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ASSORTED NUGGETS OF MONITORING WISDOM

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CAN YOU TRUST YOUR EARS?

Even if you have perfect hearing, your ears will not always give you a true idea of what is being heard.

Expecially if you like to really

crank your monitors while mixing. As the session progresses, your ears will have a tendency to become accustomed and eventually numb to volume and EQ levels. We call this phenomenon ear fatigue. The longer your session, the more ear fatigue you’ll encounter.

EXAMPLE : Have you ever spent an entire night working on a song trying to get the EQ and volume just right, only to find that when you listen to your results the next day you are horrified by the shrillness and lack of separation ?

This is a symptom of ear fatigue. By the end of the session, your ears had become accustomed to the EQ level...so you cranked in some more mid and highs. You also cranked the monitor amp level up every once in a while, so by the wee hours, things sounded distinct to you (after all, you were listening at a VERY high volume which tends to help definition...until you turn the level back down and discover mush at normal volume).

To avoid this, give your ears a break every hour or so they can recuperate. Also, it is a good idea to resist the temptation to start out mixing with a real high output level because this will speed up the process of ear fatigue.

Your mixer can become a victim of this vicious circle as well. Avoid inching up your levels in order to get better separation. Watch EQ levels, too. You may think you can get better results by adding a lot of EQ to a guitar or keyboard part to open up the mix. But eventually your CR-1604 can become overwhelmed by heavy-handed EQ and excessive output levels, creating what we call mixer mush.

Like we said, take a rest every once in a while. If things start getting out of hand in regards to the overall clarity of your mix, stop for awhile, go grab a soda or order in a pizza or both. What the heck. Big studios do it everyday !!

You’ll find these rest times are a far better use of time than if you just bear down and twist some more knobs.

CAN YOU TRUST YOUR MONITORS?

Another common problem that many new engineers experience is the Big Studio Surprise . It happens when they take their tape to a larger studio with better monitors.

“Gee, the bass didn’t sound that boomy at my studio” “Where’s the guitar solo?””

“The cymbals sound like garbage can lids !!”

If this has ever happened to you, don’t feel bad. You can’t appreciate a color movie if all you have is a black and white TV. And just like having a good video

monitor, the key to successful music production is an accurate idea of what your mix really sounds like.

In order to do this properly, several things must be present. The first and foremost is a quality set of control room monitors and a clean power amp with plenty of dynamic headroom.

These two components are indispensable if you are to achieve the album quality product that many of our professional users achieve with their CR-1604’s (one recent album mixed on the CR-1604 was submitted for a Grammy nomination... in the classical category where they’re sticklers for sound quality).

If your current monitors are an old set of POLY POOPALA liquid cooled monoliths that you bought off your roommate for a hundred bucks, and your amp is the stereo receiver you bought with your paper route money 15 years ago, you can be assured that whatever you create with your CR-1604 will most likely not sound right if played on any other system. Save cheap hi-fi speakers and wimpy 30- watt amps for your next garage sale.

Instead, spend the money on serious monitor speakers and a beefy amplifier.

Actually we recommend two or three sets of speakers: First, a good quality pair of near field monitors. This is a mandatory investment if you’re serious. They’re critical to accurate perception of what you’re creating, since as you move close to true near field monitors, the room’s acoustics no longer become as large a factor. You can then hear exactly what’s happening. Next, get a pair of cheap mini-speakers. These simulate boom boxes, car ra- dios, etc. Finally, if you’re not out of room and money yet, get a pair of larger speakers with 10 or

12-inch woofers. They can be pro-style studio monitors or just quality stereo speakers with good bass response. This pair gives you the other end of the consumer spectrum and helps with adjust bass response to fit your potential audience’s hi-fi systems. “DO I HAVE TO?” Like we said at the beginning

of this manual, it’s your music. Good monitors and power amps don’t have to cost a fortune.

DON’T DEVELOP TUNNEL HEARING

Even if you have ultra-accurate monitor speak- ers, remember, not everyone else does. Experiment with different systems to really hear what your music sounds like. Take your rough mixes to your friends house and play it on his stereo or pop a cassette of your mix into your car stereo. This will give you a wider feel for what your studio monitor system is really telling you. This is exactly why there are always at least two sets of monitors in big recording studios.

CARE AND FEEDING OF YOUR CR-1604

•If you’re going to use the CR-1604 in a horizontal position (the mixer, not YOU!), cover it when not in use to prevent dust for settling in the faders.

•To clean grunge out of the channel faders, use “canned air” which is available at photo shops. It comes in compact spray cans.

Just shove the nozzle into the fader slot and blast away. Do not use any solvents.

•To clean fingerprints, diet Pepsi and peanut butter off the surface of the mixer, spray Windex or other ammonia-based window cleaner on a rag and rub at will. Do not spray cleaner directly on the mixer lest it get into the faders.