Monitor Query

Hello everyone, I'm Ben.

I've just set up quite a nice studio (Mac, Logic Pro, Mackie 400f, AKG 414) but the only thing I haven't got are monitors/speakers, and I'm having a bit of trouble.

The thing is, whenever I go into a recording studio, the recordings sound great and lively over the huge expensive speakers but then they're really flat when I get them and play them on my stereo.

I want to know what I'm working with all the way, so I want something that would replicate the sound of average stereo speakers. I'm assuming I can't just attach stereo speakers as they'd have to be active.

Any ideas?

Ben

ps When I'vce asked t music shops in the past, people keep telling me "yes, but you have to have the quality monitors so you can listen to the nuances that you don't hear on stereo speakers". I'm not so bothered about the nuances as the feel of the song (and I can use my headphones anyway).

You need all options. You are so screwed if you can't reproduce the low end. Headphones suffer badly in the low end, but they are useful for hearing defects that get covered over with room ambience. But for a lot of the time, you should mix at low volume with small, mid-rangey speakers. This is why Auratones and NS10's and other little speakers are used by the top guns.

There is no single perfect speaker. I've gone away from active speakers, because they typically have a cheap, crappy, hissy, hummy power amp. Good amps aren't cheap. Excellent passive speakers are more affordable than actives.

So why not invest in a quality power amp, and get some passive monitor speakers, and plan on getting some more.

I just bought some Dynaudio Acoustic BM15's. I don't really need a sub with those. But I could do with some smaller mid-rangey speakers as well. Maybe Tannoy Reveals.

What amps do you like to fit the bill?

You really should try to get studio oriented monitors rather than looking for something that replicates the sound of average stereo speakers. I know it might seem like a studio pretension that you need "specialized gear" or something like that but the truth is that studio monitors are indispensible for recording audio because they are built to give you the most honest representation of what is recorded. The idea behind designing a studio monitor vs. any consumer audio system is that you want to reproduce the sound with as flat a frequency response as possible, meaning you want to present the material how it sounds without altering it by hyping the high end for a more bright, present sound or increasing the bass for a strong thump.

The idea behind this is that you want to hear a true representation of whats there rather than something that is designed to alter or dress up the sound because all consumer stereo systems affect the sound in a different way. Some might have a really inflated bass to make music sound full or make hip hop and rap thump down in the low end while others have artificially increased high end to make the music sound more "clear" or "bright". This is all good and happy if it makes the music sound better to the single owner of that stereo but the fact is that if you mix on a system like this you will compensate for the different output of the system. For example if you mix with an average home setero system which emphasizes the bass for some low end thump and you don't really want your song to thump, you will turn the bass down more than you really need to and when someone listens to your song on a stereo system that does not increase the low end's volume, it will sound like there is no bass at all in your mix.

It might seem tempting to mix on something that is more like "what you will listen to it on" but the fact that stereo systems can vary so much is the reason studio monitors are necessary. If you mix based on what is really there, your mix will be right in the happy medium and all the changes made by other people's stereos will never be too far from what you heard when you are mixing. You won't be overcompensating for anything. It's not necessarily just about hearing the nuances - its about being able to make judgements that won't make the mix sound like crap on an oppositely altering stereo system.

What you have mentioned is the reason why a lot of people will make a mix in their home studio and then burn it on a cd and listen to it in their home cd player, their car, their friends car, their portable cd player etc etc. All of these things will make it sound different - you just want it to sound good on everything. A good option if you want to keep tabs on multiple representations while you mix is to hook up studio monitors and a pair of computer speakers or not so good speakers so that you can AB your mix on each pair for anything that jumps out. Really though, nothing beats mixing your music on a system that gives you a true, honest representation of whats there.