Distortion’s been around so long that even its originations are unclear. Ask a variety of engineers and you’re bound to get a bunch of different responses as to who the first musician to popularise distortion was. History aside, distortion comes in a wide variety of different forms, each with their own unique characteristics. In this article, we explore some of the more common types of distortion and how they work. Tape saturation Back in .
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The beauty of home recording is that you can often bring your setup wherever you go. The biggest challenge however, is getting your space to sound right for the job. If you’re looking to get your home studio sounding its best, you’re going to need much more than good gear. As the saying goes, your monitors will only sound as good as your room. But don’t fret! Just because your room doesn’t sound great .
There’s a sad but evident truth to buying expensive, high-end monitors: they’ll only sound as good as your room. But for this article’s sake, let’s say you’ve already got your room sounding fantastic (for a full article on getting your room to sound great, click here). Now, all that’s left is the matter of how to position your speaker setup so that you achieve the best listening position possible. Let’s dive in, shall we? .
Your job as a producer goes far beyond laying down bass and beats. You’ve also got to think about where each element should sit in the mix. Strategic choices pertaining to space must be made for tracks to sound sonically interesting, and panning does just that. Panning is the placement of sounds across the stereo field, i.e. from left to right. This guide covers a quick overview on some of the basic principles of .
It’s a fact of life that we all make mistakes. After all, we are human, right? With the widespread availability of cheap and even free plugins, we often get caught up in the frenzy of grabbing every VST we can possibly fit into our hard drives. While this isn’t inherently a bad thing, it can often lead to us forgetting about basic techniques and relying on presets and (god forbid) mastering to fix our .
Much like the musicians themselves, the job of every FOH engineer is to deliver an unforgettable live gig experience. It never hurts to develop a repertoire of great engineering habits, so here are 5 cardinal rules every FOH engineer should practice and preach. Control the bass You’ve got to remember though that very few genres require earth shattering sub-sonic frequencies! It’s a common pitfall for engineers to go overboard and swamp their mixes with .
Preparation is key to success, and the live mixing world is no exception. As it never hurts to have a few tricks up your sleeve, we look at 5 quick but effective live sound mixing tips that separate the rookies from the pros. Be prepared for dropouts There’s nothing worse than having a piece of gear fail you at a critical moment, but you have to be prepared for it. Before every gig, assess .
Feedback is every live audio engineer’s worst nightmare, and it goes without saying that nobody in the crowd deserves to be subjected to an ear canal torture session. It’s your job as an engineer to ensure that never happens, so without further ado – here are 3 great strategies to help minimise stage feedback during a live performance. Position your microphones (and vocalists) correctly Ensure that you’ve correctly positioned your microphones in accordance to .
The humble Mirror ball is a classic disco icon, yet not everybody knows how to optimise its effect. Find out some tricks on how to make your mirrorball set up a dazzling head-turner..
The Garter This is a tradition that is observed is many weddings. You need to know about it so you can do the MC’s job seamlessly if it is part of this wedding. “And now it’s the guy’s turn. If someone would be so kind as to grab a chair and place it in the centre for the bride to sit on…” “Don’t go away (bride’s name).” (they frequently run). Then, arrange for all .