Ok so 2 days ago me and my girlfriend went to see one of the farewell shows of Elton John. (Sportpaleis Antwerp)
So the performance of Elton was good. and musicians where good. they played good and Elton his voice was correct in Tune.
But then the sound......brrr especially the vocals. Agressive without any warmth. Sometimes it sounded like a crow singing (the typical distortion of to loud compression drivers....) It was also very loud but without impact, just noise... not nice to listen to. Then the bass/sub was a little shy you could say. The last songs where a little better but still....
A few months ago I have seen queen on the same location. The overal sound was better but still the vocals where ugly sounding and thin....
So this got me thinking. The last years when I go to a concert or festival with live music the vocals are always compromised.....why is that?
A few years ago I saw deep purple also in the same location and that was wonderfull and good sounding.
It's really a shame.
Today there is a lot of DSP power where past sound technicians could only dream of.
There is a lot more amplifier power and speakers have more power handling then ever... but to be honest.... it doesn't sound really better.... I think it sounds actually worse... Why is that?
Most mixing engineers mix with earplugs to protect their ears.....
Just putting the master volume down a few dB is to easy?
Now I just read in the newspaper that the same thing happened on the first concert of the reunion tour of the spice girls. I'm not a fan but it's the same problem again with vocals.....
On the other hand most people just use their phone when listening to music.....so maybe they don't now how a decent live PA can and should sound....
So share your toughts I would say
So the performance of Elton was good. and musicians where good. they played good and Elton his voice was correct in Tune.
But then the sound......brrr especially the vocals. Agressive without any warmth. Sometimes it sounded like a crow singing (the typical distortion of to loud compression drivers....) It was also very loud but without impact, just noise... not nice to listen to. Then the bass/sub was a little shy you could say. The last songs where a little better but still....
A few months ago I have seen queen on the same location. The overal sound was better but still the vocals where ugly sounding and thin....
So this got me thinking. The last years when I go to a concert or festival with live music the vocals are always compromised.....why is that?
A few years ago I saw deep purple also in the same location and that was wonderfull and good sounding.
It's really a shame.
Today there is a lot of DSP power where past sound technicians could only dream of.
There is a lot more amplifier power and speakers have more power handling then ever... but to be honest.... it doesn't sound really better.... I think it sounds actually worse... Why is that?
Most mixing engineers mix with earplugs to protect their ears.....
Just putting the master volume down a few dB is to easy?Now I just read in the newspaper that the same thing happened on the first concert of the reunion tour of the spice girls. I'm not a fan but it's the same problem again with vocals.....
On the other hand most people just use their phone when listening to music.....so maybe they don't now how a decent live PA can and should sound....
So share your toughts I would say
Some sound 'engineers' have damaged hearing and what I call "cloth ears". They cannot tell how it really sounds. It is an age thing adjusted by experience and sound levels too loud. The problem is the more experienced the engineer, the more work they get and in time it can go pear shaped.
One thing I learnt many years ago as a sound engineer is once the sound it set leave it alone as nothing changes apart from the lead singer may require more or less effects/delay/echo etc from time to time. I am in demand as an engineer and have had no complaints.
One thing I learnt many years ago as a sound engineer is once the sound it set leave it alone as nothing changes apart from the lead singer may require more or less effects/delay/echo etc from time to time. I am in demand as an engineer and have had no complaints.
today there is more power, but at the cost of quality, higher thd is what you hear in that crow sound, nothing DSP can fix. Less good drivers are now used with high feedback amps. All the new drivers can do is HEAT , take heat and scream very loud. Old PA drivers could play very loud with very little power but quality.
If you have a good sound system at home you cannot listen to pop music anymore, the upper bass and deep bass sounds like a car sub for young ****** people. It is produced to sound ok on cellphones and cheap audio which has almost no bass under 200 hz....
Deep bass is also now a distorted mess to sound 'authoritative'.
To me this is not music, but pop junk, but the black eye peas were the first to record deep bass lines for subs (which sounds very good!!! YouTube), it was very clear. Nowadays, most pop songs have that deep bass too but it is a dirty boomy bass.
