How to make a mixer happy
... and therefore sound goodDear Bands,
After operating sound for around a zillion acts over the last 20 years or so, I’ve noticed some commonly recurring mistakes made by musos that contribute to making it harder for me to give them a good sound.
This rant is intended mainly for those who are relatively new to playing live or recording music, I'm hoping to help save someone a lot of time by skipping a few basic steps along the learning curve. A large majority of what you are about to read will probably seem incredibly obvious, but these are actually all very common things that bands (even those with regular gigs) don’t consider during their early careers.
"The best PA is: Air" - anon
The bulk of a live mixer’s job isn't necessarily to make an act sound better (as many people assume), it is primarily to make a band louder (or at least easier to be heard).
In the process of making the band louder, a myriad of acoustic problems are introduced that need to be rectified. So, in reality, the bulk of a mixer’s skill is geared towards amplifying a band so that the sound is as close as possible to when the band is un-amplified. Only then is the power of all that mixing-gear employed to improve the sound.
Due to this fact, it is ideal that an act comes “pre-mixed”. It is in the band’s interests to ensure that the sound is good “at the source”. If you can sound good without a sound system and are not relying on a controlled environment then you can potentially sound good on any P.A. at any venue. You will also save money on expensive sound people, recording costs and probably write better songs too.
Note: Obviously in a recording situation, the recording engineer is turning songs into 1’s and 0’s rather than amplifying them, but the majority of this advice still applies.
Order of importance
Below are the important components of a P.A. or recording set-up. I have listed them in order of most to least important for making songs sound good. This should determine the priority given to each component in terms of time and/or money spent.- Good songs (obviously this is subjective)
- Intonation
- Arrangement
- Tightness/Rehearsed
- Good instruments
- Room/Environment
- Operator/Mix
- Speakers/Microphones
- Gear (desk, compressors, amps etc)
Writing and playing
Mic technique
If you sing though a P.A. then your microphone is as much your instrument as your voice is. You need to practice using a microphone almost as often as you would practice learning your scales. Know when to pull back and where to place it so that your voice gets the best tone with the maximum volume. Mic technique should be intuitive to anyone who sings through one.While standing in front of a band with a drummer and two guitars on a small stage, your voice may have to compete with all that noisy wattage entering your mic from behind you. A mix can be ruined by a weak or off-mic vocalist because often turning up their channel also involves turning up all the guitars and cymbals bleeding into it. Singing strongly and directly into a mic is realistically the best way to solve this. Another solution to this would be to turn down the guitars of course, but i learned early on in my career that doing so will get you sacked by most bands.
Enunciation
Trust me on this one: Singers should over enunciate their words. It might feel weird to you in your head, but to the outside it makes a lot of difference, and a well enunciated vocal can cut through a mix at almost any volume. In particular with long notes, don’t drop the last consonant.Intonation
Intonation is the difference between amateur and professional in my opinion.If you really pay proper attention to the roughest sounding punk band who has made any impact on the world of music you will find that their guitars, drums and vocals are perfectly in tune despite the illusion of chaos and noise. Don’t let their seemingly lack of care-factor fool you... songs with bad intonation don’t sound good.
Intonation is what people notice first even if they have no idea what the concept actually is, non-musicians particularly. Producing sounds from several instruments perfectly harmonically in tune with each other (and themselves) is fundamental to making music that people like and also makes a P.A. sound good.
Every note on your instrument should be in tune, for example a guitar should sound perfect when you play a chord anywhere on the neck. Learn how to fix the intonation of your instrument yourself... It’s actually a lot easier than you think it is and it will empower you as a musician. Tweak your setup quickly before every gig or rehearsal.
The above spiel also goes for singing in tune too.
Arrangement
From a soundy's point of view, it’s a big line to cross to offer song writing advice, but arrangement is one crossover where a song writing device can affect the sound of a mix... so I'll go there.Make sure there is space in your songs, or if your genre doesn't allow for subtlety then at least make sure there is space between instruments in the frequency domain. Allow instruments to be heard alone regularly. If an instrument is heard in isolation, then it is more likely to be distinct during the rest of the song and will cause the mix to sound clearer psychologically, even if it isn't a particularly clear mix. Instruments should shut up regularly or do “call and response” with other instruments so as to avoid too many people playing at the same time. At bare minimum each instrument should occupy their own range of frequencies in a song so as not to interfere with other instruments.
Arrangements can make a big difference to how a song sounds in various sized/shaped venues. A noisy, fast or intricate song can work well in a small intimate room, but in a large space can sound like a big washy mess. The simpler the arrangement, the more portable the songs will be between venues.
Criticism from strangers
Unless you are totally ok with your band being a project just for your own pleasure, I’ll assume that part of the plan is to get people to like your music, or maybe even pay to consume it. The best way to achieve the latter is to ask for criticism about all of the above and more.Whatever you do though DO NOT ask your friends for criticism. Your friends will almost always repeat the mantra: “That was really good”. Every night of the week, after many sets at any local venue, the backstage area will be abuzz with well intentioned
One good person to pick the brains of would be your soundy, he/she has seen a lot of bands. They have seen many many mistakes and many other things done right.. also they were probably paying the most attention to whether you actually sounded good or not. Plus, they will be flattered because (bizarrely) hardly any bands actually ask their mixer for tips.
Be ready to throw out dumb ideas or songs, or re-arrange bits of songs. This is especially true in recording. Despite the hours of work and ego invested in a song, if something doesn’t work it’s better to throw it out than to bring down your album or live set .
