Beginning Analog Recording

[dukedudez]

Well, here's some background to my problem. First, I love music. I have cubase and a usb interface, but I'm very new to recording and don't know much about it. Besides that, I want to record with analog. The only problem is, they don't sell analog equipment at guitar center. I'm currently a senior in high school and we have to do a graduation project. I decided to do mine on analog recording and I would love to record a song using all analog equipment. I don't know, however, if this is reasonable or possible. I don't want to spend a ton of money, and I don't know how I could present my recording to them because I want to keep it in analog and not convert it into an mp3 or CD. Any ideas?

[The Ghost of FM]

This song that you are recording, is it of just you performing all the parts or do you play in a band that is decently rehearsed?

If you're in a band, you could just buy a decent stereo cassette deck, a smaller 8 to 12 channel analog mixer to plug in your microphones and direct boxes to create a decent live mix where the mixer's stereo outputs will feed to the line input of the cassette deck which will record the performance. If you shop carefully through your local Craig's list, you could probably pick up all that gear used for three or four hundred dollars. And if you purchase a double cassette deck, you can make copies in analog of that recording to submit to your school. But they'll also need to be in possession of a cassette deck or cassette Walkman to be able to play that tape. Hopefully a few of the older teachers might still own that gear. If they don't, then you'll have to make use of your USB interface to transfer your cassette's recording into your computer to convert it into a wave file or mp3 which you can then submit to them in whatever digital format they can deal with such as a data CD, a pen drive or just emailing them the file.

If you don't play in a band and want to play all the parts yourself by playing one part at a time, then you'll need quite a bit more equipment in order to overdub the parts together. Something like a cassette Portastudio which is an analog 4 or 8 track recorder and mixer combined into one unit and some signal processing gear such as a compressor to even out overly dynamic vocals and instruments, and you'd probably also want a reverberation processor if you don't have a suitable live environment to capture each part in. Used Portastudios can usually be had for under $200 and used compressors and reverb units can be found for around $100 a piece, depending on market conditions. If your local Craig's list market is not too good, you could also try looking on ebay but that can be more problematic as you obviously won't be able to see and test the gear in person before you hand over your money as you could with a face to face transaction. But that's a whole topic unto itself. A set up like that would still require the separate double cassette deck because the 4 or 8 track Portastudio tapes are not directly playable and must be mixed down and transfered over to the stereo cassette deck.

Tell us more about what it is you plan on recording and what your budget is for this project and then we can fine tune our suggestions for specific gear and resources of where you can learn how to use it.

Cheers!

[dreib]

Hopefully you live in a populated area because then it will be easier to find old analog gear. Just the other day i saw 2 old recorders at a music go round, one 4 track one 8 track cassete recorder. It would be cool for you to finish your project on both platforms, cassette and computer/CD, to really show and learn what the sonic characters really are...Good Luck!

[diggy_dude]

Guitar Center does sell little analog mixers. You don't have to multitrack. You can record and mix in one take with a cheap Behringer mixer and a regular stereo cassette recorder. Just don't expect that setup to prove some point about the real or imagined superiority of analog over digital. And understand that this technique has been obsolete since the 1960s. I mention it here because I suspect you don't have much time to get up to speed. If your school project is due in a couple of months, this will get you there a lot faster than hunting for and acquiring equipment and learning all the skills that multitracking entails.

[dukedudez]

Thanks for the great replies so far! I do not have a band, but my close friend records music and him and I would probably have to record a couple parts at a time, so a portastudio seems best. I think he has a very nice compressor, a lot of good microphones, but i don't think he has a reverb effect. Can you guys send me links to some gear i should be looking for? Like the mixers, effects, and cassette deck? I don't really know what to look for and I would really appreciate you guys getting me in the right direction. I live in Charlotte, NC by the way.

[The Ghost of FM]

Thanks for the great replies so far! I do not have a band, but my close friend records music and him and I would probably have to record a couple parts at a time, so a portastudio seems best. I think he has a very nice compressor, a lot of good microphones, but i don't think he has a reverb effect. Can you guys send me links to some gear i should be looking for? Like the mixers, effects, and cassette deck? I don't really know what to look for and I would really appreciate you guys getting me in the right direction. I live in Charlotte, NC by the way.

OK. So you're going to need a Portastudio, a reverb and a stereo cassette deck to mixdown to.

Let's start with the Portastudio. These come in 4 track and 8 track varieties and have the mixer built in So you won't need a separate mixer with a Portastudio. The 8 track ones will be rarer to find and cost you more money. I asked you earlier what your budget was for this project and you didn't answer that. So it's tough to make meaningful suggestions without knowing that. Also, about sending you links, no one is going to shop the Internet for you. We've already mentioned Craig's List and Ebay as being the most popular. Getting back to the Portastudios for a minute. The 4 track ones will allow you to record up to 3 parts before you have to mix that down to the 4th track where you can then add on 3 more parts. So if you have a very simple song of drums, bass, guitar and one vocal, a 4 track would work well for that. But if you're going to add keyboard, separate lead guitar parts and backing vocals, you're going to need to bounce tracks to fit all those parts in. And the more bounces you do, the worse the sound quality gets and the less chances you have to fix mistakes. So an 8 track model will be a lot easier and more flexible to work with but they will cost more on average. Decent 4 track models from TASCAM for the Portastudios would be the 244, 246 and 424 in the 4 track category. Models like the 488 and 688 are the 8 track models.

