Choosing A Recoridng Space

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xSALx
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Choosing A Recoridng Space

Post by xSALx » Tue Sep 12, 2006 4:32 pm

I was just asked by a band to track an EP for them, with basic tracks recorded live. The last few recordings have been plagued by the click- it's killed the energy. So at this point we have a few options as to recording spaces and I'm almost baffled right now. It's a really tough call.

They'll be recording electric guitar, bass, and drums live.

We have a couple options:

1. A room in my school's music building. The place would be great for drums. Huge 30' ceilings and a lot of space. The room kind of reminds me of pictures that I've seen of Abby Road. But the problem is that I can't set up equipment and leave it there overnight. So each session would require a set up and break down. We'd have to do the sessions in 2 or 3 nights. Probably get in around 7:30pm leave as late as we can go. So needless to say this could get tiring after the first night.

There is also question of isolation here. It's cool not to have so much isoloation and have this stuff sound "live" but I'm afraid of not having control later. So i could build small barriers for amps and stuff, or I could just leave them be. It's sort of a catch 22.

So the biggest dissadvantage here is the set up and break down problem. But it's a great sounding room.

2. We can record at one of the guy's houses and leave everything set up. But the drum sound wouldn't be as desirable. IMO it would actually be harder to get the sound because of the lack of the room mic to have a nice blend. But we could record whenever and the process would go a whole lot smoother with a steady house set up.

Yet for soe reason in the comfort I think some of the energy might also be lost. As though the anxiety of not having much time will add a lilttle benificial spark to the performance. Hell I might just try and track some vocals live too.
"I'd rather her sound artificial [auto tune] than sound completely drunk." As said by the producer during a long pitch shifting session.

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Post by Mane1234 » Tue Sep 12, 2006 5:36 pm

If it's just an EP you should be able to get the basic tracks done in one or two nights. 3 or 4 songs? Take really good pictures and notes of your mic placement and it won't be hard for you to re-create the set up. Yea it kinda sucks having to tear down and then set everything up again but if it will make the difference between good drum tracks and great drum tracks then why not. You can always start over at the other place if you decided it's not working for you.

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Mr PC
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Post by Mr PC » Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:55 pm

I think when you get to mixing and have the room sound on your tracks, you would be patting yourself on the back for the extra effort taken by using the big room.

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Post by audiogeek1 » Tue Sep 12, 2006 8:13 pm

I would go for the big room. Set up would be kind of a pain but you could make it easy and only bring necessitites. Make sure you listen to sounds outside of the room in a familiar place so you know exactly what you are getting.

As for the click. If a band is prepared the click will not kill the energy. People can play without thinking about if they are prepared and it makes the overdub process much easier.

Good luck

Mike

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Post by xSALx » Wed Sep 13, 2006 1:06 am

Thanks guys, you confirmed what I was leaning towards. Now...

Amps...Isolated or live feel?

Fortunately I know how the room sounds, freakin great. I've recorded drums in there before. Lush. Not too wet. So I'm not to worried on that end.
"I'd rather her sound artificial [auto tune] than sound completely drunk." As said by the producer during a long pitch shifting session.

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Post by lobstman » Wed Sep 13, 2006 2:54 am

xSALx wrote:Thanks guys, you confirmed what I was leaning towards. Now...

Amps...Isolated or live feel?
You'll probably want at least some baffling, and make sure you get the amps off the floor. "Live feel vs. islolated" will be determined by what the band wants to sound like. Steely Dan or Led Zeppelin? The Cars or In Utero?
Steve Albini used to like it

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Post by A.David.MacKinnon » Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:13 am

I've done lots of mobile recording in big rooms like this. One of the last ones I did was a 4 peice rock band in a barn with no baffelling. Here are some things I've learned -
1)If you can get your hands on some shipping blankets use them to cover the amps. This will tame some of the highs getting into the other mics.
2)Use mic placement to avoid bleed, especially in your overheads. Try to have the mics set up so that the nul of the pattern is aiming in the direction of the stuff you don't want.
3)Bleed can be your friend as long as it sounds musical and isn't out of control. You will have to be extra carefull about phase issues. Sometimes it's better to have the instruments closer together to avoid phase issues (especially the bass amp and drums). Having the amps close to the drums but pointing away from them is better that having them far away but pointed at the kit.

