BillFitzmaurice.info

Sitting here on a Sunday morning with nothing in particular to do, so thought I'd just make conversation.

Starting my 66th year on this mortal coil today. Coming off of back surgery a little over a week ago and hoping that, once fully recovered, I'll be back to my 63 year old self.....playing golf, not spending every day dealing with the back issues, etc.

Mixed the band I've been with for 10 years last night. Couldn't carry anything heavier than my iPads. Had one of the guys drag in my rack mixer for me. They replaced their old JBL subs/Peavey Pro series tops a while back with a powered Mackie system. I miss the old stuff. Those old Peaveys were from back when Peavey had a Pro line with a 2 inch exit horn crossed at around 800hz. Really damned nice sounding boxes. But, they wanted to dump the trailer, amp rack, etc to make it easier to move. The Mackies are ok, but can't really push the air that we used to, so I really concentrate on quality and live with the lower decibels. I could push 'em harder, but cheap HF drivers always sound like crap when you step on 'em. So, quieter and cleaner is the rule now.

While we can always wish we had better tools, the whole argument of which system sounds better is really beside the point for most of us weekend warriors. I mix all over town now on different systems in different venues - because I know how to mix. Too many young guys get caught up in the latest tech....should I use the parallel compression plug-in or the Waves bundle that has a much better slew rate when the damping factor is equal to the ambient temperature of the Fairchild Limiter...

When what they really need to do is to learn how to EQ the room before they ever start to sound check, then set a high pass on every channel, then start to build a mix. Then (heaven forbid), close your eyes and LISTEN to the whole mix. Don't get focused on one instrument. Serve the song.

I'm pretty old school in that I only use compressors for fixing a problem. I totally understand their value in the studio, but in a live room with screaming guitars - the compressor on the tambourine is the least of your worries.

Anyway, I digress.....really just wanted to say that I've had a blessed first 65 years. Music has always been part of my life and whether playing in a Rock and Blues band, doing a Classic Country duet singing old Merle Haggard songs, or mixing any of the several bands/acts that I've been priveledged to work with over the years - my day starts with a song in my head and ends the same way every night.

Great post Bruce
Hope you make a full recovery soon, get back to golf and gain some ease in the things you do...

Happy Birthday, Bruce!
Hoping for a successful recovery for you.

Sage advice Bruce. You’ve had more of an impact over the years here than you may realize. Wishing you a speedy and full recovery.

Well, I have another story for you gents......

First, I guess it would be prudent to set the stage with the players and circumstances.

We'll start with a guy named Paul Rogers. Paul started as FOH with George Strait back in the early to mid 80s and has been with him ever since. He gave up the FOH duties a decade or so back, but is still the production manager. Needless to say, he's mixed on the biggest systems in the biggest venues in the country for the last 40 years.

Just so happens that Paul lives right here in my little hometown. While we don't have slumber parties and curl each other's hair, we are acquaintances and friends. I've taken a show or two for him at a local venue where he's mixing and he's stepped in for me at a show that I mix.

That leads us to the show.....about 2 and half years ago, I got the call to mix a radio show in front of a live audience. It's called Roots and Branches of Americana and is put on by the local radio station that is well-known nationally as one of the first and premier Americana stations.

The show is hosted by Ray Wylie Hubbard (he wrote the big hit, Redneck Mother, that Jerry Jeff Walker made a ton of money from for the last 50 years). It's an interview show - typically two performers doing singer-songwriter stuff on acoustics. It's a ticketed event and gets recorded for broadcast the next week. Ray is quite a character and does a great job interviewing the guests and has some great stories - he's been right there along side Willie, Jerry Jeff, and all the Austin scene guys since the 1970s. His last couple of records have had the likes of Ringo Starr, Joe Walsh, Don Was, etc. playing on them. So, yeah - he's the real deal.

