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I bought a Zoom H4N field recorder a few months ago. I wanted to broaden the sounds I use in my recordings and do some experimental stuff. I don’t have a huge field recording passion – I’m not very interested in recording a storm or a train. But I do like recordings of people behaving naturally. It’s been fun, the quality is great and listening back to most recordings I feel like I’m in the room again. Which for a lot of situations is more interesting to me than taking a photograph as far as capturing a memory.

So here’s a montage of some of the recordings I’ve done with it since I got it:

Field Recording I [5.4 MB]

• [0:00] Justin (my drummer) has a giant, giant empty room in his basement. This is me trying out the reverb in it.
• [0:05] At a Barn practice I made some jokes about Bryan Adams and then wound up singing Summer of ’69.
• [0:25] And then “Run To You” but I couldn’t remember any of the lyrics really.
• [0:39] Then, after being exposed to a bunch of ska recently, I suggested the worst combination in the world might be a ska version of Bryan Adams’ Everything I Do, I Do It For You. [1:03] And then we improv it.
• [1:28] Total Breakdown in Brad Sucks practice. Next time I’m gonna feed the computer output (vocals and synth) into the H4N. I think that’ll sound better.
• [1:55] Rehearsal of I Think You’re Alright for a performance a few weeks ago.
• [2:31] As a favor I did sound for a bluegrass show by Yonder Hill. They needed eight microphones but they were very good. This is them doing “Beefsteaks When I’m Hungry, Whiskey When I’m Dry”. There is a banjo solo.
• [2:54] My guitarist Ben and his wife performed an intimate Valentine’s dinner-music show. This is them covering Here Comes the Sun by The Beatles. On this one I fed the monitor output into one of the H4N inputs so the vocals sound a lot clearer.
• [3:28] At Brad Sucks practice: Ben randomly plays an Irish jig riff, Justin says “dance, leprechaun, dance”, and I yell “WHERE’S ME GOLD” in my evil leprechaun voice and then the delay from the microphone makes us all giggle.

It’s a sweet little device. Main complaint is I wish it powered up quicker.

Posted on - March 30, 2010 [at] 6:37 pm by Brad
Tagged in - field-recording, gear, recording

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14 Comments on this post

Sonora on Adventures in Field Recording
March 30, 2010 at 7:35 pm

Gritty. You’re always keeping it real and I love that!

JB on Adventures in Field Recording
March 30, 2010 at 11:13 pm

Honestly I kind of expected better from the thing. The recordings all sound a little far away for my taste, except for the one you fed from the monitor. And I guess the “where’s me gold” one sounds pretty up close too. But I know when you were in the thick of rehearsal the sound was more full and… well, louder I guess.

Growyoyorhino on Adventures in Field Recording
March 30, 2010 at 11:23 pm

where do I acquire one of these?

Brad on Adventures in Field Recording
March 31, 2010 at 11:01 pm

JB: Well, there’s a lot of voodoo to placement of the device. Like the Total Breakdown recording I just had it stuck on a couch to the side of the room pointed in the opposite direction of my vocals and in the Barn Adams ones I have it on a tripod.

I think with headphones it captures the room pretty good. It was definitely louder in the room but also less clear. I think this is a nice middle ground (I could run it through a limiter and achieve basically the sound in the room).

JB on Adventures in Field Recording
March 31, 2010 at 11:48 pm

I guess maybe I was hoping it would be the field-recording equivalent of an Awesome Button. Just like, process the heck out of the recordings for me, with a button that lets me turn that off.

pseudosu on Adventures in Field Recording
April 1, 2010 at 1:36 pm

Thanks for the peek behind the curtain. Love your music, and it’s fun to get some behind the scenes low down. People dig that on my visual art site too i’ve found.

Kalix on Adventures in Field Recording
April 2, 2010 at 6:36 pm

Sound quality was a lot better than I expected, and hearing that “reverb” clip makes me want to go grab one of these and start getting some live reverb on the go :D

Benn Wolfe on Adventures in Field Recording
April 5, 2010 at 5:25 pm

I just wanted to say that your guitarist sounded awesome, that Beatles cover ruled. Feel free to make him do that again and put it up.

Awa on Adventures in Field Recording
April 8, 2010 at 3:46 pm

Yeah, that Beatles cover was kick-ass. The whole thing was pretty cool, though.

dauntless on Adventures in Field Recording
April 11, 2010 at 12:43 pm

The Zoom H4 is awesome. Looks like something straight out of a Star Trek movie as well!
Yep, the guitarist certainly did sound great!
Nice site BTW and I love the studio pics!

respect!

dauntless

Bas on Adventures in Field Recording
April 11, 2010 at 1:06 pm

I think H4N sounds like some kind of new flu

London Sound Survey on Adventures in Field Recording
January 20, 2011 at 7:40 am

Thanks for posting up that sample of the H4N in action, sounds like you’ve got yourself a pretty versatile machine there.

The earlier Zoom H4 was a bit plasticky, noticeably creaking if you squeezed it even lightly. Is the build quality of the H4N ok?

Brad on Adventures in Field Recording
January 20, 2011 at 7:23 pm

I haven’t handled an H4, but this one’s pretty rock solid. In the reviews I read they said they improved the build quality and I’m not disappointed with that.

London Sound Survey on Adventures in Field Recording
January 21, 2011 at 5:15 am

Thanks Brad, I’m tempted to get one of them myself now.