If you have a good sound system at home you cannot listen to pop music anymore, the upper bass and deep bass sounds like a car sub for young ****** people. It is produced to sound ok on cellphones and cheap audio which has almost no bass under 200 hz....
Deep bass is also now a distorted mess to sound 'authoritative'.
To me this is not music, but pop junk, but the black eye peas were the first to record deep bass lines for subs (which sounds very good!!! YouTube), it was very clear. Nowadays, most pop songs have that deep bass too but it is a dirty boomy bass.
Ok so I am not the only one having this experience....
I sometimes do sound on small venues and we have build our own PA systems Problem is that most of the time DIY is classified as "junk" by many mixing engineers without even listening.... And if you hear what they do when mixing..... Our PA doesn't have brochures and technical/commercial blabla but it works.
Ok it has small flaws too (every system has) but most of the time we have 20db of headroom giving some serious impact....
Ones we had a stacked system using 10" horn loaded mid's and an array of 1" compression drivers on a waveguide on top of a stack of 12" loaded subhorns. This was outside. There was also a big name company inside a tent with I think ten times the power and more speakers. They had to come and ask if we could turn our system down because they couldn't do a sound check because our system was to loud. Now it didn't hurt or sounded screechy. it was loud but not extreme. But the sound had a lot of throw and the vocal stayed clear and full even at 100m... 10" drivers where RCF and altough it's an older driver they still make them.
So if you then go to a concert where a big name company does PA with a big name PA system and it sounds crap it's frustrating....
Many small 'line arrays' if you can call them that have very limited response at upper bass where the warmth of the vocal is. It doesn't help if you use 6.5" or 8" drivers to get the case as small *** possible and use tons of EQ and Power..... Now if you start from a 10inch low mid driver..... it does make a difference
But then boxes become to big.... today it's all about show and the sound comes second....so the less speaker the people see the better.
I hope it will change in the future.....
The last system we build was for permanent install. We used 2 12" drivers (12p80nd) under a coaxial dompression driver The 12p80nd impressed me. So tight clean and loud..... Underneath double 18" reflex (18pwb1000fe) very nice driver to go low..... but you need to tune low and make the box a little bit bigger.
good for permanent install. System had a response from 25Hz (-3db) to 20kHz. Almost no EQ needed and super tight but when needed could go lower then most systems....
I sometimes do sound on small venues and we have build our own PA systems Problem is that most of the time DIY is classified as "junk" by many mixing engineers without even listening.... And if you hear what they do when mixing..... Our PA doesn't have brochures and technical/commercial blabla but it works.
Ok it has small flaws too (every system has) but most of the time we have 20db of headroom giving some serious impact....
Ones we had a stacked system using 10" horn loaded mid's and an array of 1" compression drivers on a waveguide on top of a stack of 12" loaded subhorns. This was outside. There was also a big name company inside a tent with I think ten times the power and more speakers. They had to come and ask if we could turn our system down because they couldn't do a sound check because our system was to loud. Now it didn't hurt or sounded screechy. it was loud but not extreme. But the sound had a lot of throw and the vocal stayed clear and full even at 100m... 10" drivers where RCF and altough it's an older driver they still make them.
So if you then go to a concert where a big name company does PA with a big name PA system and it sounds crap it's frustrating....
Many small 'line arrays' if you can call them that have very limited response at upper bass where the warmth of the vocal is. It doesn't help if you use 6.5" or 8" drivers to get the case as small *** possible and use tons of EQ and Power..... Now if you start from a 10inch low mid driver..... it does make a difference
But then boxes become to big.... today it's all about show and the sound comes second....so the less speaker the people see the better.
I hope it will change in the future.....
The last system we build was for permanent install. We used 2 12" drivers (12p80nd) under a coaxial dompression driver The 12p80nd impressed me. So tight clean and loud..... Underneath double 18" reflex (18pwb1000fe) very nice driver to go low..... but you need to tune low and make the box a little bit bigger.
good for permanent install. System had a response from 25Hz (-3db) to 20kHz. Almost no EQ needed and super tight but when needed could go lower then most systems....
