Live band to four-track / bouncing issues

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masonpitzel
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Live band to four-track / bouncing issues

Post by masonpitzel » Sat Jan 09, 2010 11:44 am

So my new band is trying to record a five- or six-song EP this month or next. We're planning on buying my friend's dad's Teac A-3440 (he's kept it well maintained) and just tracking to that. We would very much like to track live excepting vocals, as well, just like our previous EP was done -- though that was in a real studio. We've got a good space to record in, decent and numerous mics, etc., but I'm mainly just curious as to how to distribute the tracks, since I've only really got four to work with.

I was thinking:
1 - drums (mono, I suppose)
2 - bass guitar
3 - guitar one (panned to the left)
4 - guitar two (panned to the right)
Does this seem like a good method? I think it'll work okay, but I don't know, you guys might think of setting it up a different way. (I always hear things like "oh bass frequencies should go near the center of the tape" but then forget, or remember them wrong, or what have you.)

From there, there's the problem of vocal overdubs. The tentative plan is to track the lead vocal and backups at the same time -- basically just positioning all the singers around an LDC and kind of self-/pre-mixing that way. That's not much of a problem. I'm more concerned about where the vocals are gonna go on the tape!

Part of me wants to just combine the two guitar tracks, since they'd need the least post-adjusting, imo, but then that prevents the possibility of panning them left and right (right?) -- which is important since the drums are gonna be mono. Part of me thinks I should bounce the drums and bass together, since they're both mono, but I don't know if that's the best idea either, since I can foresee having to play around with the bass a bit after vocals are done to get everything sitting right. So I'm in kind of a quandary here!

How do you guys think I should proceed?

masonpitzel
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Post by masonpitzel » Mon Jan 11, 2010 12:57 pm

aaaaaaaanyone?

mertmo
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Post by mertmo » Mon Jan 11, 2010 2:03 pm

that's funny, I've got that very deck and I've been thinking of doing a similar recording,
except in my case it's drums/bass/guitar/violin/vocals.

I think the best way would be to get a little mixer and submix the drums and bass to
one track on the way in. Spend a little time getting it right and it should sound
great. SO:

track 1) drums/bass
track 2) guitar 1
track 3) vocals (same method you described above, lead and backup performing at the same time)
track 4) guitar 2 (violin in my case)

have fun!

keep in mind that deck will add a healthy bump at 100hz to everything you record... fun tape deck, even if it's not the most hi fi thing ever.

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Post by Dakota » Mon Jan 11, 2010 2:28 pm

You're basically asking WWTBD (what would the beatles do), or any band in the mid to late 60's. You should read some books on what choices engineers made back then when 4tk was the current workhorse.

Often from the phase you're at, the 4 basic tracks would then get submixed over to to 1 or 2 tracks on another 4tk, continue w/ vox and touches from there. Without a 2nd 4tk, you could submix off to whatever the best thing you have, then back from that to 1 or 2 tracks on a fresh 4tk reel.

Or if you want to stick to the first generation 4tk, often chosen was drums and bass together on one track, taking the time to get the volume balance right between the two. Often a good idea to compress the drums some (-3 to -6 on peaks) and the bass some (-3 to -9 on peaks) each separately before arriving together on the track.

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Post by donny » Mon Jan 11, 2010 7:23 pm

depending on what type of sound or stereo image you're looking for, there are a couple options. i usually would do either:

1 - bass/drums (pre-mixed live)
2 - guitar
3 - guitar (overdub)
4 - vocals(s)

(OR)

1 - bass
2 - drums
3 - guitar
bounce them all to 4, then overdub 1, 2, 3. this would be a more '60s type approach (rhythm track on one track, overdubs on the other tracks) with mono in mind but can make a cool stereo track too.

if you wanna get crazy and do stereo drums, you can pre mix the whole band and go live to 2 track on 2 of the tracks, then overdub the other 2.

overall, i would likely do the 2nd option because you have more flexibility.
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Post by donny » Mon Jan 11, 2010 7:34 pm

oh yeh, i didn't mention center vs. edge tracks ... put the least important elements and/or bass sounds on the edge tracks. if you go with option 2, do it

1 - bass
2 - drums
3 - OPEN
4 - guitar

then bounce all 3 to track 3. overdub the least important final elements to the edge tracks, although w/ 4-track there are limited options. avoid putting drums on the edge tracks, if there are dropouts etc, they will be more noticeable on drums.

also, DO NOT bounce in sync mode on the 3340, it has a poor frequency response in sync mode and it meant for monitoring only. this means that your bounced track will be out of sync with the rest, which won't matter once you start overdubbing the rest.
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mertmo
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Post by mertmo » Mon Jan 11, 2010 10:31 pm

DO NOT bounce in sync mode on the 3340, it has a poor frequency response in sync mode and it meant for monitoring only. this means that your bounced track will be out of sync with the rest, which won't matter once you start overdubbing the rest.
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Post by ashcat_lt » Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:59 pm

I so do not miss 4 track recording.

