which 8 tracks?

[cafewalter]

Trying to make semi-decent rehearsal recordings of my band so that we don't flounder so badly when we get into the studio next time. Have an ADAT, an A&H GL2200 24-ch mixer, and lots of mics (I'm a live sound guy mainly). Don't need stereo drums.

The band is drums, bass, elgtr, acgtr, mandolin, and 4 vocals (two lead, two harmony).

The question is: how should I divvy up those 8 ADAT tracks? There are 9 instruments, one of which (being drums) represents a couple of inputs, so obviously some things are going to get mixed in advance. We do *not* have any sort of isolation or control room, and when we're playing, there's nobody listening to what's going down on tape.

Right now I've got: (1) lead voc; (2) lead voc; (3) acgtr; (4) elgtr; (5) drum o/h; (6) both backing vox; (7) kick and snare; (8) bass and mandolin.

Can anyone suggest an alternate approach that has worked for them? Thanks!

[soundguy]

I wouldnt put the mandolin and bass on the same track unless you have a reason to do so. I'd want to have the bass on its own track and Id be tempted to put the mandolin on the acguitar track or just anywhere but the bass or kick drum track. Bass EQ and mandolin EQ would be hard to make happy together in my world.

you could also do a good stereo mix of the drums on two tracks instead of isolating the way you broke it down. Spend the most amount of time possible recording and listening and fixing and get the drum sound right. If your drum sound isnt right it more or less doesnt matter what you do with the rest of it. Get the drums right, and then spread out the rest of the tracks in a logical way which will accomodate shared EQ where it needs it and shared panning where it needs it.

dave

[nacho459]

I'm guessing by your lineup that your band is vocal driven, like a pop vocal or folk group. If so I'd set it up like this.

Drums, Bass & E guitar tracked/mixed live to track 1-2

A gtr to track 3

Mandolin to track 4

vocals individually on tracks 5, 6, 7, 8

Or instead of tracking the rhythm section live you can track it to 6 tracks (K, Sn, oh L, oh R, bass, E guitar. and then mix them down to the two open tracks and then erase the individual tracks and record the rest on the open 6 tracks.

[Mark]

I know it's unfashionable but, in your case, bouncing may be the only option. With four vocals (all of which I'm assuming you want on separate tracks) and 5 instruments you really don't have room to argue.

The other alternative is to buy a second ADAT and sync the two up.

Personally I 'd start by tracking thus

Track 1: Rhythm Guitar (I assume they aren't both lead)
Track 2: Bass Guitar
Track 3: Snare Drum
Track 4: Kick Drum
Track 5: Overhead
Track 6: Clear
Track 7: Clear
Track 8: clear

Then I'd bounce the first five tracks down to 7 and 8, with the rhythm guitar being panned left or right and everything else being panned centre (for example). And then I'd overdub

Track 1: Lead Vocal #1
Track 2: Lead Vocal #2
Track 3: Backing Vocal #1
Track 4: Backing Vocal #2
Track 5: Lead Guitar
Track 6: Mandolin
Track 7: Rhythm Bed
Track 8: Rhythm Bed

With a digital medium hopefully generation loss will be a non-issue after only one bounce (two when you mix down to stereo).

[Mark]

Of course, if the rhythm section can pull off the "live to two tracks" thing then Nacho's suggestion is good

[cafewalter]

Thanks for the suggestions, everyone!

We will not be doing any bouncing of tracks or overdubbing. I know that's heretical in terms of modern studio practice, but it's a strongly held personal belief on my part. (I won't rant about it cuz it'll take us off topic.) The reason I'm recording to ADAT rather than one-track is just that it means I can mix later on, when I can actually hear what I'm mixing.

It's true about bass and mandolin EQ. I'd been trying to get them both EQ'd reasonably well in their individual channels during tracking, so that when I put them both onto one channel in mixing I could have a bit of relative control by using EQ - but that doesn't seem to work as well as I'd hoped.

I've been keeping the drums in mono, because I think mixing to mono will force us to get our musical arrangements better. And I don't actually like stereo that much better than mono - some of my favorite recordings are mono and it never bugged me.

[Mark]

If you have to have the drums in mono put them all straight down to one track, rather than wasting two.

[Mark]

And since you STILL only have 7 tracks left for everyone else (you have too many lead vocalist, btw, sack one or make the bastards take turns) you'll need to put the bass on the same track as the drums

Track 1: Lead Vocal
Track 2: Lead Vocal
Track 3: Backing Vocal
Track 4: Backing Vocal
Track 5: Acoustic Guitar
Track 6: Electric Guitar
Track 7: Mandolin
Track 8: Bass and Drums

[slowblue]

Do you want to buy another ADAT? I've got one of those 20 bit ones the LX. Best of all I live in Seattle. I'm not using it much as I got a PT rig, but I've got the snakes as well. Let me know.

[Mark]

Buy the Adat, buy the Adat

[cafewalter]

Naw, I used to have another ADAT and decided what I needed was some discipline. Failing that, before I added another 8 tracks of ADAT I'd probably get a 24-track HD recorder instead.

I know I said "two lead vocals" but really there's one male lead, one female harmony, and then rest of us just holler some on the choruses. Basically, there are two critical vocals and two noncritical vocals.

In thinking about everyone's input I think the conclusion I'm coming to is I need to spend some time on the drum sound, get it so that I can record it to one track; then everything else will fit fine on the remaining seven, with the bass and mando on separate tracks and the two BG vox mixed together.

[Lee Knight]

1 OH
2 Kick
3 Bass
4 AcG
5 Mand
6 ElG
7 Backups x2
8 LdVox x2

Mix the 2 Ld Vox evenly while recording
Ditto with the Backups
Place the OH to capture the snare, toms, and cymbals evenly

Position the Mandolin and AcG each side of the drums so any bleed of the drums can add stereo ambience.

[cafewalter]

That's a smart idea, to get stereo ambience out of bleed.

I'm interested that you would separate the kick and OH into two tracks, and mix the primary vocals into one. What's the rationale? Seems to me that having a bit too much or not enough kick isn't going to render a mix unusable, but having too much harmony vocal is fatal. (Did I confuse the issue by calling them both lead vocals? "Primary" would be a better term.)

[Lee Knight]

I guess it depends on the nature of the vocal parts. You have the luxury of mixing after the fact, so the thing you want to make sure of, is that you can in fact, mix the different levels later.

I was assuming the two lead vocals wouldn't be occuring at once. OK, Lead vocal on one, backups on another. If you get a good balance on the backups you should be fine. Slam 'em with a compressor during the mix to even it out if needed.

I like having the kick separate. This is from the experience of not having that option and being screwed later.

[Soulfull]

I was thinking the bass and mandolin on 1 track would be ok, but I guess it depends on how you are going to mix this. I would want to move the 8 tracks in to a DAW and then mix. In that case you can duplicate the bass/mandolin track and EQ them seperately. Dumping all the lows should leave you just the mandolin. Dumping the highs would give you the bass although minus some possible valuable harmonics which might be ok for your rehearsal purposes.