the closed-mic'ed instruments as the base ingredients. I think it's like a play in a theater, the decor is put in place and is mostly static while some actors stand still most of the time and some move across the stage for the sake of drama or entertainment. It's the mixing / sound engineer that creates this virtual (audio) stage for us....I consider it to be a form of art. There's an assumption that one could quite safely make : when listening to your home system, chances are that you are sitting perfectly centered....in the sweet spot. So that would allow for a bass guitar to panned hard left/right, if the mixing engineer chooses to do so. What makes a rock recording enjoyable for me, is if the instruments are put in a certain place (left to right and also back to front) with sufficient 'empty space' in between. There can be some creative panning, EQ-ing, changing of levels etc. during the song, to provide a certain interesting effect, Pink Floyd used this all the time and I very much like it and consider it to be a sort of benchmark of what can be done creatively to keep a listener engaged in the mesmering virtual audio landscape. The possibilities are endless and there's no single way that is right or that dictates how a rock recording should sound.
For the purpose of this video I ignored the ground between accurate imaging and what I called 'sonic mush', but of course in recording there are a lot of creative possibilities. In fact far more than are actually used. I may make a video on this point.
Words of wisdom... if it sounds good - it is good 🙂. Right - rock band's records from 60-ies, fewer from 70-ies - they simply ROCK !! Few instruments, "simple" setup , and ech instrument in its place in space. Whet I listen to let's say Atomic Rooster it is just amazing how this recording were made, so realistic, so overwhelming, ...all in my listening room. I am so grateful for this !! I do not go to live rock concerts anymore, for the very reason you have just said - sound is bad unless you end up in the centre and not too far away from the stage - and even then - not always true... I think that some of this so called front end sound engineers are half deaf this days...
There are many, many tricks to create a convincing image from discrete channels. Among just the ones I use: 1. Haas-effect panning. (Using micro-difference delays, 2 per instrument.) 2. Pan all channels to a single common ambience effect rather than directly. 3. Add a coincident pair right onstage obnoxiously visible and blend as much as needed. This will often require time aligning the close mics to the pair to use more stereo mic level. These are not theoretical. As I said, I have used all of these.
At the beginning of the video I thought for a moment "where is this going" and I had the thought that you wanted to talk about something else. Namely the way in which the stereo image is created. It is only partly true that our brains interpret that a sound comes from the left because it sounds louder in our left ear than in our right ear. A much more important indication is that sound from the left first reaches our left ear and a little later the right ear, and because this sound also has to go around our head, it also sounds slightly different in the right ear. That information gives a much better impression of where the sound comes from than the difference in volume. And almost always the stereo image is created with the pan knobs and therefore only the difference in volume. Listen to a binaural recording with headphones and it is immediately clear that the stereo image sounds much more natural here. With modern technology it must be easy for digital mixers to have pan knobs that not only control the volume but also the time difference and a small adjustment of the timbre. It surprises me that this is not yet the standard way of mixing.
No home audio user can reasonably expect to replicate a live performance in a small rubber walled room. Just the size difference should make that obvious. The ultimate question is ... _"Did you enjoy it?"_ If the answer is "yes" then mission accomplished, nothing to worry about.
Wonderful video. Thank you! Very informative and entertaining. Question: Why do we not want drums to be a point source, generally? I've noticed that most music played on my fairly revealing system (be it jazz, Americana, rock, or blue grass) tends to have somewhat floating drums that are hard to pinpoint, save for cymbals, it seems. One exception is the "Drum Duet" on Genesis' live The Longs albums which is very spacially queued with one set of drums on the far left and the other on the far right. I think it sounds terrific. Thanks!
Can you make a video about the difference between mixing for stereo speakers and mixing for headphones? I would in particular to know more about crossfeed. Thank you.
Clever way to tell us about your accident. Hope to see you have a full recovery. Now, for answer , I saw Rick Wakeman back in the 70’s and was amazing synthesizers and earth shaking base. I bought the albums and was very disappointed, the recording quality was alf awful. No bass! I later ordered the CD version. Still bad. They didn’t make these recordings for good stereo. I’m still disappointing to this day.
Yes it does matter: spatial separation helps to separate and make sense of musical strands. Whether it's a studio or live recording engineers will always create more or less defined images for the instruments, irrespective of what it sounded like on the spot. And if it's there, yes, any half decent system will be able to show it.
That's one of the reasons that many audiophiles have a very limited spectrum of music they listen to, i.e., Dianna Krall, various classical, jazz, and blues.
Great video! It all depends on mic placement! I am working on getting good stereo recordings of my meager set up. Thank you for sharing! PA is basically mono!
In studio recordings, most drum setups have different microphones for each drum or at least many of the drums. Any stereo that comes from that is done at the mixing console.
I just recorded a whole show small venue maybe 70-100 people using just an iPhone and the recording mostly sounded better than being there. Go figure. I think only the vocals were controlled by the mixer, the drums were not amplified. I was more towards the left of stage. Bass guitar in middle, rhythm on left and lead on the right and they must have just been going through their own amps only. What was really neat to see was that between songs these people tune their guitars into their earpieces while one of them has some musical atmospheric thing going on to bridge the gaps. The vocalists obviously also use the earpieces for vocal monitors since harmony is important. I couldn't tell that much being there but could tell in the recording that they kept vocals on key. We need good studio recordings and they should do whatever it takes to make it sound good. I have a ton of respect for those who can make a live concert sound good either in recording or being there.
I'm not in a position to judge US vs. UK mixing consoles. I did use a US console a long time ago in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Unfortunately my memory of how it sounded has gone completely blank. I guess it was good though.
My solution is to hire the recording engineer of "Jazz at the Pawnshop" for every piece of music that is recorded in the world from now on. He/she obviously knew what they were doing.
So sorry to hear about your bike fall. I hope you are recovering well. I think the only way to achieve this is a carefully combine a binaural mix with a multi-mic mix. Phase would be the gotcha I think but still possible.
There's an interesting interview on Rick Beato's channel with FoH engineer Dave Natale, who has engineered live for just about everyone - Stones, Tina Turner, Jeff Beck, etc, etc. He mixes in mono. His reasoning is that, whilst stereo may be all very well for those in the centre of the room or for a gig in a small, intimate club type of venue, those on either side (not necessarily just at the far left or right) of a venue of any size will not hear everything if you mix in stereo. I agree with him and always mix my band in mono live. Dave also believes (and I agree) that the most important thing is to use eq effectively to ensure various instruments and voices don't cancel/mask or fight with each other. The resultant sound of each instrument or voice may not be strictly "natural", but it's most important that they play nicely together. It's hard to argue with him when you hear the results he gets. As for "live" recordings "sounding just like you were there", I'm afraid they can't and don't, for several reasons. They will always be taken from multitrack recordings (one and often multiple track/s will be recorded for each performer), which are mixed and produced in a studio after the event. No live recording, with the possible exception of the simple jazz trio you refer to, will ever be made Blumlein style with a simple pair of mic's, because what worked in the room at the event will usually not work when the music is played back in the home. Eq, both individual and global, will need to be changed, often drastically (your room has very different acoustics from a concert venue). Mistakes, fluffed notes, etc, which at a live gig pass in an instant and are forgotten, will need to be corrected, because they can become REALLY annoying on repeated listening. Sometimes, an entire part will need to be replaced, if for example, the intonation is not on the money (do you really want to listen to an entire passage that is flat?). As for imaging, it's one of the least of the issues. Stereo is a trick and an illusion. A pleasant and enjoyable one to be sure, but an illusion nonetheless.
Sorry to hear about your bike accident... I guess a 4.0 Vehicle is safer than 2.0 one, feel well. Glad To see you back. Example for Ultimate Rock band Studio recording: Machine Head, Tommy, Led Zeppelin II, Etc... Example for Ultimate Rock Band Live Recording: Made in Japan, Live At Leads, Etc. Example Fur ultimate Rock band Live Performance: Pink Floyd Early 70s "Quadreo"" speaker System. other bands like DP, Led Zeppelin and The Who where excellent too. Suggestion for today's live performance: A 5.2 Speaker system or at least 3.1 Stage Located Speaker System. Whish you all the best.
Audio engineer and DJ here. Sound imaging in a audiophile system all comedown to the listner. Where imaging in a venue differs is that the sound mix has to be good at all angles and distances. In a live setting everything is run as a mono mix so there is no stereo imaging at all. And to be honest. Most studio recording is done as a mono recording, unless there are two or more channels of any one instrument being recorded.The stereo imaging all happens in the post production mixing in the mastering mix. Mastering is where all the magic happens with all recording. Back in the day they only had two channels to record on so left and right is all they had to throw everything into. But with today modern equipment 32 channels or more can be recorded and split up in any direction anyone would ever want. Then throw in THX or Dolby sound into the mix and you can have sounds coming out of places there are no speakers for it to come from. So trying to compare a live production to a studio mastered production is like comparing a Volkswagen to a Lambo. Both owned by the same maker, but completely different worlds.
If I wanted to recreate the rock band club sound at home, I would probably forget stereo and run the recording mono to some really big speakers turn the volume to 11 and put in some foam earplugs so I don't go deaf.
I have better perception of sound when it is in mono. Because I am not busy by surprising me directions . In stereo it is like double sensation sounding and positioning. My mono listening which I enjoy in recorded from AM radio music I modified by modification to developed by me 2x2,5W tube SE ampifier to make it deeper, wider and higher so it would not sound like from exact center.
