PreSonus mixer practice/recording question

TheBigDipper

I've put together a new original music writing/performing band. We're a four-piece (gtr/vox, bass, keys, drums/vox). The keyboard player already had a practice facility that we're now using. It's a new experience for me. We're all going direct into a PreSonus StudioLive 16.0.2 mixer and hearing ourselves in the room via a PA. The drums are electronic and the rest of us are going direct. The only live thing in the room is two voices. The sound we're getting is really surprisingly (to me) good and I think I'm a bit of a convert for this as a way to develop material, learn parts and build a band out of four individuals who didn't know each other two months ago. Long background to my question...

The mixer is also sending the stereo feed we're hearing over the PA to a stereo audio interface and a Mac running Logic. It's proving useful. That recording is just the mix we're hearing in the room. Vocals are a bit quiet (because in the room we're hearing the live voices, too) but it's a lot better than using a handheld recorder in the room. But I was wondering...

What would we need to do to also get a multitrack recording at the same time? Just turn it on and forget, without affecting what's already in use? The bass player has a Zoom LiveTrak L-12, which could be used as a second recorder. Could we hook that into the PreSonus in some way to get a live feed of our individual tracks?

None of this is my gear, and, despite having some expensive kit in the room, it's not something the owner knows much about or has used for anything more than stereo mixing/recording.

Anyone?

TheBigDipper

Oh, just to clarify - the idea of recording a multitrack in parallel is not to turn it into anything we might put out in public. It's to isolate parts, and play around with things in development when we're "at home" to bring along to the next session or share in between times. Studio quality sound is not a requirement - just isolation of raw parts. 

Musicwolf

A quick glance at the manual tells me that the PreSonus can act as a 16x18 multi interface, in other words you can send up to 16 tracks of audio simultaneously.  This is the same as the Behringer XR-18 which I use.

All you need is a laptop running a DAW (I use either Reaper or Cantabile on my laptop).  You don't need to touch the mix that you are hearing in the rehearsal room but you'll be capturing each channel seperately which you can then mix at home.  I also did this at gigs and, for me, this included a couple of overhead mics on the drums that weren't used in the front of house mix.

You could also use the LiveTrak as your mixer (i.e. not use the PreSonus) and do the same thing all in one.  I used to have an L-12 and did exactly this, but I sold it after I got the XR-18 as it was a much better mixer.

Danny1969

You need to install the driver for a Windows laptop to see it as an audio interface but the Macbook should see it as a multitrack core audio interface straight away.

Capture is the software designed for the Presonus desk to record in multitrack but I used Reaper for years with no issues. 

You can actually plug straight in the desk, place an amp plugin in Reaper on your guitar channel, set the channel on the desk your guitar is plugged into to USB rather than mic / line and monitor yourself through the plugin. 

If you install the remote app on a laptop and connect the desk and the laptop to a router you can use an iPad / phone to set your monitor mix which might be useful

TheBigDipper

Thanks, both. 

spark240

Agree Capture is the solution here…I think it will record multitrack and a stereo mix at the same time if I recall ?

Stratavarious

I use a laptop and reaper for this with my bands with my soundcraft MTK mixer and our other Soundcraft digital rack mixer records direct multitrack to an attached USB stick.  Both gigs and rehearsals.

Check out the support docs but it is clear it should be able to do same with an attached computer. Presonus have some Capture software to help.

TheBigDipper

Some feedback. At last weeks band practice, we went into the mixer and heard ourselves in the room, as before. The recorded takeway was a Logic project containing the raw tracks plus an extra track with the stereo mix being sent to the PA. Very illuminating and very helpful. 

Stratavarious

Properly mixed live promo videos next.. 

TheBigDipper

Stratavarious said:

Properly mixed live promo videos next.. 

Once we work out our parts and learn to play them properly! :-)