Maybe an Antwerp problem. Jeff Beck at the Louisville Palace was great in 2017 (he doesn't sing, the women do) Fleetwood Mac & Lynyrd Skynyrd sounded great at the Louisville Yum Center in 2018.
I've preserved my hearing with earplugs since ROTC in 1969. I still have 14000 hz response. So I should be able to tell. There are PA artists out here in flyover land. Some of them are at Far Out Music where I shop for dead PA gear.
I won't even listen to MP3 on decent speakers, I think they are the casette tape of the 21st century. Cell phone music? That is not music, that's a commo device. And those tiny "smart speakers" everybody is diving into? The emporer has no clothes. The SP2-XT in my living room derive from the Bell Lab experiments with horns of the 30's, emgineered to 2nd harmonic HD 20 db down @ 1W1m. I listen at 1/8 watt base level at 3-4 meter away.
I've preserved my hearing with earplugs since ROTC in 1969. I still have 14000 hz response. So I should be able to tell. There are PA artists out here in flyover land. Some of them are at Far Out Music where I shop for dead PA gear.
I won't even listen to MP3 on decent speakers, I think they are the casette tape of the 21st century. Cell phone music? That is not music, that's a commo device. And those tiny "smart speakers" everybody is diving into? The emporer has no clothes. The SP2-XT in my living room derive from the Bell Lab experiments with horns of the 30's, emgineered to 2nd harmonic HD 20 db down @ 1W1m. I listen at 1/8 watt base level at 3-4 meter away.
well I'm still quite young but I have listened to some loud music but never ever do I listen to headphones. Only exception is when I play in the studio. When I do some mixing I use monitors.
I still hear till around 15k. Many people don't and turn up the high frequencies. I have the tendency sometimes to put less high in a mix because of this...
Today it's all about Sub and High like putting a smiley on a graphic EQ..... A contributing factor is the fact that loudness regulations use the dBa to measure noise. Turning up the sub won't be a problem. Turning up the highs won't be a problem either. Turning up the mids however..... now guess where al the basic music experience is located in the frequency spectrum.....
I do like loud music but it should have dynamics. 90dB of average is loud enough but having transient peaks going 10 -15db above this gives a nice experience and impact you can feel. There will also be some quiter parts... (you know dynamics....)
If everything is slammed to 90db with a few dB left of dynamics it sounds like noise to me. and in my opinion this is where the hearing problems (tinitus) comes from. Your brain reacts against the noise and hello tinitus.
I experienced this a few times. a lot of dynamics and it was a joy to listen to. the day after my hearing was just fine.
Having no dynamics an a constrained system with lots of agressive distortion and the day after I had a little bit of tinitus. It got away after a few days but still...
But I am glad there are still people wo listen to music and think a little bit in the same direction.... I was born to late I guess.... many people my age (I'm 33 btw) don't understand my frustration about music these days.... And I do like electronic music (a lot actually) but it should be something decent without autotune and massive sub.... (I'm a big fan of psytrance and the like....)
I still hear till around 15k. Many people don't and turn up the high frequencies. I have the tendency sometimes to put less high in a mix because of this...
Today it's all about Sub and High like putting a smiley on a graphic EQ..... A contributing factor is the fact that loudness regulations use the dBa to measure noise. Turning up the sub won't be a problem. Turning up the highs won't be a problem either. Turning up the mids however..... now guess where al the basic music experience is located in the frequency spectrum.....
I do like loud music but it should have dynamics. 90dB of average is loud enough but having transient peaks going 10 -15db above this gives a nice experience and impact you can feel. There will also be some quiter parts... (you know dynamics....)
If everything is slammed to 90db with a few dB left of dynamics it sounds like noise to me. and in my opinion this is where the hearing problems (tinitus) comes from. Your brain reacts against the noise and hello tinitus.
I experienced this a few times. a lot of dynamics and it was a joy to listen to. the day after my hearing was just fine.
