bad habits in R&B/Hip Hop

[JonJ1176]

In an attempt to better our R&B and Hip Hop recordings, what are some bad habits and mistakes you hear repeated within this genre?

[Dave Nutz]

letting the rapper have his way and record in the bathroom.

wrong dimensions/shapes= nasty Early reflections.
plus you cant really get rid of it once its there.

[3db@1K]

Or letting them record vocals from jail....

[Antero]

"I've got a great idea! Let's overdub the vocalist a bunch of times on EVERY WORD THAT RHYMES!"

"That's brilliant! Our listeners are too stupid to notice rhymes!"

"....."

"Okay, Snoop, say 'chronic' into the mic. Say it again. Say it again. Say it..."

[Family Hoof]

Letting them use synth (fake) guitar. Or even worse... letting them record really badly played real guitar with wrong strings ringing in between chord changes and such + recorded through a DI with an amp sim plugin to sound ultra tiny.

[tiger vomitt]

Letting them use synth (fake) guitar. Or even worse... letting them record really badly played real guitar with wrong strings ringing in between chord changes and such + recorded through a DI with an amp sim plugin to sound ultra tiny.

see, now that one im not so sure about. i think of that as part of the style...it's sort of an anti-rock move if you know what i mean. trying to intentionally NOT sound like the guitars that the rock dudes use.

it's the opposite of the jerkoff in linkin park that raps. he's not a real rapper, but it's just enough of the flavor to make the suburbanites get a boner.

i wont phrase this as a mistake that people do, but the last 6 months or so ive been really into rap SONGS. not some beat that someone did that later got matched up to some lyrics that the rapper wrote. but a real song that has the music really intertwined with the vocals in a more traditional way.

[Jesse Skeens]

i wont phrase this as a mistake that people do, but the last 6 months or so ive been really into rap SONGS. not some beat that someone did that later got matched up to some lyrics that the rapper wrote. but a real song that has the music really intertwined with the vocals in a more traditional way.

Any good examples?

[tiger vomitt]

yeah a few come to mind

10 crack commandments (biggie)
workout plan (kanye west)
ummm...lots of stuff. you know it when you hear it.
i try to do it every time with my own songs

some things that dont do it so much:
just about every G unit song
terror squad
etc

[Disasteradio]

isn't it wierd how the 808 clap has totally replaced the otherwise general snare? wierd. see uh. that usher "yeah" track and that "I love the way you move" track by outcast. I'm sure there are heaps more examples of this.

I'm totally sick of gratuitous, pointless double tracked vocals. And that whole "sample a good song to make a bad song" a la the luther vandross (?) thing in that Twista track. I dunno. I'm loving the Compurhythm & synthery pastiche in Kelis / Andre 3000's "Millionaire", best track I've heard on teevee in a long time. I think really awesome synth sequencing can potentially be "better" / more exciting than just sampling in hiphop, that is, in light of the fact that hiphop is built on the whole sampler aesthetic. uh yeah. I'm totally biased due to my synthgeek nature though.

[stevebozz]

Kanye West and Mos Def (his stuff with NERD) are very musical hip hop examples

[dirty]

10 crack commandments (biggie)

Couldn't agree more! Biggie had a way of making even old beats his. Not many have done it that well once, let alone over and over.

How about early De La Soul, Black Star, the first Mos Def album (Ms. Fat Booty), or the Roots.

Or, for that matter, some of those nasty early songs from Big L, Jay-Z, Diamond D, ATCQ....

[joelpatterson]

Shooting the people who run studios is definitely a bad habit.

[Family Hoof]

Letting them use synth (fake) guitar. Or even worse... letting them record really badly played real guitar with wrong strings ringing in between chord changes and such + recorded through a DI with an amp sim plugin to sound ultra tiny.

see, now that one im not so sure about. i think of that as part of the style...it's sort of an anti-rock move if you know what i mean. trying to intentionally NOT sound like the guitars that the rock dudes use.

OFF TOPIC RANT...

Okay. So I'm being too harsh and over generalizing. Yes I hate the sound of fake guitars but that's my bias, not necessarily bad or a bad habbit. Mainly what I was referring to is the Trick Daddy song "Let's Go". If I weren't so anti-sampling and it didn't sample (steal the main riff!, that's just plain wrong!, worse than short samples) a song I like then maybe I wouldn't be so pissed, because I think it's very well done. The rapping is top knotch and it has a nice sing along chorus. However, when the lead guitar comes in at the end and it's played so badly... well that has just been pissing me off to no end. I interpret it as the people who recorded that song having no clue how to record guitars well or how a well played guitar sounds.

[Family Hoof]

what are some bad habits and mistakes you hear repeated within this genre?

1) Bringing the entire posse to a session and letting them in the control room. It makes for a horrible working environment. You can't hear shit, yet you fear for your life when telling them to be quiet.

2) Never turning the monitors lower than 100dB SPL for the duration of the session.

[dirty]

On the plus side, when the monitors are at 100dbL, I imagine you can't hear the mutterings of said posse....