@@tsunamitube3351 by putting earplugs in your ears you are not hearing the music. You are purposely degrading the music you are hearing. and by listening to music that is patently too loud you risk hearing damage. Se Craig Gill and his suicide and countless musicians and gig goers with hearing damage because the music is too loud. it can be felt of course but its just stupid to paly music so loud that you need earplugs. From someone who saw Motorhead at Queens Hall Bradford.
I have to advise anyone considering falling off their bike, I haven't recovered fully yet but hope to get all the way within a few months. On the bright side, the doctors said I'd been lucky. And since I did it to myself, there's nothing for me to be bitter about.
@@AudioMasterclass Well if you are anything at all remotely like me, (I fell over trying to mount my stationary bike!), you may be experiencing the strange phenomena called "the older I get the sillier I get", I've found it to be quite dangerous.
Wow man! Quite a lot to unpack there. First off, sorry to hear about your bike accident. I hope you're recovering well. The issue of stereo placement is an almost never-ending discussion. Should we care? Absolutely, but there is no one answer. Perhaps one of the oddest discussions I've had over the years is about drum panning. Some seem to think that it should be presented from the perspective of the audience, and others from the perspective of the drummer. Most simplistically we could think of this as ride cymbal on the right and high hat on the left - or vice-versa. Does it really matter? What if you have a left handed drummer that plays a right handed kit? It's an interesting paradox. I'm of the opinion that if the final mix has good separation and everything is clear and intelligible, there's really no cause for concern. Live is different though. My experience there is mostly in small clubs. I rarely, if ever, pan anything. Leave it mono and just make sure that every instrument has its own spot in the frequency range, and it doesn't sound like a garbled mess because of bad room acoustics. Live mixing and studio mixing are entirely different worlds. At the end of the day, it's about doing what is most appropriate while still achieving a pleasant result for the audience/listeners. We engineers certainly should care and consider these things, but there isn't a set in stone rule book that I've ever seen.
Yes !!! I own multiple systems that can do it, I reference the mid 1930s Alan Blumlein demonstration including 3 Grand Piano 's in a triangle in the EMI archives and Include Yamaha DSP reverberation patterns if you want to deepen the experience. Stereo was originally designed for life size analogous recreation.... That was the goal.....
I'm sorry to hear of your accident. I hope you're feeling better! You're opinion appears to be that imaging for rock is somewhat arbitrary. Should one approach stereo systems more like tuning an instrument to the listener's taste than attempting to perfectly reproduce a sound? If so, then how far one should go? Is going beyond playing with the bass and treble controls overkill?
This was/is a problem with digitally created music ie with instrument patches and kits from all over the place. Some have dry mixes and some have more ambient/wet sound and some had both with phase corrected sample sets. To blend them one would usually put an overal reverb over everything to try to make it sound more coherent but do it too much it'll sound too echoey and unnatural. The same issues arise with live vs studio music, though now the recording engineers are at least in control of the recording which gives more creative freedom during mixing and mastering (if there was any communication/coordination between the engineers and the artists at least). What I like about electronic music is that it's very coherent like Equinoxe pt 5 by Jean Micheal Jare or Kiss the Cloud by Yello, which is one of the best sound designs with regards to sound stage and stereo mixing I've heard. How the vocals shift between wet and dryer sound etc, the pops and clicks that shoot towards you and escape left and right, the very soft chime far in the distance etc. Or how Love is like a butterfly by Dolly Parton, it has some hard left/right instruments and choir spread in the half left to half right. The simple mixing and mastering is so tastefully done imo. If you look at Yesu Wanga by Agape African Choir the choir is beautifully recorded/mixed with reverb and vocals stretching all the way from hard left to hard right to tickle behind your ears ;) and anywhere in between, but the percussion and base guitar later in the song is dead dry and centered. Quite jarring, still a nice listen though. Even if it can't be considered natural, as in, you would need to stand in the middle of the center with the choir in a semi circle around you, which is often the position of the microphone, but if you listen from the bleachers/seats it sounds totally different. I prefer the center of the semicircle as listening position, I like to be wrapped by the full sound of the choir, like a warm cosy blanket.
In a land far away and a time long ago, I used to stereo mix live bands to sound good in the middle of the hall. This worked well until a reggae band turned up with a massive folded W bass bin and amp which was louner than my PA! At the time, my reference was Eric Clapton's Just One Night which was ideal for setting a good EQ for the venue.
I think believable (notice I did not say accurate) imaging absolutely matters if you’re having a focused listening session. How it’s best achieved is beyond my knowledge, but there are many examples of rock albums I love never getting play in my listening room because the imaging is flat and vague.
BTW....surely you are aware of, and perhaps, have even listened to, a presentation utilizing the Bacch phase correction software? If not, I strongly encourage you to investigate it. The effect is ...startling? Engaging? I'd love to see a post from you discussing ( more pointedly, REVIEWING ) this technology.
Much of the time,using live PA systems pretty much all of the sound comes through both channels. "Imaging" in that instance doesn't exist,with perhaps the odd moment of panning. Regarding recordings for domestic playback,if there is panning there and phase delays,reverb etc in the recording we should remain faithful to it whether it's an obvious effect,or done more subtly,positioning instruments within a soundstage.
I have always felt live performance and what we listen to on a recorded album are two different things, and as such there is a reason metal and hip hp for example do not show up in audiophile reviews much. But what does it matter when the majority of hifi, audiophile or not, is just as compromised due to living space constraints and small drivers, the only time I heard a drum kit sound realistic in a recording was an uncompressed DSD playback through PMC BB5/XBD, and low bass or impact etc requires large drivers. Funny enough I like a lot of rock, I can appreciate some labels mix better than others, and now even with Spotify bringing out old albums you can at times hear what the engineer is doing with the mix. It takes a big system and good engineering hand to pull of what sounds like a rock band on a stage, with a drum kit actually in its space and not sounding like the drummer has 30ft arms with a high hat to the far left, kick drum in middle and snare to the far right. Various recordings and technique, and it all comes down to the recording technique and engineering, which is why with a lot of opld rock albums collectors look for originals or audiophile pressings or copies that have no bar code and never been remastered. That said, you can have a blast with a pair of massive 15" bass drivers and compression horns in a nice system, that will make that rock music more lifelike and enjoyable than some multi driver modern speaker can acheive, a 15" has that feel, kick, the rim shot and skin have a sense of being just that, the thrum of bass guitar isnt lost while some 6" driver loses its composure. These days so much seems to have been lost with engineering mixes, you only need to listen to old rock albums original vs remastered to see something has been lost in the art. Good room, good speakers and a well engineered album. You can then add placebo by watching the video of a live performance and playing that in stereo or surround and often you will find you hear what you see.
In my small venue performances I generally mix to mono. I have tried placing instruments in space as they are located on the stage thru the PA but you always had some instruments not being head at different points in the room. Also, you had the issue of dealing with the sound reflected back from the stage monitors. In ear systems solves that issue provided they are not too loud and feedback can destroy a performers hearing very quickly. To record, youvneed a separate console with direct feeds to a multitrack recorder. This allows you to remix the performance for playback at home or car or whatever. That mix is not really to make it sound like it did in the live performance music hall. If done by talented techs, the sound will be far better than the live experience. Ofcourse you should have tracks from the sound of the audience to make you feel like "you are there." I really enjoy live performance recordings even if they are not as pristine as a studio mix. The excitement of the live experience if well done, makes for a very exciting listening experience. Add video and you are there in the perfect sear to see and hear the band! Thank you amazing recording engineers! 😅
Audio wise I have been into mono records a lot lately. Love hearing those BIG recording studio rooms. Nothing is panned ( or was it in the 1950's ) I do not think but, mike placement was key and the room acoustics and players positions. Honestly true mono records do and can sound stereo naturally. Many years later the studios got smaller and the bands so now they had to try and recreate that natural room effect. Frankly it has been downhill every since. My personal stereo system sounds like orchestral groups or jazz groups are right in the room with me while performing. Very hard to get the personable feel and effect with stereo records for it sounds contrived. This has been a huge audio eye opener for me lately. Yes I still love rock music but compared to a 1950's jazz mono record it blows newer stereo contrived/mixed recordings out of the water! Room acoustics and player placement and correct miking was the secret. This type of recording is now about gone completely for the most part these days. Hate digital 1's and 0's music. That is another massive failure musically now. Arrgh.
Yep, band PAs are mono for the room. The band hears itself rehearsing and playing differently and a studio mix is closer to their perspective, which is a good thing.
I almost always mix mono for live events. The smaller the room, you can get away with *some stereo imaging but otherwise it can sound weird. Just my opinion!
I think imaging is over-rated for a listening room. If I want exact replication of how a performance is mic-ed, headphones are the best bet. But real performances interacting with a room is something entirely different. This is why we like concerts. And this is why soundstage is what's most important to me. It's also why Omnidirectional speakers and piston speakers with coherent/point-source drivers can sound so special. But... don't look for perfect imaging in speakers like these.
Having worked on dozens of live concerts I completely see your point. The problem is that the FOH mix is often recorded as well (for that 'you-never-know' live album or whatever). Now for the live audience, the FOH mix should/could be almost mono. For the recording however.... And there's your FOH problem: make one mix that suits both goals. Impossible. Although I think a proper live album should be (almost) mono. Unfortunately most people (and producers) don't agree with me on that. Even one of the best live albums ever (Full House by J. Geils Band) suffers from panning. And so do Rory Gallagher's live albums and many others. It's a pity.
