Post embarrasing rookie mistakes you made
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MoreSpaceEcho
- zen recordist
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- Joined: Wed May 07, 2003 11:15 am
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losthighway
- resurrected
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- Joined: Mon Apr 14, 2008 8:02 pm
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I don't know how many times I have worked a fast paced session where things are being moved around really fast and someone is set up for an overdub saying "I've got nothing in these headphones." I'm looking at Aux sends, patchbay, cable coming off the snake, sometimes twice through. Oops, headphone amp is not plugged in.... need electricity. 
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cjmnash
- re-cappin' neve
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- Joined: Thu Apr 22, 2004 9:25 am
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drill it out. it'll take 2 seconds.Bro Shark wrote:Fuck me; I stripped a screwhead on my rack. It's holding a 002R in place. What's the best way to go, screw extractor kit?
when i was a rookie i used to post my mistakes on a public forum for all to read.
j/k
-chris
www.welcometo1979.com
Owner: Welcome To 1979 Studio & Mara Machines
When I first got my MS16, the session went great. Next day came back to listen to playback and.....nothing. WTF?
I didn't realize that I had left the shields up and had spooled the tape over them. Took me a few minutes to figure it out but I felt like an idiot.
Eddie
I didn't realize that I had left the shields up and had spooled the tape over them. Took me a few minutes to figure it out but I felt like an idiot.
Eddie
"I raged against the machine and all this money came out!" Bart Simpson
this is awesome...like going to confession....
When I got my otari a band was really really pumped to track to tape for the first time. I was single then. They took over the whole house for a long weekend. Amps, cables, mics, guitars, drums everywhere. We were tracking some really really great stuff. i had borrowed a friend's Midas board to have good quick playback.
The plan was to dump eight tracks onto the computer, then bounce a quick mix back onto tape and continue with overdubs (i can't remember if bounced mix was mono or stereo). I had to leave for part of the session and let the band take over.
They called me pissed that what they were printing back into the computer of their overdubs was not lining up no matter how hard they tried.
Yeah, I didn't know anything about 'wow and flutter.' Dork.
The band was able to use the initial drum tracks but they had to do almost all of their overdubs again at a later date on the computer. I loaned them all the mic pres and mics i could to try to make it up to them, but I bet if you asked they'd still feel a bit of angst even still today 7 odd years later.
Shew...it feels great to get that off my chest.
When I got my otari a band was really really pumped to track to tape for the first time. I was single then. They took over the whole house for a long weekend. Amps, cables, mics, guitars, drums everywhere. We were tracking some really really great stuff. i had borrowed a friend's Midas board to have good quick playback.
The plan was to dump eight tracks onto the computer, then bounce a quick mix back onto tape and continue with overdubs (i can't remember if bounced mix was mono or stereo). I had to leave for part of the session and let the band take over.
They called me pissed that what they were printing back into the computer of their overdubs was not lining up no matter how hard they tried.
Yeah, I didn't know anything about 'wow and flutter.' Dork.
The band was able to use the initial drum tracks but they had to do almost all of their overdubs again at a later date on the computer. I loaned them all the mic pres and mics i could to try to make it up to them, but I bet if you asked they'd still feel a bit of angst even still today 7 odd years later.
Shew...it feels great to get that off my chest.
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hughmanatee
- gettin' sounds
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- Joined: Tue Jan 30, 2007 7:42 am
- Location: Portland, ME
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my first condenser mic was a behringer, i bought an xlr-1/4" cable with it, tried to record and went to the store fuming, just to realize i need phantom power (what ever that is!) and an xlr-xlr cable.
other rookie moves include:
checking that power is on LAST
buying the rest of the behringer gear that i have
still owning it
sending signal the opposite way in a studio. i.e guitar going into head output. and trying to record from the input. in my defense they were un-labled wall jacks, but i should have known
other rookie moves include:
checking that power is on LAST
buying the rest of the behringer gear that i have
still owning it
sending signal the opposite way in a studio. i.e guitar going into head output. and trying to record from the input. in my defense they were un-labled wall jacks, but i should have known
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nag hammadi
- gettin' sounds
- Posts: 136
- Joined: Sat Jul 17, 2010 10:35 pm
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nag hammadi
- gettin' sounds
- Posts: 136
- Joined: Sat Jul 17, 2010 10:35 pm
bought my first 16 trk tape machine, and was ready to rule.
alignment? calibration? whatever - let's rock.
so, we put bass drum on track 1, snare in 2, etc...
day 2. where did the bass drum go during the middle of the song?
never mind - i know what to do!
take a send from one of the overheads, use a crossover and a gate to find a bass drum.
use the resulting "sound" as a trigger for the bass drum channel one of those alesis d4 rack deals...
wow.
alignment? calibration? whatever - let's rock.
so, we put bass drum on track 1, snare in 2, etc...
day 2. where did the bass drum go during the middle of the song?
never mind - i know what to do!
take a send from one of the overheads, use a crossover and a gate to find a bass drum.
use the resulting "sound" as a trigger for the bass drum channel one of those alesis d4 rack deals...
wow.
i can't really hear my solo, man
I was trying to hook up Midi from my AKAI Mpc to my computer to have pro tools run the MPC. I had a midi/usb port (motu) and had been configuring the MPC and pro tools in all sorts of ways to get the machines to see each other.
