[Dana Nielsen]

What a feel-good banger, @shimmerisland!! Love it! I’m on my laptop and only listened intro thru chorus 1 on each option (cause I couldn’t wait to hear) but will give a real proper listen when I’m back in the studio tomorrow. My initial partial-listen “laptop thoughts”:

• would be great to hear these level-matched while comparing. Turning down the loud one (via volume knob or fader or clip gain) will at least give the quieter one a fighting chance. Otherwise we humans of the 21st century will choose the louder option every time.
• Feel like the louder one (“C” as it’s titled) the vocal is, as u mentioned, tooo loud. I would request from that mixer a “vocal down” version for comparison. Just have him/her turn down the vocal like 2db.
• I can hear the bass gtr much more clearly on the laptop speakers on version “C” which is fun
• The song is already stuck in my head! Great work!! Look fwd to giving a proper listen to each option all the way through, volume-matched, tomorrow!

[Dana Nielsen]

Hey I know that band! 😂. What a trip, @detective – AND what a trip down memory lane! I recorded and mixed all but one or two of those “reimagined” songs. Wild what that technology can do! Loved your creative transitions too. Our own @avernet turned me on to that Rip-X software just the other day by posting it to our Black Friday Roundup and I was watching demo vids a couple nights ago – so cool!

Love your creative reimagining of these songs so close to my heart, using tools at the bleeding edge of technology! 🙌

As for the legality … (I’m certainly no lawyer and not giving legal advice here lol) … I’m fairly certain that creating things like this for private use is perfectly fine – and fun! Only if it made it’s way onto streaming platforms, youtube, or some other commercial platform would there be an issue and likely a takedown order or Content ID flag or potential legal issues. 🤘

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[Dana Nielsen]

Jesseeeeeeeee!!! This is so awesome! YOU are so awesome!! Thank u so much for sharing this beautiful, creative, finished product here — full circle, I LOVE it! Such a privilege and a joy for all of us here to get a peek into your creative process and cheer u on along the way 🙌. Love the video, man. Especially when the mysterious twin “voyeurs” arrive – i was like, “woah!” The Jesse triplets reminded me of a fantastic, hilarious show I’m watching featuring multiple Paul Rudds, called Living With Myself (on Netflix … hilarious and amazing concept).

So proud of you, homey!! 🤩⚡️🤩

[Dana Nielsen]

Hahah – wow @detective, thanks for sharing your track – I love your humor and creativity (and sound effects! 🐒😂) and I look fwd to hearing more of your work! I also think there should be more 30-second songs in the world! lol

Hey, so, before anyone else comments I wanted to quickly chime in with a gentle reminder for us all (realizing I haven’t yet created formal Community Guidelines .. perhaps this is a decent first draft?):

Our community is a space where we celebrate music and the art of audio production. We’re here to enjoy and learn from each other’s musical and technical journeys.

To ensure everyone feels comfortable, let’s aim to keep our discussions and collaborative responses centered around audio, music production, and the technical aspects of our craft.

Let’s all also be mindful of the lyrical content in our creations, ensuring our space remains positive and inclusive for everyone.

I’m certainly not saying “don’t post music that pertains to religion or politics, or has occasional/mild profanity, or is satirical, edgy etc.” … that would be boring and we’d miss out on a TON of fantastic music! But I AM saying, let’s be mindful of and compassionate to one another as we share and comment, and keep our focus on engineering, composing, mixing, producing and other technical craft-y things.

Sound ok to y’all?

…. and Paul, don’t let this discourage you from sharing and engaging here!! I’m just trying to set the right tone for the group and keep us all on topic. ⚡️🙌

As for anyone looking to discuss hot-button polarizing topics with strangers on the internet, you will absolutely LOVE twitter and Reddit! haha

💜

[Dana Nielsen]

Jesseeeeee!! This is such an excellent question I can’t wait to answer (cause I love this stuff and think about – and experiment with – all the time). I’ll probably circle back to this post when I have more time to elaborate, but a quick basic answer from my personal perspective would be:

• I love multi-mic acoustic guitar, especially when the guitar is the main focus of the mix/performance. Usually I’m using multiple mics to a) capture a bigger, fuller-frequency picture of the instrument, and b) so I can pan the mics across the stereo field for a wider “immersive” vibe. As such, I’m often choosing mic placements that are fairly tonally balanced, panning them, bussing them to a stereo aux input (or recording them directly onto a stereo track if I’m feeling really confident and/or lazy lol), and then EQ-ing the combined signal as one unified guitar sound.
• Sometimes tho I will touch up individual mics to remove resonant frequencies or hi-pass a mic with sub rumble etc. before they get summed together on the “Ac Gtr” stereo aux input channel for further EQ/compression/etc.

So I guess my short answer is: I do both. Sometimes. But also, not all the time. Easy right? 😂

I will say tho, that putting one mic on the fretboard for left hand definition and one mic on the body for right hand body could be more effective when summed together in mono rather than stereo (like I do often with upright bass) since, as you mentioned, the two parts of the instrument sound tonally pretty different from one another. If you were to pan those mics wide it might feel weird with all the low end body on the left speaker and relatively no body on the right speaker.

If you were, however, to put a stereo mic placement (XY, Blumlein, ORTF, etc) in front of the guitar near where the neck meets the body and back a foot or more, you’ll still be getting the best of both worlds (body from the body of the guitar, clarity and definition from the neck) but the sound will be more equally balanced in each mic since the two mics are placed right next to each other (also called a “coincident pair” of mics) so that the full combined frequency spectrum of the instrument (neck and body) arrives at the two mics at exactly the same time, which makes for a very balanced Left/Right image … if that’s what you’re going for.

