Andy P

A great resource for headphone measurements: http://www.innerfidelity.com/headphone-data-sheet-downloads Has independent measurements of loads of headphones so you can actually see what the frequency response and distortions of the headphones actually are. I had to pause AdBlock to view the page though incase anyone else has a similar problem. They even have the apple earbud measurements, the stock ones have nearly 100% distortion (THD+n) below 100Hz. Surprising!!!

Bands like Meshuggah use drum sampling all the time, and they sell well. The album Catch 33 was all drum samples, and that sounds great! If you like the style that is...

Sounds alright to my ears, pretty damn good actually. Maybe like Moseph said, try cutting some of the mid's out to make it sound a little less muddy. How was this recorded, or was it samples? Personally, I think the piano sounds a little close, but that's just because of the hammer noise. The close sound with the reverb confuses me a little, because it sounds close, but the reverb tries to make it sound more distant. If you're having problems getting decent level then try sticking a gentle compressor on the piano. Something like 1.5:1 ratio. Or is you feel fancy and just want to remove the harshness, try using a multi-pressor to just bring down the problem frequencies when they get too loud.

Thinking about investing in an Axe Fx II, just wondered everyone's opinion on them. Some of the stuff sounds great, and all the gigs I've been to where they've been used they sound amazing. Although there is the odd youtube video where the guitar tone makes me completely cringe. Anyone had any experience on the Axe FX?

Seems snappleman hit the nail on the head. Personally I think macs are more stable, and in a pro studio environment it's not a good idea to make your clients wait for a quick reboot. Then again the only PC I've used in a studio environment was running Pyramix. Not sure if it was a Pyramix fault or Windows but that fell over more than you might hope for.

Care to post a small snippet of the white noise in question?

Might be a good idea to record just the MIDI output data from the keyboard along side the audio. that way you can always begin to sculpt the sound from scratch when musicians inevitably change their mind

So does this software change the tone of the music at all? Or is it intended as a 'loudness' maximiser? The whole argument about increasing the sample rate seems a bit silly to me, since the quality won't actually increase. You are always guessing what will be inbetween, not actually what is there. The only reason for over-sampling IMO would be 1-bit DACs, but that is a different issue.

Ah man, why no Focusrite?

Try recording the hum and do a spectral analysis (audacity can do this) and just look at where the peaks of the hum are. If the peaks are based around 50Hz and 100Hz (or 60Hz and 120Hz for US) then it is a mains hum issue. you could also post the hum, would be easier to diagnose the problem hearing it.

Even with the subtitles I didn't know what he was talking about...

An example of how NOT to use japanese influences: Me and Cain (Fishy) used to have a challenge to try and sit through the entire 'instructional' DVD, neither of us have succeeded yet

Hmmm, I'm not sure if it'll work or not. Can't hurt to try! You could always return it if it doesn't work. A quick solution would be to put your DC converter as far away from your laptop and guitar as possible, won't solve the problem but should make a slight difference.

Yeah the guitar cable. The noise might be being inducted onto other parts of the guitar though, like through the pickups so might not 100% solve the issue. Depending on what the guitar is it might not work with a balanced jack lead. What guitar is it you're recording?

Pop studios use Yamaha NS10's as reference speakers normally, along side some high class speaker, and the frequency response of the NS10's is awful. The main point is they accentuate the mid range, where the instruments need to be balanced most accurately. Plus if you can make a mix sound bad on NS10's then it'll sound good anywhere. As for what everyone else has been saying, they are all right! Familiarity is the most important thing when mixing so it doesn't really matter what mons you have given that you know what it is supposed to sound like. I tend to high nice headphones, and crappy iPod headphones as a reference for my mixes as well as mons. A lot of people seem to like the KRK rockets, but IMO you can get better stuff for the price. The ones I've heard have had a problem with LF ringing and transient response, with that it's kinda hard to get a good balance between bass and kick. My friend works in the service department for KRK and he keeps moaning about the build quality of some of the rockits, so they seem to be a bit hit and miss as to you get a good set or not.

I've had a similar problem before. It wasn't a grounding issue though. Your laptop power supply is probably a switched mode power supply which means it kicks out a lot of magnetic noise. That means whenever your power supply is on the noise is inducted onto any unbalanced. Before going to see if the problem is a grounding problem I would suggest trying a balanced cable first. Sine you're recording guitars I assume that you're just using a standard jack cable. You can get balanced jacks which don't cost much more than regular jack leads. Hope this helps!

There is an audio unit plugin called livecut which seems to work pretty well for this glitchy stuff. This style isn't exactly my forte so I don't know what plugins are about but I know this one sounds alright to me, although it does produce the cuts randomly so each play through will be different. http://mdsp.smartelectronix.com/livecut/ Hope this helps!

Fishy just pushed me in the direction of this thread, I'm definitely up for some guitar if no-one has taken the role yet.

I know they have been mentioned already but if you haven't heard them yet check out Haken (pronounced like bacon). Amazing metal music with a sense of humor. Plus you can't go wrong with a tuba solo

From the first opening fanfare and melody of FF7 i was completely hooked!!! Cant get enough

Kind of on a tangent but if you double distorted electric guitars with an acoustic guitar it sounds awsome. Check out Darkane's Layers of Lies for a good example. If you wanted some more tones out of your acoustic you could try a MIDI pickup similar to what Al Di Meola uses.

AKG 414's are fairly standard, really good alround mic you can use for alot of things and are quite rugged with a variable directivity pattern. However, they are on the fairly obease side compared to Neuman KM 184's or 84's and will stick out like a sore thumb so your commander won't appretiate that too much. If your willing to spend up to $2500 then you can't go wrong with DPA 4011's, really nice condenser cardioid microphones, or the 4015's with are the super cardioid version. These are very pricy but the sound quality is amazing, mainly studio mic's really but again have the problem that your commander might not like having them in his field of vission. You could opt for a spaced omni configuration of mic's rather than an XY pair, or be really fancy and go for the full blown decca tree. That way the mics won't nessacerally be in front of your conductor, although to get a descent stereo image they might have to be in more awkward possitions than the XY pair, depends on the stage setup really. Personally i would try and stay well away from ribbon mics on brass bands, especiaslly live ones, as the ribbon can break if dropped or gets the wind blown up it by an over enthusiastic saxophonist. But if you wanna use them by all means, try the Coles/ STC (can't remember which one has the pattent nowerdays) 4038.

I love whammy bars, and as for alternate tunings I was intending to get a tremol-no aswell. I've got one in my 7 string and works wonders, highly recomended.