I've gotten to mix a bunch of big name performers on that show from Ray Benson of Asleep at the Wheel to Randy Rogers and tons of songwriters and sidemen along the way.

Let's fast-forward to a week ago Tuesday. Typical show with Robert Earl Keen's bass player, Bill Whitbeck and his son doing some original tunes. The second hour was with a young lady named Jade Patek - young up and comer who's out touring and living the standard starving musician life.

And this is where IT happened. I've always prided myself on having no feedback issues in the monitors. Hell, I don't think I've heard a squeek in a few years. About halfway into her interview, Ray Wylie gave me a shout out to the crowd for handling sound.....it's rare to get that from the stage and be recognized by the main guy, so that was nice of him. So, you can imagine what happened next. Not two minutes after he sings my praises to the crowd and the whole radio world- Jade leans her big ol' hat over the mic and EEEEECCCKKKKK!

It was just the one - but of course, Ray gave me credit for it. Later, before I could even say it, he agreed that it was her hat that did me in.

Fast forward to last night - I was mixing the monthly Opry-style Country Music Show that we've been doing for about 6 years when I get a text from none other than Paul Rogers. It said:

I heard your part on Jade's Roots and Branches. It happens to the best of us. Rock on my friend

My part? What the heck is he talking about? Then I remembered that last week's show was on the radio and he heard it. Of course, my part was the dreaded feedback that is now enshrined in the archives of the radio station and can be accessed world-wide.

Oh well, I guess if you are going to get ribbed about feedback, it might as well be from a pro like Paul.

I did tell him that it was the hat and he responded that back in the days before George Strait went to in-ears, he had to tune his monitor with whatever hat George was going to be wearing that night.

As a side note about Paul......a few months back, they booked a Roots and Branches show on a night that I was already comitted to another show, so Paul agreed to come do the show for me. So, we go down the day before to get everything set up and for me to "show him the ropes" on this particular setup. Just two days prior, he'd been putting on a show in front of 100,000 people in Houston at the arena where they have the rodeo. But, here I am explaining our show that's gonna be in front of about 150 people.

The sound business is always interesting.

I always enjoy your stories, Bruce. Well told.

I'd never considered hats being an issue. But, now that you mention it, it makes all the sense in the world. Gonna tuck that little morsel of knowledge in the back of my mind for future use. The shows I do are outdoors. We sound check early in the day and by showtime the sun is in a position that makes wearing hats nearly mandatory for the performers. From now on, I'll make sure they sound check with their hats on.

I wish I could say I haven't had feedback in two years!

Bruce, you gonna write a book? You've got a way with weaving in and about in your story-telling.
Thanks for the hat tidbit.

Seth, I remember that Bill once mentioned that a western hat affected the 3,000hz(?) range when mixing.

Tom Smit wrote: ↑Wed Aug 16, 2023 9:23 pm Bruce, you gonna write a book? You've got a way with weaving in and about in your story-telling.
Thanks for the hat tidbit.

Well, I do enjoy writing, but I have the drive of a two-toed sloth.....which makes the three-toed sloth look downright speedy.

I've written a few pieces for some email groups over the years and even wrote an article about guitar players' sound/tone. Sent it to one magazine, but heard nothing. I may have posted it here years ago. If anyone wants to see it, I could put it back out here. It'd probably piss off the guitar players, but with all the bass players on here - it would be a hit.

Many of you probably don't know that Bill has a book out there in the ether. Good book - I read it a few years back. I think I picked it up as an E-book.

Bruce Weldy wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 9:00 am ..I've written a few pieces for some email groups over the years and even wrote an article about guitar players' sound/tone. Sent it to one magazine, but heard nothing. I may have posted it here years ago. If anyone wants to see it, I could put it back out here...

