Starting to regress...

[kinger]

First, I'll apologize for what is probably going to be a rambling post. After years of building up and digitizing my little home studio, I'm finding that I just want to go back to eight tracks and work in as much of an analogue realm as possible. I'll still use something digital as a recorder but I'd like to use a summing mixer and stick to my analogue effects and compressors. I guess I'm looking for advice on what to get.

What're my options on a little mixer with eight channels, decent pres and channel inserts? What should I use as a recorder? I have a fairly high-powered PC now, but I'm thinking about getting a Mac laptop at some point also. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, and please let me know if I'm asking something stupid or haven't given enough information to make answering this post feasible.

Also, if this has been covered extensively elsewhere and I've missed the post, please feel free to post a link. Thanks everyone!

[joel hamilton]

Kinger,
I think that this entire website is devoted to the exact questions you posed here.
Read a bunch of the existing posts, and i bet you will start to find things that apply to your "situation."

What is it that you feel is lacking in your current setup?

[kinger]

I think there's actually too much in my current setup. I find myself these days spending too much time looking at waveforms and digital representations of knobs and faders and not listening to my mixes enough. I also miss the soul (for lack of a better word) of recordings I used to do on limited tracks through analogue gear. I'd like to get a small mixing board that has a bit of character and run that into some sort of digital recorder, I guess something like an ADAT but not an ADAT. I just find I did a lot better mixes when I had nothing more to look at than some level metres and could close my eyes and twiddle knobs until things sounded like I thought they should.

I'll do some more searching through the posts as I'm sure this has all been covered, but if anyone can recommend any boards or recorders (old or new), that'd be great!

[kinger]

Kinger,
I think that this entire website is devoted to the exact questions you posed here.

Oh, and I just finished reading all 121455 posts on the site and found two that were unrelated to my question, so please refrain from such exaggerations as it ruins our credibility as mix gurus.

[Randy]

I don't know what your budget is, but it sounds like you want a Radar unit.

I guess they can get a little pricey though.

[joel hamilton]

Kinger,
I think that this entire website is devoted to the exact questions you posed here.

Oh, and I just finished reading all 121455 posts on the site and found two that were unrelated to my question, so please refrain from such exaggerations as it ruins our credibility as mix gurus.

Anyway,

I seem to be finding myself in this conversation a lot these days. You should just work on the song however you see fit. Would someone be a better painter because they threw away all but 4 of their colors of paint? If they have 300 different colors, do they ALL have to be on the canvas?

Why not just take a simpler approach to the mix? keep in mind that I fully hear you, and I mix on a console.

If you are fully convinced you need limitations imposed on you, then for sure you should just get a small mixer, and some sort of small tape machine. maybe you really should get an ADAT !! all the hassle of tape with NONE of the benefits! awesome!

I am sure people will chime in on this, maybe with something actually helpful instead of my gross generalizations, devils advocate stance, and incredible hyperbole.

[rwc]

I find myself these days spending too much time looking at waveforms and digital representations of knobs and faders and not listening to my mixes enough.

operating analog equipment blind is a bitch.

I tried this theory when I was a tech at a "big name" facility.

It's not all it's cracked up to be, mixing with your eyes closed. I kept turning the snare up instead of the kick, and fucking with the cheesy yamaha reverb when all I wanted was the LA-2A. I love looking at stuff! How else would I turn up the ratio on a comp? Can anyone here really find all the controls on an 8088's comps in the center section, for every channel blind? Can you turn the release time of a comp on the SSL 9K down without seeing it? It's enough of a to do without being able to see color for me as it is, much less without being able to see at all!

The VR is the worst offender of them all. Not only for being the worst console for maintenance ever built, but also for the sexy meters and the touchsense faders that light up when you move them. Talk about watching over listening - and this is analog!

But seriously.. with analog, and digital, you will have to look at stuff. You might then find yourself looking at the knobs, or the sexy faceplate in the rack, or the lights and switches instead of listening. I never understood what it was about analog that made people listen more, and to this day I don't. Touching gear, vs touching gear with a mouse, isn't going to make or break a record.

