One Mic No Shit

The High & Lonesome Sinnbeck Experience gathered last week in Chips' Woodshed to whip up a demo of the cream of the Tassie Tour for a Maldon Folk Festival application.

The recordings were made using an Edirol R-09 digital recorder with built-in studio quality mini-condenser microphones (it looks like, and is about the size of, an electric razor). It records better than CD quality at 48Khz and 24-bit. Slim has been keen to try using what Steve Earle called the 'One Mic No Shit' recording technique, much favoured by Bluegrass performers.

Bluegrass instruments, whether you play 'em loud or soft, are beautifully acoustically balanced, so Bluegrass is best played in a huddle to get everything blending sweetly. Once you've got that in place, you can basically just record it. The musicians move in and out of proximity to the microphones to give dynamic emphasis and definition to the mix. As you can hear from the attached track, it worked pretty darn well for a first attempt. The limitation, of course, is that the recording also captures the sound of the room in which it is recorded. That's why Gillian Welch and David Rawlings chose the old RCA Studio B in Nashville to record The Revelator, because it sounds so good.

Slim used some digital plugins which recreate old-school analog valve gear with bakelite knobs which helped to get a little closer to that traditional bluegrass tone.

Have a listen on headphones for better spacial appreciation.