Even if I've already seen it, I wouldn't mind reading it again. Post it up

Seth wrote: ↑Sat Aug 19, 2023 11:24 am

Bruce Weldy wrote: ↑Thu Aug 17, 2023 9:00 am ..I've written a few pieces for some email groups over the years and even wrote an article about guitar players' sound/tone. Sent it to one magazine, but heard nothing. I may have posted it here years ago. If anyone wants to see it, I could put it back out here...

Even if I've already seen it, I wouldn't mind reading it again. Post it up

Ok, here ya' go......

I had to go hunting for it....wrote it 6 years ago and couldn't remember where I saved it. It's written as a magazine piece...just never got there.

As a guitarist who also owns a small sound company, I’ve seen and heard a few things over the years. Guitarists don’t listen to sound men, nor do they listen much to other guitarists, but having been both, I feel I’ve earned the right to at least talk about ‘em. Some will see themselves…..some will see others….some will immediately stop reading this and drool over the new pedal advertisement on the next page. They can’t help it – it’s like yelling “squirrel” to a dog.

Today’s topic is tone and how it has disappeared from our musical palette. There are players out there with a thousand bucks tied up in their Marshall/Boogie/Vox/(name any boutique amp) that are totally wasted because the sounds emanating from them bear no resemblance to any of them at all. They might as well have saved the money and run direct from their 17-pedal effects board.

Observations/Suggestions

- Effects have totally supplanted tone as the definition of a quality sound for most players….even some really good ones.

- I’d love to see guitarists go through 3 practices with their bands with NO pedal board. Just the channel switcher on the amp. Dial up a fat clean sound and a nice overdrive. If it’s a one channel amp, add a single overdrive pedal for leads. Play this way for awhile – THEN begin to add in effects one at a time and let them truly be an effect – only used on certain songs in certain places.

- Too many people are trying to play live using their “bedroom” tone – you know, the one that sounds soooooo great – all that delay, chorus, and distortion. It makes you sound like a one-man band. Unfortunately, that tone sucks for playing with other people. What guitarists don’t seem to understand is that all of the effects get somewhat buried and lost within the sound of the band – so, if your root tone is covered by effects and the effects get buried in the band……what’s left? Not much except for a really dark, buried sound out front.

- All guitarists complain about keyboard players who are heavy on the left hand. Why? Because it stomps all over everyone’s sonic space, right? Well, guitar players are doing the exact same thing with their giant, fat, lush, wall of sound. For a band to work – every instrument should be heard clearly….so, guitarists – get out of the way!

- Consideration for what the band sounds like out front has become secondary to “how I want me to sound as I play to the back of my legs because I refuse to raise my amp or put it far enough back to hear what’s actually coming out of the speaker”. In order to get the treble I need way up at my ears – I’m killing the people in the audience with a shrill, screeching, ear assault.

- Want to be a better player? Then practice at home with no effects and no distortion. If you can make that solo sing through a clean amp – then you are ready to add effects. Not to mention, you will uncover many problems in your technique and you will spend more time on actual practicing than finding new “sounds” to cover up your playing.

CASE STUDY

Recently, I went to hear a local guitarist and his band. He’s a great blues and rock player, great singer, and has a great band. However, they sounded anything but great.

He asked if I’d listen and help him get the band balanced in the PA once they got started. As they began, his guitar was right there on rhythm, but his leads were buried. So, I went to the board and turned up his guitar mic. The band got louder, but the guitar was still buried. After a few songs, the crowd (they sit really close at this venue) starting telling the guitarist that they couldn’t hear him – even though he was really loud on stage.

I knew what the problem was, so when they took their first break – we took a look at his amp settings. He was using a 3-channel Marshall head. The bass on all channels was dimed. So, we had a short discussion about sonic space, not using his “bedroom” tone and thinning it up some so it would cut through. He really was cringing at the thought of dialing back the bottom, but he trusted me and did it anyway.

After one song, he asked the patrons up front if they could hear him – the answer was yes. Sitting further out where I was – the guitar was now coming cleanly through the PA and you could hear every note of the solos. The bonus was - now that he was no longer muddying up the bottom with his guitar - the bass jumped out of the mix and was clean and every note was discernible.

