Hi Lewis!
-> BG> clean audio sources, but hopefully, you can see the drastic
-> BG> difference in treatment of some musical instruments and typical
-> BG> hi-fi and recording sources.
-> oh, I understand the difference, but does that mean that a guitar amp
-> needs to be at full volume (or a little more) to get the desired
-> sound? when I tell people in a band to turn their amps down and let
-> me take care of the volume am I doing them a disservice?
-> Depends; if you are a fan of Spinal Tap, then "11" is the only way to
-> go! :-) In reality, no, tell them to turn it down. Having been on
-> both sides of the fence it is a common problem, often due to -either-
-> noise exposure during a gig(ever notice it gets worse as the set(s)
-> progress?) or due to the same reason effecting their perception of
-> -their- monitor mix (or lack of). More often than not it's a ongoing
-> battle!
  Interesting conversation! Looking at it from the guitarist's
standpoint, their amplifier needs to be loud enough to satisfy them
"locally" as far as comfort level, loud enough to get the necessary
sound, and no louder. Then the sound system takes over with "sound
reinforcement" in the literal term. Hopefully, the guitarists are able
to get that comfort level much lower than at "11"!
A band's monitor mix is critical. If the band can't hear each other in a
decent mix, then the band is "blind" and mostly won't "groove" by having
an ensemble feeling. Without the musicians playing together, it's not
much point to amplify the results much of the time, so the primary job
of any musical sound job is make sure the musicians are comfortable, and
then if you know how to reinforce the room right, it's a piece of cake!
Just let the musicians get sounding good together in a decent mix and
some true magic can happen musically, and that doesn't mean having to
hover over a console like a vulture all night. Usually, I run sound on
gigs that perform on, and seldom touch anything after sound check other
than effects for particular tunes.
 When I first starte doing professional sound systems, it was mostly
loud bands needing mostly vocal reinforcement.. the drummers were being
too macho and demanding on going through at least three bass drum pedals
each gig.. then it was mostly attempting to get above a stack of
Marshall amplifiers with a little vocal or horn sections. Then as bass
drum started getting more and more dominance in the music, it was
brought in, and then the rest of the drum kits were miked.  Now it
seems like you need a 72 channel console just to do a pick up gig at
the corner bar!
 It sounds like you've got the general idea though.. just let the
guitarists get their "Sounds" together and hope they don't need negative
amplification (gotta get that invented one of these days!!)
Bonnie *:>
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