Bands Read This!

[Stripey]

thanks betamax thats the kind of reply i was after.

I get the impression a lot of people are just walking away with the raw recorded mixes from places like captain toms and putting them out, and either don't care about any further production or don't know any better. Judging by the responses in this thread and some of the recordings I've heard anyway...

[Shaki]

thanks betamax thats the kind of reply i was after.

I get the impression a lot of people are just walking away with the raw recorded mixes from places like captain toms and putting them out, and either don't care about any further production or don't know any better. Judging by the responses in this thread and some of the recordings I've heard anyway...

It depends what you're after and how much you want to spend. If you're "putting something out" then you should certainly invest and make it sound as quality as possible. If you're recording a demo for the purposes of sending it away to venues, promoters etc. and punting it for a couple of quid at your gigs then you maybe don't need to spend so much?

Mark at Exile recorded our demo and gave us a rough mix away with us. We got back to him with our thoughts and he did more mixing and some mastering on it. I think it sounds pretty good quality and was certainly value for money. If we were "putting it out" I'd make a heap of changes but I view it as a demo and not a release.

I think you're right in that people don't know any better. I don't know what mastering means! It sounded "better" afterwards though........

[betamax]

Another thing not mentioned, room acoustics...... Recording in a nice sounding room or a 'dead' room is preferable also.

For example: I recorded the same singer two weeks running. The 2nd week, I placed a number of large pieces of foam around the room the singer was recording in. There was a recognisable difference. The voice was a good bit 'clearer' and slightly more 'powerful' sounding. The room wasn't that bad for echos in the first place but even that tempory D.I.Y was worth doing.

I get the same benefit by hanging duvets in the room - makes a massive difference to the miked vocal sound compeared to a un-duveted room. Much more clarity / presence. For recording vocals - the deader the room the better I reckon.

[FatHand]

thanks betamax thats the kind of reply i was after.

I get the impression a lot of people are just walking away with the raw recorded mixes from places like captain toms and putting them out, and either don't care about any further production or don't know any better. Judging by the responses in this thread and some of the recordings I've heard anyway...

What do you mean by putting them out? Is that releasing them for purchase in oneup or fopp or putting them on myspace? All the recordings I have, from tapes (I still use these and like the sound) of my personal songs, rough recordings in practices, live "demo" recordings to those that are slightly higher quality, I consider worth letting people listen to and keep if they want.

I recently did some home recording which is not exactly well produced, it was done quickly to capture an idea and let people hear a potential direction. The bear minimum, getting levels set reasonably and cleaning up sounds, was done (still took a few hours to do with my limited knowledge).

Personally, it doesn't make a huge difference to me how well something is recorded as long as you get a decent idea of where it is going/could go and some semblance of effort has been put in and the songs are to my liking. I enjoy hearing the progression of songs from bands I like, hearing different versions along their road (even if is them learing how to mix down previous recordings) is not a bad thing in my book. It is nice document of how progression is made as a band and as individual musicians.

Quality is important if people are buying your material but generally I'd say if people are interested in your music they are also interested in the progression it makes. I certainly, like Shaki, wouldn't charge more than a few quid for some home produced recordings, mainly so you can either keep up recording with the song writing or save up for the final product.

I'd say the local recording facilities charge appropriately for the level that can realistically be achieved at them. Maybe the likes of the Byer (not exactly local) have the sort of facilities that are under discussion. I know they have some quality equipment.

Colin

[KimyReizeger]

Is that real sidechain compression? What compressor do you use for it?

KVR: slim slow slider Side Chain Compressor - Virtual Effect

[The Milner]

In terms of mixng for us it depends of what we plan on doing with the track. For the recording of charlies we tracked and mixed it all in 3 hours i think in captain toms, but the single we spent i think about 5 hours mixing overall and a couple hours tracking up. We now spend most of our money mixing the tracks we record, but again as betamax says sometimes the song just works without heaps of hours being spent.