I can't really answer the question in any useful sort of way, but I can offer an observation that is almost completely unconnected. It's always fun to compare the 1958 Sir Malcolm Sargent HMV recording of The Planets (some planets have rocks, so we're almost talking rock music) with the 1987 Charles Dutoit Decca recording. Well, I say 'fun'. (I may have I said this before - it's a favourite audio-related story of mine.) The point is stereo imaging. The imaging is very precise on the Dutoit recording, but I don't think that is what I would hear in a concert hall, as I would not be sitting in front of each instrument (or section) simultaneously. I therefore prefer the Sargent recording, although a bit more clarity would be nice (the HMV 1974 Previn recording perhaps?) Incidentally, I was unusually happy with the sound and sound imaging at a gig I went to back in February. But that was Cerys Hafana singing and playing the tripple harp in a Brighton pub - so, small venue, and Cerys was even less a rock band than an orchestra playing Holst. Very sorry to hear about the lung and the ribs. I broke just one rib once, and that was bad enough. It takes a while, so all good wishes.
My most recent planetary experience was at the Royal Albert Hall last year close to the front of the arena. I don’t think even the Hubble telescope could have provided better imaging.
Just buy the DTS 5.1 or Atmos 7.1 versions of the albums which there are many of. You get put right in the middle of the stage and don't have to rely on that placebo effect you think you are getting from just 2 speakers in front of you called "Soundstage".
There isn't one solution, there are many, maybe an infinity ... so technically there are no solutions. I think that you should mix so that it sounds good and vaguely realistic, the home listener wasn't at the concert and couldn't see the musicians moving around anyway... And rock is some kind of organised chaos by definition almost.
I never understand how the engineers mix the drums. They seem to be on the left, the right and centre all at the same time as if we are about 1 foot away from them.
I’m a music lover with a rather entry-level system, and I have no clue about professional sound recording and public addressing. But isn’t a live performance and the production of a recording for home use, two different pair of shoes, serving different requirements and expectations? If you have like a dozen of mikes and signal sources, they end up at the mixing desk of the sound engineer, who takes care of the live reproduction, the „public addressing“. Why can’t in parallel each of these channels be recorded separately, for a later mixing and mastering in a studio, to produce a record for home use? If this is a stupid question, please be so kind to ignore it.
This has answered that question. Now I know. It’s Debbie and Betty. I think if AI takes over they will have their own RUclips channel. You might even get a guest spot with the legend Audio Phil. For that ultimate rock band feel. Any sound in the bass spectrum is hard to locate its source. So we have sub bass speakers. The placing of instruments goes back hundreds of years in front of live audiences. The question is why copy what worked in classical. Just steal them use and experiment. Some laws have to understood to be broken correctly.
Conflating audio hi Fi and live, two different things entirely. I love the imaging my hi Fi offers me, I don’t go to a live concert to create what I hear at home.
We as listeners should rethink what we are intending to hear. We cannot have it all. We cannot have group of original instruments placed in stereo order in our own listening room simply because we listen to whole recorded venue, not pure single instruments. Even if it was engineered later it is existing and cannot be removed. That is why I reject idea of big listening room which has acoustics actualy mixing with concert/recording acoustic. Our hearing pinpoints and rejects with ease perception of room short resopnse unveiling only unusual for it sensations..In bogger space hearing may be confused what is recording vice what was created by our own big room.
Seems to me I’ve never heard my home system sound like a club/live system , exactly. it also seems to me that it is /was your job to make these decisions?
I am a sort of Audiophile, in that I want a violin, for example to sound like a violin and also want things like chamber orchestras to produce a good stereo image when recorded. But as I mentioned in a previous comment, with rock music, you essentially get what the producer thinks sounds good. Some producers, like Mutt Lange, do this very well, but in general, what was recorded in the studio is often physically impossible to perform live. If you have a recording with 6 different guitar parts, how does a band with two guitarists do anything but try to amalgamate the most important parts when playing live? In general, though,if there are a couple of guitar parts in a recording, they are generally split left and right which is convenient for transcribing, but it's not real stereo imaging. Aas for the recording in general, if a rock recording sounds good, it is good. One additional note is that when recording, generally, the band is not even playing live with different members of the band being recorded separately, maybe even in different studios. Any illusion of a stereo image is just that - an illusion, and hopefully the producer gave some thought into what illusion sounded good instead of trying to create the illusion of a real stereo image. Rock bands invariably sound better recorded than live, anyway just due to what magic the studio can do.
Mutt Lange is not what I would call a genius for capturing live sound first he is the one who screwed up def leapard and went you can record anywhere. Real genius producers to me were guys like Roy Thomas baker, Martin birch. Tom allom And no I don't count Keith Olsen as one of them either. As he is another one who seemed to like and go mess with bands Martin birch touched first like Fleetwood Mac, whitesnake. Ohh and the 1987 whitesnake album was Bob rock and Mike stone. Who got that sound. Which means I like Bob Rock too. Too me a good producer always seeks first to capture in the studio the bands natural live sound first they produce on stage then starts to tweak it.
@@gabrielstern4992 I never claimed he was a genius at capturing live sound - quite the opposite. He makes excellent rock recordings. There is no real rock stereo recordings with real imaging like there would be for a chamber orchestra. As I noted, rock sounds worse live than the recordings and even then there is no real stereo imaging. What you hear is what is mixed by the sound person.
A studio recording is a chance to hear superior imaging and what the hell’s wrong with that? Almost 100% will never notice and of the few who do they’ll only be one or none who prefer the usual mush.
I think you look at it from the perspective of a mixing engineer. Then you always make a choice how to place the different instruments in the stereo image, whether it is a studio recording or the sound of a live performance with a PA system. I think that most concert listeners are not concerned with that. Unless something is clearly wrong. A guitarist who is on the left of the stage and mainly sounds through the speakers on the right side is very strange and will probably be noticed. But it is much more important that the total sound is well balanced and sounds good and above all that the band plays well. The largest group of listeners who listen to music at home or on the road are also not particularly concerned with the stereo image, in my opinion. The enthusiasts, not only the audiophiles but also the real music lovers certainly hear it. The solution is not complicated in my experience. When mixing a studio recording you create a new reality, so to speak. In addition, for rock music, in theory everything is good. I make sure that with all types of music, including rock music, I can clearly identify all the musicians while listening with my eyes closed, that they are evenly distributed across the stereo image and that the most important voices/instruments are in the middle. During a live performance, I find it logical that a musician who is on the right of the stage also sounds right and left vice versa. If that is not exaggerated (completely left or completely right in the sound), it is also acceptable for the listeners who are at the front near the sides of the stage. For someone who is on the left of the stage, the musician on the left side is closer and the musician on the right side is further away. Then it is also logical if the musician on the left sounds a bit louder than the musician on the right. As long as they are both still clearly audible. I do the sound for a starting band. I always ask them to think carefully about where they are going to stand on stage. The band consists of a singer, guitarist, keyboardist, bassist and drummer. They had a tendency to have the guitarist and the keyboardist stand on the same side of the stage. That didn't give a nice sound. I kept asking them to stand on the left and the right because that gave a nicer stereo image. I never had any complaints from listeners standing on the sides that they couldn't hear something.
I had a motorbike once, a Triumph Tiger Cub. I'm definitely glad I gave that up. I was simply riding my mountain bike too fast beyond my ability. On the bright side, I am still living and I have definitely learned.
Here's mine: Now that there are 11 channel processors and they can all be discrete, need I say more? Well yes but that would be giving away the secret sauce... I have already sent this off to Patent Office...
Modern bands don't even have amps on stage anymore. Or anywhere. It's all DI, modelers and triggers. Almost no live stage sound. Not even wedges, because they've all got in-ear monitors. It's all down to the front-of-house mixing choices.
I would suspect loads, mostly bootlegs. I mean, what self-respecting FOH engineer wouldn't put up a crossed pair for, you know, backup purposes? As for the bicycle, not yet. I was told very seriously that the worst thing I could do right now is to have another accident.
@@AudioMasterclass Could it be done well in a small venue, like The Cavern, where the Beatles played? If a rock band asked you to record them there with a pair of microphones, crossed or not, how would you do it? I hope your injuries are healing well. And thank you for replying, few you-tubers bother to do that.
Now it's push back time on one comment about you can't record a band playing live and have seperate booths not true pro tools changed that and if that person wants proof iron maiden with Kevin Shirley does that in the studio. Now the late great, Martin birch would have loved to do things like that but pro tools did not exist during his producer days. But at least he bothered to capture the bands natural sound first and got to know the bands he worked with before going into strict headmaster mode. Technology today can be great but only if not misused.
glad to have you back, sir. two things occur, & I've done a lot of live sound & recording with rock bands & other music too- the grateful dead, & the wall-of-sound system they toured with, is one famous & successful answer, but beyond the reach of smaller bands. the other approach which *could* have its principal concepts scaled down to suit a budget, is espoused in this video by dave rat, who knows whereof he speaks. ruclips.net/video/H5S34Hf95gI/видео.html
The wall of sound was possibly an amazing idea but I never had the chance to hear it. That was in an era when PA had a choice of directions to go. Did it choose the right way though?
Rock should be recorded in mono and played back at volumes that leave your ears ringing for a day. At least, that’s my aural experience of the real thing. Stereo has no place in such music.
