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This makes me thankful to be in Texas where sound engineers are still capable of dealing with a loud tube amp mic'ed through the PA because Texas and loud guitars are still a thing and so they get plenty of experience in dealing with a Twin or other loud combo set on 10. I am always ready to throw down and put someone in their place about it. Maybe I have an attitude but I'll threaten to walk on a gig if they can't be reasonable. A lot of places the soundmen seem to think they are more important than the entertainment. They need to be reminded: you are there to make me sound the best you can with what I give you to work with, not the other way around.
Originally Posted by Christian Miller
As far as I'm concerned plugging into a P.A is for when a gig pays so low it ain't worth humping an amp. I haven't played for that cheap since I was in my early 20's. I'd rather stay home and wash my hair.
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12-23-2022 12:31 PM
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Sorry to hear that it did not work as you expected , but you have to dial in your sound before going to pa/ monitor etc...You are sorta working backwards here...... Technically, since you don't want to carry the 48 pounder, you need to get something to replace it,(obviously the fishman is not it) which is smaller and lighter and sounds the way you like...as a first step you could test this with a DI direct to the L1 and see if you like that, if not, then that's where you start, get the sound you like first. Originally Posted by charleyrich99
hope this helps
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I think most good ones prefer to mic. The reason they don’t is probably the fact that many venue owners won’t spend their $$ on good mics and boards. Going DI is better than using marginal mics and preamps/boards, especially because it also bypasses the input stage on the board. Power amps are generally interchangeable, although speakers are clearly not. And it appears to me that venues put a lot more money into their speakers than they do into the invisible component of their systems. Originally Posted by Christian Miller
Even the lowly SM57 (still a decent mic for most purposes) is close to $100 now. An M80 is about $250, an SM27 is $400, a DPA 4018 is over a grand, and Neumann etc go up from there. Even if the biggest group they book is a quartet, they probably need 3 or 4 for the drum kit, 1 for each amp, 2 for an acoustic piano, one each for horns, upright bass, vocals, etc. And mics get dropped, smashed, stolen, etc. So it can add up to a barrier for club owners - even those who can well afford to do it right.
Yes, you get what you pay for - but (as HL Mencken said) you can’t go broke underestimating the taste of the public
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100% agree with this post. Good soundmen don't give the musicians grief they just do their job I just think some soundmen have no experience dealing with loud bands and so they are intimidated or annoyed by them. A lot of the crappier clubs don't provide sound but the better paying clubs around here usually farm the work out to dedicated sound companies or hire a few regulars from those companies to run their house owned systems, so it's a rotating cast of guys, just about all of whom I've worked with at various gigs at one point or another. Most of them are really good at their jobs. Only a few have created any kind of problem and they usually get weeded out by their own people or by club owners overriding them altogether when there are conflicts. I've had good fortune with soundmen in central Texas, many are musicians themselves and several I would call friends so I am thankful to have them in my life. Hopefully it stays that way! Originally Posted by nevershouldhavesoldit
I think most good ones prefer to mic. The reason they don’t is probably the fact that many venue owners won’t spend their $$ on good mics and boards. Going DI is better than using marginal mics and preamps/boards, especially because it also bypasses the input stage on the board. Power amps are generally interchangeable, although speakers are clearly not. And it appears to me that venues put a lot more money into their speakers than they do into the invisible component of their systems.
Even the lowly SM57 (still a decent mic for most purposes) is close to $100 now. An M80 is about $250, an SM27 is $400, a DPA 4018 is over a grand, and Neumann etc go up from there. Even if the biggest group they book is a quartet, they probably need 3 or 4 for the drum kit, 1 for each amp, 2 for an acoustic piano, one each for horns, upright bass, vocals, etc. And mics get dropped, smashed, stolen, etc. So it can add up to a barrier for club owners - even those who can well afford to do it right.
Yes, you get what you pay for - but (as HL Mencken said) you can’t go broke underestimating the taste of the public
About mics, after a lot of gigging and recording I still prefer the lowly SM57 for mic'ing cabs. I carry my own Beta 58 for vocals. I've used some expensive Royers, the Sennheiser dedicated cab mics, etc and none of them impressed me enough to justify the added price though they are still quality gear. The 57 is just a great mic period IMO and worth the $100.
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In Texas you can probably also drive to the gig tbf and have a straightforward get in. Makes moving a tube amp a lot more practical. Originally Posted by DawgBone
It all kind of hinges on the set up of your local scene… Texas will always for me be the spiritual home of the electric guitar, so …
As far as loud guitars go - well I’m a jazz player not a blues guy. I don’t actually want the guitar to be that loud, and neither do I look for the amp to colour my tone particularly, so practicality and convenience don’t require much sacrifice. My gigging tube amp is a Princeton lol. So I don’t need to die on the hill of Authentic Tube Toan or whatever, that’s not really my thing. I’m not exactly an electric guitarist in that context, more like an amplified guitarist if that makes sense, and found it hard to play if the amp level was set too high. (Getting back into more electric playing again now I have the 335.)
but I do have to say that playing through a Twin or something adds a certain element of comfort to a gig even at a lowish volume level.
It’s nice when there is one as a house amp, although the one at Ronnie’s is an absolute state haha.
But more recently it’s moved to these DI solutions like Axe FX in the commercial/big pop show/theatre band environment and in ears and things which sound horrendous to work with.Last edited by Christian Miller; 12-23-2022 at 06:16 PM.
