How many mic's for a rock band?

[marsonpee]

Hello, tonight I have been working out how many mic's/channels on a mixer I should require for getting started with your average band night in a medium hall or small club etc. My initial list was:

 

3 x vocals

3 x guitar (bass, 2 leads)

7 x drums (bass, overheads, toms, snare, hihat)

2 x additional instrument (congo drums, random instruments etc)

2 x DI boxes/lines

2 x mono FX processor

stereo DJ input

 

If anybody could point out any major things I need and have missed out then could you say. Thanks :)

[Ben Lawrance]

You will always be 1 channel short.

[Captain]

Maybe add a couple more Di boxes. Bands with keys, synths and samples aren't unusual, as well wanting the a Di on the bass, and asking for stereo for keys and synths isnt uncommon either. Would suggest 3 as minimum, 4 to be comfortable.

[Rob_Beech]

I'd say this was about right.

There may be occasions where you'd need to have a bit of a swap round.

For larger setups the drum mics may be limited.

kick

snare

hats

tom1

tom2

tom3

oh......

 

Possibility of a 4th tom mic, and a 2nd overhead maybe?

 

With my setups, when I dont know what acts are on or if theres a lot of acts on which do not sound check I'll put a Bass DI box at either side of the stage. that way the bass player can go wherever he or she likes.

This of course would normally require 2 channels for ease of use.

 

I think the main thing is the additional instruments. you can never have enough channels for this.

 

think 2 keyboards in stereo, an acoustic guitar, a saxaphone, some weird synth module.. possibly in stereo. This may not be in the same band but can you warrant puilling leads in and out of the multicore all night to swap things and reset the levels on th desk?

 

 

with what you list you would be looking at a 24 channel board giving you a couple of spares. you may be able to utilize a stereo channel for a dj that may not be counted on the main channel count.

 

 

If you shell out the extra cash for a larger board you have to make it pay! you cannot financially and practically have a 32 channel board when you dont have enough mics and Di boxes to fill it entirely. 8 extra channels you can't use is more like a toy than a financial investment.

 

 

things to remember.

 

Dont forget that bloke who wants to make an anouncement from somewhere to the side of the stage.

Dont forget the spare wired mic for when your (or the artists) radio mic fail mid show. there is NO reason not to have one there IMO.

 

 

Rob

 

 

 

edit : the captain beat me to it with part of it....

[Chris Hinds]

Ben is right, you nearly always end up one short. Also are you prepared to share channels with the opening act? Some (many) headliners aren't. Consequently a night with a headliner and a single opener pretty well fills a 40ch Console, make it two openers and none prepared to channel share and you got yourself a full 48ch console.

 

My typical 5 piece + 3 vox rock input list puts me at about 18ch plus CD and Fx. So I'd start with a 24ch desk being the smallest to look at. 32ch would give you growing room, though by this point lifting and shifting starts to be an issue too. As does space in a smaller venue. You might want to check out one of the smaller digital solutions like the DM1000 too... smaller footprint, and easy to add a few more channels if you happen to outgrow the 20 mic inputs it has already.

 

Regards

 

Chris

[chrisdavies]

I always place 2 sm57's on lead guitar, one at the centre of the cone, one at 45degrees on the diaphragm, this allows you to control how much of a clean or distorted sound you get off the guitar, possibly worth looking at if you've got free channels, as if that ever happens!!!

[Rob_Beech]

hmmm.

 

This is fair enough, however you could go on and on coudln't you.

 

Kick I plus O

Snare Top plus Bot

Hats

Tom 1 thru 4

OH left centre and right

 

Bass DI

Bass Mic

Leads Guitar 1 and 2

Rhythm 1 and 2

acoustic mic

acoustic di

2nd acoustic mic

2ns acoustic di

keyboards 1 2 and a synth module AL in stereo (6 channels)

a saxophone

2 trumpets

5 vocals. 2 backup vocals

dj left and right

dj vocal

fx returns

your cd or md player

and a couple of spares

 

Its an effect and process that works very well dont get me wrong but the OP said, getting started with the average rock band. I think this may be a bit OTT for now.

 

 

 

edit... notice I say BACKUP not BACKING vocals.

[BlueShift]

My desk is laid out as follows:

 

Kick

Snare Over

Snare Under

Hats

Tom 1

Tom 2

Floor Tom

OH L

OH R

Bass Mic

Bass DI

Electric Guitar A 1

Electric Guitar A 2

Electric Guitar B 1

Electric Guitar B 2

Keys - Piano L

Keys - Piano R

Keys - Synth/Loops L

Keys - Synth/Loops R

Keys - Click Track

Backing Vocal 1

Backing Vocal 2

Lead Vocal

Lead Accoustic

Lead Electric

 

Vocal FX L

Vocal FX R

Drum FX L

Drum FX R

General Reverb L

General Reverb R

 

And on the stereo returns:

CD 1

CD 2

 

Thats for a 8 piece band.