Having no dynamics an a constrained system with lots of agressive distortion and the day after I had a little bit of tinitus. It got away after a few days but still...
But I am glad there are still people wo listen to music and think a little bit in the same direction....
I was born to late I guess.... many people my age (I'm 33 btw) don't understand my frustration about music these days.... And I do like electronic music (a lot actually) but it should be something decent without autotune and massive sub.... (I'm a big fan of psytrance and the like....)Elton John is well known in pro audio circles for wanting ear bleeding loud SPLs at his concerts. Yeah I know that seems strange given his chosen music genre but there it is and when the engineers make that happen sound quality takes a back seat. And if you have been to a major concert in the last 20yrs or so there is a good chance the main PA was a line array of some type.
This type of PA is very good at delivering consistent SPLs to the vast majority of seats and it's very touring friendly with fast setup and take down times so there are several very good reasons major concert firms use this system, but sound quality does suffer for some listeners because the way this system works depends on constructive and destructive interference from a hugh stack of drivers. The good news is all you have to do is move a little bit to get a totally different experience, it could be a few inches or a few feet depending upon your distance from the PA. Sucks if your seat was in one of these bad spots as it was for me at a Stones concert a couple years ago but that is a concert goers life these days, corporations set the priorities and unfortunately for music fans sound quality is waaay down the list.
This type of PA is very good at delivering consistent SPLs to the vast majority of seats and it's very touring friendly with fast setup and take down times so there are several very good reasons major concert firms use this system, but sound quality does suffer for some listeners because the way this system works depends on constructive and destructive interference from a hugh stack of drivers. The good news is all you have to do is move a little bit to get a totally different experience, it could be a few inches or a few feet depending upon your distance from the PA. Sucks if your seat was in one of these bad spots as it was for me at a Stones concert a couple years ago but that is a concert goers life these days, corporations set the priorities and unfortunately for music fans sound quality is waaay down the list.
As others have said. It's not the gear, it's the people.
Some are actually conditioned to distortion and find clean natural reproduction boring and "lifeless".
The gear available today can easily deliver very clean high impact audio to the majority of the audience when properly tuned. It's a shame that the potential isn't fully utilized every time.
Best large indoor concert sound I've heard was Yanni...don't laugh. Sound was a bit rough at first but by the 3rd song it was dialed in and sounded very natural with the volume right on point. This was a 15,000 seat indoor sports venue with a two line array hang 8 boxes per side. This was in 2005. The tools 14 years later are much more refined.
Some are actually conditioned to distortion and find clean natural reproduction boring and "lifeless".
The gear available today can easily deliver very clean high impact audio to the majority of the audience when properly tuned. It's a shame that the potential isn't fully utilized every time.
Best large indoor concert sound I've heard was Yanni...don't laugh. Sound was a bit rough at first but by the 3rd song it was dialed in and sounded very natural with the volume right on point. This was a 15,000 seat indoor sports venue with a two line array hang 8 boxes per side. This was in 2005. The tools 14 years later are much more refined.
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Most of the time when they use line arrays te sound sucks, You can really here the "phasing" interference It's consistant bad sound everywhere... most line arrays are way to short actually... if you read the theory
In my opinion they should at least horn load the lowmid section = less power = less distortion It's more difficult to build the speaker boxes but it can sound very good. Martin has done this in the past with very nice results.
Small line arrays just don't sound right. and using EQ is not a solution for everything....
In the end of course much is done bye the mixing engineer and going to the "digital" age of mixing with lots of effects etc on each channel doensn't help either.
The first concerts I was just used Wbins and a "stacked" system. now that really gave a punch I don't get anymore on a concert.
Ok flying a big point source is not that easy......and Wbins are not that good. but there are good solutions that can really work well.
In my opinion they should at least horn load the lowmid section = less power = less distortion It's more difficult to build the speaker boxes but it can sound very good. Martin has done this in the past with very nice results.
Small line arrays just don't sound right. and using EQ is not a solution for everything....
In the end of course much is done bye the mixing engineer and going to the "digital" age of mixing with lots of effects etc on each channel doensn't help either.