Reverbs. Companies like Alesis made some fairly inexpensive ones like the micro-verb and midi-verb series. These will offer a variety of simulated environments like halls, stadiums, smaller rooms, etc. Most of those can be found used for around $100. Companies like Roland and Yamaha also made these units and are a bit quieter, hiss wise and a bit more expensive. So if you have a larger budget to work with, look for those too. Models like the Yamaha REV-500 are true stereo units and are very clean and natural sounding.

Cassette decks. Names like TEAC, Nakamichi, Harmon Kardon, Denon, Aiwa and Sony all made some great sounding cassette decks and the 3 head models will offer up better specs then the 2 head models. Look for newer models with feather touch transport buttons and Dolby C or dbx noise reduction built in to keep the noise levels down. Older decks with mechanical "piano key" style transport buttons and only Dolby B will be cheaper usually but be more problematic.

Double cassette decks. Again, look for the same names and transport features but know that none of those will be of the 3 head variety. So the specs won't be as good as the 3 head single well decks. Prices can range wildly for this kind of stuff so be cautious of extremely low prices or sellers who claim they know nothing about the deck or say they have no way to test it or say that it worked fine the last time they used it 25 years ago. People are creative liars. Learn to be weary of them. Also, don't buy anything from a Craig's list ad where you can't go to the sellers house and get them to demonstrate that everything works before you hand over your money. People who want to meet you in a coffee shop or somewhere else where you can't test it are to be avoided. And that applies to any of the gear we're talking about here. Also, you have parents right? Get one of them who knows a bit about cassette decks to help you out. Maybe they know quite a bit about this stuff but you never talked to them about it. Old people know a lot of weird shit. Make use of their knowledge! And that goes equal with teachers, older cousins, aunts, uncles...even grandparents. You like Analog because its retro and cool, right? Well so is the act of talking to other humans face to face.

Cheers!

[dukedudez]

Wow! Thanks a lot for that information. I apologize for forgetting to put my budget down. It's around $300. You gave me a great list to start doing some searching with. I appreciate it a lot!

[The Ghost of FM]

Wow! Thanks a lot for that information. I apologize for forgetting to put my budget down. It's around $300. You gave me a great list to start doing some searching with. I appreciate it a lot!

No problem.

$300 ain't a whole lot to cover all those pieces of gear. So realistically, you'll have to allot about 150 to the Portastudio, 100 to the reverb and 50 to the cassette deck. Basically, that's going to limit you to a 4 track model of either the 244 or the 424. So you're going to have to learn about bouncing tracks if your song is going to have more then 4 parts to it or you might try playing the bed tracks of the song live with your friend where you have a mix of say a drum machine, bass and guitar mixed to feed to one track of tape and then have 3 tracks remaining to add vocals, solos and keyboard, (as an example), and that way, you wouldn't have to bounce any tracks and maintain better sound quality over all.

Also, if your realistic budget is 50 bucks for the cassette deck, you might have to give up on the idea of a single well, 3 head deck and opt for a lower end 2 head model or similar lower end double cassette deck, if you plan on making analog copies. If you fore-go the cassette deck all together and just use your computer to master the project, you could put that much more money toward a better Portastudio. But all of that depends on what's available in your area and how long you can wait for something decent to come onto the market in your price range. It's complicated, dealing with the used marketplace.

So start hunting around on Craig's list and post up the links to stuff you're considering and we can give you an idea as to how good or bad each one appears to be.

Happy hunting!

Cheers!

[dukedudez]

Alright, I've been doing some searching on craigslist and found some equipment. Let me know what you guys think!

Tascam Portastudio 424 - The price looks amazing, but he has no pictures or specifications. If I went to his house with my friend to check this out, what questions should I ask to make sure it works? I don't want to buy this and then get home and realize the thing is broken.

Tascam 202 MKII Casette Recorder - I think this is a double cassette recorder. And it's a great price. Is this a reputable piece of equipment?

Audio Processors - This guy is selling an Alesis Micro-Verb 4 for $65

Another quick question, what tapes do I buy for these and where can you buy them?

[A Reel Person]

I think if you kick all $300 toward a Tascam 488mkII, you get a fuller production with less hassle. Then you can skip the rest of the components and mixdown step, and bring the 488mkII to the classroom, plug the outputs into a boombox, and just present the mix directly off the Portastudio to the class, as is. Say, "I have all the individual tracks recorded onto this tiny little tape, and I mix it down, creating all the balance and stereo image with these faders and knobs on this wondrous little analog beauty called a Portastudio".

That's what I'd do, anyway. Then you have a much nicer and full featured analog Portastudio to go forward with, and you can get effects and mixdown units at a later date. I think it's more illustrative of the "analog"-ness of the process, and why do you care to mix it down anyway? Are you going to present the teacher and each student with a cassette copy? That, IMO, would be missing the point and rather useless.

Take the Portastudio into the class and do the mixdown live in front of them, while giving a brief explanation to your purposes and methods. At the end you can wrap up and say something along the lines of "digital recording and production is meant to mimic the basic ideas and methods used in the analog world onto a computer driven device",... not to get high and mighty about it but something like that to simplify the expression and give a little mini-lesson or tutorial on the subject.

That's how my mind works, anyway. That's what I recommend. IOW, if you bring the production unit (Portastudio) in and do a full demonstration, it's way better than saying "here's my song on tape we did it on analog", which to most people means ... nothing. Just make sure the 488mkII is in full working order and you're golden.