Live Sessions: An Essentially Simple Method
An effective approach to live recording

By John Thomas Griffith

Editor’s Note: After touring and recording together for almost 14 years, the New Orleans-based quartet Cowboy Mouth decided that it was time to document its renowned live shows by recording during the current tour. Lead guitarist and vocalist John Thomas Griffith, who spearheaded the recording project, was kind enough to take the time to share his process for developing a handy live recording rig. - Keith Clark

The author (right) and Reece Anderson, his guitar tech, twiddling with the new recording rig prior to a recent Cowboy Mouth show. (All photos for this article by Will Byington.)

Just because I’m in a band that’s been selling records and touring successfully for some time now doesn’t mean that manufacturers are flocking to my door, trying to hand me their latest tools and toys to take for a spin. Nope, like most, I’m always looking for a good solution at the best possible value. However, note that I didn’t say the “cheapest” solution, because putting together a system based solely on price is dangerous business. There’s definitely a reason for the phrase “you get what you pay for”. On the other hand, you can have an unlimited budget and still wind up with less than desirable results. To me, it’s all about careful evaluation, asking a lot of questions, hitting my comfort zone and then trying to maximize what I’ve chosen. With that in mind, I went about trying to assemble a rig that would give us quality recordings in the live realm. I wanted something simple to set up and use, no techno-geeks need apply!

GETTING IN THE FLOW

Another facet of developing this rig was an interface that would also be conducive to my creative workflow in composing new music. Ideally, something that could that could be set up in literally five minutes in any hotel room in the world, and also be able to be easily integrated with my home studio. And in every case, the goal was something that could travel light and not take up a huge amount of space.

So back to that “bang for the buck” concept - I wanted my money to go into a system that could literally handle 10 different things, and do all of them reasonably well, if not better. Good luck!

My existing tools consisted of a Sony Vaio laptop computer (AMD Athlon 4 1.3 Ghz processor with 512 MB of RAM) loaded with Steinberg Cubase VST, running on Microsoft Windows XP. In a nutshell, Cubase VST (for Virtual Studio Technology) facilitates the integration of virtual effect processors and instruments into a digital audio environment. These can be software recreations of hardware effects units and instruments or new creative effect components, all of which can be integrated into the application.

I’ve been using Cubase for some time now in my home studio, and am comfortable with its functionality and feature set. It’s not the only program of its type, and I’m sure there are other viable ones - this just happens to be the one I’ve settled on and been able to get to do what I want it to do. Why fix what’s not broken?

IN THE BACKYARD

So, the key was integrating these tools into a live recording realm, finding a logical, efficient way to bridge the gap between the two disciplines. Some-times you look far and wide, only to realize that a solution is in your own backyard. This proved the case here, when a colleague referred me to the PreSonus FIREstation interface, made in Baton Rogue, Louisiana, just down the road from our home base.

The FIREstation is a FireWire compatible interface with eight channels of both balanced/unbalanced analog and ADAT inputs/outputs (I/O), along with S/PDIF and MIDI I/O. You can plug in microphones, instruments and external preamps into the analog inputs while monitoring them in real time. It comes in a 1U rack-mountable package, so no concerns about size/weight.

And all eight channels of analog inputs can be routed to the ADAT outputs, and/or all of the ADAT inputs can be routed to the analog outputs and line mixer. In this way, FIREstation can be used as an eight channel A/D and D/A converter, making it a cool way to add I/O to many digital recorders and interfaces like Cubase, or DigiDesign 001 and 002 and the like, for that matter.

The simplicity and portability of the system is ideal - it can be set up out of the way at FOH, and just as easily put together on a hotel room desk for impromptu recording.

So, prior to any show we want to record, our front-of-house mixer, Adam Kamm, sets up a six bus out of his main console, and runs that directly into (analog) channels 3 through 8 of the FIREstation. To capture the crowd ambience, we use two stereo microphones, a Shure KSM 32 and Audio-Technica 4033, which directly feed the mic preamplifiers on channels 1 and 2 of FIREstation. (Indoors, these mics are positioned in the ceiling rafters, while outdoors, we put them on stage, out of the way, pointed at the audience.) With a Firewire link between the PreSonus unit and my laptop, we feed all eight channels to the Cubase program, where it’s stored. Mixing the instruments live at FOH, and running just a total of eight channels into Cubase, helps save precious hard drive space, especially important over the course of a tour.

PROGRAMMER OR PLAYER?

I keep my gear with me when traveling, so if a new guitar riff pops into my head at some random hour of the night, I just unlock the laptop, hook it up to the FIREstation and plug in a mic or two, and I’m good to go. The last thing you want to do is have to figure out your computer system and gear when you’re trying to create music. I’m not a computer programmer; I’m a guitar player.

And at the home studio, I patch the FIREstation to my Yamaha AW4416 with Lightpipe cable. This gives me another eight inputs, so that I can record up to 16 tracks simultaneously, and/or some additional space to break things down further for fine tuning and cleaning up.

This approach has proven to work out very well. As a matter of fact, our next record, to be released a bit later this year, is going to be comprised primarily of tracks that I’ve been able to record with this system. As noted earlier, there are other ways of capturing recordings in the live realm, but the quality of this particular approach speaks for itself in that we’re comfortable enough with it to release the results commercially.

John Thomas Griffith is a founding member, lead guitarist and keyboardist for the New Orleans-based rock band, Cowboy Mouth. He currently resides in Atlanta, Georgia where also he produces, writes and scores film with various artists. Find out more about him at johnthomasgriffith.net

October 2003 Live Sound International