I’ve been recording a song for my band. We got the drums recorded last week and just finished recording guitars and vocals. We’re doing it ourselves, and I’m going to share a bit of advice I’ve gleaned from doing this.
One song at a time
First, when recording on your own, only go for one song your first time. Before, I went for recording a whole album with my old band. The problem with recording a whole album your first time doing it yourself, you don’t find the problems until you start mixing down the individual tracks.
Until you scrutinize each and every track, you don’t hear what you did wrong during recording. You don’t realize that the snare mic was knocked out of place. You don’t realize that you were singing into the wrong side of that condenser mic. (This happens.)
Recording an entire album, you get really discouraged when the reality slaps you in the face that hours and days of your work are entirely unusable. As an example, my last band recorded a ton of guitar tracks. When we went to mix them down, there was this annoying “whoosh” noise. I couldn’t EQ this noise out. It was a noise you couldn’t hear unless you were consciously listening for it during recording. The guitar tracks were unusable.
When everything goes to crap, only having to re-record one song is annoying, but doable. Re-recording an entire album is enough to break the spirit of any aspiring band. Going through the mixing and mastering process, you realize exactly what you did wrong and need to do correctly next time.
With only one song, your investment is low enough that you can correct course with the next song. Trust me, I’ve recorded an entire album that was done incorrectly. It was weeks worth of effort down the toilet.
The Holy Click Track
If you are not recording live, the click track is the most valuable friend you can ever have. In fact, I argue that you should spend your time on the click track before anything else. You should even rehearse to it to know if it’s too fast or too slow.
We tried to wing it with my band just recently. Our song has two different tempos, and we recorded separate takes with the drums at the two different tempos. However, we didn’t put them together into one comprehensive click track. We thought we could play along with the drums.
We discovered, much to our embarrassment, that the tempo changed section had nothing to keep time to. It was one hit per bar of music. Nothing happening with drums. I tried recording bass by looking at the wave forms. That sucked. That really sucked. It didn’t work at all. It worked even worse when our guitarist tried it.
I had to rip out that section of the song and start a new project with a click track. We got it done, but now I have to go and surgically transplant this new take into the original. Much more work during mixing which slows the whole process down.
So, it’s worth sitting down and figuring out your click track. Figure out how to insert tempo changes into your software. If your band has tempo changes, you will need software that accommodates this. But even with the click track, we ran into a different problem…
Understand the latency of your DAW
After getting the click track going, I tried playing along with both the drums and the click track. Kai, our drummer, said the click track was wrong. I then started insulting him saying, “Sure, it’s the click track and not the drummer!” But he was right.
After wiping the egg off my face, it turns out the latency between the USB interface and what I was recording was completely wonky. I checked the audio settings, and the USB audio interface had a huge lag. 50 milliseconds is enough to get you completely off track.
USB audio interfaces just have this latency, and there isn’t much you can do about it. But, I muted the drums and just recorded to the click track. It worked out perfectly. But if Kai didn’t catch this, my life would have been a nightmare trying to adjust for this latency during mixing.
USB interfaces suck for latency. However, they are great for live recording. Firewire interfaces have less latency, but it’s still there. Unfortunately, I have had nothing but bad luck with Firewire solutions. I have two PreSonus audio interfaces sitting on my desk, dead. $1,200 worth of paper-weights. I have no clue why they will not work, but after that much money, I’ve learned my lesson not to buy them anymore.
The best interface, though I haven’t tried it, has to be a dedicated console. Consoles cost a crap-load of money, though. Considering my band’s budget (none), a dedicated hardware console is out of the question.
So, despite the drawbacks, I’ll have to deal with this latency. The ideal solution would be to record live, but we don’t have isolation booths to prevent bleed-thru of all the instruments into the mics.
The best thing about recording on your own
Despite the drawbacks of DIY recording, you learn exactly what you need to record. You figure out the harmonies you’d like, you learn how your guitars sound in the mix, and you learn if your voice can hold up for hours of takes.
When you put yourself under a microscope, you figure out all the things that would have cost you a ton of money recording in a professional studio. All the warnings you hear before going into a professional recording studio become perfectly clear when you do it on your own and experience it first hand.
But you wouldn’t have known it if you hadn’t tried. In fact, you wouldn’t have even thought you were violating any principle of preparation for pro recording.
When you hear things play back from a recording, your opinion of how you sound changes. You might want to change the song structure. You might want to add different melodies or harmonies. The full impact of the song doesn’t hit you until you hear the raw tracks coming back at you unfiltered.
Until you record yourself, you don’t appreciate the amount of work that goes into it. I hear “record it on your own” bounced around glibly on different blogs. Even my own. But it’s hard and time consuming work. Mic placement. Click tracks. Multiple vocal takes. Compensating for latency. A jet flying overhead right when you’re recording vocals.
Despite how much I wish someone else could do this part of my band’s work for me, I think the practice is invaluable to saving you a lot of time and money before heading into a real recording studio. Learning how to record your own music is a great skill so you can record on a whim. But nothing replaces a professional recording studio with people that are specialists in recording, mixing, and mastering a band.
Are you recording and mixing on your own?
