First Use At Church

aftrshok99

Inspired
I finally got to use my AX8 yesterday at Church and boy was I a nervous wreck about how it was going to sound since we hadn't practiced until yesterday morning and even then it was a quick run through of the songs. Well it's a good thing that what I hear in my headphones at home translates pretty closely to sounding the same at church.

I had spent last week installing a piezo system in my strat and rewiring everything. Let me say that was an adventure and getting some of the grounding issues figured out whew. Also spent a couple nights working out my patch that I used Sunday. It was a dual input from AxeFxTutorials but I changed it some to fit my guitar. I also added a multidelay block from @simeon (excellent stuff man) that would work for my swell. I setup the bottom 4 footswitches as scenes. Clean, Crunch, Lead, Swell. Within each scene I could use my piezo which was handy. I also had a lot of X/Y switching from scene to scene and had no issues with lag, worked great for me.

I'll have to say, from coming from a Helix last time I was playing at church I thought I'd miss some of the bells and whistles it has but I sure didn't....AX8 all the way and it sounded great when I was rehearsing, even with my in-ears it sounded great.

Had a buddy who used to play guitar with us text me and say "I wanted to say you sounded great but I couldn't hear you!!"

*rant*.....Now that's a whole nother story, for you sound guys that know what you're doing, thank you but the ones we have...OMG they shouldn't be even allowed to touch the board and some of them have gone to training. It's the second week in a row that I've been told by multiple people that they can't even hear me. So why do I even get stressed about playing or even bother to practice. The sad thing is, the music minister just doesn't seem to really care any more or won't listen to what I have to say about all the sound issues.*rant over*
 
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Sound guys suck...just kidding. One thing to think about which I do, when I play churches. Is sometimes your tones need to sound a little middy to fit in that space where nothing else is sitting. When I hear my presets by themselves they sound strange, but you stick that tone amongst all the other instrumentation and it fits. My theory comes from listening to all those soloed out guitar tracks. They don't sound as massive as you think they do. Plus most church music these days are single note dotted 8th lines, with a ton of main stage synths. I still have to tell my sound guy stop eq filtering the top end of my sound out. more volume doesn't equal being heared better. It's all about the frequency. The more you use your tool, the better you will get at finding the balance between tone and placement. There is a happy medium out there.
 
Ugh. I played air guitar for a while in church too. It took our worship leader telling the sound guy that he needs to treat the mix as guitar driven music and that the electric guitars must be audible and at the forefront. That changed everything for the better. That, and getting a sound guy that was willing to learn and adapt.

Also, make sure the sound guy actually listens to the original recordings of the songs and knows the parts so he knows what it's supposed to sound like.
 
Sound guys suck...just kidding. One thing to think about which I do, when I play churches. Is sometimes your tones need to sound a little middy to fit in that space where nothing else is sitting. When I hear my presets by themselves they sound strange, but you stick that tone amongst all the other instrumentation and it fits. My theory comes from listening to all those soloed out guitar tracks. They don't sound as massive as you think they do. Plus most church music these days are single note dotted 8th lines, with a ton of main stage synths. I still have to tell my sound guy stop eq filtering the top end of my sound out. more volume doesn't equal being heared better. It's all about the frequency. The more you use your tool, the better you will get at finding the balance between tone and placement. There is a happy medium out there.

I totally get that and that's how I have my patches set, so they sit in the mix. My not being heard issue is because of volume not my frequency in the mix. Right now we only have a piano, cajon, acoustic, me (electric) and two singers. There should be plenty of space for me to be heard, during rehearsal I was but during the service I wasn't.
 
Ugh. I played air guitar for a while in church too. It took our worship leader telling the sound guy that he needs to treat the mix as guitar driven music and that the electric guitars must be audible and at the forefront. That changed everything for the better. That, and getting a sound guy that was willing to learn and adapt.

Also, make sure the sound guy actually listens to the original recordings of the songs and knows the parts so he knows what it's supposed to sound like.

I'm sure the 900 people there yesterday enjoyed my air guitar, I think next week I'll jump off the grand piano...Haha

I know they've had issues getting the sound guy's to learn and adapt, they want to argue with you that they know what's best.
 
I know they've had issues getting the sound guy's to learn and adapt, they want to argue with you that they know what's best.

My favorite church sound guy story goes like this:

I was told nobody could hear my guitar in the FOH, so during rehearsal I go wireless out into the sanctuary and stand next to the sound guy. I heard nothing. Zilch. Zero. So I turn my guitar volume off and continue playing with the band and ask him "How does that sound?". His reply: "Loud and clear, sounds awesome!" Really???

We normally have a full band with acoustic drums, synths, piano, bass, 2 electrics, an acoustic, and 3 vocals, but our acoustic Sundays have the same mix of instruments as you, and they have to turn my guitar down to fit in for those. Sorry to say it, but if your guitar can't be heard in that mix, it's plain old incompetence.
 
> AX8 all the way

Thanks for this!