There are so many other fun ways I like to multi-mic acoustic guitar too, which would be easier to demonstrate visually/audibly … maybe I’ll make a video series…

Meantime, there are those two vids on the Mix Protégé Instagram page about exactly these techniques (which I know you’ve already seen, but for anyone else reading this who might be interested ….)

Aaaaand, as usual, my “short quick answer” turned into a long one! haha. I can’t help myself. I love this stuff!! Keep us posted on your acoustic guitar mic’ing experiments!

[Dana Nielsen]

Love these thoughts, @shimmerisland, and can’t wait to dive in to all this myself, @JLEW!

[Dana Nielsen]

A+ comma work, Paul! Impressive. 😂 🙌

[Dana Nielsen]

Yes yes YES please! The music you’re sharing and the questions you’re asking are 💎💎💎💎! Your creativity and curiosity are infectious, homey!!

[Dana Nielsen]

Haha – succinct and do-not-cross line adjacent. Very punk rock way to be! 🤘 Thanks man.

[Dana Nielsen]

Ah! Yes – LA-2A much better on sustain-y gentler things like vocals and bass than on percussive things like drums and plucky things like nylon guitar. (Sometimes can be good tho on strummy acoustic guitars).

[Dana Nielsen]

Ahhhh, nice! Didn’t realize there was a vocalist occupying that left-side space in other parts of the vid – makes perfect sense!

And I bet it’s the LA-2A … it sounds like that compressor’s attack/release profile. I can explain more in our upcoming 1-on-1 sesh, and maybe can make a lil “acoustic guitar compression” video later this week for the MP site here.

With the LA-2A specifically I would say the only “setting” that really matters is that gain reduction meter (i.e. how many -dB of compression is happening). For plucky instruments like nylon guitar with fast transients and relatively short sustain that LA-2A can start to sound pretty noticeable due to it’s fairly fast attack (10ms) and slow release (60ms for 50% of the release, and anywhere from 1 to 15 seconds for the rest). While I wouldn’t consider 60ms a “slow” release time, it’s that 2nd 50% of the release (1-15 seconds) that can start to sound “grabby” on certain sources.

Muuuuch easier – and more FUN – to demonstrate with video and audio than to type out meaningless numbers here hahaha. But you know I get all excited and can’t help myself. AND I want to assure you what I heard on your recording is subtle and probably only noticeable by engineer-dorks like me 🤓. But since this is a perfect space to nerd out about such things I thought I’d indulge myself haha.

Happy to go into more detail with a followup video if you or anyone else here is interested!

[Dana Nielsen]

Heavy breathing .. lololol. #realtalk

Love these additions, @Jon_Plett! And it’s a GREAT tip to use different guitars and/or mics to keep those overdubs from sounding too “same-y same same”. If that’s not possible and there is only one player playing one guitar on the same mic on all overdubs, I’ll often look for other ways to switch things up, such as:

• alternate tuning
• alternate chord positions (bar chords vs 1st position for example)
• capo
• alternate mic position

And, man, I’m soooooo glad the Natural Vocal Production course has been helpful, brother!

[Dana Nielsen]

@Martyn (aka James)!!! Amazing first post and so glad you’re here – you are such bright, creative, musical light!! I’m gonna bullet point a few quick musings of my own:

• Fantastic video share of your classical guitar recording. Alex Park sounds excellent. I can’t wait for my classical-guitar-wiz brother @Kwas (aka Casey Nielsen) to check this out too!
• I love ORTF – great work! Where can I get one of your 3D printed ORTF clips?? (I’m usually guess-timating and eyeballing my 17cm and 110-degrees 😬)
• Ideas for your next stereo classical guitar recording: 1) try the mics positioned more centered on the body of the guitar — perhaps the center of the ORTF somewhere around where the fretboard meets the body so that the resulting recording has the guitar more centered in the stereo field (currently it feels a bit right-side heavy); 2) try less compression – or a faster release time. I bet it’s the limiter in your Zoom recorder I’m hearing? Just curious! But these are just minor ideas of things to try … you’re doing GREAT!
• Yes! Love those Octava MK012’s! Excellent cost-effective lil mics. I’ve owned my pair for over 20 years.

Also, two more general points for the whole community:

1. Don’t ever be afraid to contribute your own thoughts, feelings, and constructive suggestions for each other here on this platform! Very sweet of you and @Jon_Plett to high five what I already wrote (🙏🏻) but I don’t want my personal thoughts and discussions stifle any of your own! Keep chimin’ in, yall! It helps everybody, is more fun that way, and keeps Mix Protégé a vibrant community, not just a “Dana echo chamber” lol.
2. EVERYONE got a personalized call-out in the Friday Fader this week! No one person was put on blast …. EVERY person was put on blast! Mwa haha ha ha haaaaa. Just trying to inspire my favorite folks (you all!) to pop by, share some knowledge, ask a question, encourage some members, and have some fun!

🤓

[Dana Nielsen]

Haha – my pleasure, brother!!

[Dana Nielsen]

Haha thanks man! I’ve always loved the visual aesthetic of music notation and admired many of my teachers’ penmanship throughout the years. (I prob should’ve spent more time shedding scales rather than “drawing” haha).

Musescore … ! Wow, I just looked into that and am so pumped to try it out – thanks for that! (FREE?? 🤯) I have Sibelius but I use it so infrequently that each time I launch it I end up scouring manuals and trying to relearn it and often times revert back to my handmade “music drawings” instead haha.

And right on — what a brilliant “thought exercise”. I totally know what you mean and feel the same way, often letting the “final product” finished mix (percolating in my imagination, or taking shape on the speakers) inform and inspire compositional/arranging decisions along the way! Love it!