Re: on-stage personal monitoring...loop-related, i assure you

[Zoe Keating <cello@zoekeating.com>]

My roommate plays loopy things in his band Crater. I've seen him sends a 
mix
of necessary sounds to a small personal monitor speaker, on a stand that
points directly at the drummer's head.

I do this with my band too. We have a looping violinist and cellist. The
last show, both of us sent a line from the back of our amps to a single,
mulit-input powered speaker for the drummer. We've talked about getting him
one of those little mini mixers, so that he could have more direct control
over our levels.

For myself, I tried using different kinds of headphones and had a few
problems. 1) I tend to put my ear over the cello strings when playing and I
keep bonking the headphones on the finger board 2) I feel kinda removed
physically from the audience and 3) sometime my hair/headdress is elaborate
and getting the headphones on and off is complicated! i had one funny 
moment
when they got all tangled up in my dreadlocks and dangled off the side of 
my
head for the remainder of the song. I should still try a discreet "bud" in
one ear maybe. Won't mess up my costume!


> From: "JAMES FOWLER, III" <jimfowler@prodigy.net>
> Reply-To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
> Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 08:59:54 -0700 (PDT)
> To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
> Subject: on-stage personal monitoring...loop-related, i assure you
> Resent-From: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
> Resent-Date: Sun, 4 May 2003 12:00:00 -0400
> 
> the band i play with, mainframe theory, employs loops
> all over the place.  it's great because it allows me
> to become 5 guitarists and it serves as a metronome,
> which is great for those drummers that like to speed
> up when they get excited.
> 
> but...making sure that everybody can hear the guitar
> is difficult.  keeping up with the drummer isn't
> difficult...keeping up with the guitar is.  i'm
> thinking that personal mixes via headphones is the
> only way to ensure that everybody gets a great mix, so
> i want to know if anybody is doing this.  i'll
> probably need to mic the bass and guitar and feed that
> somehow to three sets of phones for myself, bassist,
> and most importantly, the drummer.
> 
> suggestions?
> 
> -jim
>