Karaoke Forums

Saturday night I had a problem with one singer. He was a fairly good singer with a STRONG voice, but he also liked to LITERALLY kiss the mic when singing. HERE'S MY PROBLEM, I had to turn the volume down to ALMOST off to stop the RED OL light from coming on, on my mixer. His voice still came out over the music, but is this the correct way to handle this problem, or should I mess with the GAIN, by turning it up, or what would you suggest. He was a new customer, with a whole table of other customers, so I didn't want to offend him by telling him to hold the mic further from his mouth, so every time he came up I turned the mic ALMOST off for the green light to come on naturally, only in the high points of the song. He sang a duet, I had the other person's mic at unity, and his almost off, and they sounded the same. Is it possible for a person like this to blow the mic? Any suggestions appreciated.

Thanks
Srnitynow

The gain or trim control (top knob of the channel strip for his mic) is what you want to adjust in order to prevent his mic from clipping (the red OL Light on that channel). Adjusting fader or mix knob (depending on your mixer) will not help if he's clipping at the input. Solo or PFL the channel and adjust the trim so that his strongest points don't go any higher than the 0 mark on the meters. Then you can adjust the fader to the appropriate level for the mix.

After you get this down, if you want to get more advanced, you can also help yourself and his clarity by adjusting the EQ. If the channels on your mixer have a sweepable mid-range EQ (i.e. you can set the frequency for the mid-range of the EQ with a separate knob), set it to around what would be 250Hz and then adjust the mid control to cut a little bit out (about 3-4 db). If this doesn't make sense to you, don't worry about it and just forget I mentioned it

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DJ Tony
Let It Rip Karaoke

Letitrip, I have a mackie profx 12. Your answer led me to another question. The meters on my mixer never go above the 3rd set of green lights, NO MATTER WHAT. I am running JBL EON 15G2's. I set the output at about 2 o'clock, so there's still plenty of power left. My equalizer is still set straight across, as I'm not experienced enough yet to mess with it (still learning). If I cut down the power on my speakers will the meters run higher? The only time I ever got them to run into the yellow, and red is when I pushed the equalizer faders up above center. I've been running my gains at about 1 o'clock. Usually everything sounds really good, but with some advice, maybe I can make it sound even BETTER. Thanks for the help.

I rarely run the G2's above 12 inside. In small venues about 10-11. Then you need to turn the mains on the mixer up. Or is it he other way? Not awake yet.

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The following was takin from the owners manual of the Eon G2
INPUT 1. Use this control to match the input sensitivity of the EON15 G2
to the output level of the mixer, microphone, or instrument connected to INPUT 1. It is a
common misconception that this control changes the power of a system. Your EON15 G2
will produce its rated output power no matter where this control is set. The INPUT 1 control
determines how much signal is required at the input in order to drive the system to full output.
The PEAK LED (Light Emitting Diode) illuminates to indicate that the system is approaching
clipping. The threshold for this light is actually about 2 dB below clipping. An occasional
flickering of this light on the loudest peaks is acceptable. If this LED is on for more than the
duration of brief dynamic peaks, the system is being overdriven. Continuously over-driving
the system will result in unpleasant and fatiguing distortion and may lead to premature failure
of your speaker system.
If the PEAK LED illuminates excessively:
• Reduce INPUT 1, 2, and 3.
• Reduce the output level of the mixer, musical instrument, or other source connected to
the speaker.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

This is the purpose of using a compressor to level out the volume in different input level situations.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

No...your mic can handle much louder sounds than a human voice, even at very close range.

Personally, I would much rather have a "close singer" than somebody holding the mic at arms length any day.

Thanks for the reply London, I've read the manual, but wasn't sure if I was matching the speakers with the output of the mixer. Also the led that their speaking of, is that the red od light on the mic channel? I've never found an led on the speaker, other than the signal light, or the power light on the front of the speaker. They talk about it in the manual, but there isn't a picture showing where it is. I'm thinking that I probably have to turn the input down as Karyoker mentioned in order to match the speakers to the mixer output. If I'm wrong please let me know.

Thanks,
Srnitynow

The peak LED is down by the EQ on the back of the speaker.

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Um, you might also tell him that backing off of the mic will make him sound a lot better...?

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

The OL LED comes before the channel fader in the signal path, so the fader has no effect in your efforts to turn off the OL LED. Overloading may occur if the gain is set too high,so check that the level set LED is not turning on frequently. Turn down the gain if it is.

Going by your information you are running about 10db below unity. I would try and restructure your signal path to get it to at least about -3db if not unity and then adjust the input sensitivity on your Eons to achieve your desired headroom and volume.

According to the on line manual you will find the location on page eight.
http://www.jblpro.com/catalog/support/g ... &doctype=3

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

for what its worth, i found that I could get a decent sounding output from the pro efx without being very high up in the output lights. I had to back off my power amp farther than with other mixers i have used. im sure you can turn down the mains and up the mixer.