The wish of a band to sound like live is senseless because the most rock musicians dont know how they sound to the audience. Therefore, all recordings have to create some artificial transformation. At least imaging is overrated for rock music. Please ride careful.
its bloody obvious that its waste of time listening to live recorded rock music. Its totally rubbish compared to a studio rock album. Who the hell wants to listen to the stones playing live in Rio whilst sat on your sofa! Its just moronic man. A well recorded and produced studio album is different matter mind. The sound of the crowd would drive me mental! I love the magic that can be made in a studio recording! The only way to listen to rock music! The Eagles released a live album in 1980, It does not sound bad at all - but its full of overdubs mind!
It's not rubbish to listen to live rock music. A live show is about entertainment and that is not due to just the music alone. That's why rock musicians (try, but not always successfully) to engage the audience with whatever stage presence they can manage. At a classical performance, everyone sits down and listens. In a rock performance half the audience is generally standing and doing whatever.
@@Harrison-kt5xr Live rock music is great! Go to a stadium, it can be pretty amazing! I would not wish to listen to a live concert in my living room - it wont sound that good! Soundwise the studio version of the track will win you over! The word audiophile is in the title of the video, which means listening at home or through headphones. Studio wins everytime from a sound point of view!
I find that usualy you are right - rock concerts are less impressive than original studio versions but for some 10% it is not the case. I think every band recorded in it's history best live concert which beaten their own original editions. Other are special concerts which are anniversary, unique and sometime also surpass their old legendary versions. I highly value them.
Did an audiophile steal your woman at some point? Sell your mom's kidney machine? What is the negative connotation you seem to have with audiophiles? My "system" can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded. The "image" you refer to is often nothing more than an engineer placing those mono mic feeds between the speakers. I think you need a 12 step program for audiophile hatred addiction.
Are you an audiophile and do you feel offended? I don't hate audiophiles, but it's precisely because of a reaction like yours that I'm surprised at the behavior of audiophiles. I'm also very curious how your system can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded. The vast majority of stereo images are created by sending mono signals louder or softer to the left or right. In reality, we perceive spatial sound very differently. A sound from the left reaches our left ear first and a little later the right ear. That sound also sounds different in the right ear because it has to go around our head first. That time difference and difference in timbre gives our brains much clearer information about the direction the sound is coming from. Most recorded music lacks this information. With the statement "My "system" can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded." you give the impression that your "system" adds this information itself. I am very curious about what kind of "system" you have and how it works.
@@huubvandoremalen I'm a recording engineer by trade, but thanks for the detailed explanation on recording techniques. I'm not offended. I just question Paul McCartney's look alike obsession with "audiophiles" and his constant poking the audiophile bear if you will. My "system" is able to do what I described because the speakers are both time and phase coherent. Myself and a physicist spent the better part of 30 years designing them. 30 years to get all the frequencies to reach your ears at the exact same time. VERY few, if any other speakers can do that. The vast majority introduce time delays via crossover networks. Mine do not. It does NOT add any information. I never claimed it did. I said the system reproduces every individual mic feed, which is what ALL speakers SHOULD do. I can very easily hear this. So can my wife, my kids, my mail lady. I did not comment to YOU and I'm not going to get into another pissing contest with you tube commentators. The speakers are NOT available commercially. Good day.
So sorry to hear about your bike accident. Glad you are on the mend, and welcome back.
I conceive two approaches to recording live sound: 1) "They Are Here"---mic-up the band for a studio-type recording separate from the house feed, adding mics to capture the room acoustics and audience... tricky but has been done very successfully e.g. Clapton Unplugged; 2) "You Are There"---binaural recording from a good seat in the audience, maybe at the FOH sound board. One of my very favorite live recordings and performances is Procol Harum Live, seemingly a kind of compromise between the former and latter approaches, somehow. My hat's permanently off for the many talented engineers that successfully pull off these tricks---especially the recording of symphony orchestras---that have provided me a lifetime of listening pleasure.
Kraftwerk's sole founding member, Ralf Hutter, once told an interviewer that their live shows were mixed to mono to ensure a democratic experience for all audience members, or words to that effect.
I believe that they now use a very sophisticated state-of-the-art (naturally) FOH system with a large number of separate channels. -- 3D sound to go with the 3D visuals.
(For those who wonder whether they're actually doing anything on stage: Hutter plays keys. Of the other three, the one next to Hutter plays keys sometimes and otherwise does some live remixing, the guy next to him mostly does live remixing, and the last guy mixes the video playback.)
Thank you for the video, which raises a very relevant topic. Let's stick with the rock concert, because I imagine that recording a classical orchestra has different aspects and could find different solutions.
The simplest and perhaps shortest answer is that since, say, the 1960s, PA technology and recording technology have developed separately in parallel, and it has never been the same. The jazz trio is perhaps the easiest to record. A good recording of three musicians playing acoustically unamplified is perhaps the closest to a live performance... with all the drawbacks. Recording a rock band well in the studio has reached a higher standard over the decades and created higher expectations among consumers. It may sound good in a stadium or a large concert hall, but the demands of an audiophile in his armchair at home are different from what a PA has to fulfill at a live concert. In the 80s, I was a stagehand during my university years. In the four years I was there, we set up pretty much all the big names in all kinds of stadiums and concert halls in North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne, Dortmund, the Ruhr area, Düsseldorf, etc. BTW, is it not a nice memory when we played football in the concert hall after the soundcheck with the original Deep Purple line-up in the early 80s because they were bored until the evening? The Perfect Stranger tour.
Back to the topic you can't compare it one-to-one. The sound of a great live concert is not audiophile in the sense of the qualities you expect at home, no "3D" listening, no "stage" as described by audiophiles at home. I have stood at the mixing desk at many live concerts. But there are other characteristics that cannot be realized at home. The incredible energy that emanates from a good PA system, the sound fidelity, the impulse of the drums, etc. All of this can be heard very physically. BTW at my time everything was still analog. The only digital thing on the set was the brand new Sony discman that the sound engineer plugged into the mixing console in the afternoon and we listened to Donald Fagen's IGY or The Wall. The sound was great, it was the time of analog Clair Brothers, Martin and Turbosound PA systems. By the way...these studio recordings by, for example, Donald Fagen did have a stereo or even hi-fi effect via the large PA system. But the live mix in the evening had other priorities. I also think that a lot of live recordings for records were taken directly from the mixing console and remixed later for home listening just adding some ambient sound of the venue.
Today, I like to listen to BBC-style speakers. But to experience a sound that is reminiscent of a concert hall, I bought old Klipschorn speakers and restored them to their original condition. They're not audiophile speakers, but they conjure up a nice live atmosphere in the living room.
I bloody well would love to hear that! What an awesome trio!
Ouch! Sorry to hear about your bike accident. I hope you heal completely 🙏
A collapsed lung and broken ribs doesn't sound like a fun time. Good to see you're back.
Hey, Collapsed Lung are playing the Adelphi in Hull on 9th November!! Should be an amazing night out. Fantastic band. Don't know much about Broken Ribs. Are they any good?
My favorite recording that I own is the 4 channel mix of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon". And the reason I love it so much is that it is positional, which is just very, very different from most other rock recordings. And because it's a 4 channel positional mix, you actually feel like the band is surrounding you, in the room with you playing their parts, with you in the middle. It is very different from the later 5.1 mixes that the band seem to prefer, which sound more like traditional live recordings with all the instruments up front and the rear speakers used only for ambience. Anyway, I realize you're talking about stereo but that is the only positional mix I think I own (or have maybe ever heard) from a rock band recording and it is unbelievable, but I'm not sure it'd work in stereo because you'd lose that feeling of the band being in the corners of the room.
Actually, now that I think about it, the only other real positional rock mix I can think of is Rush's "Farewell to Kings", which is another surround mix (both of these are on Blu-Ray Audio). The imaging is not used throughout the entire recording but, for example, at the beginning you can hear the acoustic guitar moving around left to right and front to back, which gives the impression of Alex Lifeson actually walking around you as he plays. It is very effective and fun. Maybe a rock mix doesn't need to be entirely positional, but touches like that can really bring some life to the music.
I have attended performances by many famous rock groups. I have walked out of some concerts when the sound was painfully awful and I would certainly not wish to have a recording that accurately reproduced this live experience. A recording should sound like the artist and be a pleasure to listen to.
The control over audience sound level provided by line array systems is incredible, I remember walking from the stage to the back of Glastonbury Pyramid stage one Sunday morning, the sound level remained constant all the way to the very back (it did get “harder” as the cabinet pointing at that area was a little louder than the one below it) then suddenly the sound almost disappeared as I stepped onto the road at the back, so much control that there were complaints from stall holders behind the arena that the buzz of being at a festival was destroyed, the following year it was set up so more sound spilled out of the arena.
Sadly I have yet to hear a line array that sounds any good, the high & mid can sound ok (although often limited to death) but the sub-woofers overwhelm at a very narrow band of bass (last weekend I was at a folk festival, one player’s double base had an open string that was far louder than all the other strings and notes he played).
Added to which live mixes seem always to be based around the drums, with the vocal almost always far to quiet, so one is aware someone is singing, but no idea what, unless you know the words.
Sorry to hear about the accident, glad you are well on the mend.
I can't believe how good old jazz recordings sound- like old blue note recordings. I can hear a difference even in my car with a CD. I have a modest stereo older stereo but my speakers are moved way off the wall (in a completely non wife approved placement 🙂) It's like magic.. It doesn't matter what format.
The soundcheck process on those recordings amounted to the band being placed where needed with tape marks on the floor. Any instrument that had solos had a second mark closer to the mic. Artists fully expected this ‘experiment’ before every recording session. This is not a completely obsolete method either. Placing the sources makes much more sense than the brute force method of remixing.
