Endless Paradigm

Anyone have any experience? I'm facing a challenge and could do with a few pointers. Here's the problem:

To begin, some background.

I've been pulled into engineering the sound for a small gig this Saturday. A medium/large size pub, 3 bands (drums, a few guitars, bass and vocal), an insane metalhead's birthday party and our good friend andrewcc. Mix in a lack of experience with this kind of thing, very limited budget and equipment and lots of beer and wee have a recipie for disaster.

What wee have:

2 small condenser mics.
A few assorted dynamic mics.
An 800w PA system with a powered mixer (mixer with power amp built-in)
Various leads.
1 or 2 mic stands.
Me + Laptop.
Beer.

What I'd like to do is re-enforce the bands playing but also record one of the bands playing. My plan goes as follows:

Not bother micing up the drumkit. The room is small enough. Choose the 3 best guitar and bass amps out of all the amps that the 3 bands have brought. Mic these amps so that the mics don't have to be moved to other amps between bands playing. Run all of these mics into the powered PA mixer and output to speakers. Meanwhile, at the back of the room, set up the pair of condensers and run these straight into the laptop. Take an output from the powered PA mixer and send into the laptop also. Record a blend of these signals. Also have an output from the laptop to the PA for playing background music before and after the bands play.

Anyone see any problems or possible difficulties based on that setup? Any recommended changes?

You probably won't get the best recording, but that seems like the best you could do with the equipment you have.

When all else fails...

SchmilK Wrote:When all else fails...

lol double fail

Give it a shot I'd say - there's not much to loose in a sense and you can easily readjust things around a bit.

So you're recording from both the mics at the back, mixed with the mixer?  I'm not sure, but it sounds like you'll be recording the guitars twice, since you're recording from the mics that go into the mixer, then from the output of the speaker that goes into any nearby mics.
Also am unsure of the effect of this type of feedback.
Note, I know zilch about this stuff.

Thanks guys but it seems it's all for nowt. Wee had a phonecall today from the pub today saying that they wanted to cancel. Apparently bands attract underage drinkers. After an incident they had a while back they don't want to risk losing their license. Wee're on the hunt for a new venue and a new date. Facebook could prove a pretty useful tool here...

In other news the school keyboard I'm typing this on is shite.

Come to London!!!

Method Wrote:Come to London!!!

I would but only 2 of the main band drive. Getting a band's worth of gear into a 2000 Ford Fiesta (belonging to our good friend andrewcc) and a leaky Citroen Saxo would be difficult I thinks... Add to that the general skintness of us all, the number of people attending and the fact wee've now found a new venue (A cricket club. Hell yeah!) I don't really think it's a viable option, sorry.

Well, at least it's back on for now. I'm actually quitle looking forward to this...

PSPkiller Wrote:

Method Wrote:Come to London!!!

I would but only 2 of the main band drive. Getting a band's worth of gear into a 2000 Ford Fiesta (belonging to our good friend andrewcc) and a leaky Citroen Saxo would be difficult I thinks... Add to that the general skintness of us all, the number of people attending and the fact wee've now found a new venue (A cricket club. Hell yeah!) I don't really think it's a viable option, sorry.

Well, at least it's back on for now. I'm actually quitle looking forward to this...

Haha well when my band gets going proper I'll come to Wales ;)

Band? I know nothing of this! Tell us more!