No problem, it's true because Fractal makes amazing products....Now if I could just get the "I need a XL+ and MFC" thought out of my head..LOL

My favorite church sound guy story goes like this:

I was told nobody could hear my guitar in the FOH, so during rehearsal I go wireless out into the sanctuary and stand next to the sound guy. I heard nothing. Zilch. Zero. So I turn my guitar volume off and continue playing with the band and ask him "How does that sound?". His reply: "Loud and clear, sounds awesome!" Really???

We normally have a full band with acoustic drums, synths, piano, bass, 2 electrics, an acoustic, and 3 vocals, but our acoustic Sundays have the same mix of instruments as you, and they have to turn my guitar down to fit in for those. Sorry to say it, but if your guitar can't be heard in that mix, it's plain old incompetence.

That's funny!!!!

In a couple of weeks we will be back to a full band like yours and I'm afraid it's gonna be the same mess as it has been. Maybe they bring in the B level sound guy since right now we are using the D level ones.

I was so tempted to reach down and bump my output knob up to the 3 o'clock position, it's at noon normally.
 
Sound guys suck...just kidding. One thing to think about which I do, when I play churches. Is sometimes your tones need to sound a little middy to fit in that space where nothing else is sitting. When I hear my presets by themselves they sound strange, but you stick that tone amongst all the other instrumentation and it fits. My theory comes from listening to all those soloed out guitar tracks. They don't sound as massive as you think they do. Plus most church music these days are single note dotted 8th lines, with a ton of main stage synths. I still have to tell my sound guy stop eq filtering the top end of my sound out. more volume doesn't equal being heared better. It's all about the frequency. The more you use your tool, the better you will get at finding the balance between tone and placement. There is a happy medium out there.
Yeah, I play at church regularly and I like to use the Mark 5 band eq in the amp block and turn the 750hz frequency up at least to 3. Even though I don't have much control over the volume, at least giving my tone more mids can help it cut through better.

I use the DC30 model btw.
 
We have had the same issues with sound guys over the last few years. I ended up becoming one of the primary sound guys for that very reason- it seems no one who can do it wants to, and no one who wants to do it actually can. It means I don't play as often, but it also means the whole band sounds great because I'm driving the mix. When I play, our primary guy takes the reigns and does great with it. I'm actually starting to push for more of our musicians to get their feet wet with mixing... When it comes to getting a song to FOH accurately, the sound guy ends up being just as much a band member as anyone else. The more folks get some training back there, the more they will get that. And the more people we can get in the rotation- always a plus.

But the AX8 has always performed like a rockstar for me. Now, if my fingers would only catch up...
 
The AX8 is definitely on point for the task. I've been using it for over a year for this purpose. One preset per song, scenes for each section. Good to go.

It sure doess and I set mine up the same as you.

We have had the same issues with sound guys over the last few years. I ended up becoming one of the primary sound guys for that very reason- it seems no one who can do it wants to, and no one who wants to do it actually can. It means I don't play as often, but it also means the whole band sounds great because I'm driving the mix. When I play, our primary guy takes the reigns and does great with it. I'm actually starting to push for more of our musicians to get their feet wet with mixing... When it comes to getting a song to FOH accurately, the sound guy ends up being just as much a band member as anyone else. The more folks get some training back there, the more they will get that. And the more people we can get in the rotation- always a plus.

But the AX8 has always performed like a rockstar for me. Now, if my fingers would only catch up...

I guess I could go wireless and sit up their and play while I mix. Problem with the two guys that are pretty good at mixing is they don't want to listen to any suggestions I have. Over the years playing at this church I've pretty much given up on them getting good sound guys. I got tired of trying to help and make things better when all it did was fall on deaf ears, pun intended. That's why I moved on for over a year, guess I wanted more abuse so I'm back.
 
Had a buddy who used to play guitar with us text me and say "I wanted to say you sounded great but I couldn't hear you!!"

*rant*.....Now that's a whole nother story, for you sound guys that know what you're doing, thank you but the ones we have...OMG they shouldn't be even allowed to touch the board and some of them have gone to training. It's the second week in a row that I've been told by multiple people that they can't even hear me. So why do I even get stressed about playing or even bother to practice. The sad thing is, the music minister just doesn't seem to really care any more or won't listen to what I have to say about all the sound issues.*rant over*


Yeah....I spent multiple years playing church services. I was on Bass and therefore, could be heard (some). The guitar players are ALWAYS buried in the mix. What the powers that be want to hear is Vocals first, keys second, drums third and then a little of everyone else. Vox is always, always, always the most important element top the leaders and hence, the sound person, IME in that setting.
 
I quite playing on worship teams many years ago. Many good times but the frustration with volunteers doing sound who don't understand with the word 'mix' means caused me to step aside. Stay humble and keep the main the thing in clear focus!
 
Yeah....I spent multiple years playing church services. I was on Bass and therefore, could be heard (some). The guitar players are ALWAYS buried in the mix. What the powers that be want to hear is Vocals first, keys second, drums third and then a little of everyone else. Vox is always, always, always the most important element top the leaders and hence, the sound person, IME in that setting.