Good grief with the injury. That is terrible.
I wish well for you.
Every time I hear discussion of sound stage, I imagine that a superb system would successfully capture and pinpoint in space the creaking of each floorboard of the stage beneath the performers.
I had such sensation with excellent mono reproduction of radio program. Speakers, cables were created by me and it was with excellent tube radio which was mono and due to that had no filtering for 19 kHz at all. (which was after detection later always in radios. With stereo programs I in my youth heard in room 19 kHz from speakers. ) The opera singers were walking on stage and I heard their steps on stage (in mono but sound was spacious enough to match imagination of at least 2 meter wide stage). With some floorboard cracks.
It was in past when people used mechanical hand watches and always recognized radio speaker by sound of her hand watch. Perceiving it today in stereo is less spectacular because in stereo we receive "programmed " directions which are not always coherent with secondary sensations Also after all engineers to make it perfect cut all unwelcomed additional sounds.
That is why I also like old recordings on vinyl - even sounding live sparkling tiny cracks like on surface of wall of sound (of courese not the loud ones) make feeling like actual creation of sound .
@@Mikexception
You can (actually) lell which boards have loose or missing nails. 😊
@@jaycoleman8062 For relaxing listeninng it is good to keep hammer and spare nails around
Center fills and subs go a long way to removing dead spots and creating a sound field that covers the listening area well. The older reliance on mains stacks is, i think, on the way out, at least for medium-sized venues. And IEMs are freeing up stage space that can now be used for fill speakers. No, the newer methods don't necessarily solve the stereo image problem, but i think in a live setting a coherent stereo image is not an actual expectation of the audience.
Had no idea about your bike accident. Glad you are doing better! A friend and I were cycling years back. He was barreling down a fairly steep grade. For whatever judgement wise he decided to take a left on a road that was impossible given the speed he was going. Majorly wrecked. Broke his hip bone. Got him in the car carefully and headed to the hospital. It was a nerve racking time for both of us.
A few broken ribs is nothing compared to a broken hip. I hope he's now doing well.
Glad you’re back . I doubt there have been many audiophiles at rock band concerts over the years . The few I’ve been to were more about the experience and crowd participation than correct imaging . On a couple of them I’ve experienced hearing loss for several days afterwards . Regarding other forms of live music , I understand your point . Anyway hope you’re feeling better.
Thank you, I am indeed feeling better but I'm still at a point where I wish I'd put the brakes on a bit earlier. Onwards and upwards though.
This really brings to point that this issue is an artistic decision that should be made by the artist and not left to chance or technicalities. Like it or not, the artist should be involved; do they want their recordings to be “photographs” of their live performance or do they treat them more like “paintings”.
Wow, hope you are on the mend, sorry to hear about that.
You're looking good.
Yet another tantelizing set of questions, great video ! 🙂 And I wish you a speedy recovery from your accident.
I would guess that it's a set of creative decisions, in order to fabricate a certain sound & stereo image, perhaps mostly by taking direct feeds of the closed-mic'ed instruments as the base ingredients.
I think it's like a play in a theater, the decor is put in place and is mostly static while some actors stand still most of the time and some move across the stage for the sake of drama or entertainment. It's the mixing / sound engineer that creates this virtual (audio) stage for us....I consider it to be a form of art.
There's an assumption that one could quite safely make : when listening to your home system, chances are that you are sitting perfectly centered....in the sweet spot.
So that would allow for a bass guitar to panned hard left/right, if the mixing engineer chooses to do so.
What makes a rock recording enjoyable for me, is if the instruments are put in a certain place (left to right and also back to front) with sufficient 'empty space' in between.
There can be some creative panning, EQ-ing, changing of levels etc. during the song, to provide a certain interesting effect, Pink Floyd used this all the time and I very much like it and consider it to be a sort of benchmark of what can be done creatively to keep a listener engaged in the mesmering virtual audio landscape.
The possibilities are endless and there's no single way that is right or that dictates how a rock recording should sound.
For the purpose of this video I ignored the ground between accurate imaging and what I called 'sonic mush', but of course in recording there are a lot of creative possibilities. In fact far more than are actually used. I may make a video on this point.
Words of wisdom... if it sounds good - it is good 🙂. Right - rock band's records from 60-ies, fewer from 70-ies - they simply ROCK !! Few instruments, "simple" setup , and ech instrument in its place in space. Whet I listen to let's say Atomic Rooster it is just amazing how this recording were made, so realistic, so overwhelming, ...all in my listening room. I am so grateful for this !! I do not go to live rock concerts anymore, for the very reason you have just said - sound is bad unless you end up in the centre and not too far away from the stage - and even then - not always true... I think that some of this so called front end sound engineers are half deaf this days...
There are many, many tricks to create a convincing image from discrete channels. Among just the ones I use:
1. Haas-effect panning. (Using micro-difference delays, 2 per instrument.)
2. Pan all channels to a single common ambience effect rather than directly.
3. Add a coincident pair right onstage obnoxiously visible and blend as much as needed. This will often require time aligning the close mics to the pair to use more stereo mic level.
These are not theoretical. As I said, I have used all of these.
At the beginning of the video I thought for a moment "where is this going" and I had the thought that you wanted to talk about something else. Namely the way in which the stereo image is created. It is only partly true that our brains interpret that a sound comes from the left because it sounds louder in our left ear than in our right ear. A much more important indication is that sound from the left first reaches our left ear and a little later the right ear, and because this sound also has to go around our head, it also sounds slightly different in the right ear. That information gives a much better impression of where the sound comes from than the difference in volume. And almost always the stereo image is created with the pan knobs and therefore only the difference in volume. Listen to a binaural recording with headphones and it is immediately clear that the stereo image sounds much more natural here. With modern technology it must be easy for digital mixers to have pan knobs that not only control the volume but also the time difference and a small adjustment of the timbre. It surprises me that this is not yet the standard way of mixing.
You’re a mind reader. I have a video planned on this exact topic, with audio demonstrations.
@@AudioMasterclass 😇😄
No home audio user can reasonably expect to replicate a live performance in a small rubber walled room. Just the size difference should make that obvious.
The ultimate question is ... _"Did you enjoy it?"_
If the answer is "yes" then mission accomplished, nothing to worry about.
Small rubber room? Does the door have a little window with a person on the other side holding a net?
@@TheDookistan
Probably should have .... Nothing strikes me as a more lonely place than the audiophile's dedicated listening room.
@@Douglas_Blake_579 lol, you certainly have a point there.
Wonderful video. Thank you! Very informative and entertaining.
Question: Why do we not want drums to be a point source, generally? I've noticed that most music played on my fairly revealing system (be it jazz, Americana, rock, or blue grass) tends to have somewhat floating drums that are hard to pinpoint, save for cymbals, it seems.
One exception is the "Drum Duet" on Genesis' live The Longs albums which is very spacially queued with one set of drums on the far left and the other on the far right. I think it sounds terrific. Thanks!
Can you make a video about the difference between mixing for stereo speakers and mixing for headphones? I would in particular to know more about crossfeed. Thank you.
I could possibly but usually if a mix works well on speakers it will work well on headphones. Vice-versa, not necessarily so.
Clever way to tell us about your accident. Hope to see you have a full recovery. Now, for answer , I saw Rick Wakeman back in the 70’s and was amazing synthesizers and earth shaking base. I bought the albums and was very disappointed, the recording quality was alf awful. No bass! I later ordered the CD version. Still bad. They didn’t make these recordings for good stereo. I’m still disappointing to this day.
Yes it does matter: spatial separation helps to separate and make sense of musical strands. Whether it's a studio or live recording engineers will always create more or less defined images for the instruments, irrespective of what it sounded like on the spot. And if it's there, yes, any half decent system will be able to show it.
That's one of the reasons that many audiophiles have a very limited spectrum of music they listen to, i.e., Dianna Krall, various classical, jazz, and blues.
The only limit is volume 😊
Great video! It all depends on mic placement! I am working on getting good stereo recordings of my meager set up. Thank you for sharing! PA is basically mono!
In studio recordings, most drum setups have different microphones for each drum or at least many of the drums. Any stereo that comes from that is done at the mixing console.
I just recorded a whole show small venue maybe 70-100 people using just an iPhone and the recording mostly sounded better than being there. Go figure. I think only the vocals were controlled by the mixer, the drums were not amplified. I was more towards the left of stage. Bass guitar in middle, rhythm on left and lead on the right and they must have just been going through their own amps only. What was really neat to see was that between songs these people tune their guitars into their earpieces while one of them has some musical atmospheric thing going on to bridge the gaps. The vocalists obviously also use the earpieces for vocal monitors since harmony is important. I couldn't tell that much being there but could tell in the recording that they kept vocals on key. We need good studio recordings and they should do whatever it takes to make it sound good. I have a ton of respect for those who can make a live concert sound good either in recording or being there.
Another smoking great upload! Oh by the way, vintage British mixing consoles sound like heaven! No one else ever came close in my book.
I'm not in a position to judge US vs. UK mixing consoles. I did use a US console a long time ago in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Unfortunately my memory of how it sounded has gone completely blank. I guess it was good though.
My solution is to hire the recording engineer of "Jazz at the Pawnshop" for every piece of music that is recorded in the world from now on. He/she obviously knew what they were doing.
yes very good recording for sure.
So sorry to hear about your bike fall. I hope you are recovering well. I think the only way to achieve this is a carefully combine a binaural mix with a multi-mic mix. Phase would be the gotcha I think but still possible.
