How do they do these live CD's?

Cafe Society
1

A couple of bands that I like have recently started getting into the trend of having every live gig (or a series of them) recorded during the show and then have the cd’s on sale within ten minutes of the end of the show (for the record, these bands are Erasure and Dead Can Dance, although you have to wait for the DCD discs).

How do they record an entire show and have the copies already printed and ready to go for the drive home? How quickly can they actually do this? Personally, I think it’s a great idea, a great souvenir for a show that you loved, and a an excellent collectors item for the fans. More bands should do this.

2

Emusic has agreements to do this with some bands/venues (I recall that a lot of shows at the Double Door seem to do this). You go and pay your $15 or whatever and they plug their burner into the sound board. When the show’s over, they use a massively fast burner to pump out as many copies as were ordered.

They might not be using emusic’s service, but I’d imagine that the idea’s the same.

3

You want live shows?

2756 by The Dead alone.

http://www.archive.org/audio/etreelisting-browse.php

4

One company that does this is Instant Live. Basically they set up six microphones throughout the venue, mix the show on the fly, and burn it to CDs (and then start reproducing them) right away. They don’t have to wait for the show to send to finish the first CD (up to 70 minutes) and get that all copied. That saves time right there. They make enough to fill the orders they collect before and during the show, plus some extra for people who buy them after.

Gotta be some duplicates or post-Dead or something in there, because they didn’t play that many shows. :wink:

5

This is actually quite a trend that has been slowly building among the mid-size and indie acts that are touring extensively. I first saw it with Bob Schneider (who, if you haven’t heard him, is utterly fantastic) and since then I’ve actually been building a system to do this myself for both my group and several other I work with professionally.

Currently I record every show and most rehearsals, for archival purposes. I generally make two separate recordings, one to DAT (the archive copy) and one to CD, with a rack-mounted Tascam CD-750 burner. The simplest feed is to take a stereo or utility out from the board right into the burning device.

At larger shows I also live-mix in a stereo audience signal. I use a little 6 track mixer and patch the board feed into two channels panned left and right. I also patch in a pair of condensor mike that are elevated and positioned to get the best possible front of house mix (including the ambient audience noise as well.) I also pan those, and generally keep them a good bit lower than the board feed, but the audience and front of house sound brings the recording to life.

Anyway, so that’s the how’s of down and dirty live recording. Excepting the archival DAT recorder which isn’t integral to the system, my entire rig only cost about $2000, and yields a finished master CD within two minutes of the end of the show. I hope to expand it in the future to include multiple master recording decks, but that’s just necessary in case a deck fails mid show - I don’t want to refund the money for live recordings that were presold and then not available!

And the recording is that simple - my rig yields results that you would have to hear to believe. I’d have to say that this point the live recording process is accessible to just about any professional group.

Onto the selling it at the show bit:

This is actually much easier than recording - it just requires some expensive equipment. To set this up, you’ll need about $4000-5000 to make it a failsafe and really profitable operation, but the basic rig could be had for about $2500.

You need as the fastest, most effective multi-disc burner you can afford. Example
here. Dump the master in and the number of blanks needed plus a couple extra for promo use. You can use a standard blank or a standard ‘Band Name Live’ blank that’s been pre-printed/screened. Some acts offer a simple CD insert, others make an officially designed graphic with the show name and date on it available for download via the web.

It’s expensive to set up, but the returns are pretty quick. I am currently in the process of doing tons of recording while shopping for the best burner for my needs.

At this point I’m comfortable with getting a salable recording just about anywhere with a real sound system (not a shoebox or ancient Peavey POS). I don’t intend to build a tour-worthy rig at this point though - I will only try to run this setup at a couple of festivals this summer. I’m hoping to get started doing some mail-order via the web though.
Wow, this has been a long post, and probably a lot more than you ever wanted to know about the topic.
I should note one point of interest to this process that does deter quite a few artists from doing it: the illegality of selling for profit a recording of a cover song.

You can either pay a compulsory statutory rate to the publisher/writers of any song you perform that’s not your own, or you can negotiate a (usually much better) rate before the fact with the publisher. But, if you sell it, you owe money. It’s a headache, but it you don’t take care of it, you may find yourself in a very actionable position.

Most artists that are able to afford the gear to implement the system would be a little leery of the situation in general, or would find themselves unable to play covers without a whole lot of hassle. Not worth it…

Anyway, I’ll shut up now.

6

At least for the Dead Can Dance shows, they won’t be available immediately after the show. From the blurb on the website:

On the DCD message boards mention was made of who is doing the mixing, and it’s someone with experience mixing live shows who was approved by the band. So, should turn out pretty good, especially considering how good DCD are live.

As for the artwork, all the information needed for design (date, venue, performers) is there except the actual track listing. Get your template set up and then drop in the track listing before sending it to press and the turnaround will be pretty quick. I don’t have any experience with CD manufacturing, but a run of 500 or 1000 discs shouldn’t take too long if you’ve got the machinery booked ahead of time.

I’m not a fanatic, so I only ordered eight shows instead of all thirteen : )

7

Then, Hazel-Rah, I have a humble request of you :slight_smile:

I plan on purchasing probably one of the shows, but don’t know which one to go for. Would you mind maybe putting up a review (or emailing me at interface2x at hotmail) of the ones you get so I could get an idea of what direction to go into?

Thanks to everyone for the answers!

8

Well so far the Dublin show got rave reviews, whilst in The Hague mention was made of technical problems/mistakes. The set lists were essentially the same, only a difference in sequencing. Paris is tomorrow night.

I’m getting my information from the Lisa Gerrard/Dead Can Dance message board. Set lists have been posted along with reviews from attendees.

I opted for every other show being recorded and both London shows so I could get the first show, the last show and a fair sampling of the middle. My guess is the set list won’t vary that much throughout the tour.

Don’t wait too long to buy… right now the CD sets are limited to 500 per show. They’ll probably begin to sell out before too long, as that number is split between the concertgoers and online buyers.