Ive always said id love to work with a proper producer, not someone who tracks up as well, just someone who's job is to make the track come alive, but at the moment there is no way we could afford it.

[Sam 45]

When we recorded with the guys in Stanley, we spent about a week doing the recordings, basically whenever we were free ect. Paul then took the 4 recordings home and spent about 6 weeks on them. Frequently e-mailing different version asking about how we wanted it done ect.

All for 50 quid a tune, no complaints atall.

[scottyboy]

http://www.aberdeen-music.com/forums/music-discussion/43941-10-easy-wishes-news-uk-dates-single.html

according to that thread 10ew had a track mastered by robin sutherland, whos in dundee... if that counts as 'the north east'

[betamax]

Ive always said id love to work with a proper producer, not someone who tracks up as well, just someone who's job is to make the track come alive,

Im lucky enough to have worked with three 'proper (ish) producers' over the years. These guys are smart like and always have a studio chimp (aka engineer) to set up the recordings and do the multitracking and editing. The type of blokes who just address the rest of the room with instuctions and comments, like '' THATS FUCKIN SHIT - CHANGE IT TO THIS.... DONT FUCKIN ARGUE '' and ''THATS A FUCKING NICE TAKE, MOVE ON, TIME IS MONEY'' and ''HAHAHA WE'LL HAVE TO GET SOMEONE WHO CAN ACTUALLY SING IF YOU WANT TO DO A CHORUS LIKE THAT''. Its def works.

I aspire to have a job like that one day.

[The Milner]

Im lucky enough to have worked with three 'proper (ish) producers' over the years. These guys are smart like and always have a studio chimp (aka engineer) to set up the recordings and do the multitracking and editing. The type of blokes who just address the rest of the room with instuctions and comments, like '' THATS FUCKIN SHIT - CHANGE IT TO THIS.... DONT FUCKIN ARGUE '' and ''THATS A FUCKING NICE TAKE, MOVE ON, TIME IS MONEY'' and ''HAHAHA WE'LL HAVE TO GET SOMEONE WHO CAN ACTUALLY SING IF YOU WANT TO DO A CHORUS LIKE THAT''. Its def works.

I aspire to have a job like that one day.

yeah see thats what id like, someone who gives it straight and as i say knows how to do things to the tracks i wouldnt think of.

[emergency72]

I subscribe to the Steve Albini ethos...."telling a band they are playing all wrong and should be playing a different way is like telling a guy he's fucking his wife all wrong and should be fucking her another way"

Don't fuck with what feels good!

[Stripey]

I subscribe to the Steve Albini ethos...."telling a band they are playing all wrong and should be playing a different way is like telling a guy he's fucking his wife all wrong and should be fucking her another way"

Don't fuck with what feels good!

It's got nothing to do with what how or what they are playing, it's about polishing that recorded material and making sure it doesn't sound like shit in the context of other commercial recordings.

As for steve albinis analogy, maybe said guy is crap in bed so his wife is fucking someone else, probably the sound engineer who was trying to give him some friendly knowledgable advice.

[Alkaline]

It's got nothing to do with what how or what they are playing, it's about polishing that recorded material and making sure it doesn't sound like shit in the context of other commercial recordings.

As for steve albinis analogy, maybe said guy is crap in bed so his wife is fucking someone else, probably the sound engineer who was trying to give him some friendly knowledgable advice.

That's all well and good if "commercial" is what you're going for. Sometimes over-production removes the raw and near 'live' element that particular styles of music require. Not all bands/artists want to sound like every other band out there, which can happen if producers, engineers etc don't treat each band on an individual basis.

I guess a good producer should almost be like another member of the band and 'get' exactly what the rest of the band want to achieve out of their songs. While this might involve suggestion and experience, the producers ideas should try and help compliment the band rather than work against them.

