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Here are some pictures I took of the microphone setup for Don Cabellero's American Don sessions. Keep in mind that the setup could have changed at any point after I took these photos.

This first one shows the drum kit from the front. The drums are in the Kentucky room of Studio A. You can see an AKG C-24 out in front of the kit as the stereo overhead mic, a D112 for the kick, Josephson 606/609's on the toms, looks like a Beyer 160 as a mono overhead.



This next one of the drums clearly shows the positioning of the C-24 (used as M-S pair) and you can also see the Altec 150's as room mics, and the Altec 175 on the snare.



This shows a close up from behind the kit. There might be something strange going on underneath the hi-hats, but I can't quite tell.



Here you can see another Altec 175 on the auxillary snare.



Moving on to the bass guitar cabinet which was in Center Field along with the guitar cabinets. That's an EV RE-20 on the left and an Audio Technica 4033 on the right.



This one just shows the room mic for the bass cabinet - an AKG C-414.



Two final shots of the guitar cabinet setup. From left to right it goes RCA BK-5A (room), VTL CR-3A, AKG C-28 w/ CK-4 (bi-directional) capsule, Coles/STC 4038.



And here's a close up of the three close mics.



That's all.

Hey Russ,

This is exactly what I was talking about! Amazing job with the pictures and descriptions. Maybe someone could get in the habit of taking a few digital pictures of the session setups from now on... would be very interesting...

Anyway, thanks for taking my suggestion (I think that's what you're doing...if not, nevermind )

Dan

Russ,

Thanks so much for putting up the pictures of the Don Cab session. American Don is, in my opinion, the greatest album of all time, and since the first time I listened to it I have wondered what makes it sound so amazing. You have fulfilled a lifetime goal of mine. Infact, the only reason I registered on this site was to try and express my appreciation towards this series of pictures.


Thank You,

Andrew Weatherhead

ps. If you have any more pictures or info about the recording of this album, I would love to see or hear it.

Ironically, I just purchased that album for the first time yesterday...it makes the description of the setup that much more prescient.

Thanks!

I support pictures of sessions! I've been putting up pictures of the sessions I've been doing since I got my new camera last winter. I'm going to scan the rest of 8 years worth of pictures and post them on my webpage soon. Only if I had the time to scan my field notes in conjunction with the photo's...

Which brings up another good point for newbie engineers, take good notes on everything you do. I don't know how many times I've referred back to something I did 'X' amount of years back that reminded me of good tones from the past.

--Adam Lazlo
AnalogElectric Studio MPLS

P.S.--I'd love to see some Neurosis set-ups.

Intern_8033 wrote:stay tuned, i'll be posting pictures from sessions in the intern's corner, and they won't be in stupid black and white.

Can't wait (even if it's not Neurosis). I'm happy to see a webpage for Electrical, especially one that's so interactive.

--Adam Lazlo

How do you use a single stereo mic (the C24) as an MS pair? Is the Beyer 160 the middle signal?

the C24s top capsule rotates through 180 degrees i seem to remember and both capsules can have the polar response changed via the power supply.

[a farily unrelated, and possibly stupid question] for years i had been told, by both magazines and engineer-types too, that placing a mic directly in front of a guitar cab speaker cone was a bad idea. they always suggested placing it more towards the edge of the cone; facing the speaker bit. yet in the above photos, i see mics facing straight into the cones.
which, if either, is the "better" way of getting a decent starting guitar sound?[/a farily unrelated, and possibly stupid question]