Recording live?

[Hog]

Hi guys,

We hope to record a live tune. Just wondering if anyone in Aberdeen can record on location?

[Fraser Mac]

Mooring do it if you ask the engineer i think?

there was a thread about this not to long ago,

[Justin]

my old band recorded live at the tunnels and the drums came out sounding amazing. some of the guitar parts came out a bit quite so we re-recorded the guiatr parts and it sounded not bad in the end. Think we just gave Scott a mini disck player.

[Alan Cynic]

I use minidiscs too.....but usually as an audience recording, as the desk ones sound a bit soulless.

[FatHand]

I've not tried using it at a live show yet but the recordings I have of us playing in Tom's using my little Zoom recorder are pretty decent quality, particularly impressed with it picking up bass and drums well. It's only really useful for capturing the vibe of the moment though. Also the thing with this kind of room recording is you have to make sure the levels are all balanced for it to sound good.

[Nickthebass]

Recording gigs can be a little hit and miss in quality terms. If you're taking a feed from the desk remember you're getting the signal that is being sent to the speakers not necessarily what is coming out of them.

The signal you're recording has been processed to sound good in that room. I recorded live with a big band once and we sounded great from the back of the room with the front of house going but listening at home it sounded like a jazz trio in a bathroom with a band of a thousand kazoos. That was purely because we had recorded the sound from the desk and it would only ever sound good in that room.

If you can get some good quality mics you might be better off recording some of the room sound and at least mixing it with the desk signal.

If you've got the cash to throw at some location recording I'd think about finding a venue you like and hiring the room for a day when they don't have a gig on or something like that. I've done that a couple of times and it worked really well. More space than in most small studios plus normally it feels nice.