[Mixing] Mid / Side EQ

This is a really interesting technique that seems to be really useful when trying to master bad mixes where you don't have access to the original mix or project. As ever this one was discovered on a weekly trawl of GearSlutz where I regularly seem to find new (to me) and interesting (to me) ideas and ways of working.

The way I use it is to use two copies of the stereo file in a DAW on separate tracks, then use MSED as an insert switched to "encode" with the "side" muted then a linear phase EQ then another inserted MSED instance switched to "decode" with "side" muted. I do the same on the copy of the stereo track with "mid" muted.

I tried this out on a really old (1998) live recording of a band I was in where we have an old tape recording from the desk in the venue. Like a lot of recordings from then (who knows what happens now, it costs so much to get a recording from the desk nowadays) the mix is pretty extreme - loads of bottom end on the bass but no mids, very trebly hard panned guitars, not a lot of drums (it was a loud drummer so not much needed to go through the PA in such a small venue) and a fairly decent vocal sound.

I am definitely not a mastering engineer but this is a really interesting method of splitting the signal into the mono only and stereo only elements and bringing the bottom end into line and balancing the stereo more than you might think possible - just by using EQ and panning on each of the two copies of the original stereo track. It's fascinating to use.

There's much more helpful info here: http://www.about-audio-mastering-software.com/mid-side-eq.html

If you've got dodgy old tapes this could help - the people I was in the aforementioned band with seem to have dug a lot up recently...

[Recordings] New Audio Online

I've uploaded a few new things to my website - at the bottom of the audio page as usual.

There are a couple of no input mixing tracks. Everyone who comes round here seems to be fascinated by this method of making sound and I have to admit I am not entirely sure why or how it works but it's very powerful and expressive. I do wonder how long the mixer will last, but considering it is about 40 years old anyway I suspect it won't be long.

I finally uploaded a track based on the Karplus Strong algorithm which also makes use of some drum synthesis which sounds like the most basic sounds one can achieve with a Roland TR808 which I made mainly using [noise~], [adsr~], [osc~] and [lores~] objects - basically kick, snare and hi hat sounds (sort of).  It's a bit of fun. I also recently made a recording with Seth using a heavily modified version of this patch - more on this soon - it needs some heavy editing and mixing but uses the patch in a more interesting way.

Another new one is Yuri which is created using a fairly complicated Pd patch. It has no "user" controls at all, it just uses various ways of creating random numbers to control the subpatches and how and when they fade in and out. I also used the bowed string and marimba from the PeRColate library (contrary to the Wikipedia article PeRColate has been ported to Pd).  I need to make it more interesting.

The above patch was inspired by listening to the music on PatchWerk Radio which is great. On a Mac I needed to download the ogg stream and play it in VLC.

[Website] Updates

I have finally uploaded the other improvisations from Und to my website. These were performed by me, Seth Guy and Mark Pearce. Mark contributed vocals - some improvised some from texts and some old songs.

Mark also shot a couple of short videos of me and Seth explaining what we were doing and how. I can't say I really like seeing myself talking on film but, it's documentation I suppose.

I've also uploaded two videos of The Miller Test from a recent gig (13/04/11) at Nambucca a brilliant venue on Holloway Road in London. Apparently some of the PA was rescued from the recently demolished Astoria and it really does sound good in there. Turns out it is owned by the same bloke who owns the rehearsal studio we use who very kindly made us a cup of tea when we got there and shouted us a few drinks - not something that happens regularly!

[Acoustic] Und Recordings

I've finally uploaded the Und files to my site - at the moment there is the final performance from 13th February 2011 and a long improvised piece by me and Seth.

Bit disappointed that the Space Bass doesn't really cut through on the handheld Zoom recorder we were using but it's not too bad overall. It was a fairly difficult environment to record in anyway, given the amount of natural reverb.

Personally I thought this was Annette's best performance of the seven we did.

One thing I absolutely love is that you can hear the rain coming down the drainpipes in the building throughout. I don't really like the sound of the bloke going "hmmm" all the way through it.

"Green tin table" indeed. Go for it Mr Barker.

Reviews:

Venue

Aesthetica Magazine

Explanations:

Me and Seth Talking Part I

Me and Seth Talking Part II

[Live] The Miller Test

We're playing at Nambucca on Wednesday night (13th April).

Embarrassingly I have never been there before - even though loads of friends have played there in the past...

[Live] The Miller Test, tonight

The Finsbury

336 Green Lanes, Manor House
London, U.K., N4 1BY UNITED KINGDOM

[Live] Looks like I am in another band

Having a try out for my friend Wayne's new band soon - here - looking forward to having a bash at it. Should be a lot of fun.

Wayne is the other member of renderplant

[Mixing] The Miller Test

We finished and uploaded the best recordings of The Miller Test recordings we did recently. They're on myspace.

Had a few scares doing this stuff, losing files and all sorts of weird things going on but they're as finished as they will ever be. We've got a load of other songs we need to record too.

Note Miller's excellent myspace graphic! Hehe.

[Recording] John Zorn

I am mixing several different recordings of John Zorn's piece Hockey - recorded with Vultures Quartet recently. We used some different instrumentation for these recordings which was fun. I was playing guitar, violin as well as the usual Pd patches and some bits and pieces of percussion. Anthony was on acoustic bass fed through some amazing effects as well as using lots of small percussive stuff and Will used his usual "cymbal tree".

The mixes are not sounding as good as they could at the moment however - a bit thin - so I need to do more work on them.

Stay tuned as they may well end up online, who knows?