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Post by xSALx » Wed Sep 13, 2006 9:57 am

Thanks so much guys. I'm excited! I'll try to post some stuff after tracking.
"I'd rather her sound artificial [auto tune] than sound completely drunk." As said by the producer during a long pitch shifting session.

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Red Rockets Glare
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Post by Red Rockets Glare » Wed Sep 13, 2006 12:32 pm

why not asess your songs to see which would benefit more with a big room sound and which would benefit more from the possibility of endless amounts of time to get them right and then do half and half?

Not every song needs a huge drum sound, some songs require an intimate, tight, and dry sound from the drums.

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Post by bluesbaz » Thu Sep 14, 2006 6:06 pm

Red Rockets Glare wrote:why not asess your songs to see which would benefit more with a big room sound and which would benefit more from the possibility of endless amounts of time to get them right and then do half and half?

Not every song needs a huge drum sound, some songs require an intimate, tight, and dry sound from the drums.
Good one, you beat me to it.

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Post by Zorgot.Crob » Thu Sep 14, 2006 6:24 pm

Yes I def. agree. Get the most desirable elements out the spaces you have access. We are living in a portable multitrack world, so take advantage of that. Yes breaking down after every session can be a hastle and could possibly be a cause of discrepancy but if you get a great sound, its well worth the breakdown time. Just document your placement and settings and you should be fine.

junkshop makes an excellent point. Big rooms warrant the need for extra control of the recording environment i.e. baffling and taking advantage of capsule response.

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Post by xSALx » Wed Oct 25, 2006 4:50 am

Ok. So largely to your all of your advice, I ended up using the huge room. It was freakin great. As you'll see in the pics, I have no isolation of the guitar and bass amps. I had the amps low enough to the point where they wouldn't bleed into the drum mics.

Originally the goal to was to record guitar, bass, and drums; we would later record AC, guitars, and vocals; but I decided to record vocals anyways, just in case. At the end of the day the guitars were useless, but surprisingly the vocals sounded great (in terms of energy). The only problem is that the drums bleed a lot, but luckily the vocal parts we kept are parts where the vocals clearly show through. Though the drums have a nice quality when they show up in the vocal mic. Nice and compressed.I could have recorded the vocals with a 57 to get less bleed per se, but I decided, "Screw it, I'm just going to use a LDC (Groove Tubes GT55)." I'm glad I did, the drums have a nice squashed room sound.

The session went from 7:00pm to 7:00 am, but they were able to cut 11 songs live. It was a great experience, and hopefully soon I?ll get another band who?s music calls for live tracking.

Here?s a song and some pics. And the vocal takes during the verses and break down are live. The "oohs" and part before the break down are recorded afterwards at my place. Guitars are of course tracked later. I hope you guys like it.

Thanks,
Sal

song5.mp3

====================================================Image Image Image Image Image
"I'd rather her sound artificial [auto tune] than sound completely drunk." As said by the producer during a long pitch shifting session.

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NewAndImprov
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Post by NewAndImprov » Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:06 pm

I love the picture of the singer holding the pop filter in front of the mic, great idea! Make the singer do something useful for once!

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Post by xSALx » Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:39 pm

NewAndImprov wrote:I love the picture of the singer holding the pop filter in front of the mic, great idea! Make the singer do something useful for once!
I wasn't actually planning on recording vocals, so for some stupid reason I didn't take a pop filter. But luckily I kept the mesh fronts on my monitors (to have some sort of protection while moving them around), and I ended up telling him to use it as a pop screen.
"I'd rather her sound artificial [auto tune] than sound completely drunk." As said by the producer during a long pitch shifting session.

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Post by vvv » Wed Oct 25, 2006 1:57 pm

Here on my little h/k computer speakers, it sounds very nice, indeed!
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