 

Chris

[marsonpee]

So a lot more than I thought then. I decided a while ago a 32 ch desk would be a wise choice and I think im right about that :blink: I'd much rather have more channels as spares than just have enough.Desk wise , ive already had up a thread about makes/types etc, think im going to go with a Behringer DDX3216 as it seems pretty good for the money, its expandable and has many many good reviews.Thanks for the help peeps :huh:

[Chris Hinds]

So a lot more than I thought then. I decided a while ago a 32 ch desk would be a wise choice and I think im right about that :blink: I'd much rather have more channels as spares than just have enough.Desk wise , ive already had up a thread about makes/types etc, think im going to go with a Behringer DDX3216 as it seems pretty good for the money, its expandable and has many many good reviews.Thanks for the help peeps :huh:

 

When you're done with 'my first digital mixer' (Copyright Tomy Toys) you can then spend the money you should have spent in the first place on a Yamaha 01v96. Behringer gear always looks 'good for the money' becuase it is. Unfortunately digital desks including Behringer rely on flying faders to switch between sends to different auxes etc. Unfortunately for Behringer when you make the faders fly the actual fader itself flies off the end of the shaft. Hit 'recall' in a scene where all faders go from right down to nominal and watch as the plastic heads fly over the front of the mixer and into the audience. Not nice.

 

The Yamaha will save you money over time, is a better desk, has better expansion and won't let you down mid show. I've known a DDX to hang more than once during a show, while the 01v96 is much more stable. I've never had it hang, but I had it fail to boot once when someone did a patch update on it incorrectly.

 

 

Regards

 

Chris

[timtheenchanteruk]

always get more cables than you need! the one cable you dont have a spare fore is the one that develops a fault!, especially the mic & line cables around the acts feet

[Rob_Beech]

and have them easily accesible, its no good having it "in a box somewhere". You shoudl know where all the cables are so you can go staight to it if you need to in a hurry. I used to carry a box around with one of each of the cables I would normlly use on a gig. That box would be placed in an easily accesible place. I also had a small torch attached to the hinged lid just incase it was dark where they box was placed.

Now I'm doing larger shows I tend not to do this. I know it sounds a bit daft. but I have more crew with me and ALL the necessary cable trunks are at hand most of the time.

However, if ever there is a gig where cable trunks have to be stored out of the way completly, or even back in the van or somthing daft I will set out a range of spares.

 

 

Rob

[Bobbsy]

One comment I'd like to make: all the mic lists above are correct...and all are incorrect too. There is no "right" way to mic up a band and lots of factors come into play here.

 

The original poster mentioned relatively small venues and also didn't mention what sort of amplification and speaker cabs he has. All these have a bearing on exactly how much you need to put through the main PA as opposed to how much is loud enough (too loud?) before you add any extra amplification.

 

For example, if you don't have subs, there's likely not too much point in putting the kick drum or bass guitar through the PA. If the lead guitar insists on using stacked Marshall cabs and a mega head (to match his ego?) then maybe that doesn't need to go through the desk.

 

Taken to the absolute, I've seen some bands who use the main system purely for vocals and rely on backline and pure acoustic energy from the drums. At the other end of the spectrum is at least one Aussie band who have no sound whatsoever on stage and rely on the mix for everything. The reality in this case is likely somewhere in the middle, but the one thing to remember is that you're trying for a good, balanced sound and for that you need to listen to what you have and decide what needs to be in the mix and what doesn't. Unlike huge stadium gigs, club gigs are always a compromise between what the audience here direct and what they get through the mix. Quite often, unless you have the best of equipment, "a little help" is better than trying to do everything.

 

(And the one guranteed "true" statement above is that you always need one more channel!)

 

On the Behringer issue, if I had the money I'd go Yamaha...in fact I DID go Yamaha! However, I'm not nearly so disparaging of the DDX3216 as some. For the money, it's absolutely unbeatable, giving you a decent number of channels AND most of your processing all in one box for under £500. If you're short of readies, it's not a bad deal.

 

Bob

[MarkPAman]

I seem to have done a lot of "vocal only" jobs in the last few months. Although not a problem if you know your band, some bands seem to find it difficult to balance themselves on stage, and of course the sound engineer is the one the punters come to when the can't hear the guitar (or whatever). So, I find it best to have mics / DIs on the back-line amps & kit, and leave them turned off or very low. You can turn it down if it's on the desk, but you can't turn it up if it's not.

[Rob_Beech]

I agree totally Mark.

 

Oddly enough I've also done quite a few small gigs like that recently. I'll often mic up the guitars and DI the bass just in case. A couple of ocasions I did bring up the lead guitar during a solo but the rest was left at vocals and keys only. Luckily the bands could balance themselves on stage really well as has been mentioned.

 

 

Rob