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Nerol
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4/18/2008 3:37:46 PM
Maybe it's just me
Ok, just for the fun of it I got out my old, OLD 4-channel cassette multitracker that I used to record on in the early-mid 90's. There was a tape in it that was left in there since the last time I used it, and listening to it brought back some memories.
Anyway, I don't know.....messing with this thing reminded me how much fun recording was then. Somehow it just feels like something's been lost with PC recording. Between the unit, pans, aux cords running out to processors, and good old-fashioned tape saturation, it just felt more "real."
But maybe it's me.
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4/18/2008 4:19:28 PM
it's me too. I use a standalone workstation (Roland VS-1680) and have never had any desire to record on my pc. Not sure why, but maybe cause I have a lot of pc problems and don't need to worry about my music getting wiped out.
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Nerol
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4/18/2008 5:11:45 PM
For the past 8 years I've become so used to recording to PC and it just quit being fun, and I think it's because music became more about editing and less about playing.
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Loren DiGiorgi
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4/18/2008 6:00:14 PM
I think I'm going to grab a Tascam portastudio and get more into playing instead of troubleshooting Windows. All the new units have usb to send stuff to the computer when you're done, so it's the best of both worlds.
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Conversation Suicide
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4/18/2008 11:11:54 PM
DAMN! Y'all should just be thankful you've GOT your own home studio! Some of us starving musicians have 100s of songs that have only been LO-FI recorded and LIVE, because of poverty.
But I do Agree that OLD School had a certain flare, and that's why I still keep the 100s of my NON-Studio recorded songs on Cassette tape! Oh, the LIVE Recordings I will be sending IACMUSIC's way, once I get the cheap way to upload to DIGITAL and clean up the hiss of the tapes, etc.
UH... Anybody still experimenting with those few recording studios out there that use Reel to Reel & old school equipment? It's my understanding there's a number of 'em -- EXAMPLE: A badass recording Engineer from the 50's & 60's did the SOUNDTRACK for the recent blues flick, "BLACK Snake MOAN", on REEL to REEL (or at least most of it)...
BUT ENOUGH blah-blah. ROCK on mutha fuckas whether it be ANALOG or DIGITAL! Just remember, you might be able to HIDE mistakes with DIGITAL remixing & EDITING, but You CAN'T do that for your LIVE show... so keep it REAL, ya know what I mean?
-Phlegm of Conversation Suicide
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Pulse Eternal
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4/18/2008 11:32:05 PM
This is a great topic and can relate to all sides of the coin (hmmm, a coin with more than two sides??)
I started my foray into recording in high school with an Akai 2 track reel to reel with sound on sound and a Juno 6 synthesizer in the early 80's and there was no doubt a certain magic to those days. I even ended up purchasing my very own Sony reel to reel so I could work on stuff at home.
Gradually I got more and more into the recording scene and progressed to bigger and better things.
In the mid 90's I was using a 'real' studio with multiple rooms, 16 track tape, outboard effects, 'real' studio microphones and analog mixing desks and thought I was in heaven (and I was!!). It got even better when I figured out how to lock my SY77 sequencer to analog tape using SMPTE timecode. Now I had digital editing and multitrack tape. :)
Then, I purchased my first computer which was running Steinberg Cubase and had very high expectations of doing wonderful things. After all, this was all digital and I could pretty much do what I wanted.
This system was great when it worked but Cubase was buggy and would often not do what I told it to do! I did make some great recordings with this system though and produced a number of albums for other bands on it too.
Then I moved to Protools (on PC) but my poor old PC was just not up to the task and Protools would often just quit or stop responding so I went out and purchased a shiny new Apple Mac G4 (400 MHz CPU) which was the very latest technology at the time and I was again in heaven!!! At last, I had all the reliability of the 'real' studio with the awesome creative power of my new Protools rig. This was bliss. :)
Things have progressed fast in the technology world but I am still using Protools (now on PC though on a MUCH faster system).
