HI again James,

Sorry, bumped a button, ended up replying to part II before
part I.  


You wrote:

> YEah I know, that's the other thing frustrates me, was
 RW> drummers who didn't tune the kit properly, expect me to
 RW> solve their problems with technology, such as noise gates
 RW> on tom mics, etc.  OFten any signal processing I had
 RW> available
 RW> was needed elsewhere, i.e. the bass man who can't play with

JB> Revisiting my last issue: White-lithium grease kiddies! One dollop
JB> on each of your drum-pedals will make you squeak less, and just
JB> *might* improve your playing. Tommy Lee (NOT a fan, but an admirerer
JB> of his professionalism.) was quoted as spouting off about a certain
JB> model of Tama bass drum-pedal, and that he could hear the click of
JB> the metal banding used to connect the foot-pedal to the cam. The
JB> bass-player from Motley Cru [Umlaut omitted for lack of time/concern
JB> on the topic.] Nicky Six, [?] was waxing over that "That's just too
JB> much detail, Tommy!" on the topic, but it is FAR from a "mute"
JB> point! [Duplicitous meaning *purely* unintentional, but *I* found it
JB> funny! ;-] If a band of leather and one well placed rivet can
JB> improve your product and you DON'T do it, what does that communicate
JB> to the professionals that you are trying to impress? Sally in the
JB> front row will tolerate the clicks every time you "kick" the
JB> bass-drum, but there's idjiats like Tommy and me in the audience
JB> that will pass judgment on you as a musician for *dozens* of these
JB> issues. 

Indeed this is true, and what I've always argued.  All those little things add
up to a lot.  I always thought GHost kick
drum pedals were well built, but the old sPeed king was
still my favorite.

JB> I explained to a local cutie, that a modern PA rig, or even a
JB> moderate recording studio begins to resemble a passenger jet
JB> cockpit. I don't think she could envision it, but some of these
JB> manuals *alone* require an engineering degree, and a masters in
JB> linguistics to reverse the logic used to to write such scuttle-butt.


YEp, often translated from Japanese or something to English
as well.

JB> Heck, even a JBL car amp with a built in active crossover has me
JB> frustrated at the moment! I've NEVER had a reason to suspect their
JB> specifications (Which I *just* found on the back side of the back
JB> cover page.) but the document was intended for the Thump-And-Bump
JB> crowd, and I expected at first view that a lot of stuff I find
JB> interesting would be glossed over. (The slope of the crossover
JB> band-passes. PS current dumping? ...) Regardless if it was


YEah I can relate.  I've never been into automotive sound
that much, but I've always heard that one should take the
specs they give on those things with a good dollop of salt.



 RW> with the snapshot automation.  THat was a day from hell, two
 RW> blind guys trying to figure out interfacing that thing with
 RW> two Alesis adats for a session.  I was glad my buddy still
JB> I have to admit to the breadth of my ignorance regarding your
JB> "limitation". Pardon me, but isn't this *truly* the blind leading
JB> the blind?  

YEp, we were sure having fun, finally we said to heck with
it, hooked up the studiomaster and went analog into the
decks, got rhythm tracks down.

JB> I hope to get more into it in the Hinton's echo, but I utilize a lot
JB> of brackets, abbreviations, and just stupid contractions that I
JB> think might appear "cute" to the sighted. I *was* wondering how this
JB> translates through your voice engine/Braille monitor?

OFten when just reading it doesn't give me the punctuation,
but when replying I"ve got the configuration for an editor
showing me such things, for obvious reasons.

 RW>   YEah I can relate.  A buddy of mine who services
 RW> broadcast transmitters is always telling stories about
 RW> people wearing watches rings and the like and 

 JB> Welding classes are down the hall? Cripes... Imagine how many ways
 JB> "talent"  finds to ruin a modulator's gain structure? [...]
 JB> neighborhood a "free show". What a  "clipping mess" that product
 JB> sounded like!

 RW>   sOme people shouldn't be allowed near such

JB> Ya, and there's a reason they make those little adjustment
JB> screwdrivers out of plastic *besides* the potential that you could
JB> spot weld it to the mother-board. 

Some folks are just too dangerous to themselves and others
to be let out without a keeper  things.  A friend of mine in upstate NY was arguing for a
 RW> poster in an internet forum to acquire a large format
 RW> Yamaha digital for a church monitor console because setting
 RW> could
 RW> be passworded.  I argued for good old analog, because the
 RW> "praise team" didn't have sound techs even for front of
 RW> house, talent adjusted it themselves.

JB> Hm... I *think* I'm on the fence on this one. Give the pastor an
JB> index card containing the instruction to return the board to unity
JB> gain and flat eq, then hire a tech for a day to balance it up for
JB> the snapshot??? Let the "talent" tweak away, and when the mess gets
JB> too smelly... No, I think a simple automated board would be my
JB> preference. If the pastor is astute, he could be left with a second
JB> index card on how to store and recall a snapshot for when Dwain
JB> comes in with his bass guitar. Maybe it depends on the
JB> pastor/volunteer tech, and their ability to learn?  Maybe a high
JB> resolution snap-shot of a balanced analog board could supplant the
JB> automation? 