The soundcheck (if any)
Paperwork
The only thing that makes a soundy more happy than a good sounding gig is a well organised gig. Contrary to what many many people believe, it is a rare luxury to have a proper sound check or even get one at all. Even in large venues and especially at festivals. A bands needs to contribute to making the sound check and changeover experience quick and easy.Have a stage plot and a line list ready and email it to your soundy days before the show. Most of the time you only need to create the document once and then use the same one for every gig.
There is nothing worse than mixing an already complicated show and then a 15 piece band turns up with strange requirements and no warning. Having this list means that your soundy can plan the night in advance, organise smooth changeovers between acts and bring in extra equipment if necessary. Note that a stage plot is not about helping the mixer, it’s about helping you to sound better and having the gear you need! It also reduces the amount of communication needed on the actual day. Time is critical setting up a show and every minute spent on paperwork outside of the chaos of a sound check is time that can be spent on getting the sound to be good.
Include things like
- a basic box diagram of members’ positions on the stage, also the positions of their instruments and amplifiers (if needed)
- preferred positions for monitors
- a list of mixing desk channels required and notes on the specifics of each line (eg special stand needed, DI required etc)... include the gear you are able to provide and what needs to be supplied
- any other notes on equipment needs or mixing information, eg: when an instrument is not used and can be muted, reverb requirements etc
It is incredible how many high-sound-maintenance bands do not provide diagrams, and subsequently leave a trail of annoyed mixers behind them wherever they play. I’d use “Google Docs” or something similar for creating and maintaining the documents, you can make diagrams and it allows multiple band members to be involved in editing simultaneously, plus all the information is kept safely on the Internet.
Gear
This tip applies to any band that is more complicated than a standard 3 piece one tom rock band: Make sure you have spare gear to meet your basic sound requirements.If you have an electronic act that needs a lot of stereo DI’s then you need to have a lot of DIs with you when you turn up to show. It is rare for any venue to have more than 3 or 4 DIs unless they specifically know they have to supply them. If you play a nylon string acoustic, make sure it has a good pick-up or carry around your preferred condenser mic in your guitar case. I shouldn't need to mention power cables and adaptors.
Spillage
Unless you really really have to, don’t bring a bunch of things that need mics but don’t get used often. I won’t go into the physics of phase or rant about spillage, but to put it simply:Every open mic on stage makes the sound a bit crapper, so choose your extraneous toys wisely.
Do you really need a typewriter with a condenser mic on the stage to do an artistic typewriter solo in one song? (true story)
If a mixer cares, or knows the band well, they will mute any open mics that aren’t being used... but even this solution will cause their attention to be taken away from other the sound related duties. So just because there’s a bouzouki lying around the rehearsal room and it sounds great in the middle eight section of that one song... have a think: is it worth lugging around, wasting a channel and compromising your sound?
Stage setup
Unless you have ears in your feet, my rarely followed advice for those with amplifiers is to point them at your actual ears. Besides helping you hear yourself (of course) it can help avoid having to put anything besides vocals though the foldback monitors giving the singer(s) a greater chance of hearing themselves. The only catch with this theory is that you have to make sure an amplifier isn't pointing directly into a vocal mic (see “Spillage” above). Don’t forget to point the foldback speakers at your ears too.Sound off stage
Something that isn’t considered by many bands is the ratio of how much of the sound you hear at a gig is from the P.A. speakers or from the stage. Even in large venues, you would be surprised how much of what you hear is coming directly from the amplifiers and drums on the stage and even from the foldback speakers. If there is only one reason why a band should be aiming to sound good without the aid of the P.A. system, then this would be my pick. There’s not much a mixer can do if half the sound of the gig is completely out of their control.The show
The below opinions aren't necessarily sound related, but more a list of the minimum things that I think needs to happen for a good show to happen. Since i still have your attention, here’s some further thoughts from behind the mixing desk on some quite obvious and fundamental things that I regularly witness being forgotten.Have lighting
At the very least have some specific lighting for your show. I don’t know why, but somehow having a visual aspect makes a show sound better to me. The lights don’t have to flash on and off like crazy all the time, just make sure the stage looks somehow better than the real world. Maybe even pay a friend a small amount of their favourite currency to operate them so that you ensure their attention and they stay sober... it’s definitely worth putting in some effort to have good lighting.Have an opener
Nothing to do with sound at all, but a show HAS to have an opener. It is a show. You are on a stage! The audience needs to know when the exact start of a show is and when to stop whatever else they are doing and pay attention. The opener doesn’t have to be anything kooky or theatrical; even something as simple as having the band walking on stage all at the same time can be really effective.Rehearse a lot
Finally, but clearly the most important thing a band can do but also one of the most overlooked.People like to go on and on about how good old records sound. One of the reasons that they sounded so good was that there was no protools or autotune and bands had to rehearse... and rehearse. It was much cheaper back then to practice than it was to record and it really shows.
A tight band doesn't need any fixing. Despite all the new fangled tech that a mixer can use, the best way to sound good is to play together as much as possible and at every opportunity and then get it right from the start. Even if an act is full of competent musicians, they still need to get good at playing together. New fangled tech is great but the better the source material is, the better the result. Rehearse in different spaces to hear how the songs sound in them.. rehearse in front of different people to elicit instant feedback on ideas.
Conclusion
I guess you are suppose to write a conclusion to a blog post this long. In that case, I'd like to use this bit to reiterate that ALL of the things above are the bare minimum steps that a band should follow in order to sound good (and be good). Obviously there are a million other things you can do on top of these as well.I hope I've been able to get the point across that just being a "good band" isn't enough and that, if sounding good is a priority for you, there's a bunch of not-so-obvious stuff you might need to consider.
This is my first blog ever, and I hope it's made sense to someone. Comments, thoughts additions and/or constructive criticism are more than welcome! ta k
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