The first concerts I was just used Wbins and a "stacked" system. now that really gave a punch I don't get anymore on a concert.
Ok flying a big point source is not that easy......and Wbins are not that good. but there are good solutions that can really work well.
Then you're going to the wrong concerts. The big systems these days don't just punch you in the chest. They make it feel like the entire world is moving, sometimes below 30Hz.
A big stack of Nexo Alpha (flat to 40Hz) can still be a lot of fun, and my hands-on experience with that system is why all of my PA subs are designed to hit 40Hz or lower.
FWIW, it's perfectly possible to have good live sound. I'm told I do it regularly, but it is literally my business to do just that.
That said, I do remember watching an instructional video of what a top-class engineer does in terms of processing just on the snare drum. Harmonic exciters, two compressors and some other bits later, and the result was far removed from what was actually going into the microphone. IMO, that's going too far. The drummer has chosen that snare drum, and I don't think it's the job of the sound engineer to change the sound so drastically.
There are lots of contributors to bad sound. Some of them are the sound engineer, of course. However, things like ear-splitting stage volumes will make life difficult for any sound engineer. You end up EQing the mics to avoid feedback, which degrades the sound.
There's also the possibility that the PA's coverage just isn't that smooth. If you're in a small area that's +5dB at 5kHz, everything's gonna sound harsh. Of course, the PA could be EQ'd to take out the 5kHz peak, but if the other 4,999 people in the audience are going to end up with a dip there, compromises must be made.
One last thing to consider is the fact that the PA system is almost certainly at or near the limiters for the loud parts of the performance. If you haven't hit the limiters, you've brought too much PA, which in turn means less profit for the PA company - you could've sent the excess boxes (in the case of an array) to another gig, and done a quicker setup with the resultant smaller system. Too much PA = less profit, and the PA world is competitive.
Chris
W bins are dated but **efficient** , a little power (by modern standard) goes a long way.
Modern Subs are small and go deep but absorbs truckloads of power.
In the end we have to move Air, and you can´t beat the Laws of Physics. No way.
A horn efficiently couples small throat area to huge mouth area, and a little movement at speaker is translated to huge movement at the mouth.
A direct radiator needs to have HUGE X displacement so unaided piston moves lots of air, there´s no other way, and that gobs power.
Modern Subs are small and go deep but absorbs truckloads of power.
In the end we have to move Air, and you can´t beat the Laws of Physics. No way.
A horn efficiently couples small throat area to huge mouth area, and a little movement at speaker is translated to huge movement at the mouth.
A direct radiator needs to have HUGE X displacement so unaided piston moves lots of air, there´s no other way, and that gobs power.
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Artists are lining up to play Louisville Yum Center & Palace theater. It can't be just the green room or the catering.
Jeff Beck had a couple of big horns on top of the stack right and left and an 8' x 8'x box probably of woofers below, all at the front of the stage. Bass line was belly shaking, the vocals and lead were probably 90 db. Perfect IMHO. He and the bass player were standing in front of guitar/bass amps, probably 50-70 W, about 15' back from the audience speakers, there were no stage monitors. I mean tweed amps that sat on the floor behind the guitar player like 1966. Tremendously rational, IMHO, especially after people like Ted Nugent went deaf.
I couldn't see the sound system at Fleetwood Mac & Lynyrd Skynyrd, there was too much video and lighting stuff in the way. But again, 90-95 db IMHO in the important band. Skynyrd in particular is an invitation to crank it up to the limit, but these guys & their sound guys were mature enough to use the dynamics to manage the show. I shall say volume peak of the show was Gimme Three Steps with justification. Free bird was the closer but it's more a reflective song, softer. Particularly playing over the videos they showed of all the fallen heros.
As far as using the excess equipment for ++++db at another show, hey this is Louisville, what other show? There is probably one spare PA amp and driver set in town, sitting out on the truck just in case.