To me, Protools is by far the most like using a real studio. The software feels like a tape machine and mixing desk rather than feeling like a clumsy audio application written by an IT person with no studio experience and it just works!
I still have my Juno 6 (which I use on nearly all of my songs) and I still have my Sony reel to reel (which I haven't used for years).
One thing that still amazes me is the number of kids I hear bagging Digidesign and Protools for not offering features like making them coffee and taking the dog for a walk!! If only they knew what it was like to record on one track and have to bounce further takes onto another track in real time in order to create a song, they would realise what they have at their disposal with a product like Protools.
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srm
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4/19/2008 12:09:03 AM
I understand what you're saying, Titania (I keep hearing "Magneto and Titanium Man"). Although (being older) I go a little deeper. I can remember doing 'multi-tracking' by bouncing from a portable (mono) cassette deck to a (mono) portable reel-to-reel.
I DO miss the immediacy of recording on analog media, but I also like the ability to edit, and sync, and record multiple tracks on a digital format, without a lot of hiss and noise. There are so many differences between the formats and between the styles that are required, that it's hard to really compare them on an equal basis. When I first started home recording (@1977), I would have given everything I owned (and even a lot of stuff I could have stolen) just to have the tools I have today. However, I don't think I would trade the experience and material that I came up with on the road to today, to get here. Fortunately, I don't have to.
The paths we take shape who we are.
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Beth Fridinger
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4/19/2008 12:38:30 AM
yeah, well you have to save what you record and then burn it...and last week I had to delete tons of stuff of my computer and burn DVDs because my computer was filled with stuff and I could not mix down the waves I recorded. .I record on my computer because it is an inexpensive option...Sometimes I think it might be nice to have a recorder separate from my computer, but then I would have to learn new methods of doing everything...and...I like having waves files and being able to save wave files...and cannot imagine having a system that does not allow you to burn waves to a DVD.
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satch
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4/19/2008 1:26:25 AM
Naaah - it totally depends how you use the technology.
I too have been recording since the days of analog tape, and I have worked in most of the major UK studios. Even before digital, there was editing, shifting the odd note around, of course it was done, even on analog - just because most people don't know how to shift audio around on analog systems doesn't mean that it wasn't done! It was done a lot more than you might imagine!
These days, I love recording on my ProTools/Mac system, we always go for performances, and the real beauty is that sometimes a fabulous performance may be marred by one tiny glitch - a flat note or a note that doesn't quite "sound" - and the technology allows you to fix and save that take really really easily! It takes me less than a minute to tune a note or to shift a note into time, and it takes no more than a couple of minutes to "grab" a note from another place in a take to replace a duff note... absolutely brilliant technology.
And if you are complaining about the sound of digital versus analog, well I believe that you get out what you put in - you can record amazing sounding audio on digital, with huge dynamics that were simply not possible on analog systems because of the inherent hiss, fabulous frequency range even at 44.1 khz that surpasses the frequency range available on most analog recording devices.
I suggest that the "problems" people are talking about lie not with the technology, but rather with the useage of that technology.
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Magnetfisch
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4/19/2008 6:39:41 AM
hello fellow tape-recorders and ex-tape-recorders,
I remember recording some childhood piano improvisations on cassette back in the 80's (on the "stay on these roads" theme by A-HA for instance).
Then in 1994, at the very beginning of our band (or should I say the prehistoric form of Magnetfisch), we took a real 3 kilogram tape (and I mean tape) recorder my dad had used at the beginning of his journalist career, and recorded "A Forest" (The Cure) plus a lengthy, yawny first pop song 8-)
1997 came the first and last album of our first band (Illusion Perdue?), recorded in a studio with TASCAM... Expensive and rather tedious procedure, especially for the drummer... Patrick did a legendary one-take with his guitar, then 8-)
1998-2000, we did recordings on MiniDisc (using a Yamaha MD80 mixing table). And put them on cassettes. We are currently remastering these early Magnetfisch recordings with Patrick and plan to release them this summer.