That is 100% true, it's going to be interesting seeing how the new pastor wants it though.

I quite playing on worship teams many years ago. Many good times but the frustration with volunteers doing sound who don't understand with the word 'mix' means caused me to step aside. Stay humble and keep the main the thing in clear focus!

It might not sound like it in my original post but I have always said in my 10 years playing at this church....it's never about me. I was just ranting about it because it can be frustrating. It's almost like, why should I practice and take time out of my life just to play air guitar?

Last year after I got frustrated with all of this I actually quit playing guitar for about 6 months and had decided I'd be fine if I never touched a guitar again. As you can see, that didn't work out....LOL

When people say "We can't hear you." I just tell them to let the pastor or music minister know because I've done all I can.
 
Hey guys - I've been using my AX8 at church for about 6 months now, and have been really happy. What has made me really, REALLY happy is dialing in a single patch and tinkering from there instead of the needle in a haystack approach I was taking - so many awesome options, so little time...

Larry Mitchell did some head-to-head stuff - Fractal vs. Real amps - back in December, and shared those patches out afterwards. There was one in the batch called "Deluxe CE1 LM+" that has been my go-to for three months. Link here:

http://www.fractalaudio.com/accurate.php

If you haven't checked it out, there is some really tasty stuff. I believe the Fractal guys were the ones responsible for dialing these in for the head-to-head comparison.
 
I finally got to use my AX8 yesterday at Church and boy was I a nervous wreck about how it was going to sound since we hadn't practiced until yesterday morning and even then it was a quick run through of the songs. Well it's a good thing that what I hear in my headphones at home translates pretty closely to sounding the same at church.

I had spent last week installing a piezo system in my strat and rewiring everything. Let me say that was an adventure and getting some of the grounding issues figured out whew. Also spent a couple nights working out my patch that I used Sunday. It was a dual input from AxeFxTutorials but I changed it some to fit my guitar. I also added a multidelay block from @simeon (excellent stuff man) that would work for my swell. I setup the bottom 4 footswitches as scenes. Clean, Crunch, Lead, Swell. Within each scene I could use my piezo which was handy. I also had a lot of X/Y switching from scene to scene and had no issues with lag, worked great for me.

I'll have to say, from coming from a Helix last time I was playing at church I thought I'd miss some of the bells and whistles it has but I sure didn't....AX8 all the way and it sounded great when I was rehearsing, even with my in-ears it sounded great.

Had a buddy who used to play guitar with us text me and say "I wanted to say you sounded great but I couldn't hear you!!"

*rant*.....Now that's a whole nother story, for you sound guys that know what you're doing, thank you but the ones we have...OMG they shouldn't be even allowed to touch the board and some of them have gone to training. It's the second week in a row that I've been told by multiple people that they can't even hear me. So why do I even get stressed about playing or even bother to practice. The sad thing is, the music minister just doesn't seem to really care any more or won't listen to what I have to say about all the sound issues.*rant over*

Glad it worked out good for you,.. just went through this whole process about a month ago,.. still working out some small tweaks,...

Sound Guys - I've been dealing with this for over 20 years - Luckly we have a sound guy who likes my playing/sounds/style and I usually get a fair shake in the mix,.. but it's been along time coming that's for sure!
 
The AX8 is definitely on point for the task. I've been using it for over a year for this purpose. One preset per song, scenes for each section. Good to go.

That's kind of how I run mine as well - One preset per song, scenes for different sections of each song. Works great for me.
 
One of the churches that I occasionally play for has a terrible speaker set-up. It's basically one main on the ceiling with a monitor behind it aimed back at the choir. The mics, piano, organ, and drums run through the system. After 2 failed (and embarrassing) attempts at running my guitar through the system I gave up. It was all human error behind the mixing board. My solution was to refuse to run through the system and use a keyboard amp or acoustic guitar amp. I now set up behind the horn section and turn it up until the director says it sounds good.

To be fair, another church that I play at has a very good sound system and knowledgeable sound guys that are also willing to learn more. I have run direct there with good results, but I still prefer to have my own amp at my side.
 
I play guitar and drums regularly at different churches in LA. Usually using the AX8 when I'm playing guitar.

My recommendation: learn how to use and work the mixing board at your church. A little knowledge goes a long way so you can just do things yourself and get yourself mixed well in case the soundman is a bonehead.

One church I play at (on drums) uses ableton and the soundman used to send the click back to me (on In ears) from the Soundboard because that's where the laptop was. I had too many instances where the click would drop out or the level would be wildly different between tracks and songs. Pretty much heart attack moments when I had to play along to a backing track without hearing the click. After awhile I just fought to be able to control the mix from the stage (via iPad) etc and it hasn't been a problem since and all the musicians and worship leader are much much happier.

Moral of the story: nobody is a mind reader and it's probably better to just do things yourself to reduce any variables about your performance.

The AX8 rules. Perfect church rig!
 
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