Remix: I’m Alright
Posted on August 24, 2008
I spent the bulk of my day Sunday remixing and redoing parts of “I’m Alright”. I think this mix is a lot better than the original and I hope you’ll agree.
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New Song: What’d You Do to Me
Posted on August 23, 2008
This is a fairly basic blues song with drums, bass, three acoustic guitars, and piano. I really love the feel and beat of this song. It is similar in style as “Feature Creep” but with more dynamics. I intended this piece to be a full acoustic instrumental without piano and voice, but my fingers were just itching to play the ivories. I hope you all like it.
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The Home Recording Studio and the Hobby Musician
Posted on August 7, 2008
If you are a hobby musician that is stepping into the world of home recording, you will eventually need to decide on how much money you are willing to spend to support your hobby. I can tell you up front, it can get expensive quickly. You’ll need to be careful and make smart choices. Your choice of equipment will depend largely on your budget and the level of quality you are willing to accept. So before running out and spending your hard earned money, ask yourself a few questions?
1) How important is quality? Are you doing this for fun, for family and friends, or for profit?
We would all like to make our fortunes writing and producing our own music. However, for most of us, this will be unlikely. So, its time for a little reality check. Do you really need to buy a $1000 microphone when a $100-$200 microphone would likely do a fine job for your purpose? Do you really need to buy a setup with 24 instrumental and XLR inputs when you can only record one maybe two instruments at a time? Wouldn’t a two input device work out best and maybe even save you a little money? I know, that dream of leading a full band with a symphony backing you up keeps putting your head in the clouds, but lets face it, this is a hobby right? If it’s not then why are you reading this post? But hey, if you can afford to spend your money on fantasies, then go for it!
2) What will you record?
Are you planning on recording vocals? If so, you’ll need a decent microphone (not the 9.99 special at Wal-Mart). My first 5 or six songs were recorded with a $40 microphone I bought at Best Buy. Are you planning on recording analog instruments? Once again you’ll need a decent microphone and in some cases more than one. Are you recording keyboards? If so you can record the analog signal from the headphones output jack hooked up to the input of your recorder with a instrument cable. Of course, electric guitars, and acoustic/electric guitars will use instrument cables. Are you wanting to record MIDI? If so then you’ll need MIDI hook ups.
3) What will you record on, computer or standalone track recorder?
This is not very easy to answer. Computer recording is by far the most flexible and in my opinion the most powerful. Yet, buying or upgrading a computer that can handle the loads required by the latest recording software and hardware can get very expensive. If you don’t have a decent computer you’ll likely be faced with a costly upgrade or in some cases a complete replacement. If you have a computer capable of handling the latest audio software then I highly recommend it over a standalone recorder. But, if you are faced with the reality that you must spend thousands on a new machine, the portable standalone track recorder is a great deal. I recorded all of my first songs on a Boss BR-600 eight track recorder that I bought for $300. This is a lot cheaper than paying hundreds if not thousands of dollars more for a new computer and hardware hook-ups. If you choose to go the standalone recorder route be certain that whatever standalone recorder you use that it records to digital and has USB or firewire hook-ups to connect to your computer. Yet, if you go with the computer recording route, you will need a hardware device to convert the analog signal to a digital format. If you are using microphones you will likely need a device that can amplify the microphone (preamp) that is hooked up to your computer. You would be naïve if you thought that cost was the only factor in this decision. Stability plays a factor. The reality is that standalone recorders unlike computers rarely crash and are more stable. When it comes to computer recording it is pretty much an acknowledged fact that your software will at some point crash leaving you frustrated and disappointed. But if you save frequently and make backups you may be spared of any permanent harm. You also need to consider how much editing you will be doing. Editing on a computer is far superior in my opinion than using dials on a standalone recorder. The ability to drag and drop, or click to splice a recording, is very easy on a computer. On a standalone recorder you will spend a great deal of time accomplishing a simple cut and paste that can be done in two seconds on a computer.
4) How many tracks do you need?
The answer to this can also help answer question #3. Basically you’ll need a single track or more for every instrument or individual part you record. When I first used my standalone recorder I couldn’t imagine needing more than eight tracks. I was startled to realize that once I started adding multiple parts like solos, rhythm instruments, vocals, etc. that I had to conserve my track use or I would have to bounce two or more tracks to a single recorded track which almost always turns into an issue when mixing later. This isn’t as much of an issue on computers since the packages I looked at allowed 32 or more tracks.
5) What audio mediums do you plan to deploy your music on?
If your goal is simply to create *.mp3 files that can be shared on the internet, then you’ll likely need a computer to do that, but you don’t need the top of the line machine. If you want to burn your recordings to CD, I would recommend using a computer with the appropriate software. Of course some standalone recorders have CD burners built-in. The BR-600 did not, so I used my computer and iTunes to convert the audio files to *.mp3.
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