Fruchtkönig (2001), Silence Fiction (2003) and Botox (2005) were all recorded with digital mixing tables coupled to computers.
Since 2007, China and Roulette (the AATT cover) and all the other songs from the forthcoming album were recording and engineered on PC by Breandan Davey.
Oh, and it's still a Tape-Recorder-Clock that wakes me up in the morning (Cranes, DM, etc.).
Rock on 8-)
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Duane Flock
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4/19/2008 8:34:24 AM
Everything I've recorded so far has been on a portable "studio-in-a-box" Yamaha AW16g. It doesn't sound all that bad, but it's also only Lo-Fi. I still have to figure out a lot of what this thing can do yet. One of the main things is drums (digital). I have a problem putting in the drum tracks later in a song cause the timing doesn't match up, or if I want to slow it down in sections, or if I want to improvise with drum rolls. I feel kinda limited or strapped down. The obvious solution would be to find a real drummer and have him play the parts, but then I have to work on his schedule which is booked until 2020! I've got a really cool tune that has about three or four different beats (timing) to it that I wrote when I was in my teens. Then again, I could teach it to the cover-band I'm in and do it live. Then I'd have to label it by "the Halley Crast Band".
Sometimes it's not just the equipment. There's a multitude of things to work around. I do like the "live" approach to the old school studios though. That's part of what makes Rock the greatest.
D.
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Hugh Hamilton
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4/19/2008 9:06:19 AM
I intentionally bought a standalone 24-track because I knew even if I solely dedicated a computer to recording it would become an endless series of software and hardware upgrades. I've grown a bit frustrated with the 24-track limitation (spoiled modern guy), it makes things a bit challenging for long-distance collaborations, and the interface is a little frustrating. I also wound up investing a ton of money in some outboard gear. BUT...I can record up to 16 inputs simultaneously even without any external gear (other than cables and mics, of course) and actually did that once for a live performance of an ensemble.
Due to the potential for continued collaborations I've started in the most general way to mull over the "ProTools" world. I don't know though, it just doesn't appeal to me.
As far as tape, I still have my 1/4" 4-track reel-to-reel. It needs work, and the 20-year old tapes flaked apart bigtime when I tried to digitize them. I never had any outboard gear other than the cheap little mixer I bought, and my recordings always sounded nasty to me. I am so pleased with the digital world for the convenience and the sound quality. I don't do any fancy editing or processing such as "tuning", and I don't use MIDI at all, so to me it's as though I have a tape machine, but don't have to wait for the tape to cue up to the spot I want. I LOVE THAT.
I think a nice tube preamp could be the simple answer to anybody who's not happy with their digitally recorded sounds. I had hit a "sonic wall" and started dabbling in preamps - I really enjoyed the Universal Audio LA-610 channel strip, which (to me) has a very cool '70s kind of sound to it. After that I took the bigtime plunge and picked up some fine gear from www.fearn.com - all tube-based, and really world class. I'm still learning how to use it properly though (lol).
Rock ON!
H
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Jack Heinicke
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4/19/2008 8:53:54 PM
Great post. I too am an ex-analog guy still fiddling in a digital world but approaching and using the stuff in pretty much the same way I did with the analog stuff.
Started out with a 4 track Portastudio and it was an awesome way to learn and have fun. I would bounce tracks until the original tracks became unintelligible. I've always had a problem (and still do) with leaving out the kitchen sink in what I'm working on. Problem is I get lots of ideas while recording and have trouble leaving anything out.
Next up was a dream come true. An Otari open reel 8 track! I bought it used in 1990 for 2800.00. This monster had seperate preamps for each track and the whole thing was housed in this sweet but big ass butcher block rack. Bought all the outboard stuff and was very excited and happy with the leap from 4 to 8 tracks and much better sound.
