Recording Will Knox with George Massenburg

00:00:10
Hi everybody! We have the illustrious George Massenburg here, who's gonna show us how it's done, and then we have Will Knox over there, who's also gonna show us how it's done, but in a different discipline.

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The point is we have a bunch of microphones over there, and some cables and some mic stands, and a sound source, and a mind that knows how to combine the sound source, the mic stands, the cables, and the microphones.

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I'm very curious to know how you would do this.

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- I'm hoping that you'll have another idea of how to go about this, and we can find a hybrid...

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or find a conversation, and ultimately, what we are here for is to make your ideas come to life.

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As I was saying, I'm not much for just "good enough." If I don't get ecstasy from it, if I can't get some ecstasy... Not your kind of ecstasy! - Hey, you're making assumptions here! - If I can't get ecstasy, then I don't know what I'm doing in the business! I really want to understand what you're trying to say, and understand that conversation that comes from your song.

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Let's get the microphones up, and then we can move back and forth.

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Ok, this is something that we did with Will several years ago, we're gonna do this in a kind of a funny looking configuration.

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But it sounds big. We're gonna do one up, one down.

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Here's the front of the mic. We're gonna rotate them a little more than 90°, and put them somewhere between the hole and the 12th fret.

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Right about there. I'm gonna use them in stereo, and I'm gonna adjust the stereo by opening and closing the angle of the patterns. - Uh-huh! - What we're gonna ask Will to do is to play as close to this as he can.

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- It's really nice.

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- Alright, let's do this. Let's see how it sounds, just as a first pass.

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It sounds really good in here! - Uh... Will sings.

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- I'm not gonna listen the singing now. - Ok! - But we're gonna see how much we like the guitar sound.

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If we like it so much, then we don't care about the vocal leaking into these mics.

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Then we're ok. - Alright! Let's rock on.

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- I just don't think it's what he was asking for.

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He said it was gonna be warm, and it's too warm.

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We're gonna go change the mic position. - Let's do that.

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- So what we really want to do, I think Will, is go back to your original idea of getting the mics a little closer to the 12th fret. We were a little too close to the hole.

00:02:47
We'll do that just by having you move just a scooch to your right.

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What I want to try is, instead of controlling it that way, I want to try going for size, and using an electrical instrument to control the low frequencies.

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- Ok! We started where you just aimed.

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- Yeah! I made it a little lower, I took them down a little bit, just trying to balance the stage, and we decided to move it closer to the 12th fret.

00:03:15
I never do it the same way twice. Let's try it one more time, pal.

00:03:20
- Let's listen... - Let's listen! - Will, if you will... - Will, can you play? So here's where we are. We went out and listened to our initial take on where the mics would sound good. - Yeah.

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- And they sounded pretty good, but they were... muddy.

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We tried another position that got rid of the mud, but it wasn't very convincing, it didn't have much presence.

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And I wasn't sure how we were going to bring it back, but that thing you said got me interested: Why not go for the best mic position? For a dramatic effect. And you were right! We're gonna have to control the low end somehow, because I don't want to change the mic. I love this mic! I love the high end of this mic.

00:04:16
And I think we can take control of the low end.

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So we're gonna try that a different way.

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We're gonna use this marvelous device called a parametric equalizer...

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- Fantastic! - To reach into the things on the guitar in the low end that are ringing. Because not the whole low end is the same.

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The fundamentals of the Helmholtz resonator are such that they are...

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resonant in a particular fashion, which is in theory inharmonic, they're not tuned to the song, they have nothing to do with the song.

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It all depends on the guitar manufacturer, and the way the guitar manufacturer has decided to tune the guitar.

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- So every guitar is a Helmholtz resonator? - Every guitar in a certain type is a little different.

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- Is that the kind of EQ where you can change the frequency you're touching? - You can do some real visionary take on... - Who came up with this stuff? - I can't remember! But the thing is you can change the frequency, the level, and the width of the peak, so you can make a very sharp, musical... - What a concept! - Dear boy! Could we hear some guitar? Then we're gonna go to work and hack away at it? - One thing...

00:05:39
- It's got a lot more presence when we listen to it that way.

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So, we're gonna try to find...

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I think it's somewhere around there. And we're gonna take that out.

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That's taking out too much. It's very thin.

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I'm liking that sound.

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But notice how we've lost all the warmth. - Correct! - I had mentioned this earlier. So what we're gonna do is...

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we're gonna bring up a shelf to get the warmth back, without that resonance, because most of what we hear in the low-end mud is that particular resonance.

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We take out a very narrow band, et voilà! It's not resonant and boomy anymore.

