Your thoughts and experience on your recording (and what next?)

tyoc

tyoc

Little Hot Wing
I want to listen how you have done your recording, the problems you find and how you solved them (I mean writing lirycs, adjust timing/playing to the rhythm, put your tracks on the right place and so on)... and perhaps if you have tryied a new recording what differences have you found.

OK, so I start?

what I have:
I only own an LP junior (kit: bag, amp, picks, guitar cable [how it is called?],instructional CD and sure the guitar) don't have a mic (the one of the headphones is not working), but I have a converter from the guitar cable to the mic input. I have no pedals.

Im a linux user so I have grabed http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ wich work OK in Ubuntu and my laptop.

The doing:

So I was playing some patterns in the guitar connected to the amp, and sounded OK (what is now in the left side of the music).

Next thing I do was plug the guitar cable to the converter to mic and started testing how to record (hit R for record, S for stop), and was watching how it added a new track each time I record again and playing the different tracks at the same time when hitting play.

So I decided that I will record the passage 2 times and do it. After that I have done some "improvisation" and recorded diferent tracks to feet in those 2 repetitions after some tries I listed something that I liked how it do sound and that is why the song is short.

The mixing:

Im my case was somewhat easy, but like I have said I repeated 2 times the pattern at the left side that has 4 figures that is 8 shapes, if you listen the song, you will only listen 7, because I have deleted the last figure at end. Also I have deleted between the two repetitions of the pattern a repetition that I played bad (I miss some strings there)... so I have deleted my bad playing :P. That was almost all that I do.

For separate the channels because the input of the guitar was on the left chanel for the shapes and the melody? (I cant call it a solo isn't?), I used right click at the left of the track in the program and popup a menu that say separate channels, and after they where apart (left wih sound, right with no sound) I deleted the ones with no sound, and changed the channel of the melody to the right, hit export for the 4 time and sended the link to mark.

The result:

Tyoc - www.markweinguitarlessons.com/2009RF/sacarracatelas4.mp3
Click to expand...
Is about 28 secs of sound :), which Im proud of. But also I wanted it to be more extended than that, but I almost forgot what I have played to the next day... so

My faults:

- Have only recorded two times the pattern of the left side (because it have limitated my "improvisation")
- Dont have writed the song for example to http://www.tuxguitar.com.ar/ or write the song by hand at less to TABS... now I should learn/start transcribing it if I want the song back.





So what next??? what next?:

Extend the software I use:

I have extended a little the apps that I want to use, being a Linux user I sometimes find nice replacements for windows apps and other times is imposible to find some decent app, after reading somethreads about apps like EZdrummer (or some like that) I started searching for one for linux and I have found http://www.hydrogen-music.org/ it has a .wav export that I can import in Audacity also watching the screenshots there I have seen http://ardour.org/ which seems nice but apparently only work under JACK Audio and I use PulseAudio (those things are related to linux :P so dont worry if you dont get what I mean) steel ardour seems nice... I will continue looking fordward to.

Oh, Im in trouble for the next song:

I have exported some of the drum tracks (demos and one so simple from myself, for learn a little how to use the app and change the drumkit that play the patterns) and imported them to audacity and plug again my guitar to the laptop, started recording a la "improvisation" and have found that this is more hard than what I have done of find a nice guitar pattern and play over it for a very short time :P.

Specially is more hard because I have thinked about a relaxed pattern (like in the left of the first song) but it simply dont go with the drums... or the drums dont go with the pattern haha. Also the drum timming that you enter when have that backtrack, for me make it feel it different than having only guitar Accompanying in a more relaxed way.

So yes, I think I need to enter/study more for been able to play a nice thing for the next time. So again congratulations to all of you.




I will not say more, because for a so short song and dont know what to do next is already a large post :P.
 
Last edited:
Don't feel bad about not being able to remember what you played from one day to the next. A lot of times with original songs, I'll get them recorded and then if the band ever wants to play them, I've got to go back and learn them again. Sometimes I can't even figure out what I did on the recordings until I solo that track and listen only to it.
 
I learned a lot from my first one. Was interesting how it evolved, and how various melodic ideas, and instrumentation ideas, that worked well in my head failed miserably in reality.

Next up is another original I'm working on, and a search for more plugins - I need better reverb, more than anything.
 
Aahzz said:
I learned a lot from my first one. Was interesting how it evolved, and how various melodic ideas, and instrumentation ideas, that worked well in my head failed miserably in reality.

Next up is another original I'm working on, and a search for more plugins - I need better reverb, more than anything.
Click to expand...

I saw a guitarport in that photo you posted of your studio, why cant you use that?
 
Chihlidog said:
I saw a guitarport in that photo you posted of your studio, why cant you use that?
Click to expand...

I'm using the Toneport for vocals...I suppose I could use the reverb in it, but I'm looking more for reverb that can be added to the track, so it can be tweaked when mixing, rather than be married to it when I record it.
 
For my song (which hasn't been revealed here but is currently in the HC Songwriting contest) I was able to take a riff I've had for more than a decade and finally write a song around it.

It was my first full recording using my new Mbox Mini/ProTools/iMac setup and it was mostly easy except for the drum situation. Having no way to record live drums I worked the song out around a simple drum loop just to get the arrangement and parts worked out. I did a couple of guitar tracks with different parts, then recorded a bass part.

After that I ran into a wall with lyrics and vocal melodies. Its been a while since I've done ANY songwriting so I had a really hard time getting rolling, and I had to fit any writing time in between students or breaks in my workday since my gear is here in my office at work.

Once I had enough to try recording some vocals I sang what I had a few times with the mic in out hallway outside my office since that was as far away from my 8x10' office as I coud get.