There's an interesting interview on Rick Beato's channel with FoH engineer Dave Natale, who has engineered live for just about everyone - Stones, Tina Turner, Jeff Beck, etc, etc. He mixes in mono. His reasoning is that, whilst stereo may be all very well for those in the centre of the room or for a gig in a small, intimate club type of venue, those on either side (not necessarily just at the far left or right) of a venue of any size will not hear everything if you mix in stereo. I agree with him and always mix my band in mono live. Dave also believes (and I agree) that the most important thing is to use eq effectively to ensure various instruments and voices don't cancel/mask or fight with each other. The resultant sound of each instrument or voice may not be strictly "natural", but it's most important that they play nicely together. It's hard to argue with him when you hear the results he gets. As for "live" recordings "sounding just like you were there", I'm afraid they can't and don't, for several reasons. They will always be taken from multitrack recordings (one and often multiple track/s will be recorded for each performer), which are mixed and produced in a studio after the event. No live recording, with the possible exception of the simple jazz trio you refer to, will ever be made Blumlein style with a simple pair of mic's, because what worked in the room at the event will usually not work when the music is played back in the home. Eq, both individual and global, will need to be changed, often drastically (your room has very different acoustics from a concert venue). Mistakes, fluffed notes, etc, which at a live gig pass in an instant and are forgotten, will need to be corrected, because they can become REALLY annoying on repeated listening. Sometimes, an entire part will need to be replaced, if for example, the intonation is not on the money (do you really want to listen to an entire passage that is flat?). As for imaging, it's one of the least of the issues. Stereo is a trick and an illusion. A pleasant and enjoyable one to be sure, but an illusion nonetheless.
Sorry to hear about your bike accident... I guess a 4.0 Vehicle is safer than 2.0 one, feel well.
Glad To see you back.
Example for Ultimate Rock band Studio recording: Machine Head, Tommy, Led Zeppelin II, Etc...
Example for Ultimate Rock Band Live Recording: Made in Japan, Live At Leads, Etc.
Example Fur ultimate Rock band Live Performance: Pink Floyd Early 70s "Quadreo"" speaker System. other bands like DP, Led Zeppelin and The Who where excellent too.
Suggestion for today's live performance: A 5.2 Speaker system or at least 3.1 Stage Located Speaker System.
Whish you all the best.
Audio engineer and DJ here. Sound imaging in a audiophile system all comedown to the listner. Where imaging in a venue differs is that the sound mix has to be good at all angles and distances. In a live setting everything is run as a mono mix so there is no stereo imaging at all. And to be honest. Most studio recording is done as a mono recording, unless there are two or more channels of any one instrument being recorded.The stereo imaging all happens in the post production mixing in the mastering mix. Mastering is where all the magic happens with all recording. Back in the day they only had two channels to record on so left and right is all they had to throw everything into. But with today modern equipment 32 channels or more can be recorded and split up in any direction anyone would ever want. Then throw in THX or Dolby sound into the mix and you can have sounds coming out of places there are no speakers for it to come from. So trying to compare a live production to a studio mastered production is like comparing a Volkswagen to a Lambo. Both owned by the same maker, but completely different worlds.
I do so enjoy your posts; pls keep 'em comin'.
If I wanted to recreate the rock band club sound at home, I would probably forget stereo and run the recording mono to some really big speakers turn the volume to 11 and put in some foam earplugs so I don't go deaf.
I have better perception of sound when it is in mono. Because I am not busy by surprising me directions . In stereo it is like double sensation sounding and positioning. My mono listening which I enjoy in recorded from AM radio music I modified by modification to developed by me 2x2,5W tube SE ampifier to make it deeper, wider and higher so it would not sound like from exact center.
Or turn the volume down so you don’t need earplugs ffs
@@harveylimpopo3042rock music is supposed to be felt, not just heard
@@tsunamitube3351 by putting earplugs in your ears you are not hearing the music. You are purposely degrading the music you are hearing. and by listening to music that is patently too loud you risk hearing damage. Se Craig Gill and his suicide and countless musicians and gig goers with hearing damage because the music is too loud. it can be felt of course but its just stupid to paly music so loud that you need earplugs. From someone who saw Motorhead at Queens Hall Bradford.
One word - separation. Simple.
Good to see you have recovered from what seems to have been a fairly serious accident. All the best, (stay off the bike!).
I have to advise anyone considering falling off their bike, I haven't recovered fully yet but hope to get all the way within a few months. On the bright side, the doctors said I'd been lucky. And since I did it to myself, there's nothing for me to be bitter about.
@@AudioMasterclass Well if you are anything at all remotely like me, (I fell over trying to mount my stationary bike!), you may be experiencing the strange phenomena called "the older I get the sillier I get", I've found it to be quite dangerous.
Wow man! Quite a lot to unpack there.
First off, sorry to hear about your bike accident. I hope you're recovering well.
The issue of stereo placement is an almost never-ending discussion. Should we care? Absolutely, but there is no one answer.
Perhaps one of the oddest discussions I've had over the years is about drum panning. Some seem to think that it should be presented from the perspective of the audience, and others from the perspective of the drummer. Most simplistically we could think of this as ride cymbal on the right and high hat on the left - or vice-versa. Does it really matter? What if you have a left handed drummer that plays a right handed kit? It's an interesting paradox. I'm of the opinion that if the final mix has good separation and everything is clear and intelligible, there's really no cause for concern.
Live is different though. My experience there is mostly in small clubs. I rarely, if ever, pan anything. Leave it mono and just make sure that every instrument has its own spot in the frequency range, and it doesn't sound like a garbled mess because of bad room acoustics.
Live mixing and studio mixing are entirely different worlds. At the end of the day, it's about doing what is most appropriate while still achieving a pleasant result for the audience/listeners.
We engineers certainly should care and consider these things, but there isn't a set in stone rule book that I've ever seen.
Yes !!! I own multiple systems that can do it, I reference the mid 1930s Alan Blumlein demonstration including 3 Grand Piano 's in a triangle in the EMI archives and Include Yamaha DSP reverberation patterns if you want to deepen the experience.
Stereo was originally designed for life size analogous recreation.... That was the goal.....
I'm sorry to hear of your accident. I hope you're feeling better! You're opinion appears to be that imaging for rock is somewhat arbitrary. Should one approach stereo systems more like tuning an instrument to the listener's taste than attempting to perfectly reproduce a sound? If so, then how far one should go? Is going beyond playing with the bass and treble controls overkill?
This was/is a problem with digitally created music ie with instrument patches and kits from all over the place. Some have dry mixes and some have more ambient/wet sound and some had both with phase corrected sample sets. To blend them one would usually put an overal reverb over everything to try to make it sound more coherent but do it too much it'll sound too echoey and unnatural. The same issues arise with live vs studio music, though now the recording engineers are at least in control of the recording which gives more creative freedom during mixing and mastering (if there was any communication/coordination between the engineers and the artists at least).
What I like about electronic music is that it's very coherent like Equinoxe pt 5 by Jean Micheal Jare or Kiss the Cloud by Yello, which is one of the best sound designs with regards to sound stage and stereo mixing I've heard. How the vocals shift between wet and dryer sound etc, the pops and clicks that shoot towards you and escape left and right, the very soft chime far in the distance etc.
Or how Love is like a butterfly by Dolly Parton, it has some hard left/right instruments and choir spread in the half left to half right. The simple mixing and mastering is so tastefully done imo.
If you look at Yesu Wanga by Agape African Choir the choir is beautifully recorded/mixed with reverb and vocals stretching all the way from hard left to hard right to tickle behind your ears ;) and anywhere in between, but the percussion and base guitar later in the song is dead dry and centered. Quite jarring, still a nice listen though. Even if it can't be considered natural, as in, you would need to stand in the middle of the center with the choir in a semi circle around you, which is often the position of the microphone, but if you listen from the bleachers/seats it sounds totally different. I prefer the center of the semicircle as listening position, I like to be wrapped by the full sound of the choir, like a warm cosy blanket.
Solution - Grateful Dead's Wall of Sound :D Line arrey killer :D :D Or maybe not :)
In a land far away and a time long ago, I used to stereo mix live bands to sound good in the middle of the hall. This worked well until a reggae band turned up with a massive folded W bass bin and amp which was louner than my PA! At the time, my reference was Eric Clapton's Just One Night which was ideal for setting a good EQ for the venue.
Those reggae guys know something about sound that audio experts don't.
I think believable (notice I did not say accurate) imaging absolutely matters if you’re having a focused listening session. How it’s best achieved is beyond my knowledge, but there are many examples of rock albums I love never getting play in my listening room because the imaging is flat and vague.
There is great diversity in recorded and live audio mixing, I feel.
As such, I have no constructive insight. All I have is preference.
BTW....surely you are aware of, and perhaps, have even listened to, a presentation utilizing the Bacch phase correction software? If not, I strongly encourage you to investigate it. The effect is ...startling? Engaging? I'd love to see a post from you discussing ( more pointedly, REVIEWING ) this technology.
Much of the time,using live PA systems pretty much all of the sound comes through both channels. "Imaging" in that instance doesn't exist,with perhaps the odd moment of panning. Regarding recordings for domestic playback,if there is panning there and phase delays,reverb etc in the recording we should remain faithful to it whether it's an obvious effect,or done more subtly,positioning instruments within a soundstage.
