ThomBassmonkey Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 One of my bands has an accordian player and last night reminded me how painful it can be to be in a gigging rock band with an accordian. There's various problems but the main one is feedback. Currently Jim (the accordisnist) owns two accordians, an awful EQ (danelectro) and his jack leads. One of the accordians doesn't sound great anyway and he's been using the EQ to try and fix that but with limited results and the pedal has it's own problems (reliability and destroying the signal). Me and the guitarist both have experience in studios and effects and we've been trying to think of a cheapish way to sort out the feedback (which affects both his accordians) and try and get him an EQ. The best thing we've thought of so far is for him to get a dual channel rack EQ with built in DIs. Hopefully giving him his own decent EQ would mean that he could try and figure out the problem frequencies for the feedback and tweak them without spending ages with engineers doing it and also let him get a sound for his cheaper accordian that sounds much better. The DIs would just be there for simplicity, turn up to a gig, point out where they are to the engineer, go (currently, partially because of the problems with his accordians, we go through a chain of DI boxes before the complete signal gets working). The other options are a feedback destroyer or noise gate (which could work fairly well with an accordian since they're not the most dynamic of instruments anyway.) Are there any other options? Or specific ideas for EQs/DIs or other helpful gear? Bear in mind that price is going to be a big factor in what he gets. Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 (edited) I can't understand why it's feeding back. Accordions are bloody loud, so you shouldn't have to drive the gain or have it blasting in Jim's monitor. Mrs WoT used to use a Sennheiser E608, but these days she usually just uses a mic so she can control her volume. I can't recall a blast of feedback ever. FWIW, you can roll shedloads of bottom off an accordion at a gig. It makes a heck of a difference to what's swimming around on the stage. Edited January 13, 2013 by wateroftyne Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Also - why's he got the EQ pedal? Does he need it? Just go straight into the desk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 The microphonic pickups don't agree with your average rock venue in my experience. He's using internal pickups (I can't remember exactly what, but iirc they're basically a 58 diaphram) rather than an external mic, he moves about far too much to be stuck on an external anyway. The EQ's there for two reasons, mainly because one of his accordions (dunno why I was spelling it with an a in my previous post) is relatively cheap and he uses the EQ on it to try and get it sounding better, it sounds very thin and gets lost quickly in the mid. Secondly the volume difference between them is rather huge and he used to use one DI and switch leads on the accordians so he was using it for a volume boost too. Bearing in mind we play a lot of dingy rock venues, a lot of engineers haven't even EQd an accordian before, never mind enough to know what they're doing with it and it's rare they even know what they're supposed to sound like so ideally it'd be good to have an EQ that we can set and send a signal that we know will sound OK before the engineer gets it instead of totally relying on them to get a usable sound out of a sub par accordian. Obviously in an ideal world he'd get a new accordian but lack of funds takes that option off the table for the immediate future. To give you an idea, here's an idea of our sound (at a big Zydeco festival so they did a good job with the accordian, though it's recorded on the camera): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D82xWeWjlvM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Hmmm... he does move about a bit, doesn't he? I can see how that would be a challenge. Maybe give the E608 a shot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 That'd potentially fix the feedback issue, it doesn't address that he'd still need a decent EQ anyway though. I'll definitely bring it up next time I speak to him though, see what he thinks. He's had problems with his internal mics (on both accordians) more than once so it's definitely something to look into. Thanks for the suggestion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 I'd persuade him to spend the money on a decent accordion, tbh. There's no reason a decent one would need judicious EQing, other than a hi-pass or the lows rolled off.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 I wish it were possible, but I know for a fact that it's not realistic for him to spend that kind of money at the moment however much he'd want to (and he does, he's definitely not just being cheap). He really doesn't like the accordion he's struggling with but needs must so he's got to use it until he can afford another. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Ah, well. Cool band, by the way... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 Yeah, fingers crossed we'll be able to come up with something. There's lots of things that would be an improvement, it's just trying to do it as cheap as possible. Thanks, it's good fun! It's been an interesting process too, it has roots in Zydeco and the guitarist and drummer had never even heard of it, so it's been fun putting together something that's based in that but feels far more rocky. I describe it now as being almost ska punk but with an accordion instead of a brass section. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oggiesnr Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 What accordions has he actually got? If you have a look at the forums at melodeon.net there's a whole raft of stuff about miccing up squeezboxes. I use a couple of saxophone mikes, the treble side attached via it's gooseneck clip and the bass side clippped onto my wrist. Another option is these which are used by a fair few players [url="http://www.microvox.demon.co.uk/accpage.htm"]http://www.microvox.demon.co.uk/accpage.htm[/url]. Have fun Steve PS love the track, my sort of band. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wateroftyne Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 IME the Microvox feeds back like a banshee... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete.young Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 I have a Microvox on one of my accordions and the box player in our pogues band also uses one, and yes they do feed back a lot at higher volumes. We have had some success taming it by running it through a feedback destroyer - this is far superior to a graphic IMO, because all you have to do is press a button and off it goes. Another alternative is to find a PZM on ebay, take off the plate, and fix the rest of it to one of the reed blocks. The Tandy/Realistic ones are perfect for this, but since they were discontinued some time ago they tend to fetch quite a high price. Tie clip microphones can also be used inside the instrument. I got mine from Jessops - probably the last thing I bought there. The absolute best solution is a Roland V-Accordion, but not a solution for you, it's not available as a diatonic instrument. Plus they are quite expensive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happy Jack Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Nothing to offer on accordion feedback, I'm afraid, but I may have to get along to a Zydeco festival - really liked that clip. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete.young Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 Yes, great clip by the way, I bet the choice of song would have upset some of the purists! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beer of the Bass Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 The accordionist in my old band used to really struggle with feedback, but I suspect his frankly crazy setup was the main contributor. He used a home-made internal mic system, which was mixed together using the inputs of a WEM copicat (also running a slap-back echo). This then went into a 100 watt Laney valve amp feeding a JMI cabinet with a 15" bass driver and a rotating treble horn, Leslie style. This used to be turned up so loud that my bass would be drowned out at some gigs. The resulting sound was halfway inbetween Zydeco accordion and an overdriven Hammond. It was an interesting sound, but we were all pleased when he ditched the huge amp! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oggiesnr Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 [quote name='pete.young' timestamp='1358069452' post='1932454'] The absolute best solution is a Roland V-Accordion, but not a solution for you, it's not available as a diatonic instrument. Plus they are quite expensive. [/quote] They are available as a diatonic instrument but they're big and unwieldly and the air button just doesn't suck enough. Also the MIDI sounds just sound MIDI like and it uses accordion sounds rather than diatonic sounds. A better bet is the two row Streb e-melodeon. Lighter and feels like a melodeon, there are also some good samples available for it. Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete.young Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 [quote name='oggiesnr' timestamp='1358088521' post='1932830'] They are available as a diatonic instrument but they're big and unwieldly and the air button just doesn't suck enough. [/quote] Coo, so they are - launched in January 2011. Well I never. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 14, 2013 Author Share Posted January 14, 2013 Thanks for the feedback on the band, I'm glad you enjoy it! We do an odd mix of covers, all in our own style. We're not particularly Zydeco any more, that was the initial intention but it's ended up far more rocky. We just play to have fun and the crowd seems to enjoy it so it's good all-round! If anyone is going to the Gloucester Cajun and Zydeco festival, we're playing on the Friday. I'll put forwards the suggestions to him, I don't know how he'd feel about getting an electronic accordion, he still does acoustic gigs in his other projects. I think maybe a feedback destroyer, A/B switch and a 2 channel EQ/DI would be the best bet for him, it'd be cheaper than a new accordion and make swapping accordions/inexperienced sound engineers less hassle. I'll just leave this here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFWMgwPgstw Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Si600 Posted January 14, 2013 Share Posted January 14, 2013 (edited) [quote name='ThomBassmonkey' timestamp='1358122306' post='1933630'] I'll just leave this here : [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFWMgwPgstw[/media] [/quote] Genius, just genius Edited January 14, 2013 by Si600 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happy Jack Posted January 14, 2013 Share Posted January 14, 2013 (edited) [url="http://www.gloucestercajunfestival.co.uk/"]http://www.glouceste...festival.co.uk/[/url] Tried to find your website to get gig dates, and found nowt. MySpace and Facebook both say you have no upcoming gigs ... is this what they call "stealth marketing"? Edited January 14, 2013 by Happy Jack Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted January 14, 2013 Author Share Posted January 14, 2013 That's odd. I'll ask Jim about it. We did have a website, but that's down for some reason now, I don't know about the FB and Myspace things, me and the other two from JWP play more in a session musician capacity so we're not really involved in the organisation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hubrad Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 [quote name='pete.young' timestamp='1358069452' post='1932454'] I have a Microvox on one of my accordions and the box player in our pogues band also uses one, and yes they do feed back a lot at higher volumes. We have had some success taming it by running it through a feedback destroyer - this is far superior to a graphic IMO, because all you have to do is press a button and off it goes. (-------) The absolute best solution is a Roland V-Accordion, but not a solution for you, it's not available as a diatonic instrument. Plus they are quite expensive. [/quote] I used to play in a touring band with accordion at the front; after I'd been in a while the accordionist got Microvox stuff, which was fine up to a certain volume. To get any louder, we learnt to tell the monitor engineer to drop the resonant frequency of his box (in his case about 550Hz) out of the monitors - worked rather well. Feedback Destroyer is supposed to do it automatically, but a parametric is manual and more controllable. The Microvox mics themselves are actually remarkably good (I was also using one on whistle in the same band) but combine an instrument-mount mic with a resonant box and trouble ensues.. The Roland FR-18 is the diatonic version.. http://www.themusicroom-online.co.uk/product_info.php/products_id/4780 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hubrad Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 Also there's the AKG C419, now morphed into the C519 Last time I asked, John Spiers of Bellowhead was using these: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INy1YqmCI5k A veritable riot of noise on stage! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete.young Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 Some more clarification - the Microvoxes we have are the M305 bar-mounted jobs - these won't work for a cajun accordion because it has no front grill, just exposed pads and levers! Also, we've used the feedback destroyer in between the accordion and the mixer, because we can never tell if the monitors or the front of house is going to go first! Take Hubrad's point about the EQ being more controllable, but it depends on you having a monitor engineer, and him having a clue. We have neither! Hubrad, I will be in Clecky for the folk festival in May. If you are around the shop it would be good to have a chat and maybe go for a pint! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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