I think bad workflow can kill a record. If I had only three hours to do the best mix I could of a song and I was given a beta version of reaper from two years ago to do so, without ever having used it before, I'd probably make a shitty product. Now, I do well in reaper, because I know how to work with it.

Go for what suits your workflow, what gets results. Don't dismiss an entire method of working though, solely based on the fact that there's an LCD involved.

[Gentleman Jim]

I'm not recording and mixing bands for a living, but I've done some stuff for a few friends. One guy in particular got really hung up on watching the screen when we were doing a mix; I was asking if he liked some fades and he was focused on watching the graphical representations of faders moving, not listening closely at all. After running the mix a few times and getting a bit annoyed that he wasn't paying attention, I turned the monitor off and played the song. Then he had an opinion.

Maybe you should try this method. If nothing else, you may save yourself a few bucks.

[rwc]

I'm not recording and mixing bands for a living, but I've done some stuff for a few friends. One guy in particular got really hung up on watching the screen when we were doing a mix; I was asking if he liked some fades and he was focused on watching the graphical representations of faders moving, not listening closely at all. After running the mix a few times and getting a bit annoyed that he wasn't paying attention, I turned the monitor off and played the song. Then he had an opinion.

Maybe you should try this method. If nothing else, you may save yourself a few bucks.

How does this work in an analog facility? do you keep a blanket around and put it over the console, and a cover over the gear rack when it's time for the band to come in and listen?

[Recycled_Brains]

I turned the monitor off and played the song. Then he had an opinion.

Maybe you should try this method. If nothing else, you may save yourself a few bucks.

That's a good solution. I set one of the "hot corners" on my Mac to turn on a blank screen for when I'm listening. Works great.

[kayagum]

I don't know what your budget is, but it sounds like you want a Radar unit.

I guess they can get a little pricey though.

The Alesis HD24 can also fit the bill too. RADAR is the gold standard, though.

[Gentleman Jim]

rwc asked:

How does this work in an analog facility? do you keep a blanket around and put it over the console, and a cover over the gear rack when it's time for the band to come in and listen?

No, what I would do there is to put black hoods over the band's heads. You can pick them up cheap at Army/Navy Surplus stores locally. Apparently after Abu Ghraib the Army's demand for tens of thousands of these seemed a bit excessive.

If your friendly neighborhood Army/Navy doesn't carry them, you can just keep a container of Morton's Salt handy and throw a handful into each band member's eyes. I think I remember reading that Phil Spector used to do this when the empty threat of getting shot for watching VU meters grew stale.

[Harry]

I did this a couple years ago and it's been great.

I got a Tascam M3500 and an HD24.

It's been a blast finding analog delays/reverbs/phasers and such..

I didn't even fully understand simple concepts like routing until I did it with cables..Like the order you put fx and stuff together. it makes such a huge difference. That seemed kind of lost to me with plug ins.(or should I say found with my new/oldschool setup?)

Plus things just blend together a lot easier for me through an analog board.


But the absolute 100% best thing for me is NO RECALL!!!

A mix is a performance and when it's done it's done...Move on!


There's a lot of boards out there going pretty cheap. I got this 32x8 Tascam in great shape for $600.

[Brian]

Go to my website to the rates page and see whatr I did in the same vein.
I like my rig and it works great out of the box. If I "have to" fix something that can only be fixed in the box I can and then I put it back on the machine to mix out of the box. If I run out of comps or gates or whatever, I can process in the box and send it back and mix.
Just got a BRC for it and some other goodies (junkie talk), even I can run it as I track myself now.

[kinger]

Thanks for all the replies! And please don't think that I endorse completely sightless mixing; I did this once while eating cup o' noodles and accidentally stuck my fork in an open power socket. Boy, was my face red! Come to think of it, a bunch of other parts were also red...

I'm going to have a serious look at the HD24; it's more than I want but anything smaller doesn't seem to exist, other than a used Fostex D-90 and it looks a little dubious. I'm also toying with getting a 1/2" 8-track tape machine but that route is also fraught with peril as you can spend as much time aligning/repairing as actually recording. Anyway, thanks again; now, back to my cup o' noodles...