I've heard FM & LS both on PBS HD-TV playing 300-500 seat halls. The PBS producers are grownups that run a great concert series. Here in Louisville both acts sounded just like themselves, only louder than my 100 w/ch TV system with the 6.5" coaxial speakers.
Jeff Beck had a couple of big horns on top of the stack right and left and an 8' x 8'x box probably of woofers below, all at the front of the stage. Bass line was belly shaking, the vocals and lead were probably 90 db. Perfect IMHO. He and the bass player were standing in front of guitar/bass amps, probably 50-70 W, about 15' back from the audience speakers, there were no stage monitors. I mean tweed amps that sat on the floor behind the guitar player like 1966. Tremendously rational, IMHO, especially after people like Ted Nugent went deaf.
I couldn't see the sound system at Fleetwood Mac & Lynyrd Skynyrd, there was too much video and lighting stuff in the way. But again, 90-95 db IMHO in the important band. Skynyrd in particular is an invitation to crank it up to the limit, but these guys & their sound guys were mature enough to use the dynamics to manage the show. I shall say volume peak of the show was Gimme Three Steps with justification. Free bird was the closer but it's more a reflective song, softer. Particularly playing over the videos they showed of all the fallen heros.
As far as using the excess equipment for ++++db at another show, hey this is Louisville, what other show? There is probably one spare PA amp and driver set in town, sitting out on the truck just in case.
I've heard FM & LS both on PBS HD-TV playing 300-500 seat halls. The PBS producers are grownups that run a great concert series. Here in Louisville both acts sounded just like themselves, only louder than my 100 w/ch TV system with the 6.5" coaxial speakers.
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When fans walk out, you know you have problems:
Spice Girls fan 'walked out' over sound problems in Cardiff - BBC News
Brian
Spice Girls fan 'walked out' over sound problems in Cardiff - BBC News
Brian
It's not just the speakers or their type, there is actually someone in the house listening and adjusting controls to make it how they want it to sound. So if there isn't any "punch" the mixperson simply didn't want it that way.
Modern stadium PA's can more than adequately deliver the "punch" along with as much sub-bass as the sound designer wants. A properly deployed and tuned rig by Meyer, L-Acoustics, d&b, Nexo and others similar can dish it out as they are so distortion-free and capable of flawless time alignment.
Of course they can be set-up and operated wrong, -but at the Elton John level that is highly unlikely. I have used the old stack rigs from the 70's & 80's (and still own some) and I have set-up and more modern stuff like vDosc, k1 & k2 (L'Acoustics) and as far as I'm concerned there will be no voluntarily going back to the old stuff by me for that level of show.
I still use my vintage rigs but only for smaller low-budget shows that use 1 stack per side, multiple side-by-side stacks just destroy any quality with the comb filtering on the older stuff. It was never designed with seamless array-ability in mind!
For Elton's concert, you were probably just hearing the effect of his jet-engine-blast monitor levels, -remember that the mic will pick that up too and it will never be perfectly in phase with what comes from the performer's voice. I've heard and read that it is stunningly loud at his piano bench. If so, there's no way that is not messing with the vocal feeding the house rig!
get use to it, these digital pa's have too many toys and everyone is compressing everything and driving amps into clipping because they have no clue WTF they are doing.
Surprised Elton had a problem, most of those sound techs understand this.
The clubs I go to are just horrible now, maybe 1 in 10 sound techs actually have a clue, most of them are sitting there smiling while their subs are feeding back and everyone is as far away as they can get because 110db is still 110db which is way too loud for a club.
Surprised Elton had a problem, most of those sound techs understand this.
The clubs I go to are just horrible now, maybe 1 in 10 sound techs actually have a clue, most of them are sitting there smiling while their subs are feeding back and everyone is as far away as they can get because 110db is still 110db which is way too loud for a club.
I heard Motorhead Valbyhallen 25 years ago. The place was notorious for bad sound but sounded great. 4 years ago I heard them at Skråen - a new acoustically treated and designed venue with state of the art PA. Sound was awfull no matter where in the room. I was so pissed about beeing one of the thousands who looked forward to that concert for more than a year, and only got an unpleasant experience for their money
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