Now that I know better, this probably wouldn't work again

[dino]

Talked to an old friend the other day. He reminded me of something I had long forgotten about. Back around 1987-8 or so I was recording my friends acoustic group in a basement. The place was very,very dead acoustically, and the recordings certainly reflected this. For some crazy reason I convinced the homeowner to bring his very expensive stereo speakers, Cantons I believe, and put them at the far end of the room. I put up a Beyer M500 ribbon near where the band was set up and ran it through a reverb unit to the speakers. The Beyer was not sent to the recorder, only the speakers. I then pumped a teeny tiny bit of the "wet only" sound from the reverb into the the speakers. I then miked everything and sent that to the recorder like we had done before. The only difference was the addition of the artificial ambiance coming from the Cantons. After adjusting the reverb and speaker volume we were able to make the recording sound so much better than what we had been previously getting in that space. We were floored by how much the dead acoustics of the space were improved by doing this. I never tried this again and as I said, completely forgot about doing it. I don't even have a copy to go back and listen to, but I wondered if it could be considered a legitimate reusable technique or just a lucky one time happening that I was just ignorant enough to pull off.
Has anyone here ever tried something this ridiculous?
Dean

[MoreSpaceEcho]

any technique that makes shit sound better is totally legit. i've done similar things loads of times.

[vvv]

Two things I look to do is play the mix thru monitors (more often just the drums, or the drums and guitars) into a room mic; the other is I like to play the mix or parts of it, and record that in M/S.

[dino]

It still amazes me that I didn't blow his tweeters with feedback. I set the level just under where it wanted to start ringing. I did intentionally use only the slightly delayed reverb signal and no part of the original sound being picked up by the microphone.
The vast amount of variables involved with the room, the speakers, the microphone and electronics could have been an issue but it just worked right off the bat with only a little futzing with the reverb time and speaker level. I would have hated to blow those speakers. They were like eighteen hundred for the pair or something ridiculous. That was a whole lot of money for 1988. Heck! It's a lot of money today. I can't imagine what they would have cost in todays market. I just know if I tried to duplicate the technique today it just wouldn't work and i'd be spending big bucks replacing drivers. I'd really like to try again sometime though....d

[Gregg Juke]

Brilliant, if risky solution! Try it now with some PA speakers, maybe?

Like vvv, I've done the artificial drum enhancement thing. And there was that LA technique of recording drums while blasting them through a PA. But your expensive speaker reverb trick certainly takes the cake.

GJ

[vvv]

And there was that LA technique of recording drums while blasting them through a PA.
GJ

The Stooges' Funhouse technique, also, I believe simultaneous with everything else being recorded.

[dino]

What's the term? Gluing the mix together. It certainly had that effect. I hope my friend can find the old cassette copy he had. Of course then I'd have to find a cassette deck to play it on. Mine hasn't worked in ages. Heck, if I can repeatedly duplicate this technique it would be an amazing tool for anyone forced to record in a bedroom or basement or whatever. In all seriousness, I think the key to my success, besides sheer dumb luck that is, is that the room, or basement in this case was full of old boxes and piles of old clothing and was absolutely without natural reverberation. Sort of an anechoic chamber by mistake. If there had been any sound bouncing around, I bet I wouldn't have been able to turn the speakers up enough to create the effect. Am I making sense here?

[Gregg Juke]

Absolutely.

They had a lot of weird speaker-y things going on at Motown Hitsville though, if I remember correctly. I think 3 or 4 guitar players were sub-mixed and monitored themselves live through a stereo speaker as a side-fill; no headphones. Not that that greatly affected the final mix or anything, but it was part of the milieu.

GJ

[dino]

First off I'd like to thank everyone for responding to this thread. Secondly, if there's anyone in the DC area that would like to help me reproduce this technique, please don't hesitate to contact me. And as Greg cleverly suggested, I even have some PA speakers to use for the purpose. I'm actually just getting back into recording after many years and would love to interact with some local TapeOpers. I actually have a whole bunch of decent gear that sits idle most of the time that I would love to bring with me. Even if your not local, I'd love to hear about anyone who may want to try this.
While on the subject of serendipitous things that worked when they probably shouldn't have; a few years back I lived in an apartment where I had a real basic system for practicing and recording. A simple two microphone setup used for vocals and acoustic guitar. One day while reconnecting things, I pushed up the fader on the guitar mic and the ambient sound of the house suddenly went away!. I'm sure you all have figured out what had happened, but at the time it didn't occur to me that the wiring on the guitar mic cable was reversed and the opposing phase of the two mics was canceling out the common noise from outside the room. Though try as I might, I was never able to duplicate that effect anywhere else. I guess it was another case of a "Perfect Storm" scenario where all the factors like acoustics and distance and whatever, interacted to create the effect. Once more proving it's better to be lucky than good....d

[Danly]

Something similar to that which I do is send the p.a. some kick drum. Feels great when you hit the kick. I don't have a sub, but I imagine that would be awesome. You'll get some nice low end in the room mics.
I'm sending it stuff post recorder from a cue send. Interesting idea to try reverb in there too.

[Gregg Juke]

Slightly off-topic, but: The best monitor mixes I ever had from behind the kit were when the vocals were balanced with just the right amount of kick and snare. When you can feel the low end like that, it really helps you to play with more authority (but conversely with less bashing).

Now days the crazy kids (drummers and bassists) have their "butt-kickers" and motorized platforms to stand or sit on and feel the low end.

GJ

[dino]

PA's have obviously evolved a bit since I ran one. The idea of mixing the kick & bass into the monitor mix certainly makes sense. Never heard about motorized platforms though. I would imagine the principle is the same. Anything to keep things in the pocket sounds like a brilliant idea.

I'm sure you understand that if you're adding verb to anything you're kind of stuck with it forever. Thats why I just barely kissed the speakers with the reverb. The effect wasn't particularly noticeable until we played the recording back. I just wanted to do something to create the impression of a bigger space. The fact that it worked so well was just pure dumb luck. I guess I need to resurrect the beat up, cheapo Lexicon I have around here someplace and try to re-create the technique. I suppose it isn't really any different than adding the verb in the mix but it seemed like a good idea at the time. d