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-- do you record "real" instruments for your songs?

do you record "real" instruments for your songs?

I bought the M-Audio MobilePre USB to record myself and my room mate playing instruments like guitar and bass, and I am wondering if anyone else uses "real" instruments in their songs, and what their recording process is like. I've been spending a lot of time figuring out the most quick and efficient way to get the recording process down, and so far I think Logic Pro has been the most reliable for recording samples and EQing them to sound right, but I am still in the process of figuring out how to record analog instruments (banjo, violin, etc) and vocals. When you record yourself playing an instrument or singing, do you use a preamp? How do you sequence the analog instrument sample with the digital instruments like drum machines etc? What program/VST do you use for processing to make the sample "sit" right in the song?

record each track individually,

normally you would start with the drums

unless you already knew the bpm and set your metronome

i'm guessing you have protools le or some garbage like that right?

have you never recorded before?

lol

nope up until I recently learned to play bass I"ve made songs exclusively on reason and ableton

Re: do you record "real" instruments for your songs?

quote:

Originally posted by phyrrus I bought the M-Audio MobilePre USB to record myself and my room mate playing instruments like guitar and bass, and I am wondering if anyone else uses "real" instruments in their songs, and what their recording process is like. I've been spending a lot of time figuring out the most quick and efficient way to get the recording process down, and so far I think Logic Pro has been the most reliable for recording samples and EQing them to sound right, but I am still in the process of figuring out how to record analog instruments (banjo, violin, etc) and vocals. When you record yourself playing an instrument or singing, do you use a preamp? How do you sequence the analog instrument sample with the digital instruments like drum machines etc? What program/VST do you use for processing to make the sample "sit" right in the song?

Yeah logic, cubase and ableton are all good for tracking real instruments. What setup you need really depends on what your recording. For guitar and bass, I'd use an effects processor like the Line 6 Pod. The setup on that is the musicians decision, not the producers, so you only have to worry about plugging it in.

Acoustic instruments are harder, and you could spend A LOT of cash getting a good sound out of them. A good mic, preamp and soundcard are going to be necceary in that case. Same for vocals, violins, drums, acoustic guitar, acoustic/upright bass etc.

Use compression and EQ (a fair bit of it) to get stuff sitting right. You can afford to be more radical in your use of those effects on real instruments, because they tend to have more dynamic performance in the first place.

Not sure what you mean by how to sequence it..? You just write the part and loop it/cut it/use it..? Thats like asking "how do I write a song?"

Hey there,

I actually work together with a excellent guitar player. We already made a track and the guitars came out great (acoustic guitar).
I found out that you don't need the most expensive equipment to make it all sound good. The most important thing (IMO) is that you need the make sure that the recordings is as dry as possible (no fx during the recording session!!). The way I did it was I actually used a rolling 19" rack that was flipped in a 45 degree angle, on top of that, I hanged a towel (they absorb great!) and inside the 19" rack I installed my microphone (a cheap ass AKG) and behind the guitarplayer I also hanged a towel for absorbation of the sound, and the recordings turned out extremely well!

If this was not your question, here comes the rest:
Recording sessions are extremely tiring! Session have to be re-recorded all the time because of some small errors (guitar-player wise). I always record them dry into cubase, after that, I can EQ, FX and compress to my taste.

Most important is to take good care of the acoustics in the room you're recording in. It doesn't have to be topshelf stuff, but pay attention to it!

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