Any of the newer line array personal amplification systems are ideal for smaller venues. You get real world imaging
Yori Horikawas Bubbles...
if image is your thing, you all should visit this mans music...
astonishing to be honest (quite different from the usual)
Great artist. I really like the album Vapor, a beautiful piece of sound design.
I have always felt live performance and what we listen to on a recorded album are two different things, and as such there is a reason metal and hip hp for example do not show up in audiophile reviews much.
But what does it matter when the majority of hifi, audiophile or not, is just as compromised due to living space constraints and small drivers, the only time I heard a drum kit sound realistic in a recording was an uncompressed DSD playback through PMC BB5/XBD, and low bass or impact etc requires large drivers.
Funny enough I like a lot of rock, I can appreciate some labels mix better than others, and now even with Spotify bringing out old albums you can at times hear what the engineer is doing with the mix.
It takes a big system and good engineering hand to pull of what sounds like a rock band on a stage, with a drum kit actually in its space and not sounding like the drummer has 30ft arms with a high hat to the far left, kick drum in middle and snare to the far right. Various recordings and technique, and it all comes down to the recording technique and engineering, which is why with a lot of opld rock albums collectors look for originals or audiophile pressings or copies that have no bar code and never been remastered.
That said, you can have a blast with a pair of massive 15" bass drivers and compression horns in a nice system, that will make that rock music more lifelike and enjoyable than some multi driver modern speaker can acheive, a 15" has that feel, kick, the rim shot and skin have a sense of being just that, the thrum of bass guitar isnt lost while some 6" driver loses its composure.
These days so much seems to have been lost with engineering mixes, you only need to listen to old rock albums original vs remastered to see something has been lost in the art.
Good room, good speakers and a well engineered album. You can then add placebo by watching the video of a live performance and playing that in stereo or surround and often you will find you hear what you see.
In my small venue performances I generally mix to mono. I have tried placing instruments in space as they are located on the stage thru the PA but you always had some instruments not being head at different points in the room. Also, you had the issue of dealing with the sound reflected back from the stage monitors. In ear systems solves that issue provided they are not too loud and feedback can destroy a performers hearing very quickly. To record, youvneed a separate console with direct feeds to a multitrack recorder. This allows you to remix the performance for playback at home or car or whatever. That mix is not really to make it sound like it did in the live performance music hall. If done by talented techs, the sound will be far better than the live experience. Ofcourse you should have tracks from the sound of the audience to make you feel like "you are there." I really enjoy live performance recordings even if they are not as pristine as a studio mix. The excitement of the live experience if well done, makes for a very exciting listening experience. Add video and you are there in the perfect sear to see and hear the band! Thank you amazing recording engineers! 😅
Audio wise I have been into mono records a lot lately. Love hearing those BIG recording studio rooms. Nothing is panned ( or was it in the 1950's ) I do not think but, mike placement was key and the room acoustics and players positions. Honestly true mono records do and can sound stereo naturally. Many years later the studios got smaller and the bands so now they had to try and recreate that natural room effect. Frankly it has been downhill every since. My personal stereo system sounds like orchestral groups or jazz groups are right in the room with me while performing. Very hard to get the personable feel and effect with stereo records for it sounds contrived. This has been a huge audio eye opener for me lately. Yes I still love rock music but compared to a 1950's jazz mono record it blows newer stereo contrived/mixed recordings out of the water! Room acoustics and player placement and correct miking was the secret. This type of recording is now about gone completely for the most part these days. Hate digital 1's and 0's music. That is another massive failure musically now. Arrgh.
Yep, band PAs are mono for the room. The band hears itself rehearsing and playing differently and a studio mix is closer to their perspective, which is a good thing.
This guy is my new Edward VanHalen audio wise. Ha! He rules.
I almost always mix mono for live events. The smaller the room, you can get away with *some stereo imaging but otherwise it can sound weird. Just my opinion!
I think imaging is over-rated for a listening room. If I want exact replication of how a performance is mic-ed, headphones are the best bet. But real performances interacting with a room is something entirely different. This is why we like concerts. And this is why soundstage is what's most important to me. It's also why Omnidirectional speakers and piston speakers with coherent/point-source drivers can sound so special. But... don't look for perfect imaging in speakers like these.
Having worked on dozens of live concerts I completely see your point. The problem is that the FOH mix is often recorded as well (for that 'you-never-know' live album or whatever). Now for the live audience, the FOH mix should/could be almost mono. For the recording however.... And there's your FOH problem: make one mix that suits both goals. Impossible. Although I think a proper live album should be (almost) mono.
Unfortunately most people (and producers) don't agree with me on that. Even one of the best live albums ever (Full House by J. Geils Band) suffers from panning. And so do Rory Gallagher's live albums and many others. It's a pity.
I can't really answer the question in any useful sort of way, but I can offer an observation that is almost completely unconnected. It's always fun to compare the 1958 Sir Malcolm Sargent HMV recording of The Planets (some planets have rocks, so we're almost talking rock music) with the 1987 Charles Dutoit Decca recording. Well, I say 'fun'. (I may have I said this before - it's a favourite audio-related story of mine.) The point is stereo imaging. The imaging is very precise on the Dutoit recording, but I don't think that is what I would hear in a concert hall, as I would not be sitting in front of each instrument (or section) simultaneously. I therefore prefer the Sargent recording, although a bit more clarity would be nice (the HMV 1974 Previn recording perhaps?) Incidentally, I was unusually happy with the sound and sound imaging at a gig I went to back in February. But that was Cerys Hafana singing and playing the tripple harp in a Brighton pub - so, small venue, and Cerys was even less a rock band than an orchestra playing Holst.
Very sorry to hear about the lung and the ribs. I broke just one rib once, and that was bad enough. It takes a while, so all good wishes.
My most recent planetary experience was at the Royal Albert Hall last year close to the front of the arena. I don’t think even the Hubble telescope could have provided better imaging.
@@AudioMasterclass Am envious.
Thanks!
Much appreciated!
Just buy the DTS 5.1 or Atmos 7.1 versions of the albums which there are many of. You get put right in the middle of the stage and don't have to rely on that placebo effect you think you are getting from just 2 speakers in front of you called "Soundstage".
There isn't one solution, there are many, maybe an infinity ... so technically there are no solutions. I think that you should mix so that it sounds good and vaguely realistic, the home listener wasn't at the concert and couldn't see the musicians moving around anyway... And rock is some kind of organised chaos by definition almost.
A lot of audiophiles rate mono recordings. see the Beatles and Dr Feelgood mono recordings.
I never understand how the engineers mix the drums. They seem to be on the left, the right and centre all at the same time as if we are about 1 foot away from them.
I’m a music lover with a rather entry-level system, and I have no clue about professional sound recording and public addressing.
But isn’t a live performance and the production of a recording for home use, two different pair of shoes, serving different requirements and expectations?
If you have like a dozen of mikes and signal sources, they end up at the mixing desk of the sound engineer, who takes care of the live reproduction, the „public addressing“.
Why can’t in parallel each of these channels be recorded separately, for a later mixing and mastering in a studio, to produce a record for home use?
If this is a stupid question, please be so kind to ignore it.
This has answered that question. Now I know. It’s Debbie and Betty. I think if AI takes over they will have their own RUclips channel. You might even get a guest spot with the legend Audio Phil. For that ultimate rock band feel. Any sound in the bass spectrum is hard to locate its source. So we have sub bass speakers. The placing of instruments goes back hundreds of years in front of live audiences. The question is why copy what worked in classical. Just steal them use and experiment. Some laws have to understood to be broken correctly.
Debbie Betty abd Phil are the unimaginable?
It all depends on how it is recorded in the studio. Imaging I would suggest is not that important in rock genre as it is in others
Conflating audio hi Fi and live, two different things entirely. I love the imaging my hi Fi offers me, I don’t go to a live concert to create what I hear at home.
You say conflating, I say building bridges between the two communities.
We as listeners should rethink what we are intending to hear. We cannot have it all. We cannot have group of original instruments placed in stereo order in our own listening room simply because we listen to whole recorded venue, not pure single instruments. Even if it was engineered later it is existing and cannot be removed.
That is why I reject idea of big listening room which has acoustics actualy mixing with concert/recording acoustic. Our hearing pinpoints and rejects with ease perception of room short resopnse unveiling only unusual for it sensations..In bogger space hearing may be confused what is recording vice what was created by our own big room.
Sorry about your accident, some say nothing good comes from exercise!
Seems to me I’ve never heard my home system sound like a club/live system , exactly. it also seems to me that it is /was your job to make these decisions?
I am a sort of Audiophile, in that I want a violin, for example to sound like a violin and also want things like chamber orchestras to produce a good stereo image when recorded. But as I mentioned in a previous comment, with rock music, you essentially get what the producer thinks sounds good. Some producers, like Mutt Lange, do this very well, but in general, what was recorded in the studio is often physically impossible to perform live. If you have a recording with 6 different guitar parts, how does a band with two guitarists do anything but try to amalgamate the most important parts when playing live? In general, though,if there are a couple of guitar parts in a recording, they are generally split left and right which is convenient for transcribing, but it's not real stereo imaging.
Aas for the recording in general, if a rock recording sounds good, it is good. One additional note is that when recording, generally, the band is not even playing live with different members of the band being recorded separately, maybe even in different studios. Any illusion of a stereo image is just that - an illusion, and hopefully the producer gave some thought into what illusion sounded good instead of trying to create the illusion of a real stereo image. Rock bands invariably sound better recorded than live, anyway just due to what magic the studio can do.
Mutt Lange is not what I would call a genius for capturing live sound first he is the one who screwed up def leapard and went you can record anywhere.