I wouldn't know where to start looking for 'local' producers and i don't know any reason why i'd want to. We record everything ourselves at the moment although i would be interested in getting some of our recordings mastered properly. As far as i see (certainly at this level) it we'd rather not spend money on using someone else who is only going to achieve a similar standard to what we can achieve ourselves. But if someone wants to chuck money in our direction to go to a proper studio and work with a well established producer i think we'd be foolish to turn our back on the chance.

[RF Scott]

That's all well and good if "commercial" is what you're going for. Sometimes over-production removes the raw and near 'live' element that particular styles of music require. Not all bands/artists want to sound like every other band out there, which can happen if producers, engineers etc don't treat each band on an individual basis.

I guess a good producer should almost be like another member of the band and 'get' exactly what the rest of the band want to achieve out of their songs. While this might involve suggestion and experience, the producers ideas should try and help compliment the band rather than work against them.

I wouldn't know where to start looking for 'local' producers and i don't know any reason why i'd want to. We record everything ourselves at the moment although i would be interested in getting some of our recordings mastered properly. As far as i see (certainly at this level) it we'd rather not spend money on using someone else who is only going to achieve a similar standard to what we can achieve ourselves. But if someone wants to chuck money in our direction to go to a proper studio and work with a well established producer i think we'd be foolish to turn our back on the chance.

I think he means commercial in the sense of a product to sell rather than over produced radio nonsense, eg. an album you'd pay money for rather than a demo/something to shove on myspace.

[Alkaline]

I think he means commercial in the sense of a product to sell rather than over produced radio nonsense, eg. an album you'd pay money for rather than a demo/something to shove on myspace.

My statement still stands regardless. It ultimately depends what you want to achieve out of it. For the record i've heard some terribly recorded/produced albums that have been released for general sale but they still sound great because they capture the band rather than the current 'it' sound.

[Stripey]

That's all well and good if "commercial" is what you're going for. Sometimes over-production removes the raw and near 'live' element that particular styles of music require. Not all bands/artists want to sound like every other band out there, which can happen if producers, engineers etc don't treat each band on an individual basis.

I'm really talking about mixing and mastering once everything has been recorded, operating on stems (the split recorded channels). i.e extremely subtle compression/limiting where required, very precise eq and filter processing which in some cases takes account of the final media it's destined for (vinyl particularly), removal of excessive peaks such as clicks and pops which push the overall track volume down and so on, it's a very subtle process which makes the difference between a muddy, quiet final cd and one that wont sound like shit if played in series with other well mixed/mastered tracks (on the radio for example) but still has a decent level of loudness while preserving dynamic range. Lofi glitch and that sort of thing important to the character of a recording are still preserved!

[Hog]

All my acoustic stuff is unmastered. I don't know how to do it. I simply record and then try and get volumes correct.

My favourite artist (oh, here we go again...is Devin Townsend) he apparently like to get away with as much compression as possible i.e. redlining it. Apparently it works very well for multi-layered stuff. However, mastering is usually left to someone else...a fresh pair of ears so to speak.

Back on topic. I have a rough idea, how to record. After that, I wish I could be pointed in the right direction regarding mixes, mastering etc.

Mastering sounds like a fine-art.

[FatHand]

I'm really talking about mixing and mastering once everything has been recorded, operating on stems (the split recorded channels). i.e extremely subtle compression/limiting where required, very precise eq and filter processing which in some cases takes account of the final media it's destined for (vinyl particularly), removal of excessive peaks such as clicks and pops which push the overall track volume down and so on, it's a very subtle process which makes the difference between a muddy, quiet final cd and one that wont sound like shit if played in series with other well mixed/mastered tracks (on the radio for example) but still has a decent level of loudness while preserving dynamic range. Lofi glitch and that sort of thing important to the character of a recording are still preserved!

The bass player from Ghost of Bongo does all of that for our recordings. He spends huge amounts of time on the fine details. Some tracks have huge amounts of work put into them due to aspects of recording. I think Drums are particularly hard to make sound good if they are not recorded well.