Let me know how it’s going in the comments! We’re all in the same boat here. Next post, I’ll let you hear the more stark naked takes of me trying to mix on my own. It’ll be embarassing for me. Like those dreams where you’re in front of a large group of people in your underwear.
I really hope I can pull this stuff off. I want to record at least one song a month. I’ll keep you in the loop.
I remember feeling the same way when I first started out recording. I know it can seem overwhelming, but keep at it. Learn from your mistakes and keep pushing your limits. Next thing you know, you’ll be able to do it in your sleep.
Oh and if you ever need any tips or pointers, feel free to PM me. I dig the blog and I’d be happy to help you guys however I can.
Cheers,
Reid
Wow! Thank you, Reid! I’d appreciate any and all help.
I’ve attempted this stuff before and got mixed results. I need to look for some type of community that can give critical feedback on mixes and masters. People that help each other out with the whole deal from beginning to end.
I remember seeing something, GrooveZoo I think, that hosted a community like this. I need to go check it out again.
Again, thank you for any help. And please feel free to point out any blunders I’m making here! I’m just throwing this out there with the hope that it helps other musicians.
I thought I’d offer a tip to help you with that latency–especially considering all the great info you have shared with me over the past several months.
Keep a pair of drumsticks handy, or even a mic to hold up to your playback speakers (or studio monitors if you’re lucky enough to have a pair). When you begin recording EACH take, either record the actual sound of the click track through the monitors or use the drumsticks to click along with the click track for several measures before you actually begin playing the instrument. Now, when you are finished recording the track, simply play it back and use that clicking you recorded at the beginning of the take to align your track with the actual click track.
The results may not be 100% perfect, but it will usually be close enough to work around any latency you may be dealing with. I hopes this helps!
You rock! I’m totally going to try this for our next take. I’m hearing quite a few of our takes being off from the drums by just that small annoying amount.
That trick is so extremely simple. Thank you so much!
I’m glad I could help, and THANK YOU for all the great advice you have shared with me in the past! Happy new year!
Great post.
There is a lot of advanced information in the article and it’s really good. I am recording my album on my own. I worked in different types of studios: home, professional, off a voice recorder!
But after several years recording solo singles and EPs and albums with bands, I’m working to carefully record a my first full length solo record.
I decided to record one demo at a time like you suggested. Sometimes, I record and mix on my own, and sometimes I record with my engineer. Nonetheless, I’ve been working on one song at a time with different instruments and textures until I’m ready to take a year out of my life to record a full solo record.
My engineer is encouraging and knows I am capable to do a lot of the work I need to do on my own. But we both know it’s a long commitment, and we’re working together to find the right sound.
.jordannah elizabeth
thinklikealabel.com
Cool, someone else doing what I’m doing! Nice!
I’m really happy I tried this on my own first. I’m hearing things wrong with our equipment. If I shelled out for a studio, I would have never heard these small noises.
Plus, everyone in my band had to really concentrate on what we wanted from the song at certain parts. It wasn’t a super high priority until we could play back what we were doing.
Either of these things would have resulted in lots of money wasted on a studio.
Still, the amount of hours it takes to do this kinda sucks. Once we nail down our issues, I want to hire a studio. I just don’t have enough hours to both record, mix, and master; then spend hours creating graphics, talking on Facebook, and booking shows.
Good luck on the solo recordings! Let me know when it’s done!
Have you tried a boss micro br? You cant do all the work on there, but they’re great for a quick demo and latency isnt an issue. You can export the tracks to mix later. For the money, they’re the best thing you can buy IMHO.
Thanks for the tip! I just checked it out, but I don’t see any XLS inputs for mics. Maybe I’m looking at the wrong thing?
No XLR socket. I use a mini condenser I got with it. You could always go through a small mixer. We have one with phantom power, just don’t have the shiny mic yet.
Another tip I would like to share with you is to check your phase between mics. Phase is everything! Many times a drum mix may be lacking power and low-end, and it is due to phase issues between mics.
Always remember the 3-to-1 rule. The best way to put this is, if there is 1 inch between the snare head and the snare mic, then there has to be AT LEAST 3 inches between the snare head and every other mic on the drums to avoid phase issues. Phase problems come from a sound source hitting multiple mics at different times, but just slightly enough difference to suck the life out of the sound.
The only exception to this is if the sound source hits two mics at the same exact time (i.e. overheads). That is why it always helps to grab a tape-measure before setting up drum mics.
The most important mic to measure between overheads is the snare, because it is generally the “center” of the drums. On a side note, when recording with a computer DAW that allows you to see the soundwaves, you can always line up the tracks to match phase.
I typically measure mic distance when tracking, then I also spot align tracks when mixing. I start with the overheads. Find a snare hit in the song, and make sure it hits at the same exact time on both overhead tracks. Once the overheads are phase-aligned, begin aligning each and every other drum track to the overheads.
This trick can literally save you hours of EQ experimenting when mixing.
One more thing, don’t forget to use the phase-reverse button to check your phase. If you phase-reverse a track, and the sound instantly sounds more powerful and has more low-end, then your phase is off. Also be sure to check stereo mixes in mono. If you have any phase issues present, checking the full mix in mono will make them stick out like a sore thumb.