Re: [microsound] Performing "Live"

[Jeremy Tolsma <ccws@xxxxxxxx>]

>I remember hearing about an Einstürzende Neubauten gig where they burnt a
>load of black plastic refuse sacks over large drums of water, which were
>mic'd up with contact mics and also normal mics. Apparently the molten
>plastic hitting the waters surface sounded fantastic..

I think I saw this it was the tabula rasa show and they wouldve used
open-air mikes to catch that fizzle.  Contact mics are useless for picking
up something like that though, as they would be for picking up an electric
shaver or a vibrating speaker.  I think EN dropped ballbearings or something
on a sheet of metal that had a contact mic attatched at the same show.
Anyway have any of you guys actually tried picking up vibrations with a
contact mic?  You have to amplify it so much that its basically acting as an
open air mike with weak signal.  Contact mics dont require amplification,
but they have to be physically struck or mashed or scraped or attatched to
something struck or mashed or scraped.  The whole deal with them is that
they don't register many of the residual vibrations, mostly the initial
attack.