We are the music makers - producers?

Logic Pro X question:

I have a track with a finger-picked picked acoustic guitar recorded with two condenser mics. At several points in the recording, the bottom end seems to disappear out of the guitar sound for a bar or so then come back. When I listen to either of the mics solo'd there is no change in sound quality. It only happens when they're combined.

I assume this is a phasing /frequency cancellation issue caused by me moving the guitar about a bit whilst playing. Is there a way of flipping the phase by region, rather than the on the whole track?

At the moment i'm treating it with compression and in some cases cut'n'pasta a different bar from else where in the performance. The problem with that is though that often the dynamics are quite different and it sticks out just as much as the phasing issue.

Any thoughts?

I've been listening again and i'm not convinced it is just phasing. The change in sound quality seems to be neatly aligned with bar lines (it's recorded to the grid). I suspect some jiggery pokery with the comping of one or both of the tracks. Fuck it, rather than spend hours trying to patch it up i'm going to choose the better sounding mic and bin off the other one.

for context, It's a rescue job on a track I started in 2017 and never finished. I'm on a mission to get closure on a load of old stuff before I move on to new things. One mic acoustic is more than okay.

Sounds like a phasing issue but not sure. It might be, as you say, slight variances in timing because you were further from one mic than the other. You could find a transient and compare the offset, and correct by that half a cycle or whatever it is.

Though I imagine you could slice a region and just invert the phase of that region, if you think that would help. Or worst case make a duplicate track, move the sliced region to that track and use a phase inversion utility plugin, which I assume there must be in Logic, though I haven't checked. And then make a track stack to treat it as one track.

You can use the Gain plugin to flip phase, then automate it to bypass the rest of the time. You could also cut and isolate the region where it happens, then zoom right in and see if the waveforms are in phase or not, then shuffle them left or right to match.

Did sound like a phase issue before you mentioned comps.

It could be where you moved with the beat perhaps?

I would probably try flipping one channel phase completely and seeing if that’s any better first. If slight movements knock it into phase cancellation they were probably close to it in the first place.

Are you using the mics as a stereo pair or just to get different bits of the guitar? Maybe high pass one to keep the character but lose the fundamental note so it can’t cancel the other track.

Thanks dudes, gonna try a few of these ideas tomorrow. Off out to an actual gig now!

Attending not playing. Gruff Rhys.

Gotta say, it's a bit disappointing that the reissue of the SP1200 is almost as expensive as the 2nd hand price for an original one. 🙁
When it was announced I was stupidly thinking "well that should help to drop the price of 2nd hand units to a more sensible level"... Guess not now.

^^i can’t remember how it was recorded tbh. Def not stereo pair. The notes on the track indicate that it was a Mojave MA300 valve mic and an NT1A. From the sound of it the Rode was the close mic with the Mojave being used as a kind of “overhead” backed off a few feet. It is weird that it seems to go in and out, I’m going to have a play with it today.

I've heard good things about the S2400, and I think it's like $1,500 new.

I've started taking another crack at modular, starting with building a little Filter chain.

• LPF
  
• Multi-mode filter
  
• Dual LFO
  
• Dual EG
  
  

Outside of an input and output, anything else that might add to it?

Noise / sample & hold? Wavefolder? Overdrive / gain stage?

I was surprised to read that they’d re-engineered the filter chip from scratch. That’s not a small investment. It’s clearly aimed at the higher end of the market, probably also studios who want the sound and workflow but with modern reliability and warranty. Being made in the US means it’s going to be expensive however you slice it.

Been a few “money no object” remakes like this recently, the Prophet 5/10 reissue, the Rhodes mk8 etc.

What do you think a sensible level is? I have one and the current prices look mad.

I guess I was thinking more like a couple of thousand dollars. Just based on the kind of prices they were selling for just a few years ago.
Same thing happened with the Linndrum.
I've still never forgiven myself for missing out on Bronski Beats own Linndrum for a grand on ebay just a few years ago, and then suddenly they started to show up in a few interviews with various producers and almost overnight the price doubled, then tripled, and now people charge up to £4500 for a clean second hand one. 😱

Translating that to pounds it seems pretty sensible. I've only seen mint looking versions selling for the big money though. Mine is a grey 1st run model not the black body that seem to sell more frequently. I fixed a few issues and cleaned it when I bought it 15 years ago, it has a replacement screen.

I managed to get a few machines from that era a long time ago but there were quite a few synths I couldn't afford and I wouldn't pay the asking price now. Worth noting that they have never been 'cheap'.

There's a black body SP1200 on ebay at the moment for £5800!! 😱

https://youtu.be/F52iphP_0AE

Interesting from Dave Rossum here, he practically apologises for the price and says that it had to be that expensive if it was going to be as near an exact replica as possible. He goes on to imply that a cheaper version is on the cards.

Mystery solved. I think they were actually totally different takes of the same part. I guess they occasionally just phase cancelled and the low end dropped out. After doing a rough mix with just one of the mics (thus only one take) I tried putting the other one back in and realised that doubling such a busy part just sounded way worse full stop. Really happy with the way the one mic guitar sits in the mix.

Chancers!

It looks like there's not been one sold in a while though, maybe supply is really drying up.

If I was selling I'd consider Vemia auctions. I used them for a couple of bits before and they handled shipping, literally came with a van and picked the items up. Useful for something that bulky and expensive.

hello, makers and producers

thinking of getting the child (11) a thing to make music on

considering one of the teenage engineering pocket operators. are they robust? They look a little fragile.

also considering one of those things where you have a grid of, say, 36 light up squares. But I cant recall a manufacturer, or what they are generally called?

any other advice, tips appreciated

They’re pretty robust. Korg Volcas are maybe more like proper instruments though.

The new Novation Circuits looks like quite neat little grooveboxes too.

Launchpad? That's a MIDI controller you'll need to use it with DAW software such as Ableton Live

You can get cases for the Pocket Operators

Thanks both! I'll look into the Korg.

Yes, launchpad was what I was thinking of but it won't be right.

Koala and a controller is pretty fun, depending what the kid wants to do. I grabbed the full version a while back but not used it enough to get a good work flow on it yet...

https://youtu.be/XEeV23u1zEE