Then what was once far out of reach financially became very much within reach and that of course was digital recording. Bought a Roland VS 1880 in 2000? brand spankin new for 1500.00. This was totally amazing to me to be able to get 18 tracks of quality digital with the expansion effects boards for that price was unbelievable.
And it's still what I use today. I would like to go 24 track with the built in CD recorder but this thing does the trick for me. And I also don't do very much at all in the way of digital editing. I don't have the patience for all that stuff and that's probably why I haven't gone to PC based recording yet. I just got a Guitar Center catalog in the mail and was looking over some of the software and interfaces and all that jazz and I have to admit it makes me scratch my head. I too like many in this post just want to record and get it over with and move onto the next thing. I use digital but I still record like I'm using analog. I really have some weird thing about the idea of reording one good chorus and then cutting and pasting it 3 more times in the song. I'm anal about getting a performance on tape. I don't have any problem with anyone else doing that, it's just something I don't like the idea of it for myself.
As a matter of fact I recorded 6 songs today for a worship CD and I really went old school. Set up a mic for vocals, a mic for the acoustic and also recorded a track from the acoustic's pickups. Banged out 6 songs lke that in a couple of hours and did it that way in order to get a better performance instead of all that overdubbing and I must admit something more organic and natural was captured doing it that way.
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Conversation Suicide
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4/21/2008 12:46:05 AM
Yup. Definitely an AWESOME post, generating LOADS of cool info about people's recording history then & now. I have to agree with some of the folks, those LIVE originals or amazing covers that were caught by accident on some type of LO-FI equipment in the middle of a band room are SOMETIMES the best.
Some of it you may never go back to, because it was a special moment caught with THOSE musicians that were in the room with you at the time, and have since moved on....
Anybody else out there released any of these LO-FI gems on IACMUSIC? I was debating on trying a few more. So far I've only dared ONCE, with our tune "HARDCORE with PHLEGM & C-NOTE", cause the beats we laid down make it ALMOST sound like a crappy studio recording.
Are people on IAC releasing garage recordings? I'd hate to be the first!
-Phlegm of Conversation Suicide
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srm
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4/21/2008 1:37:47 AM
I have one of my old, analog 4-track recordings, Family Values up on my page. Listen with caution, if you dare.
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Pulse Eternal
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4/21/2008 2:38:18 AM
Steve, that's a REALLY funky and very cool track! I like, a LOT!
Phlegm, you have just inspired me to upload a rehearsal room recording with a band called Seren I played piano and keyboards with a couple of years ago.
This track, F-Spot is a live jazz improvisation and was recorded directly to my minidisc recorder through two PZM mics hung over a mic stand in the middle of the room.
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Maria Daines
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4/21/2008 2:49:49 AM
Good post Nerol!
We've used our trusty Boss 1180 recorder for years now & we love it, plus Paul & I are not very techno savvy so keeping music away from the pc, apart from uploading songs, is probably the best way for us, it's great to read everyone's thoughts on this subject :)
M&P xx
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RedRobin
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4/21/2008 2:54:41 AM
....I agree with Satch - It's the usage of the technology and not the technology itself which can fail to meet expectations.
All this gear is simply another musical instrument in the chain of music creation. Choose whatever you feel most comfortable with. I've only been making music for 5 years and feel most comfortable with Logic on a Mac.
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srm
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4/21/2008 4:28:42 AM
I think you're absolutely correct, RedRobin. The whole analog/digital debate reminds me of the furor over drum machines, when they first came out. It's just another tool in the arsenal with which to create. Sorry about the mixed metaphor.
Btw, Titania, I really am enjoying "F-Spot". In fact, one of the things I miss most about being in a band is the jams we used to do. I'd upload one of our old mushroom jams, but I'd have to pare it down from 30 minutes to a more reasonable length (maybe 15 minutes, or so- just KIDDING!).
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