So... score at the end of the day. 9.5 hours. Drums for all 4 songs are laid down and sound good. Rhythm (is that really how that's spelled???) guitar for 2 songs was laid down before I had to leave. I'm not too confident on them finishing the rhythm parts without me in an hour, but maybe they did.
PC didn't stop recording once, and I didn't pick my nose all day (while I was there anyways).
So who knows how much we'll get done tomorrow. The guy running the PC was having a HELL of a time keeping track of new tracks. It was driving me insane. I wanted to keep butting in, but 3 cooks trying to cook a meal in front of hungry guests is not pretty. I had to assert myself a few times because of the stupid mistakes he was making. Seriously a comedy of errors. Wish you guys could have seen.
I really understand the comments someone made about controlling the room. People need direction and to be told what to do. It was interesting. Also interesting what people hear in their own performances. There was this part where the guitarist said he heard a problem. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't explain it to us, and no one else could hear it, even the guys in the band. After a couple minutes of back and forth I told them it sounded fine and we are moving on. Worked great. Taking control really helped things move along. I would love to actually be 'in control'. Someday.
Who messes with a setup that works right before a recording session?
What were they trying to do anyway?
Apparently the guys I'm working with do. :/ I can't say I was thrilled when I showed up and saw what had happened.
The computer had been dropping out during practices, giving an error something like: Hard drive not fast enough, stopping recording. So in the past few days they got an external firewire hard drive. I don't know if they did something wrong installing it... (not sure what you can do wrong with an external hard drive, thought you just plugged it in). Anyways, they had hooked it up yesterday and never actually tried pressing record with it plugged in. So I unplugged the thing and thought that would fix it. After I did that the DAW wouldn't even load. Yikes! The one guy took reigns of the computer only to turn on the wifi... guess he wanted to look something up. I've brought it up to him many times not too. He doesn't listen. So with the wifi on, Windows decided it was time to update.
30 minutes later it finally recorded. Not sure what was done, I'm positive they don't know what they did to fix it either. He said he just turned everything off and on a few times and voila. I bet that's how they did the moon missions too.
Sounds like a case of "Not ready for prime time"
Are you sure you weren't across the street watching. haha
Glad to see you guys are off to a good start.
That's one of the beauties of tracking to a tape deck...getting a cue mix ready and then simply hitting REC is much easiers, plus none of the latency issues, can make things more straightforward...of course, you then pay the price with limited track availability, and the RW/FW actions, since the tape deck doesn't have that instant recall capability of a DAW....
...but the tape rewinds give the drummer more time to waste.
Hey, where are you in the Big Bear area...?....any of the fires near you?
I can definitely appreciate the beauty of tape after today. I'm a computer guy (it's how I earn money sometimes) and so I've always dreaded my computer crapping out during a critical time, so I've always gone to lengths to make sure the thing works as best I can before that critical moment arrives. Not exactly the case today. Things ended up working... so that's good... but man was it painful to get there, especially with two people who have paid money are watching wondering what's going on.
And HOLY SHIT! The drummer really was a picky sob. Not about his own playing, but the guitarists. I wanted to slap him a couple times. He was funny though, so it redeemed him a little.
I might be too late with the advice...
The best thing you can do is make the band comfortable with the process. If you are able to get a great performance out of them, the only thing you have to do is stay out of the way and capture it. A half-assed recording of a great performance will work. A great recording of a half-assed performance will not.
We actually got some really good recordings of some pretty good performances. Pretty good might be selilng them short. They were better than any band I've ever been in as far as technical ability goes. The guys drum set was beautiful and sounded great. His pickiness (not a word spell check says) serves him well in the set up of his kit. The kick was awesome.
Maybe a chuckle because I have been there before. Many many years ago...Not so funny when you are older and have other stuff you could be doing.
Curious how it works out tho.
The takeaway from today revolves around time. After todays experience I can't Wait to get my own studio going. I'll have to because we are planning on moving twice in the next 2 years... but once settled it will be fun to set something up right. And when it's all setup right I will aim to get things done in good time. Man it KIlled me how many man hours were wasted today. The Lead guitarist and bassist didn't even need to be there today at all... yet spent the better part of 6 hours there. Just watching. The drummer and guitarist could have easily only been there 2 hours and got done what we did in 9. Blah...
My guess is that tomorrow will be eaten up by the rest of the tracking, so there will be no chance to flounder trying to mix in front of everyone. I'm planning on taking the files home with me and mixing it here, in my own time, without multiple people telling me another way of doing it. That was the hardest part of the day... listening to peoples ideas about stuff. Like 'hey what if we played that part like that?'.... 'but no, you were playing 2 flams there'... 'no I wasn't'... 'yes you were, play it back'... 'that's not 2 flams, it's an off timed roll'... 'but I thought when you did that...........
Shut the fuck up. It sounded good didn't it. "yes" Ok... moving on.
I think I will really enjoy this 'job', once I get to do it my way.
Thanks again for the tips and continued support.
Oh, last thing. We tried to start the day using click tracks. OMG... you wouldn't believe (actually I'm sure you all would) the hassle that was. Trying to get peoples headphones to get a good mix. It was literally painful. The drummer needed the click to be BEYOND loud, and the way the guys were running the headphones there were not separate mixes for people, so the guitarist had the same levels in his phones... which was so loud... well when he was wearing his headphones, it still sounded LOUD to me 8 feet away. Then someone bumped a volume pedal and someone else decided to adjust the gain know on the board instead of fix the volume pedal. So when the headphones were on again the guitar was crazy loud, and instead of turn that down, they thought it would be good to turn the drums up to compete.... so that when the guys played they both blew each others ear off. It was so stupid. Reminded me of the movie UHF, with the asian guy... if you've seen it you'd know what I mean.
And to answer you miroslav, I'm in Crestline, about 40 minutes west of Big Bear. I'm not sure where the fires are, but they aren't too close. My neighbor was talking about them the other day, but we don't smell anything here which is a good sign. It's finally getting cold up here. Had to turn the pilot light on the heater on.
Happy weekend fellas (and ladies if any read this).
Do ladies do sound? Never heard or seen one.
