• What a further  disappointment? [ reports coming in all the time ] 
• Guitarists will never be the same again?  [what a reaction to my latest manual]
• The Hottest Ticket in town?  [ Jim Marshall throws his birthday bash yet again ]    
• Support a fellow 'One Minuter'?
• Visual Laugh?   [This will give you a huge laugh.]  
• Success Stories [ None this week ... first time ever! ]
• Charts   
• Subscriber's Section [compressors again?]  
• The gags: .....   Willie at it again! [  A Child? ]

After last week's lead article about the abysmal sound delivered  for the support acts to 'Muse' at Wembley, I am finding lots of similar catastrophes.

I can only put it down to my original opinion that the support acts are being presented with 'impossible to operate' highly sophisticated digital desks , specifically set up for the headlining act.  This seems to be becoming a huge problem.

The 'Muse' critique in The Sun newspaper must have been written by someone who definitely was not at Wembley! .

 Here's what I heard about the O2 Wireless Festival at Hyde Park - this was in reference to the appalling mix and sound delivery of 'LCD Soundsystem':

"it's not the band's fault, it's either the engineer, or the technology, or both. LCD's performance was marred by the house PA dropping out for half a second – twice – plus an appalling moment of howl across the whole system. And James Murphy's vocal mic was nowhere near loud enough. In fact, the set was a few dBs under par all round (as several people remarked to me). What was the engineer doing?!

This was all compounded by a downbeat finale as the band were faced with their electronic instruments failing onstage. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah ended with what seemed like band members wandering off in partial disgust and bemusement.

Unfortunate. But as one PA hire company director told me recently with a shrug, "Sometimes, it's like building a finely-tuned F1 racing car, only to let some learner driver prang it on the first bend."  

What was Glastonbury like?  The radio DJ's, who were there, did not think much of the live sound but the radio stuff was excellent.  And Guilfest?  Mind you, my son has a lot to do with Guilfest so he will be wielding a big stick!

Guitarists will never be the same again?  [what a reaction to my latest manual]

Everyone who calls to order 'So you're thinking of Recording Guitar' has the same moan.... " Dec, I just can't get my guitar to sound as big as it should" ... well my new manual is certainly causing a stir.  Now the guitar players of the world are being given the info. they have craved for years.

I really cannot understand why the knowledge is not available ... say, one bit of technique here and one bit there.  What I have done is gathered the best methodology from my own experience and the experience of all those I have played with, plus a lot of research into the 'secret methods'.  I feel that it is a 'chance in a lifetime' for guitarists to play like 'the big boys' ... Fancy checking out a chapter for Zip, Nada?  Go to www.makehits.com/recordingguitar.htm  Scroll down to near the bottom where it says in a picture frame "sample chapter" ... press your mouse and you will get a chapter absolutely for Zip!

"Why don't you slip into something more comfortable - like a coma!" [have you ever wanted to say that?]
 

The Hottest Ticket in town?  [ Jim Marshall throws his birthday bash yet again ]    

You may know that Jim has not been too well recently.  But he is determined to make his birthday party on 27th July.

This genius of a man, who invented 'loud' is a fighter ... you will not believe that he is 84 this year and still pushing his company forward as the principal guitar amp. manufacturers in the world .... what cabinets was Matthew Bellamy [Muse] playing?  You bet .... Marshall ... he jokes: "We love 'em because they are the only cabinets you can jump on without breaking!"  But eh sound?  Wow!

Check out my invitation to Jim's bash 

o  The best ticket in town?  What present can I give a man who definitely does not need anything?

A***

The difference between software compressors and outboard is mighty!

There is only one that producers use and that is 'Bomb Factory' software ... that is pretty d*mn good but again is not a patch on TLA Audio Fatman.  That is a valve driven state of the art stand alone unit... much favoured in Hip Hop circles ... as I always say: "You certainly can hear it working!"

The reason why software is not as good is that there is a limit to the CPU [computer processing] that is available for the plug in's.  Think about it.... all the plug in's and sequencing is all coming from the same set of processors within the computer tower.

With the HD Protools a whole different ball game starts .... most of the top studios use plug in's that are self powered, so they do not rely on the main tower.  These start at about £1,000 ... very good but expensive.  And we all know that HD Protools start at around £15,000.

The current best set up for home use is Digidesign 003 loaded with Protools ... this gives 8 individual outputs, so you can have all the 'live' stuff recorded on the computer and running out to 8 channels on to a good mixing desk ... then you can apply a range of effects and  compressors.  All the sequenced Midi stuff can then operate live from the computer through as many Midi sound modules as possible ... this is my preferred way of working at the moment.  Fantastic results.

For some unknown reason that I have never heard explained well, the sound through a big mixing desk is just 'bigger'.

Regards

DEC [Cluskey]
mailto:dec@makehits.com

The best guitar recording manual known to man = 'So you're Thinking of Recording Guitar?' .... go to www.makehits.com/recordingguitar.htm
https://secure.mistral.co.uk/makehits/swgappsecure.htm or fast cred*it card line: +44 1323.728005 or UK 01323.728005

 Make it a Great Week  ...... 

Dec    contact Dec at dec@makehits.com