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the voices arent real, but they have some good ideas

Thanks for all the GREAT info from all you guys. This will give me a better understanding of what I'm doing. I'll try fooling around with different settings on the mixer, and speakers. The reason I never saw the peak led, is because I use the xlr input, and didn't pay attention to the area with the 1/4" inputs. Thanks for the refresher coarse. I'll let you know how it turns out, my next show is Saturday.

Srnitynow

I would suggest as well that you try to lower the gain on the mic before pulling down the slide. You mentioned it was a man... is his voice low? If so, I have found that pulling back the low frequencey on the mic's EQ channel works well... after that gently up the compression.

I have a guy who has become one of my most steadfast followers because I'm the only KJ around that apparently has the equipment and know how to mix his voice to the music. He's got a great voice, but it is over powering. I've seen him at other venues, and he has the mic at full arms length and still he's clipping the speakers!!

On my system, even at his loudest he can't clip me... and we had fun one night near closing TRYING to see if he could clip and he never could. Digital compression is a wonderful thing.

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Good music, good friends, howling good times!

I agree with Barry and Koyote. The close-mic style of this singer is almost professional, except most pro singers have to sing for hours each night so most of them don't quite holler continuously in my experience. I would rather have people like that than the ones who hold the mic a foot or two away from their mouth. I am slowly training all my regular singers to close-mic. You should, too!

As far as compression goes, it is a great tool; but try not to use it just to reduce the amount of times you have to adjust the knobs through the night. If you go from a really quiet singer to one who projects well and close-mics, they will have no real dynamic range while they are singing. This is their fault as much as yours, because they probably can hear it and don't adjust; but you can help them by reducing the gain, which is pre-insert, so the compression will not be triggered so easily.

The next time you see that singer, you should ask him to put in some extra songs and tell him you do not have very many people who sing with his mic style, and let him sing a couple extra times to practice. That will make him happy because he gets to sing more, and if he feels like he doesn't sound as good as he does with another KJ, he will know you are doing your best. I have one guy who says "check check blah blah turn it down just a little bit" every time he comes up to sing. I know he will and I usually adjust the gain quite a bit more after he does his mic check, but I would always prefer that than the person be unhappy with how they sound.

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Jeff Wheeler, moonlight DJ/KJ

Specific questions are usually pretty easy to answer and your questions fell into that category. It's the vague ones that you have to watch out for. I don't know if you own a compressor or not but it sounds like you need to add one to your arsenal if you don't. Contrary to what some others may think, a compressor can be your best friend if set properly. The problem is most people fear them as they don't fully understand their function and purpose. An improperly set compressor can do more harm than good so I would practice and learn your way around one at home. If you have any other specific questions, fire away.

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Quickness of mind will deceive the eye

Agree, add a compressor to the mics!

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Compression is better than sex. Try it out in your garage one day and familiarize yourself with the function of each knob. Read the instructions, too! And keep in mind that over-use of compression can contribute to feedback.

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Jeff Wheeler, moonlight DJ/KJ

To me, for karaoke, compression is essentially set and forget. 2.5-1 ratio, auto attack/release, -10db onset. You could nudge the ratio up, I suppose, if you get a mic-cupping screamer. But I tend to turn those down these days until they stop cupping the mic.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I had to take over a show for one of my partners last night, as he had an emergency about 15 minutes into the job. I was going to hang out and drink with my friends at that bar anyway, but I was not planning on working, nor was I dressed for it!

Anyway, his gain structure is totally different than mine, like 40dB of head-room out of the mixer if not more, and I have been trying to get him to change it for ages but what ends up happening is we just change each-others' equipment around to our own preference all the time, and then the other one of us will change it back later. No big deal, until I had to jump into the middle of his show!

Both my mic-cupers had squeals from the front-of-house. I EQ'd the tone out of my monitors a couple months ago. I was like ... damn ... maybe I shouldn't have had so many shots so I could think of how to get rid of that squeal! Eventually it got to be time for a music break, so I took the opportunity to change the system back to how I like it.

One of the singers, who used to DJ for many years, said something about the squeal and I was pretty much like well, when you cup the microphone you are defeating its feedback rejection mechanism.

I still can't figure out why the squeal was there in the first place. I fiddled with the compression knobs, turned the monitors down (before I realized that is not where it was coming from), blah blah blah. I wish I hadn't been drunk so I could figure out why it was happening. But anyway, it went away when I moved some of the system head-room from the line-level part of the system to the amps. Or else I adjusted something else at the same time, and forgot about it. Arg.

(edit: at the forum replacing a TV-acceptable curse word with "gosh darn" )

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Jeff Wheeler, moonlight DJ/KJ