This guitar player admitted that he was struggling with the sound since it was so different to his ear, but the audience convinced him it was the right thing to do, so he was going to keep the settings that way. A few weeks later, he told me he was playing a gig with a different band that he had played with many times and the drummer commented that he could actually hear the guitar for the first time.

Finding everyone’s sonic space in the mix is extremely important and the majority of the time it’s the guitar that’s messing it up (the other times it’s that left-hand-heavy piano player).

Experiment

I challenge you to make a list of all of those great guitar solos from the past and those great guitarists that you wish to emulate – be it Hendrix, Page….. you name it. Now, get a pair of headphones and listen….I mean really listen to those parts, paying particular attention to the actual guitar tone. You are going to be amazed at how thin and clean most of those guitar lines are. Even their distorted tones are probably cleaner than your current clean tone. The reason those players and solos stand out was because of the playing, the song, and the fact that you could actually hear them pop out of the mix. So, what good is your mind-blowing solo if no one can actually hear it? Clean up your act!

Rebuttal

I’m sure a few of you are crying foul. I know….you just can’t play without your tone. Well, guess what – your tone sucks. If your tone is the most important thing in your musical life, then stay in the bedroom and play away. But, if you intend to play in front of an audience, then your job is to entertain them – which means, how you sound to THEM is more important than how you sound to YOU. You are the guy who demands that you must have your tone, then gripes that you can’t hear your amazing solo in the iPhone recording that you girlfriend did. There’s a reason for that – start at the top and read again.

Conclusion

As a guitarist, you might recognize some of the above issues in your own setup – we all are guilty of some of them occasionally…..some are guilty of them all the time.

But, don’t fret – fix it! Adam and Eve didn’t know they were naked until they gained knowledge. Now you have the knowledge – don’t be showing your ass!



Since writing this, I've seen it repeated over and over and over. I've mixed some really outstanding players whose performance is buried by all of the crap they are running the guitar through. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against effects or pedals - just the extent to which they are used. Most of these guys could just play direct to the PA, because their amp tone is not even discerable.

I'm lucky to stand next to a guy in my band who plays through a Tweed Deluxe 5E3 with just a Zen drive pedal. I've only lately added a Zen drive to my rig (strictly as a clean boost with a little hair) after playing forever straight into my Boogie and just using the channel switcher to get a little dirt. You can hear every note either one of us plays - clean or dirty. We get tons of people coming up to us and wanting to know how we get our tone......before I added the Zen, one guy wanted to know what pedal I use - I pointed to my tuner.

Good words, Bruce.
I run sound from time to time, and I strive to keep a balanced mix. I, too, will thin some things out be it vocals, guitar, keys,....so that everything is cleaner.

I'm a noob to all of this, Bruce, but I've read enough to know that your advice is spot on. Great read! Thanks!

Hey guys,
It looks like Emenince is being handed off to the B&C Speaker family.
https://bcspeakers.com/en/news/186

After reading the press release, my "Hometown American Pride" may be a little sad that Eminence is now ran by the Italians, but I'm not too concerned just yet. I have high respect for B&C and 18Sound products and am curious how this deal will move forward. I'm hoping this at least helps broaden the dealer networks and global availability of all brands involved.

Looks like it will stay business as usual at least for a while.

What are your guys thoughts?

Strange Kevin wrote: ↑Thu Sep 14, 2023 12:28 am Hey guys,
It looks like Emenince is being handed off to the B&C Speaker family.

As an Eminence dealer, I'm sorry to see it happen. Eminence has always been a small, family-run organization where you can get people on the phone. Maybe that will remain, but things usually change when a big company takes over a smaller one.

Hope I'm wrong.

Chances are nothing will change in the short run, as B&C isn't a huge operation. Its market cap at 167M euro makes it a small entity.