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How to Convert a Bathroom into a Room Reverb Chamber


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...and it's all analog!

 

I've mentioned this before but I'm not anyone has actually tried it, so...

 

1. Remove anything soft from the bathroom - towels, shower curtain, etc. Preferably, there will be lots of hard surfaces, like mirrors and tiles.

2. Insert a small powered monitor in there. I prefer a 4" speaker with the lows rolled off.

3. Send your reverb bus to a spare audio interface output, and run that to the speaker.

4. Put a mic in the bathroom, behind the speaker, and run a cable from it to a mic input in your audio interface.

5. Close the bathroom door.

 

I record the reverb sound into a track so I don't have to leave the speaker and mic set up :)

 

But wait! There's more!!

 

Changing the mic position even a little bit gives a slightly different sound, sometimes changing the phase makes a difference as well. The main "rule" is I try to keep the mic behind the speaker, so it picks up as little of the direct sound as possible.

 

Some EQ on the reverb really helps, I tend to roll off the lows and lower mids, and maybe boost the highs a bit.

 

This really does work!

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Back in my early Tascam days before affordable reverbs, we used to drop an Auratone cube at one end of a bathtub and a mic at the other and then lay a sheet of plywood over the top of it. Otherwise all we had was springs.
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I have a fair amount of drywall in the bathroom. Are there acoustical treatment options that instead of diffusing or absorbing, reflect? And can cope with the humidity from hot showers? Hmmm...
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I have a fair amount of drywall in the bathroom. Are there acoustical treatment options that instead of diffusing or absorbing, reflect? And can cope with the humidity from hot showers? Hmmm...

 

Mirrors for one. Glossy enamel paint on the ceiling would help. Formica on the walls, hard smooth flooring...

It took a chunk of my life to get here and I am still not sure where "here" is.
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Yes indeed, I mentioned using multiple reverb tracks toward the end, and you could hear how it changed the sound even more. What I find is that moving a mic even a couple inches makes a huge difference in the reverb effect.
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I"ve loved DIY analog reverb solutions for a long time, ever since tracking my first solo album at a home studio where the owner (the father of a college friend) has built and wired up an old-school echo chamber off the live room.

 

I"ve used tiled hallways and stairwells to great effect (no pun intended) as vocal and guitar reverbs. In my new house, the plumbing access panels we"ve had to cut mean there"s a pretty direct line from the studio to the upstairs bathroom. It is giving me ideas...

 

EDIT: I actually found an interview with my friend"s dad, the studio owner. His book Studio Stories is a great read.

Samuel B. Lupowitz

Musician. Songwriter. Food Enthusiast. Bad Pun Aficionado.

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