When in the studio…
My A7’s arrived today, and after I got home from work, I quickly unboxed them and hooked them up.
They’re a awful lot smaller than my old 20/20’s. And they look very high tech. One reviewer wasn’t kidding when he said “they look like the kind of monitors Darth Vader would have” - all matte-black with beveled angles and glowing blue lights.
So how do they sound? Goddamn brilliant. I wouldn’t want to use these in my home theater or anything - they’re not flattering at all - but holy balls are they detailed. I’ve got smooth high end far above what I used to, and I pretty substantial low end too. My Events would roll off around 60hz, dipping about 3db at maybe 80hz. These roll off at around 40hz, dipping at 60. I did a little tuning with the EQ in the back and they have substantial but not overpowering bass. And the old monitors would “smear” the high end a bit, which after a while could get very fatiguing at higher pressure levels. I’ve been listening to these at my usual monitoring volume for about 2 hours now with no ill effects. That is nice. VERY nice.
We’ll see how everything sounds over time.
I also spent several takes trying to figure out just why my vocals sucked so bad - I thought I had good performances, but everything kept coming out kind of reedy and with way too much top-end air. I checked my EQ settings, I hecked my preamp - none of it was the problem. I thought maybe my voice was starting to just go. Then I noticed that the multipattern switch on my mic had gotten set to “omni” instead of “cardioid.” Huge difference, when you’re not recording the room sound at the same volume as the vocals. Sigh. Must’ve gotten knocked during the Flood of 08 Great Studio Rellocation.
Now, to go hook up my old 20/20’s in the practice space. They’re better than those cheapie wedges I’m using there…
Mine!
Sunday
We played another show at the Darkroom in Chicago on sunday.
Turnout was about the same as last time - that is to say, members of The Dark Clan, Ned, Sega, Dave and Jean, and 5 people we didn’t know.
Sigh. Sunday nights are brutal, man.
On the plus side, Chuck’s dad came with us, and really seemed to get into it. It was kind of awesome.
Some side benefits of this show, though - Dave was handing out WTII Sunday Night Sampler CDs, which are pretty nice. A few tracks I already had, but one I didn’t, that being the Iris remix of Atomica Project’s “Gravity”, which is an entirely dope track. Very “big room trance” but with less stupid vocals than what usually dominates that genre. Her voice is great, too - I’m going to have to pick up the rest of their stuff (IIRC, AP is Wade Alin’s band). I also had duck tenders, which are like chicken tenders, but made with duck.
Also got to meet the guy from Fluid - he used to be a touring keyboardist for Diary of Dreams and a few other bands, and he did an instrumental set of some very NIN-Fragile-type stuff. It sounded extremely cool, and the guy is best described as looking like the last henchman the hero has to fight in an action movie before going head-to-head with Alan Rickman (or whoever) - a muscly, shaven headed guy with sharp cheekbones that totally wails on the hero until he remembers his exploding watch and blows him into the tank of sharks. Anyway, I talked to him a bit and he’s also a pretty cool dude.
I caught a bit of the Dark Clan’s set - we had to bug out early because at least a few of us had to work the following morning. I’m really digging them as a 4-piece, actually. They seem tighter than when they had 7 members. There was some idiocy on the part of the doorman, who wouldn’t let their underage keyboardist on premises, which is some bullshit right there.
At one point during the night I was confirmed as a licensed developer of the Andrew Sega Bassline API.
Our set was fun, I indulged in a little jackassery, and our monitor mix was wildly different between soundcheck and live time. Not just “wow the acoustics are different” different, but “wow all I have in my monitor are my own vocals and Chuck’s bass.” This made things a little difficult.
I’ve decided that dressing like a mid-90’s Damon Albarn works pretty well for me - mostly because it gives me an excurse to wear something breathable onstage, and I have this tendency to perspire. Also, it makes me look thinner than I actually am.
We had this show last night…
It was pretty awesome.
We debuted a number of new things, including brand-spankin’ new versions of Footfalls (featuring the wall of taikos and Elizabeth beating on a large frame drum with a pair of big sticks) and the dance-tastic version of Walk In London. We also busted out our new cover tune, Dead Can Dance’s “The Ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove”, which went over well as well. That one was a bit of a risk, as it was a much more downtempo track, has some tricky changes, and forces Jill to sing a harmony part that doesn’t actually exist in the original.
So, whew.
Our big surprise was a semi-planned Rickrolling of the audience. In the breakdown of “Twisting and Turning” we’ve been dropping a chunk of Blue Monday because, well, Blue Monday mixes into everything. So we went that way at first, but after the cymbal break, I started singing “Never Gonna Give You Up”, complete with the Rick Astley dance. Tricky, as it was about 10bpm faster than the original. Got a good laugh and kept things interesting.
Jill made her Madison debut and acquitted herself well. Both Chuck and Elizabeth had to contend with technical problems on their own - Elizabeth’s drum stand broke and Chuck’s bass wasn’t turned on in the mix, but both of them just plowed ahead without missing a beat in each case. I consider myself lucky to get to work with people who can just roll with it like that.
I don’t think our set was any longer than before but for some reason it felt like it. Might’ve been the fact that this was our first hometown gig since Reverence.
Great turnout for a wednesday night, too. Beta Virus played well, and their Prodigy cover got people going. Sensuous Enemy was splendid as always, although I missed part of their show because I was loading gear into my car. Rick from the MAMAs was impressed by the whole thing, and told me “with music this good, the line to get in should be out the door.” He’s right, you know.
Anyway, it was a really great night, and it was for a good cause, too.