In The Studio

Tuesday night was the first booked session time I had for recording. I had Rob on acoustic guitar, and brother Mike on drums. The goal was not a perfect mix, but just to record the raw signal. Everything for the guitar was going great; used two AKG 414 B's for the body and neck. I was thinking about adding a room mic, but I liked the sound as it was already after a listen. Only thing I did was put the 40 Hz low pass filter on the body mic, and changed the pattern to supercardioid on the neck. Sounded a lot like Jack Johnson's tone. Very dry, but bright and thick. The levels were not as high initially, and the preaps on the MCI were around 80%, and the recording levels were around 0dB. All it needed was a little more preamp, and the signal was strong. Recorded two minutes of that, and then moved to drums. Were going to use the 414's as overheads, but the shockmount broke as I was adjusting it. i felt bad, but honestly, its a plastic shockmount, just not sturdy enough for the heavy, and expensive 414. Oh well, good thing Pat came and brought his Groove Tubes 55, and used that along with the studio's 55 for the overheads. I really wanted to try two mics on the snare: 58 on top, 57 on bottom, I've heard that is a very popular technique. I also wanted to put a small diaphragm condenser on the hi-hats for that close intimate sound. I had my Audio Technica 2021, but I decided against it because it was the first session and I didn't was the mix to sound bad...unmixed. Used just the 58 for the snare, didn't want to complicate it with the underside miked as well. Two of my 57's for the toms, and the other 58 for the floor tom. Of Course the D112 for the kick, placed at the opening of the soundhole, facing the closest side of the drum. The 7 track mix was excellent unmixed and unpanned. The overheads were very sensitive, and could have been brought down in the mix, but they picked up a great overall sound. Unmixed, I can't believe how good it sounded. So I was very satisfied with the first session.