When I did record full bands that way, I would do either a drum/bass mix on one or two tracks (for stereo drums) or one track per instrument, bounce to stereo and then record vox/etc.

Either way, you are going to be forced to commit to something in the tracking stage. Don't let this intimidate you. If it's a good song a and performance, people will thank you for recording it even if all you do is stick a boombox in the middle of the room. (Ever listen to the early Beck stuff?)

One thing I used to do is record things like guitar solos and extra stuff that happened when there wasn't any vox directly to the vocal track. This sometimes required some fancy patching and realtime manipulation of the mixer controls. If you're dumping these tracks to computer afterwards there's even more room for this kind of thing.

I did this stuff on cassette, so crosstalk was always an issue. I usually put the drums as far away from the vox as physically possible.

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Post by Ron's Brother » Tue Jan 12, 2010 5:35 am

Take a read of "Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles"

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Post by fuzz » Tue Jan 12, 2010 7:20 am

I have no idea how to quote (example below)
Last edited by fuzz on Tue Jan 12, 2010 7:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by fuzz » Tue Jan 12, 2010 7:21 am

"i didn't mention center vs. edge tracks ... put the least important elements and/or bass sounds on the edge tracks."

Do the opposite of this. Anything with a bass, organ, kick needs to NOT go on the edge. Especially on a 4 trk deck the low and /or hottest tracks will spill to neighbor tracks and on 1/4" tape you're gonna want that space.

If it was me. I'd treat the Inst tracking like a direct to 2 and sub mix everything down to stereo and toss it on tracks 2 and 3. Then cruise back in for your overdubs. I've also done several recording on and 4trks and 8trk, then bounced to two, and came back to the 4trk or 8trk for overdubs but the hiss will get ya, especially on a prosumer deck.

masonpitzel
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Post by masonpitzel » Tue Jan 12, 2010 9:10 pm

Awesome. Thank you all for the replies.

*searches furiously for threads giving advice on dumping tracks from a 4-track onto a computer and how to time-align them*

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Post by suppositron » Wed Jan 13, 2010 6:09 am

I'd say screw the overdubs. Practice the songs till everything can be pulled off tightly live. Drums and bass on 1+2 guitar and vox 3+4.

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Post by donny » Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:39 pm

fuzz wrote:"i didn't mention center vs. edge tracks ... put the least important elements and/or bass sounds on the edge tracks."

Do the opposite of this. Anything with a bass, organ, kick needs to NOT go on the edge. Especially on a 4 trk deck the low and /or hottest tracks will spill to neighbor tracks and on 1/4" tape you're gonna want that space.

If it was me. I'd treat the Inst tracking like a direct to 2 and sub mix everything down to stereo and toss it on tracks 2 and 3. Then cruise back in for your overdubs. I've also done several recording on and 4trks and 8trk, then bounced to two, and came back to the 4trk or 8trk for overdubs but the hiss will get ya, especially on a prosumer deck.
feel free to do as you wish, obviously it depends on what elements are most important to you ... that said, i learned this specifically from the beach boys' engineer Stephen Desper and have found it to be quite useful. the basic idea is that you are going to have more dropouts on the edge tracks and dropouts are more noticeable on dynamic, prominent and/or high frequency elements. a dropout on a kick drum or a bass guitar will be less noticeable than on a lead vocal or guitar solo.
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Post by inasilentway » Tue Jan 19, 2010 3:11 pm

I add a +1 to tracking everything straight to 2 tracks. Get a small mixer and do a submix of drums, bass, and guitars, with everything panned the way you want them (that gives you some room to use additional drum mics and place them in the stereo field). If you're going to do it to 4-track and engineer it yourself, you need to embrace that you're going to have to commit to sounds at the time of recording.

Then, in your shoes, I would track lead vocals and backup vocals separately, because it's a little tougher trying to get both to hit a keeper take at the same time than to get a band to track an instrumental keeper all at the same time. Cut vocals immediately after doing the instrumental, bounce down the mix, and take it home to listen to it to make sure there's nothing drastically off. Your EP will be done unbelievably fast!
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