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For sure. I’d rather have a consistently decent and easy to get sound than a sometimes great sound. I see it as removing variables. That said if they’ve gone to the trouble of setting up a fender amp, I’ll go with that. Originally Posted by nevershouldhavesoldit
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As a retired sound engineer (+40 years) I can tell you I much prefer to mike (guitar amp mics are inexpensive) your rig than any other method ...You usually would have it tuned up the way you like it and that's what I would aim to reproduce, unless I was your soundman, then we could get creative together but, this is not the case.....The OP does not have a sound engineer or a decent PA for that matter Originally Posted by nevershouldhavesoldit
I think most good ones prefer to mic. The reason they don’t is probably the fact that many venue owners won’t spend their $$ on good mics and boards. Going DI is better than using marginal mics and preamps/boards, especially because it also bypasses the input stage on the board. Power amps are generally interchangeable, although speakers are clearly not. And it appears to me that venues put a lot more money into their speakers than they do into the invisible component of their systems.
Even the lowly SM57 (still a decent mic for most purposes) is close to $100 now. An M80 is about $250, an SM27 is $400, a DPA 4018 is over a grand, and Neumann etc go up from there. Even if the biggest group they book is a quartet, they probably need 3 or 4 for the drum kit, 1 for each amp, 2 for an acoustic piano, one each for horns, upright bass, vocals, etc. And mics get dropped, smashed, stolen, etc. So it can add up to a barrier for club owners - even those who can well afford to do it right.
Yes, you get what you pay for - but (as HL Mencken said) you can’t go broke underestimating the taste of the public
Get your sound early and keep it all the way thru...or deal with the opposite : garbage in garbage out .
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I've had to plug into a PA now and then - more in jams than gigs.
Recently, I was playing a pretty big room (think converted warehouse) where there was a Yamaha Stagepas 300. It would perhaps be fair to say that this is the low end of the PA spectrum. The Stagepas speakers were on big poles -- I had to reach up to plug in.
I went out of my LJ with an XLR cable right into the Stagepas. Another guitar and vocals were also in it. I'm not sure if bass or drums were in it, but I doubt it. I was very pleasantly surprised with the sound. The LJ is 15 lbs and about a 10 inch cube. It's easy enough to carry that I can't imagine leaving it home and plugging in to the PA directly.
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+1 Originally Posted by rpjazzguitar
Good example right there, and you control your sound, to some extent , and you get your monitoring....
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If you have a Fender Twin Reverb on 10 and you still need a PA, how the hell big is the place you're playing? A Twin on 10 ought to fill Madison Square Garden.
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it did occur to me… but, you know, it’s Texas Originally Posted by Cunamara
If you have a Fender Twin Reverb on 10 and you still need a PA, how the hell big is the place you're playing? A Twin on 10 ought to fill Madison Square Garden.
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Quote of the year! :-) Originally Posted by DawgBone
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Hey There, I believe Tuck Andress does plug his guitar directle in to the P.a. I've read that somewhere. He built a pre-amp into his guitar. So you can't say it's directly into the P.A. but sure a lot less kilo's to drag around. I like his sound very much
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I've gone direct via a Line6 Relay G10 wireless, which has both XLR and 1/4" outputs. The sound wasn't terrible. Didn't sound like a Twin Reverb, but then I'm not a Fender fan anyway. A GK MB200 is better, but bigger. I can use the head with a cab plus XLR out, or just the head with no cabinet. Works either way, and it allows the output to be before or after the preamp section. Any small solid state head should allow use of the direct out without a speaker cabinet.
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I do a lot of outdoor gigs. I play monthly at a place that has a couple hundred people or more in it and all the instruments are mic'ed and run through house sound. I am known as the loud guy but we do well there and have a good working relationship with the owner and volume draws in customers as long as you are making good sounds. Coming from the world of Marshall half stacks a Twin is kind of like a toy to be honest. It's not nearly as loud out front as a half stack laser beam and it has half as many speakers and an open back cabinet. We play rocking blues, but not blues-rock, so volume is generally part of that and a Twin is about ideal where a Deluxe would nose over and not be able to get a clean sound at those volumes for more laid back soul tunes and the like. Originally Posted by Cunamara
If you have a Fender Twin Reverb on 10 and you still need a PA, how the hell big is the place you're playing? A Twin on 10 ought to fill Madison Square Garden.
As Christian Miller mentioned a lot of gigs here are ground floor and often you can back your car up near the stage so load-in isn't bad but the amp still doesn't move itself, lol. Hand cart. Playing loud and playing quiet are somewhat different skill sets each with their own challenges and rewards. I don't mind doing lower volume gigs I just want to know about it in advance so I don't get made a fool of in front of an audience being told to turn down. If you have a good band and everyone utilizes good dynamics you can get away with more volume than you might imagine as you can trick the ears in a way as volume and intensity is constantly on the move, which should be part of any good blues band's bag of tricks.
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yeah I don’t think that’s unusual here either tbh. Used to be a blues night at my local and that’s what they would bring. Volume would be vibey but not offensively loud. Originally Posted by DawgBone
my new local has a Fender tonemaster twin as the house amp. I like it.
I used to gig a Plexi half stack in my youth, could never get thing to break up lol. I don’t know if people still do that?
There seems to be a genre of YouTube video which under 40s getting their faces melted by cranked Plexis. I kind of feel like no one’s playing them like that any more?
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