DSC00157.jpg


I thought the choruses sounded a little small so I tried to double them to thicken the "big" parts of the song....I didn't worry about getting things too tight since I thought I would have time to re-record everything when I was finished tweaking the lyrics. I also hated the vocal sound because the mic was hearing the sound reflected off of the low drywall ceiling. Would have been nice to warm up and track the vocals seriously. Anyhow, the chorus melody is high in my range, and I didn't sing it very well...at some point I want to re-record the song and I'll work around that stuff....

The drums were also an issue. I had never programmed MIDI drums before or used loops much...one of the instructors here gave me his copy of Addicted drums to use but it didn't work too well with ProTools 8 so I ended up buying EZdrummer. Once again, short on time I decided it would be easier to construct and loop drum beats than it would be to actually learn how to use the program so I wrote the basic beats in ProTools' MIDI editor and then looped them.

I tried to make the drum beats a little less stiff. Here is a shot of just the velocity information for a section of the song...tweaking the basic beats a little bit and making sure that drum fills actually built into the next section really lived up the track in places although there are other that still sound very "drum machine" like.

Picture2-1.png


Ultimately I recorded the whole thing backwards. Normaly I would figure out the arrangement, record the drums and play everything to the drum track to ensure that the feel was good. In this case I built the track backwards and the drumms were the very last thing I did :facepalm:

The guitars were mostly my Suhr Classic although the guitar solo was my Les Paul. The Bas was my MIM P-Bass special. All of the guitar tones are through the free version of GTR Solo (the bass is actually through a guitar model since the bass model sounded pretty muddy to me).

I'll elaborate on this after the reveal...:)
 
I learned all kinds of stuff.

The best thing I learned is to be prepared to record at all times, cause you might come up with really cool stuff outta the blue.
 
cfgsteak said:
I learned all kinds of stuff.

The best thing I learned is to be prepared to record at all times, cause you might come up with really cool stuff outta the blue.
Click to expand...

Yeah, at least for me, I have to strike while the iron is hot. If I have an idea and think "I'll remember that tomorrow", I inevitably forget it by tomorrow.
 
Prages said:
Yeah, at least for me, I have to strike while the iron is hot. If I have an idea and think "I'll remember that tomorrow", I inevitably forget it by tomorrow.
Click to expand...

Its weird how that happens. Its like it makes so much sense, you cant possibly forget it. Then poof. Gone.
 
My thoughts are what I have known for a long time. I suck as a writer. I happened upon something that I was able to work with, that's how I was able to enter this. It happens very rarely. There is no way I could write lyrics. I also learned that programming drums is completely tedious and takes seemingly forever to do a good track. But I also enjoyed it very much, I am hooke don recording all sorts of different things now, experimenting with different sounds, time signatures, styles, etc. I look forward to the next one.
 
Chihlidog said:
My thoughts are what I have known for a long time. I suck as a writer. I happened upon something that I was able to work with, that's how I was able to enter this. It happens very rarely. There is no way I could write lyrics. I also learned that programming drums is completely tedious and takes seemingly forever to do a good track. But I also enjoyed it very much, I am hooke don recording all sorts of different things now, experimenting with different sounds, time signatures, styles, etc. I look forward to the next one.
Click to expand...

You'll get better and it will get easier the more you do it, though...
 
I'm not sure which program you're using but I was able to cut and paste pretty easily with EZdrummer. I actually did all of the programming in the protools MIDI editor and treated it almost like a word processing document...
 
That's why I have real drums. I programmed my drum machine for almost 10 years, and while I got to where I could it in my sleep, many times I couldn't get the drums to feel right.

I'm a terrible drummer, but I would rather use real drums played poorly than fake drums programmed well at this point. :embarrassed:
 
My thoughts....

For my next song I'll have Prages do the guitars and vocals, Dexter do the drums, Mark can cut a smokin's end solo, and I'll play bass....

:grin:
 
Ultimately I recorded the whole thing backwards. Normaly I would figure out the arrangement, record the drums and play everything to the drum track to ensure that the feel was good. In this case I built the track backwards and the drumms were the very last thing I did
Click to expand...

I see the other day talking with a friend said me that the drums are recorded first, then the bass, guitar and the last thing are the vocals.

Now I see how difficult is to make all fit, lately I have tryied to do some drumming for some parts I have and because they are slow I see no help in that :S... perpahs I need to first find a nice not so played pattern for the drums something more soft and reduce the BPM... will continue for something for this :), if not I should let the drums alone for the moment.

I happened upon something that I was able to work with, that's how I was able to enter this.
Click to expand...
O yes, me too, something that I can handle, now let see what can be done for little next step.

The best thing I learned is to be prepared to record at all times, cause you might come up with really cool stuff outta the blue.
Click to expand...

I think I need a recorder :), I have a little mp3 recorder... but Im unable to find the power cable that conects to the PC :S.
 
Normally what I do with original songs is to lay down a 'scratch' guitar and vocal track to a click. Then I'll do the drums along with the click and scratch tracks. Once the drums are recorded, I mute the scratch tracks and then do bass, rhythm guitars, keyboard (if any). Then I do the vocals. At least the lead vocals. After the vocals are done, I do the lead guitar part. I do the lead guitar last because I don't want it to overlap with the vocal tracks.
 
Aahzz said:
I'm using the Toneport for vocals...I suppose I could use the reverb in it, but I'm looking more for reverb that can be added to the track, so it can be tweaked when mixing, rather than be married to it when I record it.
Click to expand...

You can try this free VST:
http://www.knufinke.de/sir/sir1_faq.html#ir

You need to load an impulse response file, which supplies info to the VST about what kind of room etc. I haven't used it yet, but it seems pretty cool. Someone posted an impulse response file of the Hamburg Stock Exchange if you're keen. Files can be found here:

http://noisevault.com/nv/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

Happy reverbing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top