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But it's not warm either.

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So let's see if we can recapture some of the magic.

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Let's turn the EQ off.

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Now let's turn the EQ on.

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- Fantastic! - It's a warm guitar, a little too warm...

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I'm gonna pull the shelf back.

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And raise the frequency a little bit.

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Ok. This is EQ out.

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And this inharmonic stuff in the low end...

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is what goes away when we turn the EQ on.

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Beautiful! Thank you Will, hang on one second.

00:07:45
- Ok, that sounds great. - The other thing that's happening is this is gonna clean up our track, because that inharmonic stuff is what gets in the way of everything else in the low end. It gets in the way of the bass, it gets in the way of left-hand piano, it's just there like a giant, lurking slug in your mix.

00:08:04
- Absolutely! Shall we try some vocals? - I think we should. Let's set up the vocal mic.

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- In the old days, we would have put a mic up right about there and do it all.

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- What has changed? - Everything! - Explain to me, why not do that? It's so much simpler, just one mic.

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- Because we want to get closer, we want to hear every little ounce of his emotion.

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We want to feel his breath, we want to...

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- Let's get another 55 set up. - Oh yeah.

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- Sing me something. - Sure! - So we're gonna go right where he's singing.

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We don't want to have to have him adapt to us, we're gonna adapt to him.

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- Alright. So, you're ready? - So let's go listen! - I'm not hearing the kind of presence I would expect to hear.

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I want to try a different mic. - Ok! - So, we're gonna switch microphones. - I think we should switch mics.

00:09:20
- I'm missing two things on the vocal. I'm missing... presence, and, I don't know whether it's always the mic's job to deliver that, but an opportunity for presence. If I hear some things that I know I can reach for later, you know, reach for EQ first, but I want to make sure it's there, I want to hear that.

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And I want to hear a little bit more size to the vocal.

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With a slightly larger diaphragm, we should get a little bit more size.

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- Let's try that. - Alright! Good idea.

00:09:51
- We ran into a phase problem where neither of the 2 microphones were actually sounding good, even with flipping the phase in that position.

00:10:00
The CU-55, it was great, it sounded good, but it didn't have the presence.

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And then the 44 sounded great by itself, but it didn't marry well with the other one, even when flipping the phase.

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The problem was not a polarity problem, it was more like... just a bad marriage.

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- Why don't we ask the fantastic performer if he can stand up? - Let's try this. I'm gonna try to get closer to it.

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- How close can you get to that before it really gets uncomfortable? - If I'm over here, I'm real close. - Let's do that.

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We're leaving some distance there.

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Let's get the vocal mic in.

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Like that... Let's try that.

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Let's try that. Ok! So... Will, let's hear the tune with this new setup.

00:11:08
- It's a much better vocal sound. - Yeah.

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- That mic has got a great high end.

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We're getting very close to something that is warm and intimate, and has great high frequency reveal and a lot of breath and air.

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Let's hear one more, Will! - So I'd might as well talk about it while he's... while he's playing.

00:12:02
What I've selected to do is to...

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on the guitar, to scoop out a little bit of...

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320, 318-320 Hz.

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Because that's where we're hearing the vocal in the guitar mic.

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There's an up and a down mic, and this is in the up mic.

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But by scooping that out...

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and here's the frequency we're scooping out...

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And I'm picking a compromise between reducing the vocal, trying to keep the vocal centered, and not taking too much out of the guitar.

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So it's not a single solution.

00:13:02
Let's try something higher for a second.

00:13:05
Well that will be better. This is better.

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So here's 500 Hz.

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Let's listen to that.

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That's with the vocal out. It's a little more centered with the vocal out.

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So let's turn the vocal on.

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It's better.

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This is without guitar EQ.

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With guitar EQ.

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Ok, the vocal's centered.

00:14:00
Too late! - One last time please, thank you.

00:14:05
- We're really getting there, it really sounds great.

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- We have one more thing to do.

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So when he starts singing...

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Here's with the guitar EQ out.

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Vocal peaks are wider and spread out.

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This is with the guitar EQ in.

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Everything focuses.

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We're gonna add the voice EQ.

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Vocal EQ in.

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Vocal EQ out.

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Vocal EQ in.

00:14:58
That's not bad! And it fits where the microphones are just a little scooped out, it feels like it's a little scooped out.

00:15:06
- This is fantastic. - So there you go! - Good! - Thank you! - Beautiful! - Fantastic.

00:15:12
- Thanks George! - Thank you so much Will.

00:15:14
Thanks for your patience and the great performances. Perfect!