Real genius producers to me were guys like Roy Thomas baker, Martin birch. Tom allom
And no I don't count Keith Olsen as one of them either.
As he is another one who seemed to like and go mess with bands Martin birch touched first like Fleetwood Mac, whitesnake. Ohh and the 1987 whitesnake album was Bob rock and Mike stone. Who got that sound.
Which means I like Bob Rock too. Too me a good producer always seeks first to capture in the studio the bands natural live sound first they produce on stage then starts to tweak it.
@@gabrielstern4992 I never claimed he was a genius at capturing live sound - quite the opposite. He makes excellent rock recordings. There is no real rock stereo recordings with real imaging like there would be for a chamber orchestra. As I noted, rock sounds worse live than the recordings and even then there is no real stereo imaging. What you hear is what is mixed by the sound person.
A studio recording is a chance to hear superior imaging and what the hell’s wrong with that?
Almost 100% will never notice and of the few who do they’ll only be one or none who prefer the usual mush.
I think at one point Jerry Garcia had a separate PA for each of his strings, so ...
Panning light with max spread just under 50%.
No fun allowed! 🤣😎👍
I think you look at it from the perspective of a mixing engineer. Then you always make a choice how to place the different instruments in the stereo image, whether it is a studio recording or the sound of a live performance with a PA system. I think that most concert listeners are not concerned with that. Unless something is clearly wrong. A guitarist who is on the left of the stage and mainly sounds through the speakers on the right side is very strange and will probably be noticed. But it is much more important that the total sound is well balanced and sounds good and above all that the band plays well.
The largest group of listeners who listen to music at home or on the road are also not particularly concerned with the stereo image, in my opinion. The enthusiasts, not only the audiophiles but also the real music lovers certainly hear it.
The solution is not complicated in my experience. When mixing a studio recording you create a new reality, so to speak. In addition, for rock music, in theory everything is good. I make sure that with all types of music, including rock music, I can clearly identify all the musicians while listening with my eyes closed, that they are evenly distributed across the stereo image and that the most important voices/instruments are in the middle.
During a live performance, I find it logical that a musician who is on the right of the stage also sounds right and left vice versa. If that is not exaggerated (completely left or completely right in the sound), it is also acceptable for the listeners who are at the front near the sides of the stage. For someone who is on the left of the stage, the musician on the left side is closer and the musician on the right side is further away. Then it is also logical if the musician on the left sounds a bit louder than the musician on the right. As long as they are both still clearly audible.
I do the sound for a starting band. I always ask them to think carefully about where they are going to stand on stage. The band consists of a singer, guitarist, keyboardist, bassist and drummer. They had a tendency to have the guitarist and the keyboardist stand on the same side of the stage. That didn't give a nice sound. I kept asking them to stand on the left and the right because that gave a nicer stereo image. I never had any complaints from listeners standing on the sides that they couldn't hear something.
I am sorry to hear you fell down and went boom/snap/collapse. Was it a motorized or pedal bike?
I had a motorbike once, a Triumph Tiger Cub. I'm definitely glad I gave that up. I was simply riding my mountain bike too fast beyond my ability. On the bright side, I am still living and I have definitely learned.
My system is mono.. and it works good enough
You missed off your specs in the equipment list. Please amend. Thank you.
Tiger specs in the UK.
Here's mine: Now that there are 11 channel processors and they can all be discrete, need I say more? Well yes but that would be giving away the secret sauce... I have already sent this off to Patent Office...
Modern bands don't even have amps on stage anymore. Or anywhere. It's all DI, modelers and triggers. Almost no live stage sound. Not even wedges, because they've all got in-ear monitors. It's all down to the front-of-house mixing choices.
To be honest ... Most concerts today are nothing but dancing to pre-recorded tracks.
Deep Purple had the solution. Make everything louder than everything else.
They must have copied The Who!
@@ian-nz-2000 who?
There's an easy solution:
Sell us the original multitrack and let us make our own mix on our DAW. This is the only way to make everyone happy.
Why not just record live rock in mono?
Phil spector did that!
@@GeirRssaak Indeed - his mixes were optimized for AM radio and jukeboxes.
Has there even been a rock band recorded with a coincident pair? Hope you haven't given up m bicycling, Cheers!
I would suspect loads, mostly bootlegs. I mean, what self-respecting FOH engineer wouldn't put up a crossed pair for, you know, backup purposes? As for the bicycle, not yet. I was told very seriously that the worst thing I could do right now is to have another accident.
@@AudioMasterclass Could it be done well in a small venue, like The Cavern, where the Beatles played? If a rock band asked you to record them there with a pair of microphones, crossed or not, how would you do it?
I hope your injuries are healing well.
And thank you for replying, few you-tubers bother to do that.
Old enough here to get the trigger warning bit
Now it's push back time on one comment about you can't record a band playing live and have seperate booths not true pro tools changed that and if that person wants proof iron maiden with Kevin Shirley does that in the studio.
Now the late great, Martin birch would have loved to do things like that but pro tools did not exist during his producer days. But at least he bothered to capture the bands natural sound first and got to know the bands he worked with before going into strict headmaster mode.
Technology today can be great but only if not misused.
glad to have you back, sir.
two things occur, & I've done a lot of live sound & recording with rock bands & other music too-
the grateful dead, & the wall-of-sound system they toured with, is one famous & successful answer, but beyond the reach of smaller bands.
the other approach which *could* have its principal concepts scaled down to suit a budget, is espoused in this video by dave rat, who knows whereof he speaks.
ruclips.net/video/H5S34Hf95gI/видео.html
The wall of sound was possibly an amazing idea but I never had the chance to hear it. That was in an era when PA had a choice of directions to go. Did it choose the right way though?
ouch, indeed
i wish you the best of health
Time travel, go see the gig and avoid falling of push bikes.
Rock should be recorded in mono and played back at volumes that leave your ears ringing for a day. At least, that’s my aural experience of the real thing. Stereo has no place in such music.
Huh?
Indeed.
The wish of a band to sound like live is senseless because the most rock musicians dont know how they sound to the audience. Therefore, all recordings have to create some artificial transformation. At least imaging is overrated for rock music.
Please ride careful.
its bloody obvious that its waste of time listening to live recorded rock music. Its totally rubbish compared to a studio rock album. Who the hell wants to listen to the stones playing live in Rio whilst sat on your sofa! Its just moronic man. A well recorded and produced studio album is different matter mind. The sound of the crowd would drive me mental! I love the magic that can be made in a studio recording! The only way to listen to rock music! The Eagles released a live album in 1980, It does not sound bad at all - but its full of overdubs mind!
It's not rubbish to listen to live rock music. A live show is about entertainment and that is not due to just the music alone. That's why rock musicians (try, but not always successfully) to engage the audience with whatever stage presence they can manage. At a classical performance, everyone sits down and listens. In a rock performance half the audience is generally standing and doing whatever.
@@Harrison-kt5xr Live rock music is great! Go to a stadium, it can be pretty amazing! I would not wish to listen to a live concert in my living room - it wont sound that good! Soundwise the studio version of the track will win you over! The word audiophile is in the title of the video, which means listening at home or through headphones. Studio wins everytime from a sound point of view!
I find that usualy you are right - rock concerts are less impressive than original studio versions but for some 10% it is not the case. I think every band recorded in it's history best live concert which beaten their own original editions. Other are special concerts which are anniversary, unique and sometime also surpass their old legendary versions. I highly value them.
Did an audiophile steal your woman at some point? Sell your mom's kidney machine? What is the negative connotation you seem to have with audiophiles?
My "system" can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded. The "image" you refer to is often nothing more than an engineer placing those mono mic feeds between the speakers. I think you need a 12 step program for audiophile hatred addiction.
Are you an audiophile and do you feel offended? I don't hate audiophiles, but it's precisely because of a reaction like yours that I'm surprised at the behavior of audiophiles.
I'm also very curious how your system can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded. The vast majority of stereo images are created by sending mono signals louder or softer to the left or right. In reality, we perceive spatial sound very differently. A sound from the left reaches our left ear first and a little later the right ear. That sound also sounds different in the right ear because it has to go around our head first. That time difference and difference in timbre gives our brains much clearer information about the direction the sound is coming from. Most recorded music lacks this information. With the statement "My "system" can image anything recorded as it will accurately reproduce in time and space each and every single mono mic feed recorded." you give the impression that your "system" adds this information itself. I am very curious about what kind of "system" you have and how it works.
@@huubvandoremalen I'm a recording engineer by trade, but thanks for the detailed explanation on recording techniques. I'm not offended. I just question Paul McCartney's look alike obsession with "audiophiles" and his constant poking the audiophile bear if you will. My "system" is able to do what I described because the speakers are both time and phase coherent. Myself and a physicist spent the better part of 30 years designing them. 30 years to get all the frequencies to reach your ears at the exact same time. VERY few, if any other speakers can do that. The vast majority introduce time delays via crossover networks. Mine do not. It does NOT add any information. I never claimed it did. I said the system reproduces every individual mic feed, which is what ALL speakers SHOULD do. I can very easily hear this. So can my wife, my kids, my mail lady.
I did not comment to YOU and I'm not going to get into another pissing contest with you tube commentators. The speakers are NOT available commercially. Good day.
Complain,complain, complaim, blah , blah, blah. You're so high on your high horse .
Comment readers may like to know that in fact I have never ridden a horse, let alone a high one. A donkey maybe, but I was five and I don't remember.