A week or two later I pulled on the midi chord coming out of the MPC and the other end was laying dead on the floor under the desk. There was another chord laying dead, with one end connected to the interface.
I took one of the chords, connected BOTH ends to the correct spots and it all worked. Wasted HOURS trying to figure that one out!!!
A week or two later I pulled on the midi chord coming out of the MPC and the other end was laying dead on the floor under the desk. There was another chord laying dead, with one end connected to the interface.
I took one of the chords, connected BOTH ends to the correct spots and it all worked. Wasted HOURS trying to figure that one out!!!
Will Kahn.
Burl Audio. Paradise Recoding. Santa Cruz CA
Burl Audio. Paradise Recoding. Santa Cruz CA
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drumsound
- zen recordist
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I've done things like that. Or used the wrong patch points, or been turning up the gain on one preamp even though I was patched into the one above it.willyk wrote:I was trying to hook up Midi from my AKAI Mpc to my computer to have pro tools run the MPC. I had a midi/usb port (motu) and had been configuring the MPC and pro tools in all sorts of ways to get the machines to see each other.
A week or two later I pulled on the midi chord coming out of the MPC and the other end was laying dead on the floor under the desk. There was another chord laying dead, with one end connected to the interface.
I took one of the chords, connected BOTH ends to the correct spots and it all worked. Wasted HOURS trying to figure that one out!!!
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calaverasgrandes
- ghost haunting audio students
- Posts: 3233
- Joined: Wed Jul 25, 2007 11:23 pm
- Location: Oakland
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hmmm I got some goood ones I think.
1-Back when I was a rookie sound guy, I was always trying to work faster, harder, smarter hoping I would impress someone (anyone!) and get a job. I got in this really bad habit of EQ-ing the various instrument channels before the band even soundchecked! Since this was at an all ages club (924 Gilman in Berkeley) the drug of choice was coffee. So I would not only do the usual smile curve on all the drums but also boost the mids on the guitars and the bass on the bass guitar. One particular day I was looking forward to getting to run the board for a show that Neurosis was headlining (Souls at Zero era). The man who has installed like half of all club PA in SF bay area, in addition ot recording Asbestos Death and others, Radley Hirsch, showed up and saved the day thank dog! He nulled all the EQ except the kick and toms, and on those I think he cranked the bass even further than I was comfortable with. While it has been joked that Radley must be half deaf for how much subwoofer he pours onto a show, his mixes always turn a show into an event.
2-Not wearing earplugs because they look dorky.
3-trying to deaden my drums into sounding good rather than learning to tune them right.
4-Not re-doing a shoddy solder job becasue I was in a hurry or lazy.
5-Thinking that gear would solve my problems.
6-Thinking that beer would solve my problems.
7-close micing stuff when recording. Hard habit to unlearn when you start off doing live sound.
8-plugging into the bottom row of the patch bay. Depending on the gear involved and the type of mormalling, you might get a faint signal even when plugged in wrong. Which is the worst thing ever! 50db of gain and I can almost hear it!
9-Which bring me to the biggest one, when things arent working right somehow turning up the master fader NEVER fixes it. bring that fucker back down to infinity and work the signal path by visual inspection. Check power lights, make sure cables are pushed ALL THE WAY IN! I have blown drivers before I learned to do it that way.
10- Oh yeah, and snubbing punk bands that made it big because that was the cool "punk" thing to do. In hindsight, that could have been work!
1-Back when I was a rookie sound guy, I was always trying to work faster, harder, smarter hoping I would impress someone (anyone!) and get a job. I got in this really bad habit of EQ-ing the various instrument channels before the band even soundchecked! Since this was at an all ages club (924 Gilman in Berkeley) the drug of choice was coffee. So I would not only do the usual smile curve on all the drums but also boost the mids on the guitars and the bass on the bass guitar. One particular day I was looking forward to getting to run the board for a show that Neurosis was headlining (Souls at Zero era). The man who has installed like half of all club PA in SF bay area, in addition ot recording Asbestos Death and others, Radley Hirsch, showed up and saved the day thank dog! He nulled all the EQ except the kick and toms, and on those I think he cranked the bass even further than I was comfortable with. While it has been joked that Radley must be half deaf for how much subwoofer he pours onto a show, his mixes always turn a show into an event.
2-Not wearing earplugs because they look dorky.
3-trying to deaden my drums into sounding good rather than learning to tune them right.
4-Not re-doing a shoddy solder job becasue I was in a hurry or lazy.
5-Thinking that gear would solve my problems.
6-Thinking that beer would solve my problems.
7-close micing stuff when recording. Hard habit to unlearn when you start off doing live sound.
8-plugging into the bottom row of the patch bay. Depending on the gear involved and the type of mormalling, you might get a faint signal even when plugged in wrong. Which is the worst thing ever! 50db of gain and I can almost hear it!
9-Which bring me to the biggest one, when things arent working right somehow turning up the master fader NEVER fixes it. bring that fucker back down to infinity and work the signal path by visual inspection. Check power lights, make sure cables are pushed ALL THE WAY IN! I have blown drivers before I learned to do it that way.
10- Oh yeah, and snubbing punk bands that made it big because that was the cool "punk" thing to do. In hindsight, that could have been work!
??????? wrote: "everything sounds best right before it blows up."
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