YEp, or, you lock up the limiters, the eq and all that in a
closet, and give them familiar controls, nobody but your
visiting tech who comes by once in awhile tinkers with the
stuff in the closet, or the locked rack.

 RW> have those parametric eqs on all the groups and that, along
 RW> with compression gates and the like, but folks who are
 RW> boiling hard just to remember to count down to the fourth
 RW> knob on the keyboard channel if you need more keyboard in
 RW> your in-ear monitors and turn that one up are going to even
 RW> have a tougher time selecting things in the menu structure
 RW> from hell.  Then, since they use in-ears, if some bonehead
 RW> happens to defeat the limiters that protect his eardrums
 RW> and deafens himself then he sues the church.  THere are
 RW> reasons
 RW> we professionals advocate that anybody monitoring through
 RW> those earbuds or headphones should strap a brick wall
 RW> limiter across them.

JB> For the love of the Lord... YES! A friend told me those in-ear
JB> dohickys had a built in limiter/compressor. Not so?

THey do have, of sorts, and they'll work, but often they're
on the transmitter, and can be defeated.  Even then, a good
limiter such as an Aphex dominator you know will do its job. Sharp transient
spikes can do some awful things to you.

 RW> All you need is somebody defeating that because they suffer
 RW> from the principle of mild, as in "make it loud dammit"


JB> I now have a new acronym I can "take to the bank".  Yes, I know
JB> all to well what you mean, though. Blue Oyster Cult, I saw
JB> attempting to destroy a FOH system by trying to "MILD" it. 

DIg it!  That "mild" isn't original with me, a guy I know,
Fletcher at Mercenary Audio in Boston, Ma. coined that one.

 RW> up professional dressed, actual shoes on feet, ready to
 RW> work.

JB> "Actual shoes *on* feet..." That's *so* funny in so *many* ways! 

YOu wouldn't believe the guys I've seen show up for a load
in and set up with sandals or flip flops.  WHen somebody
works for us doing a remote if they're working overhead
flying stuff I tell him or her that you *will* get a hard
hat from the truck, and it will be on your head.

JB> My mind is repeatedly returning to a PTSD incident were the pick up
JB> "lighting tech" couldn't undo the knot on the auditoriums' truss
JB> during a tear-down. This *special* guy found the quick fix to be to
JB> pull out his Buck knife and let gravity do his work for him,
JB> dropping the truss and ALL the pars to the stage four-feet from a
JB> BRAND NEW Gretch snare I had just crated, and closer to my head. I
JB> think that was my turning point if I was going to waste any more
JB> time with *that* band of thieves. Cripes, if I need steel toed boots
JB> AND a hardhat to play rock and roll, I needed to find a new
JB> profession!

  I've seen that before, watched a guy drop a wrench
which barely missed me on the deck one night, same sort of
situation.  That's why if they're flying stuff overhead I
insist folks working for us wear that hard hat.
I watched another guy drop a weight from a line one night
and do some pretty good damage to a piano.  HE was tied off
up there luckily, but the arbor for the weight was too long
a reach, and he dropped it.  IF he hadn't been tied off not
just would the piano have been damaged, but he might not
have survived the night.

 RW> everything that goes down in documentation is written by the newbie,
 RW> even if he doesn't understand it.  tHen we go over
 RW> his session log after the day's work is done, and we
 RW> explain why he was told to make note of that.  This means making
 RW> notes of the position of every knob button and fader on the
 RW> console, what's patched where on the patch panels, etc.

JB> That's an interesting point the layman can't seem to grasp. Your
JB> workday doesn't end when the tape is stowed. Heck, I'll bet most
JB> would think the tape says on the deck! To power up, AND to shut down
JB> is a sequence in itself. A neighbour *just* expressed, "I'll learn
JB> to play the guitar in three months, and get the quantity/quality of
JB> chicks you used to." (It's the same *arse* that I can't teach how to
JB> wrap a cord, but he's crass like me and a LOT of fun to poke with a
JB> stick. ;-) I didn't bother to get into callous management, or how us
JB> musicians are #2 in line for carpal tunnel and repetitive stress
JB> fractures, but I tried to explain the time commitment before you
JB> step foot on your first showcase gig, even IF you're an art-school
JB> punk band with better haircuts than equipment. Cripes, if he saw the
JB> price of *one* good guitar cable alone, I bet he'd learn how to care
JB> for the friggin' thing. 

I"ve seen plenty of them.  Back in the day often you had
better recalibrate the machine before you started work that
day too.  I"ve been in this business decades, and I still
learn something new every job it seems.

Regards,
           Richard
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