[emergency72]

It's got nothing to do with what how or what they are playing, it's about polishing that recorded material and making sure it doesn't sound like shit in the context of other commercial recordings.

I was referring more to the posts of Milner and betamax about the guy in the studio barking orders...

The only good example I've heard of this is where Rick Rubin told The International Noise Conspiracy to stop trying to add extra little "cool" bits to their tunes in the studio as he said that wasn't how the band sounded live, and ultimately thats what he thought the band should sound like on record.

[black_matter]

Back on topic. I have a rough idea, how to record. After that, I wish I could be pointed in the right direction regarding mixes, mastering etc.

Mastering sounds like a fine-art.

Very much so myself hog man. I can cope with the recording process fine, but when all the twiddly fiddly bits come in and all the fandangled words come in, i'm fucked.

[Guest Jake Wifebeater]

I get the impression a lot of people are just walking away with the raw recorded mixes from places like captain toms and putting them out, and either don't care about any further production

In our case, you have the correct impression. Our method of recording is as follows:

1. Book some rehearsal time at Tom's.

2. Set up Craig Spike's 4-track recorder.

3. Record the songs live (no cheating) onto said 4-track recorder.

4. Dave Spike takes the tape home and puts it onto CDr, eliminating the clicks and fuzz along the way.

5. Dave Spike gives the CDr to me, and assuming we're all happy with the sound, I start burning CDr's of it.

Points to consider re. said CDr:

1. Do we like how it sounds?

2. Can you clearly hear the vocals, guitar, bass and drums?

If the answer is yes to the above, we release it, simple as that. No pissing about and disappearing up your own arse in an orgy of self-indulgent tweaking and nitpicking. If you can hear everything that's going on then it's good enough to release i.e. release it properly, as opposed to putting 10 copies into One-Up and sticking a few tunes onto a Cryspace page and leaving it at that.

That's how we do it, anyway. Might not work for everyone.

[Stripey]

we release it, simple as that. No pissing about and disappearing up your own arse in an orgy of self-indulgent tweaking and nitpicking. If you can hear everything that's going on then it's good enough to release

Yeah well admirable sentiments, u go girl, stick it to the man etc, but sticking up 2 fingers to the tangible, accepted and well understood science of audio engineering is doing you no favours.

[Stripey]

I should point out aswell that frequently exposing yours ears to extremely loud PA systems/amps wether performing, practicing or listening probably does enough cumulative damage over time to actually make you physically incapable of making the kind of decisions required to do this kind of mixing.

[Paulscoconutass]

It depends on how well practiced the band are and how much time they can afford in a studio. For our last demo we recorded and mixed 5 tracks at Captain toms in just under 3 hours (having booked one of their 8 hour sessions, we were pissed off 'cos we thought it would have taken MUCH longer) and that wasn't even rushed. As long as the individual track's are relatively clear - you can hear every instrument - I don't see much point in taking the mixing much further.

There's no point in kidding on that 95% of the bands recording in Aberdeen really need day upon day of mixing and editing to get their tracks to up to Radio standard, unless they sound crap enough to need it, because it's not going to happen anyway. Anyway, if a 'suit' from the industry had to choose between a perfect sounding track that a band had spent weeks on, or a sketchier demo, quality wouldn't even be a factor because all the mixing in the world can't save a shite song.

[Stripey]

It's surprising that so many people who supposedly care about their music have such an apparent disregard for how it is actually presented and reproduced. Producing a good mix is not about "day upon day of mixing", infact I'd argue that if it's taking that long there is some kind of problem with the engineer.

Anyway, I don't see how you can record AND mix 5 tracks in the space of 3 hours and produce satisfactory results, unless you have incredibly low standards or superhuman hearing. Why skimp on this when it has such a profound effect on how your material is perceived?