Band Rehearsals - Sound Levels

[LennyTunes]

Just like guitar players (and keys players), some drummers are consummate and sensitive musicians and very interested in this journey and others just want to bash out rock and roll.

 

Great post, Nathanael. It actually helped me to understand the drummer perspective better.

[SamuelBLupowitz]

Had a revelatory rehearsal with one of my bands last night, when we finally made the switch from a series of little PAs and monitor speakers that were constantly feeding back and competing with amps in our tiny rehearsal room, to switching to running everything direct and monitoring on in-ears (well, studio headphones). All y'all who have been using in-ears for years will laugh at my surprise, but I can't tell you what a relief it was to every single one of us to make that change -- we do a lot of intricate vocal work, and it's become so hard to focus on the details that we want to when our tiny rehearsal space (of five very sensitive musicians) is just a loud mess of sound. But we've just resigned ourselves to it after so much time.

 

The impetus for the switch was that our drummer bought a Behringer X18 mixer, which can run six separate monitor mixes, controllable from a phone or tablet. But the in-ear amplifiers we bought that accept the XLR feeds are on extended back-order, so we just improvised with a 10-output passive headphone splitter I had handy and all shared the same mix out of the headphone output (which I guess we could have done with our old rehearsal mixer anyway). I figured we'd struggle through the compromise for one night, and it would at least bring down the rehearsal volume level. But it was still SUCH an improvement that I kind of can't believe it.

 

Didn't have to mic the drums at all; again, the room's tiny anyway, but the bleed from the drums into the vocal mics gave them just enough presence in the mix that we didn't think about it, and it didn't feel like the sound was coming from a different room or anything. Everything was super clear even in mono, but panning the keys to the left and guitar to the right made it so easy for the guitarist and me to listen and interact with each other the way we're always trying to. The bassist was marveling at how he could sing in his lower register and actually hear himself over the band.

 

I know this is ever-so-slightly OT about the discussion of rehearsal volume levels, but I wanted to share my overwhelming joy, on behalf of every member of my band, at how much we all just improved our weekly rehearsal.

 

Integrating the in-ears into our live shows will require a little more work; the guitarist and I are definitely amp people (I like to use a real rotary speaker for the organ whenever possible; he's a tone wizard who doesn't just use tube amp gain staging as an excuse to play too loud). The guitarist in particular wouldn't want to perform in front of people with his pedalboard-straight-into-a-PA tone, but it's so much better than what he was dealing with in rehearsal before anyway. After years of playing in bands and never really being able to hear what I sound like in the moment, I'm sort of dumbfounded by how easy it was to make the switch. And, as stated before, it didn't actually require that much investment for the rehearsal setup we used -- just some studio headphones and a splitter we already had, and a headphone output from a mixer.

 

[mate stubb]

 

The impetus for the switch was that our drummer bought a Behringer X18 mixer, which can run six separate monitor mixes, controllable from a phone or tablet.

 

Yep, that'll do it.

[Nathanael_I]

In-ears are wonderful. When rehearsing in my studio with the band, the acoustic drums are way too loud. But the kit is always fully mic'd and ready to go. The guitar amp speaker is already mic'd inside an ISO box. We are all on in-ears. Luxurious sound every time. Everyone has an SM-58 to talk/sing into so no one has to yell. Like many, I can't image going back. I'd probably take a small mixer and a room mic before I'd take a wedge screaming at me.

[El Lobo]

Rehearsed with a new band Tuesday night. Country-swing with female vocalist. Drums played with brushes very quietly, acoustic stand-up bass, acoustic guitar. We had to ask guitar to be amped slightly in order to hear him. Vocalist sang without mic in the living room rehearsal. I had to work hard to keep my Nord at very low volume and still be able to play. Pretty sweet. It doesn't all have to be killer sound.

[Stokely]

Yay, our drummer can't make the next practice...so it's going to be an acoustic-style one where we can get through the songs and work on vocals.

I like our drummer and he's good (he's an extremely fast learner so him missing practice isn't a huge deal), but for new songs the first time through I prefer doing this. Basically we will be doing as El Lobo described above but with no drummer I wish we could convince him to do that with the brushes.

 

 

[Spider76]

Bass amps are usually not made to tilt back.

The bassist ends up "listening" with their knees.

The low notes to tend to "bloom" a considerable distance from the bass amp.

 

This.

In my experience too, the worst offender is almost always the bass player. Everything gets drowned in booming bass notes, and if anybody dares to turn up, the bass goes even louder.

Of course, if anybody dares to say he's too loud, it's because "I CAN'T HEAR ME!!! YOU should turn down!"

I really believe it's at least partly because of hearing loss. This was definitely the case in at least two bands I was in. The bassist and/or guitarist clearly had impaired hearing and of course wouldn't admit it, blaming the others for the insane volume levels.

 

I wear hearing protection all the time and use headphones or IEMs. The other can go deaf as much as they want, if it really pleases them so.

 

 

Another thing that drives me crazy: having to shout into the microphone to communicate with other band members, even during breaks and supposedly "quiet" moments, when instead of silence, everybody is noodling on his own instrument at full volume.

 

[MotiDave]

Bass amps are usually not made to tilt back.

The bassist ends up "listening" with their knees.

The low notes to tend to "bloom" a considerable distance from the bass amp.

 

This.

In my experience too, the worst offender is almost always the bass player. Everything gets drowned in booming bass notes, and if anybody dares to turn up, the bass goes even louder.

Of course, if anybody dares to say he's too loud, it's because "I CAN'T HEAR ME!!! YOU should turn down!"

I really believe it's at least partly because of hearing loss. This was definitely the case in at least two bands I was in. The bassist and/or guitarist clearly had impaired hearing and of course wouldn't admit it, blaming the others for the insane volume levels.

 

I wear hearing protection all the time and use headphones or IEMs. The other can go deaf as much as they want, if it really pleases them so.

 

 

Another thing that drives me crazy: having to shout into the microphone to communicate with other band members, even during breaks and supposedly "quiet" moments, when instead of silence, everybody is noodling on his own instrument at full volume.

One of my bands, i would swear the bass player is near deaf. He plays at ridiculous level. I used to play next to him and i would constantly turn him down. He"d go turn up again and I"d turn him back down. Now i play opposite as far from him as i can get. Unfortunately I"m sure nobody else is turning him down and he"s being ridiculous again. He"s a nice guy ... he just needs to hear bass thru his feet because he"s deaf

[WesG]