We are a 4 piece band. Pubs, outdoor, weddings etc. We now have a decent PA but struggle a bit with sound checking.
- For pubs/weddings, is it normal just to use the PA for vocals and bass drum mic only? Or do people usually put guitar/bass through too? The best we ever sounded was outdoors where we all went through the PA.
- How do bands (without a soundman) soundcheck at a gig? We normally play a quick song 15 before our set and the guitarist (who has wireless) walks into the crowd and has a listen but 15 mins never seems to be long enough by the time we have tweaked. We have been in some pubs with no carpet and the drums rung like crazy and the sound is 'muddy'.
- We have two monitors which are not great quality and when we setup I switch to monitors only and all sounds good, but when we then soundcheck with the PA we can never get the vocals loud enough in the monitors without feedback. They are 'just' behind the PA (I am wondering if they need to be another 1ft back perhaps, but difficult in tight venues).
Thanks for any advice.
Comments
With regards to sound checking golden rule is give your self time to get it right and once your happy don't touch volumes or tweak. What you think needs adjusting from where you are standing is very often wrong from out front.
The audience has come to hear the band not the monitor mix
With regards to feedback in the monitors learn to identify what frequencies are feeding and cut them out with a graphic to achieve a louder monitor mix. Do bare in mind the monitor mix will not reflect the sound to the audience (see above) and learn to work with what you hear as opposed to what you expect to hear.
Best tip is turn everything down, you don't need to be as loud as you think you do
You need to get know the limits and work to just below that as a maximum end of the night setting.... And having a limiter light flicking on an active speaker isn't what I mean, people need to use their ears more and realise when gears starting to 'stress' and Turn It Down. 2-3dB can be the difference between clean and harsh.
My issue with alot mixes is they drive stuff too hard and put too much through the subs. The first thing is to (obviously) get as clear vocal mix as possible and then work on finding space for the kick and drum in the mix..
The trick I wish more bands would use is to turn it down a bit half way through the night and then start to ramp it up again (if required). The audience don't actually notice and you leave yourself somewhere to go. We get involved in noise monitoring of large events and I once saw Metallica's FOH engineer do this brilliantly at an outdoor gig.
Being old I've done gigs as a musician and a sound man and there's imho no one way to do it but plenty of fail to be had in all cases. So to answer the question...
The OP scenario does work but someone has to be in charge. The meeting point is how loud you can get the vocals and how soft you can get the drummer to play, with no feedback at one end and some energy at the other.
It's easier with a sound person (mostly) but a you have to get a good one and b pay them or include them in the band.
I'm actually surprised more people don't use a soundguy. If everyone took a tenner less there's generally enough to pay someone to mix it out front where they need to be. Mixing from the stage is kind of possible but it's never gonna be great unless the band plays in exactly the same way every song. AC DC could be mixed from the stage, not so much Radiohead if you see what I mean
It helps is someone has experience of the above, and is aware of things like singing in a higher register cuts through a mix and needs much less volume that a lower vocal ............ imagine your in a covers band and doing Common People one minute and Living on a Prayer the next .... your have to adjust your vocal level accordingly as well as boosting solo's
A small amount of compression on vocals helps them to be more consistent and require less riding, don't go mad on the threshold, only aim for about 5dB gain reduction on the strongest vocal peaks ... that will make them sound more even and professional ... and less Karaoke
Try and kill any vocal reverb \ delay with a footswitch if poss between songs ... it sounds really amateurish if you talk to the crowd with the effects left on
To sound check we firstly do a check on each input channel, then run through a couple of stray verses from different songs so that all instruments are checked within the mix. During this the singer and I use wireless gear, and stand out front.
We don't get feedback because:
1. Our onstage volume is low. My 50w 2x12 hasn't seen daylight for years.
2. We use IEMs rather than vocal monitors
3. We have a Behringer 32 channel graphic which can be used for rooms which have a resonant frequency or overly reflective surfaces.
I do wish we could use a soundman, but we don't know anyone who would do it for a share of the money that pubs pay.
Either that or a big pair of mittens gaffa taped to the hands of "Mr Tweaky".
Ah, originals.
Bandcamp
Spotify, Apple et al
I think we've pretty much given up with monitors except for one for the drummer. Our two wedge monitors out front are pretty much just to mark our territory now.
We got into volume battles and used the monitors to try to fix that so we could still hear the vocals and then everything is on the edge of feedback. Mare. If I can hear the vocals ( not necessarily crystal clear but hear them) through FOH that's probably about right. I don't like to hear my guitar or vocal too dominant in the mix, ideally at about the same level the audience can hear it. Hearing yourself really well is quite distracting and you can end up focusing on minutiae that no one else can hear.
Finding a sound guy who knows what they are doing and shares the same vision of how the band should sound doesn't seem easy, although I probably haven't tried hard enough.
Oh, vocals, bass drum and keys through our PA. Although I'd cheerfully not bother with the bass drum, I'm not quite sure why it is done at pub level but our singist ( who does the PA and does PA for other people sometimes) finds it very important.
Soundcheck is invariably minimal on pub gigs as you are basically making unpleasant noise to a room full of people trying to enjoy a quiet drink. So, it's very, very short - half a song covering the major sounds.
Funnily enough I was having a chat with our singer and songwriter and we are going to stick some originals in the set alongside all the covers we do . Not going to bombard the public with totally all originals but I don't think a few will hurt.
In regard to sound guys it's not that hard to train someone up to a reasonable standard if you can find someone that wants to do it to begin with. Luckily I lot of my friends like the idea of being paid to be in the pub so I haven't found it difficult so far to get volunteers